Barbara Kingsolver's Animal Dreams

The Holocaust was a major event that happened in history, causing death to around ten million people who suffered death from this tragic incident. The novel Night by: Elie Wiesel explains the perspective of what he suffered going through this situation. Elie Wiesel uses animal imagery, when explaining his point of view. They were treated as animals, significant use of the imagery helped his story and the purpose of it. Elie Wiesel uses animal imagery to paint an image to us of how they were treated, spoke to and used as if they were wild or barn animals, through the novel.

Stephen King’s insight on dreams are all based on personal experiences. King begins by comparing the functionality of a dream to a mirror “I’ve always used dreams the way you’d use a mirror to look at something you couldn’t see head on”. By using this idea of dreams being like mirrors, King is able to alleviate his writer 's block by depicting his dreams directly onto paper. An example would be when King had already written seven to eight hundred pages of his novel which he could not seem to finish. Then later reveals how a nightmare provoked the ending, he states how he woke up frightened yet at the same time relieved he’d finished the book. According to King all he had to do at this point was to take his dream and transfer it to paper. Without a doubt, King’s personal experiences can justify why he believes “dreams are a way that people’s minds illustrate the nature of their problems. Or maybe even illustrates the answer to their problem in symbolic language”.

Have you ever had a dream that you have been really committed to? Has something or someone ever stopped you short of that or any dream of yours? These questions are quite relevant to the main characters in the selections Of Mice and Men and “Only Daughter”. Of Mice and Men is a well-known story by John Steinbeck that tells the tale of two travel companions, George Milton and Lennie Small, as they dream and work hard to gain a small piece of land for themselves during The Great Depression, a harsh financial time. “Only Daughter” is an autobiographical essay by Sandra Cisneros about her struggles on trying to bond with her father while being impeded by her six brothers. The two selections’ main dreams are both corresponding and distinct in various ways. The dreams are also very substantial to the one who holds it. George and Lennie’s dream, in Of Mice and Men, influenced their lifestyle, behavior, and relationship between them. Sandra Cisneros’s dream, from “Only Daughter”, had an impact on the topic of her writing, her writing style, and her relationship with her father, who she has been trying to gain the approval for her writing career for many years.

The novel begins narrated from the view of a man named Homero, who is also known as ‘Doc Homer’. In the brief chapter he remembers watching his two daughters, sleeping when they were younger. With their mother dead, Homero has had to raise them on his own since they were a young age.

Families are different today than they were fifty years ago. Not just regarding the social changes with gay couples, divorced couples, and single parents, but other changes around us have caused the family to evolve. The invention of the television, the internet, and even freezers and microwaves have changed how the family functions. Compounding changes in the world around us, the treatment of women as equals has also adjusted the dynamic in households. In the novel Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, by Barbara Kingsolver, the author pins the changing of our family culture, with regards specifically to mealtime, on the women’s liberation movement from the sixties. (126) Family mealtime has changed over the years, but there are multiple reasons for its perceived demise. The women’s liberation movement gave women the chance to leave the kitchen and enter the workforce, but changes to the family meal began before women started taking up careers alongside men. Food processing, personal electronics, and the way our society raises children, have all changed how we eat together.

A shiny, crisp red fruit hangs enticingly off a lush verdant branch; a sly, seductive serpent and a woman in the nude converse under the sacred tree, and then Eve tentatively reaches up and plucks the juicy crimson fruit, a look of panic only reflected on her face once she realizes the gravity of her decision. She picks the forbidden fruit and her ignorance is ripped away from her like a newspaper on a windy day, and this single act started a trend of succumbing to temptations throughout human history. Even in the novels The Hours and The Awakening, the characters are tempted by someone else or a different idea; however, some of these characters exhibit strong self control and avoid their demise. The fine line between success and failure when it comes to avoiding temptation is most obviously demonstrated by Edna Pontellier and Laura Brown, and these two women showcase the destructive power of seduction and the strength of will it takes to deny the enticement. The allure of the unknown is not exclusive to the female sex either, many men in the novel also suffer from it, namely Robert Lebrun. The secret snare of temptation is interwoven throughout the stories, and the sliver of thread can be glimpsed between the inky words.

As the late Osho believed, "And desires are never here and now -- they are non-existential. They are just mental, in the mind. And they cannot be fulfilled because their very nature is to move into the future." John Steinbeck 's novella, Of Mice and Men explores this theme of futile desire through various relationships and character complexes. This fictional story begins by introducing two men with a relationship built from the very foundations of love. As the novel progresses, we begin questioning innate truths. Steinbeck uses his literary prowess to entwine us within a story of loneliness, loss and morality. The characters ' hopes and dreams, regardless of outcome, are a mechanism of survival and a desire to lead something other than an otherwise inconsequential existence.

The Language of Dreams by Belle Yang features the role of memory, language and story-telling in human lives, especially those displayed and complicated by the movement and the blending of culture (pp 697) whereas, Death of Josseline by Margaret Regan encourages a reconsideration of how the immigration issue is discussed in the media (pp704). Both the article describes about change in one’s life because of immigration.

“Accept what was and what is, and you’ll have more positive energy to pursue what will be”, said by Dong Heng; Memory can be either sweet or fearful, but a person must bravely face his/her past whether disappointed or proud, and learns how to move on in order to find their life values instead of stick to an old way all the time. In Animal Dreams, stressed from the failure of previous medication experiences and the reputation of being a descendent of successful doctor, Cosima regards herself as a life copier of Hallie, her sister, and Dr. Homer, her father, without having any personal life goals, and the incorrect and incomplete memory that she holds reveals that Cosima feels excluded from the community and always hide from her past and be self-denying person due to lack of confidence;

  Perhaps The Poisonwood Bible is Barbara Kingsolver's best work. It was while reading this book (which centers around The Congo and what the western world has done to this country) that I began to make the connection that all of Kingsolver's books contain a political and social message. She uses her stance as an author to illuminate her readers to situations and issues that she feels are important. Kingsolver's voice can be heard in Animal Dreams when the main character, Codi talks about what happened to her sister, Hallie in Nicaragua, and how unaware Americans were to what was happening in that country. "It made the news in Tucson, at least for a day. You

Three books that I have read with influential themes are as follows: Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior by Ori Brafman and Rom Brafman, Animal Farm by George Orwell, and Night by Elie Wiesel. Sway talks about how most human behavior do can be explained by science. It goes into detail about why people are attracted to doing what they know is the wrong thing to do. Animal Farm uses the metaphor of a farm being compared to a government to illustrate what happens when people are under the rule of strict leaders. Lastly, Night tells the story of a Holocaust survivor. Its vivid and horrific details about the Holocaust left an impact on me. One thing the author mentioned is how much it hurt him when people said the Holocaust was

The Awakening utilizes symbolism to reflect the character of Edna as she’s living an independent life that is free from her family and societal norms. As a result, Edna’s development as a more autonomous character is reflected because of symbolism, such as the caged bird that represents her entrapped life, Mademoiselle Reisz’s piano playing that opens up her artistic creativity, and the waves that drag her into freeing her own life. At the beginning of the story, a caged parrot is introduced as an annoyance to Leonce. For example, the book says, “A green and yellow parrot, which hung in a cage outside the door, kept repeating over and over: ‘Allez vous-en!

In Barbara Kingsolver's novel, Animal Dreams, every character who was introduced in this novel has had their aspirations and dreams influenced by the vastly changing town. While every character has had influence in the town of Grace, Arizona, Kingsolver shows the reader that Codi the protagonist had an immense change in beliefs in relation to the other characters. Codi's beliefs have changed from her seeking for acceptance with Carlo in the beginning of the novel to her becoming a more confident and self accepted woman with Loyd in the end when it comes to love.

Humans have always had a complicated relationship with non-human animals. This relationship has always benefitted the needs of humans, with little consideration for animals’ needs. Some animals are tortured for entertainment, some are butchered for food and others are taken from their habitat and family, and forced to be pets for humans. These are all examples of the ways humans have exploited animals for their own satisfaction. Hal Herzog’s essay “Animals Like Us” describes the complicated relationship that humans and animals have, and how difficult it is to determine what is ethical when dealing with animals. Jonathan Safran Foer makes a similar observation in his essay “The Fruits of Family Trees” of the ethical issues in the

In the first chapter titled, “The Search for Glory”, Karen Horney explains a human’s potential to develop their own unique thoughts, wishes, interests and feelings, which is their real self. She describes the real self as, “ that central inner force, common to all human beings and yet unique in each, which is the deep source of growth”. The real self is all about the individual’s depth and clarity of their own feelings, strength of their own will power, special talents or gifts they might be born with, and are able to express themselves. The goal as they grow older is to grow toward self-realization. But first to expand their given potentialities, they must be provided with favorable conditions to grow. These conditions include a warm atmosphere, for a feeling of inner freedom and security encouraging them to have their own thoughts and feeling, leading them to better self expression. Next they need the good will of others in order to develop