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Abduction

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Abduction
By Mia Christiansen

1)
Abduction is a short story written by Shelagh Delaney in 2002. From the beginning the story takes place in Manchester, but the scene changes to Kensington in London and tells us about a woman named Ann, the main character. The title of the story Abduction describes the story very well. Ann “abducts” her younger brother, who has just left school to live with her in London. He was only 16 years old when Ann took him from their parents. She has high expectations of him like a mother. In general she acts as if he was her own child. The story is told by an unknown narrator, who is a part of the story. It is told in the past tense.

We are introduced to three characters: the main character Ann, her younger brother and the narrator. Ann is the oldest child in the family. She is a typical older sister. She is described as clever, independent, very self-assured, and proud. She is very successful and focuses on education and job. She left her home town and moved to London as soon as the opportunity came up. You can see this in the text: “When the best job opportunity, working in a London children's hospital, came along, she couldn't get out of Manchester quick enough” (l. 30, p. 1). Ann loves children and she likes working as paediatrician. She has a good job and a big house in Kensington and she spends her time looking at cultural things like theatres and art galleries. Life she had always wanted. Ann’s younger brother is the youngest in the family, the family baby and he has no education or job yet. In a way he is the opposite of Ann. Ann put him in college doing media studies, but he has no interest in the media. He only picks media studies because “he knew his sister expected something of him and media studies seemed the lesser of all the evils that college offered” (l. 10, p. 2). He loves music, dancing and sports. He has learnt

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