A Dangerous Symbol In his extremely short story, “The Paring Knife,” Michael Oppenheimer utilizes symbolism masterfully. In literature, authors typically use objects with which the readers are familiar in order to assist in plot development or to convey a key theme. They accomplish this by arranging the language so that the focus is continually shifted to the object throughout the selection. The reader is able to grasp new meaning because of either universal familiarity with the object or an immediate understanding of what the object represents within the context of the story. If an object is viewed by most or all readers in the same manner, the author is making use of conventional symbolism.
Hemingway’s “In Our Time” relates stories of the individual before, during and after war – and how this individual becomes affected. Many thematic links exist between Hemingway’s stories contained in “In Our Time” and Fromm’s essay “Chains of Illusion”. While Erich Fromm lays the philosophical foundation for his argument, Hemingway’s stories transport life into Fromm’s philosophies. Fromm would have found the themes of Hemingway’s stories enlightening and not unlike many of the ideals he set forth. While Fromm discusses the philosophy of his argument, Hemingway puts into practice this dynamic in action through his stories.
The Raven Paradox and Essay I think after watching The Simpsons paradox of “The Raven” it was some what a good comparison to Edgar Allan Poe “The Raven” but differed in some ways. One of the main ways that The Simpsons paradox differs from Poe’s poem is established in the fact that the two tales are conveyed through different media. Poe’s “The Raven” is purely text. All imageries and tones are left to the imagination of the reader. The Simpsons paradox is free to decode the poem as they desire, and they often kept exactly loyal to Poe’s original text creating a different meaning using only visual effects and erratic voices.
Digging Deep “The Big Two-Hearted River” by Earnest Hemingway is one of the greatest short stories in American Modernism. Hemingway creates a hidden division between the textual and idea level. The story textually does not share a thrilling plot. The use of a simple plot line creates the illusion that the story has a dull aspect. However, the further you dig into the story the more thrilling it becomes.
The Old Man and The Sea is an example of short writing at its finest. There are many websites and critics that address Hemingway’s style, but they all seem to reach the same two conclusions. First, Hemingway prefers a journalistic, or short sentence style from his early days as a newspaper journalist, and second, he is a master at dialogue. In Observations on the Style of Ernest Hemingway, by Harry Levin, the critic says: "Hemingway puts his emphasis on nouns because, among other parts of speech, they come closest to things. Stringing them along by means of conjunctions, he approximates the actual flow of experience."
As in Huck’s life with people they are always there, but it does not mean that they are always good for him. Many well-known scholars of Mark Twain era and beyond have picked apart his novel for its hidden meanings of life’s situations. An influential twentieth century figure was Professor Thomas Stearns Eliot (T.S. Eliot), well known for his poetry and the literary movement known as modernism. His interpretation of the Mississippi river and the ending of the novel resonated with me.
Nevertheless, this is the precisely the beauty of this anthology. The stories provide fresh and novel perspectives on common relationships found in all of the readers’ lives. Carver leaves every story slightly “up in the air”, in a way that is very thought-provoking. I found myself needing to put down the book several times and think about questions that had arisen, which was unexpected. His simplistic and to-the-point nature of writing allows the reader to focus truly on the important skeleton of the stories, avoiding wordiness and unnecessary details that are typical of some classic stories.
James Baldwin's "Sonny's Blues," is one of his most enduring stories because it offers several common literary themes: individualism, alienation, and "Am I my brother's keeper?" The story has also generated some perceptive critical views, some of which emphasize Baldwin's metaphorical use of the blues. However, none of the criticism bothers to look more closely at the significance of the jazz and blues images and allusions in relation to the commonly-agreed-upon basic themes of individualism and alienation. A closer examination of Baldwin's use of jazz and blues forms and of Louis Armstrong, Charlie Parker, the character Creole, and the song, "Am I Blue?" reveals some solid support for the basic themes, as well as some possible important thematic and structural flaws that might cause some readers to question whether Baldwin really understood the nature of the jazz/blues motif that he used.
Virgil Tibbs: Accepting the Future “[...] there are places in this country where a coloured man, to use your words for it, is simply a human being like everybody else.”(94) John Ball’s novel, In the Heat of the Night features a unique character named Virgil Tibbs. Virgil significantly contributes to the novel’s plot, but is only a flat character because his views remain the same from beginning to end. Though he is quiet and respectful, Virgil’s mere presence in the small southern town of Wells, Carolina leads to many changes that shape the novel and influences the characters in it. Virgil serves as a sharp contrast to another character in the book, Jess the mechanic. Unlike Jess, who is muddled by: injustice, segregation, and racism, Tibbs stands for: freedom, acceptance, and equality.
His style of writing is like no other, he is very eloquent in the way he sets up his scenes, and the way his characters interact with one another. Even though Wolfe’s style is very eloquent, there are still holes in the story to where the reader has to really think about what is really happening and figure out where the story is going to go from that point. This short story has received much recognition, including the Nebula and Locus Awards for short stories. It is very drawn out and Wolfe seems to have mapped out each scene, character and theme in a very detailed manner. He is able to hurl the reader right into the story without taking forever to do it.