At the Bar Revision Notes

[missmcgrory]

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[missmcgrory]

At the Bar: Revision Notes

CHARACTER

The Big Man AKA Rafferty

“ill fitting suit”
“slightly out of fashion”
“he seemed uncertain what to order”
“bemused innocence”
“But the Big Man wasn’t looking at her so much as reading her, like a long novel”
– makes the barman wonder if he is just out of prison.

“The charcoal gray cloth sat on him loosely, but that looked like the suit’s problem. You wouldn’t have fancied whoever the suit might fit to come against the man who wore it” – he may be thin, but the Big Man is still tough and the barman thinks he exudes an air of aggression/ like he could be violent

“the bar man felt as if he was pouring out the Big Man’s blood” – makes you feel that the barman is on the Big Man’s side, so we feel that the act of violence he commits is almost justified

The Man in Denim

“nasty hard. A broad pitted face framed in long black hair” – ugly, bad impression for the reader
“someone the bar man didn’t like” – we see things from the bar man’s point of view so we automatically dislike the man in denim, too

“one of those who kept looking over his shoulder as if they know somebody must be trying to take a liberty and they’re determined to catch him at it” – looking for a fight

“he took his pint like a penance” – word ‘penance’ suggests punishment, like he is so negative he cannot enjoy his pint

“he kept glancing along at the Big Man and seemed annoyed not to get any reaction” – he is looking for a fight with the Big Man.

NARRATIVE PERSPECTIVE

We see things from the barman’s point of view, so we only know as much about the characters as he does, and we feel the same way about them as he does.


IMAGERY

Similes
“Old Dave came towards the bar as if he was walking across America” – shows that the pub normally attracts elderly people, it is a quiet pub, unused to trouble.

“he took his pint like a penance” – see above notes on The Man in Denim

“The silence prolonged itself like an empty street with a man either side of it” –
Shows the tension between the two men (BM and MiD) and how no-one else wants to interfere.

“the moment crackled like an electrical storm” – this conveys the tension and fear

“the bar man felt as if he was pouring out the Big Man’s blood” – even the bar man feels that the big man has been emasculated by the man in denim drinking his pint. At this point the bar man is half relieved that the big man hasn’t responded with violence (yet!!), but also surprised and embarrassed for him. Everything changes not long after this line.

“the big man’s clenched right hand had hit the base of the glass like a demolition-ball” – this comparison shows the power of the big man and the extreme nature fo the violence of this act.

SETTING
A pub in Scotland.

The pub is clearly very quiet, and peaceful, as we can see from the regulars, Old Dave and Sal (see quotations above). This is a place unused to violence, which is why the barman feels uneasy a) about the man in denim being there b) about Rafferty’s entrance and appearance and c) the tension between them and the threat of violence this poses.

The place is distinctly Scottish – we can tell this from the dialogue and the language used e.g. the man in denim says: “Ye had a pint. But ah drank it.”

This links to the main theme which is about masculine (male) identity in Scotland. See below for further notes on this.


THEME/MESSAGE

The writer, MacIlvanney, has written this to make a point about masculine identity in Scotland. He is saying that in Scottish society, there is pressure on men to use violence and aggression to maintain status/get the respect of others.

When we had a class discussion about if we could imagine something like this really happening in a pub in Scotland, the whole class agreed that this sort of thing is a normal occurrence.

But if you think about it, doesn’t it seem like quite an extreme act of violence in response to something minor? A man drank another man’s drink, so it is just ACCEPTED that it is OK for the man to retaliate by smashing the glass over his face!

Because it is from the bar man’s point of view, we agree with everything the bar man thinks. Clearly the bar man expects there to be violence and, indeed, thinks that the Big Man (Rafferty) is being weak if he does not respond violently. We know this because he says he felt “as if he was pouring out the Big Man’s blood” when the Big Man asks to buy the Man in Denim a pint of his own. This is not saying that the bar man condones violence, he has just grown to expect it from these types of men in society.