20th century blogs with Leor

 Philosophy With Meursault in The Stranger by Albert Camus       The Stranger  is one of the more strange books that I have read. The plot revolving around the main character Meursault, is unable to feel emotions which leads him to have a very questionable attitude towards many of the plot points in the story. However in Meursault's eyes it all seems acceptable as he has the mentality that nothing matters. This ideology as Camus depicts it, is extremely dangerous and wrong, which can be seen throughout the story with Meursault's actions. This philosophy is called Nihilism which means that life is pointless and that there is inherently nothing good nor bad. Camus, as mentioned earlier takes Nihilism and flips it on its head by suggesting that if there is nothing good or bad Meursault should have the freedom to do whatever he pleases.      The most obvious instance of the presence of Nihilism in The Stranger is when Meursault murders a man i...

Jakes Struggle With Acceptance of His Masculinity, In The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway       Jake is an extremely interesting protagonist in Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises , because of his unique struggle with masculinity. When the reader is first introduced to Jake, he seems to hold traditional values that uphold his idea of what masculinity should look like. He tries to hold himself to this standard by being a man of faith, and having passion for bullfighting. No matter how hard he tries there is still something that shackles Jake from living like someone that fits his idea of masculine. The answer is the injury that he suffered during his time serving in the war. This injury imprisons Jake from achieving his full potential of masculinity and directly impacts the way that he lives. Jake's injury is also the source of prejudice against different men throughout the story as it pains him to watch other men in his eyes, live life wrong.   ...

How does perspective change the way the reader views characters in Mrs. Dalloway     In Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway , Clarissa is the character we see the most throughout the story. There are many depictions of her from multiple perspectives which gives the reader a completed impression of her character. similarly, Septimus is another character we see being written from multiple perspectives. Without differing perspectives, the reader would not be able to fully understand these characters. Having multiple perspectives adds to the way a character is viewed and broadens our vision/understanding of those characters. The reader is able to see more layers and depth to the character rather than just hearing about the character through the perspective of a narrator or through the perspective of that character. This is especially important when looking at Clarissa as she is an extremely layered character that you can't just write through one perspective. Conversely when looking at ...

The Clean Background Effect In The Mezzanine        The Mezzanine is a simultaneously complex and simple book, however the entire book can't work without a concept that Nicolas Baker introduced in the book called the white background effect. On page 38 Baker introduces the concept saying "When I was little I used to be very interested in the fact that anything, no matter how rough, rusted, dirty, or otherwise discredited it was, looked good if you set it down on a stretch of white cloth, or any kind of clean background. The definition that Baker gives of the clean background explains to the reader how the book flows as smoothly as it does, to the point where it seems artistic; the theory that Baker gives the reader reveals that it's not so much the content that matters, it's what surrounds the content that makes it appealing to the reader. Howie does this with all of his seemingly pointless memories however it always leaves an interesting un-thought of epiphany of t...