Jim Henson: The Mind Behind the Muppets
"Sure, Jim the creator was a genius. Yet I see Jim foremost as an appreciator. He appreciated the Muppet family and his own family. He appreciated flying kites with his children. He appreciated beauty and he appreciated fun." -Frank Oz (Readers Digest, 126)
There is no doubt in Frank Oz's mind that Jim Henson was a creative genius. According to the model of creativity proposed by Howard Gardner, Henson can be considered creative in five of the seven intelligences: interpersonal, spatial, music, verbal, kinesthetic. He became a master at combining these intelligences to create Muppet productions full of wit, music, sight gags, bright colors, and meaningful messages. He also had the ability to coordinate all of the people who worked with him. Before, discussing how Henson's life fits into Gardner's model, I will present some influential events in Henson's life and his major creative works.
James Maury Henson was born September 2, 1936 in Leland, Mississippi as the second son in the Henson family. During his childhood, Jim's maternal grandmother, a prolific painter and master of needlework, encouraged Henson to appreciate imagination, visual imagery, and creativity. She was a steady emotional support for him, constantly listening to his adventures and dreams. When Jim was fourteen, his parents finally acquiesced and bought a television set, after years of badgering from Jim. He always knew that he wanted to work in television; watching Burr Tillstrom, Bil Baird, Ernie Kovac, Spike Jones, and Walt Kelly influenced him greatly during his adolescence. In 1954, while Jim was still in high school, he began working for WTOP television station doing puppet performances on the "Junior Good Morning Show". "It was interesting and kind of fun to do -- but I wasn't really interested in puppetry then. It was just a means to an end," Henson later recalled about his first job (Finch, 9).
At the University of Maryland, he studied art and continued doing puppetry for TV with a fellow student, Jane Nebel, whom he later married. Their show, "Sam and Friends", debuted as a five minute piece aired twice a day, right before the Huntley-Brinkley Report and the Tonight Show. Jane recollected, "We were just college students amusing ourselves, and we did all these wild things with puppets...I guess it had a quality of abandon and nonsense and of being somewhat experimental." (Finch, 15) Their show became very popular, partly because of its widely-viewed time slots, and it won a local Emmy in 1958.
Walt Disney is the greatest entrepreneur of all time in most minds of little people and big people everywhere. The reason for this is he started his ‘business’, selling sketches, at the age of around seven years old. He was a vibrant child, as well considering he painted the side of his barn with tar. To him schoolwork was boring which he actually said once he was a lot older. Walt Disney was a family man, considering he had so many children; his children even had lots of children. Walt Disney was a man with a lot of talent, character, and imagination, who deeply loved fairy tales.
Jim was known as the town’s practical joker, even though his jokes were cruel and disrespectful. In one of whitey’s stories about Jim, he mentions how Jim once said “that lots of people had tried to make a monkey out of him, but he always got even.” which explains some of Jim’s reactions to some things. For example when his wife went to one of Jim’s jobs and asks for his wages, Jim later finds out ...
His work in modern media was revolutionary. Moreover, he broadened communication and made it easier to learn about new cultures. Disney’s movies play a vital role in children’s development and their productivity when they enter the “real world”.
Once upon a time there was a man named Walt Disney who opened up doors of unbelievable fascination.Fascination so indescribable and so irresistible that everyone especially the children, adored the experience it let them live. Even to this day, Disney is a major part of childhood. Through a princess who is saved by her knight in shining armor, to a girl with magical hair, a singing mermaid with desire to live her own life, and a girl biting a forbidden apple, Disney teaches us to wish upon a star. But what Walt Disney didn’t tell us was the real misconceptions lying underneath all the fantasies. Because Disney portrays whimsical fairytales that lure our heart and mind into a state of complete fascination, children all over the world are trying to live up to the Disney expectation, a false reality that’s impossible to meet.
Creativity is a hard phenomenon to be measured, for it is a complex concept that encompasses a lot of domains; it is not specific to a certain field, rather it is manifested in different ways. Throughout the years, researches have tried to come up with a variety of methods to assess the occurrence and the development of the creative abilities individuals possess, each depending on a different perspective. As mentioned in the previous sections, creativity was considered an exceptional gift only certain people are endowed with, the reason why, at that time, there was no need for assessment, for it was recognized through the exceptional achievement of those “exceptional individuals”; their outcome is sufficient to tell how creative they are. Barboot,
While most just think of Walt Disney as the creator of the Disney movie empire and the Disney theme parks, those such as author Steven Watts, who think more deeply about Disney, consider him to be the “influential architect of modern America” (Watts, p. 4). While the genius of Walt Disney has affected many aspects of American, and now overseas, cultures, his empire has had a significant impact on what people experience during childhood.
The complicated nature surrounding Heathcliff’s motives again adds an additional degree of ambiguity to his character. This motivation is primarily driven by Catherine’s marriage to Edgar and past rejection of Heathcliff, since he was a servant whom Hindley disapproved of. Prior to storming out of Wuthering Heights, Heathcliff overhears Catherine say, “It would degrade me to marry Heathcliff now…” (Brontë 87). The obstacles that ultimately prevent Heathcliff from marrying Catherine provide insight into Heathcliff’s desire to bring harm to Edgar and Hindley. The two men play prominent roles in the debacle, Edgar as the new husband and Hindley as the head figure who refused Heathcliff access to Catherine. Following this incident, Catherine says, “Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same…” (Brontë 87). Catherine’s sentiment indicates she truly would rather be with Heathcliff, but the actions of others have influenced her monumental decision to marry Edgar. Furthermore, Heathcliff is motivated to not only ruin Edgar’s livelihood, but also gain ownership of his estate, Thrushcross Grange. This becomes clear when Heathcliff attempts to use Isabella
Walt Disney is known around the entire world for the amusement parks and films which bear his name. He won a record 29 Academy Awards, many Oscars, and even received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest honor for a citizen of the United States. While his life may seem glamorous, Disney encountered many hardships in his life and reached his dreams only by remaining determined.
Many Athletes are willing to do whatever it takes to become a professional. One of the easiest ways to enhance natural ability is through performance-enhancing drugs or, PEDs. PEDs are substances used by athletes to increase their performance. The use of PEDs in athletic competition can date back to ancient Greece. Athletes use PEDs to run faster, jump higher and recover at an increased pace. Many athletes are pressured into using PEDs by coaches or managers and are not thoroughly educated the harmful health issues that can come along with taking performance-enhancing drugs. A rising issue is if performance-enhancing drugs should be allowed in professional sports. I believe that in any professional sport, the use of performance-enhancing drugs by athletes should continue to be banned because this rule will help to keep athletes from abusing these harmful drugs.
Walt Disney and the Grimm Brothers used their talents, and, with help, became some of the most famous children’s literature writers and business owners of all time. Many children have read Grimm Brothers’ fairy tales and watched Walt Disney’s films and cartoons. The creators have used their tales, films, and cartoons not only during their lives, but even now.
Catherine Earnshaw appears to be a woman who is free spirited. However, Catherine is also quite self-centered. She clearly states that her love for Edgar Linton does not match how much she loves Heathcliff. She is saying that she does love both, and she is unwilling to give one up for the other; she wants “Heathcliff for her friend”. Catherine admits that her love for Linton is “like the foliage in the woods”; however, her love for Heathcliff “resembles the eternal rocks beneath”. She loves Heathcliff and yet she gives him up and marries Linton instead, Catherine believes that if she marries Heathcliff it would degrade and humiliate her socially.
Catherine is trapped between her love of Heathcliff and her love for Edgar, setting the two men down a path of destruction, a whirlwind of anger and resentment that Catherine gets caught in the middle of. Catherine is drawn to Heathcliff because of his fiery personality, their raw attraction and one certainly gets the sense that they are drawn together on a deeper level, that perhaps they are soulmates. C. Day Lewis thought so, when he declared that Heathcliff and Catherine "represent the essential isolation of the soul...two halves of a single soul–forever sundered and struggling to unite." This certainly seems to be backed up in the novel when Catherine exclaims “Nelly, I am Heathcliff! He's always, always in my mind--not as a pleasure, any more than I am always a pleasure to myself, but as my own being...” This shows clearly the struggle Catherine feels as she is drawn spiritually to Heathcliff, but also to Edgar for very different reasons. Edgar attracts Catherine predominantly because he is of the right social class. Catherine finds him "handsome, and pleasant to be with," but her feelings for him seem petty when compared to the ones she harbours...
During the first half of the book, Catherine showed different types of love for two different people. Her love for Heathcliff was her everything, it was her identity to love and live for Heathcliff but as soon as she found out how society views Heathcliff, she sacrificed their love and married Edgar Linton in the hopes of saving Heathcliff from Hindley and protecting him from the eyes of society. In her conversation with Nelly, Cathy who professed her love for Heathcliff quoted “My great miseries in this world have been Heathcliff's miseries, and I watched and felt each from the beginning: my great thought in living is himself.” Catherine proved Nelly Dean that the only person who can make her feel pain and sorrow is Heathcliff. The extent of her love was uncovered when she sang her praise of “I am Heathcliff” because this was the turning point in the book that allowed the readers to truly understand and see the depth of Cathy's love for Heathcliff. On the other hand, Catherine's love for Edgar wasn't natural because it was a love that she taught herself to feel. It might have come unknowingly to Cathy but she did love Edgar as she said “My love for Linton is like the foliage in the woods: time will change it, I'm well aware, as winter changes the trees.” Cathy knew that it was not impossible to love Edgar for he was a sweet and kind gentleman who showed her the world but unlike ...
One of the ways he is an inspiration to all is through his willpower to never give up. Disney's cartoons became widely popular in the Kansas City area, and through their success, he was able to purchase his own studio, Laugh-O-Gram, unfortunately, studio profits were unable to cover the...
Jim, though not as noticeably withdrawn from reality as the others, can also be found retreating by his undying hope that things have to get better. His zeal to succeed, though very different in nature from the others' attitudes, is nevertheless an escape mechanism that shields him from the blandness of his