John Updike is a well-known writer in the second half of the 20th Century and early 20th Century in both short stories and novels. His death in 2009 was the end of an era of uncanny stories about the real world for over fifty years. They were the stories of real people and not just the made up fictional worlds of those that were rich. His stories were of the realities of the world and the reader was always able to easily comprehend and connect with the characters. While AP is not one of the most read of his short stories, it is a very interesting and explanatory story of the times. Within the confines of the story, the main character, Sammy, portrays the reality of the world and the feelings of the youth in the changing era of the 1960s. He is both narrator and protagonist, and it is his words that tell the story in setting, point of view and theme.
The first aspects to be evaluated are the characters of the story. The main character and narrator is Sammy, a 19-year-old, drop-out that works at the AP supermarket. He shows the reader the world of the AP through his disenchanted eyes. He has worked at the store for long enough to be able to sit at his register and still know what is going on in every aisle of the store, and out in front of the large plate glass windows (Updike 338). However, this is not the only thing that is known about Sammy (Blodgett 236 Thompson 215). The reader also realizes that Sammy has worked in the store for a long time by the way he explains and compares the three girls to the foods in his store. Such comparisons are found in the chubby berry-face (Updike 338) and smoothest scoops of vanilla I had ever known (Updike 342). He also compares the girls to dented sheet metal tilted in the light (Updike 339) which may play out to other aspects of his life.
However, his view of the normal people in the store is quite different and calls the crowd of supermarket shoppers house slaves in pin curlers (Updike 340), or witch (Updike 338), or as women with six children and varicose veins mapping their legs (Updike 340). He has a downward view of these sheep (Updike 342) that come to the store to buy their goods. For Sammy, he wants out of the AP, but is unsure as to how to make it happen. He feels trapped and needs only one good excuse to get himself out (Blodgett 236 Thompson 215 Porter 1156).
Other characters in the AP are Stokesie and McMahon, the butcher. Stokesie is a cashier like Sammy. He, too, is stuck in the job at the AP, but because of the fact that he has two children and a wife, he accepts his fate and his responsibility and tries to make the most of it. McMahon, the butcher, is like an elder of the store, and he will never leave. The only other character associated with the AP is the store manager Mr. Lengel. It is this man that holds the values of the store, and neighborhood church over the employees and customers of the store. He is a Sunday school teacher and in this high moral frame of mind, it is he that causes a scene with the indecently dressed young girls, telling them that they must be dressed appropriately before entering the store again (Blodgett 236 Thompson 215 Porter 1157).
This leads to the analysis of the three girls. The girls are dressed in bathing suits, and no shoes. Even Sammy mentions that women generally put on a shirt or shorts or something (Updike 340) before coming into the store, but these girls do not even skip a beat or think it unnatural to go to the store in their bathing suits. Therefore the entrance of these three girls is noticed by everyone. Sammy calls the one he assumes to be the leader Queenie (Updike 340), and it is she that caught the attention of Sammy from the beginning. Her reaction to Mr. Lengel would create a sensation that would evoke a response from Sammy that would lead to unforeseeable consequences (Blodgett 236 Thompson 216 Porter 1157).
The setting in which the characters meet is obviously an AP grocery store. However, the fact that it is outside Boston and five minutes from the beach of Cape Cod needs to be understood, which could be the reasoning for the girls in their bathing suits. However, the actual location of the AP sits in the middle of the small conservative town and is surrounded by several real estate offices, the newspaper store, two banks, and the Congregational Church ( Porter 1155 Updike 340). Even while they are very close to the ocean, they are closer to the church and therefore, the conservative values of the church tend to spill over into the grocery store (Porter 1157).
One theme of this story is the refusal to conform to the norms of society. The old and normal way of life is represented in the church, the middle of the conservative town, and in the character of Mr. Lengel. Through the values of these very conservative entities, Sammy begins to lose himself. He works at the AP because he believes there is not much out there, especially for someone like himself. However, he wants to escape and find a different way in which to live that is loyal to his own belief system and not just like everyone else around him (Blodgett 236 Thompson 216 Porter 1158).
Another theme is the changing of the societal norms between the differing generations. The old norms are represented in Mr. Lengel in his high brow ideal of how a woman should dress and how she should act, especially in the sense that he expected people to be completely dressed when they were only five minutes for the Oceanside and beach. Stokesie kind of sits in the middle of the two views of the old regime and the new generation. This fence sitting occurs because of his freedom in life and sexuality that has landed him with a wife and two children by the age of twenty-two. He may not agree with the norms, but he does abide by them as a result of the need to be responsible. Sammy, on the other hand, represents the new age of freedom that was found in the sixties. It is the age where the old societal norms of the 1950s are waylaid by the hippie and flower children of the 1960s and their view of life and happiness.
Another theme could be the heroic actions of Sammy in light of the treatment of the young girls. However, both Harriet Blodgett in her article Updikes AP (2003) and Corey Thompson in his article Updikes AP (2001) refuse to see Sammy as a hero, but more of an opportunist in the sense that he uses the girls appearance at the store as his basis for quitting his job (Harris). He had no other real excuse, but saw this as a heroic and chivalrous way in which to stand up for the girls. He would make himself feel important and will get out of a job he hated (Greiner 415).
Updike seems to put the chivalry back into the event, in the sense that Mr. Lengel reminds Sammy that he does not want to do this to his parents, and that this will be felt for the rest of your life (Updike 343). Sammy knows this, but follows through to stand up to Mr. Lengel, the AP, and the town in their old system of beliefs. It is like the new generation pushing to be heard, and this was just one step in the direction and into the future of the society (Greiner 415).
There is much in the way of underlying themes and symbols in the story of the AP. However, one must remember the time frame in which it was written. In 1962, the generations of flower children were making statements, and while it was only the beginning, it was still being felt by all. One could assume that Updike was using this story to show that this new freedom and system of beliefs was felt from the big cities to the little towns, and that the influence was felt all over. Updike wrote of the reality of the world. He used his fictions to represent the real life events that were taking place. He was not afraid to show the ugly or the bad side of life, as long as it was for a purpose (Harris). It was always from the outside looking in for the reader, so that the reader could evaluate the event from their own perspective, and whether conservative or liberal could see the error in the ways of the society.
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