Johnny Cash's song "Mercy Seat is a first person narrative. The listener assumes that a prison chaplain has ministered to the man. And the man was probably in possession of a Bible that was given to him by the chaplain It is a song that is sung by a man who is being executed in the electric chair.
The idea of Jesus starts in the first verse: I began to warm and chill To objects and their fields A ragged cup, a twisted mop The face of Jesus in my soup…" The second verse contains more of the man's thoughts: "I here stories from the chamber, how Christ was born into a manger and like some ragged stranger died upon the cross, and might I say it seems so fitting in its way He was a carpenter by trade, or at least that's what I'm told." The man is contemplating the fact that Jesus was a carpenter, and he was executed on a wooden cross. The man knows that he is about to be executed in a wooden chair. The man is seemingly making a far-fetched comparison between his death on a wooden chair and Jesus' on a wooden cross. Perhaps, he finds it comforting to know that
The song is a juxtaposition of two ideas—that of a man sitting on an electric chair and that of seat that sat on top of the Ark. In Exodus 25 God tells Moses to put the mercy seat on top of the Ark: "You shall put the mercy seat on the top of the ark; and in the ark you should put the covenant that I shall give you. There I will meet with you, and from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim that are on the Ark of the Covenant, I will deliver to you all my commands for the Israelites." (Exodus 25:21-22). This verse explains much about the meaning of the song. In the third verse the subject switches to the seat in which God sits on: "In heaven His throne is made of gold, The Ark of His testament is Stowed, A thrown from which I'm told all History does unfold, down here it's made of wood and wire, and my body is on fire and God is never far away.
Setting: This book starts out in this kids house his name is crash. Then they go to the arcade. That is where they spend most of the story. Then close to the end they go to the riverside.
He was working in the steaming pit of hell; day after day, week after week- until now there was not an organ of his body that did its work without pain, until the sound of ocean breaks echoes in his head day and night… and from all the unending horror of this there was a respite, a deliverance- he could drink! He could forget the pain, he could slip off the burden: he would see clearly again, he would be master of his brain, of his
During the summer of 1984, Calvin Johnson trudges knee deep through a swamp in the wetlands of South Georgia. As snakes brush past his legs, he marches in line with nine other men, each dressed in an orange jumpsuit, swinging a razor sharp bush axe in collective rhythm. His crew entered the swamp at dawn and they will not leave until dusk. Guards, armed with shotguns, and equally violent tempers, ignore the fact that the temperature has risen well above 100 degrees and push the men even harder. Suddenly, an orange blur falls to the ground and a prisoner from Wayne Correctional Institution lies face down in the swampy floor. As guards bark orders at the unconscious, dying man, Johnson realizes "the truth of the situation, and the force of injustice just incapacitates" him. It is then he decides he does not belong in the swamp.
All of this is brought to the reader by an abundant use of figurative language throughout the song. For Instance, the scaffold the man is standing on symbolizes his position in life (he is scared and wants to escape. In the third stanza, after describing the problems with his world and how he prays, he curses the windstorms. This is actually a metaphor for his mental confusion and despair. In the next stanza, the prestige of the boardroom is made evident by the allusion of it towards a pharoahs tomb. We know in the end that he has pulled it all together when he calls his “crystal clear canvas” (the windows) a “masterpiece” . He has given value to his work and thus, value to his life.
Jonathan Kozol's book, Amazing Grace, analyzes the lives of the people living in the dilapidated district of South Bronx, New York. Kozol spends time touring the streets with children, talking to parents, and discussing the appalling living conditions and safety concerns that plague the residents in the inner cities of New York. In great detail, he describes the harsh lifestyles that the poverty stricken families are forced into; day in and day out. Disease, hunger, crime, and drugs are of the few everyday problems that the people in Kozol's book face; however, many of these people continue to maintain a very religious and positive outlook on life. Jonathan Kozol's investigation on the lifestyle of these people, shows the side to poverty that most of the privileged class in America does not get to see. Kozol wishes to persuade the readers to sympathize with his book and consider the condition in which these people live. The inequality issues mentioned are major factors in affecting the main concerns of Kozol: educational problems, healthcare obstacles, and the everyday struggles of a South Bronx child.
Main theme: How a person deals with drug and alcohol addiction while in an institution
In the novel “Shane”, by Jack Schaefer, Marian, the wife of Joe and the mother of Bob is initially played out to be a very simple character. She cooks and cleans and cares for her family. She starts to develop a more complex character as Shane arrives. You can tell from the beginning that Marian wants to impress her guest with her cooking and her curiosity of the latest fashions. But as the novel progresses you begin to see that Marian may want more from Shane than originally shown.
Straying away from life as a whole only to be alone, some may say is the strong way to heal themselves when dealing with extreme grief or a major crisis . In the book Wild, twenty-two year old Cheryl Strayed thought she had lost it all. Dealing with the loss of her mother, her family torn to pieces, and her very own marriage was being destroyed right before her very eyes. Living life with nothing more to lose, lifeless, she made the most life changing decision of her life. Strayed never seems remorseful on her decisions to up and leave everything behind while deciding to flee from it all. This being her way of dealing with life, it shows her as being strong; a woman of great strength and character. She shows personal strength, which is more than just a physical word. It is a word of very high value and can only be defined by searching deep within your very own soul.
The book “A Million Little Pieces” by James Frey is a heart wrenching story of James’ time in drug rehab. In this book Frey is trying to inform the reader about what it is like to go through rehab. He describes his entire time, from the day before he arrives until the day he leaves. He describes all his feelings and the routine life they give him at the clinic. The main themes of this book are holding on and love. He has trouble making any progress with the program until another patient, named Leonard, gives James a talk about holding on. He also falls in love with a girl named Lilly and finds a new love for his family. This book really illustrates a look at the drug culture and entails a history of James Frey’s stay at the clinic. He begins reading a Taoist book and learns to control his temper better. He sometimes has dreams about a bottle in one hand and a crack pipe in the other. He describes one girl blabbering on about nothing after smoking the rock. It focuses on his progression in his mind and his outlook toward life. In the beginning he hates himself and wants to die, but by the end of the book he is strong enough to smell alcohol and still choose not to drink it.
For as long as man has walked the earth, so has evil. There may be conflicting moral beliefs in this world, but one thing is universally considered wrong: serial killers. Although some people may try to use insanity as an explanation for these wicked people, they cannot explain away the heartlessness that resides in them. As shown in The Stranger Beside Me, infamous serial killer Ted Bundy is no exception to this. Even though books about true crimes may be considered insensitive to those involved, the commonly positively reviewed book The Stranger Beside Me by Ann Rule handles the somber issue of Ted Bundy’s emotionally destructive early life and the brutal crimes he committed that made people more fearful and aware of the evil that can exist in seemingly normal people well.
STUDY GUIDE ----- The Anthem Chapter 1 1.a. What is the difference between a and a? The society that is represented in the novel is futuristic in terms of the actual date, yet incredibly underdeveloped to what we experience today. The political structure obviously works, because there doesn't seem to be much discontent among the citizens.
This shows how the little boy looks at his father in complete awe and thinks that he can do no wrong. Christ is God-like too many people and the boy puts his father on the same level as Christ. The Brewery cops could only “watch in drunken disappointment,” could be viewed as all of the Christians who watched as Jesus was freed from the struggle which is known as life on Earth. The last line of the poem, “I searched my father’s hands / for a sign of the miracle” indicates that he looked for the wounds that Jesus was said to have had on his hands from being nailed to the cross. This connects to the theme of racism because the hole in the father's hands would have been the only thing that directly connected him to Christ. Which would have explained why the father was able to tolerate the unjust cruelty that he faced every day due to being a victim of racism because it is said that Jesus was able to get through any and every hardship thrown his way. In the second stanza, the narrator says, “in 1964, I had never tasted beer, / and no one told me about the picket signs.” This can be seen as
In the first scene of Paul Morrissey’s 1968 film Flesh, the viewer is taken on a brief journey through the streets of New York City. The perspective taken is that from a passive observer looking into the life of the main character. The camera does not tamper with the images nor try to impose new meaning on them – we see the sequence of events as it actually unfolds. Throughout the film clip, a main theme is centered on the banality of the protagonist’s existence, and his restless state is reflected within both technical and organic aspects of the clip.
Many times when reading a novel, the reader connects with one of the characters and begins to sympathize with them. This could be because the reader understands what the character is going through or because we get to see things from the character’s perspective and their emotions and that in return allows a bond to form for the reader. The character that is the most intriguing for me and the one I found comparing to every book that I read during school was Stacey from the book “Ravensong” Lee Maracle. The character Stacey goes through a lot of internal battle with herself and it’s on her path to discovery that she begins to understand herself and what she’s capable of. Throughout the novel, Stacey has a few issues she tries to work through. This is emphasized through her village and in her school that is located across the bridge in white town. Stacey begins dealing with the loss of Nora, and elder in her town. And this in return begins the chain of events that Stacey begins on the path of self-discovery not only on herself but everyone around her. She begins to see things differently and clearly. Stacey is a very complex and confused character, and she begins to work through these complexities through her thoughts, statements and actions.
...hung from the church’s walls john has ended the pain for his family and John was hung. All the event that occurred showed that John’s action effect the people around him in a positive and negative way, having cheating on his wife had an major effect on his wife and there relationship he completely took away all the trust she had for him, also form being a very selfish man and only caring for himself to a man who gave him life for his wife so that she can live a easier life.