Essay on Charles Frazier's Cold Mountain

This book is told from the diary of the main character, Sam Gribley. Sam is a boy full of determination. He didn’t give up and go home like everyone thought he would. He is strong of mind. After the first night in the freezing rain, with no fire and no food, he still went on. He is a born survivor. He lasted the winter, through storms, hunger, and loneliness, and came out on top even when everyone expected him to fail. “The land is no place for a Gribley” p. 9

Based on character analysis, “The Sniper” and the “Horseman in the Sky” both clearly reveal a true question of humanity but do so in different ways. Carter Druse, a young wealthy Virginian, and a Republican sniper whose name remains yet unknown, have various similarities and differences in their ways of handling their conflicts. Similarly, both young snipers willing choose to fight in their own civil wars. Carter fighting in the American Civil War, and the sniper fighting in the Irish Republican Civil War. Along with both being snipers, the two are also faced with the same horrifying conflict… killing a family member. Carter Druse, fighting for the Union, is ultimately faced with an unimaginable decision to kill his father, a Confederate soldier.

"The Sniper" places a strong emphasis on the evils of war, and yet paints a vivid image of mankind's qualities and their society. Employing the technique of describing one particular sniper to symbolise a general subject, readers are able to gain a deep insight into the evils of war. In this story, the assembly of setting, contrasting characters and themes of fanaticism and division of loyalties are vital to conveying the horror of war. On the other hand, "The Sniper" also discusses the power of war, depicting it as the decider of life and death for men. Its force is further emphasised when neighbours are turned into enemies under war's influence.

War covets the aspect of man that is man itself, for it craves to morph them into mere objects and targets. For many soldiers, they succumb to such a fate; being depleted their ability to feel immediate emotion, they develop primitive, animalistic urges of bloodlust during a time of bloodshed. The aspects of war gravely impacts a person, and as such can be seen in O’Flaherty’s character “the sniper,” as well as seen in O’Brien’s character “Private Paul Berlin.” The sniper is a victim to the war’s cold, emotionless embrace. A Republican soldier, he is, divided from his brothers in arms on the other side, the ones called the “Free Staters.” Nonetheless, under the circumstances, they all are pawns to Dublin’s chess table of a civil war, being played at the mercy of the war’s

The world that Charles Frazier bases his novel, Cold Mountain, on is ridden with hardship and desolation. People in this world are either forced into war or subject to isolation. Main characters Inman and Ada seek to find comfort in each other in this horrible, decrepit world. In this novel, Frazier demonstrates the human condition in the characters’ need for love, companionship, and family.

The archetype of the journey is seen in Charles Frazier’s novel Cold Mountain, most clearly through experience Inman has wandering back to Cold Mountain. The journey archetype sends the hero in search of some truth to restore order and harmony to the land. The journey often includes the series of trials and tribulations the hero faces along the way. Usually the hero descends into a real or psychological hell and is forced to discover the blackest truths. Once the hero is at his lowest level, he must accept personal responsibility to return to the world of the living. Inman’s trip fits this description very well in some ways and not in others. It could be said that Inman’s search for truth is his desire to be back home. He has been

In Ernest Hemingway’s short story “A Soldier’s Home”, Krebs, a soldier, returns to his hometown from fighting in World War I. As indicated throughout the story, “home” for Krebs is not unlike the war front: confusing, complicated, and restless. Hemingway uses the setting in Kansas, during World War I, to convey Krebs post-war life in comparison to his pre-war.

Often times war is depicted in a victorious, triumphant manner when in reality war is chaotic; full of destruction and death. In Stephen Crane’s “A Mystery of Heroism” and Ambrose Bierce’s “An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge,” we witness the harsh reality of the war and the common human reaction to the havoc. Fred Collins simply wants water, but the well is on the other side of the battlefield. Peyton Farquhar, a loyal civilian to the South, just wanted to help in the war but instead was hanged for his good-intentioned attempt to destroy the bridge to help the Confederates. Ambrose Bierce and Stephen Crane wrote “An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge” and “A Mystery of Heroism” to show the natural human condition in adverse situations.

Cold Mountain is a tale about a man named Inman who gets injured in war and wants nothing more than to return to his wife, Ada. Inman ends up deserting the Confederate Army after being wounded, and goes through many trials and tribulations in journey back to Ada. The main antagonist, besides nature, is Tague. Tague is the leader of a group that tracks down Confederate soldiers that have gone rogue. However, Tague and his team kill more soldiers than they bring back, causing Inman to be on his toes the whole time.

Scrutinizing snow descending out-of-doors of the cabin, my exposed bone-chilling feet being linked together, and soldiers vacating or even expire or perish in forepart of the soldiers one by one in Valley Forge. The forecast exterior of the cabin was frightening to the soldiers that were to go outside. Revealing the truth, habiliments on the soldiers were narrowly unceasing on the bodies on the arctic and incapacitated. Soldiers are vacating minus terms and stoutheartedness. Suffering soldiers are living throughout the winter tide. As a matter of fact, some soldiers are steadily at death’s door. Even some soldiers assume vanquishing the bloodshed while the other half of the militia do not. Other soldiers conjecture in successfulness. Subsequently analytical about my disenfranchise country, I have manifest to reenlist because numerals of deaths and sickness to the soldiers, combat with strength and loyalty, and finally endorsing your ancestry and country with fulfillment.

The novel Cold Mountain is about two peoples’ independent journeys through different struggles and situations at the same time. One of these people is Inman, an injured soldier who is trying to find his way home after deserting from the fighting. He meets a lot of strange people along the way. Some of them help and some of them hinder. However, they all teach him something about himself, or something that he can relate to himself. There are some characters that are more significant in this respect than others and they have more of an actual influence on Inman’s journey.

To begin with, the mass bloodshed that occurred during the major, long-drawn conflict of 1861 to 1865 was called the Civil War. The stakes were dangerously raised as a casualty count climbed toward roughly 1,264,000 deaths and other similar ailments. Although, a number of books and historical fiction are based on the Civil War; the short story that we are particularly focusing on is “The Drummer Boy of Shiloh.” In this piece of literature beautifully written by the author, Ray Bradbury, we experience Bradbury’s story based on a 14-year old, dejected drummer boy, Joby, who doubts that he has a crucial role in the army. Throughout the short story, a various amount of symbols stick out like a sore thumb and ultimately enhance the story’s

As a young man coming back from the war, Krebs expected things to be the same when he got home and they were, except one. Sure the town looked older and all the girls had matured into beautiful women, Krebs had never expected that he would be the one to change. The horrific experiences of the first World War had alienated and removed those he had cared about, including his family, who stood naïve to the realities and consequences only those who live it first hand would comprehend.

In Soldier's Home, Ernest Hemingway paints a vivid picture of Harold Krebs return home from World War I and the issues he confronts while trying to shift his way back towards the ordinary life he once lived. After his battling over seas took place, it took Krebs over a year to finally leave Europe and make his way back home to his family in Oklahoma. After finally finding the drive to come home, Krebs found that it was difficult to express his feelings towards all he had seen during his tour of duty, which must be attributed to the fact that he was in the heart of some of the bloodiest and most crucial battles mankind has ever seen. Therefore, Krebs difficulty in acknowledging his past is because he was indeed a “good soldier” (133), whose

In Charles Frazier’s Cold Mountain, the theme of music is one of the novel’s most powerful themes. From symbolizing character growth to the healing of physical wounds, music plays an integral part in this novel. While many critics will point out that music has little effect on the human psyche, Charles Frazier shows his belief that music does indeed have a profound effect on the human mind throughout Cold Mountain. Throughout the novel, Inman, Ada, Ruby, Stobrod, and many other characters experience music that allows them to keep faith against the odds or even heal their wounds! There are three major types of music used in this novel; hymn music, folk music, and “natural music”. It is through these types of music that