Essay Questions

Outline the main deductions from “Telephone Call” regarding the narrator’s emotional status.

The narrator explains, “And here I am sitting for hours alone in my flat, knowing there is no one to ring, that there is no question of pleading or submitting to any terms, for there is no way of communicating from the grave…And yet I don't really ask for a miracle, nothing as tangible as that, just the very smallest signs that he is there beyond the grave waiting for me." The narrator's assertions confirm that she is widowed and longs for death so that she can reunite with her departed companion. She yearns for signs that would help her calm, and bid her assurance that her husband is watching over her. Moreover, she is absolutely devastated by her bereavement.

Why is the narrator dissatisfied with life? (Respond using Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs) - “Thursday Lunch”

The narrator explains, “I had thought how sad it was that one could approach the end of life and find that for all the people who were around him there was not in fact anyone to whom one could go in a time of crisis and unburden oneself; that instead of building up relationships with an increasing number of friends as time went by, we find ourselves collecting around us a small number of acquaintances, some of whom we positively dislike, and at the same time make barriers between ourselves and those nearest to us.” Manifestly the narrator is lonesome and she is deficient of companionship and unconditional love. She cannot rely on her family members and friends to lend her a listening ear and to support her unconditionally. In the context of the Hierarchy of Needs, she lacks the needs of ‘love and belonging.’ Her family and friends have not yet fulfilled these needs although she is fifty. The feeling of emptiness elicits her crying and desolation.