The House of the Scorpion Thematic Essay In the novel The House of the Scorpion, Nancy Farmer writes about a clone named Matt who lives in a futuristic society, and escapes the evil drug lord named El Patron. During his journey, Matt meets a young girl named Maria, who loves him and helps him escape. After he escapes, he goes to Aztlan where he meets his new friends Chacho and Fidelito. Many themes are present in this book, the most prominent of which being power corrupts. Throughout this story, she uses the actions and words of two distinctly different characters, Tom and Matt, to demonstrate the powerful theme of power corrupts. One character who often personifies this theme is Tom, the child of Felicia and Mr. MacGregor. …show more content…
Matt… P.S. Don’t tell anyone or you’ll never see him again!!!” (131). Even though Matt knows this action of his is wrong, he still makes the wrong decision. This is because, in his past experiences, everyone has forgiven him for everything simply because he was a clone. Even though he doesn't like this, it is still a form of power. A third instance in which Matt demonstrates the theme of power corrupts is when Matt says, ”One more thing… I demand a birthday kiss” (109) After the people react negatively to his request, he continues by saying, “It’s my party too… and I can have anything I want. Isn’t that so, mi patron?” (109). This sequence of dialogue shows Matt taking his power that El Patron gave to him, and choosing to abuse this authority. In this situation, Matt is corrupted by El Patron’s authority to overstep his boundaries and harm his relationship with Maria. This establishes a theme of power corrupts because the prescience of power in Matt’s life causes him to do many bad things, even though he is arguably a good person. In Matt’s case, his authority is not his, but is El Patron’s. Therefore, even this second hand influence leads to corruption, further illustrating the
Characters Comparison/Contrast Essay Intro: Include one or more sentences summarizing each story and describing each character. Esperanza and house on mango street: Esperanza is a young girl who lives for a year on mango street and gradually grows into a mature young woman by a series of encounters and situations on her quest to learn more about female sexuality and later conclusion on rejecting sex as a form of escaping reality but rather focus on the importance of community and family. At the end of the book, Esperanza becomes a important figure for women’s help in her community and proves herself as an artist and writer through her analysis and observations through her writings.
An example of this scenario is when they find abandoned properties and the boy warns his father about going inside of homes and exploring the different rooms including a basement that held people captive and abused. Pizzino agrees with the idea of the boy being a messiah who looks out for his father’s best interest when stating, “the boy’s existence is an equivocal good, and that anything done in the service of this good has divine “warrant””(361). In making this statement, Pizzino insists that the boy is a considered an authority figure who allows the permission of specific events. The author of this article also reminds his audience that the only company the man and boy have is each other. McCarthy provides more information when he writes, “He knew only that the child was his warrant.
Throughout history there has been many leaders and each and every one them has had an impact on this world. There's been leaders that has made a positive difference and made people's lives better in the process. On the other hand there has been many corrupt leaders who only led a life of deceitfulness and false hope. The leaders doing these things are only doing it for their own personal twisted benefit, masterminds of manipulating people into believing their outlandish ideals. In Arthur Miller's The Crucible displays the battle between good and bad, Reverend Parris and Abigail are the corrupted leaders in the story and how they use their dominance to convince people of the ridiculous accusations.
Matt refuses, or at least tries, to be put in places and he refuses to be ordered around. But they are very desperate for one goal and that is to get out, and explore the world and to not be
For example, the corrupted people can enjoy a better life but other is still get trouble on how to live a good life. The most dangerous effect of corruption is when judiciary is corrupted. Development, justice and civil society are based on law and justice, but in developing countries corrupted people uses law to justify their illegal behaviors. Otherwise, there are many cases that government officials cooperate with mafia in other developing countries.
Corruption can be a very surreptitious and overwhelming thing, but unfortunately it’s everywhere. Power can corrupt by putting fear
(Wikipedia, 2014). Corruption in
When he is telling Paula, something is her fault his demeaner becomes stiff, and cold. He looks down on her like a scolding parent, and is eyes look filled with anger. This expression of emotions is important to Paula’s character both loving and being fearful of her
Through the Salem witch trials, twenty-four innocent people lost their lives due to betrayal. They were hung because they were accused and found to be guilty of witchcraft. In reality, everyone that was accused and had died were innocent, but used as targets by others to save their own lives. In Arthur Miller’s play, The Crucible, out of fear, Abigail Williams, Mary Warren, Mercy Lewis, and Reverend Hale betrayed their morals to save themselves. As a result of betrayal, lives were taken, relationships were ruined, and trusts were broken.
Robin said that Matt knew everything from the book but he never had the first hand experience, it hit Matt very hard. Robin frankly told Matt
Corruption occurs in a government when politicians are bought out by private companies. These companies would pay the politicians large sums of money and in return, the politicians would do political favors for the companies. According
He kidnapped Richards and made him feel like he was anything, but a human being. Matt was possessed with the guilt of not being there for Frank and felt sorry for his wife having to constantly see Richards around the town. “He walks the goddamn streets”(Dubus,63). Matt suffered through many conflicts and finally decided to pop the bubble of problems by killing Richards. This act of Matt taking law into his own hands explores both the ideas of justice and revenge.
The House on Mango Street is set in a poor, primarily Hispanic neighborhood. Author Sandra Cisneros creates an atypical, yet easily digestible world for the reader to experience while learning about Esperanza’s childhood. The culture of her environment influences Esperanza’s development as she becomes a young woman, and contributes to the book’s driving theme of self-empowerment. Mango Street is the source of Esperanza’s growth through her childhood, and it hides sadness and longing underneath stereotypes of Hispanic people. The characters that live in the broken-down neighborhood all seem to represent pigeonholed views of Latino individuals.
The Story of the Vargas Family “Rosa Vargas’ kids are too many and too much. It’s not her fault, you know, except she is their mother and only one against so many” (Cisneros 29). In the novel The House on Mango Street, the author, Sandra Cisneros, touches on the many negative consequences of a single, impoverished mother raising an overwhelming amount of children. Poverty, discrimination, parental and neighborly responsibility, and respect are all issues and social forces that act upon the family; their presence or lack thereof cause several grisly occurrences to take place. Poverty was almost like a curse given to Rosa Vargas by her husband, who “left without even leaving a dollar for bologna or a note explaining how come” (29).
William Shakespeare, playwright of Macbeth, shows the importance that power and corruption can hold on a person’s humanity. In order to prove the true effect of personal gains, he uses the main character, Macbeth, to show how evil people are willing to become. Personal power has the ability to be essential to greatness, but at the same time is able to destroy a person’s true nature. Believe it or not, Macbeth once was a man of honor. At the beginning of the play, Macbeth was loyal to King Duncan, a strong military leader, and a respected husband.