Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil starts with the main character, John Berendt as the Narrator. He first introduces the book by speaking of a man by the name of Jim Williams, the home owner of the Mercer house in Savannah Georgia. This intelligent yet cocky man is an antique dealer and is quite rich, owning many houses and valuable antiques. He spends most of his time restoring antiques and “living like an aristocrat, but not actually being one.” His assistant, Danny Hansford is very rowdy, he intrudes on Berendt's interview of Williams by storming into Mercer house cursing a certain “Bonnie” and insists that he get “jacked up” on drugs.…
In Judith Ortiz Cofer’s short story “Volar,” a girl who is a huge fan of comic books dreams of being a Superhero but realizes her reality. Whether a child or an adult, most of us have our dreams; however, not all wishes become true. The narrator, the girl, begins her story describing how much she loves comic books such as Legion of SuperHeroes and Supergirl so much that a pile of her books is high as she is. She smoothly continues with her repeated dream in which Cofer vividly conveys the image that provides the reader with her strong sense of purpose.…
Gavin De Becker’s, The Gift of Fear, is a very intriguing, thought-provoking book that attracts attention from all walks of life. The theme behind this well-written paperback is the importance of listening to your instincts when it comes time to consider fear and violence. De Becker’s background was security issues, which primarily was for the government, large corporations and working for celebrities where he provided insight on the innate survival skills that help protect us from violent crimes. He has had an extremely keen method of educating everyone to use our “gut feelings” to help us through difficult violent occurrences. The evocative account the examples that he provides throughout his literature are not only the key to survival in…
At one point in life, we all wanted superpowers. The thought of having the ability to fly or read minds always seemed amazing. However, everything has its cons, no matter what. In Alexandra Bracken's book "The Darkest Minds," the main character, Ruby, went through was not being able to control her gifts, people constantly hunting her down, and was wanted as a weapon.…
As Pittacus Lore once said, “I know what I’m capable of; I am a soldier now, a warrior. I am someone to fear, not hunt.” Fear is caused by the belief that someone or something is dangerous. In the short story, “The Most Dangerous Game” by Richard Connell, the main character Rainsford is repeatedly trying to convince his friend Whitney that the animals they hunt and hang on their walls have no sense of emotion or fear. But when he learns the unbearable feeling and anxiety of being the huntee, he is convinced otherwise.…
In “Night” by Elie Wiesel I learned that the history behind the Holocaust is very inhumane. For example, in the Holocaust a total of 1.1million children were killed. The children were not killed in a very gentle way, they were worked to death,gassed, and cremated. Another example, most people think that Jews were the only victim to the Holocaust. This statement is proven to be wrong because the Nazi’s persecuted homosexuals,the disabled,gypsies and non Aryans. In addition, when selection came, the fit were put back to work;the elderly and disabled were sent to be killed. Another fact is that Auschwitz was the largest camp there was, It contained 3 camps within itself. Auschwitz was the worst camp to be put in. The condition in the camps were…
In Survival of the Sickest, Dr. Sharon Moalem explores how harmful hereditary diseases that are still around in present day have survived through generations. He begins his journey into the world of medicine, genetics, evolution, and the influence of environment when he started looking into his grandfather’s strange love for donating blood and later his diagnosis with Alzheimer’s disease. Beginning at the age of fifteen years old he was determined to find answers and make connections. It wasn’t until years later that he put all the pieces together. Along the way he discovered incredible connections and reasons why so many hereditary diseases are still alive today. He organizes the novel into eight chapters that go into examining different hereditary…
Into The Wild A true story written By John Krakauer and published by Villard in 1996. Christopher McCandless grew up in Annandale, Virginia. In 1990 when he graduated from university, he stopped talking with his family and donated his College money to charity then started traveling across the United States then later abandoned his car in a flash flood.…
Jon Krakauer's is considered an eccentric writer to many, even so he is a very intelligent one. Into the Wild is a true story about Chris McCandless who is found dead in the Alaskan Wilderness. The story recaps his life prior to his death. Krakauer writes this story for the notion of how individuals exist in a state of nature might be a component of the work's essence. Jon also felt a connection to Chris death as he was a huge nature lover as well.…
“The courage of life is often a less dramatic spectacle than the courage of a final moment, but it is no less a magnificent mixture of triumph and tragedy. A man does what he must-in spite of personal consequences, in spite of obstacles and dangers and pressures-and that is the basis of all morality” (John F. Kennedy). Courage is demonstrated in the Pulitzer Prize winning novel, To Kill a Mockingbird. In this story, Atticus Finch finds inner strength to defend an innocent black man of a horrible crime against a white girl in a small Alabama town filled with racism and prejudice. In the realistic fiction novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, written by Harper Lee, the story shows that people express courage in many different…
Without courage there would be no bravery in the world. “Courage” by Anne Sexton reaches out and tells us what it is to be brave, she teaches us that we have to have courage, for our own sake. The article “Mich. Teen Helps Save Abduction Victim’s Life” by John Carlisle introduces us to a boy that lives us to the expectations of courage. He shows us that it is hard, but worth it to be courageous. In Michigan, a fourteen year old boy, James Persyn the third had to be more courageous than ever when he decided to save the life of a woman that he did not even know until she came knocking on his door asking for help.…
Nelson Mandela once said, "I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it." He also learned that courage is the ability to stay strong through adverse situations. The characters in Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird are courageous. The novel tells the story of how the Finch family overcame a predicament that emerged from racial discrimination. In To Kill a Mockingbird, Atticus Finch is disgraced for defending a black man who is accused of raping a white woman. This causes his children, Jem and Scout, to also face hostility. Despite this animosity, the Finch family bravely confronted any crisis that arose. Courage is necessary when facing adversity because it allows one to do the right thing and defend those who cannot…
Courage isn’t just exemplified in literature, but in the real world as well. Rosa Parks is a famous African - American civil rights activist who was born on February 4, 1913. The United States called her “ The First Lady of Civil Rights “ and “ The Mother of the Freedom Movement “. On December 1 in 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, she was on a bus. Parks refused to listen to the bus driver, James F. Blake, when he told her to give up her seat in the colored section to a white passenger because the white section was filled. It takes courage to stand up for your rights, so imagine the courage it took for Rosa to do something like that back then. She didn’t have any legal rights or any form of protection, and she defied the law. She didn’t want to be treated differently anymore, and she thought it was wrong. “ The only tired I was, was tired of giving in,”she said. Rosa wanted to do something not just for herself, but for everyone else who didn’t have the courage to do what was…
Bibliography: Cisneros S, Eleven, Health Communications Inc., Deerfield Beach, FL, January, 1, 1997. (anthology), pp. 150-161.…
Another character in the novel that demonstrated bravery was Dolphus Raymond. He was brave because he let everyone know that he loves an African American when it wasn’t right in other peoples’ eyes. He says, “They could never, never understand that I live like I do because that’s the way I want to live.” (pg. 268) The reason why he lives this way is because he prefers African Americans. Dolphus Raymond even has mixed children with his wife. Another reason why he is brave is because he has a different mindset speaking as a white man; he believes that white people give hell to black people and that it is wrong.…