“W I Have Been Doing Lately” Essay
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“W I Have Been Doing Lately” Essay
The short story “What I Have Been Doing Lately” by Jamaica Kincaid, is told from within the dream of a young girl. She encounters many conflicts throughout her dream stemming from personal problems. The story is written in a circular structure that continues without resolution since her troubles are never resolved. The story makes use of small, choppy sentences which help the reader follow the quick, fast-paced actions happening during the dream. The non-traditional circular structure helps show the adolescent girls ongoing problems within herself which are in no way resolved.
The young girl’s internal conflicts are encountered mainly near the end of the story. The reader never quite knows what exactly she struggles with, which helps add to the mystery of the story. At the end of the story she laments, “I felt so sad I couldn’t imagine feeling any other way. I said, I don’t like this. I don’t want to do this anymore.” The reader sees that the girl’s problems are never-ending. Every time the doorbell rings her inner problems reappear. Not only is she struggling with interior problems but she faces many external problems within her dreams. At the beginning of the story she complains “I wanted to get across it but I couldn’t swim”. Another outer conflict is in her second dream. The girl and the monkey start throwing stones at each other, resulting in her explaining that “the stone struck me on my forehead over my right eye, making a deep gash.” The external and internal conflicts culminate to drive the narrative forward, keeping the reader interested and reading more.
The structure of the story is unlike many typical stories. Kincaid uses a circular structure which begins and ends at the same place, with the narrator in bed, just before the doorbell rings. The plot covers the same material twice, first when the recounted events apparently happen to the narrator, and then when she answers the woman who asks her what it is she has been doing lately. The circular...
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