The Unknown Citizen by W.H. Auden The Poem “The Unknown Citizen” by W.H. Auden is a satire. Its narrator is the state. In this, the state pays tribute and describes a successful and positive product of its efficiency and effectiveness. In other words, it builds the character later described to the reader as “the perfect citizen.” The narrator speaks as if he is delivering a speech or common tribute using words and phrases that are familiar to the reader. Using such imagery helps the reader paint a clear picture of the character. The subject or character is illustrated as a hardworking, common, tax paying, proud – to – be American citizen living in an obvious post Depression setting. The post Depression setting is key, as the reader knows during that time bracket in History, citizens went on the hunt for what was known as the “American Dream.” A driving force to recover and reinvent as well as the thirst to prosper. The government (or state, as described earlier) by use of statistics wanted to not only show, but also greatly embellish and make grand, its effectiveness and success in its recovery and prosper. The narrator takes a sincere yet ironically humorous approach in doing so. Humorous and ironic because the reader knows that no such person exists as the “perfect citizen” as described in this poem. It is found that the poem is set during the post depression and post war period. Supported by the picture painted in...
After reading the story, I found I had mixed emotions about it. To explain, when we were getting into detail and finally finding out what really happened the day of June 28th, I found myself completely interested and glued to the book. I also enjoyed the way the incident was explained because I felt like I was there watching it all happen from the great detail. I enjoyed Phillips style of writing because through his writing, he really came off as an intelligent person who is very familiar with the legal system. The book is an easy read, and I liked the non-pretentious style of writing. I did not find myself struggling with reading the book at all, which made the overall experience that much more enjoyable.
Every individual has two lives, the life we live, and the life we live after that. Nobody is perfect, but if one works hard enough, he or she can stay away from failure. The Natural is a novel written by Bernard Malamud. It is Malamud’s first novel that initially received mixed reactions but afterwards, it was regarded as an outstanding piece of literature. It is a story about Roy Hobbs who after making mistakes in his life, he returns the bribery money and is left with self-hatred for mistakes he has done. Hobbs was a baseball player who aspired to be famous, but because of his carnal and materialistic desire, his quest for heroism failed, as he was left with nothing. In the modern world, the quest for heroism is a difficult struggle, and this can be seen through the protagonist in The Natural.
In the short story “No One Is a Mystery” by Elizabeth Tallent the reader is introduced to a nameless female character. Throughout the story there are various descriptions that has great subtext to the relationship between the narrator and her lover Jack. One of the best descriptions in the short story is when the narrator is staring at Jack’s boot. The description Tallent uses makes the reader use one of their five senses, she makes the reader focus on the sense of touch. Tallent writes of boot’s frayed thread and scuffed toes. Another good description of the sense was muddy manure. The last part of the description is when the narrator gives a telling detail about the relationship between the two. She mentions that Jack has been wearing the
Flannery O'Conner has again provided her audience a carefully woven tale with fascinating and intricate characters. "The Displaced Person" introduces the reader to some interesting characters who experience major life changes in front of the reader's eyes. The reader ventures into the minds of two of the more complex characters in "The Displaced Person," Mrs. McIntyre and Mrs. Shortley, and discovers an unwillingness to adapt to change. Furthermore, the intricate details of their characters are revealed throughout the story. Through these details, the reader can see that both Mrs. McIntyre and Mrs. Shortley suffer from a lack of spiritual dimension that hinders them as they face some of life's harsher realities. Mrs. McIntyre struggles throughout the story, most notably during the tragic conclusion. Her lack of spiritual dimension is revealed slowly until we ultimately see how her life is devastated because of it. Mrs. Shortley, on the other hand, seems to have it all figured out spiritually -- or at least she believes that she does. It is only in the last few minutes of her life that she realizes all she has convinced herself of is wrong.
he doesn't he even own one. This where you can see how he is different
Furthermore, Bharati Mukherjee describes how both her and her sister’s life resemble each other in order to develop her argument that there are multiple ways to belong in a foreign country. For example, using anecdotes, Bharati provides the audience, being lawmakers, a personal view of how she and her sister were before they moved to America. Then, she clearly illustrates how close to being the same person they were in the sentence: “We dressed alike, in saris; we expressed identical views on politics, social issues, love, and marriage in the same Calcutta convent-school accent.”. The explicit description of how they were the same, gives more meaning to the differences expressed later in the essay. Afterwards, Ms. Mukherjee exemplifies how
“Without Conscience" by Robert D. Hare is one aimed towards making the general public aware of the many psychopaths that inhabit the world we live in. Throughout the book Hare exposes the reader to a number of short stories; all with an emphasis on a characteristic of psychopaths. Hare makes the claim that close monitoring of psychopathy are vital if we ever hope to gain a hold over Psychopathy- A disorder that affects not only the individual but also society itself. He also indicates one of the reasons for this book is order to correctly treat these individuals we have to be able to correctly identify who meets the criteria. His ultimate goal with the text is to alleviate some of the confusion in the increase in criminal activity by determining how my of this is a result of Psychopathy.
"When a trout rising to a fly gets hooked on a line and finds himself unable to swim about freely, he begins with a fight which results in struggles and splashes and sometimes an escape. Often, of course, the situation is too tough for him."
In the story, The Natural, certain characters and events are portrayed in a distinctive way that makes this story unique to other books and shows the typical writing style of the narrator. The author uses a repetitive writing technique that is impossible to overlook. The writer of this book is able to catch the reader’s eye with his concept of the importance of beautiful description. The Natural, by Bernard Malamud, uses great imagery that makes the story appealing.
In Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man, the narrator goes through many hardships that make him who he is. He experiences being discouraged and unlucky many different times throughout the novel. However, there are three major times that the narrator goes through these hardships. He is mistreated for his race, especially in the beginning of the novel. He is discouraged by the president of his college when he is expelled. He is also taken down when he finds out that the Brotherhood is not who he thought they were. In Ellison’s Invisible Man, the narrator is degraded and humiliated three major times throughout the novel.
The sentence that says “technology has made privacy a relic of that past” is saying that within the New World of technology, Cyberspace, we no longer have our own personal privacy. Alan Westin defines privacy as, ““Privacy is the claim of individuals, groups, or institutions to determine for themselves when, how, and to what extent information about them is communicated to others.” [2]. When you step into this world we live in today, we no longer have just the aspect of the Old World. We are born into this New World a majority of the time. In this New World, all of our actions are presented to the world for everyone to easily see. We can no longer do things without the entire world knowing. As an example, in the Old World, at the age of 15 we could sit at a park bench and crack open an ice cold beer to drink with a friend. This would cause no problems, and bring no harm to anyone or anything. If you were caught in this occasion, drinking under the age of 21, that would be breaking the law. You would more than likely not get in trouble at all, and if you did, it would be nothing more than a slap on the wrist and a report to your parents. If this sort of thing was to happen today in the New World, the outcome would have been completely different. In this New World, the privacy of a 15 year old teenager getting a slap on the wrist for drinking 1 can of beer now turns into your entire community knowing about it through the means of the newspaper, TV news, internet news, easily available police reports, and even the community around you gossiping about it all over social media such as Facebook, Twitter, etc. So simply going from the Old World to the New World, a 15 year old drinking a can of beer turned into a sl...
In his 1971 paper “Personal Identity”, Derek Parfit posits that it is possible and indeed desirable to free important questions from presuppositions about personal identity without losing all that matters. In working out how to do so, Parfit comes to the conclusion that “the question about identity has no importance” (Parfit, 1971, p. 4.2:3). In this essay, I will attempt to show that Parfit’s thesis is a valid one, with positive implications for human behaviour. The first section of the essay will examine the thesis in further detail and the second will assess how Parfit’s claims fare in the face of criticism.
throughout the poem. Thus making of this poem a delight to the mind, and an enjoyable
then resolved or summed up in the last lines of the poem. The two main
The poem is not said to of been set in a particular place but I