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Conclusion on analysis of snow white
Conclusion on analysis of snow white
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I believe the use and mention of metaphysics in Jorge Borges The garden of the forking paths and Donald Barthelme’s Snow White is to point out the similarities between metaphysics and metafiction. I believe both authors incorporated metaphysics to draw parallels with making reflections on the mechanics of making and comparing literature, and how we perceive and reflect upon the nature of reality. I believe literature can be interpreted just as any object in the real world, and it is dynamic and changing according to interpretations. An author can integrate their interpretations into their text, in the reality they have created. Metaphysics and metafiction are inherently similar concepts and both novels were intended to demonstrate this idea, by pointing out that just as the realities in the real world reality can be altered so too can a known story change.
Both stories are taken in different periods of time, but generally in the past. Snow White by Donald Barthelme is a modern take of the fairy tale by the Brothers Grim. In the novel Snow White is characterized quite similar to her old self. In the beginning, the description “The hair as black as ebony, the skin white as snow” (Barthelme 4),” shows how similar she appears, yet this version of Snow White has her differences. She is older, and as such her height reflects this change, and she conducts herself not as innocent as she was in the fairy tale. Despite the similarities and differences, it was deliberate that the author chose to create Snow White in this manner, as opposed to an entirely different character that was intended to symbolize Snow White. It was also intended for certain characters to be placed into similar roles, such as how Jane represents the stepmother from th...
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...knowledge, or ideologies change how I view the world, and I continue to change as time goes by. Just as a story is not exactly etched in stone, values change and stories are told in new lights. I think it is important to see how novels can entice readers, draw them into a reality similar to the ones we live in. The idea of a metafiction is akin to metaphysics. Is our reality just like a novel, created by us and molded to out liking, or dismay? I think both Barthelme and Borges intended to show that it may in fact be true, as tales we told as fairy tales can be modernized and events can be interpreted in multiple ways.
Works Cited
Barthelme, Donald. Snow White. New York: Atheneum, 1967. Print.
Borges, Jorge Luis. "The Garden of the Forking Paths." Labyrinths: selected stories & other writings. Augmented ed. New York: New Directions Pub. Corp., 1964. 19-29. Print.
The most significant journeys are always the ones that transform us, from which we emerge changed in some way. In Paulo Coelho’s modern classic novel The Alchemist, and Robert Frost’s poem The Road Not Taken, the journey that is undertaken by the central exponents leaves both with enlightening knowledge that alters their lives irrevocably. In stark contradiction to this, Ivan Lalic’s poem Of Eurydice , delves into the disruptive and negative force of knowledge, in contrast to The Alchemist which details an antithesis of this point relative to knowledge. In all journeys, the eventuality of knowledge is a transformative one.
Jorge Luis Borge the author of the essay “The garden of forking paths” was born August
Brave New World, written by Aldous Huxley, is a thought provoking novel set in a future of genetically engineered people, amazing technology and a misconstrued system of values. Dubliners, written by James Joyce, is a collection of short stories painting a picture of life in Dublin Ireland, near the turn of the 19th century. Though of two completely different settings and story lines, these two works can and will be compared and contrasted on the basis of the social concerns and issues raised within them.
Even though the time periods are very different (by 200 years) the formulas for their fairy tales seems to remain constant. Character development, which is very important in fairy tales is both well done and accurately portrays the living situation for a character in the time period of when it was written. Perrault's version seems to put Cinderella's family in a higher, well-off situation of the Grimm's because she is still abided to obey the rules that her dying mother had set for her. Something that you would see a women do in the late 1600's. Her higher class and the rules of her generation has set her to not have revenge on her step-sisters and helps them marry in the end, making a happy ending to the story for everyone. This also gives off the rules of the time to the young girls who would be listening or reading this story back then. They knew their place in society and tales like Perrault's reinforced it. The Grimm's version, titled Ashenputtle, has key elements in the story line that make it very different from Perrault's Cinderella. The theme becomes very different as the end of the tale results in revenge on the step-sisters from Ashenputtle. This variation in the story line represents the setting in which the Grimm's either lived in themselves, or the living situation of the people who related this tale to the Grimm's.
Even though the overall setting of each story remains the same or very similar, there are smaller settings that have both similarities and differences. Each version of Cinderella takes place in a time long ago where women have no rights and basically had to make a living through marriage. But, the seasons each story takes place is different between each version. For example, the Grimm brothers’ version of “Cinderella” starts in the Autumn. Autumn is an archetype that represents tragedy and death. In the beginning of the story, Cinderella’s mother dies which is tragic for Cinderella and results in her crying at her grave everyday as explained earlier. The “Little Golden Book Cinderella” takes place in summer. Summer is an archetype for marriage which relates to a common topic in the story which is true love. Also, the story ends with a wedding which also relates to the season the story takes place in. One very important setting in the “Little Golden Book Cinderella” is the garden. The garden also prevails in the film Cinderella and they share a very similar purpose in both. A garden is an archetype that means paradise and innocence. This is Cinderella’s place of paradise in both of these stories because she goes here to get away from the horrors and malice she faces inside of the house from her stepsisters and her stepmother. She comes here in both stories to weep and let out her emotion from everything she has gone through. In the “Little Golden Book Cinderella” it states “Cinderella ran into the garden. She wept and wept.”(Little Golden Book CInderella). But in the Grimm brothers’ version, rather than praying at a garden she “went out to her mother’s grave every day and wept, and she remained pious and good” (Grimm). This is completely different than the other two settings and this relates to the darker theme the author attempted to
The short stories “The Ninny” by Anton Chekov and “Mrs. Bertha Flowers” by Maya Angelou both have similar themes that explore power and privilege. Both stories explore the theme of power and privilege because there are characters who have power and privilege and characters who do not, the benefit and usefulness of having power and privilege, and both stories teach a similar lesson.
Can you imagine a world where literature did not exist? It’s very hard, nearly impossible. Literature plays a major role in shaping society. Literature is a word used to describe written or spoken material. Literature educates, informs, entertains and influences the reader or listener in a myriad of profound ways. Broadly speaking, “literature” is used to describe anything from creative writing to more technical or scientific works, but the term is most commonly used to refer to works of the creative imagination. Writers can change one’s beliefs, thoughts, actions, indeed their entire lives. In Northrop Frye’s The Educated Imagination, Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird and Plato’s The Republic, the writers use literature to utter the importance literature bestows on society. The three writers state their opinions using different methods to prove to the readers that their opinions are valid. Since each author has a unique writing style, most envision their writing with a relatable figure. Some would argue that Frye’s writing style is much like that of a textbook, very instructional and factual, Lamott reminded them of a conversation with a friend and that Plato’s writing style is very informative, akin to a professor carrying on a dialogue with an inquisitive student.
There are many differences between the two. One difference in them is the number of times the Evil Queen tries to kill Snow White. In the Grimm version of the fairy tale, the Queen tries to kill Snow White three times instead of just once, as she did in the Disney film. Another difference is that in the Grimm version of the tale, Snow White promises the dwarfs that she will cook, clean, and keep up the running of the house in order to live there with them. In the Disney version, Snow White arrives at the dwarf’s
What could a deeply religious, devout Christian nobleman and an existential, indifferent common man separated by roughly four hundred years have in common? Furthermore, what could Sir Thomas More, an eventual saintly martyr as portrayed in Robert Bolt’s A Man For All Seasons, and Albert Camus’ Meursault from The Outsider, an apparent murderer who does not believe in God, possibly have in common? For starters, both men have led similar lives in a search for the truth, and have very strong personal belief systems. It is for this that they are persecuted and “who, without any heroic pretensions, agree...to die for the truth'; (The Outsider, Camus, p. 119). Both characters, More and Meursault refuse to compromise their beliefs and as a result society condemns them.
In the title “In This Strange Labyrinth”, the labyrinth is symbolic of love’s maze-like qualities. The speaker describes her predicament by saying, “In this strange Labyrinth how shall I turn/Ways are on all sides” (1-2). A different path on every side surrounds her, and every way seems to be the wrong way. She is confused about which way she should go. Wroth is conveying the theme of love in a decidedly negative way, for according to myth, the Labyrinth was where the Minotaur lived and before it’s demise, death was evident for all visitors of the maze. The speaker is struggling with every choice she may make and cannot rest or find aid until she finds the best way: “Go forward, or stand still, or back retire;/ I must these doubts endure without allay/ Or help, but travail find for my best hire” (10-11). She has several choices and each one is confusing and leaves her feeling helpless.
“Boys and Girls” by Alice Munro is a story that depicts the change of an unidentified female character. At the beginning, the narrator was a dutiful individual, always eager to help with her father’s business, however, as the story progresses, she slowly lets her emotions guide her, as she becomes an empathetic person which ultimately becomes her weakness. The narrator is a dutiful daughter, who obeys her father diligently. She is driven by a desire to perform well and “worked willingly under his eyes and with a feeling of pride” (Munro 48-49). The girl thinks very highly of her father and strives to impress him by performing all her tasks flawlessly. However, this attitude is missing when she is doing chores inside the house with her mother.
Kasi Kaye Iliopoulus, author of Living in Light, Love and Truth, once identified in one of her novels that “knowledge without application is simply knowledge. Applying the knowledge to one’s life is wisdom — and that is the ultimate virtue.” Iliopoulus is saying that without the application of knowledge in the world, then knowledge is quite simply useless. In this, my senior year of high school, I have voluntarily and involuntarily had the pleasure of recollecting from the memories that I have gained from my high school experience. I have made good memories with friends, gained an education that will advance me into the world, and been taught truths that will remain manifested within my mind. Many of the writer and authors of the past have placed within their works a central message to instill within their reader’s minds a better view of the world. Also, does the study of Literature hold any value in the world? Why must Literature be taught in school? Do these truths insert significance within this study? Throughout these past four years of English, through the many works that have been studied, and through all of the knowledge that has been taught, the reader has learned many lessons that are plausible to impact his or her life whether they choose to listen or not; however, all in all, readers owe many of the universal themes to the works that I have read.
In 1967, John Barth wrote an essay which characterized modern literature in a state of exhaustion ,a “used-up” form. The ultimate question then was: What do we do with literature? Barth’s answer suggested that we present narrators that are aware of themselves, as well as the exhaustion of their medium. Also, that we reorient and give new meaning to stories that have already been told, such as the greek myths the second half of the novel focuses on. Meta-fiction is defined as fiction that includes commentary on it’s own construction and narrative process, as well as it’s relation to the reader. Barth’s Lost in the Funhouse addresses the complications of post-modernity and the text. He rejects the idea of a knowable, Cartesian self that can authoritatively construct a unified, coherent narrative because the protagonist is no longer capable of defining him/herself. Meta-fiction addresses this lack of center not only within the self, but within language as well, and grapples with the effects it has on the future of the reader, the role of medium and author, and the intersections between them. Barth redefines this relationship as one of inherent, but not defined, meaning by entering into self-reflexivity and consciousness as the novel progresses. Barth furthers the deconstructive project by asserting LF’s fictionality to engage the reader in play, rather than a passive consumption of authorial intent. (Worthington)
Is it safe to assume that the choices we make affect our lives? The poems “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost and “The Choosing” by Liz Lochhead both deal with the theme of choices and the consequences of choices we make. The poem “The Road Not Taken” is more symbolic (“Two roads diverged in a yellow wood”), metaphorical (“And looked down one as far as I could/to where it bent in the undergrowth”) and it gives the reader some advice for their own choices. “The Choosing” is written more with a personal tone as if the poet had experienced the events first hand (“But from the top deck of the high-school bus/I’d glimpse among the others in the corner”).
...es it easier for their audiences to picture what is taking place. Borges manipulates fact and fiction in his stories to vividly and clearly describe events that occur in his mysterious novels and to make them seem more captivating.