Ambition
Poor little Suzy isn’t going to get to eat tonight because her father decided to spend his paycheck on lottery tickets that didn’t win. A man is going to prison for life because a gang said it was part of his initiation. A lady is jumping from boyfriend to boyfriend because she believes she will find the one any day now. Each of these scenarios are worlds apart, yet they relate back to one thing: ambition. Though not everyone may think about it so much, but in literature it is displayed in countless pieces of writing be it poems, books, plays. It can be studied in the early roots of English literature and it is through this that one can find many different types of ambition. The vast amounts of writings from the Anglo-Saxon era, and …show more content…
Even though these two stories relate to ambition, they portray the thought of the ambition for wealth in complete contrast. The Pardoner’s Tale where these three men fall to the temptation of money, influence their actions in such a way that it ends up getting them killed. The tale goes on to say,” At once the three young rioters began to run, and reached the tree, and there they found a pile of golden florins on the ground” Chaucer, Line 168). The love of money blinded them to the trap that was laid before them. Whereas, in the story of Federigo, it was his ambition to have enough wealth to be able to woo the lady of his dreams that he would do anything to obtain it. The story tells,” When I think of how you have come here to my poor home…” (Boccaccio, page 176) where Federigo believes he is too poor for Monna now that he has spent all of his money. In both circumstances, the ambition for wealth play a big role in the decisions of the characters, ultimately influencing how the story goes
Poor little Suzy isn’t going to get to eat tonight because her father decided to spend his paycheck on lottery tickets that didn’t win. A man is going to prison for life because a gang said it was part of his initiation. A lady is jumping from boyfriend to boyfriend because she believes she will find the one any day now. Each of these scenarios are worlds apart, yet they relate back to one thing: ambition. Though not everyone may think about it so much, but in literature it is displayed in countless pieces of writing be it poems, books, plays. It can be studied in the early roots of English literature and it is through this that one can find many different types of ambition. The vast amounts of writings from the Anglo-Saxon era, and …show more content…
Even though these two stories relate to ambition, they portray the thought of the ambition for wealth in complete contrast. The Pardoner’s Tale where these three men fall to the temptation of money, influence their actions in such a way that it ends up getting them killed. The tale goes on to say,” At once the three young rioters began to run, and reached the tree, and there they found a pile of golden florins on the ground” Chaucer, Line 168). The love of money blinded them to the trap that was laid before them. Whereas, in the story of Federigo, it was his ambition to have enough wealth to be able to woo the lady of his dreams that he would do anything to obtain it. The story tells,” When I think of how you have come here to my poor home…” (Boccaccio, page 176) where Federigo believes he is too poor for Monna now that he has spent all of his money. In both circumstances, the ambition for wealth play a big role in the decisions of the characters, ultimately influencing how the story goes