Shoes (1916) Intertitles

Sadly, she imagined a different life one filled with luxury and pleasure. Provides exposition for previous POV sequence with the shoes and transitions to ballroom sequence.

Wednesday and Thursday in contined to rain. Establishes timeline of events.

There they were.../Her shoes!/Poor child, she knew / them by heart. Narration as free indirect discourse that precedes close-up of desired object (the shoes), creating a narrative frame for the close-up as a POV shot.

"Other men find work!" dialogue spoken by mother to father, advances characterization of father as a bum.

Every evening she scraped the caked mud from her bare, swollen feet. Exposition that creates pathos for the protagonist.

She caught a bad cold. Her throat hurt / and her head ached. Exposition creating pathos.

Sometimes she lay awake / in the night--wide-eyed--/ thinking of the fate of / her family. Provides exposition and explanation of the fantastically personified Hand of Poverty in the next shot.

By Saturday she was so / utterly miserable that it / seemed she could hardly / live until that night when / she would get her / new shoes. Exposition establishes timeline and also uses free indirect discourse to frame the next sequence and its exchange.

At last it was time to receive the blessed pay envelope. Exposition establishing timeline and mood.

"Aren't you going to me / the three dollars, Mama?" dialogue as exposition for previous exhange.

"I can't do it, child. We got to eat / and no one will let us have / any thing more except / for cash." Dialogue explaining core narrative problem from mother's perspective and the issue of debt.

"I've got to have a new pair of shoes." Dialogue to father.

"I'll be sure to find some / work, and I'll give you / the money then." Dialogue after father shows off his broken shoes, establishes family power dynamic and reason for poverty.

"We haven't tasted / meat all week, mother." Dialogue from younger siblings expresses pathos and desperation, and basic needs as trumping commodity culture and personal need.

It was only a matter / of hours before they would / literally fall to pieces. / She felt that the end / had come. Exposition with free indirect discourse. It also parallels the fate of the object (her broken shoes) with the individual's mind and the narrative conclusion.

"Give me carefare, mama. I'm going to Lil's / over Sunday." Dialogue as exposition that establishes that the protagonist lies to her mother because the next sequence at The Blue Goose.