By Kayode Matthew, Dominica State college English and Biology Major.
LA CLÉ (THE KEY) is a short story published by Miss Leandra Landa in 2015. It is about a family comprising of two twin that are experiencing nightmares and are unable to unravel the mystery behind them. The title itself can be interpreted in many ways, the key could be referring to the door which remains closed for a reason known to only the Grandmother. On the other hand it could be the key unlocks the mystery of the strange noises which are heard by the girls at night .
Many literary devises are used to make the story flow and develop, Personification for example “our eye lids fought a losing battle” and the sun obeyed and proceeded to rise majestically” are wonderful examples to young writers wanting better understand how words are important to develop the mood of a story. We can see the twins and their Grandmother are not very wealthy as they have little furniture and have to carry water methodically however they are still happy and pride their selves In enjoying the little things
The strange noises seem to arrive around their birthdays and the writer uses suspense and foreshadowing to show that that day has significant meaning as a result; “We were having the same nightmare for the third time this week. Always this week, for the last nine years…” This line indicates that at their birthday something happened that is causing them to be haunted. ”She was a little older than our friends’ mothers” this is another example of the brilliant foreshadowing expressed I this piece as it points out that something about ma being their actual mother doesn’t add.
The short story provides a great air of mystery and leads much to be understood and analyzed to fully grasp the depth of it clearly. The reason why Ma never forced them to visit the grave on old souls day was because she didn’t want the twins to know the truth about who she was really visiting, their mother.
LA CLÉ (THE KEY) is a wonderful example for readers of the proper way to mask the meaning of the story and add a little mystery in your writing. The events of the story flow and add up in the end after truly understanding the information given. At the end it is realized that the reason they are haunted around their birthday is because their biological mother actually died giving birth to them and is not at ease in the afterlife. The man with the scar turns out to be their biological father who in disgrace of leaving his mistress and twins returns in the end only to the news that only his daughters remain
Miss Lander does a wonderful Job at portraying to the emotions of the reader and really feel the pain that the twins are going through as you feel in the story experiencing the emotions first hand. Her Many Literary devices and breaking down of the creole words in the story allow swift reading and understanding and is to be commended.
Cut the guy slack, I swear most of ya’ll just jumped to the comments without reading the thing and reiterated
what the first comment said ,but instead of just saying it politely like the first did you decided to be dicks about. Let him do his do,one mistake in a critique does that make him a ridiculous English Major ,at least the dude is brave enough to set his work out there to be hung out in front of people showing that he isn’t afraid of anyone sending commentary in a distasteful way. Stop being thinking of destructive Criticism and stop trying to disrespect people who are trying to learn ,so they make mistakes or whatever correct them and don’t be one of those people….Dominica has enough of those.
The young person made an error which many others have done before but instead we try to encourage him/her to keep on the positive work , we simply do what we know best to Ridicule them so we can look Intelligent ……. It’s OK to be a Critic but don’t Criticise.
“Two twins” are FOUR people.
Ok I couldn’t take this review seriously….from the time I saw the author of this article wrote “two twins”…that was it for me.
And you’re an English Major you said? wow.
And you guys can dislike my comment all you like. No skin off my nose.
Great piece. One correction; twins means two so it is redundant to say two twins.