Beginning of Essay
Jean Stafford's "In the Zoo" is a short story that cleverly uses animals to further develop the human characters. Each human character in the short story has his/her own personality likeness bestowed upon an animal. The human characters are complex and well dra ....

Middle of Essay
.... These are a few examples of how animals are used throughout the novel to mold the reader's understanding of the human character they correspond to. One of the strongest illustrated characters in this story is Mrs. Placer, or "Gran" for short. The first description we hear of Gran comes from an unidentified person who glorifies her as a woman of "Christian goodness" (p. 1452). In this first paragraph the reader learns that Gran has had tough times herself in the loss of her husband and by single-handedly running a boarding house. Gran seems to be a courteous woman by accepting the care for the orphaned narrator and her sister, but her character is n ....