Omeros portrays Helen as a beautiful, prideful, and spirited young woman, yet there are times when she is portrayed as a sexual object that is promiscuous with two friends. There are also some suspicions raised within Maud about her husband’s Plunkett obsession with Helen. Helen represents both the young woman and the island of St. Lucia, which is known as the Helen of the West Indies. The characteristics given to Helen by Walcott reflect the struggle with being dominated by males and them trying to claim her. She must fight the tourism and the men attempting to cast claim on her. In VI, we see Helen with an independent and rebellious spirit: “What the white manager mean to say was she was too rude, ‘cause she dint take no shit from white people and some of them tourist—the men only want to touch local girls; every minute—” (33) Helen does not conform like the others to the social expectations of the tourists. She rejects the ideology that a subservient attitude is necessary to keep the tourists appeased. The mention of the “white manager” also implies contempt for the white pop...
Have you ever had something of great value be taken from you and then feeling emotionally empty? In Celia Garth, Gwen Bristow desires to share the important message of Celia Garth’s past to the characters and readers. Memories prove that Celia got through the war and the bells provided a stress free period. Her memories were resembled through the bells of St.Michaels Church. The past demonstrated in Celia’s eyes about the war and what the bells reminded her of.
In the novel, My Antonia, by Willa Cather, society seems to govern the lives of many people. But for the others, who see past society's stereotypical values, had enough strength to overcome this and allowed them to achieve their dreams. Throughout the book, everyone seems to be trying to pursue the American Dream. While they all have different ideas of just exactly what the American Dream is, they all know precisely what they want. For some, the American Dream sounds so enticing that they have traveled across the world to achieve their goal.
In a world dominated by religion it was thought that the only place where perfection existed was within God. In some cases, for instance the ontological argument, it was the proof to his existence. But in a modern world the concept of perfection has been distorted and comes with an abundance of seemingly negative consequences, ultimately putting into question whether or not perfection is even possible. In Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake the concept of perfection is constantly challenged in a world run by corporations who are trying to package human perfection and profit from it. The desire and attempt towards attaining perfection brings moral instability and corruption. Even though perfection seems as if it is the ultimate and most excellent way to live, it is always accompanied with negative results making true perfection unattainable. As previously mentioned, the society that is most present in the novel is run by large corporations that attempt to provide a perfect life for the people within the Compounds. The corporations are riddled with immoral actions that are projected onto the lives of the people they are trying to provide for. Jimmy, on the other hand, lacks this desire for perfection and is pleased with his mediocrity; this level of being content with himself allows him to feel and exercise more valuable traits like empathy. Finally, through the novel Crake is slowly trying to grasp at, or create perfection and he is slowly losing his moral grounding. What seems to be a positive goal for man to have is actually the opposite, causing men to lose what makes them most different from animals, leaving them cruel and ruthless.
It is human nature to seek out answers and solutions to the unknown. Humans constantly create definitions for complex ideas in order to establish a sense of truth and understanding. However, not everything has one definite answer. Zora Neale Hurston proves this notion in her most popular narrative, Their Eyes Were Watching God. In her novel, Hurston uses Janie’s three husbands to reveal that happiness cannot be defined by a society nor a single individual; true happiness is different for everyone and must be sought out.
Helen comes from a very low class family and community. Helen’s family is known as what is called “the ghetto”, although they may not have riches they have a great heart that unites them happily. Helen depended so much on a believed love who failed her. Helen never really came far on her education due to having everything with Charles. Charles lost interest on Helen, but she was blindfolded to see that her happiness didn’t exist. Charles has had an affair during their matrimony with a light complected woman who is mother of his two children. The woman had more power over Helen’s feelings because Charles realized his children needed him. Charles left Helen without much to do, kicking her out o...
The Empress Dowager Tzi-his (1835-1908) was a unique ruler unlike any other China had ever seen. She is considered to be one of the most influential people in Chinese history, a rarity in the male dominated Chinese world. The empress dowager exerted great power over the Chinese empire and influenced the political structure in ways it had never been influenced before, making many great reforms that she believed would help the Chinese people.
Memories are a stockpile of good and bad experiences that are retained of a people, places. How do you remember your childhood memories? Do certain people, places or things trigger these memories to the past? Does the knowledge of these experience still affect your life today? Throughout the novel My Antonia, Jim's nostalgia for the past is represented by nature, symbolic elements, and above all Antonia.
The Ones Who Walked Away from Omelas is a short story written by Ursula Le Guin. In her story, Le Guin creates a model Utilitarian society in which the majority of its citizens are devoid of suffering; allowing them to become an expressive, artistic population. Le Guin’s unrelenting pursuit of making the reader imagine a rich, happy and festival abundant society mushrooms and ultimately climaxes with the introduction of the outlet for all of Omelas’ avoided misfortune. Le Guin then introduces a coming of age ritual in which innocent adolescents of the city are made aware of the byproduct of their happiness. She advances with a scenario where most of these adolescents are extremely burdened at first but later devise a rationalization for the “wretched one’s” situation. Le Guin has imagined a possible contemporary Utilitarian society with the goal to maximize the welfare of the greatest number of people. On the contrary, Kant would argue that using the child as a mere means is wrong and argue that the living conditions of the child are not universalizable. The citizens of Omelas must face this moral dilemma for all of their lives or instead choose to silently escape the city altogether.
...xtent will this essay bring about a change in Antigua? The Antiguan scene can only be modified by the government choosing to run the country in a more manner that will benefit everyone associated with Antigua, especially its natives. The native’s behaviours are related to their jealousy of tourists, and of the tourist’s ability to escape their own hometown to take a vacation. While a tourist can relate to the idea that the exhaustion felt after a vacation comes from dealing with the invisible animosity in the air between the natives and themselves, having this knowledge is almost as good as not having it, because there is nothing that the tourist, or the reader, can really DO about it! If Kincaid’s purpose is solely to make tourists aware of their actions, she has succeeded. If Kincaid’s purpose is to help Antigua, she may not have succeeded to the same magnitude.
This book is about a girl name Ellen Foster who is ten years old. Her mother committed suicide by over dosing on her medication. When Ellen tried to go look for help for her mother her father stopped her. He told them that if she looked for helped he would kill them both. After her mother died she was left under her fathers custody. Her father was a drunk. He would physically and mentally abuse her. Ellen was forced to pay bills, go grocery shopping, cook for herself, and do everything else for herself. Ellen couldn't take it any more so she ran away her friends house. Starletta and her parents lived in a small cabin with one small bathroom. One day at school a teacher found a bruise on Ellen's arm. She sends Ellen to live with Julia the school's art teacher. Julia had a husband named Roy. They were both hippies. Julia and Roy cared a lot about Ellen. After Ellen turned 11 years old she was forced to go live with her grandmother. Ellen didn't want to leave Julia and Roy but her grandmother had won custody. Her grandmother was a cruel old lady. Ellen spends the summer with her grandmother. Living with her makes her very unhappy. Since her grandmother owns farmland she forces Ellen to work on the field with her black servants. Ellen meets a black woman named Mavis. Mavis and her become good friends. Mavis would talk about how she knew Ellen's mother and how much Ellen resembled her mother. Her grandmother didn't think the same. She thought that Ellen resembled her father. She also hated that man. Her grandmother would often compare her with her father. Her grandmother would torture her because she wanted revenge from her father. Her grandmother also blames her for the death of her mother. While Ellen was staying with her grandmother her father died. When her father died she didn't feel sad because she had always fantasized about killing her father. Ellen just felt a distant sadness. Ellen cried just a little bit. Her grandmother was furious because Ellen showed some emotions. She told her to never cry again. After that Ellen becomes scarred for a long time. One day her uncle Rudolph bought the flag that had been on Ellen's father's casket. Her grandmother turns him away. Later that day she burned the flag.
A Century of Dishonor is a non-fiction book that was written by Helen Hunt Jackson and was first published in 1881. It focuses on the experiences the Native Americans had in the US, specifically on the injustices they faced while coming into contact with expansionist Americans. It consists primarily of the tribal histories of seven different tribes and describes their varied treatment respectively. For example, one of the incidents it depicts is the attack of Praying Town Indians in the colonial period, who, even though they converted to Christianity, were nevertheless eradicated.
Through attention to detail, repeated comparison, shifting tone, and dialogue that gives the characters an opportunity to voice their feelings, Elizabeth Gaskell creates a divide between the poor working class and the rich higher class in Mary Barton. Gaskell places emphasis on the differences that separate both classes by describing the lavish, comfortable, and extravagant life that the wealthy enjoy and compares it to the impoverished and miserable life that the poor have to survive through. Though Gaskell displays the inequality that is present between both social classes, she also shows that there are similarities between them. The tone and diction change halfway through the novel to highlight the factors that unify the poor and rich. In the beginning of the story John Barton exclaims that, “The rich know nothing of the trials of the poor…” (11), showing that besides the amount of material possessions that one owns, what divides the two social classes is ability to feel and experience hardship. John Barton views those of the upper class as cold individuals incapable of experiencing pain and sorrow. Gaskell, however proves Barton wrong and demonstrates that though there are various differences that divide the two social classes, they are unified through their ability to feel emotions and to go through times of hardship. Gaskell’s novel reveals the problematic tension between the two social classes, but also offers a solution to this problem in the form of communication, which would allow both sides to speak of their concerns and worries as well as eliminate misunderstandings.
In Kleist’s novella The Marquise of O, the narrative depicts the account of the Marquise of O’s, a young Italian window and a “lady of unblemished reputation”(Kleist 68), sudden impregnation and her subsequent attempts to solve the question of the paternity of her child. Through the contrasting interactions between the characters from the Marquise’s estrangement with her family to her eventual reconciliation, Kleist utilizes the search for her unborn child’s father to provide a social commentary on how tensions of uncertainty complicate the search for truth and identity within established gender relationships and traditional social constructs.
Emma by Jane Austen Setting Emma took place in a small town called Highbury in 18th century England. During the time period set in the novel, there was a definite social rank, or hierarchy. Almost all of the scenes in the book take place in or around the estates of the characters. Their property determines their social status.
At the beginning of the movie, Susan, who is an American tourist in Morocco, gets shot by a Moroccan boy, Yusef. Because of this, other tourists in the bus all scattered into the village. The scene in the village showed many examples of stereotypes and disconnection of the communications. The other tourists feel many stereotypes about the small village, and they get afraid. The stereotype that they have is the people in the village might hurt them; they think the people in the village are dangerous, and might take them as hostage for terror. They decide to leave the village without Susan and her husband, Richard. Richard asks them to wait, but the tourists did not want to. This scene of when Richard and the other tourists get into an argument exposes the selfishness that people have. Because of the stereotype and selfishness they had for each other, Richard and the tourists were not able to communicate well. They did not consider each other’s situations, did not listen to each other, and held fast to one’s view.