Biographical Approach to Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour” Essay

Literature is always said to be the echo of life. It reflects the time, the mind’s state, and author’s life. Whenever one looks into any literature piece, they do not only read what is on the text but also try to understand the context that matters. These contexts include the life of the author, the era it was written, the social condition during the time it was set, and others. There are many ways in which a literary piece can be read and interpreted. The act of interpreting a literary text is called literary criticism. As said by Lamb (2003), literary criticism is an attempt to assess and comprehend the creative writing, the literature of an author. In this paper, the researcher uses a type of literary criticism to institute the meaning of the text. The researcher uses biographical approach to literary criticism. Eagleton (1996) describes this approach as a strategy of relating the author’s life and thoughts to his/her works. This allows the reader to understand elements employed in the work, plus to relate works to authorial meaning and readers. MHS Composition Guide states that there are central biographical questions needed to reflect on in taking this approach. These questions are: †¢ What biographical facts has the author used in the text? †¢ What biographical facts has the author changed? †¢ What insights do we acquire about the author’s life by reading the text? †¢ How do these facts and insights increase (or diminish) our understanding of the text? These questions wil used in the development of the body of this paper. In this paper, the researcher also attempts to give assessment in life to her short story, and to the main character of the short story â€Å"The Story of an Hour†. Horward (2005) states that Katherine O’Flaherty, also known as Kate Chopin, was one of the most renowned female writers of her time. Her universal themes are what made her extraordinary. She wrote several short stories including â€Å"The Story of an Hour†, â€Å"Euphrase†, â€Å"Mrs. Mobry’s Reason†, â€Å"A Shameful Affair† and many others. Kate Chopin was raised into a home of women in St. Louis. This had been a very big influence to her writings, mainly on her views about feminism – views about women. Chopin was later widowed at 32, and there she started writing for herself and for her six children. Chopin was an extensive reader that is why she was able to write stories of herself into creative ones. In the early 1970’s, it was the resurrection of women’s rights movements, and Kate Chopin was one of those contributors to the occurrence. She contributed a lot with her writings about women, daytime dramas, the feminine mystique, women’s liberation, Mars vs. Venus, self-help and open marriages. Definitely, Kate Chopin’s early experiences had a great influence on her writings. One of her celebrated short stories is â€Å"The Story of an Hour† and it is entirely famous not only in American Literature – but also in the world. While reading the short story, the reader finds connection between the life of the author and the life of the main character of the short story. These connections are the similarities that the reader had taken into consideration: Chopin and Her Father’s Loss One of the main events in the story is a loss of someone very important, more particularly, Mrs. Mallard’s husband’s loss. Josephine, Mrs. Mallard’s sister, had brought the sad message that there was a railroad disaster and of those listed as ‘killed’ was Brently Mallard, who was Mrs. Mallard’s husband. In Kate’s life, she had lost someone too, in a railroad accident in 1855 to a train accident. A Widow Mrs. Mallard is sooner or later, assumed to be a widow, but readers will soon find out that Mr. Mallard is alive. In Kate’s life, his father had widowed her mother. Both experienced having lost someone very special and as well as being widowed but definitely, their responses to the loss may entirely be different. In the end, before she would have learned about Brently’s return from the accident, Louise died of heart disease – of joy that kills. This suggests that she had a monstrous joy, because it killed and consumed her to death. Perhaps, Chopin would just let Louise die instead of seeing Brently again, wherein she will be living like a prison again. Freedom for Women In â€Å"The Story of An Hour†, Chopin has made no suggestion to the readers that Mrs. Mallard was sorry for her husband’s loss. Instead, she has uttered ‘over under her breath’: â€Å"free, free, and free! †, which suggests how happy Mrs. Mallard is to have lost her husband, because she has now freedom of herself. The joy she senses in possessing her freedom is something which consumes her. In Kate’s life, she was used to write about resurgence of women’s rights. She experience a period when there was this declined and confinement of women’s public needs like education, the vote, rights to her own property and her own children. Those events drove her to write this kind of feminist text instead of choosing other universal themes. Briefly, the title of this novel, â€Å"The Story of an Hour† is a image of the feelings provoked by the main character, Louise Mallard. In connection to this, it can be confirmed that this novel is a reference to Kate Chopin’s life since most of the events in Louise’s life are similar, or at least made a great influence to that of the story, â€Å"The Story of an Hour†. The biographical approach made by the researcher accomplishes its purpose because an understanding able of the issues behind the book went through by tracing the history and life of Kate Chopin. Literature can bring us to the world of the author. Therefore, this research established that literature reflects the time, state of mind, and the life of the author through understanding the connection between Kate Chopin and Mrs. Mallard in the short story, â€Å"The Story of an Hour. † References: Original Text: References Chopin, K. (1976). The Awakening and Selected Stories of Kate Chopin. New York: Signet Classic. Eagleton, T. (1996). Biographical Approach. An introduction to Literary Theories (2 ed. ) University of Minnesota Press. Horward, A. ( 2005). A Woman Ahead of Her Time. Retrieved 28 April 2010 from: http://www. angelfire. com/nv/English243/Chopin. html Lamb, A. (2003). The topic: literary criticism. Retrieved 24 April 2010 from:

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Our impact on the environment - Essay Example ties includes the element of pollution, which is currently a major global threat that has been increasing in a dramatic rate due to the increase of industrialization and other human activities that involve use of energy. This essay is going to focus on the impacts of human activities on the environment, analyze how different sources of energy affect the environment as well recommend usage of the most sustainable and friendly sources of energy. Carried out studies have proven that one of the major factors contributing to the high levels of pollution to the environment is the type of sources of energy that human beings use in fueling their industrial activities (Jaccard 63). Most of these sources of energies used in almost all countries are nonrenewable and highly unsustainable, a factor that have made them a chief threat to the environment (Jaccard 65). However, some sources are known to have more adverse effects to the environment than others with oil, coal and natural gas being the main sources that environmentalists blame much for the high level of pollution in the modern world. Statistics show that oil is the most common source of energy with oil being used to fuel over 80% of all the activities undertaken on daily basis such as in factories, cooking and for transport. However, combustion of oil leads to emission of greenhouse gases that have detrimental effects to the environment (Curley 95). The main constituents of products released after burning oil, natural gas and coal are carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide that have significantly contributed to global warming or climate change. In addition, combusted fossil fuels lead to formation of other harmful gases which ends up forming acids such as carbonic acids and sulfuric acid. Carbon dioxide and suphurous gaseous produces once fossils are combusted combine with moisture or rain in the atmosphere to form acidic rainfall. Acidic rains are a major threat to plant and fish health once they get on to the ground.

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1.Critically examine the challenges facing the NHS in employing the use of computer-based systems in the management of patients care since the introduction of the National Programme for IT in 2005 - Essay Example e National Audit Office (2006) the establishment of the specific Programme was decided mostly because of the following reasons: a) the high volume of cases handled by hospitals and other care centers; it has been estimated that every week about 6 million people are likely to visit their GP (National Audit Office, 2006, p.9), b) the increase of security in regard to the storage and management of personal data, c) the high cost in prescribing in healthcare settings across Britain. Despite the above advantages, the NHS IT Programme of 2005 has faced a series of challenges – an indication of the failures related to its design/ monitoring. These challenges are analytically presented in the next section; it is concluded that the use of the NHS IT Programme has helped towards the increase of quality of healthcare services across Britain; however, appropriate initiatives should be developed so that the above system to fully perform. Such schemes of action would be the training of user s, the introduction of simpler guidelines and the continuous review of the system’s needs. Through the introduction of information systems in the management of activities across NHS the performance of the specific organization has been improved. The advanced information technologies available to health practitioners have helped to the increase of quality of the services provided to the patients but also to the establishment of services which were not available previously – for instance the services available in the context of the Geographical Information System (GIS) which is incorporated in the IT systems used in NHS’ healthcare settings (Higgs et al., 2001, p.247). However, the performance of information systems in NHS has faced severe delays mostly because of the failures developed across the organization in regard to the management of the specific systems. The update of existing NHS IT systems framework in 2005 has been considered as a necessary solution in order for the above

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THE ORGANIZATION - Coursework Example In this case study, the father son duo have diametrically opposite leadership styles, wherein the father ‘Peter’ believes in an extremely friendly business environment marked by ‘Participative’ leadership, the son ‘Joseph’ is seen to portray the typical character of an ‘Autocratic’ leader. It is stated that Peter is a man of charisma and has a dynamic personality; some scholars like Rowe and Guerrero argue that charisma is a necessary condition for leadership (Rowe and Guerrero, 2011, 260). A charismatic leader can ensure that the workforce will follow in his footsteps, and consider him to be right, instead of doubting in the effectiveness of the leader. With such personality traits Peter could have chosen to be an autocratic leader who leads from the front and gives orders, such that they would be followed since the staff believes in him and is devoted and Peter trusts them. However, he chose to be a democratic leader or in other w ords, a participative leader (Appel and Schmid, 2003, 22). The name itself suggests that the characteristics of such a leader do not revolve around strictness and authoritative rule, but allows for participation and a democratic way of decision making. On the other polar side is the leadership style adapted by the ‘bright’ but not ‘brilliant’ Joseph. He is categorized as having adapted the authoritative or autocratic leadership style which is recognized as being a one man show, since the leader does not allow for participation in decision making, delegation of duties is not carried out, there is lack of trust of the leader in the staff and vice versa, thus the opposite of democratic leadership. Leadership is cited as one of the crucial reasons behind the decision of managerial staff to leave a job (Hogan, 2007, 38), thus the fact that under Peter’s leadership almost all employees have been retained by the organization for at least 10 years is a subst antial proof of his effective leadership, and that he is welcomed by his staff. When this factor is considered for Joseph’s leadership, it was observed that the employees were not happy, which can be figured out from the statement by Mr. Spike who told Joseph that he ‘just couldn’t work in this climate’, hence showing that employee turnover would be high as even the most loyal and senior manager wants to quit the job under Joseph’s leadership. Furthermore, Peter does not practice a laissez-faire leadership style or a rigid leadership style, since his delegation of duty and decision making is coupled with regular inspections of the efficiency and quality of work and the organization on the whole. He believes in motivation through praise, and thus has made it a regular practice to praise good work, and simultaneously pointing out flaws and inefficiency in any work done by the staff, but since he is so accommodating and open to his staff, it automatica lly leads to a welcoming response and the staff does not mind if he points out flaws, but on the contrary regards his comments as constructive criticism. While, on the other side, autocratic leaders such as Joseph, believe in meeting rigid targets, and do not allow for any suggestions, it is their personal style of motivation, however apart from the positive aspect of speeding up the process, it

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