Loneliness of Long Distan
Born in Nottingham in 1928 to a working class family, serving in the Air
Force, and going through many struggles, Alan Sillitoe is known as an
effective representative of the English working class. Through his story
"The Loneliness of the Long-Distance R unner" and the other stories
contained within the book, Sillitoe effectively criticises the legal
system of England, which deprives individualism from its people, is
ineffective and interferes with people's lives. His stories "Uncle
Ernest," "On Saturday Afternoon, and "The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Runner" show these themes. The issues presented still are pertinent today. Sillitoe
effectively criticises the legal system in "Uncle Ernest." Uncle Ernest
is a working-class lonely man who lives an isolated, despondent existence.
Joan and Alma, whom he befriends, are very poor and in need of a father
figure. Ernest has lost all of his old friends. His family has left him.
He is need of company. He can no longer cover up his loneliness like he
covers up the sofas he re-upholsters for a living. Ernest buys food for
them, clothes, and gifts. All three are happy in the rela tionship they
have with one-another. However, one day, he was told, "Now look here, we
don't want any more trouble from you, but if ever we see you near those
girls again, you'll find yourself up before a magistrate" (57). Ernest is
deprived his life, w hat makes him happy. He is deprived the only
friendship he has because the unwritten social code suggests that a man
such as himself befriending young girls as such means that he is a
paedophile. The detectives interfere with his life. Sillitoe shows t he
legal system not only makes false assumptions, but goes by an unwritten
social code that is accusational. The issue of conformity is central;
Ernest is not a "normal" member of society, therefore he is further
ostracised. In "On Saturday Afternoon," Sillitoe's narrative is of an
account of a bloke hanging himself. The man survived. When found by a
copper, he was told, "Its against the law." "It ain't your life. And
it's a crime to take your own life. It's killing your self. Its
suicide." (103). The legal system is ineffective; the man proved to the
coppers whose life it was. He jumped out of a hospital window to his
death. Furthermore, the legal system is questioned. In this almost spooky
is him being lonely. This trait is shown when Carlson says “It ain’t no go to himself” describing
Furthermore, sometimes the desire to be accepted is stronger than prevailing conventions. This makes an individual to do things to make him feel accepted in the society. Krakauer compares the people in Alaska and McCandless. He writes, “And I’m sure there are plenty of other Alaskans who had a lot in common with McCandless when they first got here, too, including many of his critics. Which maybe why they’re so hard on him. Maybe McCandless reminds them a little too much of their former selves” (Krakauer 221). In today’s society, an individual confirms itself to what a society wants and expect him or her to be.
Since at least the 1980’s performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) have been a major challenge in the world of Major League Baseball, and past trends indicate they will continue to pose an ongoing problem. A number of the most prominent and accomplished professional baseball players, such as Alex Rodriguez, Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire, Jason Giambi, Roger Clemens, are also the most famous examples of baseball players who have broken longstanding records, attracted countless numbers of fans, and allegedly have taken performance-enhancing drugs. Athletes who have been caught using steroids in order to increase and better their performance rates have been suspended, fined and traded from the teams on which they once played. Despite the punitive actions taken against them by the League and lawmakers, players continue to use performance-enhancing drugs and likely will continue to do so, because the associated athletic effects will draw more fans and bring more money to the individual player and franchise.
The era in sports from the late 90s and into the 2000s has often been nicknamed “The Steroid Age” due to the raging use of anabolic steroids and other PEDs (performance enhancing drugs) by professional athletes. The usage of drugs in sports has never been more prevalent during this time, and many people are making it their goal to put an end to the abuse. Influential athletes such as Lance Armstrong, Alex Rodriguez, and Roger Clemens, who were once held as the highest role models to the American people, now watch as their legacies are tarnished by accusations of drug use. The American population, and lovers of sports everywhere, have followed in astonishment through recent years as many beloved athletes reveal their dark secrets. As organizations such as the USADA (United States Anti-Doping Agency) and BALCO (Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative) attempt to halt the use of PEDs, both the drug users and their high-end suppliers work diligently to avoid detection. The use of performance enhancing drugs in recent years has proven to be cancerous to the honesty and competition of modern sports. Although some strides have been made over the past few decades, the use of steroids is in full swing in Major League Baseball, The dangerous side effects of the drugs are often overlooked and many do not realize the message this sends to the youth. The support for halting the usage of PEDs is in need of attention or professional sports will face the loss of all progress made through the past two decades in its war on steroids.
T.S. Eliot and William Butler Yeats portray their characters as two men, who are trying to deal with the idea of loneliness. Both men are presently depressed with their existing lifestyles and crave to become a part of an entirely different state of affairs. As these authors present their characters desires to live a separate life from their recent one, Prufrock and the narrator (Yeats) take a different approach to expressing their ideas of loneliness. Eliot chooses to depict his character as an overly educated man, whose mental state is deteriorating because he longs for companionship, while Yeats chooses to depict his character as a man, who wants to live-out his childhood dream in solitude. Both authors show their characters as men who are trying to cope with their feelings toward seclusion.
The purpose of Philip Slater’s book The Pursuit of Loneliness is to “reach some understanding of the forces which are unraveling our society” for his readers (xxii). It is a common conception that America is the best country, an idea which is substantiated by economic figures. However, Americans are not happy. According to Slater, “all societies frustrate certain human needs and satiate others (because) humanity and any particular society’s idea of what humanity should be is never very exact” (2). In America, the gap between reality and perception is growing farther and farther apart, at human expense. Americans work their entire lives for the future, in the pursuit of economic security, which ultimately leads to continued unhappiness in the present. American culture “struggles more and more violently to maintain itself, (but) is less and less able to hide its fundamental antipathy towards human life and human satisfaction” (122). Slater’s book teaches people about the existence of the “wide gap between the fantasies Americans live by and the realities they live in,” in the hopes that this will inspire people to react in positive ways (xxiii).
Famous German physician Albert Schweitzer said, “We are all so much together, but we are all dying of loneliness.” In the novel Of Mice and Men, written during the Great Depression, loneliness is a very important theme. I am going to write about how loneliness has impacted the lives of George, Crooks and Curley's wife, in this essay.
Nathaniel Hawthorne was a prolific writer, weaving some of the best-known stories in American literature. While Hawthorne’s works tend to focus around the Puritan themes of sin, he was usually critical of Puritan ideals. Some of Hawthorne’s works (“Young Goodman Brown”, “The Minister’s Black Veil”, and The Scarlet Letter) have characters living life outside of their Puritan communities and can be classified as outsider narratives. Young Goodman Brown, Reverend Hooper, Arthur Dimmesdale, and Hester Prynne are all outsiders in their communities, but what makes the characters unique is that they chose to be outsiders.
Of Mice and Men is a colorful piece of American literature that depicts the lives of multiple individuals in the Great Depression over the course of a few days. The author, John Steinbeck, approaches several themes and topics throughout the novel and really makes the reader think and ponder over the issues being discussed. One key theme that is always present in Of Mice and Men is the idea of loneliness. In the novel loneliness can be found in the relationships characters have with others, sexism, and racism. Even the town that the novel takes place in is Soledad, which is Spanish for loneliness. Of Mice and Men accurately shows the hardships that loneliness can inflict on people in the Great Depression and even today and is a topic that a myriad of readers can connect with and sympathies for.
... resources and also the undeniable fact that it's been decriminalized in a very couple states. All of those points are connected with one another and directly impact the U. S. in a very positive manner. The push for marijuana use is solely a series of dominos on the brink of be hit. Within the close to future America can countenance marijuana use for its individuals and America are going to be ameliorate back on their mental attitude yet again?
All in all, through the use of the characters in Of Mice and Men, Steinbeck is able to highlight how isolation that is forced on individuals by society ultimately leads to one’s suffering. The overall message of the novel is that no single individual should be mistreated because of a mental issue, his or her race, his or her gender, or the fact that one may have a physical injury. It is everyone’s human right to be treated equally and respectfully. No one should ever feel alienated from his or her surroundings. Loneliness is something that no one can avoid. As the story comes to an end, the story brings to light different causes of isolation, particularly discrimination and preconceptions.
In today’s society, the notion and belief of growing old, getting married, having kids, and a maintaining of a happy family, seems to be a common value among most people. In Kevin Brockmeier’s short story, “The Ceiling,” Brockmeier implies that marriage is not necessary in our society. In fact, Brockmeier criticizes the belief of marriage in his literary work. Brockmeier reveals that marriage usually leads to or ends in disaster, specifically, all marriages are doomed to fail from the start. Throughout the story, the male protagonist, the husband, becomes more and more separated from his wife. As the tension increases between the protagonist and his wife, Brockmeier symbolizes a failing marriage between the husband and wife as he depicts the ceiling in the sky closing upon the town in which they live, and eventually crushing the town entirely as a whole.
and his need or desire to be alone all the time, he doesn’t like to be
In "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock", written by T. S. Elliot in 1917, J. Alfred Prufrock makes the reader privy to his innermost thoughts on an evening out. Prufrock wants to lead the reader to an overwhelming question, raising expectations, but he is a bitterly disappointing man; he never asks the question. He lacks self-esteem, women are intimidating to him, and he is too much of a coward to ever be successful with women. The title is "The Love Song,", not "A Love Song." So whenever Prufrock is around women, he behaves the same way. He always has and always will. Because of his inability to change he will die a lonely man.
"…Races condemned to 100 years of solitude did not have a second opportunity on earth." These powerful last words of the novel One Hundred Years of Solitude ring true. The book demonstrates through many examples that human beings cannot exist in isolation. People must be interdependent in order for the race to survive.