The American Dream

Setting: The American Dream is written in the theatre of the absurd style. The majority of the play takes place inside Mommy and Daddy’s 1950s apartment, where Grandma also lives.

Style: The American Dream is a play where Ablee is extremely critical of the superficial idea of the American Dream. Mommy and Daddy are both symbols and demonstrate how chasing after trivial things such as money has little to no meaning in life. Albee uses a lot of imagery in the novel to contribute to Mommy and Daddy’s naïve nature. An example is the first scene in which Mommy is convinced to buy a hat that is the same color as the one she just bought.

Characters: Mommy likes to micromanage everything and is the dominate one in the relationship. She and Daddy do not have a good relationship and it is implied many times throughout the play they are no longer sleeping together. Daddy is very subservient to Mommy and she suggests that he is not a man. Young man is basically what the American Dream entails. He has no emotion, no meaning, no heart, nothing on the inside of his body. However on the outside he is very handsome.

Plot: The American Dream is about Mommy and Daddy’s quest to be the perfect, ideal American couple. They are very focused on their image and what the rest of the world thinks of them. This is very apparent after the first scene where Mommy buys a hat after she was told it was a different color, but it was actually the same color. Daddy often has little to no impute on discussions, and when he does he just repeats what Mommy initially said.

Theme: Because Mommy and Daddy are so focuses on money and appearance, Albee is trying to show how superficial the American Dream is through symbolic characters.

Quotes:

“While everybody’s got what he wants…or everybody’s got what he thinks he wants”

            -This summarizes the whole play very nicely. Throughout the duration of the play Mommy and Daddy are searching for what they want, and at the end they finally believe they found it in the Young Man.

“They wanted satisfaction. They wanted their money back. That’s all they wanted”

            -This quote really drives home the point that all satisfaction is is money.

Death of a Salesman

Setting: Willy’s home in a large city in the post world war two era.

Style: There is a lot of symbolism in the book that relate to Willy’s increasing failure to take care of his family. The primary symbol is Linda’s stockings that he gives to other women. There is also a lot of imagery such as Willy planting seeds in the back yard during the night that all relate to Willy’s increasing level of insanity.

Characters: Willy is stuck in the past and as a result struggles in the present. He cheats on his wife, decides his kids’ jobs for them, is extremely controlling. However, he truly does care about his family and wants what’s best for them. Unfortunately, what he thinks is best for them they do not think is best for themselves. Linda is a very caring and lovable wife. She does everything in her power to keep the family together, which is extremely hard because of Willy’s personality. She is loyal to Willy throughout her whole life. Biff is an athlete and Willy’s favorite child. Willy wants Biff to follow in his footsteps as a salesman, but Biff does not want to. This causes a lot of tension in the house. Happy is Willy and Linda’s other child. He is largely ignored by them. All Happy wants is his parents attention and for them to recognize his existence.

Plot: Willy is trying to provide for his family but with age begins to fall out of his salesman prime. As a result he turns to cheating on his wife with secretaries so he can get business deals. When his son Biff discovers this, Biff is completely torn that his father is cheating on his wife. Willy wants his son Biff to follow in his footsteps, but Biff wants to go another direction. As a result, there is a lot of fighting in the Loman household. Eventually Willy takes his own life to help his family finish the mortgage on the house.

Theme: The capitalist world has forced men to struggle and act in irrational ways to put food on the table for their families. Men are then so focused on providing for their families they lose sight of what is actually important in life.

Quotes:

"Isn't that - isn't that remarkable? Biff - he likes me!"

            -Willy says this after a fight between him and Biff. This quote does a great job of summarizing how awful Willy and Biff’s relationship is because Willy is surprised that his own son likes him.

“Nobody dast blame this man. You don’t understand: Willy was a salesman, there is no rock bottom to the life. He don’t put a bolt to a nut, he don’t tell you the law or give you medicine. He’s a man way out there in the blue, riding on a smile and a shoeshine.”

            -This quote does a good job of explaining what Willy was going through. He was out in a huge world by himself, searching desperately for a way to survive and provide.

Ceremony

Setting: Laguna-Pueblo reservation in the American southwest after World War II.

Style: Ceremony is written in an extremely unique way that incorporates the native’s culture. It is written like a web that Spider Women spun. Tayo is trying to untangle his life, so the story becomes clearer as it progresses. At the start of the novel, it jumps to significant events all throughout Tayo’s life that are years apart. At the end, it follows his life day by day in a very clear manner.

Characters: The main character in Ceremony is Tayo. Tayo is part Native American, and struggles to be part of one culture throughout the whole novel. After World War II, where he experienced being accepted, he returns to the reservation where life is the same. His life is in pieces and he spends the duration of the novel sorting it out. Emo is the primary antagonist in Ceremony. He is a raging alcoholic that dislikes Tayo, mainly because Tayo is still connected to the Native American society and is a voice of reason. Betonie is a medicine man that guides Tayo throughout the Ceremony and helps him get is life back on track.

Plot: Tayo and his friends are torn between two cultures which causes a lot of tension in Ceremony. Tayo struggles with alcohol and post dramatic stress syndrome after World War II. Ceremony is about Tayo untangling his life and getting it back on track with the guidance of Betonie, the medicine man.

Theme: The Western European idea of Manifest Destiny caused a number of consequences and hardships in the Native American community, the least of which is a loss of land. Natives had to deal with tremendous pressures to assimilate to the Western European cultures and the effects of the forced conformity. Silko is advocating for the acceptance of both cultures.

Quotes:

“She sighed, and laid her head back on the chair. ‘It seems like I already heard these stories before—only thing is, the names sound different.”

            -This quote does a good job of showing Tayo’s slow transformation and his life becoming clearer. The same things happen throughout time, it is just how you interpret them that make a significant difference.

“But after the white people came, elements in the world began to shift; and it became necessary to create new ceremonies. I have made changes in the rituals. The people mistrust this greatly, but only this growth keeps the ceremonies strong”

            -This quote does a good job of describing only a small portion of the impact of the Western Europeans on the Native American Culture.

Pride and Prejudice

Setting: England in the early 1800’s.

Style: Pride and Prejudiced in written in 3^rd person in old American English. It is a love story after all, so the tone is romantic.

Characters: The main characters in the story are Elizabeth and Darcy. Elizabeth is a very proud woman and knows what she wants in life. She refuses to follow the societal norm of getting married just for money, but rather wants to marry a man that she loves. Darcy is a very wealthy man that is very stuck up initially and does not like to socialize. At first, this turns Elizabeth away from him, but eventually they fall in love. Mrs. Bennet’s sole focus in life is to get all of her daughters married. This could be considered foolish and bad parenting, or good parenting. Depends at how you look at it. Mr. Bennet supports his daughters’ decisions no matter if they are good or bad. Jane Bennet is the prettiest of the sisters.

Plot: Pride and Prejudice is about the notion that women have to get married for money, not for love. The main character, Elizabeth Bennet refuses to marry for any other reason than she loves the person. This causes some tension between her and her mother, but her dad is very supportive.  In the end, she finds a man that she initially disliked because she thought he was a stuck up jerk.

Theme: Austen is criticizing marriage in the 1800 society because people often got married for the soul purpose of money instead of love. She is trying to show through Elizabeth that it is possible to stick to your morals and find someone who will love you in return, it may just take longer; but in the end you’ll be happier.

Quotes:

“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife”

            -This quote does a good job of summarizing the whole thought process of society in the 1800s. Men with a lot of money want to get married to a good wife.

“She is tolerable; but not handsome enough to tempt me”.

            -This quote does a good job of showing Darcy’s initially prejudice and how is very focused on the looks of a woman rather than her personality.

Hamlet

Setting: Denmark in the medieval ages.

Style: The play does not have a narrator. It is written in a very dark, eerie style. Denmark is at war, the king has mysteriously been murdered and his wife quickly remarried. It is a time of great confusion and uncertainty in Denmark.

Characters: The main character is Hamlet. Hamlet spends the whole play planning out how he is going to revenge his fathers’ death. People often debate whether Hamlet is actually insane or is just acting insane throughout the play. Hamlet’s uncle is the main antagonist in the play. He murders Old Hamlet and is out to get Hamlet as the play progresses. He is your typical power-loving, self centered king. Hamlet’s mother is corrupt because she marries Claudius only a few months after the death of her husband.

Plot: After the death of his father and hasty remarriage of his mother, Hamlet is lost in a world that is very unclear. After talking to his fathers ghost and learning how his father died, Hamlet spends the rest of the play out for revenge. Many argue whether or not Hamlet is actually insane, but he at least acts insane. He spends a lot of time alone and thinking and often goes on long, wordy rampages. 

Theme: Shakespeare uses symbols, dialogue between characters and their actions to show that the royalty is corrupt from bottom to top and the consequences of that corruption.

Quotes:

“Something is rotten in the state of Denmark”

            -A very famous line from Hamlet. This quote does a good job of introducing the corruption and its extent in the Denmark Royalty.

“To be or not to be. That is the question.”

            -Another famous line from Hamlet, this quote puts Hamlet’s thought process throughout the whole play into one line. Hamlet is so indecisive that it causes some problems for him. 


Fifth Business 
Setting: Late 1960's in Deptford Canada.

Style: The novel has a very interesting format; the narrator is writing to the headmaster of a school trying to justify his life. There is also a lot of symbolism in the novel, and the main character himself is "Fifth Business."

      Characters: Dunstan Ramsay- Dunstan is the narrator of the whole novel. He is trying to justify it to the headmaster. He is “Fifth Business.”  Mary Dempster- Who the main character is in love with. Percy Staunton- Dunstan’s childhood friend.  Liesl Vitzlipützli- Liesl labels  Dunstan as a “Fifth Business”.

Plot: The whole entire novel is a retelling of the main characters life in a letter to the head master trying to justify his life and decisions. In the very beginning of the book Percy hits Mrs. Demptster with a snowball that causes her to have her baby prematurely. This causes a lot of guilt Dunstan later goes to war. He later joins the magic show. Dunstan is called “Fifth Business,” or a character that is just a supporting character; never plays any important rolls. 

Theme: There is already a set story written for your life and you cannot control or alter that story. Accept your roll in life and make the best of it.
Quotes: 

"Percy had been throwing snowballs at me, from time to time, and I had ducked them all; I had a boy's sense of when a snowball was coming, and I knew Percy. I was sure that he would try to land one last, insulting snowball between my shoulders before I ducked into our house."

            -This quote basically lays out the whole entire story ahead. This is right before all the guilt due to the snowball causing a premature labor.

“By himself, by the woman he knew, by the woman he did not know, by the man who granted his wish, and by the inevitable fifth, who was the keeper of his conscience and the keeper of the stone.”

            -This is one of the most important questions of the novel, who killed Boy?