Dreiser's "Second Choice" jolts Shirley out of her "lower-middle-class complacency by Arthur, a dashing, romantic newcomer who woos, wins, and leaves her. Love, Shirley suddenly finds, is excitement, defined by Arthur as freedom, movement, exploration," and a different way of being in the world (Harris 73). When Arthur leaves her, instead of using this reinvigorated sense of purpose to change her own life, her inability to win Arthur causes Shirley to regard "herself as a failure because in his eyes, she is worthless" (Harris 73). Shirley engages in an act of self-punishment, forcing herself to settle for a "steady, phlegmatic suitor, and resume the life she had abandoned when Arthur appeared. 'What's the use?'" she asks herself (Harris 73)....
Dreiser does not endorse this sense of ineffectualness, merely depicts it as a sad warning to the reader as something that is, like the town itself, "commonplace." By showing the sadness and commonness of such choices in human nature, Dreiser encourages the reader to change his or her own life and assumptions.
characters in Theodore Dreiser's Sister Carrie. The writer of this paper provides an insight to the things leading to the eventual outcome of Carrie and Hurstwood. The writer uses examples from the book to underscore the paths each life takes and explain why they each end up the way they do. There was one source used to complete this paper. Many times fiction imitates real life with a hint of
Sister Carrie" by Theodore Dreiser, and "My Antonia" by Willa Cather. Specifically, it will determine what each character's value system is by asking what things are most important to her and what things or values she spends most of the time seeking. Each of these characters has strong and determined values that guide them through their lives. These values are at the core of their being, and help the
Financier written by Theodore Dreiser traces the personal and financial life of a fictional financier from the time of Andrew Jackson's administration through the aftermath of the "Great Fire" in Chicago in 1871. This essay identifies three problems in the public financing area that negatively impacted public interest and highlights the rules and organizations that have been created to reduce the probability of these three problems recurring. All three
Gender as Performance Theodore Dreiser's 1900 novel Sister Carrie is in style and tone in many ways radically different from Edith Wharton's The House of Mirth, published just five years later. And yet there is in both works a similar core, what might be called a parallel moral, for both novels explore the ways in which gender is performative in the two societies that we learn about within the world of
Narrator In many ways, the literary movements and philosophies of determinism and individualism are opposites of one another. Determinism is one of the facets of Naturalism, and is based on the idea that things happen due to causes and effects largely out of the control of people and that choice is ultimately an illusion. Individualism, however, is widely based on the idea of free will and the fact that people can
Sister Carrie and a Modern Instance and discusses the characters geographic attempts to escape their problems. The writer compares and contrasts the stories and argues that social norms continue to follow the characters wherever they go. There were two sources used to complete this paper. Theodore Dreiser's Sister Carrie and William Dean Howells' A Modern Instance are classic examples of the way people try and change their personalities and their
Our semester plans gives you unlimited, unrestricted access to our entire library of resources —writing tools, guides, example essays, tutorials, class notes, and more.
Get Started Now