Analyze This! American History Paper

Political, Economic, and Social Practices of Puritans

            Puritan ideals dominated the political, economic, and social development of the New England colonies during the years 1630 through 1669. Politically, the towns’ laws emerged in part from the Puritan view of original sin. Economically, as Puritans always worked hard, the towns became stable and, for their time and place, prosperous. Socially, New England consisted of towns, which allowed for easy and frequent interaction. That made the colonies very unlike the later West territories. Combined, all three of these factors created what most people think of as early colonial New England.

            Politically, the Puritans promoted limited government. John Cotton said, “It is therefore most wholesome for magistrates and officers in church and commonwealth never to affect more liberty and authority than will do them good” (H).  Many Puritans from this time period had some bad experiences with governmental officials having too much power, such as during the English Civil War. Puritans believed that everybody was born with sin and that the tendency to wrongdoing must be checked. To keep one person from having too much power and abusing the power, the Puritan men would appoint one man as Governor, while the rest of the men acted as councils, to whom the governor had to answer. Thus, they came up with a very good method of limiting government power.

            Economically, even though Puritans believed that “worldly gain was not the end and designe of the people of New England...” (J), hard work was encouraged. An example from the Enlarged Salem Covenant of 1636 explains why: “We resolve to approve our selves to the Lord in our particular callings; shunning idleness as the bane of any state...” (C). Often, this idea is called the Protestant work ethic, according to which one has to work, in case the devil tempts one to sin out of sheer boredom. Also, the Puritans exemplified the Protestant work ethic because they would otherwise die from starvation or cold. Most importantly, the Puritans emphasized work to build a free society of self-reliance and government that allowed freedom of worship, since many of them had spent most of their lives in a country, specifically England, that did not allow free worship. Some Puritans did not agree with this. For instance, those in Williamsburg gave licenses to pastors of the approved denominations and, if a pastor preached without a license, he was thrown in jail. However, the idea that “God requireth not a uniformity of religion to be enacted and enforced in any civil state” lasted the longest.

            Socially, the layout of the towns put everybody and everything within walking distance, making it easy for the townspeople to interact with each other. The Puritan towns had a green, common, church, town hall, and school in the very center, with houses surrounding, then fields, pastures, and woods. surrounding the houses (B). Because interaction took little physical effort, the Puritans could “advance Learning, and perpetuate it to Posterity” fairly easily (E). They founded schools so that the colonies could survive, after the founders had died, under the rule of literate officials. Puritans also had methods of socialization other than school and work. For instance, they greatly enjoyed weddings, baptisms, and other formal celebrations.

            The Puritans left their mark on New England in three ways. Politically, the forms of government came from a mix of their experiences and theology. Economically, the Protestant work ethic made the towns stable and prosperous. Socially, the Puritans lived close enough together that the towns aided their social interactions.

Analyze This! Short Story Theme Paper

Hawthorne’s Variation on a Theme

            In the musical Jekyll and Hyde, a song reads, “There’s a face that we wear in the cold light of day—it’s society’s mask...There’s a face that we hide/ till the nighttime appears/ and what’s hiding inside...is our true self.” During the Romantic Era, artists, composers, and writers put an emphasis on topics such as these. Nathaniel Hawthorne in particular delt with the nature of humans. Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown” describes what happens when “each man you meet...isn’t one man but two,” as the song continues.

            Hawthorne implied the theme, just by writing with a Romantic background: Appearances sometimes misrepresent reality. At the beginning of the story, Goodman goes into the woods and encounters a stranger. The stranger—actually the Devil in human form—and Goodman soon meet Goody Cloyse, who speaks to Satan: “Ah, forsooth, and is it your worship indeed?...But, would your worship believe it? my broomstick hath strangely disappeared, stolen, I suspect...when I was all anointed with the juice of smallage, and cinquefoil, and wolf’s bane.” At this point, Goodman says, “That old woman taught me my catechism” and Hawthorne describes that sentence as having “a world of meaning”—but only implies the meaning. Goodman does know that something is not what it seems, as he grew up near Goody Cloyse, who acted like an upright, Christian lady. However, if she believed in Jesus, she would not mix smallage (used in a soothing tea), cinquefoil (good for inflammation and gastrointestinal issues), and wolf’s bane (a poison) together, especially right before going into the woods at night. If she had simply mixed smallage and cinquefoil together, she would have aroused less suspicions, as she could have heard of a sickly child or mother and gone to help, like many Christian women feel their duty. But, she mixed a witch’s brew instead.

            Next, the stranger leaves Goodman and walks ahead, apparently to the “communion.” While sitting by the side of the road, Goodman sees two shadows that do not look like anything recognizable, but sound like the deacon and minister, two men who previously appeared as upright, Christian inhabitants of Salem. However, they talk of “several of the Indian powwows, who, after their fashion, know almost as much deviltry as the best of us.” Based on the words “know almost as much deviltry as the best of us,” one can assume the deacon and minister had no intention of holding a church service in the Indian village or going on a trading expedition—both natural reasons in 17^th century New England to visit Indians. They intended to hold a witchcraft rite, which from Hawthorne’s description, sounds like a corruption of the holy Office of Baptism and also the Rite of Confirmation. Goodman also begins to believe Appearances sometimes misrepresent reality.

            If things are not necessarily what they seem, then Goodman cannot trust anything. He did believes he could only trust Faith and presumably God, until “something fluttered lightly down through the air and caught on the branch of a tree...and [Goodman] beheld a pink ribbon.” Apparently, he cannot trust his wife, Faith. The pink ribbon, which Faith often wore, causes Goodman say, “Come, devil; for to thee is this world given.” He gives up trust in God, since if he cannot trust humans, he knew not how to trust God, for those in the story who profess to follow God are really serving Satan. St. Paul warns of this, saying “Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour” but, as St. Paul was also a human, Goodman could not even go to that passage of the Bible for help.

            “Young Goodman Brown” has a theme which indicates that a falsity may look true. Hawthorne ends the story with Goodman Brown’s fate: “And when he had lived long, and was borne to his grave a hoary corpse, followed by Faith, an aged woman, and children and grandchildren, a goodly procession, besides neighbors not a few, they carved no hopeful verse upon his tombstone, for his dying hour was gloom.” During the course of the story, Goodman Brown loses faith in God and man because even the holy men had devilish natures. As the song finishes, “It’s a nightmare/ we can never discard/ so we stay on our guard/ though we love the façade/...Look behind the façade!”

Analyze This! World History Essay

(The numbers in parentheses come from the document we were given to work off.)

Causes of the French Revolution

            Between 1700 and 1900 A.D., three important events happened in Western history: the Industrial Revolution, the Second Great Awakening, and the French Revolutions. The effects of each still exist today, but the French Revolution became the most famous. Three factors led the common people of France to revolt. First, a large amount of the French population became wanted to change their country. Second, between 1700 and 1900, most Frenchmen lived in the very poor, lower class with no way to better themselves within their current system. Third, after aiding the Colonists in the American Revolution, the French learned that democracy could replace monarchy.

            Modern enlightened thought began in France, where men published works such as Encyclopedie by Denis Diderot and Jean le Rond d’Alembert and philosophical treatises. Those works spread through France extremely quickly—as quickly as Martin Luther’s works in the 16^th century. Even though the readers did not act on the ideas in the Encyclopedie and treatises, they kept the works in mind for several decades (5), and because of these works, people, especially in the middle class (4), began to form non-Judeo-Christian ideas of morality, human nature, and government. However, for the most part, the middle class acted upon the ideas. Albert Mathiez said, “The Revolution had been accomplished in the minds of men long before it was translated into fact” (4). Thus, the Revolution began in the thoughts of the people, but no one acted upon it, until two things provoked and made them brave enough to make a change.

            In 1789, during the Old Regime of the French government, the people had three classes, called estates. The First Estate consisted of clergy, about 1% of the population, who owned 10% of French land. The nobility, the Second Estate, comprised 2% of the population and owned 30% of the land. 97% of the people, middle class, peasants, and city workers, made up the Third Estate and owned 56% of the land (2) and the government taxed their land quite heavily, while taxing the First and Second Estates lightly. Between 1787 and 1789, Arthur Young went to France and described what he saw, thus: “In the south of France there is a taille. There is an injustice of levying the amount each person can pay...The children are terribly ragged...Stories arrive every moment from the provinces of riots...The price of bread has risen above people’s ability to pay...” (1). What Arthur Young described is now often called the Bread War of 1789, since people did begin fighting the government with weapons instead of words. Because the middle class members of the Third Estate held the Enlightenment’s ideas in mind for several decades and also made up a great deal of the population, they had the ability to lead and organize a revolution. Enlightenment philosophy had given them the argument for revolution, and after the Bread War of 1789, they now had a reason. They saw no way to escape starvation except through force. Sometimes, farmers held strikes, which of course did nothing to feed the population but made their point clear. Even women rioted—something very unusual for the time—and would go to the marketplaces and threaten merchants with pitchforks and other household tools, until the merchants sold the bread at a reasonable price. However, the most surprising riot took place during the storming of the Bastille, a prison. Rioters freed the prisoners and executed some French governmental officials visiting the prison. Thus began the French Revolution.

            The Americans first completely threw off a monarchial rule, which many Frenchmen also wanted to do. When the Frenchmen who fought in the American Revolutionary War as allies came back to France, they had gained some valuable experience in staging revolutions. Further, they liked the idea of a democracy and saw that America had a fairly stable system even that early in its history. Thus, Lord Acton described the American revolution as “The spark [that]... caused the Revolution to break out” (5). After the American Revolution, the French had an argument, a reason, and now some experience in deposing one government and forming another. Based on the acts of the Americans, the French drew up a list of complaints and presented them to the Estates General, a governmental body similar to the United States Congress or England’s Parliament. The French middle-class had some of the same complaints as the American Colonists presented to Great Britain, including “That the king be forced to reform the abuses and tyrrany of letter de cachet...That every tax be granted only for a limited time...and be borne equally by all classes...” The complaints also suggested reforms directly in the Estates General, such as scheduling meetings for definite times, instead of when the king called, and an accurate counting of votes (3)—again similar to the Americans asking for representation in Parliament. When these did not succeed quite as well as hoped, the French also imitated the Americans by actively fighting.

            France had a very difficult time building a democracy, mostly because of the Enlightenment influence that removed God from the government, going so far as outlawing churches. However, they did eventually work out a good system of non-monarchial government that still exists today. In the 18^th century, France suffered due to high taxes, which caused poverty, starvation, and discontent, which almost always leads to rebellions. The causes of the French Revolution sprang from what the Frenchmen had: a large population with well-thought out arguments, a reason, and knowledge.

Analyze This! Poetry Explication

It Is Not Sweet and Proper to Die for One’s Country

            In 23 B.C., Quintus Horatius Flaccus—a soldier, rhetorician, poet, and public notary more commonly known as Horace—wrote an ode saying, “Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori,” or “It is sweet and proper to die for one’s country.” 1,940 years after Horace wrote the ode, in 1917 A.D., one particular English soldier, Wilfred Owen, knew this saying, but did not think it could apply to World War I. Owen’s experience and Horace’s experience in wartime differed greatly—Owen had a gun, helmet, bombs, and gasses to use in war while Horace used an armored tunic, helmet, shield, and sword. The different fighting styles between the Romans and Allied Forces of World War I alone means that the saying by Horace may not have been completely wrong, but only right for his time. However, while Owen believed in the valor of dying for one’s country, he thought it not at all sweet and proper. In the poem, “Dulce Et Decorum Est” he showed his disagreement with Horace by exactly describing trench warfare of the Great War by talking about how the war felt, looked, and sounded.

            First, Owen showed how it felt to march, fight, and die in the trenches. For instance, “sludge” covered the ground, lit by flares. Although Owen does not describe the sludge, one can take from the context of the Great War that it would not be factory run-off, but instead mud and blood, with some spent shells, live ammunition, and soldiers’ possessions, such as photographs, mixed together. Owen describes how they sloshed through the sludge: “bent double, like old beggars under sacks/ knock-kneed...” The soldiers also became blind and deaf, as large explosions cause the ears to bleed and the eyes to go temporarily blind.  Even the noise of war can be blocked out of a person’s perception, resulting in a type of deafness. Essentially, the men Owen fought with turned into a blind, deaf, bloody-footed army that certainly veered from sweetness and propriety.

            In his poem, Owen also described what the effects of chlorine gas looked like. This greenish gas stoppable with activated charcoal, which many gas masks had. Owen describes a chlorine gas attack thus: “An ecstasy of fumbling/ fitting the clumsy helmets just in time / ...someone...floundering like a man in fire or lime.-- /...dim, through the misty panes and thick green light /...I saw him drowning /...guttering, choking, drowning.” Then the man’s eyes would “writhe [in] his hanging face” and blood would come “gargling” up from his lungs. When the gas hits the lungs and meets the watery mucosa, it forms an excess of hydrochloric acid, which corrodes the lungs and leads to choking on blood and other fluids. Owen’s description indicates that he held dying of chlorine gas inhalation a lamentable way to die.

            The trenches, according to Owen, also had certain sounds, which he describes and implies. For instance, while the men walked, they made noises: “[coughed] like hags... / yelling out...guttering, choking...” They also spoke, sometimes by swearing, but most famously in this poem “GAS! Gas! Quick, boys!” Through his descriptions, Owen implied other sounds, such as squelching through sludge. In addition, when the soldiers were “fitting the clumsy helmets,” the helmets clanked and rattled and went “snap” when the chin straps tightened. The last sound occurred with detonating shells, followed by the swearing and yelling. While Horace though very highly of such actions, Owen thought quite the worst experience a man can have.

            When Horace wrote his ode in 23 B.C., he had quite a different experience in war than Owen had in 1917 A.D. While Horace said, “Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori,” Owen tended to agree more with Dulce et decorum non est pro patria mori. Owen particularly used the conditions in the trenches, the shells, and the effects of chlorine gas as evidence. At the end of “Dulce et Decorum Est,” Owen drove his point home by writing, “If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood/ come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs, / obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud / of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,-- / my friend, you would not tell with such high zest / to children ardent for some desperate glory, / the old Lie: Dulce et decorum est / pro patria mori.”

Analyze This! Characterization Essay

After Lovell’s Fight

“Cold, cold is the north wind and rude is the blast / That sweeps like a hurricane loudly and fast, / As it moans through the tall waving pines lone and drear, / Sighs a requiem sad ‘er the warrior’s bier” (http://www.hwlongfellow.org/poems_poem.php?pid=2095) describes the same situation in “Roger Malvin’s Burial” by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Both the poem and the story take place very close to each other—both during Father Rale’s War, also called The Battle of Pequawket and Lovewell’s Fight. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Pequawket) “The Battle of Lovell’s Pond” describes the actual fight, while “Roger Malvin’s Burial” suggests the effect it may have had on those who fought and survived. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s story, Reuben Bourne goes mad because of his actions and also the expectations of the society he lives in, but returns to sanity after an event that would make most people more eccentric.

            “Roger Malvin’s Burial” takes place in 1725, directly after Lovell’s Fight. At this time, the Wabanaki Confederacy fought on one side and the New England Colonies and Mohawk Native Americans on the other (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Father_Rale%27s_War). Compared to most battles, this one tends to the small side, with only 47 Englishmen and Mohawk Native Americans fighting. However, a relatively small battle still contains men killing other men, which often wears down the minds of the survivors. In the case of this story, Reuben Bourne and Roger Malvin appear mentally sound while escaping—at least, as mentally sound as one can be while badly injured to the point of death and trying to leave the area where angry scalp hunters may live.

            Because Reuben Bourne grew up in a Judeo-Christian society, even when his mind leaves, he behaves in ways that society considers proper. The biggest example occurs at the beginning of the story. Rueben Bourne knows that when a person is dying, one should stay while the person dies, then bury him. But, Roger Malvin tells Reuben Bourne “Your last moments will need comfort far more than mine; and when you have laid me in the earth, and are alone, and night is settling on the forest, you will feel all the bitterness of death that may now be escaped...you led my tottering footsteps many a mile, and left me only at my earnest entreaty, because I would not have your blood upon my soul.” Reuben Bourne, however, does not want to leave because if Roger Malvin dies before he can return, he has to tell Roger Malvin’s daughter, Dorcas. He avoids telling Dorcas the whole truth through the first fifteen years of their marriage, which may not have helped him recover from the battle.

            In several different cultures which influenced the society where Reuben Bourne lives, the lack of burying means an incomplete death. This appears first in Greek poetry—often an unburied person appears to the hero and makes it known he is unburied and should be. Roger Malvin appears to Reuben Bourne in a way similar to the Greek poems: through conscious instead of visions. However, through the Middle Ages and somewhat into the 18^th century, many Christians believed than a person had to be buried in a church yard or he would not enter heaven. Possibly, Reuben Bourne grew up in a church which believed this, but since he did not bury Roger Malvin, he felt guilty.

            However, when Cyrus Bourne dies, Reuben Bourne’s mind returns. Perhaps, Reuben Bourne felt that upon the death, he could perform the proper burial, as Roger Malvin asked. On the other hand, Reuben Bourne may feel that Cyrus was the younger version of himself, and thus by dying erased the past and gave Reuben Bourne and Dorcas a chance to start again. The story reads, “The vow that the wounded youth had made the blighted man had come to redeem. His sin was expiated,--the curse was gone from him...”

            In “Roger Malvin’s Burial,” Reuben Bourne’s mind leaves because of his actions and the expectations of the society he lives in, but recovers after a normally somewhat traumatizing event. Because of traditions from mythology and Christianity, his mind may have left from the guilt of not following them. Further, the lack of accurate communication between Dorcas and Reuben Bourne added to the guilt. “The din of the battle, the tumult, is o’er, / And the war-clarion’s voice is now heard no more.” (http://www.hwlongfellow.org/poems_poem.php?pid=2095)

           

Works Cited

http://www.hwlongfellow.org/poems_poem.php?pid=2095

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Pequawket

Huismann “Analyze This Class” The Potter’s School 6-18-14

Analyze This! notes for 6/23

(I'm taking the course Analyze This! from thepottersschool.org. Here are my notes from the 6/23/14 class meeting. I'll also post the essays and notes about the readings. No classes next week.)

“Good Country People” by Flannery O’Conner

            According to Mrs. Hopewell, who are “good country people?”

            Why does Mrs. Hopewell invite Manley Pointer to dinner?

            List Joy’s character qualities. Why does she leave home at 21? Why is she back? What does her leg             represent to her?

            Why can’t any of the women see through Manley Pointer?

            Identify the conflict in the story. How is it resolved?

            O’Connor said she wrote her stories as parables. How does this story work as a parable?

            O’Connor also said “God often uses violence to break down a person to be able to receive                           the grace of God.” Does this observation apply to this story?

“Cask of Amontillado” by Edgar Allan Poe

            How reliable is the narrator?

            How would you describe the narrator’s attitude about himself and his actions?

            Is there anything attractive or likeable about the narrator?

            How does the narrator use verbal and non-verbal strategies to gain the trust of Fortunado

            Do any of Fortunado’s words or actions support the narrator’s belief that he is worthy of hatred?

            Why does the narrator go to such lengths for revenge?

            Is the narrator a fully developed character?

            What is the theme of this story and how does it relate to the characters?

Analyze This! notes for 6/18/14

(I'm taking the course Analyze This! from thepottersschool.org. Here are my notes from the 6/16/14 class meeting. I'll also post the essays and notes about the readings.)

Literary Critical Analysis

            Analysis—breaks up story into parts and examines one aspect and relates the elements to the central meaning of the story.

            Evidence provided with specific and concrete examples from text.

Characterization

            Direct—exposition, narration, other characters’ words

            Indirect—shows us characters in action without telling the reader what to think. Dialogue can indirectly reveal character as well as action.

            Flat or round?

            Static or dynamic?

“Everyday Use” by Alice Walker

            Characterize the speaker and evaluate her reliability as a reporter and interpreter of events

            Where does she refrain from making judgments?

            Where does she present less than the full truth? Does it undercut her reliability?

            Describe as fully as possible the lives of the mother, Dee, and Maggie prior to the events   of the story.

“Roger Malvin’s Burial” by Nathanial Hawthorne

            Why does Roger Malvin tell Reuben Bourne to leave him in the wilderness?

            What sort of man is Reuben Bourne when he returns to the settlements?

            What does Reuben feel so guilty about? Should he be?

            How is the shocking death of the son mean in the story and to Reuben?

            How should we interpret Reuben’s new-found ability to pray at the end of the story?