In “The Red Convertible,” by Louise Erdrich, she shows how the war changes people when they get out. People that go to war often feel they will change due to war, and will not know how to react to being back home. This is proven by the plot of the story because the brothers’ relationship changed due to the war. Henry and Lyman went from being traveling buddies and good friends to hardly any contact. Erdrich uses Henry as a symbol showing the hard times in Vietnam that people go through when they return. The most important symbol is the red convertible itself, which represents the relationship that the two brothers have, but also Henry, which shows the hard times of war. The red convertible represent their open connection to one another showing the brothers better side of their relationship in the story. In the beginning, before the war Lyman and Henry had a normal relationship. They did everything that two brothers would normally do. Erdrich uses the Henry giving the red convertible to his brother as a symbol of happiness and reunion. The red convertible in its best state...
Two brothers, Lyman and Henry, had very little in common other than their blood. One day they decided to catch a ride to Winnipeg. The car was introduced while these two were doing some sightseeing in the city. They spotted the red Oldsmobile convertible. Lyman, the storyteller, almost made the car a living thing when he said, "There it was, parked, large as life. Really as if it were alive." (461) The brothers used all of the money they had, less some change for gas to get home, to buy the car. The car's significance was the bond that it created between the brothers. The purchase of the vehicle brought these two together with a common interest: the car. Once the bond was formed, the brothers became inseparable, at least for a while. The boys spent the whole summer in the car. They explored new places; met new people and furthered the bond that the car had created. When they returned from their trip, Henry was sent to war. He left the car with Lyman. While Henry was gone, Lyman spent his time pampering and fixing the car. Lyman saw the car as an extension of Henry. Lyman used the car to maintain an emotional bond with his brother who was thousands of miles away.
In the book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot, the author highlights the scientific advances of HeLa cells, as well as the personal setbacks of Henrietta Lacks’ family. HeLa is a commonly used cell line in laboratories worldwide and is so often referred to as “the cell line that changed modern science”. This line of immortal cells has helped advance science in ways beyond compare. HeLa has allowed cell testing, cell cloning, and the discovery of various vaccines, including the HPV vaccine. While HeLa has done wonders in the medical field, it has caused unrepairable damage among the Lacks family.
Throughout "The Red Convertible" Erdrich embraces the car as a symbol for the powerful relationship between two brothers, Henry and Lyman. The brothers combine their money to acquire a red convertible which they drove everywhere together; the car symbolized that relationship. Lyman preserved the vehicle while Henry was in the Army, deployed to Vietnam. Even when Henry gave Lyman the car, Lyman always regarded the car as Henry’s, which Erdrich depicts with the following passage, “I always thought of it as his car while he was gone, even though when he left he said, ‘Now it’s yours,’ and threw me the key” (Erdrich 357). The brothers held their relationship with high regard, Henry trusted Lyman with the car enough to give Lyman his share of the vehicle while he was away. Conversely, Lyman surmised that the car would always belong to Henry; just like their relationship, the car was important and would always belong to both of them. During Henry’s deployment, Lyman preserved the state of the car, he kept it in immaculate condition while waiting for Henry's return. By spending so much time caring for the car, Lyman in a way was caring for his brother. Little did Lyman know that his brother was going to come back a changed man and t...
...who endures pain. His brother, Lyman, suffers from many of the same things as Henry. Lyman also experiences post-traumatic stress. Although Lyman seems to acknowledge this stress in a rather different way than Henry, it is there all the same. Just as Henry tries to give the red convertible up to his brother, Lyman does the same in the end, and pushes it right back to him. The red car represents a bond between the two brothers, and with Henry gone, Lyman can not bear to have it around anymore. Unfortunately, getting rid of the car does not take care of Lyman's pain. Even a long time after Henry's death, Lyman still experiences post-traumatic stress. Only now he has a tragedy of his own to endure.
Perhaps no other event in modern history has left us so perplexed and dumbfounded than the atrocities committed by Nazi Germany, an entire population was simply robbed of their existence. In “Our Secret,” Susan Griffin tries to explain what could possibly lead an individual to execute such inhumane acts to a large group of people. She delves into Heinrich Himmler’s life and investigates all the events leading up to him joining the Nazi party. In“Panopticism,” Michel Foucault argues that modern society has been shaped by disciplinary mechanisms deriving from the plague as well as Jeremy Bentham’s Panopticon, a structure with a tower in the middle meant for surveillance. Susan Griffin tries to explain what happened in Germany through Himmler’s childhood while Foucault better explains these events by describing how society as a whole operates.
The book Revealing the Invisible was written by Sherry Marx, a formal teacher, who went in-depth to explore the racist beliefs of white female teacher education students. The book began with Marx talking about pre service teachers that focused on English-language learning school children (ELLs). During this course she discovered just how low the expectations her students had for ELLs students. Throughout her interviews she will explore more beliefs of white females and their thoughts about race, racism, whiteness, and the children they tutored.
In "Our Secret" by Susan Griffin, the essay uses fragments throughout the essay to symbolize all the topics and people that are involved. The fragments in the essay tie together insides and outsides, human nature, everything affected by past, secrets, cause and effect, and development with the content. These subjects and the fragments are also similar with her life stories and her interviewees that all go together. The author also uses her own memories mixed in with what she heard from the interviewees. Her recollection of her memory is not fully told, but with missing parts and added feelings. Her interviewee's words are told to her and brought to the paper with added information. She tells throughout the book about these recollections.
There are times when people are hurting and feel like giving up, but then they think of their family and they keep trying. In the novel “Night” by Elie Wiesel, Elie the narrator and protagonist is at a concentration camp. Although he lost his mother and sisters the first day, he still has his father with him. As the story goes on, readers learn of the hard experiences he goes through and what is going on his mind the whole time. He struggles with his faith and belief in God and he learns what it means to live not just for himself, but also for the one’s who love him. By examining the novel Night, we can see that family is the key to survival, which is important because those who do not have family often end up not surviving because they don’t have someone to push them and someone to live for besides themselves.
Written in the first person by Lyman Larmartine, The Red Convertible follows a typical dramatic development. The story begins in with an introduction of the narrator's life. Almost simultaneously the reader is introduced to older brother Henry Junior and the shiny red Oldsmobile convertible they bought on the spur of the moment together. The rising action of the story begins when the two take off one summer on a road trip that ends them in Alaska. When they arrived home, it was conveniently just in time for Henry to be drafted for the army. Just months later in early 1970 Henry was fighting in the Vietnam War and Lyman was had the red convertible in his possession. More than three years later, Henry finally returned home three years later only to be a much different person than the one that had left. Henry was distant and lackadaisical for the most part, never really caring about anything. Lyman knew there had been only one thing in the past that really cheered him up, and would do whatever it would take to have Henry back to his old self. Lyman took a hammer to their prized possession one night and soon showed Henry the car. Henry then was angered by the way the car was treated and was soon spend all his days and nights consumed by repairing the car. The climax of the story begins when Henry finally finished refurbishing the car and posing in front of it with Lyman for one last picture followed by a trip to Red River like in the good old days. When they arrived at the river, Henry confessed that he had known what Lyman did to the Olds, and was thankful for it, then offered to give his portion of the car to him. Just when the reader believes the old Henry has come back to life, he dives into the river and is sucked down with the strong current.
In both stories the main characters brothers have been remitted into society after returning from their individual battles. In Louise Erdrich’s “The Red Convertible,” Lyman’s brother Henry enlisted in the army and is called to arms in Vietnam. Before he left, the two brothers went on a road trip in a red convertible that they purchased together. The time that they spent in the car, traveling across the globe, was meant to be valuable time to strengthen their brotherly bond. When the war was over, at least in the eyes of the government, they sent Henry back home with the war still raging in his head (Erdrich 234). Henry had been captured by the enemy and the memories of the war and the gruesome things that he had encountered were still very fresh in his mind. The ghastly details of the war desensitized Henry and he was no longer the same man as when he left. Lyman noticed that people began to stay away from him. He no longer cracked jokes as he did before, in fact, “Henry was jumpy and mean” (Erdrich 234). Henry is constantly tortured by the memories of the war and can no longer participate as a functional member of society. In James Baldwin’s “Sonny’s Blues,” the narrator’s brother Sonny is a recovering drug addict who has just been released from prison. While in prison, Sonny realized the error of his sinister ...
Green is an image of the natural world and of the army’s youth, while red in the previous quote is clearly and image of battle. In the beginning, however, Crane uses red to describe distant campfires: “…one could see across the red, eye-like gleam of the hostile campfires set in the low brows of the distant hills” (1). Obviously, the fires are red, but Henry characterizes the blazes as the enemy’s glowing eyes. He continues this metaphor in the second chapter: “ From across the river, the deep red eyes were still peering” (15). Crane then transforms this metaphor into arrogance used throughout the text: “Staring once at the red eyes across the river, he conceived then to be growing larger, as the orbs of a row of dragons advancing” (16). The red campfires come to represent eyes of the enemy, of dragons.
The professor, Deborah Brandt, believes that one becomes literate by their surroundings and not by themselves. In the first paragraph it claims that literacy is not simply about reading and writing, but also how you can use all the knowledge you acquired into real life situations such as solving problems. Brandt claims that sponsors do help out individuals, she also thinks that sponsors have their own goals they are striving for. Although, sponsors are supposed to help out individuals it seems like they pretend to be the protagonist, but are hiding their self-interest at the same time. This makes me question if whether or not my English teacher would actually preparing us for our AP exam or just making us write over and over?
PTSD, also known as Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, can cause change and bring about pain and stress in many different forms to the families of the victims of PTSD. These changes can be immense and sometimes unbearable. PTSD relates to the characters relationship as a whole after Henry returns from the army and it caused Henry and Lyman’s relationship to crumble. The Red Convertible that was bought in the story is a symbol of their brotherhood. The color red has many different meanings within the story that relates to their relationship.
Even though Lyman and Henry’s relationship ends up ending, the red convertible will always be with Henry and will always be a memory for Lyman. While Lyman struggles with losing his brother to the war, the red convertible brought them back together, even though it was really the end. Henry was faced with war and when he was finished and came back home he changed because of his experiences. Both Lyman and Henry changed throughout the events that took place, but unfortunately for Lyman the red convertible was not able to bring back the relationship they had when they first bought it together.
Throughout "The Red Convertible" Erdrich embraces the car as a symbol for the powerful relationship between two brothers, Henry and Lyman. The brothers combine their money to acquire a red convertible which they drove everywhere together; the car symbolized that relationship. Lyman preserved the vehicle while Henry was in the Army, deployed to Vietnam. Even when Henry gave Lyman the car, Lyman always regarded the car as Henry’s, which Erdrich depicts with the following passage, “I always thought of it as his car while he was gone, even though when he left he said, ‘Now it’s yours,’ and threw me the key.” (Erdrich 357) The brothers held their relationship with high regard, Henry trusted Lyman with the car enough to give Lyman his share of the vehicle while he was away. Conversely, Lyman surmised that that the car would always belong to Henry; just like their relationship, the car was important and would always belong to both of them. During Henry’s deployment, Lyman preserved the state of the car, he kept it in immaculate condition while waiting for Henry's return. By spending so much time caring for the car, Lyman in a way was caring for his brother. Little did Lyman know that his brother was going to come back a changed...