A priest named St. Jerome once stated, “Good, better, best. Never let it rest. ‘Till your good is better and your better is best.” One is to keep on working until they are the best at their passion. Julia Child cooked for a living. She was born in Pasadena, California, on August 15, 1912 (Shapiro, 2007). Julia child created Mastering the Art of French Cooking that launched television show, innovated recipes in both the cookbook plus the television show, and changing the way Americans thought of cooking. She became a role model and an icon; all while doing what she loved.
Amongst all the things Julia created, a cookbook and a television show were some of the most famous. In 1961, with the help of Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle, she wrote
Louise Bourgeiois was born in Paris in 1911 and lived in New York until her death in 2010. Much of her artwork was inspired from her early childhood that she spent in France. The human body was Burgoeiois primary form of art, as she made multipe sculptures
Repeated images of Angela Bari living an imprisoned life in Voices by Dacia Maraini play an important role in book. The internal and external forces surrounding Angela Bari lead her to a life of confinement and domination. If Angela Bari had broken away from her confinement she may have prevented her untimely death by exposing the ill ways of her stepfather, Glauco Elia. Angela's secretiveness, self-doubt, and compliance with others lead her to victimization.
Born in 1941, Ms. Stewart had quite the life. Growing up, her father introduced her to gardening, while her mother introduced her to cooking, baking, and sewing and after marrying her husband, Andrew Stewart; she became a
Inside Toyland, written by Christine L. Williams, is a look into toy stores and the race, class, and gender issues. Williams worked about six weeks at two toy stores, Diamond Toys and Toy Warehouse, long enough to be able to detect patterns in store operations and the interactions between the workers and the costumers. She wanted to attempt to describe and analyze the rules that govern giant toy stores. Her main goal was to understand how shopping was socially organized and how it might be transformed to enhance the lives of workers. During the twentieth century, toy stores became bigger and helped suburbanization and deregulation. Specialty toy stores existed but sold mainly to adults, not to children. Men used to be the workers at toy stores until it changed and became feminized, racially mixed, part time, and temporary. As box stores came and conquered the land, toy stores started catering to children and offering larger selections at low prices. The box stores became powerful in the flip-flop of the power going from manufacturers to the retailers. Now, the retail giants determine what they will sell and at what price they will sell it.
Julie Andrews performance in The Sound of Music was anything but ordinary. Andrew’s role as Maria secured her tittle as one of the greatest actresses of her time, though The Sound of Music was only her second onscreen performance. She played the role of Maria with such strength and kindness yet, in a very assertive manor; when standing up for the children against Captain Georg Johannes Ritter von Trapp. In the film, being it a musical, Julie Andrews shows off her stunning vocal abilities with her intense 5 octave range. She transitions from song to song with such ease that it makes you believe that you could sing it as she can. Andrews shows her “acting chops” with her apparent onscreen chemistry with the other actors. In such scenes as when she confesses her feelings for Captain von Trapp to Mother Abbess; you can practically see the chemistry between the two actresses as well as the chemistry between Julie Andrews and the children, along with Captain von Trapp himself all throughout the movie.
Childhood is often perceived as a period of innocence and purity. However, it is also the period of time where a person’s fundamental character is established, which can be easily affected by the conditions of the child’s environment. Alias Grace, a novel by Margaret Atwood, contains many themes centered on the concept of childhood and the influence of a person’s past. The book features a famous convicted murderess, Grace Marks, and a doctor, Simon Jordan, who interviews her at the Kingston Penitentiary where she is held in order to find the truth behind her convicted crime. In the novel, the relationship between Grace and her family contributes the most to her character development throughout her life. Grace’s family influence causes her to develop independence, protective characteristics, and murderous thoughts which all influence her actions later in life. The conditions of her childhood are essential factors and contributors to Grace’s individuality.
The interpretations of the characters is greatly known throughout Julia Alvarez’s “Daughter of Invention” and is well hidden deep within the layers of what the story is trying to reflect. In the short story, the reader is able to identify the characters’ distinct personalities with ease – however, most readers do not muster the time to comprehend any evident changes that makes the character what they are. As hinted, the father is known as a gentle and passive man who loves to pass on his tradition and youth to his daughter – Cukita (92). This later changes when he ends up throwing a tantrum in outrage at Cukita’s speech (94). To the average reader, it’s explicit that the father’s character is known to be lazy and angry, but don’t acknowledge the reasoning behind his and any other character’s behavior.
“She was from Pasadena, this six-foot-two marvel of a woman. It was not so much because she was an extraordinary cook- and she would pointedly remind us that she was a cook, not a chef” (Kehoe 1). Julia Child was an extraordinary woman who had a passion for cooking that she didn’t even know could change the way people cook. Julia Child most definitely influenced cooking for generations to come with her passion for cooking and love for food.
The book Stella by Starlight written by Sharon Draper is a very interesting story a young girl named Stella and The Klu Klux Klan. Stella lives with her brother, Jojo, and her mother, and her father In Bumblebee, North Carolina. One night Jojo wakes Stella up because he heard voices while he was going to the outhouse. They went out to the lake by their house (where the voices were coming from) and they saw a burning cross. Stella knew it was the Klu Klux Klan. Stella and Jojo ran home and woke up their parents.
Rachel was born on the 11th of December 1960 in Haslemere Surrey. From a young age she was interested in music and started composing music at 14. At college she started composing music especially for student films.
Since seventh grade Kaye Hoff started writing her own music. She had never really thought about writing her own music until an open mic session where a man came up to her and encouraged her to sing her own music instead of just Taylor Swift covers because she has such a beautiful voice.
Laura Esquivel’s novel, Like Water for Chocolate, is a contemporary novel based on romance, recipes and home remedies. Very little criticism has been done on the novel. Of the few essays that are written on this work, the majority of them consist of feminist critique. This novel would be most easily approached from a feminist view because of the intricate relationships between women. However, relationships between women are only one of the many elements touched upon in the novel. Like Water for Chocolate is a novel that uses recipes as a crypt for many important themes in the novel. Jaques Derrida defines crypt as something that, "disguise[s] the act of hiding and to hide the disguise: the crypt hides as it holds" (Derrida 14). The recipes are more than just formulas, they hold, concealed within them, memories. These crypts are revealed through food and the process of food production. Esquivel has personal ties with food and feels that the production of food creates a center of the household. Tita, being the person most closely associated with food preparation in the novel, becomes the primary focus in the structure of her family. The crypts that Esquivel uses are opened throughout the novel in a variety of ways. Tita is constantly struggling against her mother, tradition and inevitably her own destiny. Along the way many aspects of her trials are revealed in her cooking. Eventually, Tita is able to free herself from the emotional chains that her mother has bound her. In the end her destiny is revealed, which in return sets her free from her struggles.
Growing up I thought that the only way to make my parents happy and to notice me was to follow the expectations they had for my older brother. I thought their expectations were supposed to be my goals, but as I got older I started to realize that meeting their expectation wasn't good for me. I wasn't supposed to just have goals to make them happy. I was supposed to have goals that I wanted, goals that were supposed to benefit me. After reading "Only Daughter" by Sandra Cisneros it helped me confirm this feelings I was having. You don't always have to meet up with your parents standards to be acknowledged or for them to be proud of you. You shouldn't let that stop you from accomplishing your goals and that one day the people that love you will be proud that you achieved your goals.
In Sophie's World, Jostein Gaarder teaches philosophy and it explains basic philosophical ideas better than any other reading book or textbook that I have ever read. The many philosophical lessons of the diversified thinkers of their own time were dexterously understood. The author has a wonderful knack for finding the heart of a concept and placing it on display. For example, he metamorphoses Democritus' atoms into Lego bricks and in a stroke makes the classical conception of the atom dexterously attainable. He relates all the abstract concepts about the world and what is real with straightforward everyday things that everyone can relate to which makes this whole philosophy course manageable. ''The best way of approaching philosophy is to ask a few philosophical questions: How was the world created? Is there any will or meaning behind what happens? Is there a life after death? How can we answer these questions? And most important, how ought we to live?'' (Gaarder, Jostein 15).
Eva Hoffman’s memoir, Lost in Translation, is a timeline of events from her life in Cracow, Poland – Paradise – to her immigration to Vancouver, Canada – Exile – and into her college and literary life – The New World. Eva breaks up her journey into these three sections and gives her personal observations of her assimilation into a new world. The story is based on memory – Eva Hoffman gives us her first-hand perspective through flashbacks with introspective analysis of her life “lost in translation”. It is her memory that permeates through her writing and furthermore through her experiences. As the reader we are presented many examples of Eva’s memory as they appear through her interactions. All of these interactions evoke memory, ultimately through the quest of finding reality equal to that of her life in Poland. The comparison of Eva’s exile can never live up to her Paradise and therefore her memories of her past can never be replaced but instead only can be supplemented.