Absalom Literary Analysis

The chronological timeline starts with Thomas Sutpen appearing in Yoknapatawpha County in Mississippi, which is located near Jackson, Mississippi. The readers are first introduced to the character of Thomas Sutpen through Miss Rosa Coldfield. However, the story starts with the birth of Thomas Sutpen. A turning point in Sutpen’s childhood was when he was went to a plantation but was turned away by a well-dressed slave. This experience invokes him to run away from his home in West Virginia because he is ashamed of his poor upbringing. Sutpen relocates to the West Indies with hopes of making a large fortune. Thomas then marries Eulalia Bon, the daughter of the plantation owner, which solidified his fortune. He then moves back to America with his new family, but then abandons them when he finds out that Eulalia is of African descent. After this scene in the novel, the readers can concur that Sutpen is a racist. After leaving his first family, Sutpen moves to Mississippi and buys 100 acres of land from the Native Americans, this land is referred throughout the book as Sutpen’s Hundred. Sutpen told General Compson, Quentin’s grandfather, that he “had a design in my mind” and he did not care “whether it was a good or bad design” because that was “beside the point (Faulkner, 212).” Thomas Sutpen had already decided that “he wanted to be the patriarch of a dependent empire” (Johnson, Kalmanson, 24). Details of this “grand design,” first mentioned in Mr. Compson’s narrative which was passed down from his grandfather, include becoming a wealthy plantation owner-- just like the one who turned him away. Part of Sutpen’s plan requires that he gains respectability through “the shield of a virtuous woman, to make his position impregnable”, and an intention not to borrow money, but to “marry it” (Faulkner, 7). He decides to carry this

Throughout the context of “Bless Me Ultima,” it is evident that there are many motifs and examples of dichotomy. I believe that Anaya uses the previously mentioned elements of literature in order to provoke his readers’ thinking and help embody a struggle of understanding the world we live in. Motifs in this novel include: family, dreams, religion, education, and the list continues. For examples of dichotomy, the idea of good versus evil is the most vivid in this novel.

Part of the definition of ethnic identity can often times be the common rejection of other ethnic values for a specific reason. This rejection of influence from other ethnicities seemed to be quite a common theme in all of the novels reviewed in our selection, but most abundant in Coming of Age in Mississippi, by Anne Moody. In this novel there was consistent conflict among black slaves due to the turmoil endured throughout lives in which rich, white plantation owners were served. Many slaves, and freed slaves that maintained the same duties with pay when awarded their freedom, were fed up with working for men that had treated them so poorly in the past. Lack of employment options

Unbroken is mainly set during World War II, in the Pacific and several other places. The story mostly focuses on Louie's life growing up, in the barracks, and in the several POW camps he had to endure during his time as a captive. The setting has a huge effect on the story because the war is what really drives the main plot through Louie's enlistment through the mental aftermath of the war that he has to work through. It's also interesting to look back at how the men at the time perceived the war effort, and how it impacts their morale. For example, after a successful air raid the men in Louie's unit believe “With the dawn of 1943 and the success at Wake, the men felt cocky. It had all been so easy. One admiral predicted that Japan might be

Power and control plays a big role in the lives many. When power is used as a form of control, it leads to depression and misery in the relationship. This is proven through the themes and symbolism used in the stories Lesson before Dying, The fun they had, The strangers that came to town, and Dolls house through the median of three major unsuccessful relationship: racial tension between the African Americans and the caucasians in the novel Lesson before Dying, Doll’s House demonstrates a controlling relationship can be detrimental for both individuals and The Stranger That Came To Town along with The Fun They Had show that when an individual is suppressed by majority they become despondent.

When Sutpen was a child, he experienced his life changed mortal affront. One day while Sutpen was with his father, his father asked him to deliver a message to a rich white man known as Pettibone. When Sutpen arrived to the Pettibone plantation and approached the front door of the mansion, he was met by one of Pettibone’s slaves. The slave then told Sutpen that he could not enter through the front and was therefore directed to go in through the back door. Sutpen was amazed and shocked at what he had just been told by the slave. That one defining moment made him realize how everyone else views him as a person. After suffering from this mortal affront, Thomas Sutpen dedicated the rest of his life to ensure himself that he would never have to experience anything so mortifying ever again. To make sure of this, Sutpen created his life’s design which revolved around gaining land, wealth, a virgin wife, and a son to continue the Sutpen legacy. By gaining money, land, and a virgin wife, Sutpen was determined to prove that he is better than the

Experiencing death can sometimes be the best event someone can go through. Death is more than just someone stopping from existing, it’s a concept that can be perceived as a new beginning. Being able to take the death of someone and turning their philosophy into consideration can be beautiful. In the novel “Bless Me Ultima” by Rudolfo Anaya Antonio gets his faith put to the test when the arrival of Ultima brings him the beginning of the end.

“‘...There’s four kinds of folks in the world. There’s the ordinary kind like us and the neighbors, there’s the kind like the Cunninghams out in the woods, the kind like the Ewells down at the dump, and the Negroes,’” (Lee 302). In To Kill a Mockingbird, Jem argues for the act that the poorer people in town were different because of how much money they had. Many people agreed and held a predetermined idea that people were different because of their social class. Class issues such as social prejudice occur in both To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee and The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. A person’s social class can largely affect how they are treated in society and what they can or cannot do.

This summer I read your book To Kill a Mockingbird. One of the main themes I discovered while reading the book was social and racial inequality. Differences in social status that constantly baffle the children are explored through the social hierarchy of Maycomb County, Alabama. The financially well-off Finches are at the top of Maycomb’s social hierarchy with most of the townspeople beneath them. Country farmers like the Cunninghams lie below the regular townspeople, and the Ewells are below the people like Cunninghams. The black community in Maycomb is an exception, despite its bounty of good qualities, they’re below even the lowest of the white community, the Ewells. This empowers Bob Ewell to make up for his own lack of importance by persecuting Tom Robinson. These social divides that make up much of the adult world are revealed in the book to be very irrational and destructive, through the eyes of the children. For example, Scout cannot understand why Aunt Alexandra refuses to let her befriend young Walter Cunningham. In the book you use the children’s confusion to point out the injustices and prejudice in Maycomb’s society based on race and financial status.

Time is a lot like sunlight. It’s not unlimited. You only have so much of it before it’s gone. You should cherish it and not take it for granted. It’s just like time because you only have so much of it with your loved ones before it’s gone. Once it’s gone, you’ll never get it back. Harvey learns that in The Thief of Always. By the end of the book, Harvey learns that time should be cherished and that he only has so much time with his loved ones.

To Kill a Mockingbird might have been written to serve as Harper Lee’s commentary on racism and segregation, but it also touches on many other important themes. One of the biggest of these Secondary themes is the effect of Socio-economic class on a person. To Kill a Mockingbird demonstrates how economic class affects not one’s values, morals, or behavior, but their social standing in a community, People’s prejudices against them, and the expectations and standards they are held to.

By questioning if African Americans can express their voice in the novel, one must first look at the social context of the South, and in particular Mississippi, leading up and during the 1960s. Since their arrival in America, the African American position was circumscribed by European settlers.1 In the South, even after the abolishment of slavery, African Americans were denied equal rights, whether it was the quality of their education, job opportunities or using the same bathroom as Euro-Americans. The actual attempt after the termination of slavery to integrate them in society was barely feasible due to the complex issue of racism. As slavery was a legal institution and a “fixed target,” once “abolished the target of racism splintered into hundreds of fragments, all of which seemed to be moving in many directions.”2 Moreover, Mississippi, being one of the rigorous states in terms of racial division, did not want to conform to the changing attitudes in the US, not even for their own president.

Inequality is exemplified throughout society in the novel and outside world. Inequality is shown by elaborating on how each race is separate and not every man is equal. Chura writes, “Prior to the 1954 decision, what Benjamin Muse has called an ‘unwholesome stability’ has prevailed in the South, depriving nearly all black of the right to vote and adhering to strict and inviolable de facto and de jure segregation of the races in all areas of social life in which mixing of any kind could result in the suggestion of social equality” (Chura 1.) Demonstrating that not every person is equal, and seen through the children's eyes, this type of discrimination can influence judgment. People are born with the idea that everyone is equal no matter the

The important texts in every different time period arose from different composer’s ways of thinking and pose a lasting significance on society. These themes arise uniquely in an array of texts including Shamus Heaney’s poems Digging, Punishment and Funeral Rites , Sofia Coppola’s film Lost in translation, Eat Pray love written by Elizabeth Gilbert and in the 2011 Television series Off The Map directed by Jenna Bans. The values explored in these texts are fundamentally linked to the religious, philosophical, scientific and cultural paradigms of the twenty and twenty first century and are a reflection of the society and literature in that time period. These texts have formed new ideologies and different ways of thinking in society and have

Southern society during 1930’s showed a marked racial bias and class distinctions between upper and lower echelons of the population. In Harper Lee’s novel, To Kill a Mockingbird the racial discrimination and differentiation between upper and lower classes is illustrated. This leads to the society of Maycomb County judging people through the aspects of race and social class by creating different communities of black and white residents. Therefore To Kill a Mockingbird demonstrates the negative aspects of classism and racism in Maycomb County, which expresses the pessimistic view of life.