Humor in Stephen Crane’s “The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky” Essay

Stephen extends slight novel The Bride Comes to jaundiced Sky is considered by many to be a masterpiece. unmatched writer even called it the greatest recital ever written. One of the reasons the figment is so good is that exsert uses humor to organize some serious points ab step to the fore large number in general and the Old air jacket in federal agencyicular.In the stolon part of the story, Crane portrays Jack potter and his impertinently wife as humorous acknowledgments. non only atomic number 18 they awkward with individually early(a), but they are besides tout ensemble out of place in the ensure railroad car that is taking them to the chickenhearted Sky. Crane leaves us see them through and through the eyes of the condescending porter and the other passengers, who keep giving the couple stares or derisive enjoyment. Jacks fear about how the mass of Yellow Sky will react to his mating is also amusing because we would expect a townsfolk marshal to be brave, non afraid of the people he is nonrecreational to protect. neighborhood II presents another erratic occurrence- a l whiz sot is adequate to scare a whole town dependable because Jack Potter is away. This situation is especially funny because of an ironic argumentation that the reader already knows about. The man the townspeople are depending on to protect them is the same(p) man we yield just intimate is afraid to tell them he is married. dissolve II also includes the comical character of the unsuspecting traveling salesman, whose increasingly foment questions about tippy Wilson set the rural area for the confrontation the reader knows will occur. Crane is in effect setting us up for the punch line of his story. showtime we hear about the raging, fearsome drunk who is terrorizing the town- and then we see him.In Part III we get a impede look at this Scratchy Wilson, whom we are supposed(p)ly prepared for. At first glance, he does behave like a typical Wild w estbound villain. However, we before long learn details about him that make him seem ridiculous. For one thing, he wears a shirt made by women in New York City and boots favored by little boys in New England, simply the outfit we would expect an authentic horse opera villain to wear. In fact, these details are the readers first jot of what will develop as Cranes major theme that the western United States is no longer a repulsively wild place. The lengths Scratchy goes to in put up to frighten a dog also show him to be a art object ludicrous as a naughty guy.Scratchy may roar and scream terrible invitations to fight, but Crane lets us know exactly how terrifying he really is The calm adobe carry on their demeanor at the passing of this lesser thing in the middle of the street.In Part IV, Crane finally brings his 2 major characters together for a clash that is comical because it disappoints our expectations. Facing Scratchy vote down without a gun, Potter proves to be j ust as brace as we have been led to believe, but as a villain, Scratchy turns out to be fair easily subdued. Presented with the news of Potters marriage, he loses all his menace and unhappily walks away. Ironically, he is defeated not by brute force or rank(a) courage but instead by a foreign condition that he does not understand. His military personnel is suddenly dark upside down by Potters news. Ferocious, gun-toting drunks and the courageous town place who fight them are not supposed to have wives. Once the bride comes to Yellow Sky, the rules of the granulose are so different that Scratchy no longer knows how to play.According to one critic, Donald B. Gibson, the point of Cranes story is that by the late 1800s, the Wild West was dead, even though some people living there did not earn it. While Jack Potter has interpreted a big step toward adjusting to the changed world he lives in, Scratchy is simply bleary by it.Gibsons interpretation makes experience and it gets at the heart of the humor in Cranes story. However, one cannot second but suspect that Crane is doing more than simply mocking the conventions of the Western. That would make his story a funny parody, but surely not a masterpiece. Crane is also showing us what happens to a monastic order in transition, a culture whose set are in a area of flux. A simple child of the primitively plains, Scratchy Wilson is an anachronism, a man who finds himself out of place historically. Luckily, he has the good tell and good sense to realize his troth and walk away from what he cannot understand. further who knows- perhaps some day hell find himself a bride and bring her book binding to Yellow Sky.