Homework: For Tuesday, Read "Twelve Moments in the Life of the Artist" and "Youth in Asia"
Prepare for a reading quiz on the essays so far.
Characters
Miss Chrissy Samson
Miss Samson is Sedaris's fifth-grade speech therapist. She is clever, often trying to trick
Sedaris into pronouncing words that will demonstrate his lisp. Her therapy sessions are
a nuisance and embarrassment to Sedaris so he works diligently at developing a new
vocabulary to avoid using S-words. In hindsight, these efforts may have contributed to
Sedaris's future as a writer.
Miss Samson waits until her last session with Sedaris to share some friendly banter.
She reveals that she has a fiancé who is in Vietnam, but is from Roanoke, Virginia. She
has a grandmother in Asheville who she will spend Christmas with while her fiancé is
overseas. She is also a college football fan, willing to make the drive from Asheville to
Jacksonville after the holidays to watch Florida play Tennessee in the Gator Bowl.
The cunning Miss Samson shares these personal tidbits because she takes her role as
a teacher seriously. It is all a ploy to trick Sedaris into saying that he is sorry, an S-word.
Once he says it, she delights in her accomplishment.
In hindsight, Sedaris presents Miss Samson as an important character in his
development as a writer.
Mr. Mancini
Mr. Mancini is the guitar teacher at the North Hills Mall in Raleigh where Sedaris
unwillingly takes guitar lessons as a child. Mr. Mancini is a very short man who is
obviously uncomfortable with himself. Thus, he presents himself in an overbearing
manner and often alludes to being a ladies' man.
Mr. Mancini's personality consistently makes Sedaris uncomfortable, especially since he
demands that Sedaris name his guitar after a woman. Mr. Mancini's macho image
crumbles one day when Sedaris witnesses him being made fun of for his size by a
group of teenagers.
Though Sedaris identifies with being an outcast and attempts to bridge the gap between
them, Mr. Mancini is clearly so self-conscious that he adamantly opposes this attempt.
Mr. Mancini is so insecure that he makes it explicit that he is a very masculine, straight
man, unlike Sedaris.
Mr. Sedaris
Mr. Sedaris (aka, Lou), is David Sedaris's father. In this entire compilation of essays, Mr.
Sedaris is clearly one of most significant people in Sedaris's life.
Mr. Sedaris is a computer engineer for IBM who has an enthusiasm for understanding
and explaining the inner workings of all things. He also has an infatuation with jazz
music and is often overly boisterous about it. Mr. Sedaris is not shy about showing the
passion he has for his interests, and this characteristic often embarrasses Sedaris
during his childhood.
Mr. Sedaris is obviously a man who cares a great deal about his children and is always
an enthusiastic supporter, and sometimes has unrealistic expectations. For instance,
when his children are young, he purchases instruments and accompanying lessons for
each in hopes of one day seeing them play together on stage.
Even when his children are grown he remains a supportive parent. Although at times he
is known to mock Sedaris, it is often in the best interest of his son who may need a
quick lesson in humility.
Mr. Sedaris is a bit of an eccentric and is extremely thrifty. He is known for hiding food in
unusual places for safe-keeping and will eat these hidden treasures well past their shelf
life. He is also the person in charge of tasks like grocery shopping, where he makes a
habit of retrieving out-of-date produce and meat to save the family money. Mr. Sedaris
is in fact so cheap that when he talks of eating an unidentifiable brown object found in
his suitcase, his children are not at all surprised when he admits that it was part of an
old hat.
Reggie
Reggie is a man with a seriously inflated self-image. He works alongside Sedaris on a
construction clean up crew when Sedaris is twenty-five years old, and is always
complaining about his job. Reggie's primary complaint is that he is a genius and is too
smart and talented to be cleaning up construction sites. Reggie and his enormous ego
are very much disliked by Sedaris.
Amy Sedaris
Amy is the sister of the author, David Sedaris. Like her brother, Amy is also a comedian.
Unlike her sisters, Amy never developed a self-conscious attitude, which Sedaris
attributes to her love of costumes. Even as a child she never spent enough time being
herself to become self-conscious.
Amy is obviously one of Sedaris's closer siblings, and shares a similar sense of humor.
As children, Amy often worked on impersonations of her teachers or parents' friends,
and at one time even had her own father convinced over the telephone she was a friend
of her mother's.
As adults, both Sedaris and his sister Amy live in New York City. While living in New
York, Amy is part of a special piece in a magazine about interesting women in New York.
Prior to the photo shoot, Amy does not become obsessed with her self-image or her
looks, like other women might. Rather, she enjoys her time in a "fatty suit", a costume
item meant to make her appear obese. She even convinces her father that she gained a
significant amount of weight. As the thinnest and most beautiful of the Sedaris children,
this comes as a great disappointment to Mr. Sedaris, but she seems entertained by his
response.
The day of the photo shoot, Amy remains a true impersonator. She does not ask the
make-up artist to emphasize her beauty, and instead asks to be made up to appear as if
she has just been beaten up.
Gretchen Sedaris
Gretchen is another one of David Sedaris's sisters. During their teenage years,
Gretchen is known for being the sibling with the ability to achieve the perfect tan through
her own method of body oils and suggestive positions.
Gretchen is also the inspiration, albeit unintentional, for Sedaris's choice to become an
artist. When they were children, Gretchen was praised for being a talented painter.
Envious of the attention his sister received, Sedaris launched into his path as an artist.
Paul Sedaris
Paul is the youngest of the Sedaris children and David Sedaris's only brother. Unlike his
older siblings, Paul acquired a thick North Carolina accent, uses terms like ma'am, and
prefers drinks like Mountain Dew. He uses an overwhelming amount of profanity, which
are generally the only distinguishable words in his drawling, rapidly spoken sentences.
Paul is best described as a bit of a hayseed. He gets into bar fights and has a relatively
juvenile attitude. Sedaris describes him as the black sheep of the family. However, Paul
is also the only Sedaris sibling that remaines in Raleigh, North Carolina near their
parents. Though he is brash, has a special connection with Mr. Sedaris and is there to
comfort him when Mrs. Sedaris passes on.
Mrs. Sedaris
Mrs. Sedaris is often considered a miracle worker by her children. Her love of animals is
shared by her children as are a number of other characteristics. She is a bit more
frivolous than her husband and concerns herself with more superficial things, like a
good tan.
Hugh
Hugh is Sedaris's boyfriend. Hugh and Sedaris met in New York City through a friend.
Hugh is evidently financially well off, and enjoys peaceful nights cooking at home
opposed to jumping into the wild New York social scene. He has a home in Normandy,
France that he and Sedaris visit in the summer, during the first seven years of their
relationship. Thereafter, he moves to Paris with Sedaris.
Hugh is a bit more sophisticated than Sedaris and has a taste for finer things, like fancy
SoHo restaurants. He grew up in Africa because his father had a job with the US
government and was stationed there. Having grown up in Africa, Hugh witnessed a
number of disturbing things as a child that Sedaris was protected from. It is implied in
the text that Hugh's childhood experiences contribute to his mannerisms, taste, and
more sophisticated demeanor.
Valencia
Valencia is a Columbian woman who purchases a townhouse that Sedaris admires, and
paints it an obnoxious hot pink with tangerine trim. She is an independently wealthy
woman who wants to live life like a starving artist. Valencia always acts as if she cannot
afford a thing and chooses to furnish her apartment in used dumpster fare and the latest
piece made by one of her deadbeat artist friends.
Sedaris works as Valencia's assistant where she has him doing menial tasks, such as
paying her bills. Her working relationship with Sedaris eventually fizzles when one day
she requests that Sedaris degrade himself by calling out "Cheeky" to a pigeon.
Patrick
Patrick owns a moving company in New York City where Sedaris takes a job as a mover
after working for Valencia. Patrick is very much a blue collar guy with distaste for the
wealthy and a soft spot for those in need of a little help.
Alisha
Alisha is a good friend of Sedaris's. She visits him once a year and always makes
herself comfortable in a way that alleviates him from having to constantly entertain her.
To Sedaris she is the perfect house guest, but she is also prone to being a bad judge of
character and one year brings a new friend, Bonnie, with her to visit Sedaris in New
York.
Bonnie
Bonnie is the new friend of Alisha who is invited on Alisha's annual trip to New York City
to visit Sedaris. Before her trip to New York, Bonnie had not been outside a fifty mile
radius of her home town in Greensborough, North Carolina. She is unsure of herself in a
big city like New York and is at first overly suspicious of every person she meets. Unlike
Alisha, Bonnie arrives with a detailed itinerary of her plans, expecting Sedaris to play
tour guide.
When Bonnie does not get her way she pouts until Sedaris and Alisha can't take it.
Once Bonnie gets her way she is in heaven. She makes a point to see every tourist
attraction in the city and soon discover that she fits right in among the tourists, not the
New Yorkers.
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