In David Guterson’s short essay “No Place like Home,” he visits communities like Green Valley and meets with residents to discuss the lifestyle of the average suburban family, typically four members in total, who live in the walled in, well watched, prestigious sounding, city sized western version of our local community Landfall. While the essay begins with a sunny sounding tone the reporter almost attempts to portray the community as a facade with something dark lurking in the deeper corners, he does this by phrasing certain things with a suspenseful tone in the first paragraph. David does, inevidetly reach some of his darker topics as he address crime and a certain area of politics. His point, after all though, seemed just to be to inform…
In the memoir, The Horizontal World written by Debra Marquart, she describes growing up in the Midwest region. By using literary devices, she tells the readers about her profound love for the area, even though it may seem to the blind eye as a boring and lonely place to visit. Literary devices such as allusions and charged diction suggest that the Midwest has a unique beauty that not everyone notices, or bothers to notice. By using these literary devices, Marquart is able to convince her readers of the beauty of the Midwest.…
Ernest J. Gaines uses imagery to explore the close familial relationships of this town in the excerpt from A Lesson Before Dying. Anyone from the south can understand the importance of food in a family household. Gaines…
The Stone Carvers is a book of obsessions. Each one of the characters has their own obsessions that at one point they believe to be a natural and helpful to their lives. However each of the characters in The Stone Carvers learns that these obsessions with perfection, love, adventure, or anything end without them being able to be satisfied and on many occasions without achieving what they were obsessing over. The author Jane Urquhart made a compelling story on the nature obsession and the effects of obsession over any matter. The characters of the novel were fixated on a large range of ideas; they were obsessed with ideas from love to architecture and because of the diversity that Jane has shown that obsession of any form will always end without resolve. The conclusion about obsession can be grasped through the various trials that each character of the story is placed under. In The Stone Carvers Urquhart is able to…
The narrator in Raymond Carver’s “Cathedral,” is portrayed as someone who lacks insight and awareness of the things around him. He is paralyzed, stuck in a destructive way of living. The narrator does not realize the limitations he has placed on himself that prevent him from seeing things greater than life.…
The partaking of society is evident in many stories. Often society’s role is especially evident and plays a huge part in a story’s plot. In most situations, a rejection—whether by society or by the main characters themselves—occurs that typically results in complete isolation from the outside world. Such is seen with John Updike’s “A & P,” William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily,” and Katherine Mansfield’s “Miss Brill,” as the main character is generally has a dispute with society in some way. By analyzing the main characters in these stories, one can come to a conclusion as to how the contrasting of society with the main character gives insight into a character’s thought process and assists in developing him or her.…
Carver, Raymond. “Cathedral.” 1983. Fiction: A Pocket Anthology. 3rd ed. Ed. R. S. Gwynn. New York: Longman, 2002. 278-291. Print.…
By constructing a theme of transformation, Carver is able to identify with his audience. People in everyday life change and evolve. They are all philosophically in search of a moral and meaningful life. In “Cathedral,” the narrator evolves from an indifferent, callous antihero into someone who is no longer restricted by the limitations he places on…
Raymond Carver, Jr. was an American short story author and poet. He was born in 1938 and died in 1988. He was married twice, struggled with drugs and alcoholism, and was an unsuccessful writer early on in his career. It was not until his publication of “Cathedral” that he gained success. Carver even believed that “Cathedral was a watershed in his career, in its shift towards a more optimistic and confidently poetic style” (Arciniegas). “Cathedral” starts out slow, spending most of the short story on the back story of the narrator’s wife and a blind man. The story progresses with the three characters doing mostly everyday things, eating, talking, and drinking. While this happens, the narrator’s ideas of the blind are challenged little by…
1. Two examples of literature that share the theme of relationships are William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily” and Henrik Ibsen’s “A Doll House.” Although there is a love relationship between Emily Grierson and Homer Barron in the story “A Rose for Emily,” a deeper relationship exists between Emily and the town she lived in. An unsound relationship between the town and Emily is seen throughout the story. We learn about the connection between the town and Emily in the first line of the story as the unnamed narrator tells us “When Miss Emily Grierson died, out whole town went to her funeral” (516). We also learn in the first line that the town had different feelings towards Emily and the men and women…
The way a family works has changed in the last decade or two. Back when this generations parents were kids and even when their parents were young, it is very different than young people today. A perfect example would be the television show “Leave it to Beaver”, which aired in 1957. It was about the Cleavers, an All American Family, trying to keep their youngest son Theodore “Beaver” out of trouble. He always finds his way into trouble, at the end of the episode his parents always help him by giving him advice an good life lessons. That show represents how families were close and protected each other. Now, in the 21st century, many families and even communities…
Diction and imagery accompany the appropriately selected details used in creating an unearthly atmosphere. The suspicious and dangerous attitudes of the Los Angeles community provide insight into the negative effect of the winds. Examples of neighbors roaming around with machetes and parties ending in fights prove to the audience that dangerous and mysterious things occur regarding the arrival of the wind. Alluding to Raymond Chandler, a crime fiction novelist, adds to the un-predictableness when describing meek little wives staring at their husband’s necks while holding a carving knife. Didion ended off Chandler’s quote with “Anything can happen” providing a cliffhanger to what the winds and nature could do next.…
Aimee Bender’s story “Tiger Mending,” underscores themes of characterization describing behavioral habits based on association. Raymond Carver’s story “Popular Mechanics,” uses themes of characterization and diction to explain responses or reactions to events. It is apparent by juxtaposing these two short stories that characters are dependent, and they have different responses or reactions depending of the events. In “Tiger Mending” and “Popular Mechanics” the writers use characterization to reveal the possible fictionality that anybody can be dependent on family members, partners, or friends.…
“I find television very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set, I go into the other room and read a book,”(Groucho Marx).Everyone in Ray Bradbury’s novel, Fahrenheit 451,is dependent on technology, and this plays a huge part in Guy Montag’s life, along with everyone around him In the fireman’s life he keeps hearing people refer to the characters on the television as their family. Guy also sees the parlor letting people’s lives run past them.Along with the parlor, Bradbury illustrates many exciting pieces technology that is used today in everyday life. The characters in the novel need these distractions, they need the fake family because real families fight and have flaws and their world, the real world is not good enough to look at so they look at a fake world one on their television screen..…
Popular mechanics In the story popular mechanics by raymond carver a separating couple is fighting over who gets to keep their baby and end up hurting the baby in the process. carvers use of symbolism and dialogue express that lack of communication can tear apart the bonds that hold even the strongest relationships apart The way carver uses symbolism plays an important role In Raymond Carver’s “Popular Mechanics” it's used to symbolize the characters changes in their relationship. Carver uses four symbols in the story:the dark and details of the depressing weather, the dirty snow, the flower pot breaking, and the tug of war on the baby.…