One of the funniest parts from the story follows, as Lee describes how he felt about sex, using lots of tricky similies and using the comparison between sex and a ‘game of cricket’. ‘After years of lazily inspecting the pitch, came when I was suddenly called to play’. This shows that Lee had been concious of sex for a long time, but his burst for it had only just emerged as he was ‘called to play’. He then writes- ‘There had of course, been early practice at the nets, some of it solitary..”. I found this particular extraction from the story very humourous, as Lee is using such phallic symbols as these, which is paving the way for the reader to imagine what he’s actually getting it, so therefore it would apply to everybody’s sense of humour. Then he writes, ‘…..the occasion arrived when I actually stood at the crease, bat in hand, ready to strip the willow’. I also found this particular part very amusing, as mentioned before, I can imagine what he’s getting at here. It’s a clever use of a set of phallic symbols which serve to take place of any crude language and also help to add an element of jocularity to it.
Lee then goes on to talk about when he first met Ellie. He describes her as a ‘whole live girl’. This is funny as it’s shows Lee’s immaturity at the time, and that he has never before been ‘confronted’ by one. Lee then reaches a humourous anti-climax as he builds up towards the idea of Ellie actually liking him. ‘I also thought of Rudolph.’ Lee ends the paragraph on this note, which I find amusing as it almost ‘out of the blue’ and surprising how he thinks about another boy when with this girl.
As Lee engages speech with Ellie, we begin to relate to them and we begin to notice the relevance that the story actually has to today, and the situation young boys of that age are sought after. Ellie asks, ‘Seen any snakes?’, but Lee just ignores her and strides past. This is a good relation to boys and girls today, as such mind games between people who are fond of each other are very much in force today as they were in Lee’s time. This is comical, as the reader understands how it actually is for Lee, and the reader has probably been through the same situation themselves, therefore can relate to it well.
Informality of speech is shown again, as the door is laid open for debate over Lee’s choice of words and phrases. ‘My hands sunk deep into her open armpits…’.
I find the next part particularly funny, as it’s rather pathetic. Ellie claims ‘Oh – I’m falling,’ as she grabs onto Lee. He then describes it as he ‘sank into a smell of doughnuts’. Another amusing extract is where Lee describes how he has never touched such a grown-up girl, ‘the others had only been children’. This is funny as we can see how Lee thinks, and how he feels towards this girl. The fact that he is admitting such things like that is very amusing too.
Ellie then goes onto produce a bag of ‘crusty doughnuts’ for them both to endulge in. I think this is funny, as I can see a comparison between a romantic moonlit dinner, and this- sitting in a field sharing doughnuts. However, to Lee this would have been better than any moonlit dinner.
Lee then uses the term ‘eating each other’ mid-sentence as he talks about some of the things that him and Ellie would be up to. This can be translated either as just kissing, or by some people as a rather rude affair- either way, the choice of such phrases that Lee uses like this, help to enlighten this short story, and make it very entertaining.
Ellie then meets with Lee, to explain that her parents had gone away for a week. She suggestively pulls out a key from the neck of her dress. The point she is trying to make is a humourous one, which Lee then illustrates; ‘She’d be all by herself, just her and the cat.’ He then ends with a funny rhetorical question, ‘So I’d best not go near her, had I?’.
Lee describes how he then felt while in decision about going over to Ellie’s house. ‘I felt amost noble, like being called to war.’ He also writes ‘I was older now, I thought I’d better not act like a savage’. This is entertaining as we can see the truth within the circumstances. Also once again, it’s his admittance of these facts which is rather funny too.
Lee then begins to become sensual, and romantically describes the setting that he finds Ellie. Also, the way that he had made himself available to her by climbing the gutter, is almost like a fairy-tale. He enters the room. Lee uses such similies as ‘her night dress like drifts of ice’ and ‘bare sleeping arms like shining rivers’. From this description we can see how Lee is feeling, which is why it is all the more funnier when we find out what Ellie is about to say… ‘Oh, no!….Not you again, really! Rudolph you bad, bad boy…’
The Opposite Sex, is what I would mark as melodramatic, yet Lee has turned this around so it has been melodramatic, yet not depressing, but very entertaining. The plot is very amusing, especially as it leads upto the end, and reaches another anticlimax. Ellie’s statement at the end, and the uncovering that Rudolph had been there before Lee, leaves the readers on edge wondering what would have happened next. Overall the Opposite Sex is a very entertaining and humourous read, and I had found myself laughing out loud throughout while reading until completion of the story.