Two great stories that illustrate two different perspectives of how to gentleman’s feel about love. In “The Chaser,” we should note that the young man ideas about love must inevitably produce just such cynicism. In the other hand “Appointment with Love” show’s that life is full of surprises and challenges that come when we don’t expect them the most. The realization is beauty is not about external looks, age, or the gift of gab. Beauty is all about the inside: confidence, attitude, and personality. The unifying idea of the both stories was…
After reading the two short stories, Love in L.A by Dagoberto Gilb and What We Talk about When We Talk about Love by Raymond Carver, I have realized that a common feeling like ‘love’ can be painted into so many different pictures. Each one of these short stories is written by two different authors and sees ‘love’ at different angles. The character Jake in Love in L.A. has this vision of love that is more of a mockery. Then, Terri’s ex-husband in What We talk about When We Talk about Love has so much passion, but the kind of passion that can be interoperated as obsession. The lies and misconceptions of ‘love’ that Jake and Terri’s ex-husband display reveal that ‘love’ does not exist in a world filled with nothing but cruelty and evil actions.…
Love in L.A.” is a story that is set on the streets of Los Angeles in the heat of traffic. Love should be an emotion of strong affection and personal attachment (DK). But in the short story Love in L.A., the definition of love is the exact opposite. Through “Jake,” the protagonist’s definition of “love” is expressed in different fashions, none results in anything positive outcome; He portrays being lazy, irresponsible, somewhat poor, and perhaps something of a scam artist, looking for his freedom. “Jake was thinking about this freedom of his so much that when he glimpsed its green light he just went ahead and stared bye-bye to the steadily employed. (Gilb 311)” Due to his lack of attention and a crash, he is forced to meet a young girl named Mariana. Mariana is foreign, not from Los Angeles, and obviously quite naïve. This crash of fate leads to the noticeably smooth and very dishonest Jake getting away with fraud, leaving Mariana to handle the damage he caused. Lie, deception, and fantasy are a few of the main themes portrayed in "Love in L.A.".…
“Against Love”: immediately controversy is conveyed by the title of Laura Kipnis’ article on modern relationships. The reader is put on the defensive as Kipnis starts her argument with strong metaphors attacking one of the most basic human interactions that we see as natural and embrace without question. Namely, love, a word held in superposition between complex and simple. Kipnis argues it has been overrated and too much is sacrificed in the pursuit of making it last. Defining her own terms that apply to most relationships such as “advanced intimacy” and “mutuality” she provides a new perspective on old notions. Her tone throughout is consistently sarcastic but make no mistake, Kipnis is addressing a real issue on what we value as a society. Descriptive language is Kipnis’ fishing line that keeps you reading, often creating vivid and objectionable images that no one can avoid cringing at. Concepts surrounding love and the ideal couple change from age to age and from culture to culture but Kipnis doesn’t disregard this. She compares today’s norms to historical precedence as she identifies the shift from focusing on the convenience of financially organized marriages to the achievement of unending life-long love. Kipnis’ article presents a fascinating argument by proposing an idea…
Mahatma Gandhi once said, “Where there is love, there is life”. Human beings cannot live a fulfilled life without love of some kind. In Junot Diaz’s Novel, “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao” we see that love plays a vital role. Love, or the lack of it, impacts each individual in the story and leads them to become reckless or grow stronger. Whether its love from a parent, from a friend, or a significant other, we need it to function, to grow, and to be able to accept ourselves.…
Many individuals encounter different love experiences during their entire lives. In the novel The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Díaz, we see Oscar de León, a Dominican American young man, who resides in Paterson, New Jersey with his family going through many different relationship experiences in his life. One of those experiences is during his childhood; he is an outcast and is considered a nerd. Another love experience that Oscar encounters is when he goes to Rutgers University to get his education. One more experience that Oscar has is when he travels back to his native country the Dominican Republic and falls in love with the woman that he least expected to fall in love with.…
In Love on the B-Line by Adam Kraar, two lovers dispute over their relationship at a subway in Brooklyn. Kraar uses a style that is simple and commonplace, but romantic still. The characters, Robbie and Marie, are rather ordinary and are living through a situation which many real-life couples also experience. This literary piece thrives on realistic human element, making is easy for readers to relate to them and understand the emotions that Robbie and Marie feel. Love on the B-Line is a believable and easy to follow read, dotted with romantic metaphors, and concluded with an unexpected ending.…
What is love? Often enough, as a hormone-struck teenager, I am lectured on what love is not. According to my mother, father, grandmother, aunts, uncles, and every adult figure that has ever made a guest-star appearance in the long-winded romance novel that is my life, love is NOT the warm cuddly feeling I get when I see a cute boy at school. Love is NOT holding hands on the playground; is not caring an abnormal amount for a favorite pair of shoes. I feel as though a vast amount of time is spent describing the negative space of a person’s heart, and not long enough spent defining its shape. Although Pastor Ostrum follows suit with his anti-definition of what love is not, he definitely strikes a chord in my heart when he says that “love is not something we wait to have happen to us, but something we do.” Many might disagree, might argue that love is a two-way street; that in order to give we must first receive. However, in the novel “Until They Bring the Streetcars Back,” by Stanley Gordon West, Cal Gant demonstrates this principle of giving time and time again.…
Alec Waugh, a British novelist once said, “you can fall in love at first sight with a place as with a person”. A place can have so much character to not only make a person fall in love at first sight, but to keep that person entranced by love for the place. The city one might picture is Paris the city of love or the islands of Hawaii. However, this city is not the typical city that comes to mind. It is the city with busy streets and beautiful people, Los Angeles. The beaches of Los Angeles can be breathtaking, but it is the personality of Los Angeles that keeps a person around. A story based on a life of a Los Angeles native portrays the city as a land of opportunity.…
It is thought that in the film “500 Days of Summer”, a 2009 comedy drama with a truly original romantic twist, post-modernism serves to enhance the overall message of the movie that is, don’t fall in love with love. The postmodern elements such as the distorted use of time, the fact that the film does not follow the tradition “Hollywood” love story, and finally the evident presence of role reversal throughout the story, all help to convey this idea. In the movie, the distorted use of time plays a major part and is able to better the viewer’s understanding of the story by the fact that it allows viewers to see both Tom and Summer’s relationships in stages, it helps capture the highs and lows along with the humor and desperation as the relationship moves along. The film also follows a much more unorthodox version of a love story than the traditional love stories in western culture, with a boy-meets-girl narrative, yet with a not-so-happy ending. Finally, role reversal is a significant component in “500 Days of Summer”, enhancing the overall message. In Tom’s case, viewers see that he is a hopeless romantic so desperate to find “the one” that he simply ignores all of the signs telling him Summer is not the one for him. This is a quite original twist to modern western culture as typically the women are the ones trying to find “the special someone”, rather than the men.…
Much like Flaubert’s Madame Bovary, Florentino Ariza is in love with soap operas and romance novels, so much so all his letters to Daza when they are young read just like one. He is so involved with the idea of romance after Fermina’s rejection of him he makes a pass time writing love letters for other couples. Ariza is all youthful passion and intensity saying, “Age has no reality except in the physical world. The essence of a human being is resistant to the passage of time. Our inner lives are eternal, which is to say that our spirits remain as youthful and vigorous as when we were in full bloom. Think of love as a state of grace, not the means to anything, but the alpha and omega. An end in itself.” Needless to say, he’s all swoon and flowery words as he makes his way into the bed of over six hundred women in the course of his life while pretending to be faithful to only Fermina. None of the women know about the others and each is told that she is his first and only, perpetuating Ariza’s illusion of himself that he is a heart sick and loyal love puppy in need of nurturing.…
T.C Boyle’s short story, The Love of my Life, mocks the idealization and seemingly invincibility of teenage love. Boyle uses pop culture as an avenue to show the distortedness of upper-class teenagers’ view on the American Dream. China and Jeremy already have education, family, and adequate wealth, so to them all they think they want is each other.…
The overall plot of The Great Gatsby tells a barely believable story of love and tragedy. The novel is highly inspired by the Romantic genre, taking account of its fairytale-esque storyline and its idealistic view on the conventions of love. We recognize the boy meets girl influenced enactment complemented by the traditional heroism conveyed by Gatsby, and also through Daisy acting the damsel in distress. The picturesque past of the relationship between Gatsby and Daisy also contradicts the characteristics of a Realist Novel. The romantic idea of lost love reconciliation also exemplifies the concept of The Great Gatsby being a traditional love-tragedy hybrid novel. The pure indulgence and self-righteousness inhabited by some characters combined with their extravagant lifestyles and social status augments the belief that The Great Gatsby is an Impressionistic novel, rather than a Realist one.…
Tita’s marriage bedspread shows how love cannot fully satisfy one’s needs. Pedro’s bouquet of roses reveals the harm and pain in a romantic relationship. Lastly, the over-powered sex represents true love finally coming together, but ending in lifelessness. Although it is desirable for true love to be effortless and untroubling, the author not only shows the goodness and richness of love, but also exposes the hardships and pessimistic outcomes…
Fiction Response When reading the short story “Love in L.A.” by Dagoberta Gilb most readers will notice the importance of the characters and how they shape the outcome of the story. This story is truly character driven, meaning the plot relies on the characters, which makes it a very powerful literary element in this case. Jake, the protagonist of the fictional piece, can easily be envisioned as a young man with a carefree attitude who does not really care much about other people and their situations. One can tell Jake is definitely a pretty young man due to some of the things he daydreams about at the beginning of the story and the fact that he is daydreaming instead of paying attention to the road. Some of these thoughts include the brief idea of getting a steady job and his fantasies regarding his lifestyle (Gilb, 113). His carefree attitude can be seen through his dialogue with Mariana after the accident with remarks such as “So how ya doing? Any damage to the car? I’m kinda hoping so, just so it takes a little more time and we can talk some. Or else you can give me your phone number now and I won’t have to lay my regular b.s. on you to get it later.” (Gilb, 114) Even though Jake has just been in a car accident he was at fault for that could have severely injured someone he still has the idea of flirting with one of the other drivers involved. Jake is also the kind of guy who prefers to stay out of trouble for his own sake and his wallet’s, which is why he gives Mariana false information and uses license plates from scrapped cars in order to avoid paying for things he doesn’t want to pay for (Gilb, 114-115). Jake’s young, carefree attitude is seen again after he drives off from the accident with him instantly going back to fantasizing about making his car awesome without a single worry about what just happened (Gilb 115).…