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The Company Man Analysis Essay

Decent Essays

ANALYSIS 7 Essay: The Company Man
The typical business man involved in corporate America works anywhere from six to ten hours per day. Phil, “the Company Man” worked six days a week sometimes until eight or nine at night, making himself a true workaholic. Using his life story before he died Goodman is able to convey her liking toward Phil but her dislike of what the business world has turned him into. Not only does Goodman use a number of rhetorical devices but she also uses Phil’s past as well as the people who were once in Phil’s life to get her message across to her reader. Ellen Goodman sarcastically creates the obituary of a man who dedicated his life to his job and the company he worked for. Goodman uses anaphora, satire, diction, …show more content…

Phil’s constancy and lack of variation are embodied in rigid words such as “always,” “of course,” and “Type A.” Extreme diction such as “overweight,” “nervous,” and “workaholic” convey Phil as a worrywart with no fun at all in his life. These words mock Phil as a man sincerely obsessed with work that had lost track of his priorities. Goodman deepens her point when she introduces Phil’s family, using diction in relation to business to further emphasize the importance of work to Phil. To Phil’s wife Helen, “A company friend said ‘I know how much you will miss him.’ And she answered, ‘I already have.’” His eldest son tells the reader of how he went around the neighborhood gathering research on his father. His daughter recalls how whenever she was alone with him they had nothing to say to each other. When Phil’s youngest son reminisces on how he tried to mean enough to his father to keep him at home. Goodman informs the reader that the youngest child was Phil’s favorite. Goodman’s sentence structure of long, short, long, helps the shorter sentence stick out more to the reader. But she ends the paragraph with a sad ironic sentence, “My father and I only board here.” implying that he never really was successful. The descriptions of Phil in “The Company Man” are sardonically accusatory of the present way people live in society. Goodman makes light of how Phil is a heart attack waiting to happen, his seventy-hour workweeks and egg sandwiches. “Of course,”

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