The two authors show feelings of betrayal by using particular language and metaphors. Sylvia Plath uses the term, “strange joy flickering in their eyes”, to describe the look the children gave the narrator when they all turned against her. When David Sterling answered the door to tell the narrator’s mother about the Snowsuit being ruined, she shows the betrayal as she says, “There was a cold draught from the open doorway”. This describes what she thought he was doing to her, and what sort of a person he is. In “Chemistry” the writer uses the metaphor of the sinking boat to symbolise the death of the boys’ father, and the invisible line across the water, symbolising life and death. The boat also symbolises Ralph intruding and ruining their happy lives. Ralph befriended the boys’ mother and took her away from both himself and his grandfather. His mother also betrayed him and Grandfather because she brought Ralph into their lives. She sided with Ralph in all arguments between Ralph and Grandfather, so she was betraying her own father. Grandfather betrayed her in the end by killing himself, he described it as, “death is a deceptive business”, meaning when you die you are not really gone because others remember you. The narrator did not betray anyone in “Chemistry” but he was being betrayed by his mother for bringing Ralph into their lives and for upsetting Grandfather. The narrator was going to throw acid on Ralph but because of Grandfathers death, he did not.
Although both stories were told from the narrators’ point of view, by children, one narrator was a boy and one was a girl. This makes the stories different as the boys’ point of view is much more factual, with less opinion and emotion shown in the story, even though in real life this must not be so. The narrator scarcely says anything about anyone’s feeling, and when he does he tells it by showing exactly what happened by using examples of speech, “Why don’t you leave her alone?!” It is also often shown by explaining people’s actions; “his face went tight and his hands clenched on his knife and fork”. He never explains exactly how he thinks people feel by saying so, which means to understand the story the reader must read between the lines. “Superman and Paula Browns New Snowsuit” is a much more straight forward story to read and understand. She explains what she feels about everything by the language she uses, “I marvelled at the moving beacons on the runway”. She is more in touch with what other people around her are thinking; “nobody on our block really liked her because she was bossy and stuck up”. The narrator in “Chemistry” knew perhaps of people’s actions and could predict very well what they would do, but does not seem as in touch with people’s emotions as the narrator in “Superman and Paula Browns New Snowsuit” because he does not talk as much about people. In “Chemistry” the narrator talks about a lot about things, such as the boat and the chemicals. He spends a lot of time describing the sinking of the boat. He also seems to describe the whole story as if he was a scientist observing his own world, commenting in an informative way, but doesn’t at first appear to have his own opinion. On looking closer, however, he does not like Ralph and may be bias in the story towards him as he makes Ralph seem a bad character as soon as we meet him because of the first thing he does; ‘shouted across the table to Grandfather, “Why don’t you leave her alone?!’”
Both of the stories are written about past events in childhood. “Superman and Paula Browns New Snowsuit” seems strongly related to betrayal, as that is what happens to the main character in the story. In “Chemistry”, the story is not so much about betrayal, more so about change. This could be the changes in relationships, materialistic things, and people’s circumstances. The theme of betrayal is not so obvious also because there are so many different emotions connected with the story, depression, sadness, jealousy, which are the results of the betrayal, and so betrayal becomes much harder to see. It is very much about death and family but it does not seem to start or finish with a happy ending. In “Superman and Paula Browns New Snowsuit”, the story starts with the narrator being in a perfect, protected and contented world. She seemed once to be happy and then the end contrasts as she “wakes up” and sees life in a different way. At the end of the story her fantasy world seemed to be lost, as she realises that her Uncle Frank and Superman cannot rescue her. In “Chemistry” this is not so, as the narrator sees the invisible line at the beginning and at the end, but it is only at the end that we realise what the line means, it is the line of life and death which connects Grandfather to the narrator and his mother.
I think that the feelings of betrayal in “Chemistry” are less obvious to the reader than they are in “Superman and Paula Browns New Snowsuit”. They are very contrasting stories, by the way in which they are written, Chemistry is much more factual whereas the other is more opinionated and uses much more metaphors and similes. The style of “Chemistry” is such that it always seems to keep to the point, and when there are sometimes long descriptions about things which do not seem t first important, there always seems to be a hidden meaning behind them, for example the door to the shed which symbolised a “step out” or half way out of life for Grandfather. In “Superman and Paula Browns New Snowsuit” there are a lot of things which do not have much significance to the story, and which add more detail to just set the scene; “he taught me some ju-jitsu in the living room until mother called us for supper”. They have some similarities, they are both about relationships between family, and about their childhoods. They are also about changes in their lives and in the way they look at life.
