Fiction Packet 3- Peter Markus

The work I would like to talk about is from Peter Markus's "The Singing Fish."  There are three short stories that are all related that use a very simple style of text.  There is a lot of repetition of words in each of the three stories.  I think the theme here is to use words to compare to tangible things to make them feel tangible for a visual effect.  In the second story at the very end, he is talking about pictures drawn on the side of a cave but he is calling them words.  He says, "Our hands, us brothers, we keep looking with our hands, and we do not stop looking until the words themselves- mud and fish, moon and river, brother and girl- they become bones."  They way that actual objects are compared to words seem to be portraying that these objects are created with the use of words and the way they are put together.  The moon and river and brothers and girl are created from the words of Peter Markus and I believe that they way he writes is trying to point out to the reader that you can create anything with your words.  They may look like simple text on a piece of paper, but the way you utilize them can paint of picture of meaning by the way you use them together.

Another thing I would like to point out is that in his first story, "When it Rains it Rains a River," I liked how he used the phrase, "We like to make mud, in the rain, out of the dirt."  Although this is a very simple sentence, it causes the reader to visualize these brothers running in the rain and tearing up the dirt.  The writer is using his words in a way that causes implications of what is going on which provides imagery for the reader.  Simple, yet effective.