Three Day Road Analysis

The protagonist of Three Day Road comes in the form of Xavier Bird, a taciturn and humble young Cree man who finds himself tossed into the chaos of the Great War; a global phenomenon that turned men into monsters and the land into a place suitable for no man. Through his devotion to his spirituality, refusal to conform to wemistikoshiw ways, and steadfast sense of morality, Xavier manages to maintain his identity throughout the novel.

In his essay “The Lonely Death of George Bell,” N.R. Kleinfeld describes how life goes on after people die and they are survived by their belongings and memories they gave to people. Kleinfield illustrates how even melancholy deaths can affect society in positive and negative ways. Although he chose an interesting topic to discuss, N.R. Kleinfield’s essay failed to be captivating because it contained monotonous, unnecessary detail and had a disconnected thesis.

-There is a focus on storytelling as a means of healing: "It is the story of my childhood. Now I tell it to you, Xavier, to keep you alive."(35)

Many times the protagonists become the victims of the story and are eventually defeated. This is the case in Joseph Boyden’s Three Day Road. The protagonist, Xavier Bird, is the victim and is eventually defeated by the powers and doings of the people that he encounters during the war, and also by the uncontrollable forces that act upon him during the course of the war. Ultimately, these two factors overpower him and lead to his emotional defeat.

Three Day Road is a book written by Joseph Boyden, Toronto, Penguin Canada 2005, 384 pages. Joseph’s maternal grandfather and his uncle both served in the First World War. The book is written about history of natives telling us about the hardships of the Frist World War. Joseph’s intent was to honor the Native soldiers who fought in the First World War because many of them did not even get noticed for their great bravery and skill. The War had its way on everyone changing people in the book Three Day Road you can see it between the friendship of Elijah and Xavier and how they both change throughout the story.

There is a strong connection between moral integrity and the ability to maintain personality and culture. If emotions or fears overpower conscience, an individual begins to lose the grasp on their character. Assimilation is prevalent in Indigenous history. The wemistikoshiw in Canada, tried to rid the Indigenous of any sense of their culture, and this inhumanity is evident in Three Day Road. If integrity is strong, a person is able to withstand the effects of assimlation. However, if a person submits to the teachings and abuse, then one loses their identity. Assimilation targets an individual’s independence and intends to destroy it. Therefore, a lack in moral integrity results in assimilation. In the Joseph

The Effect of Rituals on Identity Rituals, in Joseph Boyden’s Three Day Road, can bring back one’s former identity after a traumatic event due to the spiritual connection it creates with one’s sense of self and the role rituals have in actualizing strong beliefs. In the second paragraph of the passage, Niska lays out food on three separate rocks without a thought to what she is doing. Niska’s faith in her culture allows her to prepare the food by placing salted fish on one rock, “on another some moosemeat and on a third, blueberries picked fresh from the bush” (Boyden 9). The way Niska prepares the food highlights the number three as a symbol, which is used to represent the relationship between life and death. In Cree culture, the number three signifies the three day journey a soul

The novel Cold Mountain is about two peoples’ independent journeys through different struggles and situations at the same time. One of these people is Inman, an injured soldier who is trying to find his way home after deserting from the fighting. He meets a lot of strange people along the way. Some of them help and some of them hinder. However, they all teach him something about himself, or something that he can relate to himself. There are some characters that are more significant in this respect than others and they have more of an actual influence on Inman’s journey.

During this part of the book they were inside a toy store at the moment and wondering where they could find the Institute to find out who they really were. Angel was missing from the group in the toy store so Max started off by going to check the stuffed animal section. This was where she found Angel talking to to an old lady. Max’s worries had faded some because the wolf men called Erasers, don’t usually live for more than five to six years. The lady that was talking with Angel decided to buy the stuffed bear that she wanted so badly. The old lady walked up to the register with Angel, pulled out her wallet, paid for the the bear, and walked out of the store like nothing ever happened.

In the book Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier, he develops characters that go through hardships and a final one that causes for a fulfilling ending to a novel. Frazier’s ending to a Civil War story is not a simple ending, instead is a complex ending that provides a satisfying ending using imagery.

In this paper you will learn my insights into my life. I will touch on my formal and informal education. I will reflect on the four Breadth areas of Ottawa University’s program of liberal arts studies. Future goals, philosophy, values, and obstacles will be discussed. This will include significant people and events that have happened in my life.

Published in 1997, Marie Howe’s anthology of poems, What the Living Do was written as an elegy to her brother, John, who passed away due to AIDS. Howe’s anthology is written without metaphor to document the loss she felt after her brother’s death. Although What the Living Do is written as an anthology, this collection allows for individual poems to stand alone but also to work together to tell an overarching story. Using the poetic devices of alliteration, enjambment, repetition and couplets, Howe furthers her themes of gender and loss throughout her poems in her anthology.

Family and heritage are very important aspects to human life. To begin, this is what is addressed in the poems,”Freeway 280,” by Lorna Dee Cervantes and Simon Ortiz’s,”Hunger in New York City.” Both poems share a great amount of similarities like the way they address the importance of family and heritage and the message of both poems. They address the importance of family and heritage by using objects or feelings, metaphorically, to express their family or heritage. Not only that, but both poems share the message that a person’s past stays with them no matter where or how far they go. Ultimately, both poems address the importance of family and heritage the same way and also share the same message.

So I have to say my commute in was pretty easy today despite the metro being closed. I caught a ride with a coworker, and it took 30 minutes to get from Takoma to Chinatown. Also I never seen so many metro buses in the morning. I thought the buses would be overly pack and crowded, but every bus I passed was only half way filled.

Imagine a time when you or someone you know has gone through loss; how alone that feeling was. Yet, the hardship it brought did not last forever. There was always something that made life worth living again. Life is filled with sad endings and bright, new beginnings. It is an inevitable cycle that everyone can relate to on some level. Whether it is the ending of a life or the end of a century, both Lucille Clifton and Thomas Hardy prove that endings can be difficult, yet there is some form of hope within each of their poems. Hardy’s “The Darkling Thrush” and Clifton’s “The Lost Baby Poem” have different styles due to the poets vastly different backgrounds, yet both poems posses a similar somber tone throughout, with a glimmer of positivity by the end of each.