In the story “ The Devil and Tom Walker” by Washington Irving, the theme of greed is exaggerated through Tom Walker’s life story. Throughout the story, Walker’s estranged and miserly relationship with his wife, his self-beneficial life choices that harm others, and his unfortunate and pitiful death, demonstrate horrible occurrences in a greed-filled lifestyle. Irving also elucidates to readers that consistent desires and the feelings of dissatisfaction towards everything will eventually lead to an undesirable ending. Emphasis on the above aspects of his life however, is placed to inevitably reveal that Tom Walker’s consistent and developing greed throughout the story suggest how human beings have an instinctive desire that invariably grows.
Many readers have and will see Willie Stark as a very ambiguous character from beginning to end in Robert Penn Warren’s All the King’s Men. A firm believer in idealism, Willie Stark has become a very strong, sneaky and persuasive politician known as the Boss. The way Willie Stark changes the way he acts and how he treats people is something that can be very tricky for everyone who reads through this novel. At one moment Willie Stark is once a very kind man who treats others with respect and at the next moment he is blackmailing other individuals in order to have an advantage. In many instances Willie has been seen treating people horribly with no remorse and treating other people like they are gods in the next. Throughout
In Arthur Miller’s play, The Crucible (1953), he shows the corruptness of the courts and their influence on the decisions of Abigail Williams. Abby was just a girl, she loved to pretend. She and the other girls of Salem loved it, they danced in the woods and pretended to be witches. That is until they were found by Reverend Parris, after which two girls pretended to be bewitched because they were afraid of the consequences. This is the beginning of the chaos that would consume Salem, ending in almost 20 innocents hung. Is it not a judge’s worst fear to condemn an innocent person? Shouldn’t the judicial process prevent the killing of the innocent? Can a crime based on superstition be fully and justly taken to court? When faced with a corrupt
“Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” This quote by politician Lord Acton has a lot to do with The Crucibles. The Crucibles, a play written by Arthur Miller takes place during the Salem witch trials. In this play a lot more was happening than just the hanging of witches. There was also corruption of power and authority in the court, specifically by a judge named Danforth. Danforth used his hierarchy to take advantage of people and situations. This still happens today all around the world. History has shown time and time again that power corrupts. A recent example can be seen in Guatemala, a country that has struggled with corruption of power for a decade. In the most current case
Politics: a constant debate between right or wrong and moral or immoral. Because of these conflicting arguments, some politicians resort to extreme measures to further themselves against their opponent. All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren deals with the strict division between the logical fairness of using truth to further oneself politically and the immorality of using facts as blackmail.
Personally, this passage reminds me a lot of Farenheit 451. I see notable parallels between the conditions of Willy Loman and Guy Montag. In the chapters leading up to the revelation of all the secret books he had been keeping and his eventual departure from home and his wife in Farenheit 451, Guy Montag can be shown growing increasingly displeased with his current situation. He becomes discontented in a way his wife does not understand. Willy’s agitation with Linda and his current state of affairs reminded me very much of Montag’s agitation with a life full of nothing but distractions. Willy’s frustration stems from feelings of not being good enough, never being good enough, and slowly
On the surface, it could seem at first that we are born into a world blanketed with hopeless, moral fog, but throughout the fog, which is created by none other than the forces of conscience and emotion that pumps through our mortal bodies, are the wandering, searching souls of our innocence, praying to emerge unscathed, and our corruption preying on the previously named. Three characters in the novel “To Kill a Mockingbird” remarkably portray separate, yet very evident representations of the infamous mockingbird and contribute a view that maybe there are more mockingbirds then what is first assumed. These three characters: “Boo” Radley, Scout Finch, and Tom Robinson, resided in the slow, quaint, old town of Maycomb, County, Alabama. In
In general, I don’t believe that juveniles can be born evil or bad. Environmental factors carry a lot of weight when it comes to how children develop and grow into adults. However, in the uniquely gritty case of Willie Bosket, I believe it’s safe to say that if there were ever a case of a child being “born bad”, then Willie definitely meets the mark.
Politics is fueled by corruption. It causes government-involved citizens to use their power to manipulate others to achieve what they want. In All the King’s Men, written by Robert Penn Warren, Warren distributes politics to show how Willie Stark transformed. His character gradually deteriorates as a person throughout the political novel leading up to his death. Warren writes to exemplify politics and how it ruined the lives of well-rounded people. Warren demonstrates the role of politics as evil because he wants to prove the corrupted doings of politics. Novel, All the King’s Men, Willie Stark is slowly, but thoroughly corrupted by multiple political instances that ultimately lead to his death.
Just Mercy is a beautiful in-depth view at the racial inequities within the justice system in America. It also explores countless other topics such as sex, gender, class and ableism. Within it’s pages it exposes the truths of a wrongly accused man, Walter McMillian. Other examples lie within the text as well, but McMillian’s glaring innocents is the main crux of Stevenson’s story. Throughout the novel Stevenson looks at the many facets of the human condition. Above all else he discovers the intersections of oppression that make innocent people prey for a vicious and cyclical justice system. Examples of these intersections are Walter’s own race, his ‘violent’ manhood, and his low economic standing. Herbert Richardson acts as another central
Montag is the protagonist in this novel. He is thirty years old. He is a fireman whose job is to make sure all books are burned therefore he believes strongly in what his society stands for: all books should be burned. Or so it seems. Throughout the beginning of the novel, it’s obvious that he is conflicting on what he actually believes, everyone around him thinks he believes books are bad. At the beginning of the novel, he is very self absorbed and doesn’t question any of his actions just like everyone else. He lives the perfect life with his wife and her “parlor family”. At his job, he burns blindly just like the rest of the firemen. All of this is turned upside down when he meets Clarisse. She asks questions and is curious, which is unheard
Arthur Miller portrays the Salem Witch Trials as a time of intense fear spreading across the town of Salem, Massachusetts. The witch trials were told in the story, as group of girls who were acting as if they were possessed by the Devil and his evil spirits. So they could have certain people in the town convicted and killed. Arthur Miller displays to the reader that power has the potential for unbalanced corruption. Miller shows the readers, people who were previously powerless, who then receive power, tend to do awful things for personal gain. Or vice versa people with power can quickly become powerless.
Burton’s films also focus around the corruption of high authoritative people, including Max Shreck, the president of Gotham city in Batman and also the corruption of the Judge in Sweeney Todd. Furthermore, the high authoritative people who have already attained success and acceptance from society, tend to be the corrupt and evil characters, the real monsters, whereas the physical monsters and anti-heroes that are neglected from society, are the ones who deserve recognition from the public, these misunderstood characters include Penguin from Batman Returns who fights to gain acceptance and love from society, something Max has already gained. This could also be interpreted in Edward Scissorhands whereas the misunderstood monster, Edward, is kind and wants acceptance and love from society, however the public pose as the real monsters, who stereotype him and are quick to point the finger, leading to the public actually posing as a threat and becoming the true villains, where at the end, they hunt down Edward and lead to the kidnap, attack and death of civilians.
Abuse, friendship, growth and love are central themes in Michelle Magorian’s novel Goodnight Mister Tom, as it traces a young evacuee’s,William Beech’s, developmental growth from a deprived, abused, discouraged child to a confident and happy boy. One learns that William’s abnormally weak appearance mirror his mental condition as a vulnerable character. Williams religiously fanatical mother’s unsympathetic fostering and abuse has led him into becoming illiterate, terrified as well as introverted and with a distorted understanding of morality.
Aristotle wrote Poetics in 335BC and in that discourse he defined the elements of a tragedy and compared it to other plays like an Epic. Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman, which was written over two thousand years after Aristotle’s Poetics, can easily be considered a modern Aristotelian tragedy. Thereby, a study of Death of a Salesman can help us to understand Aristotle’s Poetics.