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Themes in Hunters in the snow
Hunters in the snow by tobias wolff character analysis
Themes in Hunters in the snow
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Selfishness is a common trait in the world, it’s not a hidden factor, but very well-known as being one’s self-interest. The story “Hunters in the Snow” by Tobias Wolff, discusses how each character in the story deals with different kinds of selfish ways. One character, Tub, deals with eating problems and lies about it. Frank deals with a secret life that he is hiding from his wife. Kenny is always comparing something to his liking and if he does not like it then he will complain. Self-absorption is when someone is focused on their self and only themselves. It is known to be a regular’s human’s condition, it’s something majority of human beings have. Selfishness may also kick in during survival incidents. For example, a boy and his friends …show more content…
Tub covered up his weight gain with his glands because of the insults and jokes that he wanted to avoid. Tub once mentioned to his friends he’s on a diet but later on he drops two sandwiches along their walk in the woods. Kenny and Frank knows Tub is lying but Tub didn’t submit until their trip to the hospital. Then, there was also another scene when Tub grabbed Frank, and pushed him against the wall for his harsh slurs about his weight. At this moment, he was furious, he couldn’t take it no more. He was living a double life at home, work, and then with his friends. He was gaining weight uncontrollably and stuffing his face like no tomorrow, so he had to reveal his secret. Tub’s self-absorption was a little different from the others. He was more so, the kind one and seem more fragile than the others because he was more defensive when he was being picked on about his weight. He doesn’t share what’s really going on to the other guys because he knows they’re going to criticize him. He only puts his feeling and his self-interest into consideration before everybody else, that’s why he …show more content…
He’s living a double life as well, he’s having an affair with his babysitter and he is lying about it. Frank has been lying about his double life to everybody, especially to his wife. The only person he has told was Kenny and Kenny doesn’t know how to keep his mouth closed. Frank finally admits to Tub at the restaurant about his lifestyle he has been living back at home with his baby’s babysitter, Roxanne Brewer, whose only fifteen years old. Frank claims he’s in love with this young lady and admits that his wife at the time was on thirteen when they first got together. The situation that Frank’s self-absorption is dealing with is the kind where he is going to keep all the secrets to himself because he doesn’t want to be judged by everyone else. He rather keep his life a secret because he knows what the outcome would be if he tells everyone what’s really going on behind closed doors. He would most definitely be called a pedophile. By him finally telling Tub about this he finally feels like a burden is taken off his shoulders by not keeping this secret no
In the book, “Touching the Void”, climber Simson Yates was,”unable to lift his friend up and losing his own grip on the mountain ended up cutting the rope to Simpson to save himself” (Survival 9). This particular incident isn’t selfish considering they both would’ve died if Yates continued to lose strength as he pulled up the rope. Also, in the “Titanic”, Bruce Ismay, “was ruined” because he got in a lifeboat even though there, “was no longer women or children in sight” (Survival 1). This is clearly not selfish since no women or children were left to aboard the lifeboat, anyone would do the same considering the circumstances. Lastly, in the Grand Central Station incident when the lady witnessed an explosion underground and she states, “people were frozen or screaming, but nobody was moving towards the emergency exits, even as smoke began to fill the cabin. After realizing everyone around her were too paralyzed to react, she took action, crawling over several rows of people to the exit” (Survival 6 & 7). This isn’t selfish because there was no time to get people to focus on the exits, so she took action and saved herself which was just common instinct if you weren’t the people,
“Self-absorption in all its forms kills empathy, let alone compassion.” This quote by Daniel Goleman relates to a lot of great works in literature that have characters who are selfish or self absorbed and cause great havoc in their society. For example, in the play The Crucible by Arthur Miller, Abigail Williams’ utter selfishness ends the lives of many while in contrast Elizabeth Proctor’s selflessness helps to heal and takes the pain out of other people.
I believe that the story Night by Elie Weisel, you need selfishness in order to survive the work camp. One piece of evidence when someone did a selfish act was when Block Altesta the person that ran the block said “But you must increase your chances.” “Before you go into the next room try to move your limbs, give yourself some color and most important don't be afraid” (Collections (308). It portrays selfishness because Block Altesta is telling them in order to survive you should just try to increase your chances by moving your limbs and giving yourself some color and his saying just do it for
Yes, we are selfish, and we only care about ourselves. For example, say there’s a tornado and someone else is struggling to get to safety, would you make sure you made it to safety, or would you help them? Most of the time, we would make sure we got to safety instead of helping others in need. We are given the picture known as “Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” by Pieter Bruegel the Elder [page 191]. Icarus didn’t think to listen to his father, and he did what he wanted and flew after his father had told him not to.
Kenny is the bully of the group. He is constantly making fun of Frank and Tub, playing on their insecurities. Kenny is the stereotypical alpha male. He has to be in control. Even the smallest factor, such as driving, has to be done by Kenny. He has to be the one driving. Kenny doesn't care when he's an hour late picking up Tub. He has the audacity to pretend that he is going to hit Tub with his truck. He refuses to listen to Tub's complaints when he gets in the truck and continues on his way. His pompous statements annoy Frank and Tub. "`You ask me how I want to die today,' Kenny said `I'll tell you burn me at the stake'" (Wolff 77). When Kenny threatens to tell Tub Frank's secret, Frank tells him that he is asking for it. Even early on in the trip Kenny is annoying the two men. He snaps when Tub and Frank challenge him. Frank tries to tell him it's not their fault they didn't kill a deer and Kenny is outraged. "`You go with them,' Kenny said. `I came out here to get me a deer, not to listen to a bunch of hippie bullshit. And if it hadn't been for dimples here I would have too... And you, you're too busy thinking about that little jailbait of yours yo...
Selfishness is a disease of the soul that every person experiences several times throughout their life. To say that it has never been experienced would be hypocrisy. To say that it is a “good thing”, would be erroneous. Although as humans we like to lie to ourselves, it is no question that selfishness can make any person act like a fool. It consumes us and makes us into someone we are not. Whether it leads to getting people killed, falling in love, or buying alcohol, selfishness always leads to destruction.
Being selfish can get you somewhere in the moment, but in the end, it will hunt you down. People have always been selfish, and that will continue throughout the ages, but Frankenstein shows just how much being selfish can affect your life as a whole. Let us all remember we can work each and everyday to better ourselves and fix what we can in our lives. If each of us changed one selfish thought a day, think about how far we would be in a
Dictionary.com defines selfishness as “devoted to or caring only for oneself”. For Abigail to have Proctor
Why would you want to hunt something? Because you want to hunt prey. What if you were the one being hunted? Richard Connell’s short story “The Most Dangerous Game” was published on January 19, 1924, and does exactly that. Telling the story of a man falling off a ship and washing up on an island. Not just any island Ship Trap Island, what does this man discover? That he is the prey being hunted. Goes through the dramatic trials of trying to escape the hunt ultimately getting away to safety. Hunter verses the hunted is the theme that most obviously sticks out to me. Richard Connell’s uses the color red, darkness, and the jungle to support the theme of the hunter verses the hunted in his short story The Most Dangerous Game.
Tobias Wolff is framing his story Hunters in the Snow, in the countryside near Spokane, Washington, where three friends with three different personalities, decided to take a trip to the woods for hunting in a cold, snowy weather. The whole story follows the hunting trip of these three friends. The reader can easily observe that the cold, hostile environment is an outward expression of how the men behave towards one another. Kenny, with a heart made of ice is rather hostile to Tub, while Frank is cold and indifferent to Tub and his pleas for help.The environment is matching the characters themselves, being cold and uncaring as the author described the two from truck when they laughed at the look of Tub: “You ought to see yourself,” the driver said. “He looks just like a beach ball with a hat on, doesn’t he? Doesn’t he, Frank?”(48). Near the beginning of the story the cold and the waiting surely creates an impact in the mood of the character. Tub is restless from the wait and the cold adds on to it. He complains about being cold and Kenny and Frank, his friends tell him to stop complaining, which seems to be very unfriendly. Wolff builds up the story on the platform of cold weather and the impact of the cold on each character slowly builds up.
Thankfully, I had been able to keep myself spoiler free as it relates to “The Deer Hunter.” For a movie with this reputation and fame, I was quite proud of the fact that I hardly knew what it was about, how it ended or even how its famous Russian roulette scene climaxes. I was excited to finally see this movie, in small part because it was the last film I needed to see to have watched every best picture winner from the 1970s. But, to put it bluntly, “The Deer Hunter” disappointed me.
Ethical egoism is diametrically opposite to ethical altruism, which obliges a moral agent to assist the other first, even if he sacrifices his own interest. Further, researchers justify and rationalize the mental position of egoism versus altruism through an explanation that altruism is destructive for a society, suppressing and denying an individual value. Although the ‘modern’ age unsubtly supports swaggering egoistic behavior in the competitive arena such as international politics, commerce, and sport, in other ‘traditional’ areas of the prideful selfishness showing off, to considerable extent discourages visible disobedience from the prevalent moral codes. In some cases, the open pro-egoist position, as was, per example, the ‘contextual’ interpretation of selfishness by famous German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, can be described as a ‘grotesque anomaly’.
Psychological egoism, a descriptive claim about human nature, states that humans by nature are motivated only by self-interest. To act in one's self-interest is to act mainly for one's own good and loving what is one's own (i.e. ego, body, family, house, belongings in general). It means to give one's own interests higher priority then others'. "It (psychological egoism) claims that we cannot do other than act from self-interest motivation, so that altruism-the theory that we can and should sometimes act in favor of others' interests-is simply invalid because it's impossible" (Pojman 85). According to psychological egoists, any act no matter how altruistic it might seem, is actually motivated by some selfish desire of the agent (i.e., desire for reward, avoidance of guilt, personal happiness).
Selfishness is one of the most common personality traits shared amongst society, Kenneth Grahame’s literature features the theme of how making rash decisions can lead to dramatic effects to those around you.
Immediately, as my dad and I was walking to the deer stand, my thoughts were that this hunt already felt like any other night hunt I had ever been on. My dad and I together chose which stand we would hunt from the choices on the board. We arrived at the box stand, which was fifteen feet tall, then we climbed in and got comfortable. In the meantime, we were looking around to find any sign of a deer. Meanwhile, as we were sitting quietly in the stand, we suddenly heard something. We could tell that the noise was something running through the trees extremely fast! Suddenly, there she was, a doe, creeping out from the bushes. At that moment, I was only able to see her head. I was getting so nervous, and I didn 't know what to do; however, my dad told me to stay calm and breathe. As she was walking into the field, stopping along the way to eat, I prepared my gun in order to shoot. My dad told me to take the shot whenever I was ready, so within the next couple of seconds I pulled the trigger. BOOM! She’s down! I had shot her; however, I knew I hit her, but she ran