Tandolfo the Great by Richard Bausch

2. The main character's underlying problem is his affections will not be reciprocated. He is a man who loved a woman that won't love him back. We can see him having to deal with all the emotions that the situation brings him. It affects his work and his health. He turns to alcohol to numb his pain. After having to face who he's become while holding onto the hope of her affections, he decides he wants to watch that hope as well with that chapter of his life explode. To bring some sort of finality to his feelings. So he waits for someone to destroy his cake, the symbol of his love and hope for the relationship. 3. This story is told in the third person point of view. We can tell because the author never uses "I" to describe the main character's narration of the story. The author tells us what the character knows and is feeling through his own eyes using "He." This is also how we know it isn't third-person omniscient. 6. I honestly expected this story to go in many different ways. It's a story about a guy that kind of gets friend-zoned. I expected some sort of incel-like main character. The one we got didn't really reach into that territory, in my opinion. Also, maybe this is just me, but this story was super tense. Especially during the child's birthday party. I expected the main character to snap and do something violent. It got a little hard to read during the climax. Maybe it's the whole clown thing, but I couldn't stop thinking it would end like the Joker movie. With the whole, a clown snaps because of the pressure surrounding them. 7. I do really enjoy how the dialogue was written in this story. However, the best part of this story is how the author's minimalist dialogue works in tandem with making his scenes tense. How the author used fewer details of what a character is doing while talking to make their words hold more meaning. 1.) What is different about the day when the story takes place? Wow, so many things!3 Initially we learn it is the day Tandolfo intends to propose to a young woman with whom he works.3 If that wasn't significant enough, he plans to propose using a six tiered pink wedding cake.3 Unfortunately, he has to perform as a clown at a birthday party before he can propose.3 Even more unfortunate is that he is intoxicated and hurt after learning the young woman is now engaged to her long time boyfriend and he behave very inappropriately in front of the children.3 He is beaten and ejected from the party by the parents of the children.3 Despite all of this, he drives to the woman's house, still intent upon giving her the cake.3 However, in front of her home he comes to terms with the events of the day and his feelings.3 It was a very different day. 2.) What is the main character's underlying problem, and how does the story bring this problem into sharper focus? Tandolfo is a shy, lonely man who seems to be a bit immature.3 He may have never had a serious relationship.3 He has fallen in love with a woman who is unaware of his feelings.3 He has been unable to ask her for a date and wants to skip right to a marriage proposal.3 The story highlights this by describing his feelings of frustration, pain, and humiliation.3 3.) Why is this story in the point of view it is? The story is told in third person.3 It is effective in describing the debacle that is the children's birthday party.3 A first person POV would have missed some of the important details that helped build the turmoil important to this scene. 7.) What specific technique would you most readily take from this story and try in your own story? I enjoyed the mix of humor and pain. The birthday party is a great example of this.3 Also, there is implied humor when the reader has the opportunity to imagine cars driving down a dark street and colliding with a tall, pink cake.3 My story would benefit from this technique.3 I hope to give it a try. 2. The problem with Tandolfo is that when he was falling for his co-worker, he tried everything to get with her, even though she was already engaged. I think that he shouldn't have tried to date his co-worker because she was already engaged and even if it was to a guy that didn't treat her right, he should've just told her how he felt and not make a grand gesture and get upset when she said she didn't like him.3 4. I think that the part where Tandolfo was talking to the dad and performing was really long and wasn't really needed in the story. I liked that they added what he was doing in his act and everything. but I would've liked more story plot with him and his co-worker rather than what his act is. 5. I think that this was a really well-written story and it was easy to read. 6. This story is different from most stories I read because I've never read a love story where the guy wanted the girl who was already engaged, and then didn't get her. I also don't read stories about clowns. 1. How is this story different from other stories you've read? This story is different from others as it doesn’t exactly give the reader all of the information but rather shows the reader. For example, the beginning of the story doesn’t directly imply that the main character is a clown but rather says that he is putting on his make-up to prepare for a party. From this, the reader may or may not be able to guess what the main character was doing this for. 2. What is the main character's underlying problem, and how does the story bring this problem into sharper focus? The main character’s underlying problem is that he lost his chance to ask his crush to marry him. As weird as it sounded, the main character seemed to like this girl and wanted to marry her without even dating her. The story brings this into sharper focus by using the main character’s emotional “explosion” at the kid’s birthday party to show how he was affected by his crush being engaged. Something that I noticed that was interesting during his breakout of character was that the narrator identified him as his real name whenever he broke out of character. These moments were dramatic and changed the mood quickly. 3. Which parts of the story are dramatized through scenes? Which parts are summarized? Why? The part of the story that is dramatized is the mentioning of the cake. Everywhere the main character went, people seemed to ignore the fact that he was dressed as a clown and was fascinated by the cake. The cake ended up being one of the reasons why he exploded into emotions at the kid’s birthday party as it was constantly reminding him of his failure to propose to the girl he loved at his ofÏce. 1. What specific technique(s) would you most readily take from this story and try in your own story? A specific technique that I picked up from this story is the lack of names. While I was reading the story, I didn’t realize that all of the characters are nameless except for the main character who is mostly called his clown's name. I think this added to the story in a way that didn’t take away from it. Many characters could have gotten confusing as the story was short and the reader wouldn’t get to know them well enough to identify them. Not only this, but this can keep the reader from being distracted by the names and who was who in the story. 1. How is this story different from other stories you've read? I have said many times that most stories that I've read are more along the roads of historical fiction/romance. I was never drawn to horror or comedy. This story is different as I have never read a story about a clown nor have I read many short stories in general. Short stories consist of fewer characters and I've never read a story about a clown before. I enjoyed though the depth of this story the metaphor of how the clown was symbolism for how Tandolfo viewed himself. 2. What is the main character's underlying problem, and how does the story bring this problem into sharper focus? From what I gathered from the story is Tandolfo comes off as unhappy in his life both career wise and personal. He is happy in the beginning because he is going to propose to woman who he assumed felt the same way. The story does an excellent job at slowly showing how Tadolfo's character slowly unleashes all of his inner turmoil with himself and his life. He first gets a letter after buying a wedding cake to propose to a co-worker and then fails at entertaining the kids at a kid's birthday party. He tries to put on a smile and fake his pain, but he eventually blows up on a young little boy. He ends up taking the wedding cake and laying it in the middle of the road while waiting to see it be smashed by a car. 3. Why is this story in the point of view that it is? The author writes the story in the point of view that it is because the reader needs to truly understand why Tandolfo is slowly spiraling out of control. He write in third person but truly focuses on Tandolfo. We are told that Tandolfo is having a bad day and is tipsy. I don't believe that we would understand why or how Tandolfo is spiraling out of control if it was written in first person( since Tandolfo is tipsy). We are given every aspect of Tandolfo's situation along with the other characters which I believe the author ties in beautifully. 4. What was different about the day that the story takes place? This was a huge detail that stuck out to me in the story. It was unique in the fact that the day Tandolfo chooses to propose to a co-worker is the day that this girl leaves a note telling him that her boyfriend proposed. This was such a telling beginning to the story as the wedding cake started the downward spiral of Tandolfo. He gets tipsy and messes up with his magician tricks at the birthday party while still thinking about the uneaten wedding cake. It drives him crazy until he blows up on a kid and ends his day by waiting for a car to smash the wedding cake. It was brilliant on the writer's side as that wedding cake symbolized a part of Tandolfo's life that wasn't as he wanted it as he then loses control in all other parts of his life throughout the story. 1. What is different about the day the story takes place? The day the story takes place, Tandolfo aka Rodney Wilbury, has planned a grand romantic gesture for his coworker that he loves and that he imagines to love him back.3 He had purchased a six tier wedding cake and planned to propose to her, only to find out that she had just gotten engaged to her boyfriend.3 There are several levels of misinterpretation that he had of their relationship, and he is revisiting their interactions in light of this.3 At the same time, the story begins with him putting on clown makeup and getting ready to perform at a children's birthday party, and driving around with a six tier wedding cake on the backseat of his car, as he declined to have the bakers put it in a box.3 3He has 'fortified himself' for the clown gig, and it does not take long for the reader to understand that he has been drinking alcohol and is inebriated as he likes to call it. 2. What is the main character's underlying problem?3 And how does the story bring that into sharper focus? Tandolfo's underlying problem is that "failures are beginning to catch up with him, and he's still aching in love" as the author writes toward the end of the story.3 He has perhaps divided himself and hidden some of his pain behind the clown costume.3 Tandolfo's failures had snowballed as he drove to the birthday party, drinking bourbon from a flask, and arrived to find that the table he had requested for his show was not set up.3 He is drunk, and hurting from his broken heart, and is carrying around this wedding cake which is a constant reminder, in sight and in smell, and because other characters keep asking about it and pointing it out.3 When the birthday boy is stubborn and uncooperative in the trick, he finds himself unable to pivot.3 In a descriptive paragraph, the writer describes the main character being tipsy, lonely, heartsick and forlorn and disdainful of the child.3 Tandolfo both insults the kid, calling him a prick and a gross slab of flesh, and assaults him by grabbing his tongue and pushing him down.3 The parents roughly and forcibly remove him, and he remains long enough to gather up his rabbit, which had been let lose, and attempt to drunkenly explain himself to a party goer.3 As the author writes, "He wants to let them know he's not like this all the time: wants to let them know it's circumstances, grief, personal pain hidden inside seeming brightness and cleverness" describing how Tandolfo wishes he could represent himself to the people at the party.3 The reader gets the sense though, that this split part of himself has been going on for awhile, and that while the cake/misread of his coworkers feelings and subsequent broken heart are new to that day, that the pain has been going on for a lot longer.3 3Ironically, and to use a cliche,3 this most recent event, that includes a literal cake with a lot of icing, is just 'the icing on the cake'. 3.3 Why is this story in the point of view that it is?33 The story is in third person omniscient in order to be able to give the reader deep insight into the character's feelings and emotional state, while also pulling in description from the past.3 Using this point of views allows there to be a narrator that can describe the situation from the outside looking in, while also giving the reader a glimpse into Rodney/Tandolfo's inner workings. 7.3 What specific techniques would you most readily take from this story and try in your own story? I really liked the lines of the story where Tandolfo was talking to himself, in the very beginning "Tandolfo, you fool, she loves you not..."3 and towards the end, when he decides to put the cake in the road in front of the girl's house and he says " I am Tandolfo, the soft hearted.3 Hearken to me" and breaks down.3 There is something compelling about what a character actually speaks aloud to themself, and it adds to both the drama of the story as well as to the dimension of the character.3 I also really liked the dramatic device of the cake.3 It was an odd, vivid prop to the story and carried my interest and the thread of curiosity of what would happen to it through out. 1. Is the writing ever less clear than it could be? I think the writing is pretty clear and obvious about the problems.3 2. How is this story different from other stories you've read? This story isn't that much different from other stories that I have read but it has heartbreak in it. I normally don't read ones that have heartbreak in them.3 3. What is the main character's underlying problem, and how does the story bring this problem into sharper focus? The main character's underlying problem is that he is just unhappy with his life. It brings the problem into a sharper focus because the story is building up his emotions and shows that he is bottling things up.33 4. Why is this story in the point of view that it is? The story is in third person because the author wants people to understand his emotions and other people's emotions more clearly. What is different about the day when the story takes place?3That Tandolfo has to pick up a wedding cake3 What is the main character's underlying problem, and how does the story bring this problem into sharper focus?I believe that the underlying problem of Tandolfo is that he is in love with a woman that does not see him in the same way. I think that the story brings this into focus when Tandolfo recalls some of the interactions he has with the girl and hints that he is the man for this girl, but she doesn't seem to reciprocate those feelings3 Why is this story in the point of view that it is?3I think that the story is from that Point of view because it gives more information about Tandolfo and his situation and makes it more relatable 3than what other types of POV would How is this story different from other stories you've read?3The story is different from the one that I read in that this one has another type of Sadness and melancholy which I am not very inclined to read3 1. What is different about the day when the story takes place? This story takes place right after the main character finds out the woman he loves got engaged. Tandolfo had just bought a giant wedding cake to propose, and now had no use for it. 2. What is the main character's underlying problem, and how does the story bring this problem into sharper focus? The main character’s underlying problem was the depression he was facing after finding out his love got engaged to a different man. The story brings this to focus when we find out he was going to propose. The writing explains the main character’s feelings about the situation and how the whole time they knew each other he saw a relationship, but she must have felt a friendship. Throughout the story he keeps looking back at the melting cake, which can symbolize his emotions. When he starts drinking the cake gets worse, just like him. The cake is a mess and so is he. We can see this at the birthday party when his anger gets the best of him. 3. Which parts of the story are dramatized through scenes? Which parts are summarized? Why? Throughout this story many parts are dramatized such as the progress of the cake. Throughout the story we keep getting updates on the cake. The cake can resemble the main character’s life at the moment, or at least what he feels his life is, becoming worse and worse. Certain parts are summarized such as him snapping at the birthday boy. This wasn’t summarized much, but it was not as detailed and dramatized as the rest of the story because it was just a scene to show the main character’s anger at the situation coming out in a different place. 4. Is the writing ever less clear than it could be? Overall I feel this story was pretty clear. I was able to follow along and get a grasp on how Tandolfo was feeling. There were many details that were important to the story and not too many fill in details.