GHOSTCONNIE JAY MARAAN

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:CONNIE JAY MARAAN was/is written works: The Boundary "Transient and other short stories The Childrens Hour: Stories on Childhood. professor in De La Salle University an obscure writer, not so well anthologized.-Dr. Joyce Arriola (Department of Literature, Faculty of Arts and Letters and the Graduate School of the University of Santo Tomas) ahe current author presents herself as a prose writer whose story Ghost has been included in the UST textbook. was nominated for an award for an annual fellowship who is completing a work in any of the following genres: poetry, fiction, drama, and creative nonfiction a bionote on her is being constructed but is not yet ready on a website about her.

SETTINGS: Tayuman flashback of the 1990 crash and the protagonists life

CHARACTERS:1. The Ghost genderless no sense of feeling2. The Creator flat character no beard hardly looks fatherly androgynous in appearance3. Friend taught the art of hand-holding pleasantly rotund but crude in conversation4. His / Her Better-half had an argument with the ghosts past life in the summer of 1984 stole a red banana for the ghost when he / she was still alive had a weakness for family and friends gathering

SUMMARY/ANALYSIS (1):The story is all about a ghost who died when the Tayuman LRT Station suddenly collapsed and the train came falling down on his face. A recently dead man recalls how he came to be in the afterlife and according to him, he has seen Christ because of that incident.

In Connie Jan Maraans story entitled Ghost, she applied various symbols to express what happened in the accident, used rhetorical devices to make the story more colorful and depicted the possible events that may happen after death. Maraan is an interesting writer who uses lively descriptions and language in depicting the realities presented in the story. She helps the readers attain a good understanding of the possible beauty in what could otherwise be morbidity in its very notion. Death is presented and tackled in the most acceptable terms like making anything possible because of the absence of feeling.

Analyzing the story using symbolical Approach, we would probably be asking ourselves what symbolizes the train and statues or medallions in the story, or if it is possible for a dead person to still live in our world, and if it is possible for him to remember his life before death. Death is the main idea that the story is presenting. We know that if a man dies, he/she will either go to heaven or hell. But in Maraans story the spirit, she presented that if a person dies, he/she will be remain in another persons heads and will stay as a memory. Just like religious statues or medallions that reminds us that God is with us all the time. We can conclude that the story is telling us not to disregard our deceased loved ones, to always let them remain in our hearts and make their memory live with us always.

When people think of trains and their functions, they simply view them as modes of transportation. In this story, this is not solely the case. While it is true that trains are included in the setting, the trains may be present for underlying reasons.

As Connie uses train as a symbol, It has been used as a place where the protagonists accidentally meet, go their separate ways with her love ones, take the time to think, work on something or just contemplating, and even as a place of rest and relaxation. As the protagonist journey back and forth in his memory in the train it helps him relieve his doubt and make him realize that things had happened and that he is dead.In the story, the main character doesnt want to die or even to accept that she is dead. She always reminisced so many things that she left that needed to done. I miss my senses, or rather cant get use to having them. This statement shows that she misses being alive. She misses feeling things. While I know I have lived through them, knowing is not feeling. Since she is already dead, she no longer has the senses of a living person. Sight, touch, taste, hearing. She also missed the feeling of love and her loved one. Maybe, someday, Tayuman will reward you with a glimpse of my ghost. This statement of hers was addressed her loved one.

As what the story was telling, she was trying to buy a figurine from Tayuman and slabs of concrete fell on them, which what caused her death. In a bitter sweet way, shes like saying that if her lover would someday visit Tayuman, she wanted that her lover would remember her, the spot where she died and the moment the accident happened. I think in this part she is getting emotional. She had so many unfinished things in life, restless with her death but yet optimistic in a way: remembering and highlighting on the things that were special to her and sentimental.As the symbols point it, the main character of the story just needs to accept her death and move on. There is nothing she can do anymore.

As a moral, people should live their lives as if its our last to prevent experiencing what the main character did. We should let our loved ones feel that we love them every day, so that when our day comes, we wont be regretting anything we didnt do when its already too late to change.

ANALYSIS (2):In Connie Jan Maraans story entitled Ghost, she applied various symbols to express what happened in the accident, used rhetorical devices to make the story more colourful and depicted the possible events that may happen after death. Maraan is an interesting writer who uses lively descriptions and language in depicting the realities presented in the story. She helps the readers attain a good understanding of the possible beauty in what could otherwise be morbidity in its very notion. Death is presented and tackled in the most acceptable terms like making anything possible because of the absence of feeling.

Analysing the story using Mimetic Approach, we would probably be asking ourselves if it is possible for a dead person to still live in our world, if it is possible for him to remember his life before death. Death is the main idea that the story is presenting. We know that if a man dies, he/she will either go to heaven or hell. But in Maraans story the spirit, she presented that if a person dies he/she will be remain in other persons heads and will stay as a memory. We can conclude that the story is telling us not to disregard our deceased loved ones, to always let them remain in our hearts and make their memory live with us always.