The Devil And Miss Prym And The Movie Seven Pounds

The issue of evil in the world raises questions with which everyone wrestles. Pain and suffering come into everyone’s life to some degree or another. Trying to find meaning and purpose in the midst of suffering, whether our own or someone else’s, is difficult regardless of what worldview one holds. How individuals and societies deal with this issue will have important implications for those individuals as well as to the whole of society.

us, there is the seed of both good and evil. It's a constant struggle as to which one will win. And one cannot exist without the other.” While this assessment of human nature is correct, there have been different reasons for this struggle. The Puritans believed that people were sinners who had fallen out of grace with an angry, yet just, God. Their days were strictly regimented with work and prayer, so they could live wholesome and modest lives. The Humanists, on the other hand, believed people were good for the betterment of their society and themselves. They were able to make their own decisions and live their lives because their loving God would understand, rather

Some time ago I was watching TV when I notice the show I was watching was surprisingly similar to a show I watched some time earlier. I decided to watch both shows again, only to find that the characters and setting were actually the same. I then researched show, only to find that they were both written by the same person. After reading about the writer, I noticed how the settings and characters coincided with people and places from his past. Authors of stories, similar to screenwriters, often write about what they know; therefore, we find their stories similar in many aspects. In the “The Devil and Tom Walker” and “Rip Van Winkle” we see that the author Washington Irving uses similarities in setting, male protagonist, female protagonist, and mystic characters.

Inside each of us, there is a seed of good and evil since it is a constant struggle for us to

Goodman Brown realizes �There is no good on earth; and sin is but name. Come, devil; for to thee is the world given� (Hawthorne 167).

society by creating a Monster that is both a reflection of the creator himself and the faults

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein divulges the thoughts of two diverse creatures with unification in a single event: the birth of a monster. The monster, grotesque and innocent at birth, becomes violent as he experiences the unjust world around him. Victor’s scientific creation leads him to dangerous knowledge: a realm of fear, guilt, and abandonment. However, Victor himself creates his emotions in his embodiment of three of the seven deadly sins1: greed, gluttony, and pride. Victor Frankenstein’s actions expose him as the true monster, pushing him into sin and leaving the monster feeling alone, unloveable, and wrathful.

Underneath a good moral, there could be a hidden truth. In, “The Possibility of Evil”, Shirley Jackson shows how the protagonist, Miss Strangeworth presumes she is protecting her neighborhood by eliminating the evil that exists within her community, but ironically, she is the most evil neighbor of all. In the beginning, the community considers Miss Strangeworth an old, caring and respected woman. Throughout the story, a handful of community members realize Miss Strangeworth is a bitter, insensitive woman, who is creating more evil in the neighborhood. In other words, Miss Strangeworth’s intentions to rid her neighborhood of evil, ultimately has the opposite effect and ironically creates more dilemma.

In Shirley Jackson’s short story “The Possibility of Evil”, Miss Adela Strangeworth lives in this small town on Pleasant Street. She is a nice old lady who everybody loves,but she’s more than nice she’s evil. She seems to be a good person, but she’s not. She walks by the townspeople smiling ,but started writing evil letters about the people and sending the letters ruining the town people’s lives. They don’t know who is sending the letters,but Miss.Strangeworth wrote these letters out of pride which shows how evil she really is. The theme of the story is that there is the possibility of evil in anyone.

Some people live in a world that holds both beauty and ugliness, both joy and sorrow. This world defines the human character in which some have disagreements with each other or have a freedom of thoughts that makes them happy. This limitless world has granted people to be free and equal and gives the opportunity to learn from one another. However, some people try to get these benefits away from other individuals. For instance, some engage to take advantage of one another, approaches the kindness of each other, and feel jealousy of someone who has better things. Therefore, one can view in the novel called Frankenstein the existence of humanity. As, is perceived of the creature constructed by Victor Frankenstein. The creature is an invention by a maniacal scientist, who neglects the monster by its grotesque appearance. Referring to the Novel, Frankenstein is differently with his own creation; due to the fact that the monster is not a living human, but an invention. Humanity plays a significant role in the novel, but also in the universe.

Robert Louis Stevenson, a famous Scottish writer, once said, “All human beings are commingled out of good and evil.” Not one person is completely good or evil; everyone possesses both characteristics. In the literary pieces of John Gardner’s, “Grendel,” unknown author of, “Beowulf,” and Robert Louis Stevenson’s, “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” the characters are portrayed as having both qualities of good and evil, proving there to be a duality of decency/immorality, righteousness/depravity, and virtue/evil.

In the gothic novel Frankenstein, Mary Shelley weaves an intricate web of allusions through her characters’ expedient desires for knowledge. Both the actions of Frankenstein, as well as his monster allude to John Milton’s Paradise Lost. Book eight of Milton’s story relates the tale of Satan’s temptation and Eve’s fateful hunger for knowledge. The infamous Fall of Adam and Eve introduced the knowledge of good and evil into a previously pristine world.

The Creation’s first knowledge of mankind is that humanity will only accept him if he is physically appealing because of the initial rejection from his creator, Frankenstein. Thus, the Creation or ‘monster’ devotes himself to learning how to make his ‘protectors,’ or the De Lacy Family, his friends through reason. He gathers wood for the family and stops stealing their food, demonstrating

Buddha once stated, “it is a man’s own mind, not his enemy or foe, that lures him to evil ways.” In “The Possibility of Evil,” Miss Strangeworth, a seemingly innocent elderly woman, sends cruel letters in order to rid her town of evil. When other townspeople discover her as the author of the letters, they destroy her prized roses. Shirley Jackson’s “The Possibility of Evil” not only reveals the deceitfulness of people, but also emphasizes the underlying evil of all humans and shows that evil remains insurmountable until fully accepted.

In Mary Shelley’s novel, Frankenstein, the pursuit of knowledge was weighed against the negative affects such knowledge would have on humanity. Mankind, in all of its glory, was shown to be both virtuous and powerful, as well as condescending and base. The desire to create a superior race of humans led to death and destruction on the behalf of both the monster, and Dr. Victor Frankenstein. Life, and it's worth, were measured against the mental states of Dr. Frankenstein and the monster, as they transitioned from believing to, and looking down upon humanity. The morals and ideas of the monster were reflections of those of his creator, as both evolved to place varying states of importance on the value of natural life.