Realism

The Story of an Hour

This story does a really good job of showing you exactly what the characters are feeling, and gives you a good since of the environment around them. "She was young, with a fair, calm face, whose lines bespoke repression and even a certain strength. But now there was a dull stare in her eyes, whose gaze was fixed away off yonder on one of those patches of blue sky." This describes the character probably the best that it could. It’s not necessarily written in a way that people can relate to it but more in a sense that you can understand exactly what she is going through.

The Social issue here is how woman were treated back then. After rereading this story and learning to understand it a little better I found that when Louise (Mrs. Mallard) finds out her husband is dead, she is relieved. Its interesting that her name is only said once in the story and ever other time she is called Mrs. Mallard or she. This shows that she wasn't respected as an individual but only as her husbands wife.
The Battle with Mr. Covey

The writer displays the setting really well in this story. You can tell this takes place on a plantation, back when slaves were still around. This best description was when he described how being Mr. Covey’s slave had changed him. "I was broken in body, soul, and spirit. My natural elasticity was crushed, my intellect languished, the disposition to read departed, the cheerful spark that lingered about my eye died; the dark night of slavery closed in upon me; and behold a man transformed into a brute!" I can’t imagine how much it must have sucked to be slave, but this gives a pretty good example.

The social issue is about racism and how bad slavery was back then. This shows you just how bad people had it back then. This guy was treated terrible, which all slaves were. "I told him as well as I could, for I scarce had strength to speak. He then gave me a savage kick in the side, and told me to get up. I tried to do so, but fell back in the attempt. He gave me another kick, and again told me to rise." This passage shows the cruelty that was shown to black people. In today’s time, even though a lot of us think we know what it was like for slaves, we really don’t. This story not only shows you how badly they were treated, but what happened when one man stood up for himself.

It’s easy to see the purpose of this story is to show people the struggle slaves went through. Even though slavery is no longer a part of our culture, it effected so many lives back then, and people need to know that. One of the darkest parts of our countries history isn’t something that should be forgotten. Forgetting about slavery would be like Jewish people forgetting about the holocaust. Even though its something terrible that happened, it happened, so we should never forget. I think the author wrote this to remind people how bad things were back then, so we can see how far we’ve come as a nation.

"The Catcher in the Rye"

One of my favorite books is "The Catcher in the Rye" and I think it’s a good example of modern realism. It’s about a teenage boy with teenage angst. The whole book is just him trying to make it through day after day. It shows relationships really well, and it is really easy to relate to. We all are teenagers at on point and it’s not always the best part of our lives.

One of my favorite quotes in the book is in chapter 10 when he is meeting an old girlfriend." I was half in love with her by the time we sat down. That's the thing about girls. Every time they do something pretty, even if they're not much to look at, or even if they're sort of stupid, you fall half in love with them, and then you never know where the hell you are. Girls. Jesus Christ. They can drive you crazy. They really can." The reason that is great is because it’s true and real. We’ve all been with a girl, and even if we barely know them, when were a teenage boy, we might think we love them. It’s realism because we’ve all been there, and when we read it, we can relate to it.