Ian McEwan

The stories main protagonist Briony first came across as being a self-absorbed brat. This impression seemed to be verified when she was more concerned with perfecting her play than her cousins’ unfortunate predicament. However, over time Briony is built upon as a character and is given depth. She is no longer painted as being just egocentric; instead she turns out to be an imaginative yet neglected child. Her father rarely appears in the household because of work. While Brionys’ mother is…

thirteen-year-old young writer, Briony’s limited understanding of the scene, where two adults have expressed seemingly unusual behaviours, has pushed her to evolve as a writer, and going from “fairy-tale castles and princesses”, to a modernist writing style (McEwan 39). Her initial attempt to portray reality under the modernist notion of truth is done by presenting it from different characters’ perspectives, while using the flexibility, juxtaposition, and the blending of the notion of time as a…

In both Ian McEwan’s Atonement and Paul Horgan’s Mountain Standard Time there is a scene of violence. Both scenes feature hate crimes against individuals, where a group of people exert all their anger and frustration on a person. In Atonement, the scene features a soldier from the British Royal Air Force (RAF) being beaten to death by angered soldiers who experienced Dunkirk, they use the man as a punching bag, blaming him for their loss. In Mountain Standard Time, a little boy is riding his…

In the very first scene of the play the idea of one having control over one's own fate is evident through the contrasting actions of Cordelia's to those of Goneril and Regans. In Act one scene one of the play King Lear decides to give control of his kingdom to his daughters with each daughter receiving a third of the kingdom. The kings’ only catch being that each of his daughters has to profess their love for him in order to receive their share of the kingdom. Lears two eldest daughters Goneril…

Annotated Bibliography The Bioethics of Cloning Devolder, Katrien. "Cloning." Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford, CT: Stanford U, Metaphysics Research Lab., 2004. 212-214. Print. This encyclopedia page describes the relationship between cloning and its embryonic cells. Cloned embryonic cells carry important advantages in biomedical research, drug recovery, and toxicity testing that regular cells don’t: these cells can be models when animal cells are not available, research in…

Current News Assignment When considering the current issues of multiculturalism in Europe, repercussions of the Syrian Refugee Crisis jump to mind, or perhaps Muslim migration to Europe in general. However, an understanding which focuses solely on Muslim migrants does an extreme disservice to the discussion of European multiculturalism as a whole and the developing definition of what it means to be European. The recent and drastic increase of Muslim migration to Europe has, however, aided in…

Welcome to the beautiful and distinguished Sinclair family; welcome to American perfection. We Were Liars illustrates a perfect family living the Dream life; private island, grand houses, big family, picnics on the beach and boat rides to the vineyard. The novel indicates abstract concepts of love, loss and youth, and demonstrates topics of tragic heroes, sibling rivalry and political power. Harris Sinclair, the patriarch of the family, is the American ideal. He is the Sinclair family, and…

The presence of the supernatural is in The Tragedy of Macbeth, is common like the one to The of Tragedy Hamlet. Hamlet and Macbeth were both pressured into going against the natural social order that they lived in; Hamlet had the heavy task to cast justice with his own young hands, at the request of his deceased father. Macbeth was told his fate by three witches; as well was haunted by the ghost of Banqo. The presence of the supernatural influenced both of the actions of Macbeth and Hamlet. The…

Many people sacrifice the most important things or persons they have in life just to do a right. For example, in King Lear Cordelia sacrifice the love she had for her father, what can happen to her family while sending the army to attack, or even her freedom after her father realized that she was the only daughter that truly loved him. In other words she sacrifice her life without thinking about it, for love. Cordelia was so blind to realize that her father didn't have much love as he had for…

Consequently, Western society’s perception of the aged has not changed much since Shakespeare wrote the play. Moreover, Lear is viewed by his evil daughters as irrelevant, old and foolish. When Lear arrives at Gloucester’s castle hoping that Regan will accept him, she responds, “O, sir, you are old! / Nature in you stands on the very verge / Of her confine” (Shakespeare 2.4 145-147). Regan demonstrates the burden of taking in her father, portraying how individuals in Western society view their…