Here it is, my essay about An Occurence At Owl Creek Bridge. This essay was made for Introduction to Prose's Final Examination. It's my very first time making an essay so.. yeah, this is probably not so good and sorry if there are so many flaws in my writing, but hope you like it :) and I suggest you to read the short story first before you read this essay. Just simply click here if you want to read the story ^^
MIND CONTROL IN PARTICULAR SITUATION
Sometimes, when we were sleeping and then dreaming, we found that we could control our own dreams. I have experienced it by myself. And this is what was happened to the main character in this story. Although he is not sleeping or dreaming, the situation is similar.
I choose An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge by Ambrose Bierce. This story is originally published in 1890 but then it appeared in “Tales of Soldiers and Civilians”, which is published a year later. The experience inspired him so much to write about short stories based on Civil War and some say An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge is the most popular short story written by him.
The story went with irregular time sequence. It starts from the middle of the story then goes back to the beginning and then continue chronologically to the end of the story. The story also has a twist ending which is ended with an unexpected conclusion. Set with Peyton Farquhar as a main character, he is a confederate sympathizer from south, he is also a slave owner, and punished to death by hanging at Owl Creek Bridge because of his Nationalism to protect his land from northern. The story set in Alabama when the Civil War between the southern and the northern occurred. I won’t talk too much about Civil War here, but I’ll try to explain about the fantasy occurs in Peyton’s mind when he almost died and also a bit explaination about the point of view of the story and the setting of the story.
First, I’ll try to explain about the point of view. On the first part, we can see that the author used third-person-limited point of view. The narrator of the story couldn’t enter the mind of any character. We know about what was happened there by narrator’s explaination without knowing the character’s mind. But started at paragraph fifth, it changes into third-person-omniscient to Peyton’s mind. The narrator enters Peyton’s mind and tells us all of his thoughts. The narrator tells us that Peyton hears the ticking of his watch like the stroke of blacksmith’s hammer upon the anvil. And the sounds of his watch hurt his ear like the thrust of a knife (line 4 & 10, paragraph 5).And he said that it sounds like a death knell to him. Yeah,the death knell for his own death, which would come in seconds.
Cummings gives his opinion, the reason why Bierce couldn’t have used first-person point of view is because Peyton dies at the end of the story. Obviously, dead men can tell no tales. And if a union soldier had told the tale in the first person “I”, he couldn’t enter Farquhar’s mind. He could only report what he saw or heard. And if Farquhar had revealed his thoughts to a first-person narrator, the pace, suspense and immediacy of the action would have been lost.
Now we’ll move to the setting of the story. The setting of the story was taken when the Civil War occurred. American Civil War (1861-1865) was a war that occurs between states in North America who call themselves as Union and groups of states in South America who call themselves as Confederacy. War occurred because the eleven southern states had detached themselves from the federal states under Lincoln’s leadership, whereas the northern were loyal to the federal states. The main problem that caused disunity is the abolition of slavery which was approved by the northern states and fiercely opposed by the southern states (James Danandjadja, 2003:6, translated)
Setting of place mainly set at the bridge, which runs from north to south over Owl Creek, the place of Peyton’s execution. And mostly take in his mind, which actually didn’t even occur in the real situation.
Setting of time was taken in the moring. We can see it from narrator’s description.
“The water, touched to gold by the early sun..” (page 2)
It means the water reflecting the sunlight so it looks glittering.
Now let’s move to setting of situation. At the first paragraph, the situation was very quiet, no one speaks. All people keep their silence. No one stares to the other one. And no one moves. It is explained by the author at the second paragraph of part one.
“The company faced the bridge, staring stonily, motionless. The sentinels, facing the banks of the streem might have been statues to adorn the bridge. The captain stood with folded arms, silent, observing the work of his subordinates. But making no sign. In the code of military etiquette silence and fixity are forms of deference” (page 1)
And the silence makes Peyton felt more intimidated. He can hear nothing unless the ticking of his watch, which heard as a death knell to him. And it makes him frustated because he couldn’t release his hand to escape from that situation. He already known that as the captain nodded his head, he will be died.
In that silence situation, he couldn’t think clearly anymore, his mind was filled with thoughts of his wife and his child. Then he starts to imagine. His fantasy is interesting for me. That’s why I choose it as the main topic of my essay, the fantasy which occurs in Peyton’s mind when he almost died.
We know that actually Peyton wasn’t even escaped. His neck was broke as he fell from the bridge. But we can see from paragraph sixth in the part two, just before the moment when the sergeant stepped aside and he fell down, he thought to himself to escape from that situation.
“He unclosed his eyes and saw again the water below him. “If I could free my hands,” he thought “I might throw off the noose and spring into he stream. By diving I could evade the bullets, and swimming vigorously, reach the bank, take to the woods and get away home..” (page 2)
He wished he could release himself and then run away. And on the third part, which is actually occurred in his mind, after he fell downward through the bridge and lose his conciousness for a while, he was concious of the sharp pain in his neck, then he felt that the rope was broken so he fell into the stream. And the subsequent events were exactly the same as what’s been on his mind before. Just as said by Haffner, which is quoted in Freud’s “Tafsir mimpi”
“Dream continue the conciousness. Our dreams always relating itself with certain thoughts which is came up in our conciousness before..” (translated)
In this case, Peyton lose his conciousness as he fell from the bridge. He made a fantasy in his mind, he imagined he could release his hands and he was sinking into the stream. He felt like he has a superhuman strenght. He saw the northern army as a gigantic. He could avoid all the shots against him. He was swimming with the rapidity of lightning, which is impossible for human. And at the end of his escape, he found diamonds, rubies, and emeralds when digging the sand, which is actually impossible to find in the forest.
“we often dream about things that are close to our desire.” (I.G.E. Maas, 1805, translated)
Peyton has a desire to escape, so his fantasy is about how to escape from the northern army and find a way back to home. And those events in the third part were strange. No human can compare his rapidity to the rapidity of lightning but Peyton did. And no human can be as big as a gigantic but in Peyton’s sight, the northern army were. It was explained by Freud in his book.
“Pecularities in dream might be explained by the limitation of psychic activity during sleep” (Freud:60, translated)
Freud argues that without the psychic value, dreamers will drift in their mind and rely on their own recources. It was happened to Peyton when he lose his consciousness. His active senses were stopped when he lose his consciousness, so his mind takes control of his psychic activity.
“Seolah-olah aktivitas psiologis dari otak seorang waras dipindahkan ke otak seorang gila” (Fechner:552)
The other strange of the third part was occurred when suddenly he sees another scene.
“...he had fallen asleep while walking, for now he sees another scene—perhaps he has merely recovered from a delirium..” (page 5)
He felt like he just did sleep walking and suddenly he was already in the way to his home. And the situation was bright with the beautiful sunshine. Radestock argues about this thing, which is also quoted in Freud’s “Tafsir Mimpi”
“Dream turns everything into confusion that changed rapidly” (translated)
A moment before, he was at the unknown place but suddenly the scene changes into the place that very familiar in his eyes, he finally found his way to home. It seems that his mind leads him to the place that he really wants to go. He really wants to meet his wife, so his minds leads him to his home. And at the moment when he was about to hug his wife, a blinding white light blazez all about him with a sound like the shock of canon—then all is darkness and silence (paragraph 20, part three). The darkness means he died already.
From these reasons,we can be sure now that actually the third part of the story is only occurred in Peyton’s mind, not in the real situation. And now we know that urgent situations, epecially for someone who is dying, can lead us to the fantasy and we can control it by our own mind. This is how we protect ourselves from the pain that we might feel. Freud quoted Strumpell’s words in his book.
“Pengasingan jiwa yang hampir sempurna dan tanpa membebani, dari muatan dan perjalanan normal alam sadar..” (Natur und Entstehung der Traume:19)
Although fantasy gives us nothing in the end, but at least we can free our minds for a moment from uncomfortable feelings that we feel.
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