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Although the language itself is not particularly technical or confusing, the way in which the characters speak to each other bars any genuine communication. Even the audience is disallowed the privilege of understanding, because language is distorted in such a way that words lose meaning. Meg and Petey converse in empty, repetitive phrases that indicate their complete lack of connection. Meg uses the word to such excess that she voids the word of any positive association. Indeed, she reduces numerous expressions to sounds that fill the obvious ravine that separates her from Petey. When Petey tells her that his paper says nothing much, on some level he is indicting the vapidity of their existence. His paper says nothing much because he is incapable of saying anything of substance himself. Even if he read something of grave importance, his inability to use language as a communicative tool leaves him impotent to convey the weight of what he read.
The more sinister employ of language comes into play...
Here, the failure of language stems more from abuse than from inanity. Stanley is unable to combat the verbal attacks of McCann and Goldberg, because their words become weapons against which his own language cannot defend. Stanley is often silent throughout the play as Goldberg victimizes him with rapid-fire insincerity and deciet. Goldberg also draws attention to the lapses in communication between Stanley, Meg, Petey and Lulu. At one point, he demands that Meg make a toast to Stanley by saying what she honestly feels. Meg is at a loss, however, because she is incapable of converting language into a genuine form of expression. The limits of language are epitomized in Stanley's final scene. He loses all capacity to form words, making only terrible gurgling noises. Ironically, however, this seems to be the first time that Stanley is accurately able to communicate his feelings. The cruel fate that likely awaits him has reduced him to terrified shudders and mutterings, and in this manner he clearly conveys his terror to everyone present.
Illusion The Argument from Illusion -- a Description The British philosopher George Berkeley sets forth an argument that separates the experience of the reality of an object from the object being experienced. By doing so, he suggests that things exist in different states -- not only the physical. This duality, plurality, or concurrent entity that one perceives is not the real object, or so Berkeley argues, because it has different properties than
Just like the letters, and just like Bartleby, everyone dies. The time that is spent living is spent completing meaningless tasks. This is what the narrator realizes at the novel's end, when he says "Ah, Bartleby! Ah, humanity!" The final message is that society as a whole needs to find real meaning, and not continue to exist based on illusions of what is important. In Billy Bud, illusion is used
Illusion and Reality in "Araby" In James Joyce's short story "Araby," written in 1905, but first published in 1914 in Dubliners (Merriam Webster's Encyclopedia of Literature, p. 611) a young boy experiences his first sexual awakening, and finds himself endlessly fantasizing about "Mangan's sister," who lives in a house near his own. As Joyce describes Mangan's sister, from the boy's perspective "Her dress swung as she moved her body and the
From time to time, however, Las Vegas illusion and Las Vegas reality do intersect (uneasily). When ugly newsworthy incidents occur, e.g., when a dozen tourists are killed by a drugged-out schizophrenic speeding in his car toward them on a Strip sidewalk; when a twenty-something female out-of-towner is shot fatally inside Harrah's; or when an elderly, but obviously, somehow, non-compliant female tourist is dragged, handcuffed, a the marble-floored casino/hotel lobby by
Race: An Illusion The concept of race has no place in today's globalizing world. In fact, it is a damaging illusion. Not only does the idea of race allow false beliefs to develop, but it allows the concept of "them against us" to develop. In such a reality, race becomes a pride-producing rallying point around which blatant discrimination, injustice, and atrocities spring. The idea of race as a meaningful concept is no
Business Ethics The Illusion of Reverse Discrimination It sounds like such a good argument -- 'don't simply hire someone because he or she is a member of a minority group,' hire the most qualified person. Yes, disregard the compelling fact that the prospective applicant for a position is a member of a historically discriminated against minority group -- simply ask who is best. While such an argument sounds philosophically, emotionally, and occasionally,