Tobias Wolff 's Profound Literature Elements

Bullet in the Brain is a short story about a sarcastic book critic, who allows his criticism to extend to his everyday life and soon learns why that is not a good idea.

The central idea of ‘’Guts” is Gary Paulsen’s life before becoming a famous writer. Some of his ideas for his books are based on his life. In chapter 1 of ‘’Guts’’ Paulsen writes about living in a small prairie town and volunteering to answer emergency calls. Paulsen writes ‘’ We answered calls to highway wrecks,farm accidents, poisonings, gunshot accidents, and many,many heart attacks.’’ I his story ‘’Guts he writes about someone who changes his life forever. This was a man looked directly into his eyes before he had passed away. Like Paulsen said ‘’ His eyes looked into mine’’ That man was used in ‘’Hatchet’’ as the pilot in the plane with Brain.

Tobias Wolff’s short story, “That Room” is a very suspenseful story that has the reader on the edge of their seat while reading it. Suspense and excitement is created through the plot and theme of the story which are both developed through four main literary devices. In the story, the narrator is put into what is potentially a life or death situation and it is at this point that he becomes aware that one is never really in full control of his or her own life. Throughout this literary analysis I will discuss the plot and theme of the story in terms of how Wolff uses setting, tone, characterization, and symbolism to enhance both the theme and the plot.

When disaster strikes, two responses exist: lose hope, or find an inner strength to rise above. “Werner” is an essay where the author, Jo Ann Beard, presents the idea of rediscovering yourself, rebuilding a life after loss, and rising above adversity. Werner, Beard’s main character, finds that the only way to truly move on after a tragedy is to take a leap into what is unfamiliar. After a fire burns down everything Werner has, he is forced to grow and become a new man, leaving his old life behind. Throughout the essay, Beard illustrates a man who faces challenges to his sense of self, and who sequentially must change and become someone new to find who he is again. Beard’s use of the third person, candid diction, and conflict resolution compose an elaborate work that focuses on the concept of becoming a new and better person after a traumatic event.

Literary fictional works are strange in that readers are enveloped in a new world. This new world becomes vivid as one reads along, and emotions are evoked. George Bowering’s metafictional short story “A Short Story” conjures feelings of frustration and surprise in readers. Through the use of an unconventional narrative structure readers are manipulated into believing and mirroring Donna’s hatred. Despite the evident warning within the story, it is not until the end that one realizes these feelings were controlled by Bowering.

This distinctness is not unexpected, for as one’s strengths and beliefs are personal, as is the effect of events effecting those strengths and beliefs. Wiesel and Ten Boom state the purpose of their self-exposed stories clearly, and their purposes differ just as clearly. Wiesel stresses the importance of applying lessons of the past to the present for the sake of the world’s future. He writes to create a feeling of such horror and catharsis within the reader to prevent the evil of the Holocaust or any type of unjust persecution to ever occur again. He opens the reader’s eyes with vividly horrible images of human suffering and creates no barrier

The world is a massive place full of endless literature, beginning from ancient scrolls to daily news articles, filled with many secrets, perspectives and surroundings that help connect literature to an individual’s daily life. Some writers use the skills of literary elements to express and discuss an event that has happened to them or what has happened to others. This helps others to comprehend the perspectives of the author’s understanding toward an incident that one might experience. For instance in Flannery O’Connor’s short story, she uses many literary elements to express her views over most of her stories. O’Connor expresses her views in her short story, “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” by using the literary elements of point of view, irony, and setting.

Tobias Wolff is today known as a highly esteemed American author that has written many short stories ad memoirs, that include This Boy’s Life: A Memoir, In the Garden of the North American Martyrs, and The Night In Question: Stories. He has also inspired many college students to continue on the path of creative writing. Wolff had a rough childhood with his parents being divorced, having an abusive stepfather, a con artist father, and being separated from his brother. In his teenage years Wolff re-connected with his ‘lost’ sibling who inspired him to become a writer (Luke Gerwe). Pete and Donald, the brothers in The Rich Brother, hold some similarities to Tobias Wolff and his brother Geoffrey Wolff. For instance, in the story Pete is successful with a good job, a wife and daughters and money, while on the other hand his brother Donald cannot keep a stable job, is always borrowing from Pete and is trying to save his soul. While Tobias had a hard time getting on his feet with being expelled from high school at nineteen, then joining the army, and then going to university, Geoffrey was attending Princeton University and was writing

Many people consider Tobias Wolff as an outstanding critic due to certain aspects of his childhood, most notably is his parent’s separation. Following the separation, Wolff evolved into more of a critic up until he went into the army. Furthermore, when he returns from his service, some might note that his personality became more pessimistic than critical. His short stories are acknowledged by many readers because of the diverse aspirations some may be led to have through a myriad of interpretations. Truly, Wolff creates a new perspective of thinking through his creation of the short story “Bullet in the Brain.” Many readers find this claim

One of the many strengths of Tom Wolfe’s writing is his effective narration and character development. Wolfe’s character development

To truly understand mental processes and behaviors of humans, and to write about and fabricate these behaviors in a realistic fictional manner, is truly an astonishing talent, one which is seldom found. Among this rare breed stands Tobias Wolff, Oxford and Stanford educated novelist and short story writer, who is revered as a great modern American writer because of his deep understanding of the human psyche and his ability to design characters so emotionally complex that their hearts beat within the pages of his work. Even without a particular unifying theme amongst his short stories, Wolff remains a pervasive figure in the realm of American literature. He does not need an overlying theme to integrate his short stories; Wolff’s powerful understanding of the human condition and his ability to give his characters pure vitality are enough to thrust him into the realm of literary greatness, where his stories will likely continue to thrive and prosper, even

E.L Doctorow’s last book, Andrew’s Brain is a stream-of-consciousness tale that is dramatic, yet vague and all-around highly questionable. The protagonist, Andrew deals with unfair deaths, epistemology scares, and schizophrenic realities of what it's like to be stuck inside one's mind. The humor adds sympathy and readers can’t help but feel bad for Andrew. However, readers are not understanding him, but how his brain works.

A narrative is constructed to elicit a particular response from its audience. In the form of a written story, authors use specific narrative strategies to position the ‘ideal reader’ to attain the intended understanding of the meanings in the text. Oliver Sacks’ short story The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat is an unusual short story because it does not display conventional plot development; the story does not contain conflict or resolution of conflict. The genre of the story is also difficult to define because it reads as an autobiographical account of an experience Sacks had with a patient while working as a neurologist. Although it is arguable that the narrative is a work of non-fiction, it is nevertheless a representation, distinct

One of the most magnificent American authors, Tobias Jonathan Ansell Wolff, and Anton Pavlovich Chekhov, a Russian playwright as well as a short story writer, are famous for contributing fictional story and drama, in which they profoundly influence the development of literature and generation throughout the world. In such popular dramatic works as “Oysters” by Chekhov and “Powder” by Wolff, the two short stories show a great exemplification of literature work where a wide range of emotions are skillfully depicted. Furthermore, “Oysters” and “Powder” both introduce numerous similarities and differences, ranging from theme to literary devices.

“Big Two Hearted River”, a semi-autobiographical short story by Ernest Hemingway, is a story about the main character, Nick, returning to Big Two Hearted River in order to recover from his inner wounds. Nick Adams goes on a journey alone in nature for a therapeutic purpose as he suffers from PTSD. However, Hemingway purposely avoided any direct discussion regarding to Nick’s mental wounds. The absence of the discussion is contributed by Hemingway’s writing style, the Iceberg principle. Hemingway focuses explicitly on what occurs on the surface without mentioning actual theme. This indicates that the theme of self-healing cannot be uncovered by simply looking at the text itself. In order to comprehend the actual theme of the story, the character development of Nick must be examined. This is possible since Nick Adams is a recurring character of Hemingway’s stories. The two preceding stories of “Big Two Hearted River”, “Now I lay me” and “A Way you’ll Never Be”, directly discusses Nick’s suffering from shell-shock and how he comforts himself by returning to Big Two Hearted river in his mind. The two short stories will be analyzed and connected to “Big Two Hearted River” in the essay first. This will provide a strong understanding of Nick’s psyche and the reason behind his return to nature. Then, “Big Two Hearted River” the short story itself will be carefully analyzed.