The Reader

Through this short story we are taken through one of Vic Lang’s memories narrated by his wife struggling to figure out why a memory of Strawberry Alison is effecting their marriage and why she won’t give up on their relationship. Winton’s perspective of the theme memory is that even as you get older your past will follow you good, bad or ugly, you can’t always forget. E.g. “He didn’t just rattle these memories off.” (page 55) and ( I always assumed Vic’s infatuation with Strawberry Alison was all in the past, a mortifying memory.” (page 57). Memories are relevant to today’s society because it is our past, things or previous events that have happened to you in which we remembered them as good, bad, sad, angry etc. memories that you can’t forget. Winton has communicated this to his audience by sharing with us how a memory from your past if it is good or bad can still have an effect on you even as you get older. From the description of Vic’s memory being the major theme is that it just goes to show that that your past can haunt or follow you but it’s spur choice whether you chose to let it affect you in the

“The Vow” is a movie that encases the turmoil and hardship associated with retrograde amnesia and the classic symptoms and steps associated with recovering and potentially regaining lost memory. Taking into account the information gained through multiple sources; such as, lecture of Mental Health, medical databases, and the personal experiences of Krickett Carpenter, the Vow provides both an accurate and inaccurate depiction of retrograde amnesia.

...e from the past and is saddened to be unable to match the face he now sees of this older woman, to the woman he remembers from years earlier. This provokes a poignant, yet very bewildered image of this man within the mind of the reader, a man who tries with all his might to remember himself for who he is now and not only memories from his past.

Mollon, Phil. Remembering Trauma : A Psychotherapist's Guide To Memory And Illusion. London: Whurr, 2002. eBook Collection (EBSCOhost). Web. 6 Apr. 2014.

Memory is a dynamic part of everyday life. It helps people function and communicate with each other without a second thought. This communication and function can be hindered if the person experiences a traumatic event. There are two main forms of trauma, physical and emotional, each of which can cause major damage to the victims mind. Both types can cause a person to have flashbacks to the traumatic event or even temporary amnesia. In his novel Remainder, Tom McCarthy uses The Narrator to demonstrate a case of physical trauma where The Narrator has an object fall on his head placing him in a coma. The second type of trauma, emotional trauma, is represented by Grandfather in Jonathan Safran Foer’s novel Everything is Illuminated where grandfather experiences a traumatic situation when he was younger but represses the memory of what happened. Foer uses Grandfather to demonstrate the struggle to overcome the trauma when he chooses to repress his memories, as opposed to McCarthy who uses The Narrator to show the initial success at overcoming trauma when there is no choice to repress the memories or not due to a case of amnesia. The Narrator uses a series of re-enactments in order to try to become more flaccid, due to the loss of memory and need to relearn every movement he makes caused by the traumatic event that he experiences.

Challenging the Reluctant Reader The research is clear: children who read every day have better language fluency, are better students and achieve more academically than those who do not. If you're the parent of a reluctant reader, however, knowing this and helping your child put this into practice are two entirely different things. For your child, reading is a painful chore. When you ask them to read a book, you're likely to be on the receiving end of any number of avoidance strategies that range from a simple argument all the way to some pretty interesting fibs.

Memories define a person. They make up what we are and who we are, and without them we are just a shell of a person because without memories, you are missing what makes you your own person. In the book American Assassin, Mitch makes use of his brilliant mind and awe-inspiring physical talent to save Hurley and Richard from their multitude of adversaries and succeeds in redressing the difficult situation. In the book Inferno, Robert awakes in a hospital to discover that he has been shot and is suffering from extreme amnesia. To make matters worse, various governmental organizations are hunting him. This journal will analyze the astounding importance of Mitch Rapp’s search for vengeance in American Assassin, Robert’s search for his memories in

Even though our bodies are in one place, our minds may be in another. In Martha Stout’s essay “When I Woke Up Tuesday Morning, It Was Friday,” the author introduces us to the idea of dissociation. Dissociation is when one’s mind is away from the body and he or she does not know what is going on in the physical world. Those that have traumatic histories may experience this. But because of dissociation, victims may not know if they had a traumatic past because a memory of it never really formed. Stout also finds that individuals may use dissociation as a way to protect themselves from trauma. Sometimes the slightest and smallest piece of a traumatic memory may bring into play the dissociation. When these individuals experience dissociation and become their “flyaway selves,” they do not remember what happened to them in the time they were “away.” For example, whenever “Los Angeles” was mentioned to Julia, one of Stout’s patients, she would “flyaway” as a way to protect herself from remembering any of the traumatic experiences that happened to her when she lived in Los Angeles. But Julia did not remember going through any traumatic experiences in her history because the memory never really formed. When she would “flyaway,” Julia would blackout and not recall any of the things she had done in the days previous to her “waking up” again. Stout came to the conclusion that Julia was abused as a child and as a way to escape during the abuse, she would become dissociated with her surroundings and what was happening to her. To not remember one’s own past puts them on a very vulnerable and difficult trail; dissociation may seem a way to protect oneself, but at the same time it’s harmful.

It has been stated that the application of memory functions in fictional works which act as a reflective device of human experience. (Lavenne, et al. 2005: 1). I intend to discuss the role of memory and recollection in Kazuo Ishiguro’s dystopian science-fiction novel Never Let Me Go (2005).

The Reader is a novel by Bernhard Schlink set in postwar Germany. The novel revolves around the live of Michael Berg, who, at the age of 15 met and had a love affair with Hanna, a much older woman in her 30's. After a brief afair that lasted only months, Hanna dissapeard one day, leaving Michael to face inner termoil regarding the reasons for her disertion of him. Many years later, when Michael is a law student, they met again at a war crimes trial. A war crimes trial for Hanna, who worked at Auschwitz concentration camp. In the end, their feelings of guilt and shame lead to Hanna's tragic death. But why did the author place so much emphasis on these emotions? In doing this, Berhard schlink was trying to portray these emotions as things which can destroy us, and those around us. Exsamples of guilt, shame and betrayal can be found all through the novel, but I will focus only on three of them in this essay. The first major exsample is the shame of adults, including Michaels father, for their acceptance of the Nazi regime during world war 2. The second is Michaels guilt for betraying Hanna by not aknowledging her at the swimming pool. And the third is Hanna's own shame at being illiterate.