In John Updike's "A&P", the main character Sammy, is developed through the use of setting. The story starts off with a young man discontent with his ordinary adult surroundings and moves to his need to change it. Throughout the story, Sammy describes and interprets the scenes around him, consequently revealing his own character. Although the physical setting of the grocery store is left more to the reader's imagination, Updike uses the vivid images of the other characters to illustrate the setting through Sammy's point of view. The characters create the setting, and the insight into young Sammy's mind leads us to see it through his eyes. Sammy's character can be seen through his interpretation of the customers, his manager, and the young girls visiting the store.
First, Sammy interprets the customers as being old, dull and unable to relate to young people. The fist customer he comes across he describes as a "witch about fifty" and a "cash register watcher". He even notes that it makes her day to see him trip up. It is at this point that he begins to make it evident that he doesn't particularly care for the customers. In the fifth paragraph he goes on to describe the customers as "sheep" and "house slaves in pin curlers". While he describes the general look of shock and disapproval towards the group of young girls he so admires, he is making it evident of the worlds and decades between he and his customers. He describes them as being so banal that even had dynamite been set off they would keep pushing their carts, muttering to themselves. Towards the end of the story when he announces that he is quitting, he goes on to say that "a couple customers that had been heading for my slot begin to knock against each other, like scared pigs in a chute." While he sees himself as being a risk taker he sees the customers as afraid of confrontation, thereby widening the gap between them. Sammy can't seem to relate to the customers in any way and thereby shows how his character sees himself as a younger and much more exciting type.
