Preview

Monkey-the Journey to the West Essay Example

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
702 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Monkey-the Journey to the West Essay Example
MKatie Lai
Mrs. Tevlin
GD II
05/12/11

How does "experience" (including failures) help to stimulate growth in any of the characters from Monkey? Do they have regrets? Should They? Do you think "experience" is essential to the development of young people today? Explain. YOU MUST USE AT LEAST 3 DIRECT QUOTATIONS FROM THE BOOK WITH PAGE NUMBERS to get full credits.

According to Monkey, although each character has different personalities, they find the same spirit to reach enlightenment when they are on the way to the West together. Going through nine times nine ordeals to return to immortality, they challenge themselves by facing with dangerous levels. Except Tripitaka, his disciples have punishment by the Jade Emperor because of their sins. By joining the journey to the West, their sins can redeem completely. Therefore, Tripitaka and his disciples including Monkey, Pisgy, Sandy and a white horse are learning the truth of spirit and be able to face with calamities.

Monkey is a naughty character who raise an uproar in the Heaven. He is stubborn and always desires to show his great power to people. That is the reason he gets punishment from Buddha because he doesn’t know how to control himself to do things. Buddha punishes him to the bottom of the mountain for five hundred years. Then, finally he can get out of the mountain when Tripitaka removes the golden letters on the top of mountain to rescue him. However, at first, he still stays the same with his personality before. Kuan-yin has to give Tripitaka a cap to control Monkey. Monkey, with the spell of Tripitaka, has to obey him. Start from that point, step by step, Monkey complies to protect Tripitaka seriously. There is one more thing that Monkey’s weakness is impatient. In Sandy’s fight with Pigsy, he is “unable to control himself, he charges into battle just when Pigsy and the monster reach shore” (p.137). It causes Monkey cannot win the battle. Nevertheless, at the end, “Tripitaka is very pleased

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Powerful Essays

    At the end of The Monkey and the Monk, the pilgrims acquire the scriptures and, thus, fulfill the task of their journey and please Bodhisattva. Yet, she points out that “within our order of Buddhism, nine times nine is the crucial means by which one returns to immortality. The sage monk has undergone eighty ordeals. Because one ordeal, therefore, is still lacking, the sacred number is not yet complete.”(Wu Cheng’en, 470) Even though the sage monk performed tasks that were supposed to lead to immortality, Bodhisattva suddenly says that his deeds were not sufficient unless the pilgrims performed one more ordeal for the perfect number of sufferings. This behavior of Guanyin is problematic – why would she suddenly insist…

    • 1448 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Throughout the film, "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest", many changes differentiate the movie from the book. Not only can these differences be seen in the characters of the novel, but also in the series of events that make this story so interesting. In this essay, the significance of these differences will be revealed as well as the reasons for the changes.…

    • 836 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    I read The Pigman by Paul Zindel. The setting of this story takes place in the Franklin High School.It is in the time period of when ten dollars was a lot of money, and you can buy a six pack of beer for a dollar twenty five.the Narrator is 3rd person. The title realates to the story because Mr. Pignati collected figurine piugs that his diceased wife gave to him.…

    • 656 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Ken Kesey's novel One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest takes place in a mental hospital. The main character, or protagonist is Randle P. McMurphy, a convicted criminal and gambler who feigns insanity to get out of a prisoners work ranch. The antagonist is Nurse Ratched also referred to as The Big Nurse . She is in charge of running the mental ward. The novel is narrated by a patient of the hospital, an American Indian named Chief Bromden. Chief Bromden has been a patient at the hospital longer than any of the others, and is a paranoid-schizophrenic, who is posing as a deaf mute. The Chief often drifts in and out between reality and his psychosis. The conflict in the novel is between McMurphy and The Big Nurse which turns into a battle of mythic proportion. The center of One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest is this battle between the two, which Kesey uses to represent many of our cultures most influential stories. The dominant theme in this novel is that of conformity and it's pressure on today's society. In the novel conformity is represented as a machine , or in Chief Bromden's mind a combine . To the Chief, the combine' depicts the conformist society of America, this is evident in one particular paragraph: This excerpt not only explains the Chiefs outlook on society as a machine but also his self outlook and how society treats a person who is unable to conform to society, or more poignantly one who is unable to cope with the inability to conform to society. The chief views the mental hospital as a big machine as well, which is run by The Big Nurse who controls everyone except McMurphy with wires and a control panel. In the Chiefs eyes McMurphy was missed by the combine, as the Chief and the other patients are casualties of it. Therefore McMurphy is an unconformist and is unencumbered by the wires of The Big Nurse and so he is a threat to the combine. McMurphy represents the antithesis to the mechanical regularity, therefore he represents…

    • 1125 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Piggy is a short and overweight boy who wears thick glasses, he is an orphan who was brought up by his aunt, and he represents orders and democracy. It is no coincidence that Piggy’s nickname is such. He is afflicted with asthma and does not care to do tiring work on the island. Piggy tries very hard to cling to civilization, and tries his best to keep peace. Although he is one of the smartest boy on the island, but he lacks any social skills whatsoever, and has trouble communicating or fitting in with the others. His glasses are very important part of the book, as they are used over and over to start fires and it’s their only hope of rescue.…

    • 794 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In Ken Kesey's One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest, the author refers to the many struggles people individually face in life. Through the conflict between Nurse Ratched and McMurphy, the novel explores the themes of individuality and rebellion against conformity. With these themes, Kesey makes various points which help us understand which situations of repression can lead an individual to insanity. These points include: the effects of sexual repression, woman as castrators, and the pressures we face from society to conform. Through these points, Kesey encourages the reader to consider that people react differently in the face of repression, and makes the reader realize the value of alternative states of perception, rather than simply writing them off as "crazy."…

    • 1054 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    “So you see my friend, it is somewhat as you stated: man has but one truly effective weapon against the juggernaut of modern matriarchy, but it certainly is not laughter. One weapon, and with every passing year in this hip, motivationally researched society, more and more people are discovering how to render that weapon useless and conquer those who have hitherto been conquerors. . . .” - McMurphy…

    • 1524 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    America has always been the country of opportunity and new beginnings. It is a place to start a fresh and better life for immigrants (at least that’s what they think). In Upton Sinclair’s book The Jungle Lithuanian immigrant Jurgis wants to better his and several members of his family’s lives. He does this by packing up and traveling to America, but he is unaware of the downfalls in his future. The family members who came along with Jurgis are Ona, his soon to be wife, Jurgis’ father Antanas, Ona’s stepmother Elzbieta, her three kids, and her brother Jonas.…

    • 715 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The harsh reality of the truth can sometimes be a rude realization. This theory is exemplified in Ken Kesey's best selling novel, One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest. Published in 1962, the novel presents controversial subject matter and themes such as sexuality, violence, and criminal activity as the reader explores the sterile, yet quite dirty, environment of a mental institution and all of its inhabitants. Due to speculation and harsh criticism of concerned and outraged parents, there have been various occurrences of the banning of Cuckoo's Nest due to the “pornographic” scenes, profane language, and the “glorification” of crimes and violence. The light cast upon the “displeasing” diction, as well as the mature events that one may view as inappropriate and offensive, is substantially overshadowed by Kesey's literary merit and valuable insight into the harsh and uncensored tendencies of the real world. The explicit content of Cuckoo's Nest provides the reader with a valuable and important learning experience into the uncensored world of literature and reality, which students should not be deprived of, rather prepared for, despite whether or not an individual is offended, as well as offering truth and insight.…

    • 824 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Among the many books and films we have read and watched, I enjoyed Monkey Beach by Eden Robinson and Flight by Sherman Alexie the most. Both protagonists’ go through struggles while making decisions that will affect their own lives permanently. Zits, the main character of Flight, had a lonely and sad life, similar to Lisa from Monkey Beach. I believe that these two characters are similar through more than just misfortunes, but on a physical and a mental level as well. Both characters go through traumatic situations that shape them into sad and angry people. The similarities between Lisa and Zits lives show that character development is strongly affected by surrounding environments as well as the people you involve yourself with. It is clear that these two characters share strong wills, individualism, and experiences of loss.…

    • 756 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    In today’s world, we have come to see that trial, error, pain, and the striving for living a glamorous life are common; we all know it’s an exhausting task. Everybody seems to “go through the motions” at one point or another; we all seem to have this point in life where everything seems like a black hole that’s going nowhere. In the book, Of Mice and Men, and play Death of a Salesman, we see this is common, among many other similarities. However, no story is ever the same between two people’s lives, and this is also shown in these two works of literature.…

    • 1291 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the Lord of the Flies William Golding has a group of schoolboys crash on an island and become barbaric. The reason why the boys turn wild is because of their innate primal instinct to hurt others. This innate behavior is inherited from early ancestors killing to stay alive. Mans innate tendency towards violence, how people take sides and divide into groups, and the struggle for power are three ways mans behavior will generally occur. Each of these suggests that violence is a key factor to getting what they want.…

    • 817 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Monkey’s Paw, written by W.W. Jacobs, is a short story about the consequences of messing with fate. Mr. White is a simple man living with his wife, Mrs. White, and his grown son, Herbert. One evening Sergeant-Major Morris, a family friend back from India, visits them and shows them a monkey’s paw he had gotten there, saying that it will grant a man three wishes, but that it was made to prove that when you mess with fate, bad things happen. Even with the warning, Mr. White uses the monkey’s paw to grant his wishes, and soon pays the price. I think the theme of this story is basically, “Be careful what you wish for because you just might get it.”…

    • 531 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The novel Lord of the Flies, by William Golding, is not only an allegory, but contains many ironic situations that cannot always be seen, but contradict or reveal the appealing situations of the characters. It seems all too common to find one or two ironic parts in a book, but Golding uses irony to a vast extent which keeps the minds of the readers constantly thinking and connecting related themes or topics. While some of the ironic situations that Golding uses are essential to the main idea of the story, others are merely present for an additional and remote search. Lord of the Flies shows certain ironic conditions including the fire, the two man-hunts, and the island's shape that illustrate or oppose what its characters want for the outcome of their epic adventure.…

    • 1046 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    A symbol can express an idea, clarify meaning, or enlarge literal meaning. In the book, “ Lord of the Flies” by William Golding, there are many symbols such as the pig’s head, fire, painted faces, and Piggy’s glasses. However one symbol stands out more than the others, the conch. The conch symbolizes order, government, savagery, and even one of the characters called Piggy.…

    • 936 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays