... saying goes, denial isn't just a river in Egypt. On the surface, "The Swimmer" may appear to be a tale of the effects of alcohol abuse or maybe even a characterization of a mental disorder like Alzheimer's. Upon closer scrutiny, however, one discerns that it is denial that allows for the supremacy of the human mind over logic and reason during desperate times. Cheever insinuates that the mind is not only a dangerously powerful tool ... your misfortunes, Ned. We heard you sold the house and that your poor children- Mrs. Halloran sympathizes. "My misfortunes? I don't know what you mean. I ...

• Word Count: 854
• Approx Pages: 3

... get held back by the absence of the two closest bridges. Days later, they ford the river, then travel on to Jefferson, where Anse remarries the day after Addie is buried. The story is narrated by fifteen different characters, but the Bundren family is the most important. The children are: Cash, the first-born carpenter; Darl, the eccentric son sent to an asylum; Jewel, the child of Addie's affair; Dewey Dell, the pregnant unwed daughter; and ... Vardaman, the youngest and most confused of ... ...

• Word Count: 2124
• Approx Pages: 8
• Grade Level: High School

... Study – The Secret River "Which was your favourite character in the book 'The Secret River' by Kate Grenville and why? Answer with close reference to the text." The Secret River written by Kate Grenville describes the life of William Thornhill through various stages of his life. The novel however starts from an event that occurs in the later parts of the novel then retells the story chronologically first describing the struggles he faced ... ] had seen Dick there on a spit of sand, playing with the native children" (page 211). Using Richard's 'innocence' the novels describes Richa...

• Word Count: 1151
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: High School

... for. And yet..." (p. 666). At a certain moment, Susan realizes that there is something wrong with her life. Despite the fact that apparently she leads a flawless life, "... why did Susan feel as if life had become a desert, and that nothing mattered, and that her children were not her own" (p. 668). Susan tries to draw herself back from this structure when she perceives she ... were in cold storage" (p. 669). She hopes once all her children are at school, she will have enough spare time for herself and hence will be able to reencounter her essence. Nevertheless, this yearning gives rise...

• Word Count: 1003
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: High School

... for. And yet..." (p. 666). At a certain moment, Susan realizes that there is something wrong with her life. Despite the fact that apparently she leads a flawless life, "... why did Susan feel as if life had become a desert, and that nothing mattered, and that her children were not her own" (p. 668). Susan tries to draw herself back from this structure when she perceives she ... were in cold storage" (p. 669). She hopes once all her children are at school, she will have enough spare time for herself and hence will be able to reencounter her essence. Nevertheless, this yearning gives rise...

• Word Count: 994
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: High School

... Marian and respect her for what she is mainly through the dialogue between Mrs Ericson and herself. Pg 115-116 Mrs Ericson is a very sweet, kind and fun-loving person she is anything but racist. She employs Marian as a sort of maid to clean and look after the children. She shows her great sense of thankfulness to Marian when she is said to have wondered ... for the thousandth time, "How the house had ever managed to get along without her." She continually compliments Marian and her driving and this ... the racism starts. Lines that include the words, "Swanee River," and "Piccaninnies,"...

• Word Count: 1005
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: High School

... O'Flaherty and Thomas O'Flaherty. Her father was a well-established merchant, who took part in many business investments. He is one of the founders of the Pacific Railroad, and was on the train when it crashed into the Gasconade River, in 1885. Her mother Eliza, was a member of a very elite social group, in their French-Creole community. After Kate's father passed away, her mother became much more religious, and ... . They were married for 12 ½ years. In 1882 Oscar died of Malaria, and Kate raised the children on her own. Two years after Oscar died Kate and her children moved in with he...

• Word Count: 999
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: High School

... the environment the same. He rarely uses one character without the other acting or reacting in the same way. We decided could not show it to anyone, and we knew that if anyone saw it they would take it away (224). The setting of the story is a key to developing the readers" understanding of the purpose of "The Secret Lion." They were always at a river, walking along as Rios described their surroundings. The description of the ... hills and then the golf course or "heaven" as the two children called it, had a big emphasis on the kids" views of their environment. Another element in Rios" ...

• Word Count: 604
• Approx Pages: 2
• Grade Level: High School

... background, thoughts and actions that the mother is left behind. The author probably did this on purpose so the audience could see the unselfish love the mother has for her children. Since the narrator is the mother, she is obviously engaged in the action and characters of the story and therefore changes the way information is revealed. Since this ... narrator is not omnipresent, she cannot tell the true thoughts and feelings of the characters, only what she thinks they are. For example, she describes Dee as someone who "washed us in a river of ... make-believe, burned us with a lot of...

• Word Count: 936
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: High School

... begins to appear that this is an empty promise; the storyteller is not really willing to make changes. "This is too gruesome," says the girl. "You want me to continue?" Alex Thomas threatens. "All right then. Go on," she concedes (Atwood, p. 119). What emerges from the story of Sakiel-Norn is a rather gothic tale of children blinded or with their tongues cut out, in order ... to uphold their society. In spite of all the obstacles to their love, the assassin and the temple girl triumph. The book of which this tale is supposedly a part, and for which the book is titled, is the posthumousl...

• Word Count: 988
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: High School

... crane was still alive; that he had left the neighborhood partly through fear of the goblin - and "The old country wives, however, who are the best judges of these matters, maintain to this day that Ichabod was spirited away by supernatural means."" The story takes place in a small market town on the shore of the Hudson River in New York known as Sleepy Hollow. The town is known as a very calming place ... he had left the neighborhood partly through fear of the goblin - and "The old country wives, however, who are the best judges of these matters, maintain to this day that Ichabod was sp...

• Word Count: 1805
• Approx Pages: 7
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

... of the bush. The end of the story emphasises the family's desolation in such a harsh environment; moreover, the drover's wife's ability to cope has been achieved at what Lawson clearly regards as the cost of her femininity. In the setting of The Drover's Wife, the reader's attention is obtained through the use of adjectives such as "stunted, rotten apple trees- and "big, black, yellow-eyed dog-. Henry Lawson intelligently compares the children and the drover's wife to the environment. The ... is important for Lawson to detail the words picturing the campsite and the species of fish in t...

• Word Count: 1266
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: High School

... children and the burden that they bring. Another use of symbolism in "Hills Like White Elephants" is during one of the first comments made by Jig says "" They"re lovely hills" [. . .] "They don't look like white elephants."". The hills for Jig represent the child while the hills for the man symbolized the big obstacle the couple had to overcome in their relationship. Later in the story there fields of grain and a river, which symbolizes the ... child and beyond the river are mountains, which suggest that if she keeps the child there will be difficulty between the couple. Yet another sym...

• Word Count: 1031
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: High School

... Clara Charmian Kittredge in November 1905. The children from the first marriage were Joan and Bess. In the second marriage there was Joy, and she died in 1910 (Dyer n.p.g). Jack London's childhood was one of loneliness, insecurity, and deprivation. The reality was that the London's were never terribly poor. Like many other sensitive and intelligent children who had been lonely and unloved, London ... found refuge in books and became a voracious reader. He was not the typical bookworm. At the age of sixteen the Oakland Public Library borrowed money to buy a ... to his fellow prospectors...

• Word Count: 1996
• Approx Pages: 8
• Grade Level: High School

... in the story: - "The lights of Boston that blazed and blinked across the darkening water" Here, the writer is talking about the airport that is based across the lake or river near the young girls house but this is also a reference to the growing war across the Atlantic, where an arm of carnage is gradually reaching out towards this young girls home land although she does not see it. The lights of the planes ... snowsuit while playing near the oil slick. When analysed from this point of view we can see that children can sometimes be crueller than adults. The themes of this story; loss of ...

• Word Count: 1179
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: High School

... aggressive wolf dog into a faithful, responsible housedog. The setting takes place in the Northland Wiled, a region in the arctic, then shifts to the Mackenzie River, which continues through Indian camp and goes on to the Great Slave Lake. It later moves to the Yukon and head towards the San Quentin Prison, who hails from San Francisco (London 1-20). The climax in the story occurs when Weedon Scott saves White Fang ... frightening. This bleak mood is in sharp contrast to the domesticate happiness that White Fang feels at the end of the novel with his new, kind master, Weedon Scott (Hile...

• Word Count: 1449
• Approx Pages: 6
• Grade Level: High School