A Comparison of the Dream in Death of a Salesman, Ellis Island, and Ame

The Dream in Death of a Salesman, Ellis Island, and America and I   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The American dream is as varied as the people who populate America. The play The Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller, the poem "Ellis Island" by Joseph Bruchac, and the poem "America and I" by Anzia Yezierska illustrate different perspectives of the American dream. All three authors show some lines of thought on what the freedom inherent in the American dream means. The authors clarify distinct ideas on the means to achieving the American dream. The authors also elucidate some different goals striven for in the dream for a better life. Diverse ideas on how freedom plays into the American dream, what actions are needed to achieve the American dream, and the goals of that dream are explained in the works of the three authors.    The portion of American culture that makes the American dream possible is that of freedom of opportunity and self-determination. Opportunity in America means that people have a chance of making a good lives for themselves with proper guidance and strong wills. The character Willy Loman in The Death of a Salesman showed his faith in American opportunity when he thought of his brother Ben saying such comments as, "Opportunity is tremendous in Alaska, William. Surprised you're not up there" (Miller 45). Because Willy passed up opportunities, he felt that he had failed the American dream. In "Ellis Island", the speaker portrays opportunity as the chance to do honest work and get rewarded for it. This idea is shown in the lines, "[Dreams] Waiting for those who'd worked a thousand years yet never owned their own"(Bruchac l. 11-13). Similarly, the poem "America and I" expressed the freedom of opportunity as a... ...or wrong. Different pictures of the American dream are displayed through The Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller, "Ellis Island" by Joseph Bruchac, and "America and I" by Anzia Yezierska. Although the dreams may vary in substance, they are all rooted in American freedom, land, and desires.    Works Cited    Literature for Composition: Essays, Fiction, Poetry, and Drama ed. Sylvan Barnet, Longman 2000    Bruchac, Joseph. Ellis Island,   Sylvan Barnet, Literature for Composition    Miller, Arthur.   Death of a Salesman.   New York: Penguin, 1949.    Yezierska, Anzia. "America and I." The Open Cage: An Anzia Yezierska Collection. Ed. Alice Kessler-Harris. New York: Persea Books, 1979. Rpt. in The Heath Anthology of American Literature. Ed. Paul Lauter et al. 4 ed. Vol. 2. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2002.      

Assault and Battery

Introduction In the context of criminal law, â€Å"assault and battery† are typically components of a single offense. In tort law, â€Å"assault† and â€Å"battery† are separate, with an assault being an act which creates fear of an imminent battery, and the battery being an unlawful touching. Assault and battery are intentional torts, meaning that the defendant actually intends to put the plaintiff in fear of being battered, or intends to wrongfully touch the plaintiff.The wrongful touching need not inflict physical injury, and may be indirect (such as contact through a thrown stone, or spitting). This article describes the law of assault and battery as it is commonly applied, although the law may vary in any specific jurisdiction. Assault An assault involves: 1. An intentional, unlawful threat or â€Å"offer† to cause bodily injury to another by force; 2. Under circumstances which create in the other person a well-founded fear of imminent peril; 3. Where there exists the apparent present ability to carry out the act if not prevented.Note that an assault can be completed even if there is no actual contact with the plaintiff, and even if the defendant had no actual ability to carry out the apparent threat. For example, a defendant who points a realistic toy gun at the plaintiff may be liable for assault, even though the defendant was fifty feet away from the plaintiff and had no actual ability to inflict harm from that distance. Battery A battery is the willful or intentional touching of a person against that person’s will by another person, or by an object or substance put in motion by that other person.Please note that an offensive touching can constitute a battery even if it does not cause injury, and could not reasonably be expected to cause injury. A defendant who emphatically pokes the plaintiff in the chest with his index finger to emphasize a point may be culpable for battery (although the damages award that results ma y well be nominal). A defendant who spits on a plaintiff, even though there is little chance that the spitting will cause any injury other than to the plaintiff's dignity, has committed a battery.

Ernest Hemingway Essay

Ernest Hemingway is one of the writers that define American Literature. Although he accomplished much in reputation and status due to his novel, his most celebrated works have always been his short stories. His short stories, which are known for their simple language and artful prose, are often seen as a reflection of his life. It can indeed be seen through several of the plots he penned that he was drawing out his own life experiences such as his portrayal of himself as a macho man, his relationship with the women in his life, war and death and of course alcohol. Noting this Martin Scofield rightly states, â€Å"the personal experience on which he frequently drew directly in his writing was full of confusing tension and conflict – between masculine and feminine elements in his personality, between admiration for the physical courage and a growing disillusion with violence, and between the optimism of youth and physical energy, and the inevitable depredation of old age and death. In his short stories we see vividly developed snapshots of turmoil, precise delineations of individual fragments of disparate experience.† (Scofield 139). The kind of heroes that the author went to write about in his book were a direct reflection of the kind of man he wanted to be. The male protagonist has an aura of dignity and an unwavering integrity about them. Compromise is not known to these characters in most instances. In fact both male and female characters that were created by Hemingway are more often than not, defiant of the society that they exist in and continually go against the societal norms and expectations. Hemingway was by nature a macho man. His life has shown us his indulgences in great adventures. The time he spent in wars, hunting and sport is reflected in several of his works. The kind of heroes Hemingway wrote about will probably not suffice today; torn soldiers, and death defying hunters, adventurers and bullfighters made up his works, but that these characters exhibited a personal code of honesty and decency. Harvey Claflin Mansfield rightly categorized the author’s personality in his book ‘Maniliness’, â€Å"Hemingway was a macho fellow and a seeker of adventure when coupled with fun†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (Mansfield 52). An example of this can be taken from his short story ‘Indian Camp,’ where the physician is neither concerned with his lack of anesthetic and equipment nor the screaming patient. In true alpha male mode, he goes onto deliver a child with a jack-knife.   His complete lack of interest in the women’s pain, which normally affects people, and the way he goes onto admire his work as though it was a non-living thing gives off a very sadistic and stereotypical macho essence. At the same time we can compare the physician’s character to the American Indian man who slit his throat and died during his wife’s giving birth. That man did not have the courage and strength to face the ordeal that his wife was going through, unlike the physician who seemed to think nothing of it. And like that Hemingway continuously writes about men that could stand up to things and endure things. The strength which he at times referred to ‘grace under pressure’ was reflective of the kind of man that does not succumb to his problems. His story of the bull fighter can also be seen as an example of this very thing, where the protagonist ignores injuries to enter battle. Explaining the development of the characters through the developments in Hemingway’s life, John Campbell noted, â€Å"In the 1920s, Hemingway began to develop a public role for himself in an attempt to show people how a writer acts when not writing. He became comfortable with this role and wrote essays for Esquire Magazine that reflected a person, outdoorsman image of a very physical man; he made a safari to Africa in the 1930s, killed big game, and so on. His male characters began to resemble this image and became more â€Å"Active† in the 1930s and 1940s. Readers often associate this macho image with Hemingway, but it is difficult to generalize about men in his work, since the early male characters are vulnerable and the later ones – more independent – have a sense of â€Å"toughness† strength and masculinity.†Ã‚   (Campbell 251) Hemingway wrote extensively throughout his career. One of the main recurring themes that can be seen in his short stories is that of war and death. He participated in the First World War as an ambulance driver under the Red Cross. It was during his term in Italy that he had his first love affair and was also injured. As a part of the Italian infantry he was awarded two decorations by the Italian government as well. It was his time here that he witnessed first hand the ruthlessness and stoic attitude of soldiers around him. Much of his observations later became part of his works. His time as a war correspondent in span also influenced his work. The events of the civil war that took place in Spain greatly affected him. â€Å"The Spanish civil war stories have two characteristics in common. The first-person narrator in all of them is obviously Hemingway himself, correspond dent, film-maker, raconteur, and famous personage. The second characteristic is that the real subject of all these stories, as well as the play, is the political nature of the conflict. Philips Rawlings, the main character in the ‘Fifth Column’ is also substantially autobiographical and the ‘girl,’ Dorothy Bridges, is clearly based on Martha Gellhorn, as is the girl in the story ‘Landscapes with Figures† (Donaldson 236). The stories are his version of events and how he saw the war. Most of the material is based on first hand information and as he experienced it. His short stories poignantly portrayed soldiers that left behind and lived with legacies of combat. In ‘Soldier’s Home,’ Krebs is the disillusioned veteran that comes back to home to find himself without a spiritual home. He is out of place, alienated from his family, religion and society. Hemingway’s examination of the war torn characters can also bee seen through Nick Adams. Some critiques have linked the short stories to a potential autobiographical connection and their thematic treatment to the various stages the characters go through i.e. Nick’s stages of recovery from his physical and psychological war wounds which mirror the one’s Hemingway suffered himself. It is Hemingway who in the third-person story supports the fundamental idea of Nick’s physical and spiritual recovery and renewal. It can be taken in view that writing was a form of catharsis for the author and through writing about his ordeal he managed to work through his anxiety of war (to an extent). We can see through the stories, glimpses of Hemingway’s own pain and anguish. When he returned from war ridden areas he was deeply affected. The effects of his experiences were heavy influences on his work and gave them a new sense of life. Hemingway had extremely turbulent relationships with the women in his life. His love stories are ruled by conflict between men and women whose lives are always stuck in some momentum of great tension and problems, or an extremely vivid change. He was married to four different women and was infamous for his multiple affairs. If one was to look at Hemingway’s life, one would notice that he lacked the will to stick to one woman. At some point and time breaking things off and moving on stopped giving him the guilt it once did and women became just a habit for him. His relationships with women affected his work a great deal; Paul Reuban went onto prove this in his work when he wrote that, â€Å"His [Hemingway’s] writing also reflected his trouble with relating to women and his tendency to treat them as objects, as he had four marriages and countless affairs, highlighting his theme of alienation and disconnection [in his work].† It was his guilt over women that led him to the bottle and subsequently drenched him in depression. He could not move past his guilt quickly enough before he moved onto the next woman. In his entire life he repeatedly cheated on all the women he was   with; it was a vicious cycle of finding love, breaking love by finding someone else, getting depressed over his actions, finding someone else to get out of the depression. An example of the effect that his love life had on his work can be seen in ‘Hills like White Elephants,’ which was written after Hemingway had cheated on his wife Hadley with her own friend Pauline Pfeiffer. When Hemingway asked for a divorce, Hadley placed a condition of a separation between him and Pfeiffer for a certain period of time; if he remained in love even after that time he was to be granted the divorce. It was during this period that he wrote the story. The biggest similarity between his life and the short story is that in either a family member or loved one was being separated. The story which centers on a conversation between a man and a woman show that the man is the authority. The poor communication skills between the two also reflect that their relationship might end. Perhaps Hemingway himself saw this as Hadley and himself which poor communication was ending up in the death of something that connected them, in the case of the characters this would be the unborn child. When in Italy, Hemingway had a love affair while he was wounded in this duration. The effects of this can be seen in his works as well. In ‘A very short story,’ the injured solider who is found on the Italian front has a love affair with a nurse who tended to him. Just like Hemingway himself who fell in love with Agnes Von Kurowsky. As the story goes, the nurse later leaves the solider for an Italian officer. â€Å"‘A very short story’ ranks as one of Hemingway’s least effective stories. Behind a pretense of objectivity, it excoriates the faithless Agnes. Even four years after the jilting, he was too close to his subject matter to achieve the requisite artistic distance†¦ twice again he explored the subject of love between a wounded soldier and his nurse†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (Beegal 105). Throughout his work it will be seen that he advocates the kind of courage in the world where men must survive without women, which goes against the work itself because it is based largely on this mother, sisters, wives, lovers etc. Hemingway’s works paved way for an entirely new genre of writing. He used plain simple language to give voice to his stories. Much of his work, when it comes to short stories, is greatly influenced by his life and it can be seen through the various example given herewith, how his life was a muse to him. His relationships with women and subsequently alcohol, his experiences at war and the death that he saw, and his ideas on masculinity and manhood were some of the basic ideas that he infused with his writings to form the basis of many of his stories. Hemingway may have been gifted but he very conflicts that he tried to work out through his writings, and the very tensions that he wrote about, subsequently became the reason he took his own life.

Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller Essay

The play, Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller is a tragedy. It is about an American family who live their lives masking their reality, which is filled with tension and instability, with the American dream lifestyle. The father of the household, William Loman, is the driving force behind fantasizing these illusions. Hence, in the play, we are faced with many incidences where false perceptions occur and fall apart in the face of reality. We see evidence of this unmasked false perception in the situation where many, despite his ongoing boasting of being ‘well liked’, laughed at William. Although he made it seem as if he was of major importance in his workplace, the reality was that he was indispensable. Willy was found to be an adulterer dissolving any fantasy of a stable family. Bill Oliver, Willy’s son Biffs’, past employer could not even recognize Biff, after creating the figment that he was well favoured by him. Finally, preceding his death, Willy prided himself on all the people who would show up to his funeral, however, no one but his immediate family and friends attended. At the start of the play, William comes home exhausted from his job. He confides in his wife, Linda that he no longer feels to take long trips as he usually drives from New York to Boston. To enhance his quality of life and to resolve the problem of his exhaustion, he decides that he would request jobs that require him to stay in New York. He believes that this option can be easily made available to him as he thinks he is a valuable asset to the business and that it owes a great deal to him.† I’ll come home with an advance and a New York job.† He tells Linda this with assurance, right before he goes to see his boss. On the other hand however, a different picture is painted when he goes to his boss, Howard, to make the request. He is denied his wishes. Willy even tries to negotiate lower wages with Howard in attempts to persuade him to conform to his desires but he turns his back on this plea as well. Howard goes on to further humiliate Willy as he fires him from th e job entirely. Howard tells Willy: ‘I don’t want you to represent us I’ve been meaning to tell you this for a long time.’ The wall of false adoration shatters as Howard uncovers how useless Willy really is to the running of the business. In the play, William emphasizes, in many instances, that he is ‘well-liked’ and that he is one of a kind even though this is not the case. He goes to his grave telling the tale that people from all around  love and admire him. He drills this notion so far that he believes it himself. ‘I am not a dime a dozen! I am Willy Loman and you are Biff Loman.’ He even nurtures these thoughts into the minds of his children. ‘And they know me, boys, they know me up and down New England. The finest people. And when I bring you fellas up, there’ll be open sesame for all of us, ‘cause one thing, boys: I have friends. I can park my car in any street in New England, and the cops protect it like their own.’ However, Willy’s son Biff reveals to us that in reality, people in the business world hold no respect for him and look onto him as a joke and laugh at him. ‘ They’ve laughed at dad for years and you know why? Because we don’t belong in this nuthouse of a city.’ In this situation we see where the false perception of Willy being well liked falls apart in the realistic world his son tries to live in where he can share the truth; that he is laughed at. At the core of the American dream is the ideal, stable family unit; Willy has failed in his attempts to achieve this. He has a supportive wife and thinks he has the perfect sons as he covers up their faults and does not correct their wrongs, but instead makes excuses for them. However, we see that the family is in fact unstable as he is adulterous to his wife. Despite his attempts to conceal his relations with this mistress to portray a loving father and husband, Biff finds his father in a hotel in Boston with her, when he goes to look for Willy after finding out that he has flunked Mathematics. This in turn deteriorates the once close-knit relationship that Biff and Willy had. Biff tells Linda, â€Å"he threw me out of this house remember?† Linda says, â€Å"Why did he do that I never knew why?† And Biff replies, â€Å"because I know he’s a fake and he doesn’t like anybody around who knows.† The false perception of an ideal family falls apart when Biff discovers the truth about his father. In an attempt to turn a new leaf and make something of himself, Biff decides on a plan of action. He would go to his past employer, Bill Oliver, and ask for a loan to serve as start up capital for a partnership he would start with his brother Happy, in a sports clothing company. His motive for believing he would be funded is that he recalls Bill Oliver showing favour to him and promising him anything he needed. ‘When I quit he said to me, he  put his arm on my shoulder and he said, >> Biff, if you ever need anything, come to me  him anything he needed. Biff found out that Willy was an adulterous husband eliminating any possibility of having a stable family like they would have thought in the past. Finally, only Willy’s immediate family and friends attended Willy’s funeral although he spoke of many people attending and of him being so well liked by many.

Regional and Economic International Organizations Essay

Regional and Economic International Organizations - Essay Example Many people lived lives of total despair. However, there were a number of brave men and women who decided to look at this crisis as an opportunity and to fashion something new out of the mess. The most important change to make involved the world economic system. And so the Bretton Woods regime was founded on July 1944, in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, United States, by the delegations of the 44 Allied nations with the intent of creating a new financial and economic order, due to the shift of power occurred as a result of the Second World War. The Bretton Woods regime was a result of the events which affected the world economy and political system, starting from the great Depression to the rise of Nationalist dictatorships and finally the Second World War; its declared objective was to ensure prosperity to all nations, so conflict would never occur again, and can best be understood by this quotation: "The nations should consult and agree on international monetary changes which affect each other. They should outlaw practices which are agreed to be harmful to world prosperity, and they should assist each other to overcome short-term exchange difficulties." The lesson learned by the horrors of the war were that increased economic integration would stand a good chance of reducing the opportunities and incentives to go to war. If war cost the same amount to everyone there would be few advantages for any one country to start one. Economic integration and some standardization would be key to this. The policy of open markets first seriously pushed at this conference would have a major influence on the world economy to this day. This policy however did not come out of the blue. There were a number of significant individuals who came up with the theories and principles that underlay and who worked hard to guide the process forward. Without a doubt one of the most important of these figures was the economist John Maynard Keynes, one

Annotated Bibliography Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Annotated Bibliography - Assignment Example In this book, the author gives information on the latest designs that are used in the aircraft industry. Among the recent materials used are the composite materials which have been highly rated. The author is an associate in the Royal Aeronautical Society, which makes the book have full information on the development of the aircraft industry. The federal aviation gives information on all the acceptable standards of materials used in making aircraft and the manual that can be used by pilots in the course of their working. The federal foundation is a body that controls the aircraft industry with control over a number of issues. This material hives information on how the technology has been improving in using composite materials in making aircraft. The author incepts that there are advantages in the use of the composite materials. The author is the head of strength analysis group. National oceanography centre. (27th June 2006). Composites in aerospoace- case studies. Southampton: National oceanography centre. Retrieved from: http://www.infosys.com/industries/aerospace-defense/case-studies/documents/living-composites.pdf With a team of experts, the national oceanography gives the case studies that have been used in making the composite materials a success. The experts have studied the use of the composite materials and how they should be improved in their usage. Edwards T. (September, 2008). Composite material revolutionizes aerospace engineering. New York: Engineering consultancy Atkins. Retrieved from: http://www.ingenia.org.uk/ingenia/issues/issue36/edwards.pdf Edwards gives all the information that is used in making the composite materials used in the aerospace. This information also gives the future of the use of composite materials as the technological improvement of aeronautical engineering. Edwards is a chief structural engineer and has ample information about composite

Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio The Calling of Saint Mathew Research Paper

Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio The Calling of Saint Mathew - Research Paper Example It is understood that a painting is incomplete without knowledge of its background. Further, interpretations of a painting vary between people and with time and it is the contradictory interpretations in paintings that makes the painting interesting and often lend an element of mystery towards it. The painting discussed in this paper is also not without its special context and interpretations. Discussion The painting, The Calling of Saint Mathews is a masterpiece that was commissioned by the church to be hanged within the Contraelli Chapel located inside the Church of San Luigi Dei Francesi. The chapel was meant to be an ode for Saint Mathews and for this Caravaggio was selected when the first choice of the church, Cavalier D’Arpino became busy with the royal patronage. This was probably the biggest church commission that Caravaggio got at that time. Therefore, he put all this time and energy into the creation of this masterpiece along with two others painting, the Martyrdom o f Saint Matthews and The Inspiration of Saint Mathews. The painting till date hangs with other paintings depicting important moments in the life of Saint Mathews. The painting was completed in 1600. We have to understand that this was a time when the church was in power. It had the money to fund biblical paintings. The Calling of Saint Mathews is a painting representing an important biblical sense. The painting takes reference from Luke 5:27-28, which reads: ‘And after that He went out and noticed a tax collector named Levi sitting in the tax booth, and He said to him, ‘Follow me’. And he left everything behind, and got up and began to follow him’ (Benner, 124) The painting, quite like many produced in the same era, is full of religious symbols. The painting, primarily, symbolizes the difference between Christ and Matthews. In this respect, the picture can be divided into two parts: one part showing Christ and Peter while the other depicting Mathews and his companies. Both these parts are in stark contrast with each other. Christ and Peter represent spirituality. They do so through their simple clothing and the fact they do not wear any shoes. The absence of footwear reflects on the fact that these men are down to earth without any love for material objects. Mathews and his companions reflect the worldly life. This is apparent in the way they dress: fashionably in the attire that was trend during the time period when the painting was created. Also the presence of the coins and the preoccupation of some companions with the coins reflect on the worldly life enjoyed by Mathews and his companies (Benner, 129). Another symbol apparent in the painting is the way the painting has been divided into two parts. Here Caravaggio uses his typical style of chiaroscuro where he paints a stark contrast of light and dark in the painting (Cunningham and Reich, 360). Between Christ and Mathews, Caravaggio has painted a dark area and the hand of Christ e xtending towards the dark spot. The light in the picture comes from the side where Christ is standing. This play of light seems to be intentional on the part of the painter as he depicts Christ as a beacon of hope and light for Mathews while taking him away from a life of materialistic love and wastage. Also the dark spot between the two important figures symbolizes the fact that before Christ, people were left in darkness with no way to reach