Secrets of the Depths
Isolated from civilization, roaming the globe, and exploring the undersea world, the Nautilus is the last refuge of an exile. In Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne, the steamer Abraham Lincoln is sent to find a sea monster and Pierre Aronnax, a French marine biologist, ventures along with them, along with his faithful servant Conseil and the Canadian harpoon master Ned Land. After searching the ocean, the crew spots the “creature” and Ned Land proceeds to attack it with harpoons. Eventually, the creature attacks the steamer, throwing Aronnax, Conseil, and Land overboard. When they wake up, they find themselves inside the Nautilus, a gigantic submarine, where they meet Captain Nemo, the creator and pilot, and enter his enigmatic world. Captain Nemo is an intriguing, multifaceted character, and his many parts include his status as a wanderer, his search for revenge, and his hidden humanity.
Captain Nemo is, first and foremost, a wanderer. Living in self-imposed exile from civilization, he is emotionally and physically separated from humanity, “Captain Nemo, “nobody” in Latin, the somber hero” (pg. xi (Foreword)). He is nobody to the world. No one knows him because he lives underwater, but even when he lived on land, he was an outcast. Captain Nemo also states, “I am not what you call a civilized being! I have broken with society for reasons which I alone have the right to appreciate. So I do not obey its rules, and I ask you never to invoke them in my presence again!”(p. 63). Nemo openly claims that he has no respect anymore for society and does not want anything more to do with civilization. Later, he also reveals a mistrust and disapproval for mankind, shown when the inhabitants of the Na...
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...ss of a friend, exposing the inner core of humanity that lies within all men, regardless of their outer shell.
The parts of Captain Nemo’s character are his quest for revenge, his inner humanity, and his status as a wanderer. I would rate this book a nine out of ten because it was an exciting, seafaring read with plenty of action and suspense. However, Verne tended to use obscure scientific terms throughout the novel and this made some of the paragraphs confusing. The denouement of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea occurs when Dr. Aronnax, Ned Land, and Conseil escape the sinking Nautilus and are washed up on a foreign island, where they take a steamer back to France and live the rest of their lives with the memories of Captain Nemo and his Nautilus. In every man, however faint and obscure, lies the spark of mercy, caring, and the things that make them human.
...lying terrified and helpless in the water reaches back for his shipmates to save him. It shows the battle in life over a cause. One side wants to save him (shipmates) while the other side wants him to die (shark) . This parable is a message to the triumphant colonists who fought for liberty and freedom in America. It can be related back to the Tea Party when the colonists stayed together against oppression from the Parliament and won.
“The Open Boat” uses vivid metaphors to enhance both the magnificent, yet overwhelming nature of the sea. Crane successfully illustrated a situation that isolated the four men, encouraging them to use the elements of the sea that they do not understand. The four men are stranded and isolated, with no help except what they are
“The Seafarer” begins with a man’s story of the hardships he faced at sea. He is on a voyage to discover new lands and riches, yet he is not happy. Despite the great journey the man is undertaking, he feels in exile from his people. He has been lonely for a long period of time now and has had no success. As he is pondering this topic, he thinks of how he only hears the sounds of birds instead of the laughter of people in the mead hall. He thinks of how he is cold instead of warm and sharing drink with his friends; he is lonely and his kinsmen can offer him no comfort, so his soul is left drowning in desolation.
Captain Nemo truly is no one. He expresses no nationality or loyalty but to himself and the oceans. In the original novel, Twenty-Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, written by Jules Verne, Nemo says, "Professor, I am not what you call a civilized man! I have done with society entirely, for reasons which I alone have the right of appreciating. I do not therefore obey its laws, and I desire you never to allude to them before me again!" The narrator, Professor Aronnax, states, "This was said plainly. A flash of angerand disdain kindled in the eyes of the Unknown, and I had a glimpse of a terrible past in the life of this man" (73). Captain Nemo is outside of society, living deep in the oceans; he is the terror of the unknown. His ship, the Nautilus, is thought to be a sea monster, and the legend is talked abo...
In 1776, David McCullough gives a vivid portrayal of the Continental Army from October 1775 through January 1777, with sharp focus on the leadership of America’s greatest hero, George Washington. McCullough’s thesis is that had not the right man (George Washington) been leading the Continental Army in 1776, the American Revolution would have resulted in a vastly different outcome. He supports his argument with a critical analysis of Washington’s leadership during the period from the Siege of Boston, through the disastrous defense of New York City, the desperate yet, well ordered retreat through New Jersey against overwhelming odds, and concludes with the inspiring victories of Trenton and Princeton. By keeping his army intact and persevering through 1776, Washington demonstrated to the British Army that the Continental Army was not simply a gang of rabble, but a viable fighting force. Additionally, Mr. McCullough supports his premise that the key to the survival of the American Revolution was not in the defense of Boston, New York City, or any other vital terrain, but rather the survival of the Continental Army itself. A masterful piece of history, 1776 is not a dry retelling of the Revolutionary War, but a compelling character study of George Washington, as well as his key lieutenants, and his British adversaries, the most powerful Army in the 18th Century world. When I read this book, I went from a casual understanding of the hero George Washington to a more specific understanding of why Washington was quite literally the exact right man at the exact right place and time to enable the birth of the United States.
Seafarer” is a monologue from an old man at sea, alone. The main theme in The Seafarer is
Analysis: Melville's Great American Novel draws on both Biblical and Shakespearean myths. Captain Ahab is "a grand, ungodly, god-like man … above the common" whose pursuit of the great white whale is a fable about obsession and over-reaching. Just as Macbeth and Lear subvert the natural order of things, Ahab takes on Nature in his
The human voyage into life is basically feeble, vulnerable, uncontrollable. Since the crew on a dangerous sea without hope are depicted as "the babes of the sea", it can be inferred that we are likely to be ignorant strangers in the universe. In addition to the danger we face, we have to also overcome the new challenges of the waves in the daily life. These waves are "most wrongfully and barbarously abrupt and tall", requiring "a new leap, and a leap." Therefore, the incessant troubles arising from human conditions often bring about unpredictable crises as "shipwrecks are apropos of nothing." The tiny "open boat", which characters desperately cling to, signifies the weak, helpless, and vulnerable conditions of human life since it is deprived of other protection due to the shipwreck. The "open boat" also accentuates the "open suggestion of hopelessness" amid the wild waves of life. The crew of the boat perceive their precarious fate as "preposterous" and "absurd" so much so that they can feel the "tragic" aspect and "coldness of the water." At this point, the question of why they are forced to be "dragged away" and to "nibble the sacred cheese of life" raises a meaningful issue over life itself. This pessimistic view of life reflects the helpless human condition as well as the limitation of human life.
"To produce a mighty book, you must choose a mighty theme. No great and enduring volume can ever be written on the flea, though many there be who have tried it" states the narrating character Ishmael as he attempts to justify his reasoning on writing such a lengthy novel. Indeed, the whale may be the most complex and grandiose mammal on earth, yet one may still question the ulterior motive of Melville for explicating every detail of a whaling journey in Moby Dick. In fact, Melville develops many themes throughout the text that lead the reader to believe that his "mighty theme" is the meaning of life. Thus, the adventure of hunting the Great White Whale, Moby Dick, can be seen as a giant analogy to seeking the meaning of life. Through this journey, Ishmael describes the different members of the crew and their interpretation of the whale. Yet, Ishmael refrains from assigning one particular meaning to the whale and, in the end, is the only crewmember to survive the journey. Symbolically, Melville believes that an individual must be able to see many meanings in life in order to survive the trap of intolerance of different beliefs and lifestyles. To evidence this hypothesis, Melville presents a number of ironic contrasts in the text including religious hypocrisy, the false appearance of the sea, the relationship of Good and Evil, the coffin as a dual symbol of both life and death, the interpretations of the whiteness of the whale, and the life/death issue of the whaling industry. Through these contrasts, Melville strives to awaken the reader to the many meanings of life and to avoid limiting one’s mind to one, fixed meaning.
At first he does not seem content with his seafaring life. During the early descriptions of his time there, it is painted as a life of hardship and penance. Images and adjectives of the sea and life there are harsh and foreboding-"ice cold", "hung round with icicles" , "fettered with frost". The sea is seen as cold, and not just in the physical sense .It is remote, a place of despair , an earthly purgatory, where there is "always anxiety …. as to what the Lord will bestow on him"2. The narrator is cut away from the comforts ...
"The Seafarer" creates a storyline of a man who is "lost" at sea. There is a major reference to the concept of the sea and how it "captures" the soul and leaves a lonely feeling. The character is set to know the consequence of the sea but something keeps calling him back to it. "And yet my heart wanders away, My soul roams with sea, the whales' home, wandering to the widest corners of the world, returning ravenous with desire, Flying solitary, screaming, exciting me to the ocean, breaking oaths on the curve of a wave." (lines 58-64).
...held him in the sea that swirled him out and safely over the boat to water in which he could touch. The surviving men were thankful to have survived, but learned that they really had no control over their lives. One of the most important lessons the correspondent took from the experience was, “… that “in the ignorance of the grave-edge” every man is in the same boat, which is not much more substantial than the ten-foot open dinghy on a rough sea” (Buitenhuis, web). Having survived the experience the cook, the correspondent, and the captain each believed that they could be interpreters for the sea. Crane gave each man a voice in “The Open Boat” that is uniquely theirs, but at the same time shared a common bond and struggle with nature for survival. It is up to each man (mankind) to find our own place in the universe and be open to the lessons that life can teach us.
Indeed, Jim had a great love for the sea. He respected it and its powers. Although it took a tragic event to learn the seas authoritative powers , Jim still admired it. The sea was Jim’s motivation and his passion.
“Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea.” Literature and Its Times. 2. Joyce Moss and George Wilson, eds. Detroit, MI: Gale Publishing Group, 1997. Print.
Symbolism was used to express the Captains minds set. In the beginning paragraphs, the Captain is viewed as depressed, apprehensive, and insecure. The Captain viewed the land as insecure, whereas the sea was stable. The Captain was secure with the sea, and wished he were more like it.