The tension rises and falls Essay Example for Free

The tension rises and falls Essay The Italian-American Carbone Family live in a poor and humble area, just over Brooklyn Bridge from Manhattan. Although American the Carbones still have their Italian values and live a Conservative Italian lifestyle. This play is in part about family values, and how two different cultures clash when Catherine and Rodolfo fall in love. But on a more perspective view, it is also about a tragic hero Eddie Carbone and his love for his step-daughter Catherine. This LOVE is not a father to daughter love but a husband to wife love, a love that is not meant to be there. A love to powerful for Eddie to give up. Eddie, the main character of this play is a longshoreman from a conservative background in Sicily. He lives with his wife Beatrice and their step-daughter Catherine. Where he came from there are very firm social and moral issues. The scene that I am going to study is when the Carbone family and their to guests from Sicily have just eaten their evening meal and are having a pleasant conversation at first, but underlying tensions soon begin to build up. The beginning of the scene originally suggests a happy family atmosphere, though we wonder if Eddie is over-protective of Catherine. But recently Beatrices cousins are coming to stay illegally in America over from Sicily. The two cousins arrive, Marco and Rodolfo. Marco simply speaks of the poverty back home and Rodolfo not a typical Italian by his appearance or personality talks about how he can sing and plans to buy a motorbike. Rodolfos singing of Paper Dolls delights Catherine, who obviously is attracted to him. But soon this relationship develops, much to the distress of Eddie who himself is in love with Catherine. He can not express or admit his love as keeps them repressed. The scene starts with a nice after dinner conversation but tension is beginning to build up. The argument starts when Eddie raises the point about submarines, slang name for illegal immigrants. I betcha theres plenty of surprises when those guys get back there, heh? He said this to provoke Rodolfo because he knows that Catherine has her eye on him and to bring up the issues of American values and how wearing a shawl doesnt mean that a girl is strict. But to Eddies disapproval the comment failed to offend Rodolfo.

Times Arrow by Martin Amis Essay -- Times Arrow Martin Amis Essays

Time's Arrow by Martin Amis The human being is an analytical creature. From scientists to philosophers to star-crossed teenaged lovers, the human is internally motivated to understand the world around him. That world provides countless puzzles for the human to solve, whether these puzzles lie in the forests of the heart, the laws of mathematics or the annals of history. However, some of the most unfathomable aspects of this world have been entirely created by humans. The Holocaust is one of the most unfathomable events in human history. Countless documentaries, pieces of literature, psychological analyses and films have explored the topic in an attempt to understand exactly how humans could commit such terrible atrocities against one another. Time’s Arrow, by Martin Amis, initially attempts to answer this question by exploring the life of a Nazi doctor. To do this, he separates the narrator’s consciousness from his mind, re-living his life backwards. In doing so, Amis tries to reverse the laws of entropy, to heal by un-creating human destruction. However, as the narrator (the doctor’s consciousness) eventually finds, reversing time’s arrow does not make the Holocaust fathomable. Therefore, in Time’s Arrow, Martin Amis suggests that humans will always manage to increase entropy, despite the reversal of time and the laws of the physical world. The term â€Å"entropy† describes a â€Å"measure of disorder or randomness in an isolated system† (Dictionary.com). According to the Second Law of Thermodynamics, the entropy of an isolated system will always increase over time. Therefore, disorder and randomness are constantly increasing. Amis drew from both this law and the work of the physicist A.S. Eddington in writing T... ... undo the chaos that we had created. Yet in Time’s Arrow, entropy is not just never truly reduced, it is ultimately increased. Thus, Amis argues that entropy’s effect on humanity is an inherently human creation. We create our own misery, our own disorder, our own chaos, regardless of the physical laws and the direction in which time is flowing. Therefore, in Time’s Arrow Amis suggests that humans are inherently entropic creatures, so much so that entropy as it pertains to us is less of a physical property, and more of a human characteristic. Bibliography Amis, Martin. Time’s Arrow. London: Vintage, Random House, 1991. â€Å"Entropy.† Dictionary.com. 2004 http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=entropy Menke, Richard. â€Å"Narrative Reversals and the Thermodynamics of History in Martin Amis’s Time’s Arrow.† Modern Fiction Studies 44.4 (1998) 959-980.

Analysis Of Arthur Miller’s Death Of A Salesman Essay

This American drama was first premiered in 1949. It was an instant success and it also won Arthur Miller a place among one of the best American playwrights of the 20th century. It was a satirical attack on the Great American Dream of prosperity and material wealth and had also challenged the ideals of the past 160 years that constituted such dreams. This exemplary play by Arthur Miller is a modern masterpiece, in which the inherent conditions of human existence and a fierce battle to fight through it, is lived by the protagonist Willy Loman, that finally ends in a tragedy called, death. Willy Loman is a disillusioned sixty three year old man who has trouble distinguishing between past and present, and reality and illusions. His illusory beliefs draw an iron curtain before his sensibilities and he refuses to see the reality of his abject conditions. His tragedy lies in the fierce determination to fight an impossible battle and to seek facile solutions to his severe economic problems. In his relentless pursuit of an unrealistic dream Willy Loman submerges himself in a complete disengagement from reality that brings an end even more tragic than his life. Being an irrepressible old man he never really evaluates or understands the false and incomplete values of a venal American society. He fails to understand the vacuous idea behind the ‘Great American Dream’ and his limitless hope. A similar theme had been portrayed in ‘The Great Gatsby’ (Fitzgerald) where Gatsby was corrupted by money and dishonesty, and the Great American Dream of happiness and individualism disintegrates into mere pursuit of wealth. Although Gatsby had the power to turn his dream into reality, the character of Nick discovers that both Gatsby’s dream and the American dream is over. In the same way, Will’s persistent struggle against the forces of entropy in his life leads him to neurosis, and finally suicide. Theater is an imagined world, inhabited by imaginary characters, but tragedy strikes one and all, and the nature of tragedy is to hit our deepest consciousness and invade our sensibilities with its prolonged stay. Robert A Martin says in his essay, â€Å"The Nature of Tragedy†: â€Å"What the performance of a play gives an audience is less a set of ideas, propositions or abstraction about life and how to live it than what Arthur Miller has called ‘ a felt experience’, the imaginative sharing and participation in the lives and actions of imaginary characters. † In support of what Robert A Martin says, Willy Loman’s character pulls the audience along with its chain of tragedies and leaves one with a feeling of acute distress, but more than â€Å"a felt experience† it also gives one an insight into the inherent realities of human tragedies. In â€Å"Death of a salesman† the audience watch the tragic collapse of a single individual and the tragedy of the entire family, right before their eyes. The audience leave the auditorium with a whole new set of lessons in life and as Martin says â€Å"how to live it. † In his article Robert A Martin also elaborates on the vicarious influences of a tragedy, on the person, who watching it with a detached sense of belongingness. He says, â€Å" Theatre is the art of the possible† and as we read the play we believe that Willy Loman’s tragedies are not unbelievable or fictitious although his character was an imagination of the playwright Arthur Miller. As Aristotle said that Tragedy is something that evokes the emotions of pity and fear in the presence of an action of a certain magnitude. Willy Loman also falls into the trap of tragedy and as the nature of tragedy is, it brings about a fear in him. Willy tries to run away from that fear and refuses to accept his misfortunes and his failures. It mostly happens with dramatic experiences that our thoughts and emotions often correspond with those of the characters we watch in a play –we weep, smile and get moved by their performances. It continues to stimulate and engage us directly in our social, moral and political questions. The audience too goes through an inveterate interchange of pity and fear inside his mind as he watches a human being go through a painful hell, which is in Miller’s view due to his own obduracy. â€Å"Death of a salesman† is not just a tale of tragedy that happens to a broken, exhausted man, but is also a caustic attack on the American Dream of achieving wealth and success with no regards to principals and values of life. Willy Loman became a household name after the play was released and became a profound example of a tragic life, bowed down by struggles to cope up with a capitalistic society. Willy Loman’s tragedy does not lie just in his miserable economic condition, but also in his misplaced sense of pride. In the play he takes loans from his neighbor Charley to make both ends meet, but refuses to accept the offer of a better job from him. His warped sense of pride comes in the way of his chances to improve his conditions. His refusal to accept reality is a tragedy bigger than his dismal life, and it exasperates his son Biff with whom he had a troubled relationship. Willy refused to accept that his sons are also ‘failures’ such as him, and in order to make their lives better he falls into a trap of further hopelessness. A man’s descent to failure is horrendous to contemplate. Whatever line of work you are in, we are all salesmen, selling our products, our services, our selves†. Says Will’s meighbor Charley , in a line that crystallizes the anxiety of uncountable men everywhere, not just in America: â€Å" And when they start not smiling back. † –employers, partners, customers- â€Å" That’s an earthqauke. † ( Kilnghoffer, Undying Salesman, 1999). Willy Loman suffered from a feverish and unrealistic hopefulness and guilt of having failed his sons, and also the refusal to accept certain facts of life. The neurosis that set in him affected his life, and also him led to suicide. His death was perhaps a bigger tragedy than his life because it proved to be the final blow to the grief stricken family. Due to his persistent stubbornness he believed the notion that one is often â€Å"worth more dead than alive† (Miller, Pg76) and commits suicide, so that his family gets the insurance money and his sons lead a better life with that money, than he did when he was alive. Willy did not realize that insurance money is invalidated when a person commits suicide. As Biff says at the graveyard, â€Å" He had the wrong dreams. All, all wrong. † In this play tragedy is on two fronts. One is ‘literal’, when Willy dies after an unrelenting wrestle with his fate, and another is a ‘symbolical’ death, that was the death of the American Dream, or ridding of a false notion of perfection. Willy’s guilt, his idolization of his sons and his constantly haunting memory of his brother turns his life into a pitiful tragedy and he lives through it all with an immature sense of unreality. In trying to project himself as an ideal father and salesman he plunges himself into an illusory world where he never really grew up. â€Å"I’m gonna show you and everybody else that Willy Loman did not die in vain. He had a good dream. It’s the only dream you can have- to come out number –one man. He fought it out here, and this is where I’m gonna win it for him. † (Miller, Death of a Salesman, Act2) The misfortune of Willy was that he tried to retrieve his lost dignity and his family’s love and also a magnified image of himself as an ideal salesman and father, on the last day of his life, and loses all. His complete disengagement from reality is what the tragedy is all about. It evokes the pity and fear that Aristotle spoke about in ‘Poetics’ (330 BC). The character of Willy Loman is befitting the concepts of Aristotle’s’ Tragedy. â€Å"True to life† (realistic), â€Å"consistency† (true to themselves): meaning, once a character’s motivation and personality are established these should continue throughout the play. â€Å"Necessary or probable†: meaning, characters must be logically constructed according to the law of ‘probability or necessity’ that govern the actions of the play. Finally, â€Å"true to life† and yet more beautiful (idealized, ennobled). Death of a Salesman has that true to life aspect, depicting the fact that any middle class man with limited means, would get into the delusionary world of dreams and aspirations of more wealth and the terrifying darkness that lies coiled beneath such unrealism. Consistency of the portrayal is apparent in Loman’s relentless pursuit of an elusive life. The necessary probability is the fact that such a dogged belief in illusionary world nearly always creates a graph of downward slide in a person’s life. True to life, is the condition of tension that is life and human existence. Death of a Salesman is a modern masterpiece that celebrates, as Chris Bigsby expressively states, â€Å" the miracle of human life, in all its bewilderments, its betrayals, its denials, but finally and most significantly, its transcendent worth. † (Poet, 723).

Singapore s Success As A Nation Essay - 1199 Words

In my opinion, Singapore’s success as a nation refers to how Singapore has managed to climb from third world status to first world status today and also how Singapore has managed to handle the continued unrest to maintaining the peace and stability it has today. Hence, I agree to the above statement that the two factors have successfully built a Singapore nation and will continue to be fundamental to Singapore’s future success as a nation. Sustained economic growth has successfully built a Singapore nation as it enables Singapore to have sufficient resources to develop in terms of education, infrastructure, society, health and many others. It also had a major part to play in the transition of our third world to first world status. On the other hand, the presence of a strong military has also successfully built a Singapore nation as it helps Singapore to protect its own sovereignty and control its internal security. With sustained economic growth, comes low unemployment rate and this has helped with the development of the society at large. After the separation from Malaysia, Singapore had a high unemployment rate of about 10%. Over the years, due to sustained economic growth, Singapore has been able to lower the unemployment rate and maintain it at 2% from 2011 to 2014. With more people employed, a sense of belonging is cultivated in the people as they feel that they are able to contribute to the society and the country at large. Also, as monetary issues are less of aShow MoreRelatedSingapore s Future Success As A Nation Essay1237 Words   |  5 Pagesbuilt a Singapore nation. These two factors will continue to be fundamental to Singapore’s future success as a nation.† Discuss. In my opinion, Singapore’s success as a nation refers to how Singapore has managed to climb from third world status to first world status today and also how Singapore has managed to handle the continued unrest to maintaining the peace and stability it has today. Hence, I agree to the above statement that the two factors have successfully built a Singapore nation and willRead MoreEconomy of Singapore 1077 Words   |  5 Pageshow government strategies and economic policy play a crucial role in the success of High Performance Asian Economies (HPAEs) during 1960 to 1990 (World Bank 1993).There are eight countries within HPAEs: South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and Japan. Its economic development has significantly rise that it was name ‘East Asia Miracle’ (World Bank, 1993). Out of the eight country, Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea were known as â€Å"Asia’s Four Little Dragon†Read MoreEast Asia is a diverse region housing some of the largest nations in the world as well as some of1300 Words   |  6 Pagesthe largest nations in the world as well as some of the smallest. Remarkably, over the past 20 years, the region of East Asia has experienced overwhelming success and growth rates. East Asia currently ranks as one of the top regions in the world in terms of economic success and growth. According to Thomas Leipziger, (Leipziger, 3) The East Asian countries have a record of maintaining political and economic stability and of pursuing long-term economic goals. The success of East AsiaRead MoreSingapore Is A Third World Country Located On The Southern Tip Of The Indian Ocean And The South China1164 Words   |  5 PagesSingapore healthcare system Singapore is a third world country located on the southern tip of the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea (Moh.gov.sg, 2015). It is a well-developed country within Southeast Asia. The territory is an island shaped like a diamond. In late 1960, the island expanded due to land retrieval. Singapore core principles are a meritocracy, multiculturalism, and secularism (Moh.gov.sg, 2015). The country is a parliamentary republic, and the officials languages are English, MalayRead MoreThe Democratic Process Of Southeast Asian Countries1478 Words   |  6 PagesThe democratic process of Southeast Asian countries, such as Malaysia and Singapore, has seen very little significant changes from civil society action. While each of these countries have claimed to be democratic nations, there has been little change in terms of government rule since their independence. These civil society groups are ones that reflect the ideas and values of a group of people, in pursuit of a common goal. The changes that have resulted are in Malaysia and Singapore’s governmentsRead MoreAsian Tigers Vs. South Korea1473 Words   |  6 Pagescountries named Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan. These states were highly developed countries. These countries were the first states that shifted to industrialization. All the four Asian tigers have a lot of people who are very educated and are perfect in undertaking their tasks. These countries developed and implemented different policies and this result in economic prosperity and tried to do them than any other state. For instance, Hong Kong and Singapore became the masters of internationalRead MoreA Company Of Organic Skin Care And Home Products1572 Words   |  7 Pagesmarket. We chose Singapore as a start and as a door to the Asian market. Given Singapore’s location we thought it as the best place to start. Eden is interested in introducing green products and living to Singapore and felt it was the best place to introduce thi s concept. In the country, there are a couple of organic food stores and health stores. There is some competition but with careful planning and smart advertising we believe we will be able to get a good size of the market. Singapore has some ecofriendlyRead MoreKey Contextual Language Differences Between Japan And Singapore And The Different Language Education Policies Of The Two Countries1288 Words   |  6 Pagesintroduce the key contextual language differences between Japan and Singapore and the different language education policies of the two countries. Specifically, the historical background concerning the use of English in the two countries, the political landscape involving the role of English, the mentality towards English and lastly the teaching of English. In the past English was the language of the Singaporean government when Singapore was a British colony. Since then it has been a wellspring of economicRead MoreIntercultural Communication Theories Covering : Hofstede s Value Orientations, Intercultural Sensitivity, Culture, And Culture Shock Essay1697 Words   |  7 Pagesexperienced living, working and socialising overseas with people from different ethnicities. In 1957 he moved from Stamford, England to Seletar, Singapore to take up a job as a manager with the military. Collier continued to live in Singapore for three years until his return to England in 1960. His experiences and insight into the foreign culture of 1950’s Singapore will be explored in this essay, with specific reference to intercultural communicati on theories covering: Hofstede’s value orientations, attributionsRead MoreThe During World War II1567 Words   |  7 PagesDuring World War II, Singapore was conquered and occupied by the Japanese Empire from 1942 to 1945. British Military Administration was formed to govern the island until March 1946. Much of the infrastructure had been destroyed during the war, including electricity and water supply systems, telephone services, as well as the harbor facilities at the Port of Singapore. There was also a shortage of food leading to malnutrition, disease, and rampant crime and violence. High food prices, unemployment