The Right Stuff - What is the Stuff?
As might be expected from the title, The Right Stuff is centered on the concept of having the right stuff. Author Tom Wolfe uses several recurring techniques and comparisons to describe this idea and its relationship to the men who took part in the Mercury program.
An opening chapter of the book is devoted to the "right stuff" in order to explain the concept to the reader. In this chapter, Wolfe makes a clear distinction between the right stuff and simple bravery. He tells the reader that a possessor of the right stuff can not only risk his life. He "should have the ability to go up in a hurtling piece of machinery and put his hide on the line and then have the moxie, the reflexes, the experience, the coolness, to pull it back in the last yawning moment" (19). One critic interprets the distinction as being "between the actual experience of the right stuff- of being a fighter pilot and experiencing, for example, night landings on an aircraft carrier- and any prior effort to describe that experience in language" (Marowski and Matuz 419).
In the same chapter, the reader is also introduced to an element which recurs throughout the rest of the book. The author compares a career in flying to the climbing of a ziggurat, an extraordinarily high and steep pyramid. In an especially vivid passage he writes: "the idea was to prove at every foot of the way up that pyramid that you were one of the elected and anointed ones who had the right stuff and could move higher and higher and even-ultimately...be able to join the very Brotherhood of the Right Stuff" (19 ). Through this pyramid the world is divided into those who had the stuff and those were just left behind.
Another characteristic of the right stuff is the pilots' relationship with one another. These pilots seem to always want to associate only with one another. Wolfe shows the reader the pilots' belief that only other pilots can understand their daily life and death struggles. In their discussions, though, it is shown that the pilots never like to use words like "danger," "bravery," and "fear." Instead they use a special code or explain by example.
Lastly, the final FHA loan requirement involves your credit and guidelines you must fall within to meet the FHA qualifications. The FHA loan requirements scrutinize your credit history, as it can be a direct indicator if you will be a good borrower or not. As a good rule of thumb, if you currently have good credit and credit history, then you should not have to worry about this requirement. Contrary, if you have poor credit, or have many delinquent marks on your credit history, you may not qualify for a FHA loan.
Mr. Billy Bishop was an ace World War One pilot who was extremely devoted to being a pilot. Billy was a man who was loyal and courageous. The young, gentle, Canadian man was devoted to what he did, Bishop would practice flying and shooting all the time. “You’ve got to be good enough to get him in the first few bursts, so practice your shooting as much as you can. After patrols between patrols, on your day off. If I get a clear shot at a guy, he’s dead.” (Pg. 69) Billy was a role model for his devotion ...
Yeager and Glenn are two fine examples of American heroes of the 1950's and 1960's. In The Right Stuff, Wolfe presents these men in such a way that the excitement they started is rekindled. Wolfe uses many tools in his recreation of these real-life heroes, including entertaining anecdotes, the characters' own words and thoughts, and the opinions of others.
Mark Twain best described courage when he said that, “Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear - not absence of fear” (Twain). Both in The One Who Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey and Watership Down by Richard Adams, the authors deal with the topic of courage and each share a similar view on it as this quote. Indeed, both authors suggest that courage is not accumulated simply by acts of heroism, but rather by overcoming fears and speaking one’s mind as well. These books are very similar in the way that bravery is displayed through the characters in an uncommon way. Firstly, an example of bravery
In The Things They Carried, an engaging novel of war, author Tim O’Brien shares the unique warfare experience of the Alpha Company, an assembly of American military men that set off to fight for their country in the gruesome Vietnam War. Within the novel, the author O’Brien uses the character Tim O’Brien to narrate and remark on his own experience as well as the experiences of his fellow soldiers in the Alpha Company. Throughout the story, O’Brien gives the reader a raw perspective of the Alpha Company’s military life in Vietnam. He sheds light on both the tangible and intangible things a soldier must bear as he trudges along the battlefield in hope for freedom from war and bloodshed. As the narrator, O’Brien displayed a broad imagination, retentive memory, and detailed descriptions of his past as well as present situations. 5. The author successfully uses rhetoric devices such as imagery, personification, and repetition of O’Brien to provoke deep thought and allow the reader to see and understand the burden of the war through the eyes of Tim O’Brien and his soldiers.
Throughout our lives we encounter dilemmas which help us learn the real meaning of courage, which differs with every person. Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear. This could be interpreted that courage isn't committing an act of temerity without a reason, however, it is facing your fears to accomplish something which is more important than fear itself. Throughout the book B for Buster by Iain Lawrence, the main character of the novel learns the real meaning of courage through his acts of temerity in order to achieve something which is important to him. This novel takes place during World War II, when an underage sixteen year old signs up to become a crewman in the Halifax bombing of Nazi Germany. Although he is young, Kak makes it through his missions through his courage and determination to accomplish his dream and his love for flying. Lawrence uses characterization and many examples from the novel to show the true meaning of courage.
“The things they carried were determined to some extent by superstition” (12). Lieutenant Jimmy Cross, Henry Dobbins, Dave Jensen, and Kiowa all seemed to have a deal in superstition. Each man carried an object that he thought would bring him luck and never left anywhere without it. These men carried these objects because it connected them to home in some way and made them feel more powerful on the battlefield. All men carried fear. At any moment, their life could be lost and they would never see their friends and family ever again. To any ordinary man, his greatest fear in life is death. Lieutenant Jimmy Cross carried more than just fear for his own life, but the responsibility of the lives of the men in his unit as well. He often would feel guilt as men died throughout the war. Kiowa often carried distrust towards the other men due to biased opinions on where he came from.”That’s a smart Indian. Shut up” (17). Kiowa carried what many men didn’t have within the unit, sympathy. He cared about others even when he didn’t want to and told the honest truth. The final thing every man carried with him is his own mind. The thoughts and memories of war are not always pleasant and it is something they must carry with them for the rest of their lives. “They were tough” (20). The men were tough and though some struggled with the thoughts of war back home, they still fought for their country
In "the things they carried", author Tim O’Brien tries to teach readers that war changes people, by using baggage as a symbol throughout the book. Ultimately, "the things they carried" is literally built on a foundation of the things they carried. Whether it’s the way Jimmy Cross uses the pebble to escape from his duties as a soldier. Or the way that they all look up to the pantyhose as an almost godly relic. All the way to Norman Bowker finally realizing that courage comes from within, not from winning the Silver Star. These things, made up the soldiers attributes, made up the soldiers’ persona, made up the soldier. But they didn’t stop at the soldier; certain items characterized all the soldiers as a collective group. It even went as far as to describe an entire group by the things all of them carried, of course being the green berets. There were no single green berets just a group; nobody made an effort to distinguish one from another. Like the way we make no effort to name each and every cell in our body, they are just smaller pieces that make up one entity.
Yet, the weight of these intangible “items” such as “grief, terror, love, longing” overshadow the physical load they must endure since they are not easily cast away. Tim O’ Brien alternates between narrative and descriptions of the tangible items that soldiers carry. He remembers seemingly everything that his squad mates were carrying and provides an “emotionless recitation” of the weights of each of the items the soldiers carried into the field. He frequently uses the term “humping” to describe how the soldiers carry their gear, making them appear more uncivilized, like animals. As he switches back to mentioning the intangible items, such as the experiences of his leader Jimmy Cross and his love Martha, the emotional weights of each soldier is felt by the reader.
The novel The Thing They Carried is a compilation of short stories that share underlying themes and characters. One of the stories is called “How to tell a True War Story”. In this story the narrator expands on a central theme of the distinction between truth and fiction when writing a war story. The story, like most of the other stories in the novel jumps erratically between events, which oftentimes creates confusion and a sense of the surreal in the story. Throughout the story the narrator repeatedly shows that when writing a war story the “story truth is truer sometimes than happening truth.”(O’Brien pg. 171) This quotation encompasses the theme and supports it. The narrator’s use of stylistic devices coupled with stories such as “How to Tell a True War Story” and “Good Form” exemplifies how fiction can fully represent the truth whilst the facts fall miserably short.
Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried has readers and critics alike scratching their heads with wonder about the meaning of “story-truth” and “happening-truth.” Although, he served in the Vietnam War from 1968 until 1970, he fabricates the events of the war throughout The Things They Carried. At the same time, he insists that the truth lies at the heart of the emotion in the story, an idea that many readers question. Furthermore, it is pointless for the reader to attempt to sort through the stories and differentiate between the “story-truth” and “happening-truth,” because it is nearly impossible. This tactic is one of O’Brien’s more ingenious writing methods. He does not want the reader to know the difference between the two because in his opinion that fact is irrelevant. O’Brien obviously thinks outside the box and has everyone questioning reality. However, this fact is truly ironic, because the point is not to care what type of “truth” it is, but to instead feel the raw beauty of the emotion and to accept it as the truth. While trying to define “story-truth” and “happening-truth,” a couple chapters in particular focus on the idea of truth, “How to Tell a True War Story,” “The Man I Killed” and “Good Form.” O’Brien believes that the most important thing for a reader is to experience the emotion of the story, be it “story-truth” or “happening-truth,” as long as the real emotion is conveyed and understood by the reader, then it is as true as it could possibly be.
Culture and identity are two very strange ideas. They are received at a very young age, yet they are very hard to give to someone else. They will affect you for the rest or your life, yet for the most part you are born into them. However, they soon become very important to us and we cannot, no matter what we do, live without them. They are a part of us, and a vital aspect of society. However, it took me a very long time to recognize that I had an identity and a little while after that before I knew what it was.
This institute sticks to its mission statement by briefly listing and explaining some of the more attractive groups, clubs and activities they have to offer t...
The Things They Carried is a collection of stories about the Vietnam War that the author, Tim O’Brien, uses to convey his experiences and feelings about the war. The book is filled with stories about the men of Alpha Company and their lives in Vietnam and afterwards back in the United States. O’Brien captures the reader with graphic descriptions of the war that make one feel as if they were in Vietnam. The characters are unique and the reader feels sadness and compassion for them by the end of the novel. To O’Brien the novel is not only a compilation of stories, but also a release of the fears, sadness, and anger that he has felt because of the Vietnam War.
There are many studies have conducted on the Common Core issue. I am interested in reading and knowing this topic, the Common Core Standards in the American perspective. According to State Standards Initiative, the Common Core State Standards established curricula for English language arts and literacy in history/social studies, science, and technical subjects “the Standards” are the peak of a prolonged effort to carry out the charge supplied by the states to build the generation of K-12 standards to help guarantee that all learners are college and occupation ready in knowledge at the end of high school. (Schutz, n.d.).