Borden's Identity In 'The Prestige'

After Lizzie Borden's mother passed away her father remarried. Lizzie was unable to accept this new marriage and new stepmother who her father brought into their home. Lizzie was so troubled over this that she attempted to kill her father and stepmother by poisoning them, which was unsuccessful. In her second attempt Lizzie whacked them both to death by using a hatchet. Thought Lizzie was found innocent after several trials the truth was never discovered. When Lizzie Borden died, she took the truth with her, being the only person to ever really knowing the truth to what happened to her father and stepmother that August day.

Identity is what makes people themselves, including their personality and the people that influence them. People have substantial control over identity, who they are and what they will become because people can control their actions and who will influence their future. In the story “We Wear the Mask” by Paul Laurence Dunbar, some people have fake emotions to hide their real emotions from the world. In this story, the narrator says “We wear the mask that grins and lies. It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes” (“We Wear the Mask”, pg 1). To “wear the mask that grins and lies” means to obscure their true emotions and to show fake emotions to deceive the world. This shows that people can control who they are because the narrators in this story,

the ability to manipulate anyone or anything for their personal gain, and does not experience the

Reading these sentences from When False Representations Ring True and When They Don’t, “Jessica went online and created a personal website, where she became the Goth model and artist, Autumn Edows, and eventually developed a cult following. Jessica said she loved the positive attention she received online, which contrasted sharply with her offline experience.” (Davis et al. 212), one can see the fake reality that Jessica creates, where she attempts to avoid reality and redesign herself. By recreating herself, she disconnects with her offline self to live in an online world of unrealistic nature. Any visitors to her website receive a misleading representation of Jessica in her online and Gothic new self. There is seldom occasions, however, where a person can “recreate” their identity, and not cross the line into lacking authenticity. Reading these sentences from the same article, “At the age of 13, Heather started an online newspaper for the imaginary Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry. Writers for the newspaper assumed fictitious personas relating to the Harry Potter world. Typically, children created identities that combined elements of their offline selves with aspects of the Harry Potter characters. Often, these online personas revealed glimpses of the children’s offline difficulties, such as illness or family conflict.” (Davis et al. 210), show an acceptable form of identity recreation. Heather creates a newspaper with the intention to give people with similar interests an outlet to socialize through, without completely compromising the people’s real life identities. The newspaper is also beneficial in the fact that the newspaper lets others show the issues in their life through their newspaper personas. In most people’s everyday lives, reality TV shows also exemplify negative identity creations, as they tend to script out the true personality of the people in

As his soul “undergoes…psychic disorder” (Monsman), his fascination with the grotesqueness of his picture also grows. Watching his picture Gray “would sit…filled…with that pride…that is half the fascination of sin…smiling with secret pleasure as the misshapen shadow…” (Wilde 133). Gray becomes interested in seeing his sin come alive on canvas. This in itself represents a man who is unstable mentally, as he derives pleasure from his own image’s ruin. Eventually Dorian’s downward spiral of mental ruin leads to his death.

Identity is a dynamic part of a person that is sculpted by social behaviors and defined by the choices one makes when faced with an individual challenge. The way people are brought up and the various turmoils they experience throughout their life is what molds them into who they are. The characters in Orson Welles’ award winning film “Citizen Kane,” and George Saunders’ literary classic, “Brad Carrigan, American,” both explore the human sense of self, the different perceptions of identity and the internal and external factors that affect it. The movie “Citizen Kane,” stars an enigmatic and ambitious billionaire Charles Foster Kane tirelessly trying to discover his lost identity throughout the film.

In The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde, the epigram “...to influence a person is to give him one's own soul.” (20) represents one of the major themes in the book, which is that influence from other people does not only change your mindset, it also changes your soul. In this book, Dorian started as an innocent and pure soul, which was soon tainted by Lord Henry’s influence, in the form of witty remarks about life. Dorian is soon bestowed upon the curse of eternal youth and perfection, while his portrait, a representation of his soul, ages and changes. Over the course of the book, Dorian becomes immersed in the desire for pleasure and sin, which reflects back upon the personality and soul of Lord Henry.

As it is used in paragraph 3, sentence 1 stating, " Alter egos are used by numerous performing artists who use stage personas." The author is meaning that both entertain audience and by there egos. People make up alter egos, and act like they are another person, by their entertainment and there audience too.

are viewed by others. In other words, I think identity is like someone's reputation. For example,

in society many people try to hide theoer true idenoty. they use other people pictures , dress like others , and try to live their lifestyle. To impress others , or simply hide the pain they face with theor own ideniity. for example, the tv show catfish. people use others identity to impress others ansd to feel better about themselves. They feel as if they couldn't get what they want with their

Oscar Wilde’s only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, revolves around a young man who has his wish of eternal youth granted. His age and sins are absorbed by his portrait, while he remains youthful and physically untouched. Ultimately throwing immortality away by not living as a proper human with morals, but by sullying his soul, demonstrated by the growing hideousness of his portrait throughout his his life. Wilde by using foil characters, choice of diction to employ emotional response, and an allegory within his novel, showcases human nature’s susceptibility to corruption. Surrounding the protagonist, Dorian Gray, are two juxtaposing characters: Basil Hallward and Henry Wotton.

In Oscar Wilde’s thrilling and aesthetic novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, a character viewed as morally ambiguous is Dorian Gray due to his dual lifestyle which conveys how the power of appearance influences man’s behavior for the work as a whole. During the novel, Dorian Gray is viewed as a morally ambiguous character because of his dual personalities of crime and prosperity. Dorian is known to be a beautiful man, full of wealth, and living a prosperous life. However, the “prince charming” is influenced by Lord Henry about ideas on life and how people never really change.

Some people believe it to be manipulative magic, however I found no sources backing this idea up. While I found a lot of sources trying to say that this word is very old, the dictionaries and etymology site all say that the earliest record of this word actually being used is in 1830, so I am not sure where the confusion started coming in, but it makes it harder for somebody who is searching for the truth. I think that I am going to stick to the dictionary on this one, and translate the meaning of the word according to what they say. Most of them agree that it is a verb meaning “to practice witchcraft” or it is a noun meaning “magic spells.” This is good enough for me, and until I can find sources that show me a deeper meaning and to where it comes from, I'm sticking with the ones that I know I can

The obsession causes Dorian to suddenly leave gatherings of friends to check on the portrait. These absences produce suspicion and internal pain that Dorian has caused himself makes some people look at him for more than just beauty. Just like a disapproving father to his daughter’s new boyfriend these few people seem to see right through Dorian’s charm and good looks and see his true colors. Appalled by him, many of these people would simply exit the room at the sight of him and throw him looks of disgust. Although these actions did not seem to affect his ego, they undoubtedly fueled greater darkness to enhance his prior

With twisted views of love and not much of a marriage Henry begins to corrupt Dorian’s sense of compassion. Henry telling Dorian his views is very bad because Dorian soon seems to grow very dispassionate. This can be seen as how after his no longer is good at acting he soon loses interest in her. After his ex girlfriend kills herself Dorian is advised to distance himself from the whole thing and to go away for a little bit. This whole event showing the influences changing Dorian and how as time progressed his soul grew darker and darker.