Portrait Of The Artist As Young Man Essays -

Portrait Of The Artist As Young Man Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man By: Valerie Gomez Stephen Dedalus, the main character in most of James Joyce's writings, is said to be a reflection of Joyce himself. In A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, the reader follows Stephen as he develops from a young child into a young artist, overcoming many conflicts both internally and externally, and narrowly escaping a life long commitment to the clergy. Through Joyce's use of free indirect style, all of Stephen's speech, actions, and thoughts are filtered through the narrator of the story. However, since Joyce so strongly identifies with Stephen, his character's style and personality greatly influence the narrator. This use of free indirect style and stylistic contagion makes Joyce's use of descriptive language one of his most valuable tools in accurately depicting Stephen Dedalus's developing ideals of feminine beauty. As a very young child Stephen is taught to idealize the Virgin Mary for her purity and holiness. She is described to Stephen as "a tower of Ivory" and a "House of Gold" (p.35). Stephen takes this literally and becomes confused as to how these beautiful elements of ivory and gold could make up a human being. This confusion is important in that it shows Stephen's inability to grasp abstraction. He is a young child who does not yet understand how someone can say one thing and mean something else. This also explains his trouble in the future with solving the riddles and puzzles presented to him by his classmates at Clongowes. Stephen is very thoughtful and observant and looks for his own way to explain or rationalize the things that he does not understand. In this manner he can find those traits that he associates with the Blessed Mary in his protestant playmate Eileen. Her hands are "long and white and thin and cold and soft. That was ivory: a cold white thing. That was the meaning of Tower of Ivory" (p.36). "Her fair hair had streamed out behind her like gold in the sun" (p.43). To Stephen that is the meaning of House of Gold. He then attributes Eileen's ivory hands to the fact that she is a girl and generalized these traits to all females. This produces a major conflict for Stephen when his tutor, Dante, tells him not to play with Eileen because she is a Protestant and Protestants don't understand the Catholic faith and therefore will make a mockery of it. His ideas about women being unattainable are confirmed. The Virgin Mary is divine and therefore out of reach for mortals. Now Eileen, the human representation of the Blessed Mary, is out of reach as well because Stephen is not allowed to play with her. In chapter two an amazing transformation takes place in Stephen from a young innocent child who believes women are unattainable and who idealizes the Virgin Mary, into a young teen with awakening sexual desires. As Stephen matures into adolescence, he becomes increasingly aware of his sexuality, which at times is confusing to him. At the beginning of the second chapter in A Portrait, we find Stephen associating feminine beauty with the heroine Mercedes in Alexander Dumont Pere's The Count of Monte Cristo. "Outside Blackrock, on the road that led to the mountains, stood a small whitewashed house in the garden of which grew many rosebushes: and in this house, he told himself, another Mercedes lived....there appeared an image of himself, grown older and sadder, standing in a moonlit garden with Mercedes who had so many years before slighted his love..."(p. 62-3). These fantasies about Mercedes are the first real step for Stephen in challenging the church's view of women, but again he feels as though this image of women is out of his reach. She is a fictional character in a Romantic Adventure novel and he can only imagine himself with her. Although Mercedes may not be real, the feelings that Stephen has and the emotions she provokes in him are very real. "...As he brooded upon her image, a strange unrest crept into his blood." (p.64). "...but a premonition which led him on told him that this image would, without any overt act of his, encounter him... and in that moment of supreme tenderness he would be transfigured. He would fade into something impalpable under her eyes and then in a moment, he would be transfigured. Weakness and timidity and inexperience would fall from him that magic moment." (p.65). Stephen realizes that some transformation is going to take place,

Crucible confession Essays

Crucible confession Essays Crucible confession Paper Crucible confession Paper The Crucible is a play about the mass hysteria and persecution, which eventually led to the tragic Salem witch trials in 1692. It was written by Arthur Miller in 1953 and was performed all over America in the 1950s. It was set in the late 17th Century and follows the life of a farmer falsely accused of witchcraft. The tragic drama was set in Salem at the time of the famous witch trials and gives the audience an insight as to a possible story that may have occurred. The play shows how a calm, farming community can be rocked by fear and paranoia of the devil. The play leads the audience through a time period of around 3 months; starting with the first accusations made by troubled youths, through the trials of those accused and finally concludes with the false execution of a hero, broken down and built up again through the play. When the play was first released and performed in 1952 it was not accepted by society. This is because many of the people that became aware of the play and its themes related it to the communist trials of the time. The communist trials were trials of those thought to be supporting the expanding communist community in the 1940s and 1950s. People were called upon to name those they believed to be communist in front of a court. This had remarkable similarities to claims made by the youths in The Crucible. People associated supporting Arthur Millers play to supporting the communist nation. However the play is now accepted as being one of the greatest English plays ever written. This is because now people do not see communism as such a major threat. The theme of fear even has relevance to today. People of today are scared of the growing power of China, especially the USA. China has a huge population and with people working at extremely low wages, products can be made very cheaply. His means that the country as a whole is very rich even though the general population is not. This is worrying because products from China are replacing US products in the market because they are cheaper. Many people joke of how China is taking over the world, but looking at the facts they know just how right they could be. This relates to the play because it again shows how a society can be changed due to fear and paranoia. This shows us how the play still has significance today. Though many now see the play as an outstanding tragedy with outstanding emotion and insight to the lives of those accused in the witch trials. One of the main reasons why the play has had such success in recent years is its fantastic, dramatic ending. This is where John Proctor, tried and sentenced to death for dealing with the devil, formally confesses to his sins to save his life. When the judges refuse to let him keep the formal account of his confession (it is to be nailed to the church door to inform the town of his confession) he tears it up! This is truly a shocking climax that strikes and stuns the audience. Arthur Miller succeeds in making this moment of the play highly dramatic in a variety of ways. He uses stage directions, dialogue and the reactions of characters to achieve this sense of drama building throughout the play. And when it finally breaks down the audience is left feeling sorrowful over the death of John Proctor and truly exhausted over the emotional ending. The end scene bewilders the audience, as this strong drama is layered slowly throughout the play, and fluently increases the emotion held by the audience for the main characters. Arthur Miller successful creates drama that explodes with precision. The audience seem lost in the way that tension that is, so slowly yet fluently, built up it is unnoticeable until the tearing of the confession when there is a sudden jolt of the pace and drama of the play. In Act 1 there is quite a lot of background information given about the setting and situations of characters before we actually meet John Proctor. For example the audience finds out that Abigail drank a charm to kill John Proctors wife. This shocks the audience because this is the first time that the fact that the girls are not children becomes apparent. All through the scene so far the girls have acted like children in front of adults and like wise the adults have treated the girls like children. This also builds up the audiences expectations of John Proctor, they wonder of his relationship with his wife and why Abigail would want her dead. Very soon after this shocking truth is let known to the audience we meet Proctor. He is introduced as a sinner by Arthur Millers notes, so it is thought that an actor trying to play John Proctors character may try to portray this in a performance. Proctors first speech is made towards Mary Warren, whom we know is one of the girls who was present at the scene where the girls danced and supposedly performed witchcraft (though she swears she only watched them. ) Proctor tells Mary to go to his house she is a servant of his. He even threatens her with her job, Why shall I pay you? I am looking for you more often then my cows. This shows us that John Proctor is a firm and boss like character. It is important that we see this side of Proctor first, we will soon learn of his affair with Abigail and how he sweated like a stallion when ever Abigail was near him and that he has been looking up at her window. This has a huge effect of how the audience perceives John Proctor at the beginning of the play. It shows us that he is a sinner who has a serious weakness and this may make the audience this that he is a bad character. However the fact that he sweated like a stallion shows that he is conscious that what he is doing is wrong and that he does not want to act on his feelings towards Abigail. This shows us that he is a reformed sinner and that he realised what he was doing was wrong and now does not wish to be in that situation again. The sign of firmness that he gives Mary (someone he is the boss of) and the firmness he gives Abigail when she tries to re-light their relationship can be compared. We can see from the way that he gets angry with her for trying to be close to him; he pushes her aside. Then when she mentions Elizabeth Proctor John roars at her and threatens her with a whipping. This will show the audience what Proctor thinks of Elizabeth and more importantly what he thinks of his relationship with Abigail. This reveals that he has a certain loathing towards Abigail and his affair with her. He now feelings the need to protect Elizabeth and this shows the audience yet again that he is a reformed sinner and a presently good character. The audience has a perceived image of what a man in an affair will think of his wife and how he will react to his mistress speaking wickedly of his wife. He defends Elizabeth and threatens Abigail with a whipping, this stands out and stuns the audience. Firstly the fact that Proctor threatens Abigail, Do you look for whippin? This shows the audience that he no longer has feelings for her and that he wishes to end the affair. This shows the audience that he is a reformed sinner. This also restores the idea that the adults of the town think of the girls and children. Proctor obviously is unaware of Abigails actions in the forest, that she drank a charm to kill Goody Proctor, he still sees her as a child that he has control over. The fact that Proctor does not want to pursue his affair shows the audience that their assumption of the Proctor-Abigail relationship was wrong and that it is in fact Abigail that is encouraging the affair, not John Proctor. This again shows the audience that though the towns folk may treat the girls as if they are children, they are certainly not.

Choose one of the following Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Choose one of the following - Essay Example It has been difficult to determine when this unique trait emerged, but they could have been on their feet before over 3 million-year-old Laetoli footprints were made (Reader and Andrew 413). The prints though did not bear semblance to that of modern, they were indeed those of a bipedal primate. Bipedalism Features They are the impressions of feet that lacked a distinctive human rounded ball, ors welling, at the base of the great toe, that had no well-defined arch, and that retained ever so slightly divergent great toes. Transformation from a quadrupedal knuckle walking to bipedalism involves various anatomical changes; development of longer legs angling of femur inwards, the feet develop an arch, the bigger toe is elongated, the pelvis is lowered, and it broadens. Additionally, the spinal cord of the hominid develops in such a manner that the vertebral bends frontward to sustain bipedalism traits. The Postural Feeding Hypothesis There are several competing hypotheses that have been p ut forward by anthropologists to explain the origin of bipedalism in hominids using non-human primates as referential models for our common ancestors. The postural feeding hypothesis (McGrew et al 282) explains bipedalism from an ecological view and explains the shared feeding behaviours exhibited by the chimpanzee and australopithecines are sufficiently common in other apes to influence anatomy. The hominids fed on relatively short trees and this gave them certain selection characters and instead adopting an upright posture and this lead to bipedalism. The other great apes for example chimpanzees do not have a straight gait and human straight gait is much more efficient than their bipedalism and quadrapedalism Hunt came up with the hypothesis after spending close to seven hundred hours observing chimpanzees in the wilderness in central Tanzania (Lewin 115). From his observation of these great apes in the wild, he found out that their feeding habits bordered on postural and this lea d to bipedalism. The hypothesis suggests that early hominids would reach out for fruits by dangling with the front limbs, and bipedalism was applied by grasping for an overhead branch. He found out that 80% of bipedalism was observed during chimpanzee feeding with arm hanging to stabilize the posture, this become the corner stone of the hypothesis. The australopithecines have shown adaptations of the torso form to arm hanging which infers that the apes adapted to arboreal bipedal fruit collection. A major basis of this hypothesis is the argument that the existence of bipedalism during certain aspects of life in extant apes provides evidence of the selective pressures that led to hominid bipedalism. According to this model, the early origin of bipedalism later evolved gradually into a habitual way of movement and this steadily led to bipedalism by the early man. Heat Hypothesis by Wheeler Peter Wheelers heat hypothesis proposes a thermoregulatory selective adaptation of bipedal homin ids to increased heat loss, increased cooling, condensed heat gain and condensed water necessities (McGrew et al 282). By adopting the bipedal posture, hominids were exposed to cooler air since the speed of wind is faster further away from the ground. Additionally, the