Analysis Of Lather And Nothing Else

How is our character reflected through the choices we make? Daily actions help reveal what beliefs and values are important to each individual, which will begin illustrating a person's character. One’s actions usually demonstrate important values and beliefs such as respecting others, courage, and dignity. As an individual becomes more conscientious of the values and beliefs they deem are important their choices and actions will further establish character. In “Just Lather, That's All”, Hernando Tellez develops the idea that an individual's values and beliefs influence the choices and actions they make, which in turn will further reveal the person's character. This is demonstrated by the barber’s decision to allow the Captain to leave

The people we see every day are not always who they appear to be. Our family, friends, peers, work associates, and even our own self’s change who we are sometimes to cope or to seem better off than we are. We put on “Mask” to show the person we want to be seen as and often times people wear more than just one. In Flannery O’ Connor’s, “Good Country People” many of her main characters wore mask. They each had their own reasons that they chose to conceal their real identity. Nevertheless, the characters in O’Connor’s short story wanted to hide their true persona’s or deceive other people. Sometimes it was merely done to cope with their tragic pain and in other cases it was done to deliberately take advantage

Throughout the essay “Our secret” by Susan Griffin, Griffin talks about a few characters’ fears, secrets and she gives us insights into these “secrets”. Griffin comes to realize her own secrets and fears by examining others. She relates to a few of the characters such as Himmler, Leo, Helene and everyone else even though she is different than all of them. The only thing that all of these characters have in common is that they all represent human emotion. Susan Griffin reveals that everyone has a hidden side to them and anything being showed on the outside could be fake or a false representation of themselves. “I think of it now as a kind of mask, not an animated mask that expresses the essence of an inner truth, but a mask that falls like dead weight over the human face.” (Griffin 237) This quote explains what she means about secrets being the barrier to others’ feelings and having this mask hides what you really feel on the inside.

This proves Gergen’s thesis, “I doubt that people normally develop a coherent sense of identity, and believe that to the extent that they do, they may experience serve emotional distress” (172). By having several masks or selves, is how we are able to adapt to changing society. With these multiple masks we are able to achieve acceptance and know who we are as individuals. Throughout life we must adopt masks when facing different circumstances; it is through these masks that we see how we change as individuals. If we spend our lives trying to stick to one mask, we can find ourselves to feel lost, depressed, or invisible. Change is good; however we must still stay true to ourselves when using masks. They are a part of us as individuals but they are not us.

False identity can become so inherent to a person’s character, they can begin to forget where it stops and their true self begins. In Tobias Wolff’s novel Old School, the narrator and the literary review the Troubadour both are hiding behind a persona that is placed onto them by themselves or others. An aspirational vision of the characters is the basis of their personas. Wanting to be more then they already are, the characters end up believing in the lies told to persuade others of their importance. Placing the personas on themselves is a way to divert people from the true nature of their identity, which might not live up to their expectations. The identities taken on by the narrator and the Troubadour convey that what they are and what they want to be are not yet the same.

“Like circus performers, we smear on makeup to become someone else. Far beyond applying a little lip gloss or hair dye, our mask attempts to cover up who we really are. Our mask attempts to cover up who we really are […] what we’ve been through, what we know to be important, and what we are afraid to share with others”. (O’Leary, 36) John O’Leary focuses heavily on the concept of taking off our masks in his inspirational book, On Fire: The 7 Choices to Ignite a Radically Inspired Life. What O’Leary means by this analogy is that we should all break the barriers which we have erected to protect ourselves from the world, walls that were built after being hurt, experiencing something traumatic, or perhaps after being betrayed. However, such walls oftentimes do not benefit ourselves in the way that we may wish. Instead, more often than not, our masks do the opposite, and they isolate us from what we as humans need most: friendship, companionship, and love.

“The mask represents the [indigenous] people who had nothing, but would do anything to support the people that they love.” Alaniz says that this idea inspires him to do more in his work to bring social change. The thin, smooth textured material of the mask made him wonder, “If people with little resources can make this [mask] to bring change, then what can I do as a person of wealth to bring social change to the world.” Although he does not necessarily have to make a big change, he can create change by getting to know the people and sharing their experiences with others. With this, he can thereby influence others to become interested in making a change in the world. It is because of experience like this the Alaniz encourages students to plunge into this trip to witness the unjust inequality the lives within the

Soldiers trained for combat refusing to kill; ironic, isn’t it? The article Existentialism 101, the short story Just Lather, That’s All by Hernando Tellez, and the documentary Soldiers of Conscience all share a common theme of morality and the guiding force of one’s conscience. The barber from Just Lather, That’s All and the soldiers, Kevin Benderman and Camilo Mejia, are each confronted with a dilemma under different circumstances, whether to act according to their moral values or against them. Eventually they follow their conscience to seek peace, however the internal dilemma and the consequences each character has gone through are unique and dynamic.

(Tellez 3), the barber is saying that it would easy to kill the captain but he quickly denies it saying that he does not deserve to die. He later weighs his decisions and thinks over the consequences “Where would I hide it? I would have to flee, leave all this behind, take shelter far away, very far away.

Just Lather, That's All Set in a war torn town in the twentieth century, "Just Lather, Thats all" by Hernandoz Tellez chronicles the dilemma of a barber who has to shave a man he despises. The Man, Captain Torres is a high ranking officer among the enemy rebel hunting troops. Being a rebel, the narrator has to choose between keeping his morality as a barber and becoming a hero among the revolutionaries. The protagonist, a barber, is a man proud of his profession.

In We Wear the Mask, the author’s purpose is to push the reader to feel something about the way things were in his perspective.

(Téilez) You see that Torres has no regard for human life. In the last four days he searched for rebels to excute them in a firing squad. As he cares not about those he kills, Torres does not care about his own as he "...came to find out if it was true." (Téilez)

Dambudzo Marechera writes of the insanity he feels as a result of his own desperate racial confusion and accompanying self hatred in Black Skin What Masks. In this story Marechera begins by placing the overall notion of discomfort that accompanies one’s skin being black on the same level as an unnamed friend. The description of the friend points very clearly to different levels of insanity while simultaneously, the reader’s attention is constantly being brought back to the point at hand, the issue of race. Ultimately, the main character’s (author’s) discomfort regarding his racial identity and his efforts to change that are displayed as a completely separate persona from

In the short film “Identity”, the makers used the concept of a society with masks to persuade the viewers-specifically youths in schools-that society should not determine or define one’s “identity”. There is little dialogue in this film, but the message is clearly conveyed through several important scenes and the actions of the characters. The opening scene shows the protagonist, a teenage girl, putting on an artistically decorated mask in the bathroom and stumbling out the door. A voice over says “Today I found the truth”.

Contrary to his belief, the narrator does not have a mask on. Although the narrator believes in a misconception that he is ‘playing the role of a boy,' when in fact, what he considers to be a mask is simply his body and his male appearance. The narrator is never in a real need to ‘play a role' because nobody really actively tries to find out who he really is. His peers, based on his appearance, all assume that he shares the same sexual orientation as they do.