While reading this story, I got to really like Farquhar. I thought he was only trying to do what he thought was right, fighting his side of the war that was underway. I could see him in my mind, standing there, waiting to be hung in perfect appearance, "His features were good,-a straight nose, firm mouth, broad forehead...long,dark hair combed straight back, falling behind his ears to the collar of his well-fitting frock coat...a moustache and pointed beard...and had a kindly expression" and then the happiness and amazement of falling to the river instead of to his death (731). Routing for him the entire way, I was willing the soldiers to miss the poor man trying to swim to his freedom. I felt robbed of the story when, at the last minute, he dies. I wanted him to be reunited with his family, for it wasn't his war to fight. Though his country decided to start a war with itself, and I'm sure he was an owner of slaves, he was only doing his part. Of course, if it were his own allies that had caught him trying to sabatogue the enemy, they only would have helped, and there would have been no story.
I would have loved to hear more about the man that is introduced at the beginning of the story, his perspective of Farquhar being hung, shot at, and dying. To end the story this way, I believe, could have been more effective. It would have been easier to understand that it was only a somewhat dream of Farquhar's that he had survived, fallen into the river, and once again saw his wife.
Work Cited
Bierce, Ambrose. “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge”. The Norton Introduction To Literature. 10th ed. Ed. Alison Booth and Kelly J. Mays. New York: Norton, 2010. 730-736. Print.
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