The Great Gatsby: Realism :: essays research papers

The Great Gatsby: Realism F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby has been labelled a masterpiece, and perhaps even one of the greatest novels of all time. In order to be revered as a classic, a novel must have one or more qualities that place it above the rest. One of The Great Gatsby's best qualities is Fitzgerald's incredible use of realism. This realism is evident in the development of plot, setting, and characters throughout the novel. The Great Gatsby is well known for its deeply entangled plots and sub-plots. At first Fitzgerald used realism to develop these plots by choosing plots that would be beleivable to readers. For example, the main plot of "The American Dream" (Jay Gatsby's dream of becoming rich and succesfull in order to impress Daisy) is easily believable and is still a quite common dream today. Smaller plots, such as Tom Buchanans affair with Myrtle, are also very realistic and are a common occurrence in every day life. From here Fitzerald deepened the story by using realism to entangle these plots. Fitzgerald then grew apon these plots by making them all have realistic outcomes (such as Gatsby's demise), rather than your typical story book endings. It is mostly thanks to Fitzgerald's descriptive, poetic style of writing that allows him to realistically portray the many plots of The Great Gatsby. Fitzgerald's realistic construction and development of plot is extremely dependant apon the setting of the novel in which it take place. F. Scott Fitzgerald uses realism to clearly depict the setting of the Great Gatsby. This incredible use of realism could be mostly due to the fact that Fitzgerald lived during the time of the novel, and by using great detail, he was able to reproduce his interpretation of the 1920's. At this time the Great War (WW1) had just ended and the United States was becoming as dominant world power. The novel takes place during the summer in New York as Nick Carraway has just moved to persue a career in the bond business. This is a very realistic setting because just after World War 1 the eastern United States were flourishing with people and business. As depicted in The Great Gatsby, during the 1920's jazz music was all the rage. Large, fancy homes and big parties (such as Gatsby's) were also quite popular. Fitzgerald realistically demonstrates the inexistence of the middle class at that time. For example the contrast between Tom Buchanan and Mr. Wilson shows vast difference between the upper and lower classes. The exact geographical location of the novel does not exist, but Fitzgerald does a

Ghosts Are Real

James Banner Mr. Perrington English 101 9/21/12 Ghosts Are Real! Often when people talk about ghosts or spirit’s they say â€Å"if I’ve never seen a ghost, they’re not real† but I’m here to tell you my experiences or â€Å"encounters† with ghosts. Over my 19 year life span I’ve had a few encounters with ghosts, that will make you reconsider your position on ghosts not being real. Its kind of hard to explain what you see, they’re not like a big sheet that’s portrayed in movies or very detailed people that you see.What I can tell you is my experiences with the ghosts and you can decide if you want to believe me or not. The first time I encountered a ghost was when I was around 9 years old making my little brother (that was 3 at the time) a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. It was late at night, I can’t remember the exact time but I know it wasn’t over 12 am. We were in the kitchen, the lights were on in the ki tchen but in the dining and living room the lights were off. Suddenly my brother dashes into the dining room and I’m left in the kitchen wondering why.Next I go to see what’s wrong with him, so I walk into the dining room to see why he’s huddled over, and then I see it. Around 5’5 I see a white lady with dark brown hair just standing there looking at me, not only could I distinguish that she was a lady, she also was naked! I’m just shocked, so I stand there for around 5 seconds, (felt like 5 hours to me) then I dash into the living room, grab my little brother and ran upstairs. I’m shivering, scared to death and I just look at my little brother and he’s just standing there like nothing happened.I tell my older brother who was up at the time what happened and he just brushes me off like I made it up. I eventually tell my sister the next day and she tells me that she’s seen her before but only in her dreams, and that frightened m e even more. The second time I encountered a ghost was around when I was 17 years old, it was during winter break and I was home alone. This time It was in the day time around 3 o’clock because I was watching Even Stevens. Remind you that its snowing a bit outside, enough were you can see the footprints where people were walking.I come downstairs, I have my headphones in so its impossible for me to hear anything and I’m fixing me a bowl of cookies and cream ice cream. I look up and see my dog barking and going wild, so I took off my headphones and I hear the alarms going off. I see that both of my front doors were wide open. I know that for sure when I came down stairs that both of the doors were locked and there was no snow prints coming in our out of the house. I’m there just standing disbelief trying to figure out what happened, until the cops called and asked what was going on.I had to give them the code for the alarm so that everything was okay but Iâ€℠¢m still there just wondering how did both of my front doors become wide open, that had double locks on both of them. I looked throughout the house, there was nobody there and I came to the conclusion that it could only be one thing and that thing had to be a ghost. The third time I encountered a ghost was last year when I watching Walking Dead my favorite television show, it was at night time around 10:20. I’m watching Walking Dead, but then it goes on to a commercial break, so I go downstairs to make me a hot pocket.I reach downstairs and all of a sudden I have to use the bathroom, so while I’m in the bathroom all of a sudden I start to hear a loud smacking sound. The thing I actually hear is the sound of the cabinet doors being closed very hard. This goes on for about 10 seconds, so I rush out of the bathroom to check out who was doing this. Remind you that it’s a school night and everyone is asleep. When I come out of the bathroom I see 4 cabinet doors wide open, I’m already paranoid easily because of past encounters so right now I’m in terror.The end signal of my hot pocket being finished in the microwave scared me half to death. I eventually get myself together and start to look around to see if anyone was downstairs. I don’t see anyone downstairs, so I grab my hot pocket and head upstairs to hopefully see if someone was awake and was playing around with me, knowing that anything these days at night being alone by myself will scare me. Sadly its to no avail, nobody is awake and I’m stuck there thinking why does the ghost/spirit keep picking on me. Have I disturbed it in someway some how?My fourth and final encounter with a ghost was this year when I was home alone doing some laundry in the day time. It takes around an hour, hour and a half to finish a load of the laundry from washer to dryer, so when I put in the clothes I went upstairs for a good 20 minutes. I remember this like it was yesterday because i t happened the most recently and spooked me a lot. I remember clearly putting in the clothes, putting in the detergent turning it on and then finishing by putting in these small tide scent balls. When I come back downstairs, in my confusion I hear the washer not washing.Next, I go downstairs, and to my disbelief I see the washer stopped, not only was it stopped but there were clothes hanging out of the washer with the lid standing up. I run upstairs to get my bat and check around the house†¦ And of course there was no one there, it seems all to familiar that these things keep happening to me for no reason. The crazy part about that is my mom told me this happened to her a few times around 15 years ago but my dad did this ritual type of thing and I guess he got the demons out of the house.Both of my parents then tell me there was a man who died in this house. The former owner until he passed his son the house died in this house when he was 93. Its okay if you still don’t believe in ghosts or spirits, I understand, believing in things like these can have you worrying more than you do now. I’m not trying to force you to believe that ghosts are real, I’m just trying to inform you on my experiences and encounters with these ghosts/spirits. It seems to me like its not trying to harm me or my family, just letting us know that its there.Its your choice, you can believe me if you want but I just wanted to share my stories. http://ehis. ebscohost. com/ehost/detail? sid=b8aac38f-066c-4df2-96bd-950e48b948f9%40sessionmgr114&vid=3&hid=115&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZQ%3d%3d#db=a9h&AN=70093461 http://find. galegroup. com/gtx/retrieve. do? sgHitCountType=None&qrySerId=Locale%28en%2C%2C%29%3AFQE%3D%28KE%2CNone%2C18%29ghosts+and+spirits%24&sort=DateDescend&inPS=true&prodId=AONE&userGroupName=monroecc&tabID=T002&searchId=R2&resultListType=RESULT

The Battle of Gettysburg Essay - 1983 Words

The Battle of Gettysburg The Battle of Gettysburg was a defining battle of the Civil War. It marked a turning point for the Union as well as for the Confederates, though it was not the final battle to be fought. There were many events prior the actual battle that had led to this clash (Berkin 442). The United States was undergoing great changes in the mid 1800s. Populations in both the North and the south grew tremendously. The main increase from the North was largely due to the many immigrants that flooded the coastal cities. Around 2.8 million immigrants came into the United States between 1850 and 1860. This great increase in immigrants further fueled the industrialization of the Northern states. The new source of labor†¦show more content†¦After 34 hours of bombardment from artillery Anderson surrendered. This marked the official beginning of the Civil War (Berkin 413). The early years of the war were marked with Confederate successes. Even though the South had won many victories in th e east, the Union was still very successful in the West. The Confederacy failed to gain international recognition. General Lee hoped to gain this with a decisive victory over the Union in the North (Williams). Lee also hoped this would hasten the peace movement among the North. On June 3rd, Lee ordered his army under Longstreet, Ewell, A.P. Hill, and a cavalry division under J.E.B. Stuart to begin the march (Weeks). General Lees army met little resistance as it marched inevitably to Gettysburg, taking supplies from the countryside they moved through (Berkin 442). On June 13th of 1863 Ewells corps defeated Winchester and inflicted heavy casualties upon the Federalists, and gained much needed supplies. On June 25th, Stuart presented General Lee with a plan. Stuart would take three cavalry brigades and cross the Potomac. He would then make his way around the Federal army in an attempt to flank them. Lee agreed and Stuart set out. He became bogged down with frequent detours a nd also ran into Federal cavalry. Stuart would not rejoin the main force until July 2nd. Both armies were closing in on Gettysburg by June 30th (Weeks). July 1st, 1863, the historic battle began. Gettysburg was at thatShow MoreRelatedThe Battle Of Gettysburg At Gettysburg1100 Words   |  5 PagesOver the last 153 years Gettysburg, has moved from honoring those who fought and died during the battle at Gettysburg to preserve the battlefield. Gettysburg went through two phases of change. The first phase happened between 1863 –1938 and the second phase happened in 1938 when the War Department transferred the administration of Gettysburg to the National Park Service. During the first phase the National Cemetery was built in Gettysburg for the creation of a proper burial of their now dead sonsRead MoreGettysburg : The Battle Of Gettysburg943 Words   |  4 Pages GETTYSBURG Introduction This is a brief thought of the events that came to unfold. Some say that Gettysburg was the battle that stopped the confederate advance to the north. In addition, that Lee only wanted to take the battle out the state of Virginia that had been hit rather hard by the unions Army . In this review of the Battle of Gettysburg, we will discuss the key events that people believed that allowed the Union Armies to cause the retrograde actions of the confederate forcesRead MoreBattle of Gettysburg1186 Words   |  5 PagesThe Battle of Gettysburg was fought by the largest number of soldiers, totaling 172,000 young men (â€Å"American Civil War†). During the Civil War, our nation was divided by the North (Union Army) and the South (Confederate Army) for opposing viewpoints on slavery and states’ rights. The Battle of Gettysburg was fought over three long, arduous days. The soldiers struggled under their respected generals in a 25 mile battle zone (â€Å"American Civil War†). 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He was second in his class at WestPoint, as well as a valuable asset during the Mexican War. When Virginia seceded from the Union, Abraham Lincoln initially asked General Lee to lead the Union Army. General Lee declined the position offered by Lincoln due to his loyalty to him home state1. General