Short Story Summary

REGRET Analysis

Synopsis:

There lived an old woman named Mamzelle Aurlie. She was 50 years old and had never been married before. She only had little friends, black people who works in her farm, cows, sheep, chicken, and her beloved dog Ponto. Mamzelle Aurlie, who looked very unfashionable, used to watch her neighbor’s children played music in a band. The name of the band was Arms Akimbo which personnel were the children of Odile.

One day, Odile knocked on Mamzelle’s house door, while bringing her children with her. When Mamzelle opened the door, Odile begged Mamzelle to take care of her children for a couple of days because she had planned to look in her mother in another town, which was very far. Mamzelle was pity with Odile so she just agreed to do so, although she had never taken care of children before. Odile was happy and she immediately went to the airport with Valsin her maid.

Mamzelle struggled really hard to take care of the children because she was used to take care of animals. For the first couple of days, Mamzelle kept complaining about the children behavior to her cook, Valsin, because she thought that the children are really different with the animals she have. She found out that she has to put extra care to the children. But after three days mamzelle had taken care of the children, she started to feel enjoy with the children. Mamzelle started to like the children and play with them happily.

The next week, Odile came back from looking in her mother and took back her children from Mamzelle’s house. It was a really sad moment for Mamzelle because she had already liked the children very much. From that day, Mamzelle regret not to have children in her live or a husband.

Analysis

Theme: Regret 

This short story is telling about Mamzelle's regret because she had never thought of being married before Odile asked her to take care of his children.

Plot: 

At the first paragraph, the writer tells a story about Mamzelle's young life, her clothes, and friends. Although the first paragraph tells about the young life of Mamzelle, the second paragraph tells the story about the first day Odile asked Mamzelle to take care of her children. The story continues until the end, the day Odile take back her children. Therefore, I could say that the type of the plot is Forward.

Characters:

• ·         Mamzelle Aurélie
• ·         Ponto, Aurélie's dog
• ·         Odile, Aurélie's neighbor
• ·         Elodie, Odile's youngest daughter
• ·         Ti Nomme, (petit homme--French for little fellow), Odile's son
• ·         Marcéline, Odile's daughter
• ·         Marcélette, Odile's daughter
• ·         Valsin, working for Odile
• ·         Aunt Ruby, Aurélie's cook

Settings/Background:

                Place: The story took place in Mamzelle’s house.

                Atmosphere: Funny but full of Regret just like the title of the story says

                Time: Not Mentioned

Morale Value:

                The morale value that I get after reading this story is that we should do things as much as we can as long as it is still positive because we don’t want to regret the things that we didn’t do.