17 pages • 34-minute read
The Chaser
A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Literary Devices
The Structure of Ironic Parable
The ironic parable often has a moral, though typically, that moral is turned on its ear. The brevity of “The Chaser” allows little room for psychological realism, plot, or character development. What the story does contain is a twist both sharp and unexpected, and simultaneous well telegraphed from the beginning in retrospect.
John Collier is updating the late 19th-century genre of the “parlor story.” Often told around a campfire or near a fireplace, such stories have uncomplicated structures and clear hooks that tweak the attentions of their audience, and which evoke a strong, discernable reaction of fear or laughter. Such stories live continuously in an oral tradition, most commonly in the form of jokes.
The Unreliable Protagonist
Either Alan Austen is an immensely gullible person, or, at least, his lack of imagination makes him vulnerable in love, commerce, and crime. He immediately believes in the working effects of a love potion sold in a nondescript shop, from a proprietor recommended from an outside source.
Alan’s self-absorption means that he cannot disentangle love from lust, and cannot conceive that overwhelming passion that never ended would cost him and his beloved their freedom. His lack of imagination is matched by a lack of experience; he is simply too young to have seen love fail in the way older people know it can. Collier expects his audience to understand that this same lack of imagination will lead Austen to murder, which is, like the love potion, simply a shortcut to the wit, charm and empathy one requires to either kindle or sustain a loving relationship. Indeed, the true tragedy is that Collier assumes that Alan Austen is a type, easily found among the population of youth, readily sold and product to intermediate the sort of emotional bonds that make human life worthy of regard.
The Power of Euphemism
Euphemism is the replacement of one harsh or blunt word for another word that softens the meaning, such as replacing “sweat” with “perspiration.” The old man never describes anything in straightforward terms. The murder weapon he sells is a “life cleaner,” for instance. His love potion is a solution to certain “impulses” (416).
At its best, euphemism assists the flow of ordinary conversation, keeping things light and to the point, and with the maximum deference to other’s experience and level of tolerance. At its worst, however, euphemism disguises intolerable realities better faced head-on, often to the benefit of those perpetuating those realities for their own profit. When repeated, such euphemisms become normalized, affecting the tolerances and prejudices of those who use them. For instance, there is no reason to believe that the proprietor of the shop thinks of his own products as murder weapons, or as “mickeys.” He, too, may think of them, when he thinks of them at all, as “life cleaners” and “love potions.” He probably could not sell his products without softening their effects for himself, nor would be a good representative of them without innately believing their benefits better than their deficits.
Unlock all 17 pages of this Study Guide
Get in-depth, chapter-by-chapter summaries and analysis from our literary experts.
- Grasp challenging concepts with clear, comprehensive explanations
- Revisit key plot points and ideas without rereading the book
- Share impressive insights in classes and book clubs