The Lottery The Lottery: Foreshadowing Every June twenty-seventh the villagers in the small town gather in the square for the annual “lottery”. The children usually arrive first. They play and gather stones in preparation for the drawing. The husbands and fathers are the next to gather. They tell jokes, but “they smiled rather than laughed.” The men do not seem to be a

Descent Into Madness Charlotte Perkins Gilman's, "The Yellow Wallpaper" is the story of a woman's descent into madness as the result of being isolated as a form of "treatment" when suffering from post-partum depression. On a larger scale, Gilman is also telling the story of how women were kept prisoners by the confines of the society of her time and the penalties these women inc

Beloved BELOVED The idea of the self in Toni Morrison’s book Beloved combines three central themes. The way an individual speaks has a direct correlation to the environment they are in. An identity cannot be defined without there being other people to anchor it. And, the self is not only limited to a single individual but can expand to multiple persons. Beloved is a complex novel tha

Descent of Women The Descent of Woman The Descent of Woman, by Elaine Morgan, tells the idea of the Aquatic Theory of Evolution. According to this theory of evolution, the ape, which man is believed to evolve from, comes down from the trees due to a drought and into the water. While adapting to a new environment, the ape evolved to become more like man. When the drought was over,

Muscle Cars The first road vehicle was built in Scotland in 1839. The vehicle was powered by electricity and was built by Robert Anderson. In later years, he became unsuccessful. The first vehicle built was in 1892 and was a prototype for modern cars. The car went at a top speed of 15 miles per hour and covered 750 miles in 48 hours. America had the most success on electric cars and

Lord Of The Flies The Loss of Civilization Through Symbolism In his classic novel, Lord of the Flies, William Golding uses many elements of symbolism to help the readers gain a greater understanding of his message. Symbolism can be anything, a person, place, or thing, used to portray something beyond its self. It is used to represent or foreshadow the conclusion of the story. As one rea

Lord Of The Flies The Lord of the flies Essay The Lord of the Flies is a story that takes a group of boys out of a civilized society and puts them on an island. In this novel, William Golding explains that when we drift away from civilization, we tend to go back to our savage roots. The characters Ralph and Jack struggle amongst themselves to be the leader, Ralph, Piggy and Simon repr

The Crucible In the past, the word Salem has always been somewhat synonymous with the infamous witch trials. Thanks to works such as Arthur Miller’s “The Crucible”, many people find it hard not to envision a community torn apart by chaos, even though Miller’s play was not so much about the witch trials but instead a commentary on the rampant McCarthyism going on at the time he wrote it.

The Turn Of A Screw This novel was, surprisingly, in a way that was not all too completely unaware to me – for I could discern my own thoughts concerning the book – interesting. The intensely complex and intricate (if not confusing!) sentences, upon first thought, made me expect an experience of complete, utter, and total confusion; however, they served not only to keep my interest in t

Brave New World On the road to Perfection The way in which Aldous Huxley presents his Utopia deals with the control of a society by means of stability. A Utopia in which can only be fathomable in a world made up from Huxleys mind and never reality. The use of technology in Brave New World and the way in which everyone is psychologically conditioned seems like a unrealistic dystopia.

The Possibility Of Evil In the short story “The Possibility of Evil” by Shirley Jackson, Miss Adela Strangeworth is an elderly woman living on Pleasant Street who is known for her beautiful roses. The setting is taking place in a close-knit town, which plays the essential role in her motives for evil. Strangeworth thinks she owns the town and everyone inside it. She believes there to be

The Demon Lover During times of war, “people [are] often led down strange paths in search of indestructible landmarks in a destructible world” (Mitchell 44). Hallucinations provide such landmarks in extreme moments. Paranoia appears to those who encounter the intense emotions of war. The psychological shocks of war deprive and fray emotions. Pressures from a previous war threaten unc

Blindness In “Araby“ Numerous references to blindness appear throughout James Joyce’s “Araby.” Joyce makes no effort to hide these frequent and overt implications. By strategically placing a just few colorful adjectives and phrases, he successfully points the reader toward the underlying meaning of the story. The uses of “blind” and the implications of “blindness” take many forms and

Masque Of The Red Death Honestly, fiction stories are not my favorite type of genre. I would much rather read a biography on one of my favorite athletes or a novel based on a true story. However, Edgar Allen Poe’s use of setting made “The Masque of the Red Death” a very enjoyable story for me. I really feel the story come alive as I read it. The enormous amount of detail that Poe use

The American Indian Wilderness In the essay, “The American Indian Wilderness”, Louis Owens presents a personal story to show a dramatic change in his point of view. His story revolves around a mind-altering experience in which he uses himself as the straw figure, allowing us to effectively see how he came to choose his new view and why it is better than the European view he once had. He

The Lottery Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” is a rebellious attempt to persuade America that our traditions are being carried on by thoughtless, ignorant men. Jackson tried to symbolize men as being the carriers of death and the women as the martyrs. Jackson places the setting of the story in a very peaceful, small town. She described the day as, “...clear and sunny, with the fresh war

Understanding David Hayden’s Meaning Of Guns As Protection In Larry Watson’s Montana 1948 There are many guns that come in and out of David Hayden’s life in Larry Watson’s Montana 1948. As each of the guns is encountered, many meanings come to mind but of the entire meanings one is constant. The meaning of protection is always there. As he encounters each gun, David understanding of h

“Hidden Genocide” “Crimes against Humanity” by Ward Churchill is a powerful essay that brings to light a very interesting point about the natives of our country. Ward begins this essay with an offending attitude which acts as a very effective attention getter. It is meant to show how distasteful the names of these sports team’s really are to the natives. After he has your attention an

A Comparison Of ‘The Whole Town’s Sleeping’ And ‘A Terribly Strange Bed’ Focusing On The Techniques Used By Each Author To Create Suspense ‘A Terribly Strange Bed’ and ‘The Whole Town’s Sleeping’, two different stories written in different centuries, yet very similar. I am going to compare these two stories focusing on the techniques used by each writer to create an atmosphere of suspens

Idle Hands Idle Hands' In Sherwood Anderson’s “Hands,” the character of Wing Biddlebaum subconsciously expresses the emotions he is feeling through the actions of his hands. He is a very sheepish and timid character. Anderson feels that “the story is a story of hands,” which play an enormous role in Wing’s life (217). Nervous and “fiddling about” swiftly, Wing’s hands also demonstra

A Tree Grows In Brooklyn Betty Smith: Brooklyn Growth I. About the Author Through the many works of her career, Betty Smith became Brooklyn's unofficial advocate and was published to critical acclaim and best-seller status with her commentary of the general struggle through life in the early 1900s. Smith, like her main character, grew up impoverished in early twentieth century Brookl

Green Is The Colour A critic has made the following observation about Fernando’s Green is the Colour: Clearly, the central concern (of the novel) is how people of different races, the heirs of colonial and migrant histories, face the challenges of living side by side.” Does this comment function, for you, as an adequate summation of the novel’s thematic concerns' In Fernando’s Gree

The Fall of the House Of Usher One of the core themes of the short story, “The Fall of the House of Usher”, is that of the nature of the house itself. The manner it is described and the way it is so puzzling. Another main theme of this tale is the nature of the people that reside in the dwelling. They are described in nearly the same manner all through the narrative. In that way, they ha

Lord Of The Flies Creating a Community from Eden The Human nature and Sovereignty in the Lord of the flies Lord of the Flies is a very famous novel; most of critics discuss its human nature and compare it with Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels, Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe or Shakespeare’s The Tempest. However, there are few of them comparing it with Thomas Hobbes’s theory. Therefore, in this pape

Blood Is Thicker Than Water Blood is Thicker Than Water The phrase “blood is thicker than water” is an important theme in William Faulkner’s “Barn Burning.” The story takes place in the Post-Civil War South. Even though there are no more slaves, there are tenant farmers who “rent” the land. These people are poor and move from farm to farm. They have taken the place of slaves. This is i

Celebration Of Womanhood Throughout the novel, Sula, written by, Toni Morrison there is a celebration of womanhood. It illustrates the various roles of women such as mothers, daughters, sisters, aunts, and lovers. Toni Morrison emphasizes the altruistic behavior of women and how their behavior is demonstrated in society. The character, Eva, sacrifices everything she has to rear her child

Desert Solitaire DESERT SOLITAIRE Desert Solitaire is widely regarded as the greatest and most definitive piece of work that Edward Abbey ever wrote. Desert Solitaire follows Abbey in his two summers as a ranger in south eastern Utah’s Arches National Monument. In his book Abbey shows disdain for the government that continues to help populate the western United States referring to

1984 On a day in April in 1984, a man named Winston Smith comes home, to his apartment in a nearly condemed building. He is thirty-nine years old, it is painful for him to get up the stairs because he has a varicose ulcer above his right ankle. The elevator in his building is always out of service. As he climbs the staircase, he sees on each flight, a poster depicting an enormous face, b

Ancient Egypt A. Summary: Many different kings and pharaohs governed Egypt. The kings and pharaohs were grouped into thirty-one dynasties. These dynasties were divided into smaller categories, which consisted of an “Old Kingdom”, “Middle Kingdom”, and “New Kingdom”. The basic assumption of Egypt and pyramids came from the Old Kingdom. Ancient Egypt became famous for having the longest

Around The World In 80 Days Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne is a novel about the adventures of Phileas Fogg and his servant Passerpartout. One day while Phileas Fogg is with some friends, he reads in a newspaper that it is possible to travel around the world in eighty days. No one believes this is true, except Phileas. Then Phileas bets them that he could make the journey