"A Soldier’s Home" by Ernest Hemingway

“So his mother prayed for him and then they stood up and Krebs kissed his mother and went out of the house. He had tried so to keep his life from being complicated. Still, none of it had touched him. He had felt sorry for his mother and she had made him lie. He would go to Kansas City and get a job and she would feel all right about it. There would be one more scene maybe before he got away.”

So many times we are forced to overcome the consequences of mental and emotional burden after we have dealt with impacting and shattering moments in our lives. A Soldier’s Home is a look into a returning soldier from World War I who is in a state of severe emotional distort. It is obvious to him and his family that he is struggling with finding peace and compromise within himself as he puts up barricades to hide the fact that he can’t move on from the damage the war had done him. It is in the recovering phase that we lose ourselves the most. However, eventually we end up having to find our identity, no matter how much resistance we put forth.

"Son" by John Updike

"I love touching him, but I don’t dare.


"He feels the boy with his talent, should be more aggressive”

The strategies of parenting naturally change over time, but all fathers of all generations have the same thing in common when it comes to their relationships with their sons, all want a compromise and an understanding to exist between them. Maintaining a stable relationship and remaining on good terms with a parent and child is an obstacle and Updike shows all the aspects that many fathers and sons have most likely seen in their lifetimes. A son may feel antagonized by a well-meaning father, while a father may feel more and more disconnected when his intentions aren’t fulfilled, and their relativity goes astray. Either way, it is shown that both son and father hold imperfections in the way their thoughts are interacted, but ultimately the most wanted goal between the two is a happy medium.

"Nature" by Ralph Waldo Emerson

“The sun illuminates only the eye of the man, but shines into the eye and the heart of the child. The lover of nature is he whose inward and outward senses are still truly adjusted to each other; who has retained the spirit of infancy even into the era of manhood. His intercourse with heaven and earth becomes part of his daily food. In the presence of nature, a wild delight runs through the man, in spite of real sorrows.”


Discovering yourself for many can mean venturing out in the outside nature to truly get away and have your personal time to analyze who you are and what meaning you can hold. Emerson describes in nature that a genuine and real impacting time of self-discovery can occur in nature, because of its innocent surroundings, and its unaffecting youthfulness that one achieves when being in a state of solitude. So often, as we age we take for granted the small and natural essences of life that we once so much appreciated before. So eventually as time progresses, nature to only a few, or perhaps even those who allow themselves to accept a moment of separation from the materialistic dilemmas they have, can really see and appreciate rare experiences nature can offer.

"Winter Dreams" by F. Scott Fitzgerald

“At a little after seven Judy Jones came down-stairs. She wore a blue silk afternoon dress, and he was disappointed at first that she had not put on something more elaborate. This feeling was accentuated when, after a brief greeting, she went to the door of a butler's pantry and pushing it open called: "You can serve dinner, Martha." He had rather expected that a butler would announce dinner, that there would be a cocktail. Then he put these thoughts behind him as they sat down side by side on a lounge and looked at each other.”

Being overly ambitious with your goals will always lead you to disappointment and a bitter ending. Many will admire Fitzgerald’s style because it all revolves around one theme, the obtaining of the American dream. The main character, Dexter sees the only to solution to his unhappy life through one woman, Judy Jones. His dreams involve her as the perfect and angelic wife, with an established name, a lavish lifestyle, and the envy of the many men that had Judy once before. As Judy is the epitome of promise and vitality, her imperfections eventually reveal. Dexter however does not marry her, which in the long run is more beneficial than if he decided to engage in a commitment with her. It is really a lesson than you shouldn’t be so discontent with life because if a person can only be happy when all their visions and greedy goals can be attained, and then life will just continue to remain a pure fantasy instead of a crisp reality

"Hills Like White Elephants" by Ernest Hemingway

'And you think then we'll be all right and be happy.'
'I know we will. Yon don't have to be afraid. I've known lots of people that have done it.'
'So have I,' said the girl. 'And afterwards they were all so happy.'
'Well,' the man said, 'if you don't want to you don't have to. I wouldn't have you do it if you didn't want to. But I know it's perfectly simple.'

The subject of abortion lays sensitive upon many couples. For some it’s a way out and a solution that can be grasped in a quick agreement. Hemingway’s story is in itself is a lesson of how the push and pull between a serious matter that can sometimes be a never-ending decision that leads to ultimate sacrifice. The couple Hemingway describes is torn on whether they should carry on with abortion while waiting at a train station in Barcelona. As the woman looks around, the scenery captures her. Hills that look like white elephants emphasize the purity and lost innocence of a baby, while many other surrounding elements represent the couple’s situation. Mostly, the man is for the idea of abortion and convinces her that abortion is a good plan that will help in their future. The waiting of the train does eventually come to an end which foreshadows the decision the two must make now and never look back on. Sadly, like most things in life, the two do not come to a resolution.

William Faulkner, Banquet Speech 1950

“Our tragedy today is a general and universal physical fear so long sustained by now that we can even bear it. There are no longer problems of the spirit. There is only the question: When will I be blown up? Because of this, the young man or woman writing today has forgotten the problems of the human heart in conflict with itself which alone can make good writing because only that is worth writing about, worth the agony and the sweat.”

As Faulkner accepted his Nobel Prize in Literature in 1950, he made it clear that present writing was in a predicament. Writing by now had drifted away from internal feelings and issues concerning personal conflict. Instead writers focused on modern quandaries and harsh realities that were occurring in their era. True literature for a while for Faulkner had been lost and disoriented from the writing that once pertained to the problems of the human heart and spirit. Deep issues were in fact being avoided during the transition of classic literature into contemporary view. While the fear of retrogressing back to classic literature occupied writers in that time, Faulkner stressed the importance of relearning the old tools of good writing which are, exploring into human conflict.

“The Strenuous Life” by Theodore Roosevelt

“A life of slothful ease, a life of that peace which springs merely from lack either of desire or of power to strive after great things, is as little worthy of a nation as of an individual. I ask only that what every self-respecting American demands from himself and from his sons shall be demanded of the American nation as a whole.”


America is a nation of ideals that constantly tries to perfect its society by striving for excellence among its peoples. In his speech Roosevelt stresses the significance of embracing effort while working to benefit the nation and take responsibility of the conflict America faces. The strenuous life, of which he describes, is reality with all its obstacles and hindrance that we have to be prepared to overcome with great toil in order to obtain victory. Roosevelt had one message to convey to his citizens and that was for America to be a healthy nation, people had to defeat difficulties and not avoid them and let past mistakes improve present strategy to achieve success. Unlike how many values are today, Roosevelt people needed to embody not the life of ease, but effort to be accomplished.