Is Reality, Understanding, And Real Life?

Are fiction stories always based on imagination? Or does it come from someone’s reality? Have you ever asked yourself why people read fiction stories? Either told through movies or books, fiction stories are ways people find to escape from their reality. However, most of the fiction stories come from people’s life, or are based in a real fact in order to be credible. In some ways, the truth must be distorted to be understandable, because sometimes it can be too complex to be explained. Both Reading Lolita in Tehran, by Azar Nafisi, and How To Tell a True Story, by Tim O’Brien, attempt to discover the truth even if it was exemplified by fiction,

Actions taken will determine the future. Caitlin, the author of Zolaria, grew up with her best friend Hanna. They went through their childhood innocence together. When high school arrived they parted ways and life changed. Through her appeal to pathos, Caitlin Horrock’s “Zolaria” establishes that people should not take life for granted; furthermore, her use of foreshadowing and connotative language stresses to readers the importance of living to the best potential.

In many books authors use elements of literature to get crucial points across, such as how Krystyna Chiger did in her book, Girl in the Green Sweater. Using conflict, foreshadowing, and symbolism, Krystyna was able to explain and show her experiences during Hitler's regime (when most of the Jewish race was persecuted). When analyzing the data presented, one can see how the author was able to convey her message of struggle and survival that families in The Girl in the Green Sweater endured during the Holocaust, so that the reader could relate to the characters and situation using conflict, foreshadowing, and symbolism.

Literature is the window to realizing the negatives of society and how destructive certain norms can be. Readers are brought into a completely different story than their own, but by using similar issues in today’s world, the readers can actually learn from the story and its overall message. All writers write for a purpose, whether it’s for a new meaning to life, to live a different life than our own, or to impact others on an emotional level by teaching them to see the importance of the little things. As a reader, you search for pieces of literature that interest you whether you find the story like your own, or wish you lived the life in the story. By using issues in today’s within their works, authors are able to grab the reader's attention long enough for them to get across what they wanted to get across. Often in many works of literature, writers use societal issues as their basis for the work’s themes and symbols. By doing so, this allows the reader to question the morality behind social norms and how impactful certain ideals can be in people’s lives.

of the author and why he or she wrote the novel. In this case, one must delve into the lives of

Accepting environments on the other hand, allow for the creation of imagination and personal connections. Nafisi in her “Selections from Reading Lolita in Tehran” speaks about the creation of her reading group, and provides the type of education she desired to provide as an educator but was restricted to provide based on the Iranian regime. The Iranian society oppresses against women, forcing them to conform to societal norms. On the other hand, Nafisi introduces her students to a fantasy like environment during their literature class. This allows for the connection amongst the girls and Nafisi to be personal. The idea of connection can be done while making a comparison between the women in Iran and characters within a novel Nafisi discussed with her students. Nafisi states:

On the other hand, it could be articulated that the female characters in both the novels have proved their mental instabilities, individualisms and rebelliousness have disturbed the lives of others. Moreover, it could be analyzed in the novels that both the author in their social context has explained the dark secrets of the life of individuals.

However, fiction is essential to the culture that it is portrayed in. It can show and educate the reader the daily life or hardships of one culture, allowing them to understand in a greater sense. Fiction also gives us the opportunity to experience the possibility of other choices without making those choices, especially as readers we are immersed in the political protests that the girls go through and partake. Alvarez did not write the book merely to entertain her readers, but to help readers learn about themselves and educate them about the Trujillo regime and keep the spirit of the Mirabal sisters alive. Without a novel like this, the world may never know how important the sisters were. They died as true heroes, and Alvarez believes that their story needs to be spread. The true spirit of the Mirabal sisters is their legacy. They are portrayed in a positive light because they did help change the future that we live in today, and if we share important history and stories, such as the Mirabal sisters, we are able to live vicariously through them and honor their selfless

“The Book Thief” presented a story filled with various themes that comprised a powerful plot line. Although there were many themes in the story, there was one that stood out to me more than others. In the process of reading the book, the theme of suffering affected me the most. The definition of the word suffer is to experience or be subjected to something bad or unpleasant. Different characters within the story are subjected to dreadful feelings and are therefore suffering. Through my analyzation, I observed the three different types of suffering that the characters experienced: guilt, feelings of emptiness, and anxiety. The characters of “The Book Thief” experience these three types of suffering in different ways.

60) This allows him to escape the hardships of mountain life on a mental level by imagining that he is taking part in the experiences and situations in the story. After stealing a suitcase full of western novels from their friend four-eyes, the narrator becomes infatuated by book one of Jean-Christophe. As he put it, ¡§To me it was the ultimate book: once you read it, neither your own life nor the world you lived in would ever look the same.¡¨ (Sijie p. 117) The narrator takes the words of Jean-Christophe to heart and is filled with the desire to live through this re-education in order to experience love, sex and a free individual action against the world. In a way, the narrator and Luo envied the characters in the western novels that they read daily. They wanted to escape the reality of the conditions they were living under to experience the same freedoms as their favorite characters, and not be burdened by the controlling power of Mao and his communist ways.

These powerful ideologies the women are contemplating over time the course of the journey places heroines in a position where they must make a choice Does she accept her potential, or return to being forced in to live in the socio-political norms that constrains women views and ideologies? The moments of realization of who the heroine truly is, is when exposed to a difficult scenario of tyranny and oppression. This is when the Gothic heroine and Young Adult heroine choose their self-worth over their tyrannical, patriarchal forces that had been holding them back.

7. According to one of the characters in Azar Nafisi’s contemporary memoir, Reading Lolita in

Novels intrigue anyone, whether it brings in the intellectuals or the ones who prefer to fantasize. Azar Nafisi, the author of Reading Lolita In Tehran, hooks the audience, page after page, filled with fascinating details of her and her loved ones life experiences of the perplexities that make up the society all together. Throughout the book, each chapter presents a new message as it introduces a new novel with each one. Nafisi introduces novels in order to create a different, separate life within the reader, creating memories and experiences unique to the combination of the books and the reader. This changes what the reader believes, no matter whether the differences are positive or negative, life changing or miniscule, it will still always change what the reader believes.

For example, I’ve learned from Diane Ackerman that we can experience events and people’s lives through a written narrative. While reading The Zoo Keeper’s Wife, we were able to visualize the everyday life during World War II and what it was like live during this period in time. Ackerman did a wonderful job of painting a picture of the characters and what they represented throughout the book. Some critics said, “A lovely story about the Holocaust might seem like a grotesque oxymoron. But in The Zookeeper's Wife , Diane Ackerman proves otherwise.

All characters in the novel are living in a man’s world; nevertheless, the author has tried to change this world by the help of her characters. She shows a myriad of opportunities and different paths of life that woman can take, and more importantly she does not show a perfect world, where women get everything they want, she shows a world where woman do make mistakes, but at the same time they are the ones that pay for these mistakes and correct them.