Escapism in Motherless Brooklyn

     I'm reading the book Motherless Brooklyn in which Lionel Essrog is trying to solve who killed his boss, Frank Minna. While reading this book I got to thinking about things people do to avoid how they really feel and who they really are.
     For instance one character, Danny, is an orphan who dropped out of high school. Yet he is always calm, and always cool. Even when Minna dies he keeps his cool. He hides behind a lack of emotions and avoids how he really feels.
     Lionel has tourette's. He and his friends get along by ignoring it They for the most part try and forget it exists. His whole life he sort of keeps himself hidden, with the tourrette's.. But as the book progresses Lionel meets other people, people who ask him about it, and how it is to be the way he is. And he slowly stops ignoring it, and accepting it. And he becomes a stronger, more complete person because of it.
     The overall message here is that you can't hide behind your problems and avoid emotion to make life better.. Hiding won't lead you anywhere except an endless loop of avoidance. to solve anything in life it must be met head on, and until you meet your issues and emotions you are not an incomplete person.

Hard things in Inda

     In this book I'm reading, Inda, the main character, Inda, the son of a noble, is in a military academy. He and his friends are in a intrigue filled feud with another group of boys. I find the way some of the boys act and think kind of hard to read, because I feel like that often. The things i find hard are hard for me because these are feelings I have about my own family, resentments I have of peers, and many things that are reflections of parts I don't like as much about myself.
     I believe the author of the book is saying something about the nature of children, and the hard things say that kids aren't always nice. In the book, the story is  sort of mirrored up to the adult world, and its own politics and intrigue. i think the author is saying how deep down everyone is essentially a kid, and a blood feud between two families is the same thing in its essence as a schoolyard squabble.
     Another effect of the similiarity of the characters to me and people I know is that it makes the book better, and makes me want to read it more. It's like you are doing these things, and you want to find out what happens to yourself.

     Im reading the book One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey. In this book the main character, Chief Bromden, a half indian son of a chief, is in a pschiatric ward run by nurse Ratched. it is a dull boring place until a new patient, McMurphy, arrives.
     In this story the world is viewed through the Chief's eyes. he can hear, but acts like he's a deaf mute. The fact that the Chief doesn't speak gives makes you feel as if you are actually in the story. And because he doen't really speak, you are a silent observer, a witness.

     Even though Kesey uses the Chief's inner voice to explains thing to you, you feel like you are a patient in the ward. This is furthered by the fact that the Cief has dreams and nightmares and visions. Because you feel like him, and he sees these things, you see them, too. And you feel the horror, and disgust of these visons. Some of these visons, though are memories. And thrugh thoe memories you feel the pain of what was lost and realize the logic of the Chief.
     Overall the fact that you're seeing the world through an inmate's eye's makes you see what is really going on in the ward, and you know how all the patient's feel. Nurse Ratched and her staff's view are mostly excluded. It's a good example of how an excluded view makes you see things a different way.

Catch 22 social issues

In catch 22 Joseph Heller excludes people's points of view for one chapter then explains them in the next. so no one's view is really excluded. I think Heller chose to do this because he wants to show how everyone thinks, and how different people are affected catastrophes, such as war.
For instance he shows how the main character, Yossarian thinks. he shows how he wants to run from the war, and hates it and doesn't believe it should continue, and why can't someone else who wants to fight fight instead of me. but he can't leave.
then Heller shows us a very patriotic character who believes in fate and how its our duty to fight and that we will die when we die, and you can't change that. he gives a background for this man to try and show how this man's views came about.
Heller is trying to show to us the way a very drastic thing happening like war affects people, and how things cause conflicts and open up differences in society and people.

Justice in The Lord Of The Rings

in the lord of the rings, fate and justice play a huge part. everything happens for a purpose and people get what they deserve. if you are a good person, and persevere against danger and evil for the greater good, good things will happen to. if you are the evil, then bad things will happen to you. it is like tolkien created his own perfect way things happen, a more perfect version of fate.
take sauroman for example. he was once wise, but grew hungry for power and tried to take over landswith an army of evil. in the real world, dictators take over countries all the time. sometimes they are deposed. sometimes they are killed. but alot of the time dictators just keep on ruling, and people are unable to stop them, for fear of consequences.
but in Tolkiens world people can do something about these problems. the good guys, Gandalf and Aragorn and everyone else, stop sauroman's armies. he is defeated. Merry and Pippin convince treebeard and his ents to stop sauroman, who has oppresed them and destroyed their forests. the good guys win. what doesn't always happen in the real world happens in the lord of the rings.
one of the reasons people like the lord of the rings is that it gives the feeling that anyone, even a small hobbit, can do good and bring about justice. in the real world it's almost impossible even for governments and organizations to fix all the problems in the world.

Hard Things and Social Issues About The Lord of The Rings, The Two Towers

The lord of the rings may be a fantasy novel, but it still has many issues that connect to the real world, such as themes of the loss of the environment.
In the lord of the rings one of the characters in the second book, which is the one I'm reading, is Treebeard, a talking tree who is a shepherd of the forests. The evil wizard sauroman is destroying his trees. This is one of the more obvious examples of Tolkien presenting the issue of protecting the environment.
Some less obvious ways Tolkien shows the loss of nature is how during the course of the story all the elves are leaving. The elves represent nature and the forest and in the real world nature is disappearing . Tolkien believes that nature is being destroyed and he is showing us this by the fact the beautiful things in middle earth are leaving or being destroyed.

The Phantom Tollbooth: Life Lessons

     The Phantom Tollbooth is filled with life lessons and author's intrusions, a little like charlotte's web. in fact the whole book is like one giant author's intrusion, disguised under a veil of interesting characters and a magical quest.
      For instance look at the forest of sight. (heh). Anyway, if you examine the cities of illusions and reality you can see a very important life lessons. the city of reality disappeared because no one payed attentions to it and went around staring at the ground walking as fast as possible. the life lesson is that you must stop once in a while to pay attention to your surroundings. otherwise it will be like they don't exist. ( i found out that at the time Norton Juster was living in Brooklyn at the time and may have been inspired by the way people act in new york city, a little like EB White)
     Another example is the Which's tail and Azaz's cabinet. the Which used to advise on how many words to use, but became miserly and used too few and ended up in the dungeon. the cabinet use too many, and are annoying and get screamed at. Juster's telling us to treat words with moderation and use just enough to get the job done.
     Many children's books such as the phantom tollbooth and charlotte's web teach kids little life lessons. great author's like teaching children and want to impart some life lessons on them.