The crisp New Hampshire air chilled the private school students with its sickly cold fingers as it would rage by with a fury that would disappear as soon as it came. The grey skies which hovered above stole away the sun so that the warring world around them seemed all the more dismal and depressing. Despite the hanging feeling of dread the weather and World War seemed to influence, the boys themselves were almost giddy with the merry thoughts that plagued their juvenile minds. It was almost the end of the day which would give way to a freezing night where most people would prefer to sleep or stay indoors; however, that was not the case with these merry men of the winter session as they hastily prepared the scenery around them with the promise of prizes, the guarantee of games, and the silhouettes of snow statues.
As a boy with crutches chatted along with the boy beside him, a tall figure, known only as Brinker Hadley, was instructing some of his fellow peers on how to hide a keg of spiked cider beneath a nearby patch of shrubbery. LORD only knows what anyone was thinking when they allowed him to bring the intoxicating poison, yet not a single soul decided to question motives or ideas as each boy dreamed up their own plans as to what they would accomplish later that night. Knowing that someone might dash away with his treasure for their own nefarious schemes, Brinker had now approached his poor roommate with an unholy combination of threat and forced persuasion evident in his voice. “Brownie!” as Brinker barked at his roommate, Brownie Perkins flinched in fear of the slightly taller boy. Brownie slowly turned around to meet Brinker’s determined gaze, knowing that whatever would happened next would probably include him going out of...
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...ourse they want you! Give it to me, Brownie, I’ll read it aloud to this assembled host.” Even though he had promised the multitude to read the note aloud, his mouth stayed shut while his eyes searched over the parchment with obvious horror. Gene Forrester, the champion of the carnival, traveled through his sea of peers and snatched the telegram from Phineas. Not a protest sounded from Phineas as the horror from his eyes stayed focus on where the telegram had been previously. Gene prepared himself for whatever blunt news he was about to learn before his eyes also scanned over the words as well. There, as clear as day, was a telegram from their enlisted friend, Leper Lepellier:
I HAVE ESCAPED AND NEED HELP. I AM AT CHRISTMAS LOCATION. YOU UNDERSTAND. NO NEED TO RISK ADDRESS HERE. MY SAFETY DEPENDS ON YOU COMING AT ONCE.
(signed) YOUR BEST FRIEND,
ELWIN LEPER LEPELLIER
In John Knowles’ novel, A Separate Piece, the main Character, Gene Forrester, has to learn to become friends with his hazardous roommate, Phineas, at his school, Devon, in New Hampshire. The novel is affected by a number of changes, however the largest and most significant change is the change in seasons. In Thomas C. Foster’s novel, How to read literature like a Professor, chapter twenty explains the significance of the seasons. Foster states that, “Summer [symbolizes] adulthood and romance and fulfillment and passion,” while, “ winter [symbolizes] old age and resentment and death.” John Knowles’ book A Separate Peace, all aspects of Summer, Fall, and Winter are excellently represented as explained in Thomas C. Foster’s novel, How to read
While Snow Falling on Cedars has a well-rounded cast of characters, demands strong emotional reactions, and radiates the importance of racial equality and fairness, it is not these elements alone that make this tale stand far out from other similar stories. It is through Guterson’s powerful and detailed imagery and settings that this story really comes to life. The words, the way he uses them to create amazing scenes and scenarios in this story, makes visualizing them an effortless and enjoyable task. Streets are given names and surroundings, buildings are given color and history, fields and trees are given height and depth, objects are given textures and smells, and even the weather is given a purpose in the...
Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown,” and Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Cask of Amontillado” utilize character responsibilities to create a sinister plot. For Hawthorne, protagonist Young Goodman Brown must leave his wife at home while he partakes in a night journey. For Poe, ancillary Fortunato covets a pretentious manner towards his wine tasting skills, and after being ‘challenged’ decides to prove his expertise by sampling Amontillado. Hawthorne and Poe showcase a theme of darkness but differ in their approach to the setting, characters, and fate of entrapment.
Gioia, Dana; Kennedy, X.J. “Those Winter Sundays.” Backpack Literature. Fourth Edition. Terry, Joe. 2012. Longman, 2012. 382. Print.
The book starts out by talking about how they all went to school together. He introduces all of the characters and describes what they all are like. The characters in this book learn to deal with the cold nights and their growling stomachs. Some of the soldiers would sneak out and get hay to cover up with during the night. (Page 40)
For Finny and Gene, the summer session at Devon was a time of blissful happiness and a time where they allowed themselves to become utterly overtaken by their own illusions. The summer session was the complete embodiment of peace and freedom, and Gene saw Devon as a haven of peace. To them, the war was light years away and was almost like a dream than an actual event. At Devon, it was hard for them to imagine that war could even exist. Finny and Gene forged the Super Suicide Society of the Summer Session and acted out in the most wild and boisterous ways. Missing dinner or being absent from school for days to go to the beach did not even earn them a reprimand. “I think we reminded them of what peace was like, we boys of sixteen....We were careless and wild, and I suppose we could be thought of as a sign of the life the war was being fought to prese...
As characters in the poem are literally snow bound, they find that the natural occurrence actually serves a relaxing and warming purpose, one that brings together family. This effect is further achieved through the use of meter throughout the work as a whole. In its simplistic yet conversational tone, the author uses meter to depict the result that nature has forced upon these humans, who are but a small sample size that actually is representative of society that that time. Due to nature, the characters can talk, represented by the conversational meter, and thus, they can bond within the family. A larger representation of this more specific example can be applied to a more general perspective of human’s relationship with the natural world. Although “Snowbound” captures what humans do as a result of nature, it can also represent a larger picture, where nature appears at the most opportune times to enhance relationships from human to human. In “snowbound,” this is symbolized by the fire, “Our warm hearth seemed blazing free” (Whittier 135). This image relays a spirited, warm, mood full of security, which is expertly used by the author to show how fire, a natural phenomena, can provide such beneficial effects on humans. This very occurrence exemplifies how such a miniscule aspect of nature can have such a profound effect on a family, leaving the reader wondering what nature and its entirety could accomplish if used as a
All spring and summer the townsfolk spoke about the three bodies that had been found, mangled and slashed. Now, had the three men headed the warning and stayed away from the old man’s house they would still be alive. Instead they were tempted by the greed in their hearts for the money the terrible old man was said to have possession of. This drove them to enter through his gate and knock on the door. They believed that because he was an old man, he would be feeble and week, making him an easy target for
In John Knowle’s A Separate Peace, symbols are used to develop and advance the themes of the novel. One theme is the lack of an awareness of the real world among the students who attend the Devon Academy. The war is a symbol of the "real world", from which the boys exclude themselves. It is as if the boys are in their own little world or bubble secluded from the outside world and everyone else. Along with their friends, Gene and Finny play games and joke about the war instead of taking it seriously and preparing for it. Finny organizes the Winter Carnival, invents the game of Blitz Ball, and encourages his friends to have a snowball fight. When Gene looks back on that day of the Winter Carnival, he says, "---it was this liberation we had torn from the gray encroachments of 1943, the escape we had concocted, this afternoon of momentary, illusory, special and separate peace" (Knowles, 832). As he watches the snowball fight, Gene thinks to himself, "There they all were now, the cream of the school, the lights and leaders of the senior class, with their high IQs and expensive shoes, as Brinker had said, pasting each other with snowballs"(843).
“Winter Dreams.” Short Stories for Students. Ed. Carol Ullmann. Vol. 15. Detroit: Gale, 2002. N. pag. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 23 Mar. 2011.
We soldiers set out on foot not too long later, led by the brave general, George Washington. It was December now, and the cold, brisk, winter air sent shivers down my spine. We would eventually run low on supplies, and there were even some soldiers who were marching through the icy, frigid, snow barefoot. As we approached the Delaware River, feelings of doubt crossed my, and I’m sure the other soldier’s minds.
Summer at Devon is easygoing as teachers mellow out and the rule enforcement dwindles, such carefree behavior represents childhood; Devon’s winter session is ultimately more strict and level, emphasizing the mood in adulthood. As the sun shines bright, tension unravels and everyone at Devon loosens up including the teachers as Gene explains on page 23, “Now on these clear June days in New Hampshire they appeared to uncoil, they seemed to believe that we were with them about half of the time, and only spent the other half trying to makes fools of them.” The summer days are filled with happy-go-lucky antics that seem to come with no serious consequence; exactly how a young child would spend everyday of his life as a youthful boy. There is no
(6) The suddenness of the winter storm caught people by surprise. A roar “like an approaching train” was all the warning the storm gave. (130) The roaring wind and snow brought darkness and dropping temperatures. The people who were inside when the blizzard struck faced a dilemma. Staying inside and doing nothing seemed “heartless,” but going into the storm “on a rescue mission was likely to be fatal to the rescuer and useless to the lost.” (143) The people who were unfortunate enough to be away from home, whether they were at school or working with their livestock, had to make a difficult decision. They could either risk trying to make it home or chance it out and stay where they were. Schoolteachers had to decide whether to send the children home or keep them at the school. If anyone ventured outside, he or she risked frostbite, hypothermia, and likely
Frost begins the poem by describing a young boy cutting some wood using a "buzz-saw." The setting is Vermont and the time is late afternoon. The sun is setting and the boy's sister calls he and the other workers to come for "Supper." As the boy hears its dinnertime, he gets excited and cuts his hand on accident. Immediately realizing that the doctor might amputate his hand, he asks his sister to make sure that it does not happen. By the time the doctor arrives, it is too late and the boy's hand is already lost. When the doctor gives him anaesthetic, he falls asleep and never wakes up again. The last sentence of the poem, "since they (the boys family and the doctor) were not the one dead, turned to their affairs" shows how although the boys death is tragic, people move on with their life in a way conveying the idea that people only care for themselves.
Pyle, Fitzroy. The Winter's Tale: A Commentary on the Structure. New York: Routledge & Paul, 1969.