Rhetorical Analysis of “separate kingdoms”

The essay “separate kingdoms” by Valerie Laken was a story about a family struggles to understand each other after the father loses his thumbs. Laken arranged the story in a two column format each column represented a different viewpoint respectively from father and son in order to show different reactions from members in a family with the accident and a separation between them. Laken uses a lot of dialogue and onomatopoeic words to express the members’ emotion, in order to show audiences how the event as a turning point made the family finally confront the separation and try to understand each other. That is, the members of a family shaken by a terrible accident and divide themselves up room by room, only able to understand each other when the separated.

They were a common family which lack of communication because of the fathers’ working hours. And after the father lost his thumbs and his job, the family forced to stay together under one roof, but it did not make them more close to each other. The father was immersion into certain animal show; the son was playing video game and drum; the mother was doing Tea-bo in every possible second. They had their own way the pass the time and hide themselves into their own space, own kingdom in order flee from the separation. They do not know how to console each other at first, as Laken states, “She (mother)’s sucking up to him, feeling sorry. The dogs aren’t, and he respects them for it” (1). She tried to console the father and it was just seems did not work, and she throw the puzzle to the son hopes he could make some improvement. As Laken states the dialogue between she and the son. “Jack (son), why don’t you take a break and keep your dad company while I (mother) exercise? As if he (father) wants company from me. As if he’s said a complete sentence this week at all, to me or her or anyone”(2). The son was confused. It was oddness for three of them that seeing each other during the daytime, especially, after this terrible accident, they were all became very sensitive and was afraid of disturb others.

Laken repeated some sentences in both columns and arranged at the same line. “Dad? Mom says I’m supposed to come and sit with you” (2) and “Do I have to”(3). These sentences are all dialogue that the son spoke to the father, I believe Laken wants to show audiences that the family was in the same kingdom at that point. the son was try to communicate with his father, even though the father did not speak anything, but the son made a good start, he was trying to communicate with his father and break the separation, no matter it was intentionally or unintentionally.

Laken uses the dialogue from the fathers’ shouting as a column bridge to break the two column format. “Take it! Take the goddamn money and the little drummer boy and drive yourselves straight to paradise, set yourselves up! I’m fine right here” (11) here the family forced to be in one kingdom because of the fathers; shouting. The father was trying to navigate the rough territory that stretches between the human kingdom and the animal kingdom. He feels misplaced and had no difference with animals because of lost the thumbs, Laken shows it with the dialogue between he and his son. “You know what separates us from the animals?” And I said, “Our brains?” He held up his thumbs and wiggled them. “Opposable thumbs”(12). He was damaged and scarred, and torn between the wonders of the world and the adventures of the mind. travel and flee, struggling against his isolation to locate a place like home, and trying to reach for certain connection that will make them as a whole.

Laken also uses the sons’ drumbeat. “duh” (6). As a column bridge to break the two column format, when the fathers’ boss came to persuade his took the money that the boss would like to pay, but it was very a short break, and Laken came back to the two column format very soon, she expressed the fathers’ feeling in the first column. “Here we go,” Colt groans, and Eddie shudders. Jack’s at the drums again. Two hours a day, every day, without fail. The boy’s obsession is everybody else’s misery”(6). Even though the father was not seems to enjoy with his sons’ music, but here implied that as a family they had the obsession.

And in the second column which narrated by the son, Laken repeated the sounds almost until the boss left. “Duh Guh Duh Guh Duh Guh Duh Guh Duh Guh duh guh duh guh duh guh duh guh duh…” (6 to 8) it was because he was obsession with the whole thing, even though he was wondering if he father took the money it might help the family up to a better living level, “I get it, how the money won’t fix anything. But it might be enough to move out of this house, to a different bus route, maybe even a different school. A whole different town”(5).but he does not really care about the money and understand that the money is his father’s choice, as Laken represented the dialogue between he and his mother. “It doesn’t really matter,” I (son) say. The money…Yesterday I tried to do everything all day without my thumbs,” I say. She wipes her nose and pulls back to look at me.“It didn’t work at all.” It’s true. I never lasted more than a half hour at a time. Nothing worked right, and on instinct I kept grabbing stuff with my thumbs. Some things, like your zipper or the drums, were entirely impossible”(18). He was trying his best to understand the father, and noticed it is hard, but he did not give up, instead, he asked his mother to joining he.

At the end of the story, the mother and the son taped their thumbs with masking tape, and the mother said, “I think we should sleep this way” (19). They tried to do things without thumbs because they were trying to found a way which will make them as a whole and break the separation.