what's real???

"An Occurence At Owl Creek Bridge" is a short story that definetly plays with your mind. If it wasn't for the point of this course, I would not have expected the major twist at the end. The lie in this story, if thought of another way, does not necessarily have to be a lie; that "second ending" probably served a purpose. The author's intention might have been giving the reader a view into Peyton's afterlife. In movies and tv shows, the shot after a person dies is usually of he/she surviving and having a happy ending. This primarily is for the reader because as a human being, we need to know that the person is going to be ok; that there is some sort of happy ending to the story. Because Peyton was unjustly executed, the author mislead the reader to give him/she a hint of hope. And even though Bierce abruptly exposed the truth at the end, the reader is still left with some satisfaction due to the fact that the second ending was written in the first place.

Bierce's imagery is so vivid and so detailed that he makes it almost impossible to distinguish it from the truth (which I'm sure is his goal). And even though Peyton's escape was like a scene from an action movie --- something that can never happen in real life --- the reader still believes it because they want to. So the question is: does it matter that his survival was a lie? Of course it depends on the reader him/herself, but what is comes down to is if the reader minds that he/she was deceived. Because that's exactly what the author did, he decieved his audience to either get a reaction or to force minds to think more about his story. Then the reader has to wonder if the fact that Peyton dies was real; because if Bierce lied once, what would stop him from doing it again...that's where your imagination has to come into play.