Marius Bøwadt Jensen Analytical Essay Silkeborg Gymnasium

Analysis of the short story “I Don’t Dream of Genie”

“Love is the strongest force the world possesses and yet it is the humblest imaginable.” This is
quote by Mahatma Gandhi, which illustrates the power of love. Love can make you feel both
wonderful and the complete opposite. The short story “I Don’t Dream of Genie” published in
2016 and written by Chad Pelley deals with love and its consequences through the character
Sherry.

The main character of the story is the thirty-three-year-old woman Sherry. In the start of the
text, we are quickly presented to Sherry’s desperation. She talks about her fatiguing job as
Santa Claus that leaves bruises on her thigh and a ringing in her ear. She does not like the job
but it is necessary because she wants to participate in a lucid dreaming seminar. She wants to
control her dreams. “I wanted to Spielberg the shit out of my dream world.” (p. 2 ll. 59-60)
The reason why can be seen in this quote: “Mainly though, I wanted to crawl under my sheets
at night, and I wanted to dream of Gene again.” (p. 2 l. 62). Gene is her ex-boyfriend, and the
quote indicates that she suffers from lovesickness, because she wants to dream back to when
they were together. The lovesickness can also be seen other places in the text, where her sis-
ter for example tells her to move on. Sherry’s desperation can for that reason be tracked down
to lovesickness. The desperation causes Sherry to be both naive and impulsive. The impulsive-
ness is shown, because she instead of reading a “Bestselling” book about lucid dreaming buys
a package in the Google Ads side-bar under the search lucid dreaming. She is naive because
she believes that the seminar can be lifechanging. Furthermore, Sherry is very judgemental,
and it can be seen because the first impression of people she interacts with often is negatively
described. “The second guy doing the interview had a gargantuan Adams’s apple. It was more
like an Adam’s grapefruit.” (p.1 ll. 25-26) The way she describes his Adam’s apple contains
negative connotations, because no one really want a large Adam’s apple. This judgement of
people supports the fact that she is not very well, and she must put down people to feel better
about herself. All this judgement find place in her mind and can not be seen from the outside.
Sherry seems well functioning on the outside, which is shown in her characterization of her-
self. “In the right dress, I turn a few heads.” (p. 1 l. 10) The quote shows that she has a bit of

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Marius Bøwadt Jensen Analytical Essay Silkeborg Gymnasium

self-confidence, even though the children from her workplace believe that she is a fat old man.
She is confident, because she can admit that she is able to turn a few heads, but the confidence
can also be seen in her language
In addition, her language is humoristic, which especially is seen in her use of simile. “What
they do, the kids, is they knife their bony behinds into my thighs, like their asses are old-lady
hands kneading bread.” (p. 1 ll. 11-12) The reason why this simile is humoristic is because she
compares the children’s bony bottoms with old-lady hands kneading bread. It is an odd com-
parison, and it is not the only one. She also shows some self-irony, “But pull a white beard
over my delicate cheekbones, and I’m a dead ringer for the fat man?” To be able to make fun of
yourself shows a humoristic sense. Sherry’s humor appears in the style as well. There is for
example used a rhetorical question “But c’mon, how the fuck are you supposed to do that?” (p.
3 l. 95) This rhetorical question is marked by slang- and swearwords, which gives the quote
an unserious and ironic feeling. It suggests that Sherry might be a bit superficial because she
is unserious and must criticize the exercise and not herself. The rhetorical question can, if you
investigate the questions context, also be compounded to the fact that Sherry is impatient and
desperate, because she wants to master the skill of controlling her dreams as quickly as possi-
ble. With that being said, the style characterizes Sherry. The lines 90-98 are marked by
parataxis and symbolizes sherry’s flow of thoughts. A flow of inconsequential thoughts. “But
that Christopher Reeve. What a handsome man in his day.” (p. 3 l. 93) This unimportant
thought supports the fact that Sherry is superficial. The way that Sherry almost seems happy
trough her language points out that she probably has created a deceitful façade to hide her
true inner conflicts.
To amplify the point, Sherry undergoes a development through the text, and it is clear when
we look at the structure. There is a very structured change between the different stories that
Sherry takes the reader through. First, we hear about the awful job as Santa Claus, then she
changes to talking about her experience with the lucid dreaming seminar, and at last she talks
about the breakup with Gene. This storyline is chronological, which can be put in perspective
to Sherry’s psychological development. In the first part of the story, she seems a bit frustrated
but quite happy as well, which, as mentioned, probably is a façade. When she then talks about
the seminar, frustration and desperation starts to be evident. At last, she realizes, “I have no
one to pull my pants down for.” (p. 3 l. 116) and she confronts the past. Through the text we

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Marius Bøwadt Jensen Analytical Essay Silkeborg Gymnasium

are therefore being brought longer into her head, and it is in the last part we clearly under-
stand why she has been so desperate and frustrated.

The writer of the text has saved the most important thing for the last part of the story. It is a
smart trick to involve the readers and make them read the whole story. The main theme of the
story is that awful lovesickness that many of us are going to feel. We meet Sherry that does
not confront this feeling but hides it instead through a façade. This can be put in perspective
to the escapism, which is an attempt to forget or escape problems from the everyday life. A
clear message from the story is therefore that it is better to confront difficult situations than
hiding them, because it leads to superficiality and an unhappy life situation.

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