The Outcasts Of Poker Flat Analysis

For a story by an author to be signified as a classic literature piece, it requires a timeless feature which the main passage can echo throughout the ages. Particularly, a relation to society's behavior and values. The characters, created by Washington Irving, most especially Tom Walker, gives us an insight on how his life centered predominantly on wealth up to the point where he is consumed by temptation. Tom Walker’s engagement in a deal with the Devil portrays how money-driven society has become more prominent through the times of the 1700s and today's world.

Sykes’s physical cruelty and unfaithfulness go together, and are apparent not only to the one’s involved, but outsiders as well. A group of village men sitting on a

     The women in A Tale of Two Cites behave in extremely opposing ways.  Lucie Manette is a frail young woman.  She constantly becomes overwhelmed and faints at even the thought of danger.  She has never been exposed to poverty nor suffered through severe hardships.  Lucie is genteel; she is  constantly pampered and always has people looking out for her.  She is constantly being treated like a small child; "she softly laid the patient [Lucie] on a sofa, and tended her with great skill and gentleness" (23).  Madame Defarge is a ruthless, bloodthirsty, vengeful, and poor woman.  She is best described by Ms. Pross as "the wife of Lucifer" (336).  She readily cuts off a man's head and "she never missed [an execution]" (342).  Madame Defarge's sadistic nature is seen best during the execution of Foulon, an aristocrat.  She tortures him,  "as a cat might have done to a mouse" and his head is impaled "upon a pike, with grass enough in the mouth for all of Saint Antoine to

Total Opposites In the short story "The Outcasts of Poker Flat" by Bret Harte, the author uses characters in the story that have very similar characteristics, except for one, "Uncle Billy." John Oakhurst is a big time gambler in Poker Flat. He took large sums of money from many people in town. The residents of Poker Flat were very upset with him always winning bets and all of their money. Out of all the people that are banned from Poker Flat, Oakhurst possesses the best qualities out of the group. The people of the town were attempting to clean up Poker Flat, but they really only rid themselves of one thief and three good hearted people that had some bad breaks. The other people that were forced to leave were "The Duchess" and "Mother

In Of Mice & Men, the character Curley’s Wife is depicted as flirtatious, promiscuous, and insensitive. However, her husband Curley sees her as only a possession. Most of the workers at the ranch see her as a tart, whereas Slim, the peaceful and god-like figure out of all the men, see her as lonely. This answer will tell us to which extent, is Curley’s wife a victim, whether towards her flirtatious behaviour, or to everyone’s representation of her.

Intro - In The Outcasts of Poker Flat, Bret Harte creates John Oakhurst to be morally ambiguous to express that one should not judge others at first glance.

At first glance, Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour,” Susan Glaspell’s Trifles, and Henrik Isben’s A Doll House seem to have nothing in common. However, the short story and plays have many similarities. Particularly, five women from these tales— Louise Mallard, Minnie Wright, Mrs. Peters, Mrs. Hale, and Nora Helmer—make drastic decisions that appear to be motiveless. Without context, any reader could be confused by Louise’s death, Nora’s departure, and Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale’s unanimous effort to cover up the murder that Minnie Wright committed, which also seems to lack serious motive. However, all of these women’s settings, situations, and lives have connections that make their motives similar. Emotion motivates all five women—not just

For while the men are looking actively for the "smoking gun," the women are confronted with more subtle clues in spite of themselves and even try to hide from each other what they intuitively know. But they do not fool each other for long, as Glaspell describes, "Their eyes met - something flashed to life, passed between them; then, as if with an effort, they seemed to pull away from each other" (295). However, they cannot pull away, for they are bound by a power they do not even comprehend: "We all go through the same things -  it's all just a different kind of the same thing!...why do you and I understand? Why do we know - what we know this minute?" (303). They do not realize that it is intuition they share, that causes them to "[see] into things, [to see] through a thing to something else...." (294). Though sympathetic to Minnie Wright, the women cannot deny the damning clues that lead them to the inescapable conclusion of her guilt.

The Outcasts of Poker Flat Summary and Analysis Poker Flat, a small town in rural California, is experiencing some turmoil in its infrastructure; after an incident involving a large loss of money, horses, and men, a secretive committee in the town decides to purge itself of undesirables, either by hanging or exile. Among those exiled are John Oakhurst, a gambler, Uncle Billy, a drunkard, and two prostitutes, Duchess and Mother Shipton. They attempt to travel to a nearby town, but after several hours they decide to rest in a cabin, and are intercepted by Tom Simons and Piney Woods, two fresh-faced young people who are heading to Poker Flats to get married. In the night, Uncle Billy runs off with the horses and some provisions, leaving the

These three brides represent the femme fatale, the fatal woman. The over sexualised women whose charms ensnare her lovers in bonds of irresistible desire, often leading them into compromising, dangerous, and deadly situations. These women serve as monstrous reminders of what happens if the boundaries of proper behaviour and traditional gender roles are crossed. These women, although beautiful, possess the wrong type of beauty, one of which brands them as evil, openly sexual and seductive women. Who, in addition lack the chaste passivity and fragility of the ideal Victorian lady, thus making them deserving of some form of punishment in order for them to be returned to their pure, innocent, albeit dead, human form.

Jack Worthing and Algernon Moncrieff are both high-class protagonists in society but are lying about their lives to preserve their reputations. “You have invented a very useful younger brother called Ernest, in order that you may be able to come up to town . . . I have invented an invaluable permanent invalid called Bunbury . . . ” (Wilde 1498). Ernest is Jack’s fictional brother, who always gets into mischief and uses him an excuse to go into town. Likewise, Algernon uses Bunbury, his fictitious and ill friend, to allow him to go to the country. These characters enable these gentlemen to retreat from their social obligations. Missing an essential reception to aid their “brother” or “friend,” gives the appearance that they are caring men, which is an admirable trait among the rich, but they are not. The name “Bunbury” is an interesting name

Finally, the reader is introduced to the character around whom the story is centered, the accursed murderess, Mrs. Wright. She is depicted to be a person of great life and vitality in her younger years, yet her life as Mrs. Wright is portrayed as one of grim sameness, maintaining a humorless daily grind, devoid of life as one regards it in a normal social sense. Although it is clear to the reader that Mrs. Wright is indeed the culprit, she is portrayed sympathetically because of that very lack of normalcy in her daily routine. Where she was once a girl of fun and laughter, it is clear that over the years she has been forced into a reclusive shell by a marriage to a man who has been singularly oppressive. It is equally clear that she finally was brought to her personal breaking point, dealing with her situation in a manner that was at once final and yet inconclusive, depending on the outcome of the legal investigation. It is notable that regardless of the outcome, Mrs. Wright had finally realized a state of peace within herself, a state which had been denied her for the duration of her relationship with the deceased.

The novel shows a dialectical structure that through this the author speaks of two different worlds, the city and the field. Also included are the inhabitants who seem to have the way of thinking and opposite behaviors. However, the creatures that inhabit these different worlds are essentially the same: complex and contradictory, immersed in the emptiness that exists in them and pensioners of a lacerating solitude. The characters are aggressive and devious beings; incapable of communicating with their fellow men, but that is not strange that these isolated beings, surrounded by a sea of silence. They find no way to escape from their own reclusion and escape of theirs fears.

Lucy Westenra, signifying the stereotypical victim, of “unequalled sweetness and purity,” symbolises the change in feminine identity within the story after she shows deviant traits, transforming from her previously repressed tender character into a strong sexual demon.

This story takes place at the end of the nineteenth century in a small American town named Hadleyburg. The conflict in “The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg” began after citizens in Hadleybrug offended a passing stranger. The stranger, described as a foreign gambler, decided to plot revenge against the town in order to expose the town’s fabricated virtue. He devised a plan that tempted citizens of the town to tell a lie in order to claim a sack of gold worth $40,000. He delivered the sack of gold to the home of an elderly cashier and his wife, Edward and Mary Richards. In a written note, he claimed that the money is meant for the person who helped him while he was in Hadleyburg before. Part of the stranger’s test was to have people of the town guess a certain remark in the sac. Whoever guessed the correct remark would receive the sac full of gold. People wrote their remarks down and submitted it to Reverend Burgess, who would open the sac during a public meeting and announce the