PURE INNOCENCE
Pure Innocence
Michael Fletcher woke with a bang; he had hit his head on the ceiling
again. It felt like it was about to explode. He clutched it tightly
with his caring, gentle, healing hands and this appeared to numb the
pain. The pain weakened and Mike released his head from his hands'
clasp. In doing so, the hands turned back into the rough, tired old
things he had gone to sleep with. He swung his tired legs over the
side of the bunk bed and climbed down the cold, metal ladder. It was
an old bed and was made of metal, but it suited him. As long as he got
his sleep he was all right, because he could get stressed if he didn't
get his beauty sleep.
He walked stiffly towards the mirror. It seemed to enlarge the cell as
well as reflect the little amount of light that managed to find its
way into the small, dank, dark room. His legs were just waking up. He
sniffed the musty air and gave a deep, tired sigh. The mirror was in
the corner of the room where the sink clung to the wall with its
rusty, arm-like nails. When he peered in, a stranger looked back at
him. He had big, blue eyes and rough, tough, unshaven skin with
dimples. The stranger looked almost ghost like except for the
infrequent sunrays caught in the exercise yard on a fine day.
"Never should have happened." Mike whispered to himself, dwelling on
the past. Mike used to be an executive manager in a big petroleum
company like BP. One day everything went wrong.
The day had started really well. He had clinched a deal with a
Californian trucking company that would bring in a good payment,
enough to ret...
... middle of paper ...
... just to hear a criminal confess. To know how you conducted your
ingenious plan" Mike asked, with the plan to not only buy time in his
mind.
"Yes, I was rather excellent. Fine, I'll will grant you this one
request."
Bolarchy then went on to explain the whole thing and how it had
actually been a lucky accident for him that Mike had arrived when he
did.
The police had broken through the guards attempt to stop them and they
burst into the room. It was strange how not a single person shot a
single bullet, everyone gave in straight away, it wasn't like it was
in the movies. Fortunately for Mike he had brought a mini tape
recorder with him and recorded the whole confession. Mike still went
back to prison though for another two weeks, for carrying an
unlicenced weapon, the permit had expired two years before.
In A Separate Peace, John Knowles carries the theme of the inevitable loss of innocence throughout the entire novel. Several characters in the novel sustain both positive and negative changes, resulting from the change of the peaceful summer sessions at Devon to the reality of World War II. While some characters embrace their development through their loss of innocence, others are at war with themselves trying to preserve that innocence.
The story, The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien is both a story of love and a story of war. But more than either of those types of stories, The Things They Carried is a story of losing one’s innocence. Innocence is the idea of not knowing the horrors of the world. The horrors of war and the horrors of heartbreak. When people are born they are born with an air of innocence, they believe in the good in the world as they do not yet know of the evils. As people grow up they lose their innocence, the learn of violence and of war and of the hate of other people because they are different, they also learn the pain of heartbreak. All of these things tears the innocence away from people, some people lose their innocence younger than others. For Lieutenant
Innocence is defined as the state of being not guilty of a crime or other wrong act. The definition does not have any exceptions depending on race, age, gender or other physical characteristics. Yet in the south, the innocence of a guilty white man, is more important than the innocence of an innocent black man. In the novel, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, is about a young girl named Scout who lives in Maycomb County, Alabama. The novel is separated into two parts, the first part is about the adventures of Boo Radley. While the second part is about the trial of Tom Robinson. In the first part of the novel, Scout along with her brother Jem and her friend Dill investigate the mysterious life of their neighbor, Boo Radley. Boo has not left
At the age of 9, a little girl is counting down the days until her next birthday because double digits are a big deal. Now she is 12 and is still counting the days until she can call herself a teenager. For years people cannot wait to be another year older… until they actually become older. As people grow up they accept that maturing means taking on responsibilities and adulthood. Having sleepovers and play-dates, taking naps, and climbing the monkey bars becomes taboo. The simplistic life of a child quickly changes into the dull reality of school and work. People will spend years wishing they were older; but when the time comes, they hope to go back to their innocence. In The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger writes a stream of consciousness
Childhood is a time in one’s life where innocence and experience are seemingly two separate worlds. Only when one becomes an adult, and has been thoroughly marked by experience, one realizes that innocence and experience resides in the same world. Innocence and experience are equivalent to the flipsides of a single coin. William Blake’s Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience demonstrate that religious doctrine and experience are responsible for destroying and understanding innocence in childhood.
“Holding firmly to the trunk, I took a step toward him, and then my knees bent and I jounced the limb. Finny, his balance gone, swung his head around to look at me for an instant with extreme interest, and then he tumbled sideways, broke through the little branches below and hit the bank with a sickening, unnatural thud, It was the first clumsy physical action I had ever seen him make. With unthinking sureness I moved out on the limb and jumped into the river, every trace of my fear forgotten.” (Knowles 59-60). Gene Forrester, one of the main characters in John Knowles' novel A Separate Peace, describes his best friend Phineas' fall from a “tremendous tree, an irate steely black steeple beside a river,”(Knowles 6) at their all boys boarding school, Devon. Gene is an introverted young boy who is very academically gifted. Finny, however, is an extremely extroverted childish young boy who is very athleticaly gifted. Finny's fall eventually leads to terrible things, such as death and guilt. Throughout the novel Knowles uses Phineas' fall from the tree to symbolize his loss of innocence, to show Gene's guilt, and to develop Phinea's death.
He took the bottom blanket off his straw mat and cut it into wide strips wrapping them over the thin moccasins he wore to reinforce them. Next, he tore a piece of the blanket long enough to cover his head and ears. And the last part of the blanket he wrapped around his bottom half.
everything he owned. He took refuge in criminal activity, and was sent to prison. His
D.H Lawrence’s The Rocking Horse Winner and William Golding’s Lord of the Flies view children as easily manipulated figures. D.H. Lawrence’s short story demonstrates how easily children, Paul, can be influenced into believing that money and luck indicate one’s level of happiness. William Golding’s novel tries to show that all children are evil and have savage impulses. A common theme in both of these works is that children create their own downfall and loss of innocence.
little money. One job he had would change the course of his life. While a store clerk
money and a life full of luxuries. He fell deeply in love with the young
Innocence is usually associated with youth and ignorance. The loss of one’s innocence is associated with the evils of the world. However, the term “innocence” can be interpreted in a variety of ways. Similarly, the loss of one’s innocence can be interpreted in more than one way, and, depending on the interpretation, it may happen numerous times. The loss of innocence is culture specific and involves something that society holds sacrosanct. It is also bounded by different religious beliefs. Still, no matter which culture or religion is at hand, there is always more than one way to lose one’s innocence, and every member of that particular culture or religion experiences a loss of innocence at least once in their lives. In addition, the individual’s loss of innocence will impair him or her emotionally and/or physically.
money. Later on he lies to his family saying that he spent his savings and
Abstract In this essay, I intend to explain how everyday lives challenge the construction of childhood as a time of innocence. In the main part of my assignment, I will explain the idea of innocence, which started with Romantic discourse of childhood and how it shaped our view of childhood. I will also look at two contradictory ideas of childhood innocence and guilt in Blake’s poems and extract from Mayhew’s book. Next, I will compare the images of innocence in TV adverts and Barnardo’s posters. After that, I will look at the representation of childhood innocence in sexuality and criminality, and the roles the age and the gender play in portraying children as innocent or guilty. I will include some cross-cultural and contemporary descriptions on the key topics. At the end of my assignment, I will summarize the main points of the arguments.