In short, on this story three child went to a ditch and did swimming on ditch, after swimming they went to the general store, there were interesting proprietor who’s reaction looks like poetry man every time three boys spoken the experience they had or when they said they can speak rare languages. It gave the impression of some man for three child and they imitated that phrase like poetry even if through road from the grocery store.
I collected the reaction spoken by the proprietor. When child said the dich was ice-cold, the proprietor reacted “I’ll be cultivated”, when a child said “I dived in we got stuck in the mud up to our elbows”, the proprietor reacted “I’ll be pruned”, when a child said I can speak Armenian, the proprietor reacted “I’ll be harrowed.”, also expect these three reaction, there were reaction like next-“I’ll be irrigated”, “I gathered into a pile, burned, picked off a tree, and let me see what else?” and so on.
After the pass from a grocery store, three child speak ill of a proprietor with respect saying “He was crazy”, but the scene that for instance one of child didn’t knows what was reptiles…so probably a ditch have some kind of legend and a proprietor knows about it, and according with that legend, reacted so over. In this means, I wonder whether three child or a proprietor was crazy. The impactful impression on this story was Saroyan expressed nature as if man- for example the phrase “the ditches were dry……but they weren’t dry, they were roaring”, “The springtime water was as unfriendly as anything could be.”. I feel in common these words usually use for human not nature.
参考
西川正身、“Modern American short stories1”、研究社、1966年
ウィリアム・サローヤン著・柴田元幸訳『僕の名はアラム』、新潮文庫、2016年
