1094 Updike, John
is a major development for Sammy, as he shows that
he is able to see things from the perspective of oth-
ers. He is no longer limited to his own fragmented
viewpoint, through which he only sees people as
their parts; instead, he has developed a more inte-
grated vision that allows him to act with the con-
cern of others in mind. After Sammy can imagine
Queenie’s view of things, he immediately begins to
infer the thoughts of his coworker Stokesie, showing
that he really has changed his thought pattern to a
more mature one.
Sammy’s decision to quit his job, without delib-
erate pondering about the results that his resigna-
tion will yield, may seem ill-advised to more mature
readers and thus indicates his relative immaturity. In
the context of the story, however, it seems that his
quitting indicates a burgeoning social consciousness:
that he understands the girls’ feelings of embarrass-
ment, and that he is standing up for what he believes
is right. Sammy’s audience has no indication that he
can see any way to make the situation right, other
than to quit. While this shows a lack of insight on
Sammy’s part, it does not undo the fact that he has
changed from a person with a singular perspective
to one with multiple perspectives during the course
of these proceedings. He does not have the ability
to foresee the consequences of his decision until he
passes through “the electric eye,” at which point he is
able to see, from another point of view, the difficul-
ties that he has caused for Lengel and for himself.
However, the audience is left with an image of a
young man who thinks that his whole world will
now turn on the issue of his resignation from this
one job; he still has a lot of growing up to do.
Maura Grace Harrington
commodIFIcatIon/commercIaLIzatIon
in “A&P”
John Updike’s “A&P” can be read as a criticism of
the conformity that is perpetuated and perhaps even
engendered by commercialism. In a commercially
driven culture, represented by the microcosm of the
A&P, people tend to act according to the same pat-
terns and motivations, and they rarely deviate from
the norm. When such deviation occurs, it can serve
as a signal that the nonconformists will break away
from prevailing values.
In the grocery store, all of the customers tend to
act in the same way. They follow invisible one-way
signs down the store aisles and are glued to their
shopping lists. Sammy describes the customers as
“sheep” and “scared pigs in a chute,” indicating that
they are driven not by their own volition but by
blind forces. These typical customers are akin to
herded or corralled animals, in that they behave in
conventional ways and choose their checkout slots
by predictable patterns.
The behavior of Lengel shows a clear crossover
between the treatment of things and of people
in the workaday world. When the girls enter the
store, Lengel has been “haggling with a truck full
of cabbages in the lot.” Presumably, his frustrations
over this confrontation regarding things to sell
carries over into his upset at the disruption of the
predictable behavior patterns inside the A&P. To
Lengel, trucks and girls must conform to rules, and
no exceptions can be made. In his black-and-white
world, there is no room for gray and certainly no
room for color. Sammy reveals that Lengel “hides
behind” the title of “Manager,” and that he uses his
position to regulate both commerce and behavior in
the store, as if there is no distinction between the
two.
The swimsuit-clad girls break all of the unspo-
ken rules of grocery store behavior, with an appear-
ance that does not conform to the status quo. They
enter the store without the material trappings of
respectability, wearing little clothing, and unlike
the other customers, they have come to the store to
buy only one item among the three of them. Until
he hears Queenie’s voice, Sammy commodifies the
girls, discussing them as conglomerations of pieces
rather than as integrated human beings. His first
description of Queenie’s appearance is strikingly
reminiscent of cataloging the parts of a car: Around
the top of her bathing suit is a “shining rim,” and her
upper chest looks like “a dented sheet of metal tilted
in the light.” Sammy also discusses the girls in terms
of animals, hinting quite strongly that he does not
see their individual personhood; however, instead of
seeing them as herded sheep or pigs, he likens their
minds to the unpredictable and mobile “bees.” It is
as though the girls’ nonconformity to the rules of
the marketplace inspires Sammy to see beyond the