Chapter 8: The Luncheon

a. The author of this story is a humorist. It mainly works to make others laugh. The author skillfully employs humour in his story from the start to the end. In the beginning, the author explains a humorous instance when the lady asked him to provide her lunch at a costly restaurant Foyot. According to the financial crisis of the author, visiting the costly restaurant Foyot was not within his budget. The author does calculations and finally decides to visit Foyot with the lady to experience a few embarrassing moments, which makes it humorous for the readers. In the beginning, on entering the restaurant, the author was taken aback when the lady ordered caviare, salmon, asparagus and champagne. These situations testify to the author’s sense of humour. The way the author did not place orders for himself so that his budget was not revealed is also humorous. The way the author explains the lady as a woman of forty who is imposing rather than attractive is humorous. In the end, when the lady asks him to follow her path of having lunch, the author replies humorously that he would do better without eating anything. Hence, the story shows the sense of humour of the author from the start to the end. Each and every instance shown in the entire story expresses the author’s sense of humour.

b. The story describes how the lady friend of the author suggested having lunch in a costly restaurant Foyot with the author. With all the monetary constraints, he decided to go to the restaurant where especially senators visit. He chalked up an idea to order a few items in the expensive restaurant so that his budget for the month would not be affected. The real irony was exposed when his lady friend starts placing orders one by one without even having an idea about the author’s budget. In the end, she asked him to follow her example to have a little luncheon, to which the author answered that he would do much better by not having dinner that night. This makes his lady friend remark – ‘you are quite a humorist’.

c. The story contains many events to depict the ability of the author to laugh at himself. At the beginning, the author says that the lady suggested visiting a costly restaurant like Foyot. The author says that as he was younger than the lady, he was not able to say no to her invitation. At the restaurant, when she started to order expensive dishes one after the other, he was able to observe the irony. He then laughed at himself for accepting her invitation to a luncheon in Foyot. From the start of the story to the end, he demonstrates his ability to laugh at himself.

This story is composed in a first-person narrative which makes the readers familiar with the mindset of the narrator and his evident anticipation, apprehension and embarrassment of visiting the costly restaurant Foyot at the suggestion of his lady friend. It allows us to go deeper into the confusion and the fear developed by the narrator inside himself. The polite and soft gesture exhibited by the narrator in front of his lady friend explains the sheer embarrassment and monetary dilemma that he was experiencing. It allows the reader to visualise his mind about the anger and sarcasm which he possessed against his lady friend. The variations in the external gentility and inner mental stress help us to understand his plight, which gives rise to irony.