"How I Met My Husband" by Alice Munro, read by Amy Ryan/"The Meeting" by Aimee Bender, read by Paul Hecht
Does the story/selection appeal to you? Why or why not?
What does the reader to do bring the story to life, create a vivid voice? How would you rate the telling of the story? What in particular did you like or dislike?
"How I Met My Husband"
ReplyDelete1) The story was fairly interesting. I liked the narration style; the first-person inner monologue, as she looks back on this event from her past, allows the listener to really get a sense of her thoughts. The story also establishes her background later on in the story, which is a nice way to organize things.
In general, characters were introduced well, as was the setting (though neither were done very subtly).
As far as writing style is concerned, there were definitely moments of very lucid description that lent themselves well to being read aloud (e.g. the description of the scene where she looks through the screen door at the pilot).
The subject of the story was very interesting, as it addressed not just "young love," but also difficult subjects such as financial classes, and the disparity between certain strata of society.
2) In general, I found the narrator's tone to be very flat. However, she did attempt to modify her voice slightly for different characters, which led to some variance in her speaking style. While her pace was fairly monotonous at first, as the story continued this improved quite dramatically.
"The Meeting"
1) This story was very different in style from the previous one. The heavy use of repetition, though slightly awkward at first, worked well when read aloud. I liked the theme of one's expectations being stumped, and adapting those expectations to fit the world around you rather than stubbornly clinging to them. Overall, the entire piece felt like a fable or allegorical story, which I think worked well for the purpose of being read aloud.
2) The tone and pace were both very steady (almost sedimentary). While this removed some vitality from the presentation, it fit well with the author's style of writing.