How to Write Radio Drama Essay Example for Free

How to Write Radio Drama Essay Here are some horrible truths: Most radio drama is very badly written. Radio drama is an endangered species. It has never taken a hold of mainstream programming on commercial radio in the UK. It used to be the mainstream in the States and Australia but lost out to TV in the middle to late fifties. It is under threat within public radio services including the BBC because of the pressure of monetarist ideology and the fact that authors and radio drama directors have been too complacent. IRDP is a significant oasis and continues to support the principle of the original play. Ground rules The Beginning The beginning is everything. If this part of it does not work you are up shit creek without a paddle. Your listeners will desert you. You have failed. You do not exist as a dramatist. Booo! The Moment of Arrival This is how you drop your listeners into the story. Dont give them a warm bed with comfortable pillows and a hot water bottle. The background and sub-text of previous histories is better explored through revelation in dramatic action. So parachute your listener into a top dramatic moment. Not the climax. That would be premature. Find the MOMENT to join the story. Avoid the slow snails explicatory route. Kick em into a high energy trip and whoosh them through the rapids. Structure Set upstruggleresolution. You can reverse this if the set-up is more dramatic and explosive than the resolution. Regard your play as a series of phases The Plot This is the story with lots of twists and turns. The more the merrier. Most listeners like good exciting plots. Without a good plot youre eating a souffle that has gone flat. You need plot, more plot and more plot. Run at least two story lines. Two sub plots would be interesting. Keep the plots linked logically within the same play. The best system is a major and a  minor storyline linked to one another. Get them to come together at the end. Surprise People are hungry for entertainment. If they wanted boredom they would be filling out their tax returns instead of listening to your radio play. Make people afraid, but also excited. Character Your main character must have the sympathy of the audience. Your audience has to identify with your main character. If this does not happen you have created a failure. Booo! Conflict Drama = conflict = audience. There has to be an emotional, financial, human, moral, physical struggle so your listeners can laugh or cry. Yes, you want your listeners to laugh or cry or laugh and cry. If you dont, give up. Polarities or Extremes The art of story telling is exploring the extreme limits of our psychological or physical existence. To pitch one polarity against another. The Climax I apologize for the sexual metaphor. But there is something in this. The better sex has foreplay, development, sustained excitement, surprise and affection, nay love followed by an explosion of ecstasy. Good radio drama is not all that different. If you dont use it, you lose it. Dialogue This is how we engage dramatically with the world. Characters inform, argue, amuse, outrage, argue through the ebb and flow of dialogue. When we do we talk and that is how great radio plays are made..by talking in dramatic dialogue. Atmosphere / Ambience This sets the emotional spirit of the play. It determines whether your  listeners believe in the world that you have created. Worlds are not created by dramatic dialogue alone. There is attitude and atmosphere. This is determined by detail and relevant detail. It could be in a sound effect. It could be in the writing. It could be in the music. It could be in everything. But the result is that the fifth dimension of radio writing the imagination of the listener is stimulated to become a picture palace of the mind. Emotion Got to be there. You have to generate an emotional response from the audience.preferably to the main character.also not so strongly in relation to the other characters. Emotion = love, hate, admiration. Never mind about the type of emotion..concentrate on whether it is there or not. Emotional connection between the writing and the listener = good radio drama. Balance Character and Plot You have to have both. You cannot trade. One can predominate over the other. Where they are balanced equally.it can only work if characterisation relates to plot development. If your main plot is character intensive, make sure that your minor plot is plot intensive. Purpose Crooks golden rule is that every word, every line, every scene must serve a dramatic purpose in terms of characterisation and plot development. Drop anything that does not have a dramatic purpose. Tension and Humour To stop the listener dropping off or switching off, maintain the tension always and throw in the humour. Tension, humour, tension, humour, tension humourlike the foxtrot..Make the emotional rhythm of the play dance on the listeners heart and mind. Charm and alarm, charm and alarm. But theyve got to be linked. Your character uses humour to react to the tension in the scene or play. Keep one character who uses humour to deal with difficult situations. Make sure the humour is verbal. Slapstick belongs to a different  type of play or entertainment. Make sure you do not have characters taking it in turns to be funny. This is not stand up comedy or sitcom. Make sure that the character who uses humour has a consistent sense of humour. Get your listener inside the world of your play. How? a. Sympathy or empathy with the main character. b. A bloody good set up. c. A big, nasty antagonist or villain. d. Great PlotGreat Story.twists and turns. e. Crisis at the beginning is dramatic and a great start. f. Emotional intensity. Hit some high points. g. Escalating conflict so the structure climbs with tension and humour. h. Strike the colours with detail so theres an atmosphere, moodambience. I. Modulate charm with alarmhumour with tensiontension with humourfunny policeman nasty policeman. j. Surprise, surprisethats what you do to the listener, through the plot. The principle of developing scenes 1.Introduction. 2.Character onegoal and objective. 3.Character twogoal and objective. 4.Purpose of scene in overall plot. 5.One of the characters achieves a goal. 6.Link to the next scene by introducing or pointing to location of next scene or presence of character in next scene. Question marks in the mind of the listener. Always keep one, better two or three The Principle of Character 1.Believable and recognisable. 2.Purpose within the plot. 3.Characters have to have function. Character has to be consistent with function. 4.Characters have to be intentional. 5.Start with a stereotype to ensure rapid recognition, then twist the stereotype. Challenge the homily that there is nothing new under the sun by making it new under the moon. 6.Give each character a dominant physical or behavioural characteristic. Make the dominant characteristic purposeful. Make it extreme. 7.Your main character must be active. 8.Active character / urgent plot. The characters energy has to fight the urgency of the plot and the urgency of the plot makes the character more energetic. The principle of Hero / Heroine 1.Listeners look up to main characters, want to admire them because we all want heroes and heroines in our lives. Lifes eternal fantasy that transcendent people and transcendent moments conquer adversity. 2.If you are very clever you can transfer the hero from the obvious to the humble and make great the inferior or character who has greater potential for human dignity. 3.Charisma. Characters need intensity and conviction. They may not be perfect but they are attractive. You cannot identify with people who are unlike ourselvestoo perfect, no beliefstake themselves too seriouslylack a sense of humour.. 4.Give your characters private moments when they drop their guards and allow us into their minds and hearts. Make the listener privileged. Use this moment for revelation. 5.The main character has to change and has to be changed by the plot. 6.You must have a main character and secondary characters. Your main character changes. Your secondary characters are probably more singular in their characteristics. Your secondary characters are already committed. Your main character is still weighing up the options. 7.You must have characters who are extreme in relation to each othercharacters that are different make drama. Where are we now? Well, we should be here. a. The main character is in the middle of the story. b. Youve used dominant characteristics. c. The listener likes the main character. d. The listener cares what happens to the main character. e. The listener hates the antagonist. f. The main character is developing. Principles of Dialogue a. Dialogue must be a response to a situation, plot or action. b. Dialogue must be a response to each character in the scene. c. Dialogue must be comic relief. d. Dialogue must connect to the next scene. e. Avoid reflective, passive and neutral. Go for active, and direct and emotional. f. Dialogue must be believable by being specificby being specific to the characters background and emotional state. g. If dialogue is reacting to action or situation then it must be dramatic and poised on polarities. The goals of the characters in each scene should be different. h. Dialogue should be continuous. Tipcharacters often take a tag by repeating the last word spoken by the first character. i. Dialogue must relate to function. j. You can mix direct with indirect between two characters because they have different goals. k. Humorous dialogue is not a character telling a joke but a line or lines responding to the dramatic situation. l. Heightened dialogue vs naturalistic dialogue. Heightened language is the language of the theatrehigh octane communicationpoetic, philosophicalcharged..the expression of the playwrightIt serves not only the development of the plot and character, but it also presents the view of the writer. Works well in radio. But there is now a tendency for more naturalism. Radio producers like to go out on location and explore realism. In these situations you must stick to natural dialogue. Principles peculiar to Radio 1.The inner existence. 2.The tension and conflict between the interior and exterior. 3.More psychological. 4.Easier to explore the real and the surreal and to delineate the line between the two. 5.Have to work in the fifth dimensionthe energy of the listeners imaginative participation. 6.The interior existence offers exploration of personal thoughts, fantasies, emotions and conflicts. 7.All  levels of external conflict can be explored. 8.The precipitating event through plot has to threaten the inner life of the main character. This is the kick-off in radio drama. 9.The end or resolution in radio drama is more deeply rooted in the emotional equilibrium and insight of the main character. Changes are internal as well as external. 10.Time transposition and translocation are faster and more rapid and more complicated. Flashbacksflashforwards different ages. 11.Radio requires less rather than more characters. Characterisation needs to be strong and fascinating. 12.Maintain the focus of the main character and plot. 13.Economy of words underlines subtextual surprise and engagement with the listeners imagination. 14.Wit is vital because language is so importantcleverness with wordsenergy with words..humour with wordsWit is advanced by surprising the listenerbeing aggressive with the listener..being fast, short and clever with the listener. 15.Irony is pathos and bathos. Its conflict between the inner life and outer action. Other radio drama producers in the world Norway: NRK kulturkanalen, P2 RODD- 0340, Oslo, Norway. Swedish Radio, SR S-105 10 Stockholm, Sweden. YLE Finnish Broadcasting Company Radio, PO Box 79 FIN-00024 Yleisrdio, Finland. HR, Hessischer Rundfunk Bertramstrasse 8, 60320 Frankfurt am Main, Germany. DR Danmarks Radio, Radio Drama Department, Ewaldsgade 3-9, DK 2200, Copenhagen N Denmark. ABC Australia, ABC Ultimo Centre, Level 5, 700 Harris Street, Ultimo NSW 2007. CBC-SRC, Radio Drama Department, Box 500, Station A, Toronto, Ontario, Canada MSW 1E6 SDR Suddeutscher Rundfunk, Neckarstrasse 230, 70190, Stuttgart, Germany. Radio Television Hong Kong, Broadcasting House, m 30 Broadcast Drive, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China. Other radio drama producers, SABC, South Africa, Los Angeles Theatre Works, LA, California, Public Radio, New Zealand.

Human Resource Management In Multinational Banks

Human Resource Management In Multinational Banks The case study, Human Resource Management in Multinational Banks in Tanzania, refers to the east located African country Tanzania, which is a developing region and has a high rate of unemployment, poverty and consists of a poor national institutional system. The country ranked poorly on the Corruption Perception Index. The country has also low influence of foreign banks. In the history the country went through different regimes including European partition and the scramble for African colonies. A strong influence on the country has the first elected leader, President Julius Nyerere, of Tanzania. The local Swahili language is known as Ujamaa, which became an official language. The Ujamaa philosophy rely its principles of government on three tenets of traditional African family system which are: mutual respect of each member of the family and society sharing of property and income obligation of all to work The African country wanted to attract foreign direct investment and other MNCs by implementing private policies to improve the socio-economic and institutional conditions and increase the inhabitants living conditions. 1. Is the role of the head offices a prerequisite for business strategy success for MNCs in cross-market integration? Explain your answer in detail. In my opinion and based on various literature the role of head offices is prerequisite for business strategy success for MNCs in cross-market integration. The head offices of MNCs represent the position where most or nearly all of the important functions of an organization are coordinated. The head office is the entity at the top of a corporation by taking full responsibility to manage all business activities. The service initiated by corporate head offices refers to corporate functional policies that are uniformly applied to both domestic and international operations. They are established specific to meet the needs of international units on an ongoing basis. One major role of the head offices which influences the business strategy success is characterized by coordination and controlling the host nation. These factors are highly visible particularly in the finance and accounting areas. For example, 70 percent of investment decisions are typically made by corporate head offices. So the head offices can keep in mind the general view of the organization. It seems to be best performed when public relations and dealings with host country governments are totally delegated to the local management. Corporate head offices of MNCs in cross-market integration are necessary to determine overall objectives and to specify organization wide strategies. The head offices are responsible for the policy guidelines and make their decision on the allocation of corporate resources to the various operating divisions. Relating to the case both bank centralized organizational system similar by controlling strategic management and business activities, including HR functions in the host nation. The Citibank head office was responsible for major corporate decisions at its country head office. The head office control was intended to achieve business integration globally and transparency in managing work and HRM policies.The head office of the Citibank was also in charge of the recruitment of expatriates for core business activities. The Standard Banks head office had full operational control over the country head office. To conclude, for MNCs in general and multinational banks particularly in this case study, the role of the head offices can be seen as prerequisite for business strategy success in cross-market integration. 2. Does the transfer of corporate business culture have a significant impact on MNCÂ ´s global business competitiveness? Be specific (you may provide examples from other companies). To understand the fallowing question I think it is necessary to define the term corporate business culture which can be used as a synonym for organizational culture. Corporate business culture refers to the shared values, attitudes, standards, and beliefs that characterize members of an organization and define its nature. Corporate culture is rooted in an organizations goals, strategies, structure, and approaches to labor. It is an essential component in any businesss ultimate success or failure. It is an unwritten value-set that management communicates directly or indirectly that all employees know and work under. It is the underlying soul and guiding force within an organization that creates attitude alliance, or employee loyalty. A winning corporate culture is the environmental keystone for maintaining the highest levels of employee satisfaction, customer loyalty, and profitability, stated John OMalley in Birmingham Business Journal. Figure 1: Artefacts of organizational culture (Reference: Organizational Behavior, Steven L. McShan, 2010 ) Positive corporate culture is a prerequisite for success and offer significant competitive advantages over rivals. Corporate business culture includes three important functions. The first function represents the control system. Corporate business culture is a deeply embedded form of social control that influences employee decisions and behaviour. Secondly the organizational culture is the social glue which bonds people together and makes them feel as a part of the organizational experience. Employees are motivated and want to internalize the organizations culture because it fulfils their needs for social identity. The third function represents the sense-making process. This is defined by the understanding of the employees of what goes on and why things happen in the organization. Successful MNCs have strong corporate business culture which means that employees understand and embrace the dominant values. This can influence the organizational performance and results as the employees well-being. For example The Standard Bank LTD promotes a family working environment which is part of their corporate culture. They also value their employees work expectations and treat them fairly which results in a willingness and motivation of the employees work. These make a balanced working environment and outstand on the global business competitiveness. Another example is Wal-Mart, which is a multinational retailer, benefited from the positive effects of corporate business culture. The MNC creates an environment of trust and respect their staff which persists to this day. Employees are called by their first name and the founder of Wal-Mart encouraged change to maintain the competitive edge. A further example which is related to our lecture is the Southwest Airlines. Southwest Airline has a very strong corporate business culture. HR policy doesnt provide layoff when the business is not going well. One main point which includes the corporate culture is the relaxed atmosphere, where people can be more flexible, loyal and productive. Job security promotes a willingness and motivation of Southwest Airlines employees. This results that employees convince relatives, friends or family members to work for this MNC. The productivity and effort of the employees helps the Southwest Airlines to keep labor costs low and savings are transmitted to travellers in form of lower prices. These factors of corporate culture might help the MNC to outstand from their rivals. Related to our lecture we learned that work behaviour is culturally determined and a lot of debates can make whenever corporate culture supersedes or supplants other cultures. What is understood and meant by corporate culture translates into universal work behaviors and standardisation of work practices An organization with a strong corporate culture can standardize more and the local culture has less influence but still local adaption should be taken into account. Figure 1: The linkage between culture and behaviour (Reference: slides from the lecture) This figure demonstrates the connection between the corporate business culture and the home and host culture and the behaviours. Standardization of work behaviour should take into account the choice of mode of operation in determining standardization of work practices. Other important points are the ownership and control. For instance wholly owned subsidiaries provide greater opportunities for transferring work practices than in International Joint Ventures. The standardization of work practices depends on different aspects: receptivity of local workforce to keep corporate norms of behavior. effectiveness of expatriates in the role of agents of socialization time of localization appropriateness to the local environment To conclude, related to the theory and the mentioned examples it is visible that the transfer of corporate business culture have a significant impact on MNCs global business competitiveness. 3. How and why did the MNC banks implement global HR best practices in their cross-market integration? Do their actions in fact reflect best practices? A precise definition of the term best practice is necessary to discuss in detail the mentioned question. A best practice is a technique or methodology that, through experience and research, has proven to reliably lead to a desired result. A commitment to using the best practices in any field is a commitment to using all the knowledge and technology at ones disposal to ensure success. Citibank LTD is an American bank and is one of the most global companies by providing financial services and products. The MNC bank offers different kinds of specialized financial services and products. The bank implemented best practice by applying modern sophisticated technology in its business operation in Tanzania. These services were used to standardize services, to monitor work performance and forms of financial transactions, to inform its customers of global financial market trends, currency fluctuations and price changes in commodities. The main corporate decisions of the Citibank were made by the head office in New York which had a systematic control of operations in the host nation. The bank used an e-check system which was used on a daily basis to monitor incoming and outgoing phone messages and record messages and telephone numbers. Employees werent given high flexibility. For instance every employee had to eat at the companys canteen. They were not allowed to bring their lunch meals from outside. Security checks made sure that employees didnt bring their own food to the workplace. The company gave bonuses to those people who attended the recreational scheme regularly, which is an organized process for socializing between employees and bank representatives. Expatriates role in the Citibank was to provide training to the local employees. One lack in the banks best practice was that the back-up function of the corporate culture which was directed from the head office, let the branch representatives and expatriates only a small space to change their policies or make local adaptations. The best practice included training program but this was also provided from the head office in New York. The purpose of training local employees was to ensure that head office policies were systematically followed. The first bank used Western-style HRM practices and didnt take local practices into account. The second bank, Standard Bank LTD was based in Johannesburg, South Africa. The mission of the bank was to offer guidance and expertise in the financial industry for its customers needs. Similar to the Citibank also the Standard bank was controlled from the head office in South Africa. In my opinion the second bank fallowed the best practice better in a way to take into account local adaptation and responds. They provided local and foreign magazines, videos and textbooks. The Bank tries to come closer to local institutional policies by focusing on a collective working environment, HR functions started to address more openly. The bank used the collective management and leadership terms to characterize its HRM practices in Tanzania. The Standard Bank implemented best practice by integrating the employees in the organizational process and culture. For both MNC banks it seems that they performed best practices. In my opinion Citibank and also Standard Bank didnt reflect totally on it. The Citibank used different modern sophisticated technology and offered various benefits but didnt take into account local circumstances. This bank didnt refer to the local culture, because the main power was in the head office in New York. This is one main lack in their performance. The Standard Bank was more successful by performing best practice because they tried to adapt locally in different ways. One lack of their best practice regarding to the Citibank was that they didnt use modern technical systems and didnt offered as many benefits as Citibank did. In my mind best practice might be achieved when both performances of the two MNC banks are combined. A mix between both banks policy can result in a balance of their performance and they could approach better the best practice in their cross-market integration. 4. How can the MNCs best reconcile the need for global integration and local responsiveness in their HRM policies? Human resource management policies are important and vital for organizations that are serious about resolving personnel issues and finding HR solutions. HRM policies are intended to help maximize the effectiveness of the Human Resource function. Types of HRM Policies: policy recruitment attendance policy leave of absence policy performance planning and evaluation performance probationary period compensation Different studies have established the need for MNCs to gain a balance between the global integration and local responsiveness in their HRM policies. It is important for the MNCs to implement HRM policies to complement the existing culture in the country where the subsidiary exists. A study of European MNCs illustrates the global integration and local responsiveness in MNCs HRM practices. This study is based on 600 UK and Ireland MNCs. They found that MNCs differ in their HR policies by noting that localization is more influenced in career traditions and labor market. MNCs sustain more similar to training frameworks. The implemented study found that host country regulation increase, when home country influence was reduced. The MNC must be aware of the local responsiveness by developing local staff through recruitment, training and development and retention. Cultural awareness training should be provide, because it has various applications domestically which can increase the effectiveness of MNCs One key factor to harmonize global integration and local responsiveness is to create and develop a consistent corporate business culture across multiple locations and maintain the critical balance between a strong corporate business culture and local cultural differences. Related to these points, communication plays an important role in all locations of the common corporate business culture. The Identity of local culture should maintain in the context of the corporate business culture. Another main reason for MNCs to best reconciles the need for global integration and local responsiveness is to integrate and adapt strategic human resources management. MNCs must become more differentiated, integrated and coordinated. Various successful MNCs implemented options like cross-national management training, cross-national assignments and cross-national project teams, to develop different values and culture to pursue global responsiveness of corporate vision and objectives. A very appropriate example of MNCs illustrates McDonalds. The organization operates globally but responds with their products and also regarding to the HR policies locally. For instance McDonalds adapt local taste to their products to satisfy their customer needs and employ local citizens in very subsidiary. The MNC build a standardize products line to succeed globally but they also take into account the local responsiveness to reach a high level of effectiveness and efficiency. However, MNCs should standardize as much as possible to save money, efforts and work but the local culture and cultural differences should be taken into account in their HRM policies.

Similar Roles of Mothers and Daughters in Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club :: Joy Luck Club Essays

Similar Roles of Mothers and Daughters in Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The Joy Luck Club, a novel by Amy Tan, is structured in an unusual way.   It is divided into four different sections.   Each section has four stories told by four different women.   In the first section all the mothers, in the Joy Luck Club, talk about their childhood.   In the next two sections the daughters talk about their childhood and their experiences through life.   In the last section the four mothers speak about the stories of when they were younger, around their daughters' age.   This novel explores countless topics.   Not only does it deal with gender identity and the relationships between Chinese-American cultures, but it also deals with mother daughter relationships.   Amy Tan shows us how mothers and daughters mirror each other. Every daughter in this novel hears about their mother's life and sees some comparisons to her own life.   "All women are daughters and must resolve the conflicts inherent in the mother/daughter relationship if they are to understand themselves an ultimately to establish their own identity". (Internet 1)   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   No matter how old they get, mothers and daughters play similar roles.   Even though an individual may not consciously do things that their mothers have taught/ inherit from them, they still act the same in some respects. An example of this would be   GuYing-ying (Betty) St. Clair and Lena St. Clair.   Both of these characters tell their stories.   These stories, in ways, sound very similar to each other.   Ying-ying's story is called the Moon Lady.   In this story, Ying-ying learns a truth and in some ways becomes a different person.   As Ying-ying sat on the edge of the boat the firecrackers went off.   She fell off the boat and found herself lost   in a large body of water.   She is discovered in the water and is brought to shore where she finds her family.   Later she sees the moon lady and wants to make a wish.   The moon lady is similar to a shooting star.   You only get one wish and it   only appears once in a gre at while.   However, when she sees the moon lady she discovers something.   "I could see the face of the moon lady: shrunken cheeks, a broad oily nose, large glaring teeth, and red stained eyes.   A face so tires that she she wearily pulled off her hair, her long gown fell from her shoulders and as the secret wish fell from my lips, the moon lady looked at me and became a man" (83)  Ã‚   Ying-ying discovers that things aren't always what they appear to be.

Cyberculture Essay :: Internet Technology essays

Cyberculture Essay E-mail today is the medium of choice when it comes to formal or informal exchange of written information. It has changed the way we thought about writing and drastically changed the way we correspond through writing. E-mail has added a certain type of convenience and its own unique style, although impersonal at times, to the written form of today’s communication. James Sosnoski said it well when he wrote in 1995, â€Å"reading electronic texts on screens is likely to be the predominant mode of reading in the very near future† (Tribble and Turbek 400). If he had only known how right, he was. E-mail today, in short has made the act of simple written correspondence so easy and convenient for all to do. Just over ten years ago, I can imagine many could never have fathomed that they would be able to write to a friend halfway across the world and have them receive the message in a matter of minutes. Writing letters on paper has lost its novelty. It used to be, not long ago that receiving a written letter wasn’t very uncommon, whereas today, it’s simply a rarity. Now not only are you able to send a letter in a matter of minutes, but you can save yourself the pains of writing several of the same copy; you can foreword or carbon copy them to as many people on your address list as you like with a click of a button. The act of revision and attention to spelling and grammatical error has all but eliminated itself in the development of this modern marvel. Dennis Baron wrote, â€Å"It wasn’t so much that I couldn’t think of the words, but the physical effort of handwriting, crossing out, revising, †¦ now seemed to overwhelm and constrict me, and I longed for the flexibility of digitized text† (Tribble and Turbek 36). Perhaps, part of the appeal that E-mail withholds is its ease of use. What was once considered painstaking, the task of writing, revising, and rewriting has now become a thing of the past. Its digitized text can easily compose with the stroke of a key and cut one’s precious time in half. With ease and convenience comes a change of what you might call the formality of written correspondence.

Capote/Krakauer Comparison :: essays papers

Capote/Krakauer Comparison Essay The most important thing any writer can do is to give their characters a feel of dimension to make them seem real. Although Capote and Krakauer do that in very different ways in In Cold Blood and Into Thin Air, they both reached the same end result: characters you believe. They give them thoughts, faces and personalities. They don’t portray everyone as flawless, they display the faults and the little quirks. They give them life through words, making these stories believable. Despite the fact both incidents happened years before each book was written, the use of detailed facts and personality profiles make each story seem incredibly realistic. But while Capote chooses to write an entirely objective piece, Krakauer relies heavily on personal opinion and experience, creating two very distinct frames of mind and causing the reader too see the characters in each book very differently. In 1959 the Clutter family was murdered in a tiny Kansas town called Holcomb. Six years later Truman Capote wrote a very detailed book about the whole case, from the day of the murder to the court case prosecuting the two murderers, Dick and Perry. Although he wasn’t there when the four murders happened, through word choice, description and characterization he creates an accurate portrait of the many intense events surrounding such a tragic story. In comparison, in 1996 esteemed climber Rob Hall led an expedition of moderately experienced climbers attempting to climb Mt. Everest, only to result in disaster and the loss of nine people’s lives. Jon Krakauer was a member of that expedition, and wrote a piece about the misadventure for Outside magazine. Feeling there was more to be said, soon after he wrote a book. Krakauer takes a similar approach as Capote, yet inserting more opinions and less of a feeling of objectiveness to his characters. This is most likely since Krakauer was living Everest first hand, as opposed to Capote who put himself into the environment years later, picking up details here and there instead of relying solely on memory and friends. One of Capote’s greatest strengths is to create thought for his characters, making it almost appear as if he knows what they are thinking. All summer Perry undulated between half-awake stupors and stickly, sweat-drenched sleep. Voices roared through his head; one voice persistently asked him, â€Å"Where is Jesus? Where?† And once he woke up shouting, â€Å"The bird is Jesus! The Bird is Jesus!† (381) This selection almost creates a feeling that Capote is talking about himself as opposed to a man he never met. Capote/Krakauer Comparison :: essays papers Capote/Krakauer Comparison Essay The most important thing any writer can do is to give their characters a feel of dimension to make them seem real. Although Capote and Krakauer do that in very different ways in In Cold Blood and Into Thin Air, they both reached the same end result: characters you believe. They give them thoughts, faces and personalities. They don’t portray everyone as flawless, they display the faults and the little quirks. They give them life through words, making these stories believable. Despite the fact both incidents happened years before each book was written, the use of detailed facts and personality profiles make each story seem incredibly realistic. But while Capote chooses to write an entirely objective piece, Krakauer relies heavily on personal opinion and experience, creating two very distinct frames of mind and causing the reader too see the characters in each book very differently. In 1959 the Clutter family was murdered in a tiny Kansas town called Holcomb. Six years later Truman Capote wrote a very detailed book about the whole case, from the day of the murder to the court case prosecuting the two murderers, Dick and Perry. Although he wasn’t there when the four murders happened, through word choice, description and characterization he creates an accurate portrait of the many intense events surrounding such a tragic story. In comparison, in 1996 esteemed climber Rob Hall led an expedition of moderately experienced climbers attempting to climb Mt. Everest, only to result in disaster and the loss of nine people’s lives. Jon Krakauer was a member of that expedition, and wrote a piece about the misadventure for Outside magazine. Feeling there was more to be said, soon after he wrote a book. Krakauer takes a similar approach as Capote, yet inserting more opinions and less of a feeling of objectiveness to his characters. This is most likely since Krakauer was living Everest first hand, as opposed to Capote who put himself into the environment years later, picking up details here and there instead of relying solely on memory and friends. One of Capote’s greatest strengths is to create thought for his characters, making it almost appear as if he knows what they are thinking. All summer Perry undulated between half-awake stupors and stickly, sweat-drenched sleep. Voices roared through his head; one voice persistently asked him, â€Å"Where is Jesus? Where?† And once he woke up shouting, â€Å"The bird is Jesus! The Bird is Jesus!† (381) This selection almost creates a feeling that Capote is talking about himself as opposed to a man he never met.

Assess How Martin Gaite Takes on the Task of Confronting Recent History Both Aesthetically and Ethically in El Cuarto de Atras.

Assess how Martin Gaite takes on the task of confronting recent history both aesthetically and ethically in El cuarto de atras. El cuarto de atras is Carmen Martin Gaite’s first post-Franco novel. Encompassing two very distinct genres, it is a fantastical novel, whilst in the same framework, a realist memoir of a woman growing up in post-war Spain. Through the use of the fantastic mode, the author approaches the real social history of the Civil War and post war period.This essay, will explore how Martin Gaite confronts this recent history, illustrating the hostile political environment of her youth and the anxiety it engendered. Through aesthetic techniques, particularly the fantastic mode, the novel facilitates a recollection of memories, which for many, were tarred with pain and anger. What we discover is that Martin Gaite’s intended purpose for her novel is not direct criticism of the fascist regime, but rather she aims to capture the collective memory of a generatio n, a memory which is often difficult to yield.To begin, it necessary to understand Martin Gaite’s decision to write her novel in this way, by gaining a sense of the climate of opinion which prevailed among the leading writers at the end of Franco’s rule, the time when Martin Gaite wrote El cuarto de atras. One of her contemporaries, the influential Juan Goytisolo, published an essay in 1967, which criticises the insipid realistic literature that was written in post-war Spain. He warns that Spanish novelists seem to have lost the ability to smile, despite belonging to a literary tradition that can draw on Cervantes and Larra.Goytisolo claims that, preoccupied with fighting Franco with words, he and his contemporaries have failed to serve either their cause or the wider interests of literature itself. In his essay, he writes: Digamoslo con claridad: las generaciones venideras nos pediran cuentas, sin duda, de nuestra actual conducta civica, pero no tomaran a esta en cons ideracion si, paralelamente a nuestra responsabilidad moral de ciudadanos, no manifestamos nuestra responsabilidad artistica como escritores.No basta, en efecto, reclamar la libertad: tenemos que probarla desde ahora con la autenticidad y responsabilidad de nuestras obras (Wood 2012: 48). Martin Gaite acknowledged and responded to this need for a new form of literature that did not rely solely on politics and realism. On November 23, 1975, the day that Franco died, she set out to write El cuarto de atras. Her novel would focus on two main literary goals; Firstly, to write a social history of the post-war era and secondly to write a fantastic novel.The novel is narrated by a woman called ‘C’, similar to Martin Gaite herself, who tells the story of an unexpected visit by a mysterious man, in the middle of the night. He has come to interview her. During their night-long conversation, the interviewer encourages the narrator in her recollection of her past. During the course of the conversation, the two protagonists notice that in the corner of the room, there is a pile of papers, which continues to grow. At the end of the novel, we learn that this stack of pages comprises the novel itself, even entitled ‘El cuarto de atras’.Their conversation has produced a novel. This powerful metafictional image of the written manuscript of the novel appearing within the novel itself creates a sense of participation amongst her readers. In the final pages, when the protagonist picks up the manuscript, we suddenly become aware of the novel we hold in our hands, and see it now as a mere artefact, the product of the conversation to which we have been aesthetically participating. The mystery behind this metafiction helps in establishing the ‘fantastic’ genre of the novel.Todorov gives a three-part definition of the fantastic genre, all three met in El cuarto de atras, ‘the reader considers the fictional world as real, the reader and the n arrator share a hesitation over whether or not what they perceive derives from commonly-held definitions of reality, and no allegorical interpretation of the unexplainable is advanced’ (Brown 1987: 41). Throughout the novel, the narrator mentions Todorov and quotes several times from his works. The narrator literally stumbles over Todorov’s book at the very start of the novel and later on, she spills water on the book, in doing so, making it more real.She even comes across a note she made when finishing reading the book, promising that one day ‘voy a escribir una novela fantastica’ (p 27). By the end of the novel, when she picks up the manuscript entitled ‘El cuarto de atras’, we realise that this is in fact, the fantastic novel which she promised she would write. The following description constructed by Todorov himself indicates why Martin Gaite decided to use the fantastic mode in her novel: ‘The supernatural thereby becomes a symbol o f language, just as the figures of rhetoric do, and the figure is, as we have seen, the purest form of literality’ (Brown 1987: 153).As well as heightening the creativity of her realist memoirs, Martin Gaite depends on the fantastic genre to uncover certain truths, which lie in hidden memories. Explaining, ‘cuando se traspasa esa frontera entre lo que estas convencido de que es verdad y lo que ya sabes si es verdad o mentira, puede ser posible todo’[1], it is apparent that in using the fantastic, mixing reality with mystery, she makes possible the difficult task of confronting painful, distressing memories experienced during the Civil war in Spain. The fantastic genre of El cuarto de atras is actually determined by the interviewer, the â€Å"man in the black hat†.The mystery of this nocturnal visitor remains unresolved and we finish the novel not knowing if his visit was real or dreamt-up by the narrator. From his very arrival, a fantastic apparition mater ialises, with the huge cockroach on the stairway, whose eyes, she will later note, exactly resemble his. ‘With its monstrous appearance [†¦ ] the insect summons the reader to anticipate the unknown. While the insect is described in detail, the man whose entry follows is not’ (Brown 1987: 151). The absent description of this character is one of several unresolved ambiguities of the novel, taking us in to the territory of the fantastic.It is in this territory and through her conversation with this ghostly character, that the narrator is able to recall her memories. The narrator realises that her difficulty in writing the memoir was due to the fact that she wanted to recapture more than just facts, ‘lo que yo queria rescatar era algo mas inaprensible, eran las miguitas, no las piedrecitas blancas’ (p. 120). With the image of white pebbles and breadcrumbs, a symbol from Perrault’s stories, we learn that she grasps how the truth about history, identi ty and collective memory, is made up of fragments, like pieces of a puzzle.Acting as her conscience, the interviewer certifies this in saying ‘tendria que aprender a escribir como habla’ (p. 120). This reflects Martin Gaite’s view that historical narrative does not suffice if and when constructing a novel which successfully approaches such a painful past. For the narrator, rather than assisting her, facts and historical data have acted as an obstacle. Martin Gaite creates a fantastic memoir, with dimensions of both reality and mystery, allowing the readers to find some form of escapism in her novel. As Robert C.Spires notes, the fantastic ‘frees both writer and reader from a one-dimensional, cause and effect, view of existence’ (1984:120). This creative release, which Martin Gaite seeks in her employment of the fantastic, hints at Spain’s sudden release from the Franco regime. In a further metafictional reference, the narrator explains how, si nce her childhood, she has experienced a form of escape through literature and fantasy. In her composition, as a child, of a novel revolving around a mythical island called Bergai, she demonstrates her desire to escape the strict silence of the regime.By declaring her own search for freedom through literature, Martin Gaite hopes that her novel will encourage the freeing of unspoken memories that her own generation has been hiding. The very title of the novel and the plurality of it’s meaning, indicates Martin Gaite’s desire to liberate memories. The narrator recalls how, ‘El cuarto de atras’ was the place where she used to play as a child, enjoying its freedom to develop her creative imagination. With the war, ‘el cuarto de atras’ begins to be appropriated by adults to store ‘articulos de primera necesidad’ (p. 157).The narrator explains, ‘hasta que dejamos de tener cuarto para jugar, porque los articulos de primera necesida d desplazaron y arrinconaron nuestra infancia, el juego y la subsistencia coexistieron en una convivencia agria de olores incompatibles’ (p. 160). ‘Politics seemed to be part of the adult world and the changes brought about by war seemed like rules for an unexplained new game’ (O’leary and Ribeiro de Menezes 2008:114). Her description reveals her imagination, yet at the same time, serves to depict the ways in which the war impeded on such basic aspects of everyday life.Through her innocence as a child, she does not politically criticise the war, but instead, discusses its inconveniences on her life as she grew up. The plurality of meaning that surrounds ‘El cuarto de atras’ surfaces in a further description of this space: ‘me lo imagino tambien como un desvan del cerebro [†¦ ] separado [†¦ ] por una cortina que solo se descorre de vez en cuando; los recuerdos que pueden darnos alguna sorpresa viven agazapados en el cuarto de at ras, siempre salen de alli, y solo cuando quieren, no sirve hostigarlos† (p. 83).In the novel, the task of pulling back the curtain is undertaken by the interviewer, as it can be perceived that his role is to help the narrator reveal hidden memories. This task of confronting past experiences is not an easy one, as it can un-surface deep fear and anger. ‘It must be remembered that government repression was a formalised expression of the psychological mechanisms adopted by a people whose horror had to be assuaged’ (Brown 1987:162). In establishing the mode of the fantastic, Martin Gaite pulls back the curtain on past realities, and in doing so, captures collective memory.The novel gives a realistic account of life as a child growing up in Spain in 1930’s and 40’s. The narrator points out that Franco came to power when she was only nine years old and she speaks openly about the effects the Civil War had on her. She recalls personal experiences such as h er uncle’s murder because he was a Socialist and the imprisonment of her friend’s parents because they were ‘Rojos’. Her recollections originate from her perception of them as a child, for example, trips to the bomb shelter are just another game.This innocence and political ignorance of her childhood memories help Martin Gaite to steer away from the blame game and political motives, giving instead, an account of what she experienced and how she perceived things as a child. The compelling image which most effectively achieves this is that of Franco’s daughter. The narrator remembers envying her but also feeling sorry for her. We see her sympathising with Carmencita’s grief as a daughter during the dictator’s funeral. Stating that ‘en mi casa, no eran franquistas’, we learn that the narrator is subtle when probed on Franco himself.Although critique on his leadership is inevitable, she avoids using her novel to directly attac k Franco, but rather to give an account of the effect of his dominance on society. As she watches Carmencita Franco at her father’s funeral, the narrator thinks about what they have in common and realises that they share the same collective memory as women who grew up in a patriarchal society. The novel explores the importance of the ‘Seccion Femenina’ and of romantic fiction to her generation of women. Martin Gaite offers the reader an insight, often overlooked in history books, into the ideological inculcation of women during the Franco period’ (O’Leary and Ribeiro de Menezes 2008: 115). She explains, Todas las arengas que monitores y camaradas nos lanzaban en aquellos locales inhospitos, mezcla de hangar y de cine de pueblo, donde cumpli a reganadientes el Servicio Social, cosiendo dobladillos, haciendo gimnasia y jugando al baloncesto, se encaminaban, en definitiva, al mismo objetivo: a que aceptasemos con alegria y orgullo [†¦] nuestra con dicion de mujeres fuertes, complemento y espejo del varon. p. 85) This description has been structured in such a way as to sarcastically signify what was expected on women during the regime. She is able to look back with humour on the expectations of the society she grew up in. As Brown suggests, ‘Luckily, she learned at an early age that the sentiments of the Fascists ruling party were not those of her own family, and that there was a dichotomy between what was thought at home and what was valued outside’ (Brown 1987: 158).Martin Gaite discretely ignored the inhibitions to freedom imposed by the Government’s restrictions and with the support of her mother, she attended university, surpassing the limited, narrow parameters of women’s lives. However, it is apparent that she was in fact influenced by the social tendencies of the time. Through her references to Hollywood stars such as Garbo, and her vision of the interviewer as the hero of a romantic novel, w e discover that her thoughts and behaviour are influenced by romantic literature and Hollywood glamour.The fantasy of each of these became a reality and something these women were expected to aspire towards as a sort of model of behaviour. Sharing such memories with her reader, providing an insight into the social customs of recent history, collective memory is captured. The narrator explains her difficulty in writing her memoirs because her memories of the war and post-war years are disordered and confused. She describes the post war period as ‘un panorama tan ancho y tan revuelto, como una habitacion donde cada cosa esta en su sitio precisamente al haberse salido de su sitio’ (p. 93).Her desire to write these memoirs arises when she is watching Franco’s funeral. As she watches the funeral procession, she summarises what she recalled of Franco’s dominance in the society she grew up in, ‘Franco pescando truchas, Franco en el Pazo de Mieras, Franco en los sellos, Franco en el NO-DO’ (p. 119). The image of Franco was everywhere. As she watches his funeral, the narrator states ‘el tiempo se desbloqueaba’ (p. 119). ‘Franco’s death set time in motion again, as well as language, thus allowing the author to explore the recent past and personal history (O’Leary and Ribeiro 2008:113).The disorder of time and space, in El cuarto de atras, brings forth a revelation in ethically confronting recent history, establishing a contrast with the imposed order of the regime whose end has inspired this fantastic memoir. As a final point, attention should be drawn to the tension that Martin Gaite creates in her depiction of life in Franco’s Spain. This tension lies between her description of the stasis of life under Franco and the life that she managed to live. During this ‘frozen’ time period, the narrator succeeds in becoming both a novelist and a mother.Despite the limitations, obligatio ns and deprivation of the dictatorship, she recalls how her childhood and adolescence were happy. The juxtaposition between stasis and dynamism is most brilliantly described in her comparison of the Franco dictatorship with that of the game ‘escondite ingles’. Under the threatening eye of the dictatorship, people stood still and froze but behind the back of the regime, when and where they had the opportunity, they strove to run their lives as they pleased. In using a popular childhood game to highlight uch tension, her readers are able to return to their past, focusing not on their pain and anger, but rather on the rhythm of life during this period. To conclude, Martin Gaite’s novel, succeeds in offering a new style of writing when confronting recent history. The complex interaction between reality and fantasy, produces a creative and gripping memoir which attempts to capture the collective memory of a generation. In recalling her memories as a child and depictin g the role expected of women, Martin Gaite provides us with an insight of what it was like to experience life under Franco.El cuarto de atras succeeds as a work that enables us to lift the curtain on painful memories that have been hidden away by so many. The recovery of this memory is a difficult task, but by taking us into the world of the fantastic, these memories can find a path to escape. Bibliography Martin Gaite, Carmen. 2009. El cuarto de atras, (Madrid: Libros del Tiempo, Ediciones Siruela). Adrian M. Garcia, 2000. Silence in the Novels of Carmen Martin Gaite (New York: Peter Lang). Lipman Brown, Jo. 1987. Secrets from the Back Room: the Fiction of Carmen Martin Gaite’ (Valencia: University of Mississippi Press).O’Leary and Ribeiro de Menezes, 2008. A Companion to Carmen Martin Gaite (Woodbridge: Tamesis). Robert C. Spires, 1984. Beyond the Metafictional Mode – Directions in the Modern Spanish Novel (Lexington: Kentucky University Press, 1984). Tzvetan Todorov, The Fantastic – A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre trans. Richard Howard (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1975). Wood, Gareth J. 2012. Javier Marias’s Debt to translation (Oxford: Oxford University Press). ———————– [1] Martin Gaite, quoted in Gazarian Gautier ‘Conversacion con Carmen Martin Gaite en Nueva York’, 11.

Campare and Contraste

Julio Alvarado English 914 â€Å"Driving While Stupid† Summary In his article â€Å"Driving While Stupid,† Dave Barry shares his experience of bad drivers. He talks about many scenarios that are taking place in many places. He first starts by stating that downtown Miami is home to the worst drivers. He claims that although some may try to say otherwise, that there is no way to compete with Miami on the worst driver scale. Barry backs up his clam by giving examples of how he has driven in every major U.S. city as well as in Italy, where there is only one traffic law, in an Argentinean city of Mar del Plata, literally meaning â€Å"Cover your  eyes,† and in China, where buses ‘encourage' people to get out of the way. He says he has seen many insane drivers and situations, but that didn't stop him from being surprised with one of his own experiences; the night when a driver in a convertible on the interstate I-95 was weaving back and forth going maybe 600 mi les per hour.The observation Barry makes is that the driver was watching a music video on a video screen installed in his sun visor. Barry goes on to say that there are many drivers who distract themselves by cell phones, reading, eating, etc, while driving, but at least, unlike the guy on the interstate, they are able to see the road from time to time. The level of comedy that Barry used in his article is high. By using deliberate and obvious exaggeration and sarcasm to convey the fact that drivers should pay more attention to the road, and less to other crazy activities.