The Cradle Will Fall In many works of literature, a main character is motivated by pure greed in order to gain wealth, fame and power. This idea is very clearly developed in the novel The Cradle Will Fall by Mary Higgins Clark where Dr. Edgar Highley, a well respected obstetrician and gynecologist is using deceitful, depraved, and often deadly methods of “curing” infertile women to gain national fame. The doctor’s motivation was so great that he was willing to go to great lengths to keep his unethical practices hidden. When his work was threatened by others he felt no shame or guilt in getting rid of his problems in more ways than one. The doctor knew his procedures were illegal and often deadly, however the chance for money and fame outweighed the failures in his mind. Dr. Highley was experimenting with females who could not conceive by taking fetuses from women who had abortions and implanting those fetuses in sterile women. The amazing part of it was that the process worked. “ In these past eight years he learned to immunize a host mother from rejecting an alien fetus.” (Pg. 311) However his plans for success were ruined when by mistake he implanted a Caucasian women with and Oriental fetus, and was forced to kill her before she leaked the truth. This occurrence brought on a police investigation that uncovered the doctor’s plans. The doctor shared his plans with no one, but he hoped someday he could share his genius with the world. He had already had a success with his procedures but he knew he could not proclaim it for there had been too many failures and too many lives wasted. “ He already had his success. He could prove it beyond a doubt. He had accurate records, scientific document... ... middle of paper ... ...r. Highley’s plans were uncovered he knew there was no more lying that could be done. He thought of his future from that moment on and realized he would never reach that level of fame and power. “He who had conquered the primary act of life, the birth process, a common prisoner.” (Pg. 305) The doctor knew it could not end like that so he took his own life the way he had taken others by swallowing a vial of cyanide. Dr. Highley proved to be a person who used his own genius for his own cause of gaining fame and fortune all powered by one man’s greed. He had God given skill but used it to experiment with lives so he could be recognized as a hero and a savior. One selfish person causing harm to others for their own personal enjoyment and success and not worrying about the consequences. This can clearly describe a villain in any piece of literature.
"Maybe he understood for the first time that to the boy he was himself an alien. A being from a planet that no longer existed. The tales of which were suspect. He could not construct for the child's pleasure the world he'd lost without constructing the loss as well and he thought perhaps the child had known this better than he" (McCarthy 129-130).
Kemp, Joe. “Fetus of pregnant, brain-dead Texas woman ‘distinctly abnormal’: lawyers.” NYDailyNews. New York Daily News. 23 Jan. 2014. Web. 08 Feb. 2014.
Why is that money and power can changes an individual’s personality? Well, when some humans see something desirable and valuable that doesn’t belong to them, they will go to a great extent to have it. Whether, that is stealing, lying or even killing loved ones. This is simply described as greed. Greed and ambition is a common theme in both Shakespeare’s tragic play, Macbeth and the movie “A Simple Plan”. They both share the concept of wanting something and committing crime after crime to achieve it. Similarly, the main characters in both stories become greedy after finding something valuable and their spouse encourages them further. Once in control, the main characters are willing to do anything to keep possession, even if it means to kill love ones.
That thing in the Dumpster--and he refused to call it human, let alone a baby--was nobody's business but his and China's. That's what he'd told his attorney, Mrs. Teagues, and his mother and her boyfriend,and he'd told them over and over again: I didn't do anything wrong. Even if it was alive, and it was, he knew in his heart that it was, even before the state prosecutor represented evidence of blunt-force trauma and death by asphyxiation and exposure, it didn't matter, or shouldn't have mattered. There was no baby. There was nothing but a mistake, a mistake clothed in blood and mucus. When he really thought about it, thought it through on its merits and dissected all his mother's pathetic arguments about where he'd be today if she'd felt as he did when she was pregnant herself, he hardened like a rock, like sand turning to stone under all the pressure the planet can bring to bear. Another unwanted child in an overpopulated world? They should have given him a medal. (623)
determined to adapt his techniques to American society. He did so with flying colors and
be a powerful man, has his life unravel before him as he loses his job, his
“He was a perfect practicing physician. These causes being known for what they were, He gave the man medicine then and there. ”
My book is called The Cradle by Arthur C. Clarke. The setting of this book takes place in sunny West Keys in Florida. The main characters in this book are Carol Dawson who is a Miami photojournalist. She takes pictures and writes stories about the pictures and sells them to the local news and newspaper. Nick Williams is a woman-hating Ivy League drop out who captains a boat for his own scuba diving company. Troy Jefferson is Nick’s trusty crewman who aids Nick in the epic story. This also is Non-Fiction.
For just thousands of dollars more, women going through in vitro fertilization can later choose to have a certain gender with perfect vision, a great heart, a natural ability for sports, and being able to avoid diseases (Angelle). Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis was first inaugurated in 1990. “It has become an important complement to the presently available approaches for prevention of genetic disorders and an established clinical option in reproductive medicine” (Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis). This has come in handy because it gives you the opportunity to create a baby free of health risks and you are able to freeze your eggs if you miscarry or if something harmful goes wrong with the first egg. Designer babies are created using In Vitro Fertilization. Using this technique, doctors can fertilize the egg with sperm inside the laboratory using a test tube. Doing so you can reduce the chance of the child being born with a genetic disorder and the parents can actually then on choose the sex of the baby. In some cases couples have used PGD to their advantage to save one of their children. Some babies sole purpose is to be created to save the life of their own sibling. Jamie was the first “designer” baby in Britain. “He was genetically matched to his four-year-old brother, Charlie, in the hope to curing a rare type of anaemia which threatens the older boy...
could never be as successful as his past. He did know that his work would have
...red. The basis of IVF, surrogate motherhood and sundry practices is allergic to morality. Further developments would only inspire other immoralities. We have to make them a tough procedure to follow. We need to construct an order before crises impose one as a necessity. By then many waters of life may have passed irrevocably under the bridge.
Pregnant and Imprisoned in the United States. (2000). Birth: Issues in Perinatal Care, 27(4), 266-
And so greed exists in the modern periods, saturating its two of its most famous novels and a theme of two of its most famous authors, portraying as all evil as caused by greed, illustrating the true cynicism of the era.
... or power or fame. The path to attain these goals is often filled with corruption, heartless doings, and unsympathetic forces. To see past material possessions and to crush one's ego and its self-centeredness should be sought. To accept one's lot in life and attempt to not control forces outside of one's power or nature should be admired. Being concerned with one's family as a primary responsibility and acting accordingly should be hailed an accomplishment. To face an evil force sweeping into one's reality and being able to hold onto one's morals and values in spite of it, an achievement.
Greed is a bottomless pit which exhaust the person in an endless effort to satisfy the need without ever reaching satisfaction-Enrich Fromm. When given an opportunity to progress most individuals take advantage of it by spending their time thinking about how they can benefit from in a smaller amount of time. The thoughts of the individual develop into destructive ideas. Over time they begin to feed on the power of the week like cowards in order to ensure their plans are fulfilled. In William Shakespeare's Macbeth, ambition and greed are observed through the actions of multiple characters, these themes are also displayed in Afghanistan's political history; it is truly unhealthy for individuals to take such impetuous actions because overtime