Cultural Shock in Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard Essay

The book, Orchards by Holly Thompson, captures the responses from the characters in the book when devastation comes upon them. Orchards shows how people respond to suffering and how they try to cope with it. Kana, the main character, has to deal with the deaths of her two classmates. Kana and her family personally know both of these girls, so they are suffering the most. The grief of Kana’s community ties them together and allows their bond to grow stronger. People outside the community blame Kana and the other eighth grade girls, making her very frustrated. She instead blames others to make her feel better, but that changes. This reaction shows the reader that Kana is a very impulsive character.

The speaker’s change in attitude and evolvement of emotions depict the enduring effects of prejudice and societal boundaries on the speaker. Unable to rise past the class system, the speaker remains on the outskirts of city limits, picking berries. Losing his enjoyment of picking berries, the speaker comes to a new realization about the cold side of reality, and consequently, when the speaker gives up his child-like view of the world and the sweetness of nature, he receives pain, the stinging thorns of

The narrator's vision of her ancestors expanding a plentiful life is emphasized with the picturesque “blue fields…with leaves and vines and orchards.” This then strikes the narrator with the realization that cutting down the tree would be a betrayal to their ancestors, their dreams and the demise of the heritage of the

2. Keeping in mind the Russian Revolution, whom do the animals collectively represent? Thinking of the allegory,

The stories of Anton Chekhov mark a focal moment in European fiction. This is the point where 19th realist caucus of the short stories started their transformation into modern form. As such, his work straddles two traditions. The first is that of the anti-romantic realism which has a sharp observation of external social detail. It has human behavior conveyed within tight plot. The second is the modern psychological realism in which the action in typically internal and expressed in associative narrative that is built on epiphanic moments. In consideration of the two sides, Chekhov developed powerful personal styles that presage modernism without losing traditional frills of the form. This essay will discuss the Chekhov's portrayal of women.

The novel is primarily about a woman who struggles in her search for self while trying to reconcile her beliefs with those imposed on her by society and the men in her life. Important symbols in the novel include, the horizon, hurricane, Porch, Janie’s hair, gates, the pear tree, Land ownership and wealth, Janie’s overalls. All of the symbols provide the reader with clues as to how and why Janie’s grows and developments into the person she becomes by the end of the novel. Horizon symbolises Janie’s life long search for happiness. Pear tree indicates that Janie is maturing sexually and mentally and her interest towards love and romance is increasing.

Likewise, another object that holds relevance in this particular novel is the peach blossoms that appear throughout the story as repeated symbolism or a motif. This means that the object or relevant detail is repeated in a pattern of meaning to convey an emotion, idea, or element. The peach blossoms not only appear at the beginning of the short story where they fall before the two-day battle that began on April 6, 1862, near the southwestern Tennessee church from which the bloody clash takes its name, but also near the end to signify the new feelings and emotions that Joby experiences. In other words, the peach blossoms, in this case, corresponds with the idea of serenity and peace of mind because as seen on line 1-2, “In the April night, more than once,

This is particularly evident within drifters were a families sense of identity is continuously hampered by their nomadic lifestyle with they must embrace as itinerant workers. Throughout the poem, the blackberry bush is constantly referred to as a symbol of hope that the family would settle into one location “when they came here, she held out her hand bright with berries”. The use of such a symbol brings to light the similarity between the drifter’s erratic life journey and the blackberry bush. As the family move into a town they begin to embrace there environment, only to end the experience as quickly as it began similarly to the blackberry bushes cycle of growth and ‘bright berries’ only to wither and die. This ultimately displays the emotional obstacles within a physical journey that reinforces our inner strength. Furthermore, the negative and positive aspects of the journey of life experienced by the characters are highlighted through the juxtaposing of the girls reaction to the decision to move, “the oldest girl was close to tear/ the youngest girl was beaming”. The positive element of the a family being an individual’s sense of support and identity is vaguely portrayed, however the overwhelming negative sense that such a family provides and undesirable predetermined script of one’s life is emphasised as in this instance it has impeded on the girls growth. This ultimately increases the responder’s awareness of the underlying emotional journey within every physical journey, increasing the inner strength of those that choose to take such

Change is never easy especially when you don’t realize it’s happening. Eugenia W. Collier's short story “Marigolds” is an excellent example featuring Miss Lottie, a positive woman who tries to overpower the ugliness by bringing colour in the grey times and planting marigolds. She faces daily struggles of being taunted by a bunch of bored kids including Lizabeth, an unbalanced teenager who is fighting her own battle inside. They use Miss Lottie as a source of entertainment by yelling dirty words, mocking her age and many other shameful actions. In this short story Colliers shows that you shouldn’t be selfish and hurt anyone just for the point of your entertainment.

For the Rosicky’s a dry summer could mean dead crops and for the men a strong storm could mean lost lives. The Rosicky’s and the men use the same method to keep each other alive. Each individual has an independent role amongst the farm that is done for the success of the greater whole. On the boat, each of the mean had a specific duty. The captain gives directions, the cook works on bailing water and the correspondent and the oiler take turns rowing. The realization of both groups that they need to group to survive makes their method of survival similar.

As a character the black walnut tree carries the ancestry of the daughter and mother. The black walnut tree is thus proved to be a character by lines 7 to 8, where it is able to destroy the house. There is also line 11 where the roots in the cellar drains are also a problem. One of the best examples of figurative language is lines 34 to 35 “Whip-crack”. By doing so, mortgage is brought in once more as an even crueler character. Mortgage on the house in this sense is the main cause of all their problems since they are not able to provide barely enough money to pay each month. In the aspect of generational feel of ancestry there are lines 16 to 19 to relate to the reader how they feel similar to them about the ancestral ties to the tree and they should be

The plot of this play centered around the family of Alice Sycamore. The Sycamore family includes Alice Sycamore, her parents Penny and Paul Sycamore, her sister and her sister’s husband, Essie and Ed Carmichael, and Grandpa Martin Vanderhof. The family is extremely eccentric to say the least. They are a crazy bunch by many people’s standards. They do things like eat watermelon and cornflakes for dinner, make fireworks in the basement, own a pet snake, and constantly have the house packed with interesting characters. Some of the other characters in the play are Donald and Rheba who work for the Sycamores, the Russian dance teacher of Essie named Mr. Kolenkhov, and the confidant of Paul Sycamore, Mr. De Pinna. Each character is developed with many unique traits, each having their quirks and nontraditional hobbies. Essie has a passion for ballet despite the fact that she is awful after 8 years of

Secondly the Pomegranate tree can be seen as a symbol of Amir and Hassan friendship, childhood innocence and shelter. The tree is presented to the reader in two different states. When the tree appears in the first part of the story, in chapter 4, the tree is shown as being fruitful and blooming with ‘blood red’

Anton Chekhov (1860-1904) was born a year before the emancipation of serfism in Russia took place. Although he was the grandson of a serf, Chekhov was able to attend the medical school at the University of Moscow and become a physician. Chekhov started writing in order to support his family economically, becoming a master in drama and short stories. His literature is characterized by the use of colloquial language which could be understood even by the less educated and recently liberated serfs. Social change is the main theme in ‘The Cherry Orchard’, a four-act play written in 1904. In this play the different characters portray how changes in Russia after the emancipation of 1861 were taking place and although the play is set several

The first landscape feature that is described are, “the tops of trees” (Chopin 203). Trees are commonly attributed to nature and the symbol of life. Although the author has attributed the trees in this story with the literary term personification, as the trees, “were all aquiver with the new spring life” (Chopin 203). The author has attributed the trees to movement as the protagonist begins to desire to be in the cycle of nature. The protagonist relates to the trees because the trees are no longer weighed down by the heavy snow, thus allowing the trees to grow again, which is similar to the protagonist, as she is no longer confined by her husband, but she desires to be rebirthed (Lucas). Consequently, the protagonist was learning her desires to participate in life as an independent individual and to have restrictions a memory in the past. Therefore, the protagonist is beginning to participate down the path of becoming