W.B. Yeats' poem An Irish Airman Foresees His Death illustrates the close proximity life shares with death much like The Things They Carried. Yeats' poem is brief and in the first person describes an Irish military man explaining his decision to fight in a war in which he foresees his inevitable death. This relates to O'Brien's short story in that both protagonists understand their life is near an end due to war and both recognize the relationship death and life have. The two pieces of literature do have some contrasting aspects though. For one, though it is labeled as fiction, The Things They Carried is largely based on real events from O'Brien's war years. Yeats' poem on the other hand, was inspired by Major Gregory, an Irish pilot who served in WWI. Ironically, O'Brien's almost autobiographical work is written in third person and Yeats' inspired poem is in first person. Both literary works do share something in common, in that both protagonists abandon feelings of love towards their infantrymen and the people whom they are protecting. Cross mentions that he is not trying...
By exposing his own experiences through a third person point-of-view, Tim O'Brien is able to convey the feelings a person in his or Jimmy Cross' shoes would have had. The letters Cross carries that symbolize love and a connection to the world less affected by war are ultimately the cause of an Alpha Company member's death. This speaks magnitudes about the effects love has on a person's life and illuminates that death is never too far away from life. W.B. Yeats seems to grasp this concept as well and displays it in his poem An Irish Airman Foresees His Death. Tim O'Brien does a brilliant job of explaining that the things the men carried with them physically, were carried with them emotionally as well and took a toll on their hearts.
Wyche agrees with this notion, adding that the station's position "between two sets of rails, whose significance lies 'in their figurative implications' (Renner qtd in Wyche 34), and between two contrasting landscapes that symbolize the couple's options" (Wyche). One side of the tracks, the landscape gives the couple the scene of the hills and the valley and on the other side of the tracks trees and grain flourish on
It also has a "Merton College Library" (93) inside along with period bedrooms were "swathed in rose and lavender silk and vivid with new flowers" (93). Nick tells us that the house has "bathrooms with sunken baths" (93) and Gatsby a private apartment in the house complete with a "bedroom and a bath, and an Adam study" (93). The bathroom even has a toilet seat of "pure dull gold"
It is only with this understanding that the needless sacrifice can end. Shirley Jackson presents a myriad of symbols in "The Lottery." The title of the story, the procedure of the lottery, the names of the characters, and the people that participate in the lottery and those that do not are all symbols or can be interpreted as such. These symbols also indicate different views of sacrifice. Sacrifice is present in
As he becomes frustrated by onlookers' questions, he shakes the bars of the cage like some wild animal. The artist's cage is literal and figurative in this case. He is confined to his life of suffering and his is a prisoner of it. His psychological cage is just like his physical one. He willingly accepts both. He was never appreciated and this led to even more dissatisfaction. The artist
I should wish her to be brought up in a manner suiting her prospects," continued my benefactress; "to be made useful, to be kept humble: as for the vacations, she will, with your permission, spend them always at Lowood." (Bronte, 1922, p. 28) The young girl was to be defined by her future prospects, being meager, as she was an orphan with little income, she was to be taught an even
Symbolism in the Road There is a story for everyman in The Road, which is doubtless a primary reason that the book captured a Pulitzer Prize for Cormac McCarthy in 2007. The story is particularly poignant for readers who are parents as it manifests many of the latent fears parents have regarding their capacity to protect their children in a world that can seem hostile at every turn. The book can
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