Elizabeth Gilbert is an educated, ambitious journalist who had everything an average American woman would want - a husband, a lovely home in New York and a successful career. Aside from all the pleasures she already had, Elizabeth felt consumed by panic, grief and a great deal of confusion. After going through a divorce, a debilitating depression and a another failed love, Elizabeth decided to quit her job, leave everything behind and embark on a journey to find the art of pleasure, devotion and a balance between both worldly pleasure and spiritual devotion. Throughout her trips to Italy, India and Indonesia, she encounters various individuals that makes her trip that much more worthwhile. At her first stop, Italy, she enrolls herself in an Italian language class and submerges into the beauty of this romantic language. She learns the splendor behind the Italian culture and gains the best 23 pounds of her life. At her next stop in India, she spends hours of quite meditation at her Guru’s Ashram. At first, Gilbert finds it difficult to stay focused and meditate whole heartedly, being ...
Alexie, S. (2007). The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. New York: Hachette Book Group, Inc.
A path less traveled by is often depicted as a path of self-motivation and loneliness, that is when one finds oneself alone in the vast sea of people. Forcing one to either quit or search for acceptance to get support and opportunities to succeed. Easier said than done, acceptance is the most common struggles one has – to be recognized and share feelings and thoughts of one’s own. These struggles ranging from culture to morals to geographical and societal borders are epitomized by the Japanese picture brides in Otsuka’s The Buddha in the Attic as the brides transform into a new culture to show the situational paradoxes Japanese faced during the time period in which they find intriguing by prejudice against them divided
Tavernise, Peter. "Fasting of the Heart: Mother-Tradition and Sacred Systems in Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club." The Joy Luck Club Page. 1994 Home page. 11 Apr. 2001 <http://mindspring.com/~petert/tan.htm>.
“I found him very patient, very forbearing, and yet an exacting master: he expected me to do a great deal; and when I fulfilled his expectations, he, in his own way, fully testified his approbation. By degrees, he acquired a certain influence over me that took away my liberty of mind: his praise and notice were more restraining than his indifference. I could no longer talk or laugh freely when he was by; because a tiresomely importunate instinct reminded me that vivacity (at least in me) was distasteful to him. I was so aware that only serious moods and occupations were acceptable, that in is presence every effort to sustain or follow any other became vain: I fell under a freezing spell. When he said “go,” I went! “come,” I came;
Alexie, Sherman. The Absolute True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. New York: Hachette Book Group, 2007. Print.
Amy Tan is a Chinese-American writer who is the author of several works such as The Joy Luck Club, The Valley of Amazement, and “Fish Cheeks”. In the memoir “Fish Cheeks” she reflects on her struggle to accept her culture as a young girl, specifically recounting a Christmas dinner with her crush at the time “Robert” and his family, and the emotions she felt during. The story highlights how you should be accepting of your culture and embrace it; rather than try to hide it or be ashamed. Through several language techniques such as word choice, Tan highlights shame and other negative emotions she felt before and during the dinner.
Introduction: The novel Saving Fish from Drowning by Amy Tan follows the hapless journey of twelve Bay Area tourists destined for Burma, accompanied by the ghost of their dear friend Bibi Chen, who died under “mysterious circumstances” just before the departure. The journey continues in a downward spiral until eleven of the tourists go out on a misty lake one morning and disappear. Miss Chen, the omniscient voice of the book, is caught between two worlds and is along for this journey. It isn’t until the end of the book that readers realize many events that occur are actually a metaphor for human relations; and the central theme is that the line between reality and fantasy can be tricky to discern, and things can be vastly different from
For a reader who is trying to find a genuine understanding of the different cultures and societies around the world, the passages, “The Endless Hunt” and “Weird Karma” might not be a reliable source to refer to. In these narratives, the narrators describe personal experiences traveling to different parts of the world, which thus provides the readers a depiction of these places through their perspective. However, because the reader’s understanding of these environments are only given through the narrators’ insights, the cultures are not always accurately presented. The narrators in these texts distort the credibility of their narratives by providing misleading depictions of these areas that stray from the reality of their experience.
Saikaku, Ihara. Life of a Sensuous Woman. The Longman Anthology of World Literature. (Vol. D) Ed. Damrosch. New York: Pearson, 2004. 604-621. [Excerpt.]
For some people life may not be satisfactory. Life has many troubles including death, pain, and suffering. It leaves little hope. There are ways in which people can live to have a good life. This method of how a person should live is viewed differently thoughout the world. James Hilton represents this combination of ideas and cultures in the novel, Lost Horizon (1933). This novel tells the tale of four distinctively different people retreating from a war zone. In their retreat they are kidnapped and taken by plane deep into the Himalayan mountain wilderness. Little did they know that here in the confines of the mountains there is a paradise. This paradise is called Shangri-La and is a Tibetan Monastery and community in a place of splendid beauty. Surprisingly, the kidnapped group finds that they are considered guests in this elevated community. They are apprehensive of the cerebrated treatment that they receive, but soon accept and enjoy their "misfortune." Shangri-La is a paradise, but the guests become held prisoner to pleasure and happiness.
Kothari employs a mixture of narrative and description in her work to garner the reader’s emotional investment. The essay is presented in seventeen vignettes of differing lengths, a unique presentation that makes the reader feel like they are reading directly from Kothari’s journal. The writer places emphasis on both her description of food and resulting reaction as she describes her experiences visiting India with her parents: “Someone hands me a plate of aloo tikki, fried potato patties filled with mashed channa dal and served with a sweet and a sour chutney. The channa, mixed with hot chilies and spices, burns my tongue and throat” (Kothari). She also uses precise descriptions of herself: “I have inherited brown eyes, black hair, a long nose with a crooked bridge, and soft teeth
Saikaku, Ihara. Life of a Sensuous Woman. The Norton Anthology of World Literature. 3rd Ed. Volume D. Ed. Martin Puchner. New York: Norton, 2013. 591-611. Print.
The average person wants one thing more than anything else, and that thing is to belong. Usha, a young girl from Calcutta, is no different. Already trying the find her place in the world, Usha must now assimilate into cultural society within the United States. Usha’s uncle, Pranab Kaku, came from Calcutta as well having first come to America, his experiences start off worse than Usha’s, which causes him to join the family in an act of social grouping. With the Old World trying to pull them back and the New World just out of reach, both must overcome tradition and develop their own personal values.
In the Third and Final Continent, Jhumpa Lahiri uses her own experiences of being from an immigrant family to illustrate to her readers how heritage, cultural influences and adaptation play a major role in finding your true identity. The Third and Final Continent is the ninth narration in a collection of stories called the Interpreter of Maladies. In this story, it discusses themes such as marriage, family, society, language and identity. In this story, we focus on an East Asian man of Bengali descent who wants to have a better future for himself so he leaves India and travels to London, England to pursue a higher education. His pursuit for higher education takes place on three different continents. In India, he feels safe in his home country and welcomed, but when he travels abroad he starts to have fear and anxiety. Through his narrations, we learn how he adapts to the European and American and through these experiences he learns to assimilate and to adapt to the new culture he travels to.
Mrs. Mallard is an ill woman who is “afflicted with heart trouble” and had to be told very carefully by her sister and husband’s friend that her husband had died (1609). Her illness can be concluded to have been brought upon her by her marriage. She was under a great amount of stress from her unwillingness to be a part of the relationship. Before her marriage, she had a youthful glow, but now “there was a dull stare in her eyes” (1610). Being married to Mr. Mallard stifled the joy of life that she once had. When she realizes the implications of her husband’s death, she exclaims “Free! Body and soul free!” (1610). She feels as though a weight has been lifted off her shoulders and instead of grieving for him, she rejoices for herself. His death is seen as the beginn...