George Saunders and Contemporary U.S. life Coming from an “unconventional” background, George Saunders is readily able to relate to the circumstances the everyday working laborer goes through (Wylie). However, Saunders has an advantage to spread out his ideas and concerns about life in the U.S. via his short stories and novellas. Because of neoliberalism and capitalism and its correlation to the huge wealth gap in the U.S. Saunders focuses his protagonists’ view from a proletariat standpoint, allowing the reader to see the life of consumerism has impacted our society. Saunders does not use conventional methods to portray this reality. Instead, Saunders emphasizes on the “absence” of certain moral human characteristics in order to take the reader away from viewing into a hero’s looking glass— to set a foundation of a world where our morals become lost to our materialistic and inherent need of money (Wylie). Throughout Saunders’ stories: “ Pastoralia”, "Brad Carrigan, American”, “Jon”, and "In Persuasion Nation"; are themes of violence, dependence, and fate. With these themes Saunders is relaying how money and power are reflected in everyone unconscious mindset: from the higher ups to the “people at the bottom of the heap”. Saunders points out that with that type of mindset is how America is declining not just economically, but as people of morals. We may be trying to “keep positive/think positive” but maybe money is the reason why we’re sinking so low into idleness, impatience, selfishness, and whatnot (Saunders). From neoliberalism, people who are at the bottom, stay at the bottom. No matter how hard or how much they work. While this idea interplays between all themes, what holds the underside is this state of dep... ... middle of paper ... ... to play in that world so the polar bear’s words comes off as irrational. You can relate this to how some people in the working class are content with the jobs they have and don’t quite aspire for more because of the economic situation they’re in. Say that jobs are difficult to finds nowadays where more and more educated people are being hired, so the ones without a degree are content with working where they are and don’t want to argue for more because of the risk of losing their jobs. Some people are just resigned to their ‘fate’. Saunders utilizes different the themes of violence, fate, and dependence to reflect contemporary U.S. life under neoliberalism and capitalism. He emphasizes the ‘absence’ of compassionate and essential humanistic traits in order to highlight the decline of such aspects of humanity because of our selfish desires for materialistic goods.
Ehrenreich, B. (2011). Nicke and dimed: On (not) getting by in america. New York, NY: Picador.
In Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America, the author, Barbara Ehrenreich, takes on an experiment where she leaves her job as a highly acclaimed writer and decides to become part of the working class in order to better understand them and their continuous strains and worries. Throughout the novel, the author cleverly utilizes statistical data, her own personal experiences and the previously untold experiences of others to bring to light the harsh reality facing many Americans who, despite their daily hard work and effort, are shockingly close to poverty.
“Earth provides enough to satisfy every man 's needs, but not every man 's greed.” As humans, we work countless hours in order to have a greater opportunity to succeed in life to fulfill our wants. F Scott Fitzgerald, author of The Great Gatsby, utilizes effective language and punctuation in the text in order to accomplish his purpose: Illustrate what material goods does to a society. From a rhetorical standpoint, examining logos, ethos, and pathos, this novel serves as a social commentary on how pursuing the “The American Dream” causes people in society to transform into greedy and heartless individuals.
Money, death and lies are the central theme of this book. Which has existed since the beginning of time and present in society today. This play heavily focuses on falsehoods and fate. The question of whether or not should we as a society be doing anything to change America, my answer is affrimative, I agree we should. With that being said, the only way to stop greed is to stop the capatilistic machine. Destroying currensy on a global scale and putting zero emphasis on money and more emphasis on building
Nickel and Dimed, by Barbara Enrenreich, is a novel written about her experiences while living and working among the common poor folk of America. Her adventures bring her from a restaurant in Ohio to the coasts of Maine to a Wal-Mart in Minnesota. Although her living and working locations change, one thing stays constant about Barbara her humorous and witty remarks. These remarks keep the reader entertained. Although her wisecracks are clever, they seem to at many times go too far, and have a tendency to be offensive, but this does not take away from the fact that these remarks greatly increase the validity of her arguments.
According to Raymond Williams, “In a class society, all beliefs are founded on class position, and the systems of belief of all classes …” (Rice and Waugh 122). His work titled, Marxism and Literature expounded on the conflict between social classes to bridge the political ideals of Marxism with the implicit comments rendered through the text of a novel. “For the practical links,” he states “between ‘ideas’ and ‘theories’ and the ‘production of real life’ are all in this material social process of signification itself” (133). Williams asserts that a Marxist approach to literature introduces a cross-cultural universality, ensuingly adding a timeless value to text by connecting creative and artistic processes with the material products that result. Like Williams, Don DeLillo calls attention to the economic and material relations behind universal abstractions such as aesthetics, love, and death. DeLillo’s White Noise brings modern-day capitalist societies’ incessant lifestyle disparity between active consumerists and those without the means to the forefront of the story’s plot. DeLillo’s setting uses a life altering man-made disaster in the suburban small-town of Blacksmith to shed light on the class conflict between the middle class (bourgeoisie) and the working poor (proletariat). After a tank car is punctured, an ominous cloud begins to loom over Jack Gladney and his family. No longer a feathery plume or a black billowing cloud, but the airborne toxic event—an event that even after its conclusion Jack cannot escape the prophecy of his encroaching death. Through a Marxist reading of the characterization of Jack Gladney, a middle-aged suburban college professor, it is clear that the overarching obsession with death operates as an...
The poem “America” by Tony Hoagland reflects on how peoples’ minds are clouded by small-scale items, money, and the unimportance of those items. Metaphors and imagery are utilized to emphasize the unimportance of materialistic items in America. How America is being flooded with unnecessary goods. The poem uses examples of people to create an example and connection to the overall meaning.
George Saunders, a writer with a particular inclination in modern America, carefully depicts the newly-emerged working class of America and its poor living condition in his literary works. By blending fact with fiction, Saunders intentionally chooses to expose the working class’s hardship, which greatly caused by poverty and illiteracy, through a satirical approach to criticize realistic contemporary situations. In his short story “Sea Oak,” the narrator Thomas who works at a strip club and his elder aunt Bernie who works at Drugtown for minimum are the only two contributors to their impoverished family. Thus, this family of six, including two babies, is only capable to afford a ragged house at Sea Oak,
In the essay The Chosen People, Stewart Ewen, discusses his perspective of middle class America. Specifically, he explores the idea that the middle class is suffering from an identity crisis. According to Ewen’s theory, “the notion of personal distinction [in America] is leading to an identity crisis” of the non-upper class. (185) The source of this identity crisis is mass consumerism. As a result of the Industrial Revolution and mass production, products became cheaper and therefore more available to the non-elite classes. “Mass production was investing individuals with tools of identity, marks of personhood.” (Ewen 187) Through advertising, junk mail and style industries, the middle class is always striving for “a stylistic affinity to wealth,” finding “delight in the unreal,” and obsessed with “cheap luxury items.” (Ewen 185-6) In other words, instead of defining themselves based on who they are on the inside, the people of middle class America define themselves in terms of external image and material possessions.
George Saunders is a New York Times bestselling American writer of short stories, essays, novellas and children's books. His short story “The 400 Pound CEO” appeared in Harper's magazine. Jeffrey is a very unique character who was very engaging as a 1st person narrator. Saunders achieved the sympathy factor for this protagonist. The concept was 100% original and interesting, and even the minor characters had clear personalities. It is especially depressing to consider that hatred like this can continue into adulthood. George Saunders “The 400 Pound CEO” relates to postmodernism because the main character been bullied, ostracized, and verbally abused because of his weight by his workers who are average weight.
In today’s society, the question of minimum wage is a large political topic. Many people argue that it is impossible to live on a minimum wage lifestyle. In her novel Nickel and Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich looks into this issue. In an experiment in which she mimics the life of a single woman, she moves into the low-wage workforce in three different cities in America. Within these cities, she attempts to make a living off of low-wage work and records her experiences, as well as the experiences of the true low-wage workers around her. Throughout Nickel and Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich utilizes both vivid imagery and data in order to persuade the audience to agree that the low-wage lifestyle is truly un-livable.
The book White Noise by Don DeLillo traces the protagonist-narrator Jack Gladney’s gradual and astounding progress in life as he tries to conform to the postmodern world to which he belongs while trying to retain his moral and ethical principles. The book discusses the postmodern and cultural explorations in an open and Western living system that incorporates within itself a consumeristically dominant culture vibrant with supermarket-grocery shopping, globalization, mass media dependency, and anticipation towards establishing a concrete, dynamic, and self-created individuality.
Dr. Theodore Dalrymle wrote “Life at the bottom” as a way to express his views of the English underclass. He believes their impaired ways of life, are the cause of poverty in England, “not the economy”. Those who pledged to serve and protect, on many levels, are neglecting their responsibilities, either in fear of being judged themselves or by simply turning a blind eye to continuous problems within England. No one wants to accept the reality of England’s horrendous situation. Therefore their endless battle with poverty, suffering and misery will continue in a vicious, endless, cycle.
...e hand of social order is telling them this is “ok.” That is why liberal views in Zenith are so quickly extinguished. The superior class wants people to think that there always must be a lower class because that is the way God has planned it, which in retrospect sustains their rank as the higher class forever. It’s ironic that this idea is still relevant today.
Jonathan Franzen’s Novel, The Corrections, is a satiric tale of American culture, the lack of values, and the absolute obsession with consumer goods and consumption. It is told through the lives of the Lambert family, and their constant needs to “correct” various mistakes in their lives and behavior. The novel, published in 2001, comments on the social ills of American society; the dependence on world financial markets, new technologies, entitlement programs, big business, and of course, consumerism. While the novel is extreme in its commentary, and sweeping in its size, it is through the recent life of Chip Lambert that we can see parallels to the current U.S. economic situation, and the potential for further disasters.