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How violence is used as a tool in literature
How violence is used as a tool in literature
How violence is used as a tool in literature
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The Signficance of Violence in Graham Greene's The Destructors
In serious fiction, no act of violence exists for its own sake. Graham Green, in his short story “The Destructors,” reveals certain intangible needs met through one central act of violence.
One need we all have as humans is the need to be creative, to express ourselves, to use our imagination. All little boys use their imaginations, which is based on what they see in their environment, whether that be television or their own neighborhood. The gang of boys in “The Destructors” witnessed destruction every day of their lives and played in the rumble of homes as they would a mound of dirt. The gang met every morning at “the site of the last bomb of the first blitz,” which hit when the leader of the gang was but a year old. Along with the destruction to the ground they met on, the house just beside it “suffered from the blast of the bomb and the walls were supported on wooden struts.”
The gang was well accustomed to seeing destruction, therefore their imaginations were corrupted with it. In an attempt to be creative, to use their imagination, the gang collectively decided to destroy the house that survived the bomb. “Destruction after all is a form of creation. A kind of imagination had seen this house as it had now become.”
The need to use their imaginations won over their logical thought.
Another need that plagues us all is the need to be known. Many people’s biggest fear is to die unknown and alone. We all try to make our mark in the world, whether it be through good grades, athletics, or putting gravy on the walls. We become known for our deeds, both the positive and the negative. The boys longed for the respect and the uniqueness that bringing a house ...
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... be met, either in a positive, constructive way or in a negative, destructive way. Through a negative, destructive act, Graham Green highlights how a gang of boys meets the intangible necessities. Being a person who chooses to fulfill my needs through positive, constructive actions, I understand there is a better way to be creative, to be known, and to be comfortable without bringing a building down with my needs. I choose to be creative through music, to be known as one who helps rather than hinders, and be comfortable with what I have or do not have. Through analyzing this short story, I can now understand and sympathize this those who choose a different path than my own.
Work Cited
Greene, Graham. "The Destructors," Story and Structure. Seventh Edition. Edited by Laurence Perrine, assisted by Thomas R. Arp. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1988, 49-61.
Believers of the Old and New Testaments claim that violence is a sin and can only lead to more brutality and death; poet Tony Barnstone firmly agrees. In his poem “Parable in Praise of Violence” Barnstone lambastes the American obsession with violence-- that it is often triggered by inevitable events which could be handled in different manners. The speaker in “Parable in Praise of Violence” reflects on all parts of his “sinful” culture and comes to the realization that people often use violence as a way to deal with emotions of grief and anger caused by events and concepts they cannot explain.
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George Helmholtz, as the head of the music department at Lincoln High School, is very determined with his regular students and the gifted musicians of the band. Each semester and year at school he dreams of “leading as fine a band as there was on the face of the earth. And each year it came true”. His certainty that it was true was because he believed there was no greater dream than his. His students were just as confident and in response, they played their hearts out for them. Even the students with “no talent played on guts alone” for Helmholtz.
Arendt, Hannah. On Violence. San Diego, New York and London: Harcourt, Brace & Co. 1970
John Hersey shows that the atomic bomb is merciless by explaining the effect of the bomb on children. Hersey describes a mother’s search for her children to do so, “She heard a child cry, ‘Mother, help me,’ and saw her youngest, Myeko… buried up to her breast and unable to move. As Mrs. Nakamura started frantically to claw her baby, she could see or hear nothing of her other children” (Hersey 10, 11). He uses an example of children in danger because they are usually perceived as vulnerable, which helps Hersey make his point. Consequently, the reader undergoes feelings of sorrow because those who are attacked are not capable of defending themselves. Hersey is able to easily prove his case by illustrating the suffering of the most vulnerable of victims.
Sartwell, Crispin. "The Genocidal Killer in the Mirror." Writing and Reading for ACP Composition. Upper Saddle River: Pearson Custom, 2009. 252-54. Print.
When first reading “Sonny’s Blues” by James Baldwin, it may initially seem that the relationship between musicians and drugs is synonymous. Public opinion suggests that musicians and drugs go hand and hand. The possibility lies that Sonny’s passion for jazz music is the underlying reason for his drug use, or even the world of jazz music itself brought drugs into Sonny’s life. The last statement is what the narrator believes to be true. However, by delving deeper and examining the theme of music in the story, it is nothing but beneficial for Sonny and the other figures involved. Sonny’s drug use and his music are completely free of one another. Sonny views his jazz playing as a ray of light to lead him away from the dim and dismal future that Harlem has to offer.
Director David Cronenberg’s movie “A History of Violence” brings a little-known graphic novel to life. The protagonist, Tom Stall (Viggo Mortensen), seems to be living the ideal life when it suddenly takes a turn for the worse. Two robbers attempt to hold up his diner in a little Indiana town, until Tom stops them by slamming a hot glass coffee pot into the face of one and shooting three gunshots into the chest of the other. The scene’s carnage is heightened as bits of flesh dangle off the shattered bone of one robber while he chokes on the blood from his own body. The corpse of the other robber is shown lying in the mist of shattered glass with blood pouring from each gun wound. Tom’s heroic reactions seem like something he does to save the day, however, we only excuse his extreme reactions because of our overall exposure to violence and desensitized conscience. This type of brutal and unplanned violence becomes the protagonist’s way of making peace throughout the movie.
The gang members in Graham Greene’s “The Destructors” are catastrophic young children and teenagers who are unfortunately being greatly affected by their surroundings. Placed in wartime London, their town is in rubble from bombings. Peer pressure is no help when a destructive surrounding and vulnerable ages are strongly influencing the instinctive human behavior of the members, which causes many of their horrific actions.
Over the course of history, violence amongst men has shaped the world in which we live through wars, political protests, or social conflicts. Sadly, enough, this is a factor of human nature which resides in all individuals and cannot be controlled or avoided. Not only have these events of man’s inhumanity been documented, but they have also become the underlying theme for many well known works of literature. Both Golding and Wiesel shed light on the immorality of mankind’s actions by putting it under close scrutiny, leaving the reader left to wonder how human beings are capable of so callously hurting and killing one another.
As the boys witness death and mutilation all around them, any preconceived notion about the indoctrination, "the enemy" and the "rights and wrongs" of the conflict disappear, leaving them angry and perplexed. The story is not about heroism but about toil and futility and the divide between the idea of war and the real life and its values. The selected passages are full of violence and death and loss and a kind of perpetual suffering and terror that most of us have never and hopefully will never experience. Both authors ability to place the reader right there on the front line with the main character so vividly, not just in terms of what he physically experienced and witnessed All the complicated, intense and often completely numbed emotions that came along...