In Michael Crichton’s The Great Train Robbery, gentleman burglar Edward Pierce organizes a gold heist. He has the opportunity and means to commit the crime, but his motive is never explicitly revealed. Crichton indicates that Pierce’s motive sprouts not from greed nor necessity. Instead, Pierce commits the crime because he is obsessed with manipulating other people. Pierce uses fear to get people to bend to his will. He walks through slums with self assurance, an attitude that makes the other criminals afraid of him (Crichton 35). He also tells a gruesome story about buffalo hunting in order to scare off Emily Trent (64-5). The story is unnecessary to achieving his plan, but the Trents’ emotions come under his power. Furthermore, Pierce
The Book Thief (2013), directed by Brian Percival, is about a young old girl living in Nazi Germany (between 1939 and 1943) in the fictional town of Molching, Germany. Death narrates the story of the main protagonist, Liesel Meminger, beginning when she is nine years old and suffering from the death of her brother and separation from her mother. Liesel then goes to live with Hans and Rosa Hubermann (played by Geoffrey Rush and Emily Watson). When Liesel arrives, she is illiterate and is made fun of in school by the other children. Hans, a painter and accordion player, teaches her how to read, using the book Liesel took from her brother's burial: The Grave Digger's Handbook. Over the course of the movie, Liesel develops a love for reading and decides to steal books because of the economical hardships associated with World War II. Liesel's foster parents also decide to help a young Jewish man named Max, whose father fought with Hans as in World War One as German soldiers. The Book Thief illustrates a different perspective in regards to the Nazi Regimen and its effects on the German people, specifically children.
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak is a story set in Germany during World War 2. This novel follows the life of Liesel Meminger, a girl who develops greatly. With Death as the all knowing narrator of the story, the reader has the ability to see various perspectives. It tells the story of oppression, portrays the power of words, and shows the human ability for kindness or cruelty. I chose to do option four, in which I have chosen important sections from the novel.
Guy Vanderhaeghe’s The Last Crossing is a Western of subtly crossed borders. Vanderhaeghe elicits a sense of blurred lines between opposites, giving the illusion that boundaries are not so statically fixed. The historical figure Jerry Potts illustrates that the division between Indigenous and white is not so easily distinguished by ways of appearances, languages, and relations. The lines of health and illness intertwine as the reader follows Addington’s syphilis, Custis’ mystery ailment, and the Indigenous peoples’ struggle with smallpox. Justice, punishment, and the law become subjective in the novel with regards to Madge’s death, Addington’s military massacre, and Indigenous resistance against unfair treatment. Distinctions between
Some people believe that lies will always be bitter in the end, no matter how sweet you make them in the beginning. In William Gass’ The Tunnel, he expounds the validity of this belief by taking the reader on an emotionally evolving journey, as he recounts the self-realization of a young boy, who’s frightening lie unravels in front of not only his own eyes, but also the readers. Gass successfully enriches this story with striking imagery, symbolism, and comparisons; exposing how no matter how sweet you make a lie in the beginning, it will always turn bitter in the end.
In the Novel the Book Thief by Markus Zusak and Breaking Prejudice from National Radio, we see there to be a change in perspective due to insightful personal discoveries. We see this occur for the better and the worse, on a smaller scale in the case of the Book Thief and on a larger scale in Breaking Prejudice, which serves to demonstrate to the reader the many levels on which insight can affect perspective. In the Book Thief, Liesel’s initial perspective of both her foster mother Rosa, and Hitler, change as a result of a moment of realisation caused by their actions. Similarly, we see a change of perspective in Breaking prejudice that sprung from an insightful discovery, however one that is more dramatic. Zelda Le Garange, a wealthy, white girl who grew up in the richer part of South Africa, had a conditioned perspective on black people, completely transformed through meeting the loving Nelson Mandela.
City of Thieves starts off with Lev Beniov sitting atop his roof, on a firefighting detail, under the German siege of Leningrad in Kirov, Russia. As he sits on top of his building’s roof with his friends Vera Osiponva, and the Antokolsky twins they listen to anti-aircraft fire, and they see a paratrooper falling to the ground. The group hops the Kirov gate, and runs towards the paratrooper’s landing sight, realizing he is drifting to the ground dead. They began looting his body, and as Lev got a German knife from the man, the GAZ turned on Voinova Street, and they had to run. While running back to Kirov, Vera slipped, and Lev had to go and get her. As he helped her over the fence, the GAZ grabbed him. Since it was after curfew, he believed execution was inevitable. He was taken to “Piter”’s prison called the Crosses with no light or sound. Soon, a Russian officer named Kolya was thrown in the cell with him. In the morning, the two prisoners were taken to a mansion with NKVD officers in it. The Colonel had a mission for the prisoners. He took their ration cards, and told Kolya and Lev they had until Thursday to get one dozen eggs. On that Saturday morning, Kolya and Lev had left their lives on the line for a dozen eggs.
Markus Zusak, the author of The Book Thief, was able to entice his readers by successfully framing the book thief 's story and giving us a better understanding of the book through the use of many color metaphors by the narrator. The prologue is my most beloved part not only because the color metaphors give captivating descriptions of every scene at the beginning of the story. Additionally, in the prologue—the author introduced us to such an “unlikely” narrator, and to the protagonist. Death, who associates the demise of others with the changing “colors of the sky,” and what those colors mean to the story; and the book thief—as a survivor.
Throughout history, humanity has had to endure many hardships. To help cope with these misfortune human nature can be observed in the many ways it has evolved in people to help them to withstand the perils that make up a war. In Markus Zusak’s novel The Book Thief, published in 2005, Liesel Meminger must survive the struggles she faces as a result of her life being in the middle of the grips of Nazi Germany. Faced with events like the loss of all her closest loved ones, the Holocaust, discrimination because of her ability to read, and her religion, Liesel’s instincts is forced to develop ways for her to survive. With some help from her new father and the power of word Liesel’s human disposition helps her live through the war. With her
Edward Pierce is a peculiar and puzzling man. And though he does not have conventional reasoning for his acts. His self-esteem and pride drove him to pull off one of the greatest heists the world has ever
Guy Vanderhaeghe’s The Last Crossing is a Western of subtly crossed borders. Vanderhaeghe elicits a sense of blurred lines between opposites, giving the illusion that boundaries are not so statically fixed. Vanderhaeghe creates an underlying fluidity of social and cultural connotations and the essence of well-being. The Metis disestablish the distinction between Indigenous and white through appearances, languages, and relations. Addington’s syphilis, Custis’ mystery ailment, and the Indigenous peoples’ struggle with smallpox draws the conclusion that health and illness are not opposites. Madge’s death, Addington’s military massacre, and Indigenous resistance against unfair treatment prove that justice is not equivalent to the law. Lucy Stoveall’s paranormal abilities, Simon and Addington’s dreams, and the land of the dead exposes the openness of interpretation and the inconsistency of the natural world. The Last Crossing fights the illusion that concepts are resilient. Within the novel Vanderhaeghe affirms the flexibility of health, law, nature and culture with their opposites.
(1) Toni Morrison’s Beloved takes place after the Civil War during the Reconstruction era, when the violent oppression of the black race continued, with flashbacks to the horrific trauma of the early 19th century slavery period. In Margaret Atwood’s review of Beloved in
Taught only to acknowledge what he is told to, the conforming individual will not realize his surroundings until somebody deliberately makes him. The rich control the poor and the intelligent control the ignorant. Edward Pierce’s heist was in response to the rampant manipulation of society by those in power. Throughout The Great Train Robbery, Pierce realizes that the power of perception is vast. Used to test how far this power could take him into a manipulator’s mind, the robbery was Pierce’s challenge to the societal ladder.
Words can influence the mind in many ways that thought may not be able to. They are carefully placed and shared in different ways by each and every individual. Words have powerful impacts and can majorly impact how one may think, feel, or even lead others to feel. Written by Markus Zusak, “The Book Thief” describes a story of an innocent foster girl, Liesel Meminger, who resides in Munich, Germany at one of the most troubling time periods in history, Nazi Germany. A tale narrated by the one and only Death himself, shows the perspective from his point of view, as well as others, describing how Liesel had been seized away from her birth mother at a young age, and put into a foster family. Her new family, the Hubermanns. As she matures and grows into a more critical thinker, understanding and analyzing everything that carefully happens around her. Her foster-father, Hans guides her and teaches her how to read, which little does she know sparks her journey, the art of stealing books. Liesel soon discovers that words aren 't simply lines on a page, they are strong emotions packed into a form that merely is held in her delicate hands. Not only did she hold the pages of emotion, she held a power, a dangerous weapon of words, a weapon of control, and every book that she had stolen was giving her unimaginable power that made her think in ways that she would’ve never thought she could have. As with Nazi propaganda, and a gift that enabled her to broaden her worldview. Liesel evolves
In Michael Crichton’s The Great Train Robbery, Edward Pierce is able to play the roles of various socioeconomic backgrounds. Crichton never clearly lays down a reason for the motive for the train robbery but Edward’s role playing establishes one of exhibitionism. This motive is repeated throughout the novel in his display of ostentatious actions and mannerisms, using the public reaction to satiate his ego. Through Pierce’s theatrics, the motive is clearly presented in a crime shocking to the time.
Notwithstanding devoting his life to being a thief, Pierce betrays the location of the money before he betrays Miss Meriam. While in custody Pierce is questioned persistently, but never strays from his answer, “I don’t know” (Crichton 253). One final time he is questioned on Meriam and the moneys’ whereabouts. But he only answers one of the questions. He betrays the moneys’ location through answering, “In a crypt, in Saint John’s Wood.” (254). Being the criminal mastermind that Pierce is he must consider every detail of the crime in conjunction with the accomplices involved. Through this knowledge the reader can infer that Pierce knows exactly where Miriam is hiding, but still does not