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Tom Brokaw’s The Greatest Generation
In Tom Brokaw’s book, The Greatest Generation, the author portrays ordinary people of a certain generation as having qualities of greatness and heroism. He tells stories of average people that lived inspiring lives through many hardships, and declares today’s society as the beneficiary of their challenging work and commitment. Brokaw’s generous and proficient use of imagery helps to persuade the reader to believe that the people of “the greatest generation” are, indeed, heroic. He defines the strength and resilience of “the greatest generation” by what they were able to confront and overcome.
“…when the nation was balanced precariously between the darkness of the Great Depression on one side and the storms of war in Europe and the Pacific on the other…..Once again the American people understood the magnitude of the challenge, the importance of an unparallel national commitment, and, most of all, the certainty that only one resolution was acceptable.”(p3) This quote is from the opening paragraph of the chapter in Brokaw’s book, “The Time of their Lives.” These ordinary people surmounted times of great destitution while courageously facing the epoch of the Great depression. They comprehended the necessity for commitment in order to preserve their independence. Brokaw uses imagery including “the Darkness of the Great depression” to reveal to the reader the severity of their situation. He depicts the Great Depression not just as a time of hardships, but as an era when thousands of men and women starved to death, parents could not provide for themselves or their families and unemployment was so high that a days work would yield, at most, a loaf of stale bread to feed an entire family. Although he does not say these things directly, his use of imagery causes the reader to have these thoughts and to see these images.
“…they were fighting, often hand to hand, in the most primitive conditions possible, across the bloodied landscape of France, Belgium, Italy, Austria. They fought their way up a necklace of South Pacific islands few had ever heard of before and made them a fixed part of American history...and they went to sea on hostile waters far removed from the shores of their homeland.”(pXIX) This quote from the introductory chapter of Brokaw’s book, “Generations,” describes what the heroes of “the greatest generation...
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...tories dedicated to many more heroes of “the greatest generation.” He mentions a man by the name of Jack Hemingway, who parachuted into France behind enemy lines, where he was taken prisoner by the Germans, and a woman named Helen Strauss, who was nominated as New Jersey’s Psychologist of the Year in 1997 for her hard work and dedication to children and low-income families. She was also known as a great woman for her service in the Navy. Brokaw also mentions Bill Mauldin, a writer who “shared with those on the front lines as well as those at home the hard truths and dark humor of life at war.”(p381) With Brokaw’s use of “hard truths,” again, the image of savage fighting appears to the reader. Another picture comes forth in the reader’s mind from Brokaw’s use of “dark humor.” A picture of a bleak and cloudy memories that the soldier’s mask with a sense of humor.
Tom Brokaw’s use of the stylistic element of imagery is one of his many methods of compelling the reader to understand that “the greatest generation” is, undeniably, great. His picturesque approach gives the reader a mental image of the great hardships that these heroes surmounted through their hard work and dedication.
In "Harrison Bergeron", Kurt Vonnegut investigates the topic of constrained balance in American culture not long from now. Vonnegut makes a world in which all living individuals are equivalent in all ways. He concentrates on making uniformity by changing excellence, quality, and knowledge rather than managing race, religion, and sex, the genuine issues of correspondence in the public eye. He composes this story to instruct the lesson that all individuals are not equivalent, but instead, they all have qualities and shortcomings making each exceptionally person.
An impartial society: Utopia or Hell? What would happen to the world if the people were literally equal in every aspect of their lives? In the futuristic short story, “Harrison Bergeron” by Kurt Vonnegut Jr., the world is finally living up to America’s first amendment of everyone being created equal. In this society, the gifted, strong, and beautiful are required to wear handicaps of earphones, heavy weights, and hideous masks, respectively. Thus, these constraints leave the world equal from brains to brawn to beauty. With the world constantly pushing for equality among people, Vonnegut reveals a world that society is diligently working toward. Through this foreshadowing of the future, Vonnegut attempts to use Diana Moon Glampers and
Being unique is a necessary part of life. People are told starting as children that they need to be themselves. They are told to do what they love and love what they do. What if the world didn’t allow this? Kurt Vonnegut ponders the idea of a life in which the government enforces complete equality. “Harrison Bergeron” takes place in a future society that hinders people with skills to make everyone equal. This society makes everyone worse instead of better. Complete equality has too many issues for it to be viable. Equality should be for all in the eyes of the law. However, complete equality should not be pursued because taking away the differences between people is a clear mistake.
In conclusion, the complete freedom and absolute equality have been a goal of innumerable societies throughout human history. However, these two ideal cannot exist together in their most perfect forms because the perfect forms of either freedom or equality represent total chaos or total oppression, as we can see in “Harrison Bergeron,” the consequences of sacrificing freedom for perfect equality. The author uses the story of this imaginary perfect world where everyone is happy to demonstrate that a society in which total equality exists is not only oppressive, but also inert and unproductive. Using his futuristic scenario, the simplicity of the society, and the actions of his characters, Vonnegut makes his point of view of a repressive society. In addition, societies that try to create total equality have almost always proven to be oppressive, such as China.
Science fiction stories are a very effective way of conveying a strong point. In “Harrison Bergeron” the strength of this short story is its ability to make you think. Not just about the societal structure, but also the abuse of power, and repression. The intentional significance of this story is if people accept oppressive measures in the name of fairness. No one really benefits from these foolish attempts to enforce equality. The tyranny of the majority stifles any sort of freedoms, gifts, individualities, and strengths. If an action must ...
Known today as two of the most prominent American satirists, Joseph Heller and Kurt Vonnegut both served time as soldiers during World War II, Heller serving as a bombardier in Italy (Scoggins) and Vonnegut as a soldier and prisoner of war in Germany (Parr). Not coincidentally, both Heller’s 1961 novel Catch-22 and Vonnegut’s 1969 novel Slaughterhouse-Five, or The Children’s Crusade: A Duty-Dance with Death follow the journeys of young men in combat during the Second World War – Captain John Yossarian of the US Army Air Forces and soldier Billy Pilgrim, respectively. While it is evident that these fictional novels are both set during the World War II era and convey bleak images of war, closer inspection of both texts brings to light the common
The pages of history have longed been stained with the works of man written in blood. Wars and conflicts and bloodshed were all too common. But why? What could drive a man to kill another? Many would say it is man’s evil nature, his greed, envy, and wrath. And certainly, they all have a roll in it. But in reality, it is something far less malevolent, at least at first. The sole reason why conflicts grow and spread comes from the individuality that every human cherishes so dearly. This can easily be shown in the story “Harrison Bergeron” by Kurt Vonnegut, in which a society has been created where everyone of talent has been handicapped so they are not better than anyone else, all for the sake of equality. This text will show that Individuality
McElvaine, Robert S, ed. Down and Out in the Great Depression: Letters from the Forgotten Man. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1983.
He wears three-hundred pounds of buckshot around his neck, glasses that make him half blind, huge headset transmitter and caps on his teeth to make him look ugly. When he breaks free of his handicaps he is seen as a threat to society because of how superior he is. The fear instilled in the government is apparent when they burst into the news studio and shoot him dead, all on live television in front of his parents. However, no one will ever remember the spectacle Harrison put on because of the twenty second memory the population has. Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. uses irony, hyperbole and reversal to help readers understand that total equality cannot be achieved without dire consequences.
O’Brien, Tim. How to Tell a True War Story. Literature and Ourselves. Sixth Edition. Eds.
“The generation of 1914” often refers to those who came of age during WWI, and because of the war were robbed of their youth. While this term is a useful expression of a collective experience of universal sacrifice and suffering during the war, the term “generation” fails to recognize the unique experiences of the different genders, races, and classes. Women, soldiers, both officers and enlisted, and colonial forces, like Senegalese soldiers, experienced and remembered the war differently from each other. Therefore, using a broad, general term like “ the generation of 1914,” discounts these individual and minority group experiences, which obscures a collective memory of WWI.
The individual is required to comply with society’s ideals. In the short story, “Harrison Bergeron,” Kurt Vonnegut sets the scene in this futuristic community when he begins, “The year was 2081, and everybody was finally equal … They were equal every
Although the comparisons are well hidden, both today’s society and the story ‘Harrison Bergeron’ share similar qualities. They both deal with equality, which leads to problems and consequences. A second similarity is the struggle of competition and trying to prevent it from occurring, which also leads to problems. Lastly, both struggle with normality, and the fact that it’s hard to accept that different is okay now.
Marriage is more similar to the way performance dogs are bred. The best guardian men and woman in their prime will bred with each other to produce offspring that are also the best (458d- 459d). To be certain that the best guardian men bred with the best guardian women, the city will have marriage festivals with an unfair lottery system (459e-460a). He proposes this so that the inferior guardians will blame luck rather than the rulers when they are not selected. The best guardian men will also be permitted to bred with as many women as they desire in order to increase the likelihood of giving birth to children that are also the best (460a-b). Plato believes that intercourse should only be done out of necessity (458d), and that it should not be permitted unless the rulers have preapproved it (459e). In conclusion, Plato believes that marriage (of guardians) is simply intercourse, it should be predetermined by the
How did I become the sexual person I am today? This is a question I have never asked myself before. It was not until writing this essay that I realized how I have been influenced, how I have grown and have become the sexual person that I am today. I came to realize that I was influenced by a variety of factors throughout my lifetime. Some of these factors include family values and expectations, social media, friends and personal experiences. These are all important to me because they shaped my way of thinking and how I felt about sex and its meaning.