Summary Of The Poem 'Into The Great Wide Open'

F word he says “Fantastic. When I get home I shall look that up in

Eddie steals a purse from an elderly lady. Manny was given a second chance by the black man. “In that instant of trying to call out to Eddie everything changed. It was like I’d seen my own fate.” (210) Manny said this because he realized that he is on the completely wrong path in life. Manny realizes that Eddie is starting to pick up character traits like his father and Manny cannot turn out to be like his own dad. Manny knows that he does not want to throw away his life so he turns it around because he knows what the outcome will be if he does not change.

Eddie’s journey begins with a passion to read books and write poems. When Eddie first opened up about this to his girlfriend Lupe, “then [she] told [him he] should be a writer” (Johnson 76). Lupe is the root of his love for literature. However, he cannot let his reputation - which

It is Eddie’s fifth birthday, and an Irish man, called Mickey Shea joyfully picks Eddie up by his feet and shakes him out once for each year he has completed, while the other adult men laugh and cheer. Firstly, “Eddie is wearing his birthday gift, a red cowboy hat and a toy holster. He gets up and runs from one group to the next, pulling out the toy gun and going, ‘Bang, bang!’ ‘C’mere boy’ Mickey Shea beckons from a bench. ‘Bang, bang,’ goes Eddie. MIckey Shea works with Eddie’s dad, fixing the rides. He is fat and wears suspenders and is always singing Irish songs. To Eddie, he smells funny, like cough medicine” (Albom 23). This is the beginning part of one of the flashbacks that talks about Eddie’s birthday, where the writer introduce Mickey

Tom Petty is a singer, song writer, and a musician best known as the front man of the

Eddie’s father influenced Eddie to be the chaperone in the family despite his age. At an early age he felt as though he had a financial responsibility, which influenced him to get a job as both a shoe-shiner and a paperboy. He describes his family’s structure as the father being the head of the family, and the mother as the heart. This helped create a balance within the family, but caused tension between Eddie and his father’s expectations. Eddie experienced two spheres of education, American school and Chinese school. “I loved going to American school, but Chinese school was another matter.” (Yung 25) He disliked the limited exposure of Chinese education, and felt that he had been exposed to a wider world in American school, which eventually led him to flunk out of school. This came as a disappointment to Eddie’s father, and added immense pressure to Eddie. The confinement he felt in Chinatown frustrated him, his overprotective mother crippled his adventurous-ambition and the pressure added by his father to lead the family caused him to runaway when at the age of 13. He

Through Eddies school experience got off to a rough start with many fights and comments about his parents and their Asian culture. He never really took comments against him very well, he fought back many times with physical violence. Many times these fights were over cultural differences at school. Huang wrote about the lack diversity he experienced when in school and the many names he was called by the students. Many students called him racist names and bullied him; Huang wrote “Edgar grabbed me by the shirt and threw me to the ground. “Chinks get to the back!” I looked up from the ground dumbfounded.”(Huang 32). Because of the lack of

Imagine that you wake up in hollywood with a girl that you just met. This is what happened to Eddie in the great wide open. Eddie is an 18 year old that when he finished high school he traveled to hollywood. He got a tattoo and met a girl in hollywood, he moved in with that girl too. “Into the Great Wide Open” by Tom Petty, is a story about a kid who took his chances in hollywood on becoming a musician, this story is using a changing tone, and an unrealistic fashion.

     The next person that Eddie meets is his Sargent from the war. He tells Eddie about how he, the Sargent, died, and how that enabled the rest of the company to survive. He told Eddie that it had been him who had shot him, in order to save his life. Eddie had become convinced that he saw someone in a burning building, and to prevent Eddie from going in there and losing his life, the Sargent shot him in the leg.

When Eddie came home, he became more serious and somber. He completely lost touch with his old self, and completely changed his disposition. Thus, Eddie’s emotional and physical changes impacts the reader’s view of modern day conflicts.

“Into the Great Wide Open” tells about the fame and fall of a man with a goal of fame. Eddie finished high school then he left for Hollywood to become famous. He met a girl and she taught him how to play the guitar. He had a job at nightclub. He got in the papers and they said he played from the heart. So Eddie got an agent and a roddie named Bart. Then Eddie made a record and he thought he was unstoppable.

can see the type of man Eddie is, as when he meets the brothers for

At the beginning of the play, Eddie is portrayed as a sensible and smart character. Eddie and the girls (Catherine and Beatrice) all have a requited respect for each other – Beatrice: “Mmm! You’re an angel! God’ll bless you” – and there are no problems as such, even when the immigrants first come. He is also respected by the community – Alfieri: “He was good a man as he had to be in life that was.” But this dominant respect that he gains is what he is very used to and the slight changes where Catherine finds another man in her life and Beatrice also looks after the two immigrants (Rodolpho and Marco) effects Eddie hugely. The respect that he becomes used to is now shared by the women in his life between the men in his house and he craves for more attention. This can be considered one of his flaws that lead to his downfall. He is also shown caring for Catherine in the beginning of the play. He can be seen as a normal uncle or father – Beatrice: “She’s got a job.” Eddie: “What job? She’s gonna finish school.” He is also very proud of Catherine – “Sure she’s the best… You look like a

a young woman “…You still walk around in front of him in your slip …”

With Eddie being limitless on this drug he gains power over things and makes more money than he ever thought would be possible, which eventually conditions him into becoming even more dependent upon the drug.