Summary of Now and On Earth by Jim Thompson
Jim Thompson's Now and On Earth tells the story of a family's struggles in San Diego, California. The story was based between 1930 and 1942, which was World War Two as well as the great depression. James Dillon is the main character, he struggles with money as well as his family. He lives with his mother, as well as his wild family who never seems to calm down. James has many struggles, he doesn't make enough money to properly fund his family. They are always strapped for cash, and James has an addiction to alcohol. The great depression left many families without jobs, money, and homes. This book is about James Dillon's struggles during the 1930's. Money was, for many people, the key to happiness as well as the cause of sorrow. For many Americans life revolved around money. Money separated people, the size of their wallet determined the level of happiness, as well as their social class, during that time the rich got richer and the poor got poorer. Money was scarce, but James had a job, a low paying job that didn't give him much, but enough to get him and his family by.
Life during the depression was hard, and money was the key to happiness. James and his family needed money but were always strapped for cash. A good example as to how money was such an important thing is mentioned in the book, a worker went into a dinner and asked for a beer and a cheese sandwich, he handed the waitress a dollar and she gave him but a dime in return, he asked if there is some mistake and she said "Oh no. Sandwich, fifty. Beer, forty. No mistake." "Funny, What's those?" in a rather sarcastic tone. "Why their my breasts, you fool! What'd you think they were?" He responded "Didn't know. Everything else is so high in here I thought they might be the cheeks of your ass.". This attitude was a common one, people were commonly in a bad mood. This is because money was short and it causes problems. People don't want to pay 90 cents for a beer and a sandwich and when they only have a dollar.
The Great Depression is one of the worst time for America. Books, cartoons, and articles have been written about the people during the Depression and how they survived in that miserable period. For example, the book Bud not Buddy takes place in the time of the Great Depression. Bud is a ten year old orphan, who was on the run trying to find his dad. There are many feelings throughout the book like sadness and scarceness. There are many diverse tones in the book about what people were feeling at the time.
In the book, Only Yesterday: An informal History of the 1920's, the author Frederick Lewis Allen started the book by introducing a family (the smith's) in the year 1919. Mrs. Allen depicted the normal woman of the times, who dressed modestly (wearing a dress about 6 inches length from the ground), had long hair and basically took care of all of the household maintenance including doing chores around the house and preparing the meals. Whereas Mr. Smith on the other hand was the head of the household and the bread winner. Allen goes on to depict things that were popular among the normal folks during that time period. For example, the Chicago tribune was widely popular as a reputable newspaper. Other things that were popular during this time were certain sports (mainly baseball), the news (peace conference at Paris), and the economy (the stock market). During this time ordinary commodities such as food, transportation and normal goods were becoming more expensive which is the reason for this being the “age of inflation”.
The dawn of the 20th century was met with an unprecedented catastrophe: an international technological war. Such a horrible conflict perhaps threatened the roots of the American Dream! Yet, most do not realize how pivotal the following years were. Post war prosperity caused a fabulous age for America: the “roaring twenties”. But it also was an era where materialism took the nation by storm, rooting itself into daily life. Wealth became a measure of success and a facade for social status. This “Marxist materialism” threatened the traditional American Dream of self-reliance and individuality far even more than the war a decade before. As it morphed into materialistic visions (owning a beautiful house and car), victims of the change blindly chased the new aspiration; one such victim was Jay Gatsby in The Great Gatsby. As his self-earned luxury and riches clashed with love, crippling consequences and disasters occur. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby delves into an era of materialism, exploring how capitalism can become the face of social life and ultimately cloud the American Dream.
The Great Depression began in October of 1929 when the stock values in the United States dropped rapidly. Thousands of stockholders lost large sums of money-or were even wiped out. Many people had to depend on the government or charity for food. Many of the stories about the Depression have been told about the large cities and their struggles to live a life of poverty after being used to the luxurious lifestyle. However, those accounts do not reflect the true damage caused by this economic plunge. The many "country folk" that inhabit the area around Tennessee had a somewhat different recollection of this time period. The stories told by the people who had lost all of their money in the stock market are stories of doom and despair, but those told by the people who didn't have anything to begin with are filled with memories of family and friends helping one another in a time of need. In a personal interview with my grandmother, Vergie Matherly (eighty-seven years old) whom I call "Nanny", I learned first-hand what the Depression was like in a small community located in a very isolated area. Her accounts of family struggle seem to dwarf those accounts of the rich tycoons who lost it all in the stock market. A book entitled Stories and Recipes of the Great Depression of the 1930's contains several pages of anecdotes written by various people who lived in small towns during this time. This book goes hand in hand with the memories of my Nanny.
In conclusion, The Baker family went through a lot through the great depression, and it affected there lives in many ways that they thought it wouldn’t. This autobiography on the troubles him and his family faced during the Great Depression. During the Depression, the major problems that Baker faced through the novel were about the financial difficulties that his family endured, ending in result of his father passing away, the struggles of moving from rural life to urban life, and the lack of Medical attention around the area. During the depression, in Morrisonville there was a common occurrence as many towns people died from common illnesses like phenomena, or whooping cough. This book has much to offer to teenage readers who are interested in the story of one individual’s growth, development, and struggles of his life in the Great Depression.
The book is set in the time of the depression. There was no work, no
In the great depression many people suffered from hunger and poverty can you imagine not being able to eat for days and days and not only that but imagine having to suffer from sands blowing away all your crops and destroying your home. That’s how it was back then, people suffered from hunger and sandstorms destroyed everything in their paths. John Steinbeck a very well know writer and the creator of “The Grapes of Wrath” is very well known for writing books during the great depression in which he liked to write about the poor, homeless and misfit people. Humility is very well described in the book “The Grapes of Wrath” because it tells about a man trying to take care of his children with the little money he has while also trying to get to California. In the story the man’s humility changes the waitress’s behavior because she feels sympathy towards the man even though she was being a stereotype at the beginning.
Due to the politics and power, the society had a major impact towards civilians and the economic society. A similarity presents its way towards Frazier’s timeline as well with the Civil War. During Frazier lifetime while writing the novel, a financial problem occurred regarding the amount of money an average person earns, towards the amount of money he or she needs to pay to acquire accessories. In 1997, the average income of an American citizen included 30 thousand a year, though the average cost of a new house valued $137 thousand dollars ($76 thousand for an average house) excluding groceries, bills, and gas. Furthermore in the assertion, the cost of a car valued $16 thousand dollars with a $576 dollar interest rate per month. In 1997, having a family would harm the individual since it would financially harm them due to the amount of money they'd need for groceries, supplies for the baby, and a babysitter to look after the baby. Accordingly, not only Inman and Ada had problems, whether the entire financial crisis occurred in the confederacy side. During the Civil war, not only Ada and Inman had a difficult time
The world in the Roaring Twenties, shown in The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, and the world today all hinge on the same ideas and issues, the most basic of which is the difference between the poor and the rich. The book takes place in the Roaring ‘20s, a time when everyone was rich. New money clashed with old money, and the sophisticated breeding of the wealthy class was not happy. The vulgar, newly rich citizens were ruining society as morals loosened all around. Old money became hypocrisy, claiming they were pure when they were just as ruined as the new money.
... the hard time would get better and that prosperity would soon come. Additionally like movies and radio, music was a huge part of the distraction of the hard times that American’s faced during the depression. The people enjoyed the popular music of the 1930’s, which was “Swing” music. Swing music was played by big bands and was the highest on the music charts. In literature during the 1930’s many featured working-class heroes trying to make it in America. One of the most classic American literatures today is John Steinbeck, The Grapes Of Wrath. This explained that instead of achieving the American dream, the Joad family faced struggling times. In English classes all over America, the Grapes of Wrath is read to teach students of the effects and history of the Great Depression in the 1930’s. Culture during the 1930’s shaped our culture and how we live day to day.
“Money can’t buy happiness” is a saying that is often used to make one understand that there is more to life than wealth and money. Jay Gatsby was a man of many qualities some of which are good and bad. Throughout the book of “The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald, we learn of his past and discover the true qualities of Jay Gatsby. Starting from the bottom, with little money, we learn of why Gatsby struggled so hard all his life to become wealthy and what his true goal in life was. When reading this story, the true reasons behind Gatsby’s illegal actions reveal themselves and readers can learn a great life lesson from this story and the actions the characters take. Readers can see through Gatsby’s contradictions of actions and thoughts that illustrate the theme of the story, along with his static characteristics, that all humans are complex beings and that humans cannot be defined as good or bad.
The young, recently married farmers living in the Great Plains during the 1930s had a terrible life. First off, being married meant having multiple people to provide for. This is more responsibility, and leads to dividing up the food between family members. Then, the country was also in an economic downturn, so the price of food and crops were low. Farmers already had debt because of new machines and land that was purchased during World War I to keep up with the demand during the war. Then the depression caused banks to fail, so farmers lost all their money that was in the bank. Everyday life was treacherous, and there were few amenities in the home, with no plumbing or electricity. Life was awful for a farmer during the Great Depression.
It tells a story about two traveling ranch workers, George and Lennie, trying to earn enough money to buy their own ranch. As it is set in 1930s America, it provides an insight into The Great Depression, encompassing themes of racism, loneliness, prejudice against the mentally ill, and the struggle for personal independence. The book can be a parallel of what many people were going through at the time. Also it touches on how skewed the American Dream could be or if it even existed at all. There were many themes that encompassed this novel and really represented what the United States was going through at the time.
The 1930’s and 1940’s were years in which the world was seriously concerned about economy. In 1929, The United States, the world’s economical power, was one of the most affected nations by the great depression: its unemployment rate rose to 25% and the personal income, tax revenue and prices dropped. Many families within the country started to starve and the McCourts were not the exception. Malachy could not get any work to support his family due to the difficult situation in the country, and when he finally found one, he wasted all his wages and money in the pub. Frank’s life in America has good and bad memories. However, the great depression is present in the crisis the family fell into and in the unemployment of Malachy.
When he wrote the book he wanted to divide up the classes of people and show that each class of people faced problems of their own. He also wanted it to represent the American dream which at the time was social mobility, which is the idea of moving up the social ladder or the poor becoming rich, and the want for material things. Many of the characters in the book aspire to move up on the social ladder which at this time was almost impossible. They all had different motives for wanting to achieve success, such as Gatsby’s love for Daisy, or Myrtles desire for the finer things in life.