There are many different characters portrayed in Irish literature. Readers never see just the stereotypical Irishman. In the readings there are characters that range from sexual deviants to a man who manages a drapery with his two spinster sisters. Each character has their own place in their story that ties in the deeper meaning, while some appear to be merely gratuities to their stories. Davy from The Belle of the Belfast City seems to be one of those gratuitous characters, but does Davy have a deeper purpose and meaning in the play?
Taking an initial look at Davy in The Belle of the Belfast City, he appears to be a small part of the plot and nothing else. A deeper look at Davy appears that he is more than just a plot point. As it turns out, Davy is a foil to the main male character Jack Horner. Davy’s and Jack’s personalities clash and highlight each character when compared. Considering that Davy is mute, he can’t talk to other characters. When Davy first sees his foil he “talks rapidly in sign language” to Jack’s cousin Vi (191). This is Davy’s means of communication. Jack, however, is the polar opposite to Davy being a mute. Jack is a public speaker and he is very passionate with his words. The choice of his words proves his feelings on the subjects he is speaking on. An example of his passion is when he is talking about the rally he is speaking at, Jack says
“Saturday is the first anniversary of the signing of the accursed Anglo-Irish Agreement. Every loyal man, woman and child must take to the streets to show the British government they will never defeat us. Never! Never! Never!” (198)
Davy can’t prove his passion on subjects as well as Jack. He can only come across with his motions, he doesn’t have the power...
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...ty. It is the smallest part of the whole country, it has disabilities of its own holding it back. It is disabled by violence and politically strife. Since Northern Ireland had been separated from the Republic of Ireland it was filled with political violence. The different kinds of views had clashed and violence had resulted. It tore apart and crippled the North. It is like Davy’s disabilities crippling his mind.
Davy is much more than a gratuity in The Belle of the Belfast City. He acts as Jack’s foil, he is part of Jack’s plan to win support for his cause, and he is a small symbol for the hardships and the people of Northern Ireland. You can find meaning in even the smallest and most irrelevant characters in literature. Even if a character gets labeled as a gratuity, there’s always a chance that he or she means more to the story than the reader initially realized.
The Watson’s Go To Birmingham, is a book narrated by Kenny Watson, the middle son of the Watson family. Kenny experiences physical and emotional insecurities that follow him from his daily life in Flint, Michigan to Birmingham, Alabama and back. Kenny made the most self changes due to several life experiences during school, his relationship with his older brother Byron, his traumatic time in Birmingham, and his realization of his inner strength upon returning to Flint. Kenny believed his physical and emotional insecurities would follow him forever, until Byron made him realize just how strong and courageous he really was.
“Ireland must be governed in the English interest” as Document 1 states. The Irish and English relationship is one of ethnic superiority over the other and geographical divide. The English feel like it is their duty to make the Irish people like themselves and they believe that their religion is the crux of what makes them inferior and the Irish just want to be left alone. The geographical divide between the nations is the mainly protestant, Ulster, and the Catholic rest of the island as Document 9 suggests. This has caused many disputes because of the fact that Irish Nationalists want the whole island unified.
Jack is the leader of the boys choir group in civilization and he is the complete opposite of Ralph. Jack wants to be leader and won’t let anyone stand in his way he rules through fear and shows signs of militarism and dictatorship. He is cruel, sadistic and preoccupied with hunting and killing pigs to help the rest signal for help. His sadism only gets worse throughout the novel, and eventually turns cruelly on the other boys. Jack pretends to show an interest in the rules of order on the island, but he views the differently because they only allow him to inflict punishment. Jack represents greed, savage and the anarchic aspects of man.
Like Ralph, Jack is charismatic and inclined to leadership. Unlike Ralph, he gets off on power and abuses his position above others so, he's basically an uptight spoiled little boy that can't be without his rich dad for long.
Bolton published a list of Jack Tales specifically for beginning storytellers as well as a brief guide of how to be a storyteller. Bolton encourages would-be storytellers to be actors, to “ham up” the alliteration’, emphasize the sounds of the story and embrace the dialect. In a direct opposite manner of the Irish storytellers who would turn their backs to the audience, Bolton encourages constant eye contact and to alter the story based on the response of the audience such as downplaying or removing a violent scene if the audience contains children evidencing fear. Bolton believes these tales are best for small groups, particularly children, with encouraged audience interaction (Bolton
Jack’s persona ‘Earnest’ has been described by Miss Prism as “irretrievably weak and vacillating” (701.35). Not only that, but Jack uses his persona of Earnest to make it seem like Jack adheres to notions of duty, honor and respectability all the while getting into mischief in London as his fake brother Ernest. Jack has shown that he will even lie to his loved ones his persona in order to get away with misbehaving and be seen as upright and moral. Later into the play Jack and his double life collide when the woman he loves starts to love his alter ego Earnest, although Ernest was an escape Jack used for his personal life but when his personal life and his real life collide he has to embrace his deception to get the life that he truly
There is particular consideration given to the political climate in this story. It is incorporated with social and ethnic concerns that are prevalent. The story also addresses prejudice and the theme of ethnic stereotyping through his character development. O'Connor does not present a work that is riddled with Irish slurs or ethnic approximations. Instead, he attempts to provide an account that is both informative and accurate.
Money is important to Tom and Daisey because it makes them feel superior to those who have less. All of these characters have been corrupted by their greed, but the one person that has not is Nick, Daisey's cousin. He is nice enough to help Gatsby with Daisey out of friendship, not for his money. In the book, money symbolizes a social evil as it destroys the lives of people corrupted by wealth. In the first chapter, Fitzgerald treats money as if it was a cookie cutter for social classes and tells how wealth divides the society into different groups.
What do you think of when you hear the name Ireland? Ireland is a relatively small island off the coast of Great Britain with a land area of 32,424 square miles (Delaney 2). There are several things that you may associate with this country such as St. Patrick’s Day, shamrocks, beer, and strife. The source of the bitterness behind this conflict began centuries ago, when Britain came over and forced Protestantism on the Irish Catholic inhabitants. For this reason there has always been an animosity between the Protestants and the Irish Catholics. The island is broken up into two distinct regions. The Republic of Ireland consists of twenty-six counties, which make up the southern region. This area is predominantly Roman Catholic. Northern Ireland is made up of the six northern counties, which are under British rule and predominately Protestant. Both sides use propaganda to spread their ideas and gain support. They each have organizations, such as the I.R.A., in the south, and the U.V.F., in the north, which use peaceful methods such as newspapers and murals along with violence to fight for their cause. In Northern Ireland the Protestants used their position in the government to spread anti-Catholic propaganda and persecute the Catholic citizens.
Up to act one, Friel presents us with a tight knit and well-bonded community of people. People bonded by their nationality, culture and language. This of course is extremely ironic (Friel uses irony quite heavily in this play, for example the fact that Jimmy-Jack is called the "infant prodigy", he is in-fact in his late sixties. His name indicates that he has always been at the same precocious level of ability and he is unlikely to advance any further), the fact that the whole play is about the English renaming most of Ireland for conveniences sake. Also the English are teaching most of Ireland how to speak English, moving them away from their traditional Gaelic tongue. The English settlers are breaking up the community.
Davy’s decisions throughout the book change how the novel progresses. Davy helps Reuben mature by helping him shoot his first goose. “I’d actually started feeling sorry for the doomed bird when Davy grabbed my shoulder and spun me so I lay on my back. He jammed the Winchester into my hands” (Enger 7). Killing a goose was a sign of manhood in Reuben’s eyes. This goodness committed by Davy gives Reuben a new sense of pride. While some of Davy’s actions have positive affects, some do not. Davy taunts Israel and Tommy and gives them an invitation to retaliate against him. “ ‘Well, he had something in his hand. A tire iron, I guess, or pry bar. Hard to tell in that rain. Anyway, he whacked every window out of the Finch boy’s car.’ “ (84). The night of Davy’s shootings, he went to Israel’s car and smashed out all of the windows. Davy wanted the issue with the boys to be over with, and gave them an invitation to come into his home. Although Davy may have thought his evil intentions would lead to a positive outcome, the murder of the two boys spark a chain of events that lead Davy into a cross-country escape from the law.
The troubles refer to the age-old disputes over the control of Northern Ireland. Even though the arguments lasted for several centuries, things did not turn extremely violent until the 1960’s (Delaney). Many terrorists entered Northern Ireland during that time. Terrorists who entered the country were said to be okay, and there was nothing wrong with them. Letting the terrorists slip by without stopping them had very deadly consequences. Thousands of people died because of the terrorists invading Northern Ireland. Very few tried to stop the terrorists from coming into Northern Ireland (Graham). Those who did attempt to stop the terrorists were unsuccessful (De Breadun).
Jean Watson “was born and grew up in the small town of Welch, West Virginia, in the Appalachian Mountains” (Jesse & Alligood, 2014, p. 79). Watson attended and graduated the Lewis Gale School of Nursing in 1961 before moving to Colorado and completing the remainder of her degrees at the University of Colorado (Jesse & Alligood, 2014). She holds a bachelor’s, master’s, and doctorate degrees. “Watson and her colleagues established the Center for Human Caring” (Jesse & Alligood, 2014, p. 80). She has also received six honorary doctorate degrees, the Fetzer Institute’s national Norman Cousins award and is recognized as a distinguished Nurse Scholar. Watson has also been the author of 11 books and has helped write six more (Jesse & Alligood,
Jack’s relatives and neighbors believe him to be a well-mannered, productive member of a polite who have a set of rules of behavior. Are they right to believe so? We’ll go to that in a short while. It can be seen clearly that Jack is a little bossy. He acts like an older brother to Algernon, even before he knows he is one. As Cecily’s Guardian, he sets down rules, even in guiding her studies, as we can see in the tutorial scene with Ms. Prism. He also very good in advising, one piece after another:
...ed on the research above, I would say that the conflict occurring in Northern Ireland is about religion, but also about civil rights. In the book, it talked about how badly Catholics were treated. “Houses belonging to those of the wrong religion were torched,” (Conroy 1995). They were deprived of their dignity, and were forced to go back to the “ghetto” they left years ago. Those belonging to the Catholic religion were pretty much exiled for being Catholic. Their civil liberties were taken away and they were harassed most of the time. Religion plays a big part in this conflict, and being of one or the other cause conflicts and violent outbreaks. Each side is fighting for something and each side is seen as the enemy (logic of exclusion), and to make a point, they used force. Even today, the past still haunts Northern Ireland, and may never reach an absolute solution.