The basic situation of the short story "Guests of the Nation" by Frank O'Connor is a story of friendship and war between two opposing sides, the Irish and British during war time. The two Englishmen, Belcher and Hawkins whom are prisoners of war and the Irishmen who are holding them captured engage in frequent card games, joke telling and arguing altogether while the war seems worlds away. The conflict with in the short story is an internal conflict. The Irishmen are forced to forget about all humanity when dealing with the enemy during combat. This was extremely hard for the guards because all but Donovan had befriended the prisoners. It was stated that if any Irish prisoner was killed by the English, then Hawkins and Belcher would be executed. This was hard for both the guards and the prisoners because although they knew that Hawkins and Belcher would have nothing to do with executions elsewhere, they would be the target of punishment. As enemies, not by choice, the Irish must enforce this because they are on the lower chain of command. So in a way they are absolved from their feelings of guilt because they "have a duty to do so." I believe the crisis occurs when Donovan shot Hawkins. The crisis is the turning point of the action in the plot of the story. At this point, they all "stood very still watching him settle out in the last agony." The first shot did not work so the narrator, Bonaparte was to shoot him again. After this, Belcher began to laugh for the first time throughout the entire story and then began to talk excessively. I view this as the falling action immediately following the climax. It was as if he could not contain his emotions of what he had just witnessed. Theme plays a very important part in this short story. Theme is the idea of a literary work abstracted from its details of language, character and action. The great example of theme that is evident throughout the entire short story is the duty to perform certain acts. We can see here that the Irishman Donovan is very big on obeying his duty to carry out orders that have been authorized to him.
...attacks, and burning from flame throwers. The Germans are relentlessly hostile toward the British and Canadian soldiers, saving no lives but disposing of many. The Germans are truly enemies of these soldiers; however, in this case they definitely do not act as friends, which ultimately disagrees with Timothy Findley’s assumption that one’s enemy is their closest friends. The saying, “keep your friends close, and your enemies closer”, is truly substantiated within the text The Wars. For one’s “enemy” will not hurt them, as no trust is deposited into an enemy, however one’s friend will, since as a friend, one invests plenty of trust into another and by having this trust broken one is hurt more than anything. Timothy Findley deconstructs the concept of friend and enemy within his novel The Wars, by illustrating that one’s enemy will turn out to be their closest friend.
An idea that recurs in or pervades a work of art of literature can be referred to as a “Theme”. Themes often explore timeless and universal ideas and may be implied rather than stated explicitly. Theme is an important part of fictional stories. Several themes are presented in the novel to kill a mocking bird. One of the reoccurring themes in to kill a mockingbird is courage.
In To Kill a Mockingbird, the theme plays an important role during the course of the novel. Theme is a central idea in a work of literature that contains more than one word. It is usually based on an author’s opinion on a subject. The theme of innocence should be protected is found in conflicts, characters, and symbols. In To Kill a Mockingbird, a conflict that connects to the theme that innocence should be protected is the death of Tom Robinson.
While both political cartoons indicate anti-immigration sentiments after the influx of European immigrants, “Columbia’s Unwelcome Guests” focuses on the nature of immigration due to U.S. immigration polices while “The Mortar of Assimilation” addresses the struggle of attaining Americanization.
The Elusiveness of War and the Tenuousness of Morality in Tim O’Brien’s “The Things They Carried,” “How to Tell a True War Story,” and “Style”
Theme is the subject of talk, a topic, or morals that the author is trying to get readers to comprehend. When reading an excerpt, the theme is not directly stated in the text, so you must dig deeper into the context to understand the matter trying to be portrayed. In both Angela's Ashes and The Street, we can distinguish a like theme of struggling through life’s complications. After reading the two different stories, we could select the theme from using character, events, and the setting.
Throughout my research into the subject of the Irish in England's industrial north during the early nineteenth century, one fact became quite clear; contemporary writers' treatment of the Irish was both minimal and negative. I consulted many sources, Friedrich Engels, Leon Faucher, James Kay-Shuttleworth to name but a few and the reoccurring theme as pertaining to the Irish in all these works was mainly consistent; the Irish were a lazy, vulgar people prone to drinking and brawling.
“An Encounter,” takes a unique approach in describing the need for escape through the viewpoint of a young boy. The story is written in first-person giving the reader an advantage in knowing the thoughts of the narrator. The narrator and his friend, Mahony, desire independence from their ordinary lives at home. They have read several stories about the Wild West that cause them to think about exploring the world outside of the one they already know. An incident that happens in school triggers the boys to finally make plans to skip school to go explore downtown Dublin. This is the major independent action taken on the part of the main characters and another boy, Leo Dillon. Obviously, school has become predictable and playing in the backyard is no longer satisfactory. The narrator describes school as a, “restraining influence,” and he, “began to hunger again for wild sensations, for the escape which those chronicles of disorder (storybooks about the west) alone seemed to offer me” (12).
The community, although it is very tight and strongly bound by tradition and family, is also troubled and varied. The potato crop is failing, the maps are being changed for the convenience of the English, people want to move out of Ireland, (for example when Maire tells Hugh she wants to learn English for when she moves to America). Things appear to be at peace when we are put into this environment and everything seems well at first, but as we look further into it we can see things are much more deep seeded and dark than at first glance. For example, Doalty steals a piece of equipment from some English soldiers; this cheeky mischief seems harmless until we hear about some of the English horses being lead off a cliff to their deaths. Nothing is what it seems in this play, there are many more issues that lurk beneath the rather innocent surface of this seemingly simple, rural community; feelings of hatred and betrayal course through the bodies of many of the populous. What the English are doing is not right, nor is it fair. They have no right to change the identity of a people for their own convenience.
One example of the theme occurs when the author first introduces the story. “But the summer I was 9 years old, the town I had always loved morphed into a beautifully heartbreaking and complicated place.” (pg. 1). The author is saying that the year she turned nine, she found out something about her town that broke her heart and changed the way she saw it. This quote is important because it supports the theme. It shows that now she is older she has learned something about her town that made her wiser than when she was younger. She is now more informed because the new information changed her and caused her to begin to mature.
In James Joyce’s Dubliners, the theme of escape tends to be a trend when characters are faced with critical decisions. Joyce’s novel presents a bleak and dark view of Ireland; his intentions by writing this novel are to illustrate people’s reasons to flee Ireland. In the stories “Eveline, “Counterparts”, and the “Dead”, characters are faced with autonomous decisions that shape their lives. This forlorn world casts a gloomy shadow over the characters of these stories. These stories are connected by their similar portrayal of Ireland. They clearly represent Joyce’s views on people’s discontent with Ireland.
Theme is defined as the subject of a talk, a piece of writing, a person’s thoughts, or an exhibition; a topic. Throughout literary history, authors have been using theme to bring a story together and make a point. In order to make a story have a resounding feeling in readers, authors use themes to leave an underlying message which are usually lessons and morals that should be widely taught, such as in children’s books or in fables. In all three stories, “A Rose for Emily”, “Hills like White Elephants”, and “Harrison Bergeron” the author’s use a mutual theme of death and further show how death brings change to each of the main character’s lives in different
The soldiers feel that the only people they can talk to about the war are their “brothers”, the other men who experienced the Vietnam War. The friendship and kinship that grew in the jungles of Vietnam survived and lived on here in the United States. By talking to each other, the soldiers help to sort out the incidents that happened in the War and to put these incidents behind them. “The thing to do, we decided, was to forget the coffee and switch to gin, which improved the mood, and not much later we were laughing at some of the craziness that used to go on” (O’Brien, 29).
There is a famous 1961 film called West Side Story. In this film the “Sharks”, who are Puerto Rican immigrants battle the “Jets”, who are New Yorkers, for claim of New York City. Often erupting into violence, these two different culture groups despise each other simply because of the ignorance both have experienced. Through the rubble a love story emerges and eventually put aside their differences. This is however after several knife attacks, gunshots fired, deaths, and a hate filled mamba dance routine. Stories such as this about cultural differences are ones that one would think are far in the past. That as a society, we have moved past the differences accepting and embracing the differences that make each individual unique. But this is not the case, especially not in Northern Ireland during the 1960s till the 1980s. In Ireland, especially in Northern Ireland, religion has been the main divider between the Irish. The Catholics and Protestants have become forms of ethnicity in which the natives identify with. In John Conroy’s book, Belfast Diary, one sees an American journalist’s perspective on the conflict which hinders Ireland. The “democratic system” that was in place created an unstable power struggle only lending more fuel to the fire between these two groups. Strong examples of the unbalanced system are seen as John Conroy gives the reader access to his experience of “the Troubles” of Northern Ireland.
For an abundance of authors, the driving force that aids them in creation of a novel is the theme or number of themes implemented throughout the novel. Often times the author doesn’t consciously identify the theme they’re trying to present. Usually a theme is a concept, principle or belief that is significant to an author. Not only does the theme create the backbone of the story, but it also guides the author by controlling the events that happen in a story, what emotions are dispersed, what are the actions of characters, and what emotions are presented within each environment to engage the readers in many