Captain Beatty believes society is filled with nothing more than non-thinkers. He says people who are infatuated with books are insane. He believes that there is no need for school because no one needs to think. The only priority in life is to have fun and stay busy. To keep from having controversy, everyone has to be alike and the same. You do not have the right to be yourself. Captain Beatty says the society makes you and all the population be the same. No one can be unique. He says the firemen are custodians. They are to clean up the things (books) that make people feel inferior or that go against the Government. lastly , Captain Beatty says the only purpose in life is to stay active and to stay contempt. He basically sees society as one
What is the message the author is trying to convey? How does (s)he convey this to the reader?
Society nowadays can conform anyone, into whoever they want a person to be.Throughout The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Wife of Bath’s Tale by Geoffrey Chaucer, and Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, there is an interconnecting theme of the flaws of perception in society. This theme is shown with various characters throughout The Great Gatsby such as characters having their own perception as to who the main character, Jay Gatsby is, in The Wife of Bath’s Tale it is shown in the way of how the knight judges his wife based off of her physical age and beauty within, and in Brave New World, Bernard, one of the main characters, is in shock of what the reality of this “utopian” society everyone believes they live in actually is, he sees how messed up everything and everyone is, yet people deem him as the crazy one.
What is sociological imagination? Our textbook describes sociological imagination as the ability to see our private experiences, personal difficulties, and achievements as, in part, a reflection of the structural arrangements of society and the times in which we live. The movie entitled Forrest Gump is a great example of sociological imagination. In this paper, I will cite examples from the movie and tell how they correlate with sociological imagination. Sociological imagination allows us examine the events of our lives and see how they intersect with the wider context of history and tradition of the society in which we live. (Hughes/Kroehler, The Core, p. 7)
It’s about the fantasy of fulfilling unachievable dreams, the selfishness money invokes, and the violence associated with power. Gatsby, Daisy, and Tom never fulfill their potential in life.
Throughout the novel The Great Gatsby, there is a constant theme present: social class. Fitzgerald makes a connection between the theme of social class, and the settings in the novel for example The Valley of Ashes which is described as a “desolate area of land” (p.21) and a “solemn dumping ground” (p.21) which is where the poor people live. The Valley of Ashes is situated between West Egg and New York, West Egg being the place where the aspiring classes are situated, which is the “less fashionable of the two” (p.8), this is where Gatsby lives. West Egg is the place of ‘new money’, Fitzgerald shows this by the idea of the main character Jay Gatsby, rumoured to be selling illegal alcohol (prohibition) which means he is quickly making vast amounts of money.” Who is this Gatsby anyhow? Some big bootlegger?”(p.86) Gatsby shows off the amount of wealth he has by his fabulous parties and oversized mansion. “There was music from my neighbour's house through those summer nights. In his enchanted gardens, men and girls came and went like moths, among the whispering and the champagne and the stars.”(p.33) Fitzgerald uses the word ‘enchanted’ to paint a visual picture of what the house and the scene looks like, a magical and enchanted castle, with elegant furniture. This is in comparison to East Egg where Tom and Daisy Buchanan live, in a house where “The windows were ajar and gleaming white against the fresh grass outside” (p.10). East Egg being the place of ‘old money’ which is made from the inheritance of their past generations, the people who live it East Egg are mainly well educated, historically wealthy and live quite elegantly, but they are also quite ‘snobbish’. Gatsby’s background does not fit into the social standards of East Egg...
I was not expecting to write about the failure of the educational system when I choose to read Watchmen. However, Walter Kovacs’, or Rorschach, elementary diction is impossible to miss. I remembered the podcast that we listened to during the very first few weeks of class, “The Problem We All With – Part One,” while I was reading Kovacs past and taking note of his limited vocabulary. Characters in the book, like prisoners, strangers, and prison guards, often perceived Kovacs to be mediocre because of his distant personality, unappealing physical characteristics, and elementary diction. However, I have learned, by tying Watchmen to “The Problem We All With – Part One,” that Kovacs’ issues have a deeper, more complex explanation.
If my life had no purpose, no individuality, and no happiness, I would not want to live. This book teaches the importance of self expression and independence. If we did not have these necessities, then life would be like those in this novel. Empty, redundant, and fearful. The quotes above show how different life can be without our basic freedoms. This novel was very interesting and it shows, no matter how dismal a situation is, there is always a way out if you never give up, even if you have to do it alone.
Topic 1: What warning does the novel carry for readers at this point in time about where their society is heading?
... his argument thus leading to him questioning things more instead of accepting what life gives him. Finally Beatty teaches Montag something in his death. As Montag comes away from the incident, knowing he just committed murder, he also realizes that Beatty wanted to die and that it was no different from suicide. Beatty wished to die since his life was miserable without literature and he works as a fireman, the very people who burn the books. Although Beatty is a well read educated man, he conforms to society which forces him to do what he does not. Therefore he represents somewhat of martyr similar to the unidentified women that burned with her books earlier in the book. From him killing Beatty, Montag learns the misery of conformity and of the oppression living inside of Beatty.
Beatty is talking about how a book can have a load of meaning and significance but he has to say it like this because he does not want to give away his big secret about him reading books. When Beatty is talking about the Constitution he is trying to talk about how this Constitution relates to people in this society and their “TV families”. Beatty wants to teach Montag as much stuff about books as he can before he moves on. So Beatty tries to lecture Montag on what kind of people they are and how 1 person could change the course of a society forever. “Lecture's over. I hope I've clarified things. The important thing for you to remember, Montag, is we're the Happiness Boys, the Dixie Duo, you and I and the others. We stand against the small tide of those who want to make everyone unhappy with conflicting theory and thought. We have our fingers in the dyke. Hold Steady. Don't let the torrent of melancholy and drear philosophy drown our world. We depend on you. I don't think you realize how important you are, to our happy world as it stands now"(59). When Beatty is trying to tell Montag how important he is and how people like him are important. He said that people who conflicted with theory and thought made other people unhappy. Beatty was reading books at this time and he knew that there was no way he could escape this society and this leads to my claim which is Beatty did want to die. When Montag was
Francis Scott Fitzgerald’s visionary writing style during the early twentieth century revolutionized a new style for other writers. “Theme is most dramatically expressed through character, and Fitzgerald used the people he created to convey his personal vision of the world” (Keshmiri 2). As Keshmiri states, Fitzgerald, unlike many other writers at the time, expresses his stories through the development of the characters. Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby and The Beautiful and the Damned illustrate the many flaws of human nature and how these flaws contribute to the downfall of the characters through their obsession with status, their inability to accept reality, and the use of alcohol.
Self-centered people live in a world where only their own agenda matters, and the wants and needs they have overpower any moral code imbedded in their conscience. This type of person becomes oblivious to all the things around them that keep order, as they disregard any concern that conflicts with what they desire. Such people are depicted in F. Scott Fitzgeralds novel, that takes place in Long Island during the 1920s, The Great Gatsby. The book, which takes almost a satirical view of the social and moral problems of the 20s, shows how people who are completely submerged in only their own business are never satisfied. Like many of the characters in The Great Gatsby, being negligent of other peoples lives causes you to end up being miserably self-centered and naïve, which was evident in all levels of the 1920s social structure.
Ray Bradbury uses the power struggle between knowledge versus ignorance to enhance the meaning of the novel. By making the firefighters (people who are viewed as heroes in present day America) the characters who are promoting ignorance and diminishing the importance of acquiring information, the reader can begin to appreciate the importance of learning and being knowledgeable because the thought of such well respected men, acting as if uniformity and illiteracy have now become the “norm” in their society is frightening.
Write an essay in which you apply Nathan”s concepts about community and conformity to the following passage from The Orchid Thief:
Beatty seems parallel to the government, as he believes that a Hound is perfect for its job and that burning books will create peace by demolishing anything that may disrupt society. However, Montag introduces the idea of censorship that the Hound is able to do more than what it is assigned, much like people in his society. This causes the Hound to be ‘perfect’ yet almost useless to what it could have been. In other words, the hound has potential to do more without knowing because it is made to be perfect in one