Final Days :: essays research papers

"The Final Days" by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein "The Final Days" by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein is about former president Richard Nixon and his involvement in the Watergate scandal. The first part of the book deals with the first two years of the Watergate Crisis and the second half is about the final 17 days of the Nixon administration. The first part of the book deals with how Nixon dug himself deeper and deeper in the scandal through lies and deception. There is tension to every decision Nixon makes in his final month in office. Whether to resign or stay in office, surrender his private tapes, or continue the legal battle. Nixon himself even becomes a sympathetic figure through his downfall. Richard Nixon was elected president in 1968. Born into a small lemon farm in California Nixon lived on the edge of poverty. He graduated from Whittier College. After he graduated from Whittier he attended Duke University Law School and in 1937 he graduated with honors. Nixon then went on to join the navy. Nixon won his first campaign in 1946, and became a member of the House of Representatives. He represented California his home state. Nixon was also assigned to the House Un-American Activities Committee. This committee was mostly concerned with Communists in the United States. In 1950, Nixon was elected for a six-year term in the Senate. He only served 2 of these years, the remaining spent as Vice President to Eisenhower. In 1960, Eisenhower's second term was coming to an end. The Republicans chose Richard Nixon to be their presidential candidate, and the Democrats chose John F. Kennedy, Nixon barley lost the race. He once again he ran for President in 1968 and won. The Watergate complex is located on the Potomac River in Washington, D.C. it contains many hotel rooms and offices. What happened in the complex on June 17, 1972 early in the morning was The Watergate Scandal. At approximately 2:30 in the morning of June 17, 1972 five men were arrested at the Watergate Complex. These five men and two co-plotters were indicated in September 1972 on charges of burglary, conspiracy and wire-tapping. Four months later they were convicted and sentenced to prison terms. The five men arrested were Bernard L. Barker, Frank A. Sturgis, Virgillio R. Gonzalez, Eugenio R. Martinez, and James W. McCord, Jr. The two co-plotters were G. Gordon Liddy and E.

A Clockwork Orange †Literary Response Essay

Nadine Gordimer, South African writer and Nobel Prize winner, said that penetrating fiction doesn’t give answers, it invites questions. This quote is accurately reflected in Anthony Burgess’ novel, A Clockwork Orange, in which many questions and moral values are explored. Burgess strongly believed that humans’ ability of choice is the only factor distinguishing us between animals or machines. The two most predominant recurring themes of and questions relating to the novel involve ‘good vs evil’, and ‘fate and free will’. The novel begins with the words: â€Å"what’s it going to be then, eh? †, through which Burgess poses a literal question that ultimately leads to choice, and is always asked before determining one’s fate. This question introduces all three parts of the novel, as well as the final chapter. The repetition emphasises the symmetrical and symbolic structure of the book. It also echoes one of the aforementioned explored themes: fate and free will. The novel concludes with Alex finally deciding ‘what it’s going to be’, by him consciously deciding to discard his previous violent and ‘evil’ habits. Society and religion recur frequently in A Clockwork Orange, and each hold similar views and opinions concerning choice and good vs. evil. In Part 1, Chapter 4, Alex wonders why ‘evil’ is analysed and goodness is not only universally strived for, but accepted as the norm: â€Å"They don’t go into the cause of goodness, so why of the other shop? Badness is of the self, the one, the you or me on our oddy knockies and that self is made by old Bog or God and is his great pride and radosty. But the not-self cannot have the bad, meaning they of the government and the judges and the schools cannot allow the bad because they cannot allow the self. † Here, Alex refers to society and authority as the ‘not-self’. He believes that people are born ‘evil’, and suggests that conditioning human-kind to be ‘good’ removes individualism. The passage concludes with Alex saying, â€Å"I do what I do because I like to do†, which is almost animalistic in the sense that his action depends solely on desire, impulse and instinct. In Part 2, Chapter 3, the questioning of fate and free will is asked yet again, from the perspective of Christianity. The chaplain refers to the Reclamation Treatment – a physiologically imposed behavioural modification that would render the incapability of performing ‘evil deeds’ – which Alex is to undergo. He asks Alex if God wants goodness or the choice of goodness. (â€Å"Is a man who chooses the bad perhaps in some way better than a man who has the good imposed upon him? It is interesting that the questioning of free will is articulated by the novel’s religious figure, and that this time, it does not come from Alex himself, but is rather asked of him. The chaplain wonders if good acts are morally valueless if performed without free will, and if forced benevolence is in fact more evil than sin itself. Although he rhetorically directs this to Alex, he is essentially asking the reader’s opinion, because it is indicated in previous chapters that Alex disagrees with the conditioning of ‘goodness’. The question is left open-ended and unresolved for the reader to interpret. Thus, rather than being didactic, ‘penetrating fiction’ does solicit more questions than it answers. It allows the reader to draw his or her own conclusions, rather than enforcing a particular point of view. In A Clockwork Orange, this is true in a number of ways (as demonstrated), but most powerfully in terms of the constantly revisited themes; good vs. evil, and fate and free will.

Character Analysis of Emily Grierson: “A Rose for Emily” Essay

Emily Grierson was a southern belle who represented the old ways of the south. A woman, who was stubborn, unchanging and unable to let go of her haunting past took both her burdens and the old ways of the south to her grave. Throughout the story the narrator refers to her as â€Å"Alive, Miss Emily had been a tradition, a duty and a care, a sort of hereditary obligation on the town.† tradition meaning that she was sort of royalty to the towns people because her father was the mayor of the town. This â€Å"royalty† gave Emily a sense of entitlement which could be seen throughout the story. An example would be when we she went to the store to buy some poison, she wanted the strongest poison the owner had to offer which was arsenic, a type of rat poison. Although the druggist, by law has to know what she is going to use the poison for, Emily refuses to answer and continues to stare at the man until he decides to give her the arsenic. This is one of the many examples of how Emily thinks she is somehow above the law and should not be questioned for her actions. Another example of her stubborn ways would be a few years later when she refuses to pay her taxes because Colonel Sartores said that she didn’t have to. She states that â€Å" I have no taxes in Jefferson. Colonel Sartores explained it to me.† The sheriff continues to reason with her by informing her that the colonel sent a letter saying that she did in fact have to pay taxes but once again, she refuses to believe it because she is stubborn and stuck in her own ways.   This attitude of authority and entitlement was due the fact that her father was the mayor of the town and it was expected of everyone to showed respect. Not only was Emily entitled but she was also mentally unstable. It was thought that mental disorders ran in the family because her aunt was also mentally unstable as well. It seems that she has this need to want to control everything because she had an aunt who was mentally unstable. Going back to the tax incident it turned out that the colonel has been dead for ten years and there would be no way of checking with him because of this, this apart of the story reveals that she seems to be living in her own reality that she is living in the past. Another example of this is when  her father died, her father sheltered her a lot shooing away boys so she became very isolated early in life. When her father died, she clinged on to the very thing that kept her from living a life of her own because that was the only life she had ever had. This event seemed to have left her in a depressed state where she would never leave the house until she meets a man named Homer Baron. Baron was a Yankee or a man from the north who took an interest in Emily, they were often seen together in town and most people thought that they were married. When Emily found out that baron w as not the â€Å"marrying type† she decided to take matters into her own hands and killed baron with arsenic so that he would never leave her. Emily Grierson was an example of a way of life that was withering away. Miss Emily represented the old ways of the south and how they were dying off throughout the story. One prime example of this is when the Yankees from the north to help build new sidewalk for the town showing the readers that the times are changing and that the old ways of life are dying. Emily’s refusal to let go of the past and traditions represents what the old ways of the south were everything is preserved. The old ways of the south dealt with keeping up with tradition and preserving the past, which Emily, was also trying to preserve the shattered life that was left behind when her father died and any attempts to try and drag her out of the past and into the future were futile. Works-Cited Cheuse, Alan, Delbanco, Nicholas (2012): Literature: Craft and Voice (second edition). New York, NY. McGraw-Hill. Faulkner, William (1932): A rose for Emily:Literature: Craft and Voice (second edition). New York, NY. McGraw-Hill. Maimon, E.P., Peritz, J.H., Yancey, K.B. (2012): The McGraw-Hill Handbook (Third edition). New York, NY. p.417; â€Å" Referencing a book with two or more Authors†