“Sadness of Desire” Richard Rodriguez: The Achievement of Desire As I read Richard Rodriguez’s The Achievement of Desire a feeling of sadness overwhelmed me. Typical of what Richard Hoggart terms “scholarship boys”, Rodriguez felt he could not admire his parents and still pursue his desire to be like his teachers; educated and successful. Rodriguez’s desire to be like his teachers caused him to abandon his family. The thought of a human being alienating themselves from a loving, supportive family in pursuit of achieving a personal desire makes me sad. As a “scholarship boy” he allows himself to be embarrassed of where he came from and that his parents were not as educated as his teachers.
As such, Luke and Lulach, still share a desire for a perfect world, “A world without war” (11pg), they both are forced out of their comfort zone and have both taken on new responsibilities Luke with school work and Lulach with leading a country. Furthermore our original thoughts have not only changed, but have also developed our thoughts and also Luke and Lulach’s from; not feeling the same love for their stepfathers to having a loving respect for their stepfathers and both of they finding it hard to accepting their father’s deaths to both having overcome their father’s death.
He goes on to describe his home and my sense of his homesickness grew stronger from reading the descriptions of the scenery and activities he grew up with and his displeasure about not being there and missing out on them. In his descriptions of his native land, he also compares their way of life to mainstream societies. I would not go as far to say he has any animosity towards white society but he has certain issues with how whites conduct their lives. His first qualm about white’s values is how they
Skrzynecki feels excluded while his family reminisce of Poland and jealous of his father’s stoic nature. The irony is that while learning the dead language of Latin he forgets his own language “Stumbling over tenses in Caesar’s Gallic Wars, I forgot my first Polish word.” He is frustrated however by his lack of cultural identity unlike Feliks who is expressed as being “happy as I have ever been”: having known exactly where he belongs. Skrzynecki articulates that he is metaphorically “pegging my tents - Further and further south of Hadrian’s Wall.” Hadrian’s Wall being what his father considers his cultural sanctuary, specifically the garden he
People need connections with others, but these connections are not always what brings them to their absolute highest level of happiness. Chris proceeded to record his personal thoughts in his journal, further proving to the reader the point that personal connections are not essential to happiness. “I now walk out and live amongst the wild. Take care, it was great knowing you.” (69), Chris wrote on a card sent to two generous people, Jan and Bob Burres. How briefly this sentence was written and how easily the “good-bye” was said to the couple that took him in and gave him supplies, Chris had displayed that his desire to be on his own was greater than his desire for theirs or anyone’s, friendship.
In the absence of any paternal figure in a member of his family, the presence of his uncle helps Ishmael to reestablish a sense of family. With the help of the genuine benevolence of strangers such as Nurse Esther, Laura Simms and his Uncle Tommy, Ishmael goes on to be considered successfully rehabilitated. Tommy invites him to leave Benin Home and return to Sierra Leone with him. He treats Ishmael like a son and helps him as best he can to begin to live a normal life on the foundations of his life in the
Gordie is faced with the neglect of his parents and feels like the “invisible boy at home” after the death of his older brother Dennie. Chris’s friendship makes gordie feel a lot better about himself and makes Gordie realise that he doesn’t have to live up to what Dennie was and that he can for full his dream of becoming a writer. Chris is faced with the problem of living under his bad family reputation but Gordie makes him realise he can escape from the shadow of his family name and tells him “you can do anything thing you want man.” This shows Chris and Gordies relationship is very important as they have both made life better for each other throughout the film. The parallel
To Be or Not To Be? The enduring truth revealed in The Namesake is to accept your identity and be thankful for loving parents. Throughout the novel, Gogol Ganguli struggles to define himself in the contexts of family and two diverse cultures. Gogol is from an Indian Bengali family, which the reader gets the pleasure of knowing since his birth. It is seen that beginning from his childhood, all Gogol ever wanted was to find a place where he could truly fit in, whether it be in his own culture, or in the American one in which he lives.
Granger believes that when people change even a small part of the world thoughtfully and deliberately, they leave behind enough of their roots to enable other people to mourn them properly.Granger’s story about his grandfather, with its moral about the importance of leaving one’s mark on the world, resonates with Montag’s desire to leave a meaningful legacy. From the beginning of the novel he has been growing increasingly dissatisfied with a life based on empty pleasures and devoid of real connections to other people. With the help from Granger, Montag now realized that because Mildred hardly ever did anything, he did not miss her. Montag thinks back to Faber’s words, promising him that Montag would be as a brother. That is Montag-plus-Faber, fire plus water which would mix and turn into wine.
After experiencing the reality that his family faced, he feels guilt about having to leave them so early again. When he returns to Underwood Samson from his holiday, he keeps his beard unshaved despite it being the talk of the employees as a form of holding onto his Pakistani