Duangpond K. 5511047 section : 476

The hand

"The hand" is written by Sidaoruang. The story is about one woman whose four finger were disappear while she took her job. She got four thousand baht for compensation. She is poor and looking for earning money alone in order to survive. Her husband was died and her daughter was ran out from home.

The first theme of this story is the life for fighting. When her family was split up, no one want to take care of her. So, her mom passed her to one relative whose think that she can took a job and earn money. Moreover, when she grew up she has her own family but her husband was died and her daughter was ran away from home. Finally, she make her decision to move forward.

The second theme of the story is her job that lead to loss. She have been changed her job for many time because her health. Start from chopping meat at the restaurant then change to working at building site. After that, she moved to battery factory and moved to soap factory as her second last job. These lead to the weak of her health and loses her fingers. Furthermore, she lose the opportunity to do the job like normal people and earn enough money for her life spending.

In term of setting, this story is talking about present time and took place in familiar place which is in the city. The atmosphere is gloomy and sad because she loss her fingers and loss working opportunity. She is poor and she have to live in the temple but she didn’t waiting for food from monk, she stand by her own feet.

At the beginning of the story the woman loss her close family and live with distant relative. Then, looking for money by working. After that, she got married and have one daughter but both of them were gone from her far away. She have to working a lot to survive. However the climax occur when she was weak and it leads to health problem and if affect to the situation of loss her four fingers. The woman change her work to rubbish keeper.

In the story there is a conflict between human being and an impersonal force. The woman had a conflict with her fate because she was unlucky and she have to be suffered all her life age.The writer uses time sequence, flashback and coincidence methods for telling the story. Firstly, time sequence because it start from childhood of her life and when she grow up with

Duangpond K. 5511047 section : 476

married life until now with only herself. Secondly, she uses some flashback to talk about her past story. Finally, she use coincidence in the situation of loss her finger and loss her job.

Since the first-person narrator is used, the reader can easily know the feeling and understand about her story that she very hurt from her experiences and her fate. She lives with unhappy life but she have to fight for survive.

The woman which is the main character was tragic hero because she is the one from many people who are very hard working in order to earn money to survive she change her job quite often because of her health . Unfortunately, her life become tragic because of her job which caused the loss of her four fingers and her life turn down again.

For the kind of this story is static-flat because the story shows just only sadness and bad point and it also doesn't change until the end of the story. This story is also presents realistic which is like the people in real life and exaggerated because she is very unlucky person but she try to fight with her bad fate. The method of characterization is direct because all the information are given in the article already.

The writer used similie at the beginning of the article "All my life my hand have been rough and coarse" which is the simple comparison that her rough hand with hard working until her hand turn to be rough and coarse. Moreover, the writer used "...it's not easy to find a job, unless, that is, you're willing to sell your body..." as verbal irony because she didn't go to sell her body but she was looking for honest job. Also, she use "Because the accident left me with only one finger on that hand, my boss didn't want me anymore" as paradox because it shows the two events happen at the same time.

The writer creates a style that presents the story of the working woman which very unlucky than many women with persuade way. The tone of this story is to sympathetic that woman whose life very unlucky according to her fate that no available job that suitable for her with only one finger left on one hand. Moreover, the writer wants to tell the reader that life is hard, not everyone born with happiness, money and support. However, the unlucky life she is, life must move forward. She can accept it and continue to write her own way.