Question

How does the author use comedic elements to describe the bureaucracy of the animals?? What impact do these elements have on the theme of the story?

Answer 1

The story’s theme is the disconnect from regular conventions of society. Sandburg provides a humorous depiction of the animals’ meeting on a serious matter. He places animals with nonsensical names in real locales, such as Philadelphia and Minnesota, to juxtapose the real and the imaginary. He also depicts the animals taking part in meetings that have the same bureaucracy and forced formality often found in real-life meetings.

"It is no picnic to lose your tail and we are here for business," he said, banging his gavel again.

The animals’ meeting offers an amusing representation of the bureaucratic meetings that humans often engage in:

"All in favor of the motion," said the chairman, "will clean their right ears with their right paws."

And all the blue foxes and all the yellow flongboos began cleaning their right ears with their right paws.

"All who are against the motion will clean their left ears with their left paws," said the chairman.

And all the blue foxes and all the yellow flongboos began cleaning their left ears with their left paws.

Sandburg’s parody on the bureaucracy and formality of society piques the reader’s interest by making the story comical and entertaining.

Step-by-step explanation:

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Answer 2

The bureaucratic style in the animals meeting is compared to real life incidents which take place in the life of human beings.

The behaviour of the chairman is extremely humorous when he says that animals in favour of the motion will clean their right ears with right paws.

He adds more fun by asking animals against the motion to clean their left ears with left paws.