The reason why Sammy quits is the result of his sudden awareness of having given up his freedom which is very well announced in the two first sentences: In walks these three girls in nothing but bathing suits/I m in the third check-out slot where the free behavior of the girls contrasts with Sammy s slave condition.

In a word, "A & P" is the story of a conflict between two concepts, Freedom and Alienation that are suddenly brought face to face through the "sacrilegious" entry of the girls into the A & P.

And the real interest of this extract consists in the various dimensions of this confrontation since it is based on three main types of opposition relying on esthetics, economics, and sociology.

The esthetical dimension of the story opposes youth (that symbolizes beauty) and old age that corrupts everything and makes people ugly. This refers of course to the contrast between the angelic beauty (with strong erotic connotations) of the girls and the repulsive face of the witch about fifty with rouge on her cheekbones and no eyebrows .

The economic dimension of the story is based on the opposition between the business activities in the town and the idleness of the girls who come from what stands for freedom, the beach: As I say, we re right in the middle of town, and if you stand at our front doors you can see two banks and the Congregational church [which symbolizes, in a way, the narrow moral norm] and the newspaper store and three real-estate offices and about twenty-seven old free-loaders tearing up Central Street because the sewer broke again. It is not as if we re on the Cape; we re north of Boston and there s people in this town haven t seen the ocean for twenty year .

The third dimension of the story, the sociological one, ensues from the former one. It opposes people suffering under work alienation or social norm and the girls who seem to be appearances, with no past, no story, no family, no social status. This is particularly obvious when we read: A few house-slaves in pin curlers even looked around after pushing their carts past to make sure what they had seen was correct ; And anyway these are usually women with six children and varicose veins mapping their legs and: Now her hands are empty, not a ring or a bracelet, bare as God made them, and I wonder where the money s coming out .

All these oppositions just can lead but to the verbal conflict between the girls and the manager during which the pressure of the social norm becomes unbearable for Sammy especially. But I won t qualify his decision to quit as an irrational one, merely imposed by his desire to become Queenie s unsuspected hero .

On the contrary, I think that the contrast revealed by the entry of the girls into the A & P had a strong setting off impact on him of course, the behavior of the girls was very provocative, but it helped Sammy to take his decision.

In fact, I am convinced that Sammy was already psychologically ready to find his freedom again (this freedom he had perhaps never had). This matter of fact can be deduced from Sammy s very critical description of his own life. He is conscious of his alienation that is shown through the mechanical organization of the A &P: the cat-and-dog-food-breakfast-cereal-macaroni-rice-raisin-seasonings-spreads-spaghetti-soft drinks-crackers-and-cookies aisle , light bulbs , six-packs of candy bars , plastic toys done up in cellophane .

He is also conscious of the social pressure coming from his family ( Now here comes the sad part of the story, at least my family says it s sad but I don t think it s sad myself ; Sammy you don t want to do this to your Mom and Dad ) and from his manager ( He [Lengel] didn t like my smiling ).

Sammy s decision is thus a very fair and courageous one. Of course, his future becomes uncertain by renouncing to the dead-end job but this is the price for freedom, for not becoming an iron human being like Lengel (and like perhaps each of us in some extent), as the two last sentences suggest it:

Looking back in the big windows, over the bags of peat moss and aluminum lawn furniture stacked on the pavement, I could see Lengel in my place in the slot, checking the sheep through. His face was dark gray and his back stiff, as if he d just an injection of iron .