Thus we can see that his arrogance and ego reached such a level that he thought of himself as god and forgot that he was a mere mortal. His disdainful challenge to the mighty of the world, allude to his excessive arrogance and pride. This bottomless pit of pride, arrogance, haughtiness and self-consuming narcissism is so apparent that it has been used by many an author as a metaphor when comparing and analyzing characters as illustrated by Allison (2012: 106) for the character of “Daniel Dillion” in “The Cinema of Michael Winterbottom”. The poet uses this juxtaposition in order to add vividness and to enhance the contrast
Man’s Unbecoming in Civilization The central project of Freud’s Civilization and Its Discontents is to understand man’s unhappiness in civilized society. More precisely, Freud’s work analyzes the conflict between man and the world outside of himself, namely “civilization.” While civilization is the objective of man’s efforts, it is at the same time the source of his instinctual dissatisfactions, hence his unhappiness. Civilization creates the superego, a control agency that imposes a sense of guilt on the individual and prevents the realization of his instinctual demands. Thus, man becomes an instinctually self-prohibiting and unhappy being that is in the service of civilization. Unlike Freud, Kant views this unhappy and self- controlling man as an ideal that is an expression of his moral philosophy.
Sentimentality, the ostentatious parading of excessive and spurious emotion, is the mark of dishonesty, the inability to feel; the wet eyes of sentimentalist betray his aversion to experience, his fear of life, his arid heart; and it is always, therefore, the signal of secret and violent inhumanity, the mask of cruelty”(Baldwin, 496). Most readers will probably fall somewhere in the middle of these two extreme opinions. No matter if one enjoys the book or loathes it, it can’t be denied that Uncle Tom’s Cabin is a very influential American Classic. Some people even go as far as to speculate that Uncle Tom’s Cabin helped prompt Abraham Lincoln to start the Civil War (Ohio History Central). Even if the influence of Uncle Tom’s Cabin on the civil war is just a blown up myth, the book definitely had an impact on how people thought about how their religion and slavery were related.
Many of them are about being aware of the impact of decisions on one’s own feeling of protection. It can be considered to be self-serving and callous. Because the problem with this is that his theory is overwhelmingly cruel. Throuhgout the text, it can easily be observed that he supports the regime of violence so as to maintain power. For example, according to Machiavelli, it may be necessary to be violent towards disobedient people and Machiavelli(1532) says “The prince should make himself feared in a such way that, if he is not loved, at least
Circumventing the Ultimate Wall Mysterious Author Honor Bound Fyodor Dostoevsky, the Underground Man, is the existentialist who throws societal values to the wind as he embraces and owns those things which are considered things that must be disowned and feared by society. He is a bitter individual who cannot find happiness in his utter independence and loneliness from society but understands that in his loneliness he can criticize society and see it from the only view an existentialist can, from the outside. He exists in the most real way, while simultaneously not existing. The Underground Man lowers humans self-image of themselves, ridicules the “titles” that governs an individual’s identity, finds pleasure in the pain of a toothache, and the struggle with the scientific destruction of the concept of free will in Notes from the Underground. “Once it’s proved to you, for example, that you descended from an ape…just take it for what it is.
PHILOSOPHICAL CONDITIONING REBT is based on the assumption that what we label our “emotional” reactions are largely caused by our conscious and unconscious evaluations, interpretations, and philosophies. Thus, we feel anxious or depressed because we strongly convince ourselves that it is terrible when we fail at something or that we can’t stand the pain of being rejected. We feel hostile because we vigorously believe that people who behave unfairlyto us absolutely should not act the way they indubitably do, and that it is utterly insufferable when they frustrate us. Like stoicism, a school of philosophy that existed some two thousand years ago, rational emotive behavior therapy holds that there are virtually no good reasons why human beings have to make themselves very neurotic, no matter what kind of negative stimuli impinge on them. It gives them full leeway to feel strong negative emotions, such as sorrow, regret, displeasure, annoyance, rebellion,
Although his actions are very insane, they can be seen as rational to reader considering hedonism. Devotion to pleasure, hedonism, makes Dorian be deceitful about his true self by deflecting the attention of the public from the mad man to the beautiful and intelligent gentlemen. Dorian is, young, sensitive, and emotional, meaning that he is susceptible to manipulation. Lord Henry takes advantage of that opportunity and gives Dorian the yellow book; this book opens up the world of hedonism and aestheticism which eventually turns his young life into an eternal oblivion of misery. Dorian develops a fear of aging so he tries to live his life as if it was his last day on earth.
Form in nature and art has always been linked to aesthetic experience. Those who concern themselves with the form of works of art, whether they are artist, philosopher or critic are more likely to be labelled a formalist. There are artists who become so oppressed by the need to express themselves or transmit a message that they neglect their proper artistic work. Oscar Wilde in the Decay of Living (1891) complains that neglect of form is all too common among his contemporaries who nonetheless lay claim to serious consideration. When consciously working with form, many artists feel hostility towards content and form.
Blindness and Insight: Torvald’s Tragedy of Pride Pride has been the cause of many conflicts through the ages of time. It is said, that at the center of every conflict is a man’s pride. Pride is a human nature that clouds the thoughts and controls the emotions of people. Pride builds barriers of arrogance and vanity that blinds people of seeing what is really going on around them. In Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House, the pride of Torvald blinded Torvald, and gave him a sense of manhood and superiority over Nora throughout the play until his pride was put to the test, and in doing so, revealed a weak and desperate man.
The central theme of “The Pearl”, by John Steinbeck, is greed. Greed has been shown in the novel to be seen as an ugly human nature that everyone tends to have, either as a potential or an obviously invisible characteristic. The struggle to overcome greed costs a price which we all might have experienced at least once and which history has shown to be timeless. The purpose of the story is both to expose the greed that is one of the bad human natures and to show that anyone can overcome it if they put effort on and willing to do it. The author shows the ugly side effects of greed and how people react to it.