Response to J.J.'s "Lessons"

For me, this story seemed to be about an American boy who is unwillingly receiving advice from an old Italian man on a train, who sees the boy as naïve, but surprisingly enough, the end of the story amusingly revealed in a twist that the boy who knew exactly what the sly old man was preparing the entire time he spilled his “wisdom” to the young boy. Both characters turned out to be pickpockets and the young boy got the better of the old man. Looking back, I would say the story is about appearances, and that they are not always what they seem to be. We always hear the saying, “don’t judge a book by its cover,” and this was a comedic and refreshing way to view that phrase. Along with that, this story also says that not only can the young learn from older generations, but the older generations are never too old or experienced to learn from a younger generation. At the beginning of the story, I thought the young boy was going to experience some life changing lesson, when really the old man was the one who learned the lesson. This too leads to an extremely similar theme of the story—never underestimate someone, or in this case, your victim or opponent.

This story is told from the 3^rd person; however, I would like to see how it turned out if it were written in 1^st person. Through the 3^rd person narrator, we are able to see both the old man and the young boy clearly, but we also tend to get what the young boy is thinking in his head. Contrastingly, we are unable to see what the old man is thinking. I think it would be neat to see a little bit of what the old man was thinking throughout. Did he not suspect anything until the very last paragraph? Did he think he had won? Did the old man spot the young boy from a distance? Maybe it wouldn’t be very effective since we technically can fill in these blanks without the information actually written down in front of us, but nonetheless it could be a neat addition.

I found the dialogue throughout the story very realistic and effective. I like that the talking was concise and not a whole lot of insignificant chatter. I could imagine the words actually being spoken. Also, I thoroughly enjoyed the great imagery and descriptions of the train, boy, man, expressions, etc. They were extremely successful in the story for me. I enjoyed the sarcastic tone the young boy and narrator took on in the story as well, especially at the end, “What an awful simile.” I was really surprisingly pleased that much of the sarcasm and twist remained at the end. I did not find it cliché or predictable. I honestly thought it was going to end with some profound moment with the young boy lamenting on some life changing advice from the old man, but I am certainly glad I was wrong.