William Henry "Hank" Devereaux Jr. and Charlie Thurber are two men lost in the realm of college departmental politics in similar settings. The main character in Straight Man, a novel by Richard Russo, William Henry "Hank" Devereaux Jr., the son of an English professor and critic, wrote a novel, Off the Road, early in his career. However, he has produced nothing since. Hank likes to believe that he lives life by Occam’s razor, despite the complexities that continue to plague him. He is the reluctant chair of a small town college in Pennsylvania, who is facing rumors of cut- backs and layoffs, causing distrust and back-stabbing amongst his fellow professors. Charlie Thurber is the protagonist of Tenure, a film by Mike Million, starring Luke Wilson, Gretchen Mol and David Koechner. He is an English professor at a small town college who needs to publish something to have a shot at tenure. Despite the fact that the college English department has hired an Ivy League professor on tenure tracks. His father is a retired professor who currently lives in an assisted living facility and is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. It is never stated where the fictitious Grey College is, but it was filmed using colleges in Pennsylvania.
Hank and Charlie share some very close similarities. Both are college English professors in small town colleges. They both are mired in interpersonal struggles of fellow staff members in and out of their departments. They both have fathers that are celebrated college professors that are now at a stage of declining health, which they have estranged emotions about. They both have hit a professional roadblock of sorts. Hank has not written anything since his first novel, and Charlie cannot get anything publi...
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...at is compounded by both individuals’ personal struggles. Each man seems to overcome the struggles of his department, but barely. They both also overcome by doing the opposite of what is expected and going against the flow of what others expect of them. Both Hank and Charlie end each of their stories with a new vantage on their lives. Both stories are also able to focus on the absurdities of everyday life and the struggle to find peace for oneself outside the fervor of office politics and familial unrest. The translatability, of both protagonists, to every one of us leaves you rooting for them and wishing them the best at the end.
References
Million, Mike, Dir. Tenure. Perf. Luke Wilson. Scion Films: 2009, Film.
Russo, R. (1998). Straight man. Vintage.
: In reading How to Be an Undividual, it is clear that the author David Koloff is a full-fledged nonconformist, although, believes in the natural order of finding yourself; even if it involves being an intentional conformist in the beginning. He quickly lets the reader know his stance on conformity in the first paragraph, that illustrates the isolated feeling that children feel as they’re thrown from institution to institution as they grow up. However, how is Koloff himself a conformist? Well, Koloff is obviously a very successful writer. He seems to follow a trend in one of the aspects of his writing. Koloff uses satire, wit and irony as devises. Although, considering he was inspired to write this piece because of the conformity he sees in
Books read by adolescents contain both positive and negative values. Bleachers, by John Grisham is one book that contains many positive values. This book is about high school all-American Neely Crenshaw, who was probably the best quarterback ever to play for the legendary Messina Spartans. Fifteen years have gone by since those glory days, and Neely has come home to Messina to bury Coach Eddie Rake, the man who molded the Spartans into an unbeatable football dynasty.
Conroy displays his life through his novel, The Lords of Discipline, to give readers a visual demonstration of how life connections can transform the entity of a novel. Conroy's attendance to the Citadel, his family, and the South helped influence his innovative writing style.
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1. Define 'satire' and provide one example of personal or social satire that yoou have encountered. You may use any source for your example:TV, media, news editorials, movies, comedy, etc.
A Few Keys to All Success by Jim Muncy, published in 2002 explains that there are 7 universal keys to success that we can relate to everyday life. Discernment, Optimism, Responsibility, Initiative, Perseverance, Purpose, Sacrifice. Each one represents how we grow and teaches us how to have a high quality of life. From reading this book I am confident because I know being normal means being average and what we do can change how we act significantly. Also we can’t let the world hold us back from greatness. There will be negativity, there will be those who lack enthusiasm but you can’t let them interfere in what you have in store. And these keys will help you get to that point in your life. Discernment; Judge the seed by the harvest. The first
This relationship is shown between Willy and his neighbor Charley. While Willy believes likability is the only way to succeed, Charley works hard and does not care how people think of him. Through his hard work, Charley started his own business, and is now very successful. Willy, however, ends up getting fired from his job as a salesman.... ... middle of paper ...
illustrated through looking at the parallels of the intertwined relationships between three separate individuals. Miss Amelia Evans, Cousin Lymon Willis, and Marvin Macy, are the players involved in this grotesque love triangle. The feelings they respectively have for each other are what drives the story, and are significant enough that the prosperity of entire town hinges upon them.
This country places great value on achieving the perfect body. Americans strive to achieve thinness, but is that really necessary? In his article written in 1986 entitled “Fat and Happy?,” Hillel Schwartz claims that people who are obese are considered failures in life by fellow Americans. More specifically, he contends that those individuals with a less than perfect physique suffer not only disrespect, but they are also marginalized as a group. Just putting people on a diet to solve a serious weight problem is simply not enough, as they are more than likely to fail. Schwartz wants to convey to his audience that people who are in shape are the ones who make obese people feel horrible about themselves. Schwartz was compelled to write this essay,
At the outset, Atwood gives the reader an exceedingly basic outline of a story with characters John and Mary in plotline A. As we move along to the subsequent plots she adds more detail and depth to the characters and their stories, although she refers back with “If you want a happy ending, try A” (p.327), while alluding that other endings may not be as happy, although possibly not as dull and foreseeable as they were in plot A. Each successive plot is a new telling of the same basic story line; labeled alphabetically A-F; the different plots describe how the character’s lives are lived with all stories ending as they did in A. The stories tell of love gained or of love lost; love given but not reciprocated. The characters experience heartache, suicide, sadness, humiliation, crimes of passion, even happiness; ultimately all ending in death regardless of “the stretch in between”. (p.329)
Masculinity in "Men Should Weep" by Ena Lamont Stewart and "Perfect Days" by Liz Lochead
Wes Moore Paper Richelle Goodrich once said, “To encourage me is to believe in me, which gives me the power to defeat dragons.” In a world submerged in diversity, racism and prejudice it is hard for minorities to get ahead. The novel “The Other Wes Moore” is a depiction of the differences that encouragement and support can make in the life of a child. This novel is about two men, with the same name, from the same neighborhood, that endured very similar adversities in their lives, but their paths were vastly different. In the following paragraphs, their lives will be compared, and analyzed from a sociological perspective.
In the two texts “Sonny Blues” by James Baldwin and “I Stand Here Ironing” by Tillie Olsen, the authors focus on relationships between family members. The stories are narrated by the brother in “Sonny Blues” and mother “I Stand Here Ironing”, therefore the story are only told through the point of view of the family member. Olsen conveys to readers that the mother does not have control over how her daughter, Emily, is raised and the internal conflict that comes along with mother. However, Baldwin shows a lack of family ties between Sonny’s and his brother. As a result, conflicts arise between the brothers in “Sonny’s Blues”. The conflicts in Baldwin and Olsen stories determine the stagnation relationships between families.
Common sense seems to dictate that commercials just advertise products. But in reality, advertising is a multi-headed beast that targets specific genders, races, ages, etc. In “Men’s Men & Women’s Women”, author Steve Craig focuses on one head of the beast: gender. Craig suggests that, “Advertisers . . . portray different images to men and women in order to exploit the different deep seated motivations and anxieties connected to gender identity.” In other words, advertisers manipulate consumers’ fantasies to sell their product. In this essay, I will be analyzing four different commercials that focuses on appealing to specific genders.
In the views of Micheal Kimmel “hegemonic masculinity” is a socially constructed process where men are pressured by social norms of masculine ideals to perform behaviors of a “true man” and its influence on young male’s growth. It is the ideology that being a man with power and expressing control over women is a dominant factor of being a biological male. The structure of masculinity was developed within the 18th to 19th century, as men who owned property and provided for his family with strength related work environments was the perfect example of being a generic “American man.” Kimmel introduces Marketplace Manhood and its relation to American men. He states, “Marketplace Masculinity describes the normative definition of American masculinity.