Phone Call by Berton Rouche
... actions but also due to the fact that he is the narrator telling the entire story from his very own point of view. He appears to be a young truck-driver and to have broken down somewhere near the home of Mrs Timothy. Mrs Timothy however seems to be older, paranoid, scared, unable to interact with others, blinded by the media’s influence, timid, intimidated, aggraphobic and most definitely suffering from some sort of psychological defect. We see the power is in favour of the male character when he is in Mrs Timothy’s house. We notice she is frightened by the man’s presence when the man states “She turned around, and she had the funniest look on her face. I mean, it was real strange. It was like she was scared or something.” We also see her fear and the fact that she is influenced by the media when she says “I know what’s going on these days. I read the papers, you know. I hear the news, and I’ve heard about boys like you…” This puts the man in power because he could easily play on her fears. After this occurs, we see that ironically the power is suddenly in favour of Mrs Timothy as she tries to defend herself with a knife. So we see, the idea of empowerment and disempowerment plays a huge role in Phone Call. Through the characters the author expresses this idea of gender and class. The author Berton Roueche appears to be very sexist. We notice this because of the roles of the male and female characters and the patriarchal society in which they appear to be ...