How far can we say that the play is a Tragedy?

All my sons was wirtten in the 1940's a short period after the second world war and it is based around the events that happened during the war that involves the keller family. Straight away from the time period we know that something dramatic will happen or has happened to this family as the war has an enormous affect on everyone.
The dictionary definition of Tragedy is : a dramatic composition, often in verse, dealing with a serious or somber theme, typically that of a great person destined through a flaw of character or conflict with some overpowering force, as fate or society, to downfall or destruction.
so how many of these characteristics of tragedy can we see in "All my sons"? so first thing of we see the serious and or somber theme of the after affects of the war, we may not be told the affects of it at first but it is still there in the background, looming.
Then we are told of the great flaw, of the fate filled day that Joe was "sick" this then leading to his inevitable destruction.
This character flaw effects the lives of others, including that of his son Larry, who kills himself, chris and kate who in the end lose their brother and their mother and Joe himself who comits suicide.

So considering we have two suicides, two great losses, all the effect of a fanatical flaw we can consider this to be a tragedy.

Act One : All My Sons

At the start of the play Arthur Miller gives some very good character descriptions, he allows us to completely imagine the characters the way he wants us too see them, i think he does this as he obviously later on in the play changes all descriptions completely! Doing this he gives us, the readers, a false sense of security with the charcters we feel for.
Joe Keller appears at the start to be a simple man in his 60's whose got a happy family that has been affected by the war, which we are told has taken a son from him, Larry.

Kate Keller at the start of the play is still in mourning of her sons larry who died in the war, this thought is kept alive by the neighbour Frank, who highly believes in the stars, and who predicts that Larry is still alive.

Chris Keller at the start of the play tells us in the conversation to his dad , that he believes larry is dead but that they are toying with their mothers feelings by telling her any different. By giving us this explantion we are able to see chris as a realist. We then also get the information aout Ann who chris wnats to marry, we then get anns background information about her going out with larry, chris's brother.
The first act is a all abit cosmic as we get the story about kates dream, and the stroy about larrys and this all happens on the day Ann arrives, its all a bit connected which sends kate into a flurry of cosmic beliefs. when Ann herself arrives , kate confronts her and asks if she is still waiting for larry, she is not, this interrupts kates cosmic balance.
When Ann announces that george her brother is coming to see her, everything gets a bit tense and Joe and Kate are worried that she is only interested in Chris to allow her dad to be exonerated from his prison sentence.

Symbolism is introduced in this act. The tree symbolises larrys death and the "prison" in joe basment symbolises the reality that prison is out there. Kate dislikes the fact that joe jokes around with a fake prison, so get very touchy about it, by doing this she is showing the readers that she dislikes the thought of her husbands in prison although secretly she knows thats where he should be. When the tree breaks it symbolises that something is going to happen that does involved him or somewhat his memory.


The first act of this play, allows us to see how the characters are in their home life, they are all quite friendly towards each other although clearly they all have a secret that isn't being told to the other. This creates alot of unknown conflict within the family, when Ann arrives the conflicts come out into the open and creates alot of tension within the family.

A convergence of the Twain

I am mixed minds about this poem as it believe that some of the stanza's dont blend in with the feel of the poem. I think that Thomas Hardy didn't at all pity the people of the Titanic as he is saying in irony how foolish they were to be destroyed by an Iceberg. I think also he is tryibng to create quite a violent and creepy image for the audinece reading in stanza 8, i think this becasue he desrcibe how the ship is growing out into the wide open sea and how the she is growing is grace staue and hue, but then he goes onto describe the iceberg which is getting closer and closer, its as if its like a pantomine and he wants to shout "he's behind you".

I think this poem starts at the end, it allows Thomas Hardy to create an image of the Ship on the bottom of the sea. He then includes the sea-worm, which is so small and insignificant to be quite happily crawls over something to great and powerful.

Throughout the poem he uses very descriptive words, he manages to change the appearance of something and manages to change our take on it. in Stanza 4 he is describing The jewelry of the woman adn men on the ship lying lifeless at the bottom of the sea, he changes the fact that jewelry which is supposed to sit on a lady's neck and look out on people and sparkle to be changed to a blury and blind of it sparkle which it was made for.

Throughout the poem Thomas Hardy does use sexual references and i think this allows him at the end to say "the consummation comes", its the end of something so great and something definatly unexpected. As quite a Romantic poet i think this is very different to what he normally goes for, but considering the creepyness of the poem it is quite romantic using the sexual references.

Hamlet 1+2

In act one we find out that hamlets father has been killed by his newly instated step father, which is his fathers brother, hamlet then creates a plan that allows him to find out that if the ghost of his father is telling the truth by producing a play with a slight twist to the story.


He is doing this becasue he also thinks the ghost could be the devil so he needs to be sure before he gets revenge.


I think Shakespear has already established Tragedy becasue there has already been a death, a betrayal, lies have been created, and we have a plot to murder someone else. Also where hamlet is telling to many lies he is causing his own tragedy by lying to the one s he loves like ophelia and his mother.

Hamlet is also stuck in his plans becasue the ghost of his father has told him to leave his mother alone and not get her involved but he will eventually end up hurting her.
We instantly feel for hamlet becasue as he is hurtintg he is having to lose so many things that he wants to hold close to him, his mother, ophelia and he has already lost his father.
He doesnt have time to mourn his father before he has to avenge him.

The Great Gatsby: Chapter 9

Chapter 9

In chapter 9 we come to the end of the book and the Nick description of the events of what happened after Gatsby’s death. We also get the introduction of a character that I think is quite important to in understanding why Jay Gatsby was hatched from James Gatz. We also gets Nicks realisation of upper class superiority amongst the people he considered his mutual friends.
At the start of the chapter Nick phones Daisy but the person on the phone states that her and tom have left baggage and all and that they left no contact, nick puts this off and expects her to phone later, but she doesn’t he then realises that she had no intention of coming, this ties in with the last part of the chapter where Nick says “They were careless people, Tom and Daisy – they smashed things up and creatures and then retreated back in to their money and their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made……” he now knows that Daisy is truly under Tom’s control as she did have the chance to leave him but she is too obsessed with the image of a perfect upper class life. Tom leads Daisy around like a dog on a leash all because she can have a nice life with her husband and daughter, it suggest that when they moved from France, to the east of America they were just waiting to ruin someone else’s life this time it just happened to be the one person who wanted her to come back. But considering she supposedly loved Gatsby you would have thought she would have phoned up or at least sent a card but she doest which suggests the whole affair was a lie.
We then get the one person who truly knows Gatsby, his father, although Nick has no possible way of contacting His father he finds out because of course Gatsby’s death is big news and it is heard all the way up in Chicago in the news papers which is where he finds out about his sons death. “He was on the point of collapse … but he wouldn’t eat and the glass of milk spilled from his trembling hand” I think Nick includes this description because it shows how truly devastated his father is, No father should have to bury their own son, maybe they didn’t speak that often but he still bought him up and was his own. “His grief began to be mixed with an awed pride” it shows just how proud he is off his son for building himself up from nothing to this great mansion.
We then get a phone call from “Mr. Klipspringer” who was the apparent border in the house. But once again it is another person who used Gatsby because he says to Nick that he wont be coming to the funeral, all these people that turned up to the parties and made up so many rumours about him, wouldn’t be coming to the funeral, he realised now that they only wanted a place to go so they be scandalous and to display their lives full of pointless gossip and money. Even “Meyer Wolfshiem” wouldn’t come to the funeral he gave a justly reason because he couldn’t be seen there as it was too risky for him to be seen. Fitzgerald now uses the perfect time to include bad weather “when I left his office the sky had turned dark and I got back to west egg in a drizzle” I think this is good language description because it symbolises that everything that Nick has been trying for, trying to get people to Gatsby funeral, has just gone out like a light, because the one person he depended on, wasn’t going to go.
I think the way Gatsby’s dad calls him “Jimmy” makes him seem a lot less profound. It makes him sound like they have a good father / son relationship. “Jimmy” makes him sound like a laid back person who was very young at heart I think this puts a positive note on Gatsby as it helps us to imagine him as a child. We then get the Schedule that Gatsby made for himself when he was younger, we know it is from his youth because one his dad has it and secondly because it is “Hopalong Cassidy”, it shows how hell-bent he was on becoming someone better then his father as it says “read one improving book or magazine per week” “practise poise elocution and how to attain it” this shows that as a young boy he just wanted his life to be better then the one he had. I think it is important that when it is Gatsby’s funeral it is raining because it shows that something truly horrible is happening and the insight into a man’s life that appeared to have many friend yet those “friends” didn’t go to his funeral. Then the one person that does turn up to the burial couldn’t believe that no-one else had turned up, which showed that even the little people matter when it comes to friends.
We then get Nicks description of his own life after Gatsby’s death and how he couldn’t stay in the east anymore because he saw Gatsby everywhere he went. I think the way he next describes his leaves is good as he says “So when the smoke of brittle leaves was in the air and the wind blew the wet laundry stiff on the line I decided to come back home” he’s like a bird, he goes where the wind takes him, in this way him and Daisy are alike.
We then get the Ending of the sub-story between Nick and Jordan, and she realises that he has done her a favour by giving her a new experience with men, I think this is important because she has more of a chance of becoming less like Daisy and hurting everyone she meets.
I think the way Nick leaves the image of Gatsby house represents the way Gatsby life turned out to be. It was built up to be something of impressive valour, much like Gatsby did to himself, and when Nick says “I went over and looked at that huge incoherent failure of a house once more” this symbolises the vast mass of emptiness insides the house and insides Gatsby’s life, it was purpose built to fill the needs of one person and that person fled when things got hard.
I think Fitzgerald in the last line is proposing one big life lesson “so we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past” I think he is proposing it as a big life lesson because he says we, which means he isn’t speaking to one person he is speaking about all people, I think he’s trying to say that you’ll always have the past on your shoulders, if it’s a struggle to get through it or if its easy then others, but you just have to get on with it until the day it all ends.

The Great Gatsby: Chapter 8

Chapter 8
This is the chapter following the tragic events of Myrtles Death in chapter seven, in this chapter we see a very different side to all the characters as we see what they do in the face of panic and strife. Everything changes in this chapter to the descriptions of the locations to the relationships between the characters. Nick describes everything so that you get the impression that everything is a lot darker because of the previous events.
He starts the chapter of by saying how he cannot sleep and how as soon as Gatsby returns he jumps straight out of bed so go tell him that he should go away. This shows the true friendship that he and Gatsby have made, that he feels the need to protect him to tell him to go away and to show that he cares, but Gatsby of course refuses because he thinks he is protecting Daisy.
Nick describes Gatsby house with trepidation now, its like as soon as myrtle died so did the passion and life in Gatsby house “His house had never seemed to enormous to me that night as we searched through the great rooms for cigarettes……………”.
The chapter also revolves around reflection as each character reflects on their discoveries of each other and what they have come to think of each other. This is the night Gatsby tells Nick about his youth of meeting Dan Cody who changed his life and Daisy who also had an even bigger effect on his life, he tells Nick that it was because Daisy was so “nice” to him, he had never known a girl to be like this to him, and from that moment onwards he was entranced. I think it is odd that Gatsby thinks “it excited him too that many men had already loved daisy – it increased her value in his eyes. He felt their presence all about the house, pervading their air with shades and echoes of still vibrant emotions” I think it excites him because he has her now no-one else. But the contrast of Gatsby and Nick’s different descriptions here is important because we know that Nick thinks she’s innocent with the constant comparisons from angels and white lights around her but here we get told that she isn’t as innocent but both men still take her for what she is.
We then get another assessment of Daisy as Gatsby says “Gatsby was overwhelmingly aware of the youth and mystery that wealth imprisons and preserves” this coincides with what Gatsby says in chapter 7 “her voice is full of money” and then Nick agrees by saying “that was it. I’d never understood before, it was full of money – that was the inexhaustible charm that rose and fell in it, the cymbals’ song of it… High in a white palace the king’s daughter, the golden girl……” I think this quote is important as it shows us just what daisy is like and it perfects the description of her that Nick has been longing to describes, but I find it odd that Gatsby realises this but it doesn’t bother him, he knows she is some what snobbish and full of money and arrogance but he loves her anyway. I like the way Nick uses “the Golden Girl” at the end of his sentence because the golden girl was often described for a goody two shoes who can get away with any thing, and she does, she is the reason Gatsby is dead and yet she still gets away with it, she just leaves and starts her life somewhere else. This also relates to what Nick later says about her “Through the twilight universe Daisy began to move again with the season” she changes men like the seasons, a new one every few months.
Nick then describes the how like any teenager rebelling against her perfect life “Suddenly she was again keeping half a dozen dates with half a dozen men, and drowsing asleep at dawn with the beads and chiffon of an evening dress tangled among dying orchids on the floor besides her bed” it think this is important because she has told Gatsby that she is waiting for him yet we know that she isn’t she is lying to him. She is living a life full of lies even to her herself as Nick says “And all the time something within her life was crying for a decision.” I think this is important because she’s wants to stop what she doing and lead a normal honest life but she can’t because no-one is there to do it for her.
Nick uses a lot of repetitive language throughout the novel about Tom but in this chapter it changes it becomes more romantic and a lot less violent. He says daisy needed a force of some kind to help her, and that force came with Tom, but he doesn’t use force in a bad way like he does in Chapter 6 where he forces Daisy to go Gatsby’s party, this time he uses it in a much more romantic sense, because he was the force that saved Daisy from the ennui that engulfed her. He says “There was a wholesome bulkiness about his person and his position” I think the key word in this quote is “wholesome” because its a good word he normally uses words like “menacing” and “hulking” to describe Tom but this time he uses “wholesome” because this man who was completely different from Gatsby likes Daisy, he’s rich, he’s there and he likes her, so she leaves with him.
When Nick finally leaves Gatsby to himself Nick says “you’re worth the whole damn bunch put together…..Good bye, I enjoyed breakfast” I think for us and Gatsby this is important because it shows us that Nick really does care for Gatsby although they’ve only known each other for a few months and it shows Gatsby that he really does have one true single friend, this was the only compliment that he ever gave Gatsby and I think it was the only one he needed.
We then get the determination Of George Wilson to find his wife’s killer. Although he still partly blames himself for Myrtles death he knows that that person driving the car was responsible for it. This is a good ideology for the Chapter as it shows the determination some people are willing to put themselves through, because George comes all the way from New York with know knowledge and by the time he is in West Egg he knows that the person car was that of a man called Gatsby’s.
We then get Nicks realisation that he knows he shouldn’t have left Gatsby, coming back to the protection you should stay with someone to protect them. But it’s too late; because Gatsby told his servants to not interrupt him they couldn’t stop the death.
I think the language Nick uses at the end of the chapter is quite outlandish because he says “and the holocaust was complete” I think this is all in relation to how small the world around the people involved that summer was. Although it is stupid comparing it to the size of the holocaust.

What i think about Nick.

F.Scott Fitzgerald makes Nick one of the main characters and the narrator of the story. We start the book with a quick introduction to Nick and we are told some interesting things about him such as his dad has told him as a young man to "Whenever you feel like criticizing anyone.....just remember that all the people in this world haven't has the advantages that you've had" which tells us he comes from a wealthy background, with this in mind he is considered to go against what his father says as he gives some judgmental opinions on some of the characters "two shining arrogant eyes has established dominance over his face" and "her face was sad and lovely" these descriptions are important because they give us good imagery of the characters he is talking to. But throughout the story we learn some new things about Nicks personality, such as he thinks far too much and he also likes too keep too himself and not to interrupt too many peoples lives. He also gives everyone a chance that he meets, as he has heard a lot of rumors about Gatsby but he then creates a good balanced relationship with Gatsby, although Nick is always suspicious of Gatsby their friendship grows and he cannot forgive the persons responsible for his death. Nick is also a very curious character, he explores Gatsby’s house in search for him and also goes to New York with Tom although he is forced. Also although Nick is very opinionated he doesn't actually vocalize these opinions which suggest he is frightened of what people would say to him if they were heard. Over-all Nick is a good character as he allows us too imagine what the characters are like and what their lives involve. I think very often goes too far with his judgments as the people he judges may see him as boring and two-faced.
But seeing as Nick is a person who takes everything for what its worth and knows what he has and has worked hard for what he has received, in comparison to Daisy, considering he judges people he can also take in his own judgments and allow them to be the same and still be friends with them, for example he knows Jordan is a liar yet he still ends up falling for her, so considering all of this i think he is pretty decent bloke, although a little bit over the top.