Getting Sent for

“Getting Sent For”

Anges Owen’s short story, “Getting Sent For” was one which most definitely made me a have a strong reaction to its ending. The story is about a mother, Mrs Sharp, being sent for by the Headmistress of her son’s school, Miss McHare. Although initially quiet and withdrawn, Mrs Sharp goes on to defend her son, George and completely turns the tables on the Headmistress. By close examination of the story, I intend to show how the ending was surprising and continue to highlight how the rest of the story had a strong relationship to the ending.

I found the end of the story surprising for a number of reasons. Owens uses dialogue and description to give us a clear insight into the characters as they appear at the end. There are two obvious endings to this story. Mrs Sharp turns to her friend and says that her son is “a proper little devil.” This ending is obviously ironic as all through the story she has defended her son against these charges and here we see that she knew this all along. Secondly we see a complete turnaround in the relationship between Mrs Sharp and Miss McHare. We see that Mrs Sharp leaves giving a “hard laugh.” She also “flounced out of the room.” She threatens to put the Headmistress “on a charge.” In contrast Miss McHare is “flushed purple with rage,” and sits at the telephone “with her head in her hands.” Here we see that Owens puts Mrs Sharp in complete control of the situation. She has “won” the obvious confrontation between the two as the description and dialogue clearly show. This is why the ending was a complete surprise to me as this was not what we had expected at the beginning of the story.

At the beginning of the story Owens uses description and dialogue to clearly show us who holds power and authority in the relationship. Mrs Sharp is described as knocking “timidly” on the door. She “shuffled in, slightly hunched” and when she addresses Miss McHare she “coughed apologetically.” When she speaks her first words are “Oh...