Sarah Herschelman

Mrs. Bernhard
AP Literature
24 November 2015
Cherry Bomb
In the short work, Cherry Bomb, Maxine Clair uses literary techniques to characterize
the main characters memories of the summer of her fifth grade year. The story revolves around a
young girl recounting stories from her childhood and what life was like for her then. As an adult,
she is thinking back on what the times were like for her then. Clair uses imagery to describe,
allusion to reference the times, and diction in order to reference the time as well.
In Cherry Bomb, there are uses of imagery and symbolism such as, the putrid-colored
jacket my father wore when he got shipped out to the dot in the Pacific Ocean (37-38). The
putrid colored jacket offers a sense of sickness in the army greens that her father had to where
when he went to war. The color shows a distaste for her father going to war. The dot that she
mentions represents the island that her father is staying at. The dot almost gives less meaning
to where he is. It shows how she as a child would not understand where her father was actually
stationed at, so she uses this imagery to symbolize where her father actually was.
Clair uses allusion to represent what time the character grew up in. She mentions, Our
mother still bought a help-him-out block of ice to leave in the backyard for us to lick or sit on,

(10-12). This alludes to the fact that there were still ice trucks giving out ice for people to cool
themselves down with since there was probably no air conditioning. This shows the readers that
this girl's fifth grade summer was from a time before air conditioning or at least not much of it.
Another example of imagery that is used includes the Hairy Man. She describes him as woolyheaded and bearded, hollering things we dared not repeat, (28-29). Hes used as a sense of
forbidden and scary. It also shows how nave she was since hes obviously a man with mental
issues but the kids looked at him as if he were a monster.
The author uses diction to help display the times as well. Clair uses phrases such as,
that-old-thing, help-him-out, and God-is-whipping-you in to display what kind of time
period she came from. Its context for the reader to understand that this character grew up in the
early 1900s or at least the 40s or 50s, perhaps the 60s. Clair wants the reader to understand that
this is how the people talked in this time period and in the authors memories. These details give
character to her memories.
Clair uses these literary techniques in order to give character to this little girls memory. It
helps the reader gain context clues from this work and get an understanding of what the times
were like for her. The little girl gives life not only to the story but to the other characters of the
time and the story.