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The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County

by Mark Twain

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Student Question

How is imagery used in "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County"?

Quick answer:

Imagery is used in Mark Twain's short story to help readers understand what the story is about. By describing how things appeared, sounded, smelled, tasted, or felt, we can get a better idea of what it might have been like to be part of the story. In "The Notorious Jumping Frog of Calaveras County," Mark Twain uses lots of imagery to help readers understand what it was like for a man to capture a frog and then add weight to it so that he could make it appear as though the frog had jumped (although most likely the frog never jumped at all).

Expert Answers

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Imagery refers to any description that appeals to our five senses: sight, sound, smell, taste, or touch. Imagery helps us to feel better connected to what we are reading, allowing us to imagine exactly what it is like to be in that moment.

Mark Twain uses large amounts of imagery in his short story "The Notorious Jumping Frog of Calaveras County." For instance, in the first couple of paragraphs he describes Simon Wheeler:

I found Simon Wheeler dozing comfortably by the bar-room stove of the old, dilapidated tavern in the ancient mining camp of Angel's, and I noticed that he was fat and bald-headed, and had an expression of winning gentleness and simplicity upon his tranquil countenance. . . . Simon Wheeler backed me into a corner and blockaded me there with his chair, and then sat me down and reeled off the monotonous narrative which follows this paragraph. He never smiled, he never frowned, he never changed his voice from the gentle-flowing key to which he tuned the initial sentence, he never betrayed the slightest suspicion of enthusiasm

Here, we have lots of visual imagery, as Twain describes Wheeler "dozing comfortably" in a "dilapidated tavern." He also carefully describes Wheeler's physical appearance, saying he was "fat and bald-headed" with a "tranquil countenance." Finally, Twain describes how Wheeler behaved: he "backed me into a corner and blockaded me there with his chair" to tell his story. All of these descriptions give a vivid picture to the reader of what happened in the tavern.

Another example of imagery in the text is seen in Wheeler's storytelling. He says:

So he set there a good while thinking and thinking to hisself, and then he got the frog out and prized his mouth open and took a tea- spoon and filled him full of quail shot filled him pretty near up to his chin and set him on the floor. Smiley he went to the swamp and slopped around in the mud for a long time, and finally he ketched a frog, and fetched him in, and give him to this feller, and says . . . "Now, if you're ready, set him alongside of Dan'l, with his fore- paws just even with Dan'l, and I'll give the word."

Wheeler describes how the man "prized his mouth open" and "filled him full of quail shot pretty near up to his chin." This emphasizes the roughness that the man used with the frog and the amount of weight he added to it. We also see imagery as he describes how he "slopped around in the mud for a long time," which explains the messy process of frog hunting. Mark Twain draws readers into his tale by using a wide variety of descriptive imagery to help readers understand just how bizarre Wheeler's story (that he insists upon sharing with the narrator) really is.

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