Jen Rivera Tim McAlpine World Literature 3 May 2018 Signature Assignment: And of Clay Are We Created In Allende’s story a horrific volcano eruption has happened thus resulting in hundreds of thousands of people dead by being trapped in the mudslide. In Allende’s story history is an important factor since Allende wrote her story based on the story of Omayra Sanchez from the 1985 Colombia’s Nevado Ruiz volcanic eruption. Allende changed the characters names and although the date is not specified, it is understood from Allende’s other Stories about Eva Luna that it takes place sometime during the 1980s which would be around the same time as Omayra Sanchez’s story. Allende uses her writing platform to shed some light on how impactful stories …show more content…
like Omayra’s can be and how strong people can be even in terrible situations. The story of Omayra Sanchez is one full of despair and strength.
Omayra Sanchez was a thirteen year old girl who lived in the neighborhood of Santander. Despite being stuck in the mudslide that her family had been killed by, Sánchez remained relatively positive. She sang to, a journalist who was working as a volunteer and prayed every night (Omayra). Near the end of her life Omayra’s face was swollen and showed how truly exhausted she was from fighting death. Before her death, the workers returned with a pump and tried to save her, but her legs were bent as if she was kneeling, making it impossible to free her without severing her legs, but later on the doctors around agreed that it would be more humane to let her die and she eventually did drift away to be with her family once again …show more content…
(Omayra). With Allende’s version, the story opens abruptly, with a startling line: “They discovered the girl’s head protruding from the mudpit, eyes wide open, calling soundlessly (p 1125).” A volcanic eruption has happened leading to mudslides that have killed more than thousands of people. Carle and his assistant film the first attempts to rescue the girl, but when the volunteers begin to pull on the rope, Azucena screams in pain: she can feel some kind of debris holding her legs, and while others suggest that it must be the rubble from her crushed house, she insists that it is the bodies of her dead brothers and sisters ( Allende 1227). Carle was always behind the camera for most of his stories so he was able to be strong and detached in the face of terrible events. This time, however, he is responding emotionally to Azucena because he completely abandoned his task as a reporter, and tries everything to get the girl free, but with no success. Finally he radios for a pump, with which he could drain the water around the girl, but none will be available until the next day (Allende 1227). Rolfe stayed beside Azucena all night telling her entertaining stories of his adventures to keep her happy and to help her stop thinking about her family whose bodies are surrounding her. Back in the city, the narrator is watching the screen, she sees that Carle has reached a kind of tiredness he has never reached before, and that he has “completely forgotten the camera” (Allende 1228). Meanwhile, the story has been picked up by other news agencies, but despite the area being covered with wires and other equipment that is needed for television crews, no one can locate a pump to save Azucena. On the morning of the final day, The President of the Republic comes to be filmed with the girl. He praises the girl for being “an example to the nation” and promises to personally send a pump (Allende 1231). As she watches on the screen, the narrator can tell the precise moment when Azucena and Carle give up on hoping for a rescue, the moment that they accept the inevitability of death. Carlé takes what has holding Azucena up out from under her arms, and she slips down under the mud and inevitably dies with her family. Allende used something historical that most people wouldn’t remember to base her story off of just to show how impactful this forgotten story was.
There are plenty of stories that have happened around the world, but Allende chooses Omayra’s story to write about since it was the most known. The similarities between Omayra and Azucena’s story is uncanny. Omayra was thirteen-year old who got stuck in the mudslide whose face was broadcasting around the world, while Azucena was also thirteen and had her face broadcasted everywhere in the story. The only clear difference between the two girls is that their names are completely different. Another similarity was that both girls went through a tremendous amount of loss and stayed strong throughout the the sixty hours they were stuck in the mudslide. Omayra and Azucena both greatly impacted the people surrounded them because of her maturity and the strength she
showed. In conclusion, Omayra’s story is one of despair and strength that the world knew at one point in time. Allende uses this story to show us how retelling powerful stories can be just as impactful. Many people may not remember Omayra’s story but Allende uses her writing platform to tell a story that will be memorable and impactful for most people. Stories like Omayra and Azucena happen all around the world but are not as broadcasted as much as they should, but it just sheds some light on how despite being in the worst possible situation people can be strong and teach everyone around them something. Works Cited Allende, I. (2012). And of Clay Are We Created. In The Norton Anthology of World Literature (3rd ed., Vol. F, pp. 1125-1231). New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company. Omayra Sánchez. (2018, March 15). Retrieved May 1, 2018, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omayra_Sánchez
...teenth century in South America. His articulation of the disastrous and catastrophic event was detailed, strong, and emotionally invoking. It compelled me to think about how things could have been. What if the viceroy had fully succeeded? What if he had never tried to change Lima’s political, social, or architectural structure? And how might that have affected such a cultural epicenter of that time period? He gives the audience an opportunity to nearly relive the event, but also experience a part of the event aside from the natural disasters that were just as effective to the people of Lima, their future, and the future of their city.
Known as the “Queen of Tejano” and the “Mexican Madonna”, Selena Quintanilla-Perez was the adored Latin singer who sadly did not get to live to see all of the success of her career. One of her most famous quotes is, “We all die. The goal isn’t to live forever but to create something that will (PhilosIblog, 2014).” That is just what Selena did and she made sure that her legacy would live on for years. Selena surely left a her mark in this world with the help of her family, in her short lived 23 years. Selena was an amazing singer, she even made it very far in a genre of music that was dominated by men. Selena Quintanilla-Perez is an influential person because of her loving personality, her music career, her determination to succeed in a genre that was only men, and her success with her music that will never stop playing even if she is not here.
Imaging that you found out that the love of your life who promised you to bring down the stars, who said yes in the altar, who you married, who is the biological father of your children is cheating on you through these dating websites that are destroying marriages nowadays. In these websites you find thousands of married people of both genders having adventures with stranger out there. They do not feel fulfil in the relationship which they have now, and simply just because they got tired of their loved partners.
In the 1960s, a wave of Cuban immigrants moved into the United States to escape their ruthless dictator, Fidel Castro. Aleida Rodriguez and her siblings were some of those immigrants. In her reflection, she looks at photographs of her childhood while she reflects upon the impact of emigration within her family during the sixties. In the excerpt from “my Mother in Two Photographs, Among Other Things,” author Aleida Rodriguez reveals the cultural rifts caused by relocation.
Abcarian, Richard, and Marvin Klotz. "The Ones Who Walked Away From Omelas." Literature: the Human Experience. 9th ed. Boston: Bedford/St Martin's, 2006. 357-61. Print.
There were other taboo's in the Indian culture other then not naming the dead, such as you were never to kill snakes. It was thought that if one were to snake, it would make the snakes mad and more snakes will come and kill a friend or relative. Snakes, spiders, and scorpions were all seen as bad creatures and they were supposed to avoid them. The only time when you are allowed or only safe time to kill one of these was if they bit you or caused you harm. The Indians also believed that if a fox comes near your home and makes noise, that would be the indication that one of your relatives was going to die. The Owl and coyote were messengers to tell you that the person that was supposed to die is already dead. The Indians believed in magic or healers and witches. The way a person comes to gain super natural powers were through dreams and after that the person becomes empowered with special abilities. They believed that certain springs were cursed and you were not supposed to drink from them. The causes of bad springs would be from a witch that would put a special stone in the water and if you drank from it, you would start hearing voices and seeing things. If the person lingered too long around the spring, you would eventually not be able to think any more and would lose your mind essentially. If a person had a bad dream, it could give you bad powers that would make people sick. The Indians were very scared of witches because of the bad things they could do to you. They would not have to touch you to curse you. The good healers when first having their power would go off and dance by himself and start healing people. Witches were not able to harm good people such as healers. If you were cursed by a witch, it would require a healer tha...
The article “Leaving Omelas: Questions of Faith and Understanding,” by Jerre Collins, draws attention to the fact that the short story “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas,” by Ursula Le Guin, has not impacted Western thought despite its literary merit. Collins breaks his article down into three parts, the first explaining that he will “take this story as seriously as we are meant to take it” (525). Collins then goes over several highly descriptive sections of the story, which invite the reader to become part of the utopia that is Omelas. Collins states that when it comes to the state of the child and how it affects the citizens of Omelas the descriptions “may seem to be excessive and facetious” (527). But this is because Le Guin is using a
In the story of The Island of “Kora”, the island had been devastated by a violent earthquake that had been triggered by a volcano eruption four years earlier. The island which had prior to the disaster been about twenty square miles in size and been reduced to less than a fourth that size to about four square miles. The island prior to the earthquakes had previously been able to support comfortably 850 to 900 people. It was a peaceful island where the inhabitants got along well. Because of the disasters the lives of the inhabitants had been changed forever.
This child was unwillingly locked away in a tool room under one of Omelas’ buildings. It cried for help, “Please let me out. I will be good.”(5), but no one ever replies. It was feared and neglected by the public. They came to see it, but only to understand the reason for their happiness. People were stunned with anger of injustice at the sight of it. However, they compared “that [it] would be a good thing indeed; but if it were done. in that day and hour all prosperity and beauty and delight of Omelas would wither and be destroyed”(6). They were too self-centered, and did not want to give up everything they had for one person. The success of the village depended on the tortured child’s
In “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” Ursula K. LeGuin depicts a city that is considered to be a utopia. In this “utopia” happiness revolves around the dehumanization of a young child. The people of Omelas understand their source of happiness, but continue to live on. Oppression is ultimately the exercise of authority or power in a cruel or unjust way. LeGuin demonstrates the oppression that the child of Omelas holds in her story. LeGuin articulates the damaging effects that oppression can cause. In addition to LeGuin’s renditions, Chris Davis, a Los Angeles writer, further
The Ones Who Walked Away from Omelas is a short story written by Ursula Le Guin. In her story, Le Guin creates a model Utilitarian society in which the majority of its citizens are devoid of suffering; allowing them to become an expressive, artistic population. Le Guin’s unrelenting pursuit of making the reader imagine a rich, happy and festival abundant society mushrooms and ultimately climaxes with the introduction of the outlet for all of Omelas’ avoided misfortune. Le Guin then introduces a coming of age ritual in which innocent adolescents of the city are made aware of the byproduct of their happiness. She advances with a scenario where most of these adolescents are extremely burdened at first but later devise a rationalization for the “wretched one’s” situation. Le Guin has imagined a possible contemporary Utilitarian society with the goal to maximize the welfare of the greatest number of people. On the contrary, Kant would argue that using the child as a mere means is wrong and argue that the living conditions of the child are not universalizable. The citizens of Omelas must face this moral dilemma for all of their lives or instead choose to silently escape the city altogether.
In order to live their “perfect” lives, the citizens of Omelas must accept the suffering of the child. Making the right ethical decision is difficult, but necessary to end the injustice of the society. Failing to overcome the ethical issues in the city of Omelas is displayed through three different characters in the story. There are those who choose to ignore the situation, those who observe the child in misery, and those who feel that they must walk away. In the story “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas” characters fail to overcome the ethical issues in their society, and the reader is taught the importance of moral responsibility and the implications of the difficult task of making the right ethical decision.
Gabriela Mistral was an extraordinary woman. Her life was filled with tragedy but she turned her experiences into beautiful poetry. Her poetry reflected many things about who Gabriela Mistral was and what had happened to her throughout her life.
El Salvador, 6 April 1992--Three siblings died near the Guazapa volcano last weekend when they stepped on a mine planted during the period of civil warfare. Ironically, their parents had returned to the area only a few days earlier. The children were four, six and eight years old. Parts from the three children's bodies were found as far as 30 metres from the explosion site. (qtd. in Grant 25)