Individual Identity in Philip Roth's The Ghost Writer
The idea of self, an individual authentic unique identity, seems to be constantly questioned and challenged in Philip Roth's The Ghost Writer. We are presented with several portraits of artists, writers and would be writers, whose notion of self is in some significant manner tied to their art. Rather than knitting together a unified (rehabilitated?) concept of self, aesthetic creativity, art, complicates and further problematizes the issue of identity. Art simultaneously undermines and underscores insights provided by a supposedly seamless master narrative. The creative impulses and ideas which inspire an artist to create may have little or nothing to do with the meaning or meanings assigned to the art itself by a virtually endless chain of interpreters. Writers are thus distanced from their texts at the same time an audience, a reader, is constructing an identity for him/herself and for the author based on the text.
Nathan Zuckerman, the narrator, is motivated to become a "great" novelist because in part of his romanticized notions of writing and writers. His identity becomes entangled in the works of E.I. Lonoff. Nathan rejects the pleas of his father to place his identity as a member of a family and as a Jew above his identity as a writer. Evoking Joyce's Stephen Dedalus, Roth's Nathan Dedalus places his identity as an artist above other concerns. He seeks a new intellectual/spiritual father in Lonoff. First from Lonoff's writings and then from the personal encounter with Lonoff himself, Nathan hopes that by emulating Lonoff in all aspects, he will become more like the idealized identity he has created as his goal.
Lonoff...
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...sentative of a larger group, concept, or commodity. This fracture first promoted by her writing is a source of both hope and agony.
Amy seeks meaning from within her fragmented existence. Where Nathan is brought to the edge of this discovery as the novel progresses, Lonoff retreats from it. Literature is adept at describing and cultivating a fragmented sense of identity; it can motivate others to actions/extremes never sought by the author. Put simply, art encourages interpretation. As writers, each of these three characters is aware of the fact that unity or singularity of interpretation is rarely (if ever) achieved. When also applied to an individual identity such interpretive freedom/ambiguity can be the source of both strength and despair. The notion of self, though perhaps less whole by the end of the novel, still houses a potential for meaning.
Vogler, Christopher. The Writer’s Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers. 3rd Ed. Studio City: Michael Wiese Productions, 2007.
The young men have, in the course of this night, authored a “piece,” a work of graffiti. In the traditional sense, authorship is defined as the creation of the work. In such a sense, one of these young men is the author of the piece. One of the artists claims the piece as his own, and gives credit to the other two for “assis...
Any study on Modern Egyptian history naturally begins with Nasser, Egypt’s first President after the Free Officers revolution in 1952. Nasser was the foremost proponent of pan-Arabism, an ideology that called for close ties between the Arab states, presumably under the leadership of Egypt, one of the most powerful states in the Middle East at the time. Compared to other states in the Arab World, Nasser’s Egypt was stable, militarily powerful, and independent of foreign influence. From this position of re...
There were several events that contributed to the Revolution of 1688. King Charles I attempted to create an absolute monarchy in 1630’s by dismissing the sitting Parliament. His actions resulted in the English Civil War, where Charles was easily overpowered by Parliament and was consequently captured by Cromwell and executed for treason. After the removal of Charles I, England entered a period of a “republic” where it was ruled by Oliver Cromwell, also known as the Lord Protector. Parliament offered Cromwell the position of king, but he refused in order to distance England from another monarchy. Soon after Oliver’s death, the Commonwealth attempted to name Cromwell’s son, Richard as his predecessor, but the people refused arguing that a theocracy would not be an improvement from the monarchial times. Charles II, the son of Charles was brought back from exile and appointed king in 1660.
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It was Italian-born physicist and Nobel winner Enrico Fermi, and his colleagues at the University of Chicago who were responsible for this success (“Nuclear”).
After the United States developed the atomic at the end of World War II, interest in nuclear technology increased exponentially. People soon realized that nuclear technology could be used for electricity, as another alternative to fossil fuels. Today, nuclear power has its place in the world, but there is still a lot of controversy over the use of nuclear energy. Things such as the containment of radiation and few nuclear power plant accidents have given nuclear power a bad image. However, nuclear power is a reliable source of energy because it has no carbon emissions, energy is available at any time, little fuel is needed for a lot of energy, and as time goes on, it is becoming safer and safer.
America’s role in the establishing of Israel marked the beginning of resentment among many Arabs and Muslims communities (Evara, Stratmann & Natta 2007). With this political stand, the US was forced to adopt policies that conflicted with major political movements in the region, namely secular pan-Arabism and Islamic fundamentalism. Egypt was on the forefront pushing for the first movement; it described its position on the Middle East and the rest of the world. Both the movements called for unity among the Muslim and Arabic community. Consequently they alienated the western countries, to an extent of advocating for violence. In 1991 the relationship was complicated further when the US led the gulf war against Iraq. However the more recent September 11, 2001 terrorist attack on America soil hig...
A successful writer is he who is able to transmit ideas, emotions, and wisdom on to his readers. He is cable of stirring emotions and capturing the reader's attention with vivid descriptions and clever dialogues. The writer can even play with the meanings of words and fuse reality with fiction to achieve his goal of taking the reader on a wonderful journey. His tools are but words, yet the art of writing is found in the use of the language to create though-provoking pieces that defy the changing times. Between the lines, voices and images emerge. Not everyone can write effectively and invoke these voices. It is those few who can create certain psychological effects on the reader who can seize him (or her) with inspiring teachings, frightening thoughts, and playful games with the language. These people are true writers…
They new the structure and particle makeup of atoms, as well as how they behaved. During the 1930Õs it became apparent that there was a immense amount of energy that would be released atoms of Gioielli 2certain elements were split, or taken apart. Scientists began to realize that if harnessed, this energy could be something of a magnitude not before seen to human eyes. They also saw that this energy could possibly be harnessed into a weapon of amazing power. And with the adven...
Berger makes his attempt to inform an audience with an academic background that there is a subjective way that we see things all around us every day and based on our previous experiences, knowledge, and other things that occur in our lives, no two people may see or interpret something in the same way. In the essay Mr. Berger uses art as his platform to discuss that we should be careful about how people look at things. Mr. Berger uses rhetorical strategies such as ethos, pathos, and logos. These rhetorical strategies can really help an author of any novel, essay, or any literature to truly get the information they desire across to the audience in a clear and concise
There is no doubt that the literary written by men and women is different. One source of difference is the sex. A woman is born a woman in the same sense as a man is born a man. Certainly one source of difference is biological, by virtue of which we are male and female. “A woman´s writing is always femenine” says Virginia Woolf
Thanks to the development of nuclear fission and the nuclear reactor, our society has seen many changes over the past 65 years. Nuclear energy has helped to take our country into the next era. From medical uses to powering submarines, nuclear energy has provided us with a much more advanced and efficient way of creating electricity and power.
In Emily Dickinson’s “Publication—is the Auction,” the speaker expresses his or her complicated negative feelings toward publishing. Through an array of literary devices (such as the opening metaphor), stylistic choices (such as the use of dashes and capitalization), and mixed diction (ranging form religious to simply aesthetic) the speaker argues that publication strains a writer’s integrity and is essentially selling out.
In the following paragraphs I will be discussing the impact of Barthes’ ‘Death of the Author’ and its interpretive impact in contemporary art; discussing why and how we establish meaning within contemporary art. Is it upon our own back? Or through the eyes of the artist. Do we follow the artist’s line of thought? Or do we create an interpretation of our own? allowing our self’s to subtract the artist as a significant figure with in the art. Allowing it to create countless voices within art; is it though the loss of the author, do we see the work for its self. But also trying to establish is the author an importance and providing examples to reinforce these ideas.