The Gate Of The Hundred Sorrows

Scott Russell Sanders’ “Under the Influence” is about a family growing up with alcoholism, mental and physical abuse. When Sanders was very young, he didn’t recognize that his father was an alcoholic, but as he grew older, he saw the bloodshot eyes, hiding alcohol, the deceptions, and the dual personalities of an alcoholic. “My father drank. He drank as a gut-punched boxer gasps for breath, as a starving dog gobbles food—compulsively, secretly, in pain and trembling.” (215). Sanders story starts at the end, where his father dies from alcoholism. The turmoil and fear this family suffered because of their father’s alcoholism, is a story a lot of families are familiar with.

When considering the themes of Denis Johnson’s collection of short stories entitled Jesus’ Son, it is important to bear in mind that Johnson himself struggled with alcoholism and addictions. Each story in the collection is a snapshot of the heroin addict narrator’s life. A short story in the collection entitled “Work” can be examined to reveal Johnson’s multifaceted perspective on addicts. The story’s plot, advanced by an early introduction of place and character paired with a non-linear narrative structure, allows for Johnson to call readers’ perceptions of addiction into question.

When emotion overwhelms you, you have two choices; let it eat away at you slowly, each and every day, or attempt to purge it from your memory. Into Thin Air is Jon Krakauer’s way of preventing himself from going insane and parting with his overwhelming emotions. Although I have not first-handedly experienced traumatizing events in the same way Krakauer has, I relate to the want, or need, to dispose of extreme thoughts through art. Contrastingly, I often part with my emotions through vague paintings only I can accurately decipher, while Krakauer parts with his emotions through a twenty one chapter novel in which he gives the readers nearly excessive details about not only his emotions, but also the emotions and hardships of others. While reading

Something Wicked This Way Comes is a novel about a boy, his friend, and his friend’s father who all struggle to survive following the arrival of a carnival fueled by fear. One of the underlying themes developed by the novel is also manifested in the texts “If-”, by Rudyard Kipling, and the article, “The Art of Resilience.” The poem,”If-”, focuses on the qualities that all men should possess. Similarly, “The Art of Resilience” encompasses the idea of resilience and how one can develop this trait. The same universal theme is developed through the use of literary devices throughout all three texts. To elaborate, the significant theme that is developed by the authors’ uses of conflict, figurative language, tone and mood is that the ability to

Throughout the beginning of the novel, Jun Do shows unwavering loyalty to his despots, despite their cruel treatment of him and his awful living conditions. This draws parallels to the poem “Rye Whiskey” by an anonymous author which details the narrator’s “loyalty” and unwavering addiction to “rye whiskey,” even though it has only lead him to his “downfall” (273). Like rye whiskey, Jun Do

In the text, “Sonny’s Blues”, by James Baldwin, the narrator and his brother, Sonny, struggle through life and are constantly facing some sort of suffering. The narrator suffers through witnessing the downward spiral of his brother into drug addiction and the loss of his daughter while Sonny suffers through drug addiction, the battle that ensues afterward in his attempt to get back on his feet, and the discord in the relationship with his brother. Baldwin uses strong diction in order to show suffering as an inevitable part of being human. Baldwin wields careful diction to demonstrate how suffering is an inescapable piece of possessing humanity.

The influence an autocratic society has on suicide is exposed when Montag’s wife accidentally overdoses on sleeping tablets in her effort to commit suicide. Montag saves his wife by calling the emergency hospital, and some workers come with a machine to pump the poison out. The next morning Mildred doesn’t even remember the previous night’s ordeal and goes about her normal business (Bradbury 10-12). Understandably, Mildred’s effort to kill herself shows the discontentment in her life in this autocratic society. Moreover, Bradbury provides another example when he writes, ‘“There must be something in books, things we can’t imagine, to make a woman stay in a burning house; there must be something there. You don’t stay for nothing’” (Bradbury 48). In this instance, Montag refers back to the event where the woman who owned all the books committed suicide by remaining in her house, even when the firefighters warned her that they were going to burn her house down. To this end, it becomes discernible that under a controlling government, discontentment and suicidal thoughts

One key event involves her father. Gabi is one out of three kids in her family's household. Her father's drug problem plays a big part in the way her mother acts. She tends to be very over protective of Gabi. Gabi also see’s that her father's drug problems put a lot of stress and worries onto her mother.

Today, 2018, those who interact in everyday society will come across many citizens of all ages that suffer from many incurable diseases, addictions,  and mental illnesses. That, or they do not seek help from others for the disorders they obtain. If one were to essay the works by F. Scott Fitzgerald, they will come to find that he discusses his experiences and sufferings with an addiction, dealing with close loved ones that also suffer from mental illnesses, alike his wife who suffered from anxiety, depression, and suicidal thoughts and tendencies, and he writes about characters who don’t have any problems, the characters he wishes he were like. Despite his addiction with alcohol and problems with money, Fitzgerald was a large dreamer, he craved

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, and Dead Poet’s Society are both set in rigid institutions with strict regimes. In essence, the unbending traditions coupled with the pressure to conform to the institution’s perception of normal, creates a microcosm of society in both texts. In addition, the outside world represents freedom, and the ideas of escape in the outside world, and escape in death is highlighted in both. In One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest each day was routine, and strictly adhered to. Any deviance from the ‘normal’ was met with harsh punishment from the totalitarian Nurse Ratched, through the threat of the electroshock table and other de-masculating forms of punishment. The Chief’s commentary on the daily routine, reflections on Nurse Ratched

A majority of us squander our time fantasizing about a faultless society, a place where sorrow has not meaning but is replaced with harmony, compassion, and riches. Essentially, we want a place where dreams come true. On the contrary, how often do we reflect on the worst? A place where sorrow is the only meaning and harmony, compassion and riches have no existence. Susceptibility, combat and abhorrence- the contemplation of our future. Glimpses of these are shown through demoralizing literature, where the dire stuff is an extrapolation of our world.

The use of counter culture and ideology can provide unique perspectives on the issues faced by everyone, even those who do not acknowledge it. Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh portrays a drug addict who rejects any conventions of normalcy in the pursuit of an alternate reality. American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis does the same through the depiction of a rich and greedy Wall Street tycoon. This essay will closely analyze the themes of illusion and reality in Trainspotting and American Psycho. The relationship between the fantasy world and the “real” world in these texts are closely linked and aid the narrative in a criticism of social and structural issues. The texts are often criticized as glorifying drug use and violence however through analyzing the effect of narrative, drug use and culture on the characters reality and illusions will argue that the elements of drug use and violence help in the deconstruction of greed and popular culture in the texts.

Knowledge has a great influence in the distribution of power. The authors Scott Westerfeld and Rudyard Kipling both illustrate the power of knowledge with the use of personification. Rudyard Kipling vocalizes words of wisdom in his poem “If-” when he states, “If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew; To serve your turn long after they are gone” (Kipling). Mr. Kipling deeply expresses, through the personification of a heart and a nerve, how if these elements influence one’s life, their power will last past their lifetime. In The Uglies, the main character, Tally Youngblood, meets someone who was not raised within her corrupt dystopian society. Those in the society who are not within the leadership position of Special Circumstances are unaware of what is being hidden from them. The text states, “Tally though of what David said about the boulders. However massive,

Wangerin uses visual imagery in his novel The Book of Sorrows, and he does this by creating visuals for the reader by describing the surroundings and various aspects in the novel. Visual imagery is created by using element of sight, and appeals to the sense of sight.

People might sometimes find themselves in a situation in which there is nothing they can do to help those who they care about, but they do it against all odds anyway. In both “An Alcoholic Case” by F. Scott Fitzgerald and “My Son the Murderer” by Bernard Malamud, the deuteragonists are dealing with the effects war had on them: one falling into alcoholism and the other into depression. Meanwhile the protagonists, the Nurse and Leo respectively, are trying to prevent them from suffering with no favorable outcome. Although both protagonists were concerned about the repercussions war had on their respective deuteragonists, they wanted to lessen their pain for different reasons. Overall, the differences and similarities between these short stories vary from the unpredictable repercussions war has on people’s lives and the despair of not being able to heal the ones you care about.