Winslow Homers Breezing Up essays

Winslow Homer's Breezing Up essays Winslow Homers Breezing Up (A Fair Wind) Winslow Homers Breezing Up, located on the West Main Floor in Gallery 68 of the National Gallery of Arts, perfectly captures the beauty and splendor of nature and innocence. The painting, which was completed after three years of work in 1876, is displayed among the works of other oil painters including additional works by American and naturalist painter Winslow Homer. In this painting, Winslow Homer depicts a man with three boys in a small wooden sail boat that is riding along the choppy waters. At the center of this painting is the stern or rear of the boat. The oldest of the boys is sitting on the far end of the stern with his knees up and his bare feet planted firmly on the deck. Although the subject is directly in front of the viewer, Homer uses a slightly diagonal linear perspective that goes from the rear of the boat to the right and distant horizon. It is this boy, not the man, who is steering the boat almost effortlessly with one hand on the line. His face is turned slightly away from the viewer, yet Homer adds so much detail using line and color to accentuate the boys chin, left cheek and eye. Throughout the artwork, Homers use of lines is only hinted at by the detailed contours of the figures and boats themselves. These detailed features stand out greatly against the thick layers of puffy clouds, painted with thick and loose brush strokes, which linger over the water. The use of expressive lines is also hinted at in Homers ability to recreate curves just as they would appear in nature, such as the shape and form of the rolling waves in the sea and the clouds hovering overhead in the sky. Winslow Homer also uses the technique of line of sight, in which lines are created from the two boys on the left and their father looking to the sail while the boy steering the boat is looking towards the shoreline, their destination. Implied lines may also be app...

The History of Postage Stamps

The History of Postage Stamps Before adhesive paper stamps came along, letters were hand-stamped or postmarked with ink. Postmarks were invented by Henry Bishop and were at first called Bishop mark. Bishop marks were first used in 1661 at the London General Post Office. They marked the day and month the letter was mailed. The First Modern Postage Stamp: Penny Black The first issued postage stamp began with Great Britains Penny Post. On May 6, 1840, the British Penny Black stamp was released. The Penny Black engraved the profile of Queen Victorias head, who remained on all British stamps for the next 60 years.   Rowland Hill Invents Adhesive Postage Stamps A schoolmaster from England, Sir Rowland Hill invented the adhesive postage stamp in 1837, an act for which he was knighted. Through his efforts, the first stamp in the world was issued in England in 1840. Roland Hill also created the first uniform postage rates that were based on weight rather than size. Hills stamps made the prepayment of mail postage possible and practical. Hill had received a summons to provide evidence before the Commission for Post Office Enquiry in February 1837. In providing his evidence, he read from the letter he wrote to the Chancellor, including a statement the notation of paid postage could be created ...by using a bit of paper just large enough to bear the stamp and covered at the back with a glutinous wash....  This is the first publication of an unambiguous description of a modern adhesive postage stamp. Hill’s ideas for postage stamps and charging paid-postage based upon weight soon came to fruition and were adopted in many countries throughout the world. With the new policy of charging by weight, more people began using envelopes to mail documents. Hill’s brother Edwin Hill invented a prototype of the envelope-making machine that folded paper into envelopes quickly enough to match the pace of the growing demand for postage stamps. Rowland Hill and the postal reforms he introduced to the UK postal system are immortalized on several commemorative postage issues of the United Kingdom. William Dockwra In 1680, William Dockwra, an English merchant in London, and his partner  Robert Murray  established the  London Penny Post, a mail system that delivered letters and small parcels inside the city of London for a total of one penny. The postage for the mailed item was prepaid by the use of a hand-  stamp  to frank the mailed item, confirming payment of postage.   Shapes and Materials In addition to the most common rectangular shape, stamps have been printed in geometric (circular, triangular and pentagonal) and irregular shapes. The United States issued its first circular stamp in 2000 as a  hologram  of the earth.  Sierra Leone and Tonga have issued stamps in the shapes of fruit.   Stamps are most commonly made from paper designed specifically for them and are printed in sheets, rolls or small booklets. Less commonly, postage stamps are made of materials other than paper, such as  embossed  foil.

Aspects of the Akan Belief System Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Aspects of the Akan Belief System - Term Paper Example The Akan depict love for freedom and independence from the foreign rule and their insistence on independence helped them in transforming the modern Ghana. Akan has several belief systems and this form of writing highlights aspects of the Akan belief system. Akan’s main feature is their language Twi, which is the most predominant native language used in Ghana and has several intelligible dialects that are qualified based on the speakers. Currently, various dialects have been incorporated into the Twi language thus making it a unified language. The Twi language constitutes proverbs that are of concise moral and religious origin as they touch on issues of common sense and good manners. Akan’s cultural influence was trigerred by the Akwamu and Asante Kingdoms that detained people to learn Twi and forcing non-Twi speakers into their Kingdoms (Gyekye, 1995). The Akans are organizedin 8 classeswhere every group is known as a TOTEM, which are social institution, and they includ ed the Aduana, Agona, Asakyiri, Asenes, Ayokoo, Bretuo, Ekoona and the Asona. The Akan was organized into kingdoms that were initially established by the Bono. The Kingdoms were full of gold that were mined in the Volta River that later turned them to merchandisers. The trade between the Portuguese with the Akan largely determined the locations of the Akan’s future kingdoms along the trade routes. ... The human sacrifice was believed to be effective when the victim accepted it voluntarily and the Akan believed that it led to emergence of quarters and flourishing town. The place where the victim was buried was highly protected because they believed that it was sacred and it was mostly used to sacrifice and carry out libations. Moreover, the Akan believed in the family (Abusua), was considered as the basic social unit and one’s individual family included the issue of his mother, mother’s sisters, and children of his sisters. On the other hand, the extended family comprised of his immediate as well as the immediate families that traced their ancestry from the common female ancestress Extended family is regarded as vital since it ensured mutual helpfulness and cooperation as well as conformity to social norms. According to their matrilineal arrangement, females were deemed the maintainer of the family in such a way that a family would become extinct whenever there was no woman to keep it going. Father is only known to be a facilitator in the family. The family was headed by Abusua Panyin who had a number of duties such as ensuring sustainability custom, law, and tradition and exercising superintendence over the family members. The Akans hugely regarded the significance of procreation as the fundamental of life and everyone who bore children was highly respected. They really valued children born into wedlock due to the great importance they gave to marriage, which sets stage for responsible and stable family. Men searches for their wives and borne all the expenses associated with the search as well as with the marriage. Marriage is regarded as a group union

Is Downsizing unethical Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Is Downsizing unethical - Essay Example Insofar as the actions that managers take are in accordance with their moral and legal obligations toward the firm's owners, any decisions resulting from those actions would not necessarily be perceived by them as unethical. Based on this reasoning, decisions made by top management to adopt and implement the downsizing alternative, with the objective of ensuring the financial health of the firm, would be in the best interest of the firm's owners. Subsequently, the ethics of downsizing is not likely to be a conscious consideration as top management formulates downsizing decisions. According to Kantian theory, employee rights are irreducible - that is, they are not to be abridged arbitrarily. This theory also suggests that employees are legally entitled to free and equal access to any rights guaranteed them by law. Legally, employees are entitled to information (i.e., advance notice) concerning layoffs (Cabot, 1988). The concept of rights suggests that employees have the right to as much information as possible about the organization they work for, their job, possibilities of continued employment, and any other information necessary for job enrichment and development (Werhane, 1985). In downsizing situations, particularly during the process of communicating to employees aspects of the downsizing that will affect them and their job, violations of this concept often occur. Pompa (1992) suggests that less than full disclosure of information concerning the downsizing represents the most blatant violation of employee rights. He states that "Deontologically, if withholding information constitutes deception which limits employees' informed choice about their work status, then it violates the Kantian imperative to treat others as ends in themselves, not merely as means" (pp. 148-149). With respect to downsizing, the concept of rights would argue that employees have rights that must not be violated during the formulation and implementation of the downsizing alternative. When these rights are denied, employees are likely to perceive that ethical violations have occurred. Downsizing and the violation of implied contracts What makes a discussion of the ethical implications of downsizing problematic is that there are (save for situations in which collective bargaining is in force) no explicit contractual, legal, or regulatory violations involved. Because employment-at-will is the dominant paradigm for workplace relationships in the United States, recourse to specific legal remedies is limited for employees who have experienced downsizing. There is, in short, no statutory or common-law "right" in American jurisprudence to have continuous employment with a particular employer, although workers in statutorily-protected classes (like women, older workers, and African-Americans) may have claims if they can demonstrate that their individual dismissals were due to unlawful bias (Lee, 1995). A discussion of the ethics of downsizing that focuses on contractual claims will therefore necessarily rely on psychological and social contract theory rather than a legal analysis. In short, the fact that many societal (and for that matter, personal) expectations of employers are neither codified into law nor included in a formalized contract is not necessarily fatal

General Management - George David Essay Example for Free

General Management George David Essay George David has been CEO of United Technologies Corporation (UTC) for more than a decade. During that time he has received numerous accolades and awards for his performance as a CEO. Under his leadership UTC, a $343 billion conglomerate whose operating units include manufacturers of elevators (Otis Elevator), aerospace products (including Pratt Whitney jet engines and Sikorsky helicopters), air conditioning systems, and fire and security systems, has seen earnings grow at 10–14 percent annually—impressive numbers for any company but particularly for a manufacturing enterprise. According to David, a key to United Technologies’ success has been sustained improvements in productivity and product quality. The story goes back to the 1980s when David was running the international operations of Otis Elevator. There he encountered a Japanese engineer, Yuzuru Ito, who had been brought in to determine why a new elevator product was performing poorly. David was impressed with Ito’s methods for identifying quality problems and improving performance. When he was promoted to CEO, David realized that he had to lower the costs and improve the quality of UTC’s products. One of the first things he did was persuade Ito to work for him at UTC. Under David, Ito developed a program for improving product quality and productivity, known as Achieving Competitive Excellence (ACE), which was subsequently rolled out across UTC. The ACE program has been one of drivers of productivity improvements at UTC ever since. Early in his tenure as CEO, David also radically reorganized UTC. He dramatically cut the size of the head office and decentralized decision making to business divisions. He also directed his accounting staff to develop a new financial reporting system that would give him good information about how well each division was doing and make it easier to hold divisional general managers accountable for the performance of the units under them. He then gave them demanding goals for earnings and sales growth and pushed them to improve processes within their units by implementing the ACE program. At the same time David has always stressed that management is about more than goal setting and holding people accountable. Values are also important. David has insisted that UTC employees adhere to the highest ethical standards, that the company produce that have minimal environmental impact, and that employee safety remain the top consideration in the work-place. When asked what his greatest achievement as a manager has been, David refers to UTC’s worldwide employee scholarship program. Implemented in 1996 and considered the hall-mark of UTC’s commitment to employee development, the program pays the entire cost of an employee’s college or graduate school education, allows employees to pursue any subject at an accredited school, provides paid study time, and awards UTC stock (up to $10,000 worth in the United States) for completing degrees. Explaining the program, David states, â€Å"One of the obligations that an employer has is to give employees opportunities to better themselves. And we feel it’s also very good business for us because it generates a better workforce that stays longer. † David states that one of his central tasks has been to build a management team that functions smoothly over the long term. â€Å"People come to rely upon each other,† he says. â€Å"You have the same trusting relationships. You know people; they know you. You can predict them; they can predict you. All of that kind of begins to work, and it accelerates over the tenure of a CEO. If you have people bouncing in and out every two to three years, that’s not good. According to Sandy Weill, former chairman of Citicorp and a UTC board member, David has the right mix of toughness and sensitivity. â€Å"When somebody cant do the job he’ll try to help; but if that person is not going to make it work, that person wont be on the job forever. † At the same time Weill says, â€Å"He does a lot of things that employees respect him for, I think he is a very good manager. Even though David is demanding, he can also listen—he has a receive mode as well as a send mode. †

Temptations Of Odysseus Essay -- essays research papers

Temptations of Odysseus   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Odysseus: a hero in every way. He is a real man, skilled in the sports, handy with a sword and spear, and a master of war strategy. Most of the challenges and adventures in his return voyage from Troy show us this even if we had no idea of his great heroic stature and accomplishments in the Trojan war. I found in my reading of the Odyssey that most of the trials the gods place upon him are readily faced with heroic means. These challenges are not necessarily welcomed by Odysseus but accepted as part of his role. He is the hero, its his lot to wield sword and shield and bravely face the next army or monster. Then we begin to see more of the challenges do not require our hero to fight his way out. These threats are the most difficult problems for Odysseus to overcome. The tests like the isle of the lotus eaters, Circe's island, and Calypso's island were the hardest challenges for Odysseus. His encounter with Polyphemus the Cyclops, the Laestrygonians, Charybdis and Scyylla, and the kingdom of the dead: these dangers were on his level, heroic battles where he could fight valiantly and if it was his fate, die valiantly. The challenges where heroic means were not a solution to overcome the danger were the most formidable tasks that could easily destroy Odysseus.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Odysseus and crew are finally on their way home after the war, after nine days on the rough sea, they arrive at the isle of the lotus eaters. The lotus eaters are a group of people who have a lot of fun, thanks to their consumption of the lotus flower. This confrontation provides Odysseus and his crew with the first of their challenges (Odyssey 9:1-103). This threat is definitely one that a heroic confrontation is unlikely. This danger is not any physical threat to him or his men. The lotus eaters create a situation where Odysseus and his crew are tempted by a gift. This gift of immediate gratification threatens to take away several their basic heroic element. By eating the lotus flower they would find immediate happiness, however they would never make it home. They would died old men on that island without their families, they would be broken in a sense. Without the memories of their homes, wives, and children they would be just a shell of who they were. Odysseus would sooner die than to never see Penelope again and be ... ...n or ever see his son. If he couldn't ever get back then there would have been no reason to ever leave. All of his heroic deed would have been in vain and no one would have even remembered him. He could not have fought the suitors and proved himself . The act of returning was always the ultimate goal for Odysseus and the temptations of happiness, beauty, immortality, and eternal youth were much harder for him to pass up every time he had to put his life on the line and fight an army or evade a monster. He could have given in to any of the temptations at any time and never had to endure the pain and strife that came from his homeward journey. Without his heroic resources to help him escape the temptations by battling his way out or using his wit to escape he holds on and endures and finally returns. Dying on the battlefield would be a fantastic ending for a hero such as Odysseus. Dying alone without a fight or giving in and living without ever returning to his home or Penelope would be a fate no hero could accept. He would have been forgotten and others would claim what was his. Odysseus does endure and returns, escaping danger and great temptation to be the hero and claim his own.

African Americans in Pop Culture Essay

African Americans have had an incredible lasting impression on popular culture. African American singers, artists, entrepreneurs, athletes and actors have all had their say and have really stood out within the past few years. They’ve also grown and not grown in different ways all around from music, to television, to movies. African American stereotypes still exist in all aspects of pop culture, while many are trying to get away from what audiences assume is the typical black person. African Americans have been fighting for and against their own stereotypes when they started breaking out into music, then branching out into television, and making it big in the film industry. They’ve gone from being the dumb, uneducated, and underprivileged minority of America, and have started to make themselves more known as gang bangers and thugs, which are often seen as heroes in popular culture. African Americans haven’t only made a name for themselves or left a footprint in only their culture, but in American culture all around. African Americans have been making their mark in music all throughout history. Many started with the jazz and bebop rebellion during the 1940s and ’50s in Detroit. They made their point by trying to be different. They didn’t want to follow the typical white, swing music criteria, and that’s exactly what happened. Bebop wasn’t so mainstream, and that’s what made it their own. They preferred small, unique combos to play instead of big named stars in the music industry. Detroit was shedding light on the working class people of the town and wanted to really make a sound for them. â€Å"The 1940s created an â€Å"afro-modernism,† a response to the urbanization, industrialization, and modernization of African American Culture. † Because of their movement ahead in music, they also made their movement in business. And so emerged an incredibly successful, black capitalist enterprise, Motown Records, founded by Barry Gordy. Along with the movement in Detroit, the Harlem Renaissance had happened even before all the rage for jazz and bebop, which raised awareness to the visual arts, which led to even more developments in music. And even earlier at the beginning of the 20th century, blacks were starting to be accepted into acclaimed schools to study music and they were allowed to join the base of white people in symphony orchestras. During the ’50s, doo-wop and soul music became popular. That’s when legends like Ray Charles emerged and paved the way for others. Soul music remained popular among blacks for long after the pop sounds started to wave through. By the end of the decade and moving into the ’70s, blacks were starting to crossover into the typical white music trends. Psychadelic music had become popular. Jimi Hendrix, along his wah-wah pedal innovation, became one of the most popular guitarists during the era. Right after that, soul had become the popular music in the black community and was starting to revolutionize African-American music. Soul had continued success in popularity during the ’70s, but the ’70s also brought along a rise in black bands. White people were listening to country, disco, and all sorts of rock music, while the African-Americans had their funk, pop, soul, and jazz music that was on a totally different spectrum from their white counterparts. The ’70s was also when Djs started mixing their own beats and playing their funk records the way they wanted to so they could get their audience to dance. And with the beats produced by Djs along with the poets who would read their poems to those beats, came the emergence of hip hop music. The era of hip hop music was a new revolution in African American popular culture.

Integrated research essay Essay

Introduction Families in the twenty first century go through very many challenges. There are so many issues that are affecting this unit. Divorce is one of the factors that are really affecting this unit. Divorce can be defined as dissolution of the marriage when the partners are still alive. Since the twentieth century, there has been an increase in divorce rates in the society. This has been very prevalent in the developed countries rather than in the developing ones. Such countries include the South Korea, Canada, United Kingdom and the United States. Single parent families have become widely accepted. This has affected how people view divorce and its rate. There are various reasons that people give to explain why they opt for divorce. Other people site unfaithfulness or financial issues as a reason for divorce. A law court has to certify the divorce and also determine the terms therein. Such a thing includes issues after and before the divorce is carried out. Many spouses usually fail to agree on these terms. Such conflicts need to be solved amicably though this is hard. There are times when couples divorce just because they are incompatible. Some spouses claim to have differences that are irreconcilable that lead to divorce. Research shows that Muslims show minimal divorce rates compared to other religions. Divorce is not something that has started recently. It began very long time ago. It was even allowed by the Athenians though it was not common in the Roman culture. Divorce in general posses a challenge to many families. When a family goes through divorce, it experiences many things. There are issues dealing with allocation of assets. Matters dealing with responsibilities and taking care of children become a hard nut to crack for the parties. Relation of divorce to my own family of origin story In my family of origin, there is a story that is quite related to divorce. There is a story that goes- once upon a time there lived a man called Flamz. The man had a wife called Staiz. The two stayed together for some time but later on divorced. They had four daughters from the marriage. Staiz left the children with Flamz. Later own the daughters also got married and also divorced one after another. This story was used to explain why divorce is so common in my family. My parents are divorced and I have witnessed my two brothers also divorce. So divorce as a topic is quite related to my family of origin stories. This shows that family background can really influence a persons’ decision on divorce. Loss When a family goes through divorce, the partners automatically experience loss. There are always feelings of grief. When this loss of a loved one through divorce occurs, the parties are mostly not prepared to deal with it. This is because in most occasions it is a new thing. It is something that they have never gone through in life. When people get married, they always expect a bright future. When divorce occurs it is really traumatic even if the parties had gone through it before. The feelings of grief have to be there and the parties should not just feel normal in relation to this loss. This loss of a husband or a wife normally brings memories to the spouses that are bitter- sweet. It is normal for a partner to go through the grief feeling and this helps him or her to come back to normal. There are times when this loss makes people to be so depressed. It is healthy for such people to seek help from counselors if the depression takes a long time due to loss of a partner. This loss can make a person to be drained physically. Some people lack appetite and fail to control their emotions. Divorce can make a person experience grief due to the loss. After the people divorcing most of them even lack interest in sex, they can feel very lonely and even lack interest in doing any work. The individuals just criticize themselves. They ponder over what they did or did not do. These people need to accept that the divorce has occurred. This helps them come to a reality of the loss through divorce. The people should allow themselves to go through the pain of the loss. It cannot be avoided. Partners need to learn to function without the other person. The first reaction to loss in divorce is denial. People just think that the other person is just having some issues and he or she will probably come back to his or her senses. A person just imagines that the other party will just come back. People assume that the other party is going through a mid life crisis. The next point is where the earlier issues that existed in marriage begin to surface. There are anger feelings on how one was treated. This shows that the person is going through a healing process. The other stage is bargaining and a person feels like promising that he or she will improve or change in the areas that they were short. There is then depression and acceptance. Identity Many people normally wonder whether they can regain their identity after going through a divorce. Sometimes the marriage terminates when some partners have gone through so much emotional abuse. Other people even go through physical abuse. In the midst of this emotional turmoil, many people fail to find their real identity. Many people who go through divorce feel that they are just not themselves. They feel that they have just lost their sanity. Many people at this time of stress reach out to friends and relatives to help them come back to themselves. They just feel useless and not themselves. Most ladies who go through divorce feel that they have lost their respectable identity in the society. They even neglect their personal hygiene and good grooming. Such partners always need to come back to themselves very fast because more often than not they have children and other responsibilities to take care of. People lose their vigor and the strength to go on in life or to do anything. The parties just have to pull themselves back to normal. Many men and women who go through divorce feel they have lost themselves completely. Psychologists always help such people to come back to their self esteem and to regain their self worth.

7 Terms with the Root -Vore

7 Terms with the Root -Vore 7 Terms with the Root â€Å"-Vore† 7 Terms with the Root â€Å"-Vore† By Mark Nichol Are you a locavore? Probably not it’s still a fringe movement but you should know what it means, even if you do not consider yourself a member of the class. A discussion of locavore and six related words follows: 1. Locavore The term was coined in 2005 by a group of San Franciscans who launched the website Locavore.com to spread the word about the conservationist concept of striving to restrict one’s diet to foods and ingredients produced locally. (Some locavores quantify the range as anywhere within a one-hundred-mile radius, but most are not exact in their limits.) Locavore is based on other words in which the -vore root appears (the root word is from the Latin term vorare, meaning â€Å"to devour†): 2. Carnivore A carnivore is a person or animal (or a plant) that eats meat; the prefix is from the Latin word for â€Å"flesh.† Other words sharing the root are carnal, meaning â€Å"of the flesh† and connoting sexual matters, and carnage, which comes from the Latin word carnaticum, meaning â€Å"tribute of flesh† and referring originally to the bodies of slain animals or people but now usually referring to slaughter in general. Interestingly, these words are also etymologically related to carnival, which stems from an Italian term, carnelevare, meaning â€Å"removal of meat.† (Carnival referred originally to a celebration before Lent, during a period when Catholics were prohibited from eating meat.) 3. Herbivore An herbivore is an animal that eats vegetable matter; the Latin root from which the prefix herb- and herb and other words based on it are derived, herba, means plant.† Human herbivores are generally referred to as vegetarians; if they refrain from eating anything derived from animals, from dairy products to gelatin, they are called vegans. Terms of further refinement are â€Å"lacto-ovo vegetarian,† for a person who eschews rather than chews meat but does consume milk and eggs (the root lac- means â€Å"milk† seen in lactate and lactic and ovo-, the root of oval, refers to eggs) and â€Å"lacto-ovo-pesco vegetarian,† or, more simply, pescetarian, for one who eats fish but not meat. (The root pesc-, from the Latin term piscis, means â€Å"fish.†) 4. Insectivore This self-explanatory term (insect is from the Latin term insecare, â€Å"to cut into,† and is related to incisive, scissors, and the like) is nearly synonymous with entomophage (from the Latin elements ento-, meaning â€Å"insect,† and -phage, meaning â€Å"eating†), though the latter term primarily refers to human practitioners. 5. Omnivore An omnivore is something that eats both meat and plants (and often fish but not necessarily insects); omni- seen also in omniscient and omnipresent means â€Å"all.† 6. Piscivore A piscivore, also called an ichthyophage (ichthy means â€Å"fish†), eats fish, though, like most other groups classified here, the term refers to the primary type of diet and does not imply exclusivity. 7. Voracious Voracious, synonymous with ravenous or insatiable, means â€Å"having a great appetite† or refers to intense greediness or eagerness. The noun form is voracity. Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Vocabulary category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:20 Computer Terms You Should KnowTime Words: Era, Epoch, and Eon10 Types of Hyphenation Errors

Best Summary and Analysis The Great Gatsby, Chapter 3

Best Summary and Analysis The Great Gatsby, Chapter 3 SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips In Chapter 3 of The Great Gatsby, we finally - finally! - we get to see one of Gatsby’s totally off the hook parties! And, it more than lives up to the hype as far as Nick is concerned. Even more excitingly, we finally get to meet the man, the myth, the legend himself - Gatsby, in the flesh! So why then does this reveal, which the novel has been building toward for 2.5 chapters, seem so anticlimactic? Read on for our Great GatsbyChapter 3 summary, coveringthe highs and lows of the Gatsby Saturday night experience. Quick Note on Our Citations Our citation format in this guide is (chapter.paragraph). We're using this system since there are many editions of Gatsby, so using page numbers would only work for students with our copy of the book. To find a quotation we cite via chapter and paragraph in your book, you can either eyeball it (Paragraph 1-50: beginning of chapter; 50-100: middle of chapter; 100-on: end of chapter), or use the search function if you're using an online or eReader version of the text. The Great Gatsby: Chapter 3Summary Nick describes watching endless parties going on in Gatsby’s house every weekend. Guests party day and night and then on Mondays servants clean up the mess. Everything is about excess and a sense of overkill. Each weekend, guests are ferried back and forth to Manhattan by Rolls-Royce, crates of oranges and lemons are juiced, an army of caterers sets up tents and lighting, food is piled high, the bar is overwhelmingly stocked, and there is a huge band playing. It's an even bigger deal than it sounds because all this is happeningduring the Prohibition, when alcohol was supposedly unavailable. The first night Nick goes to Gatsby’s for a party, he’s one of a very few actually invited guests. Everyone else just crashes.At the party, Nick is ill at ease. He knows no one. There’s a surprising number of English people at the party, who seem desperate to get their hands on American money. No one knows where Gatsby himself is. Nick hangs out near the bar until he sees Jordan Baker.Nick and Jordan chat with other party people. A young woman tells them that at another one of these parties, when she ripped her dress by accident, Gatsby sent her a very expensive replacement.They gossip about what this odd behavior means. One rumor has it that Gatsby killed someone, another that he was a German spy. Food is served, which Nick and Jordan eat at a table full of people from East Egg, who look at this insane party with condescension. Theydecide to find Gatsby since Nick has never actually met him. In his mansion, they end up in the library, which has ornately carved bookshelves and reams of books.A man with owl-eyed spectacles enthuses about the fact that all these books are actually real – and about the fact that Gatsby hasn’t cut their pages (meaning he’s never read any of them). Back out in the garden, guests are now dancing, and several famous opera singers perform. Some partygoers also perform relatively risquà © acts. Nick and Jordan sit down at a table with a man who recognizes Nick from the army. After talking about the places in France where they were stationed during the war, the man reveals that he is Gatsby.Gatsby flashes the world’s greatest and most seductive (not sexually, just extremely appealingly) smile at Nick and leaves to take a phone call from Chicago. Nick demands more information about Gatsby from Jordan, who said that Gatsby calls himself an Oxford man (meaning, he went to the University of Oxford). Jordan says that she doesn’t believe this, and Nick lumps the info in with all the other rumors he’s heard (that Gatsby had killed a man, that he was Kaiser Wilhelm’s nephew, that he was a German spy, etc.). The orchestra strikes up the latest number one hit.Nick notices Gatsby looking over his guests with approval. Gatsby neither drinks, nor dances, nor flirts with anyone at the party. When Jordan is suddenly and mysteriously asked to speak to Gatsby alone, Nick watches a drunk guest weep and then pass out. He notices fights breaking out between other couples. Even the group of people from East Egg are no longer on their best behavior. Despite the fact that the party is clearly over, no one wants to leave.As Nick is getting his hat to leave, Gatsby and Jordan come out of the library. Jordan tells Nick that Gatsby has just told her something amazing – but she can’t reveal what. She gives Nick her number and leaves. Nick finds Gatsby, apologizes for not seeking him out earlier. Gatsby invites him to go out on his hydroplane the next day, and Nick leaves as Gatsby is summoned to a phone call from Philadelphia. He waves goodbye from the steps of his mansion, looking lonely. Outside, the man with the owl-eyed spectacles from the library has crashed his car. An even drunker man emerges from the driver’s seat of the wreck and is comically but also horrifyingly confused about what has happened. Suddenly, the narrative is interrupted by present-day Nick. He thinks that what he’s been writing is probably giving us the wrong idea. He wasn’t fixated on Gatsby during that summer – this fixation has only happened since then.That summer, he spent most of his time working at his second or third-tier bond trading company, Probity Trust, and had a relationship with a coworker. He started to really like the crowded and anonymous feel of Manhattan, but also felt lonely. In the middle of the summer, Nick reconnects with Jordan Baker and they start dating. He almost falls in love with her and discovers that under her veneer of boredom, Jordan is an incorrigible liar. She gets away with it because in the rigid upper-class code of behavior, calling a woman out as a liar would be improper. Nick suddenly remembers the story he had read about her golfing career: Jordan was accused of cheating by moving her ball to a better lie, but the witnesses later recanted and nothing was proven. When Nick complains that Jordan is a terrible driver, she answers that she relies on the other people on the road to be careful instead of her.Nick wants to take their relationship further, but reigns himself in because he hasn’t fully broken off the non-engagement back home that Tom and Daisy had asked him about earlier. He claims that he is one of the few honest people that he’s ever met. So, lots of car accidents, and talk about car accidents, all in the vicinity of alcohol? Can you say foreshadowing? Key Chapter 3 Quotes I believe that on the first night I went to Gatsby's house I was one of the few guests who had actually been invited. People were not invited- they went there. They got into automobiles which bore them out to Long Island and somehow they ended up at Gatsby's door. Once there they were introduced by somebody who knew Gatsby and after that they conducted themselves according to the rules of behavior associated with amusement parks. Sometimes they came and went without having met Gatsby at all, came for the party with a simplicity of heart that was its own ticket of admission. (3.7) Gatsby’s parties are the epitome of anonymous, meaningless excess – so much so that people treat his house as a kind of public, or at least commercial, space rather than a private home. This is connected to the vulgarity of new money– you can’t imagine Tom and Daisy throwing a party like this. Or Nick for that matter. The random and meaningless indulgence of his parties further highlights Gatsby's isolation from true friends. As Jordan says later, large parties are great because they provide privacy/intimacy, so Gatsby stands alone in a sea of strangers having their own intimate moments. A stout, middle-aged man with enormous owl-eyed spectacles was sitting somewhat drunk on the edge of a great table, staring with unsteady concentration at the shelves of books. †¦He waved his hand toward the book-shelves. "About that. As a matter of fact you needn't bother to ascertain. I ascertained. They're real†¦."Absolutely real- have pages and everything. I thought they'd be a nice durable cardboard. Matter of fact, they're absolutely real. Pages and- Here! Lemme show you." Taking our skepticism for granted, he rushed to the bookcases and returned with Volume One of the "Stoddard Lectures." "See!" he cried triumphantly. "It's a bona fide piece of printed matter. It fooled me. This fella's a regular Belasco. It's a triumph. What thoroughness! What realism! Knew when to stop too- didn't cut the pages. But what do you want? What do you expect?" (3.41-50) Belasco was a renowned theatrical producer, so comparing Gatsby to him here is a way of describing the library as a stageset for a play – in other words, as a magnificent and convincing fake. This sea of unread books is either yet more tremendous waste of resources, or a kind of miniature example of the fact that a person’s core identity remains the same no matter how many layers of disguise are placed on top. Gatsby has the money to buy these books, but he lacks the interest, depth, time, or ambition to read and understand them, which is similar to how he regards his quest to get Daisy. He smiled understandingly- much more than understandingly. It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. It faced- or seemed to face- the whole external world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just so far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself and assured you that it had precisely the impression of you that, at your best, you hoped to convey. Precisely at that point it vanished- and I was looking at an elegant young rough-neck, a year or two over thirty, whose elaborate formality of speech just missed being absurd. Some time before he introduced himself I'd got a strong impression that he was picking his words with care. (3.76) Lots of Gatsby’s appeallies in his ability to instantly connect with the person he is speaking to, to make that person feel important and valued. This is probably what makes him a great front man for Wolfsheim’s bootlegging enterprise, and connects him with Daisy, who also has a preternaturally appealing quality – her voice. Dishonesty in a woman is a thing you never blame deeply- I was casually sorry, and then I forgot. (3.161) The offhanded misogyny of this remark that Nick makes about Jordan is telling in a novel where women are generally treated as objects at worst or lesser beings at best. Even our narrator, ostensibly a tolerant and nonjudgmental observer, here reveals a core of patriarchal assumptions that run deep. Every one suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues, and this is mine: I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known. (3.171) There are layers of meaning and humor here. First, the humor: While in Christian tradition there is the concept of cardinal virtues, honesty is not one of them. So here, since the phrase â€Å"cardinal sin† is the more familiar concept, there is a small joke that Nick’s honesty is actually a negative quality, a burden. Nick is telling us about his scrupulous honesty a second after he’s revealed that he’s been writing love letters to a girl back home every week despite wanting to end their relationship, and despite dating a girl at his office, and then dating Jordan in the meantime. So honesty to Nick doesn’t really mean what it might to most people. Second, the meaning: What does it mean to have our narrator tell us in one breath that he is honest to a fault, and that he doesn’t think that most other people are honest? This sounds like a humblebrag kind of observation. But also, we need to question Nick’s ability to understand/empathize with other people if he thinks he is on such a removed plane of existence from them. And of course since he just showed us that he is not actually all that honest only a paragraph ago, we need to realize that his narration is probably not completely factual/accurate/truthful. Plus, this observation comes at the end of the third chapter, after we've met all the major players finally - so it's like the board has been set, and now we finallt have enough informationto distrustour narrator. I guess we’re going with â€Å"Nick Carraway: World’s Most Honest Liar† on this one? Chapter 3 Analysis This is a good time to step back from the plot and the text to see how this chapter connects to the book's bigger picture. Themes and Symbols Money and Materialism. Nothing says Roaring 20s excess like the insane party Gatsby throws. In Nick’s description, it’s an explosion of decorations, food, alcohol, music, and anonymous guests who don’t even know the host. This, combined with the over-the-top level of entertainment he provides is jarring even for the wealthy West Egg crowd, and speaks to the materialism and conspicuous display of consumption the novel deplores. It’s interesting that Gatsby orchestrates but doesn’t participate in his extravaganzas – even the guests become display pieces of his wealth as he stands above them and watches. Society and Class. At the same time, we get a sense of the West Egg/East Egg divide as Jordan Baker’s East Egg friends stick together and do not mix with the rest of the guests, regarding them as vulgar and beneath them. Mutability of Identity. The beautifully decorated libraryfilled with books that have never been read speaks to Gatsby’s theatrical approach to crafting his new identity. He can create the trapping and appearance of an Oxford man, but doesn’t have the background or inner resources to actually be one.At the same time, the mystery around Gatsby deepens. We get new theories about his background - he killed a man, he was a German spy during the war, he went to Oxford. And we also see him doing all sorts of inexplicable things – taking business phone calls from Chicago and Philadelphia, telling Jordan something secret and fascinating, not actually partying at his own party. At the same time, we get the first glimpse into the â€Å"great† Gatsby – that dazzling smile that captivates Nick with its empathy and connection. Motifs: Sports.We get our second mention of organized sports in Nick’s brief description of a golf cheating scandal that Jordan was involved with. He chalks it up to her general tendency to lie. Golf is the perfect sport for Jordan to play. It is a game that is highly ordered by social rules and customs, so it fits neatly into her lying MO- she relies on the idea that accusing a woman of cheating is seen as ungentlemanly. Jordan Baker: using the staid rules of the behavior of the upper crust to leverage her golf game, like a boss. Crucial Character Beats Nick and Jordan meet the man with the owl-eyed spectacles (a mysterious and yet somehow important minor figure - later, he will be the only person who will show up to Gatsby’s funeral) who shows them Gatsby’s library of unread books. Like the rest of Gatsby’s life, this library is just window-dressing. We finally meet Gatsby! The title character of the book doesn’t appear until Chapter 3 – and by this point, he’s no longer just a man. He’s a myth and a legend. His actual appearance doesn’t dispel the mystery, but deepens it: why is he getting business phone calls on a weekend? How does a man as young as he is have this kind of money? Why doesn’t he participate in his own party? Why doesn’t Nick describe what he looks like (the way he does every other person in the book)? The owl-spectacles man and his even drunker companion crash a car that they have no idea how to drive. This alarming combination of driving and alcohol is here played for laughs, but is also an important bit of foreshadowing. The foreshadowing is laid on even thicker when Jordan says that as a careless driver, she relies on other people to watch out for her, and Nick points out the danger of two careless people meeting on the road. Present-day Nickinterrupts his story to let us know that the things that he is describing as significant now didn’t appear so at the time. This both shows how much his fascination with Gatsby has grown over time, and makes the novel’s heavy use of foreshadowing all the more significant. Nick and Jordan start dating, and he realizes that she is a compulsive liar. What’s Next? Learn more about what makes Jordan tick in preparation for the next chapter, when she will take over narrator duties for a while. Consider the role the motifs of music, alcohol, and sports play in the novel. Think about how Gatsby’s parties have been portrayed in the movie adaptations of this novel, since these are the scenes that have become iconic in the way Gatsby has seeped into the larger culture. Move on to the summary of Chapter 4, or revisit the summary of Chapter 2. Want to improve your SAT score by 160 points or your ACT score by 4 points?We've written a guide for each test about the top 5 strategies you must be using to have a shot at improving your score. Download it for free now:

Critical review on The Prophets Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Critical review on The Prophets - Essay Example The text of the article is highly exaggerated, the prophets have never reacted overwhelming about any unethical or immoral practices of the society, but yes there have been some instances where such practices had the potential to ruin the sanctity of human society, and for the sake of the protection of the sanctity achieved by the human society, through the services of the prophets, and the blessings of the God, the prophets were liable to react severely against the potential crimes and malpractices. The prophets have been descended not for the analysis of the human society; their responsibility is to ensure that the will of God is well maintained and practiced with true spirit and fervor. The prophet is sleepless and grave, the frankincense of charity fails to sweeten cruelties . The prophets were bestowed with the responsibility to criticize and rectify beyond analyze, the prophets on their part were justified to take serious notice of the corrupt and unethical practices which were commonly followed without any fear or despair. The religion of the God has focused upon peace, therefore every prophet has tired to communicate the significance of the peaceful live, and the factor of peace is strong due to the fact that it enlightens the human spiritually, morally and eternally. The factors which humans have ignored might have the potential to distract and demote the spiritual development achieved by the society of the time. The intellect of the human is far limited, whereas that of the prophet is manifold. The diversification of opinions, thoughts and objectives attained by the human is incomparable with the qualities possessed by the prophets. It is justified to regard the prophets as the enlightened creature, which is provided with spiritual authority and intellectual capabilities to handle, judge, practice and resolve the issue. It is untrue to regard that