Douglas Coupland's The Dead Speak

In the book “Dead To You”, by Lisa Mcmann, the main character, Ethan, has returned. He was abducted 9 years before and now he is back. His family hopes that he remembers everything, but he does not. He slowly forms a new bond with his family, but it is still not perfect. His brother, Blake wants him to remember so badly. Why would he get into the car? Why was he gone for so long? In the end, he realizes why he doesn’t remember and everything falls apart.

“ ‘Who are you?’ ‘I am Death.’ ‘I have long walked at your side.’ ‘That I know’ ‘Are you ready?’ ‘My body is, not myself. Wait a moment’

The Forgotten Dead takes in an account in US History that the problem of lynching did not only occurred in the US Southern states with African-Americans, but it also occurred in the US southwest with the Mexican-Americans.

Cain’s use of compare and contrast helps the readers visualize similarities in the examples that she gives to the larger idea the author wishes

Most people in the world have had a hard time admitting that someone has died that they care about. In the world this happens a lot because it is a hard thing to excepted. Lucille Fletcher, the author of “The Hitchhiker” shows the fear of death through the eyes of the main character that can not escape that he is dead. He is being followed by a Hitchhiker that is representing death because the main character is dead which goes back to not admitting that someone is dead. In the story “The Hitchhiker,” Lucille Fletcher uses flashback, foreshadowing,and symbolism to build a mood.

The power of the story has been very much a part of the lives of humans throughout time. The story is able to bring the past to the present and the dead to the living. The story can make the blind see. The story is able to make others feel for events in time that they have never experienced. The story has a profound effect on both the teller and the audience. As the audience is thought to be the beneficiary or the storytelling process, the teller is able to relive the times of old, or even teach a valuable lesson to his or her audience. Thus, allowing both parties to gain something intangible throughout this process. In “The Lives of the Dead,” O’Brien conveys the importance of storytelling and imagination by suggesting that the dead can be brought back to life in the minds of the people who hear it.

“What the dead don’t know piles up, though we don’t notice it at first,” is an insight in Roger Angell’s descriptive memoir, “Over the Wall” (414). Emotional responses, stimulating thoughts and solid feelings are elicited through the use of personal reflection, regarding the death of his wife, Carol. This literary nonfiction, memoir uses the present tense, a constant tone, and an informal view to help add immediacy, by keeping the reader involved step by step as the author connects his personal present and past experiences regarding death. Readers are continually intrigued by Angell’s literary nonfiction essay, with provoking thoughts focusing on death, while using figurative language to keep Carol alive, with the use of vivid personal reflections and descriptive personal experiences.

The theme death has always played a crucial role in literature. Death surrounds us and our everyday life, something that we must adapt and accept. Whether its on television or newpaper, you'll probobly hear about the death of an individual or even a group. Most people have their own ideas and attitude towards it, but many consider this to be a tragic event due to many reasons. For those who suffered greatly from despair, living their life miserably and hopelessly, it could actually be a relief to them. Death effects not only you, but also those around you, while some people may stay unaffected depending on how they perceive it.

Many authors use storytelling as a vehicle to convey the immortality of past selves and those who have passed to not only in their piece of literature but in their life as an author. In Tim O’Brien’s work of fiction The Things They Carried, through his final chapter “The Lives of the Dead,” O 'Brien conveys that writing is a matter of survival since, the powers of storytelling can ensure the immortality of all those who were significant in his life. Through their immortality, O’Brien has the ability to save himself with a simple story. Through snippets of main plot event of other chapters, O’Brien speaks to the fact the dead have not actually left; they are gone physically, but not spiritually or emotionally. They live on in memories as Linda lives on in the memories of O’Brien and as many of his war buddies live on through his stories. He can revive them and bring them back to the world through his writings and through these emotions or events he experienced with them and with their deaths can make them immortal. Through the reminiscent stories of Linda and O’Brien’s war companions and himself, O’Brien conveys that storytelling allows people to reanimate others who have died and past selves to create an immortality of humans.

This summer, I read the book The Dead by Charlie Higson is a novel about a large group of kids, left to live by themselves without guidance from their parents. In this run-down setting of London, England, people who are over the age of 16 turn into kid hunting, flesh-eating zombies. The younger kids are forced to live on their own, fighting for life against the wrath of the Adults. The message Higson showed in his book is: after people are forced to rely on themselves without experience, their lack of experience and knowledge will lead them to failure.

Ghostly representations of “the other” imagine a social evil that has not been put to rest. These images reoccur in the Western canon, marking the persistence of slavery long after its abolition. Haunting, ghosts and skeletons in Benito Cereno act as a vehicle through which the suppressed return to the stage with a message. The ghosts carry with them all that the imperialists wanted to control, including emotions, and more precisely, the emotions of the oppressed. I argue that ghosts and skeletons comprise an area of tension in which the appearance of the “other” reveals that the dominant party’s control is incomplete. Yet, the presence is merely ghostly due to the constant policing and lack of respect for the Other. These ghosts also break through the boundaries of the dominant culture’s paradigms and identities (Harpham 17), signaling potential political crisis. This text signals the fear of the retaliation of the Other through ghostly representations by projecting on to the other, their own identities of brutality and irrationality. “Benito Cereno” by Herman Melville overturns the racist images of the colonized by relocating evil in the order of slavery. Hauntings carry the perspectives and powers of the slaves by preserving the dead amidst the living and the past amidst the present, they muddle up the concept of time and therefore defy the Western dream of complete control.

When children think of darkness they think of lack of light which causes them to become scared. As we grow older, we begin to not only realize the lack of light, but the objects inside the dark which can be more frightening. We start understanding how darkness makes us feel. Darkness makes one think of unusual scenarios that are not real, but seems so real at that moment. Once we start believing in those scenarios, they start to overcome us and we no longer stay ourselves. There are multiple definitions of darkness and they all go with these two authentic stories, Heart of Darkness and The Dead. In the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, darkness is defined as: partial or total absence of light, wickedness or evil, unhappiness, secrecy and lack of spiritual or intellectual enlighten. Comparing, Heart of Darkness written by Joseph Conrad and The Dead written by James Joyce, each author brings out darkness and the living dead into the main character and shows how much it changes them for the worse and/or for the better.

Margot Norris’ criticism is about the silencing of women, I used this one because it helps with that point of view I want to back up in my own essay as well. Norris argues that the silencing of women in The Dead proves to make the feminist criticism stronger. She describes in depth the characters that are silenced and the ways that they are silenced and her view of on the feminist end of things. She supports that these women are silenced and makes a strong argument about it. But, overall, she says we read the novel as we choose to. Some readers may see it as different and some may not.

Hope is stronger than despair. The short story by Douglas Coupland contains 2 major themes: hope and despair. Although despair is mentioned a plethora of times, hope is much more overriding. Hope is the sole reason why the narrator has “never lost the sensation of always being on the brink of some magic revelation”(p.1). He then goes on saying “that if only I would look closely enough at the world, then that magic revelation would be mine.” This line shows that the narrator still believes there is a chance for him to get closure “about what had happened recently“(p.2). Also, his mom says people like birds because “they free us from the unique sorrow of being human”(p.2). However, the narrator disagrees with her despair and says that “birds

James Joyce’s Dubliners: “The Dead” explores corruption in connection to power relations. Specifically, through the interaction between Lily, the housemaid, and Gabriel reveals the abuse of money between the powerful and the servants. Further, Gabriel’s attempt to buy off his wrongdoing reveals a corrupt behavior; Lily, although exposing his corrupt actions, leads him to make an even more corrupt action: paying her off.