Themes In Escape From Spiderhead By George Saunders

The Memoir Spider Eaters by Rae Yang is her personal account of her life during the Maoist revolution. In addition, she reminisces about her trials and tribulations during her active participation in the culture revolution and the great North Wilderness. Her family also had various misfortunes due to these changing ideological beliefs spread by the revolution. This memoir illustrates in great detail what Yang experienced under communist rule. Spider Eaters opened up a door to a young girl and her families struggle to be good Samaritans under communist rule and their final disillusionment of the revolution they whole heartedly believed in. Yang and her family struggled with the vast ideological changes during the Maoist Revolution, in turn,

Government control is enforced through the use of soma, a hallucinogen that is known to sedate and distract individuals from realizing their enslavement, and this drug is exploited as a way to escape reality. However, this abuse ultimately leads to mental corruption. The majority of society consumes this substance to combat pain, worry, and tension. This narcotic is used in everyday life and “served with coffee” (Huxley 75) to help fill people’s days with mindless acts. Soma gives a feeling of euphoria, often times withdrawing the feelings of depression and illness. “Soma, the perfect pharmaceutical, soothes pain” (McQuail) leaving individuals in a state of pleasure and nirvana. Within the corrupt society, a few characters refuse consumption of the hallucinogen. These individuals are regarded as

George Saunders has thrilled minds and captivated hearts in many of his short stories since the start of his career. However, this particular short story from Saunders, entitled “Escape from Spiderhead,” tells the story of a young man getting pushed to his limits; in a twisted and beautifully sad way. Saunders illustrates how one person can hold on to his humanity in an increasingly oppressive environment. By paying close attention to the dialog, themes, and characters of this story, you will begin to see clear indication that Abnesti is creating a brutal and demented environment for Jeff.

But, in seeking this goal, they sacrificed the prisoners’ liberty within the prison to the extent they went insane. Solitary confinement and beatings are two examples of the terrible conditions. The search for finding a way cure deranged men led to unjust treatment against democratic ideals even though the reformers were trying to improve their lives.

To provide social commentary regarding the dismal, yet realistic possibility of government surveillance, a human’s capacity for violence, and loss of self, James Dashner creates a futuristic society in which children are under manipulation through supervision. In The Maze Runner, children are stripped from everything they have. This includes materialistic possessions, family, friends, and their memory of all of those things. The teenagers’ reality is living in an experiment and fighting for their lives by the result of a disease. In the world today, there are are a plethora of diseases, but even with advanced medical technology, a lot remain incurable. The Maze Runner presents a possible outcome of a terribly contagious disease. James Dashner uses social commentary to explain the negative aspects of a world which the government is almost in complete control.

In The Stanford Prison Experiment it explains how guards take power over the prisoners. In paragraph 11 it tells how they are tormenting the prisoners and enjoying the things that they are doing. The guards demanded even greater obedience from

Less than two days into the experiment, one of the prisoners began to experience rage, emotional disturbance, uncontrollable crying, began acting crazy, and screaming. The experiment leaders realized he was really suffering and they had to release him. The next day was visiting day for the parents and friends of the prisoners. In order to stop parents from taking their children home, the experimenters cleaned the prison and the prisoners to make them seem pleasant. After the parents visited, there were rumors going around that the prisoners were going to attempt to escape. After the rumor was proved to be untrue, guards acted harshly towards the prisoners and added punishments. A priest who visited the prison, talked with prisoners and offered to contact some of their families for legal help. By day five, there were three types of guards; tough but fair guards, good guards, and hostile guards.

Individually, we create a metaphorical puzzle as we reflect on our life. These puzzle pieces represent all of the small-scale decisions we’ve made. Inside of those decisions, also consists of other people and how they influenced our upbringings. When this puzzle is put together, all of these decisions create one large picture. Specifically, Wes Moore’s “puzzle” obtains unfinished than other people, these pieces may not fit particularly well with other pieces, and they may never will. The reader may never perceive why Wes made any of the poor decisions he has made in his lifetime, nevertheless, there’s one large section of the puzzle that holds together–this would be Wes Moore’s influence from drug abuse. The idea of drug abuse continues to be frowned upon by other people. However, what most people may not understand is that there’s an addiction that comes with it, not an addiction to the drugs specifically, though an addiction to the lifestyle that came with it.

What do you get when you mix drugs, a man named Fuckhead, and drama? A Denis Johnson story. Drama is a prominent and key aspect that appears in all of Johnson’s work. Johnson’s work demonstrates various uses of multiple techniques and ideas that young writers can understand and apply to their own work.

In Washington Irving’s short story The Devil and Tom Walker, greed is shown to be a terrible trait that comes with many negative affects. Revealed by Irving when he introduced the setting, Tom Walker lived a miserable life isolated with his untrustworthy wife due to his miserly personality, and by this Irving was showing that living a life of greed will ultimately lead to misery. When decisions are being made based on greed and self benefit it will alter one thinking process and help you to make harmful and unintelligent decisions, as shown by Irving represented by greed based decisions both Tom and his wife made. Irvin also illustrated that you can be overwhelmed by greed and it can metaphorically turn

The conditions of the prisons and asylums of the 1800’s were archaic even for that era but by today's standards are criminal in themselves. The march 26th, 1880 edition of The New York Times ran a story titled Out of an Insane Asylum, which described one patient's first hand treatment. According to the story that The New York Times ran this particular patient was beaten on several occasions seemingly at the whim of the people in charge (The New York

Nic Sheff was 18 and collage bound when he discovered crystal meth. At first his father had no idea. Then came a call from his school, the late nights, the lying, the ghoulish pallor and the wasting away. David’s life became an eternity of waiting, for the phone to ring, the door to open, or

For centuries, scientific development has been a hot issue among media. Especially since the invention of cloning technology, more and more arguments about the developing pattern and power gained from such a development worried people globally. No doubt that the rapid development did provide us numerous conveniences and improving our life greatly, though, in regard to the increasing acknowledgment that people have from our nature, and the unpredictable human nature, likewise Dr. Abnesti in the fiction story, Escape from Spiderhead. From my pass readings and experiences, I think that human need to take every step of scientific development extremely seriously. As see from now, people are arguing about

There once was a boy named Zits. He was half Native American, half Irish and completely parentless. He lived in many different foster homes until he eventually met a troubled youth named Justice, who filled Zits with ideas of violence until Zits opened fire on a bank. Subsequently, Zits was shot in the head and switched bodies throughout time and space. His journey continued as he was transferred through time and different individuals, all who related to his personality and had to make choices about violence. His story is one of self-discovery as he travels until he can return to himself and reverse his horrible actions in the bank. This story is the novel Flight by Sherman Alexie. In this novel, Alexie explores many complex themes, such as the effect of a father figure on one’s personality and how compassion can help heal a person’s soul. Throughout the novel, it is evident that Zits is strongly influenced by his parental figures or lack of them. In the beginning, he chooses to let his violent role models have total control over his version of right and wrong. After his journey of learning, he realizes that he has command over his thoughts and can choose what he believes. At the end, he also has positive role models, ones that won’t force him to be violent and care for him. Because of his change in role models and ideas, he becomes a more compassionate and empathetic person.

The experimentors proposed that these reactions were caused by a loss of personal identity, dependency, emasculation and acceptance sadistic treatment from the guards and the unpredictable and arbitrary control of the prison system.