Greasy Lake by T. C. Boyle Essays

Greasy Lake by T. C. Boyle Essays Greasy Lake by T. C. Boyle Essay Greasy Lake by T. C. Boyle Essay Essay Topic: Easy In the coming of age, young adults and adolescents experience with numerous positive and negative things, in doing so they gain hands-on life experience and knowledge of important life lessons that shape and mold them into the adults they become in the future. many if not all young people coming into the age of majority explore different things in life and want to step out of the traditional societal norm during this phase they may indulge in drugs alcohol and many other mischievous activities for in doing so they learn from their mistakes and grow into better mature adults. in the short story greasy lake by author t.c. boyle the above statements can be shown indefinitely. the story follows the adventure of three boys and their one night of juvenile exploration into the greasy lake, the characters are intent on proving that they are bad and in the process they have a most unfortunate chain of events, which lead them to change their ways and hopefully take a different path in life. th roughout the story the young men boast on how bad they are and the main character gives us some details about the other boys badness but they soon learn that they are not cut out for that bad lifestyle in the first passage of the story the main characters elaborately recalls his adolescents and how him and his friends at the time were dangerous characters reminiscing on a time when it was good to be bad The protagonist, who remains unnamed throughout the story, and his two friends, try to reciprocate what a typical â€Å"bad boy† is and what they would typically do.T.C. Boyle states â€Å"watch a girl take off her clothes and plunge into the festering murk, drink beer, smoke pot, howl at the stars, savor the incongruous full-throated roar of rock and roll against the primeval susurrus of frogs and crickets. This was nature.†As if this is what felt natural to them.Hunting down this kind of fun.Seeing that all of these words are used in the past ten :

Platos Apology

Platos Apology Platos  Apology  is one of the most famous and admired texts in world literature.  It offers what many scholars believe is a fairly  reliable account of what the Athenian philosopher Socrates (469 BCE - 399 BCE) said in court on the day that he was tried and condemned to death on charges of impiety and corrupting the youth. Although short, it offers an unforgettable  portrait of Socrates, who comes across as smart, ironic, proud, humble, self-assured, and fearless in the face of death.  It offers not just a defense of Socrates the man but also a defense of the philosophical life, which is one reason it has always been popular with philosophers! The text and the title The work was written by Plato  who was present at the trial.  At the time he was 28 years old and a great admirer of Socrates, so the portrait and the speech may be embellished to cast both in a good light.  Even so, some of what Socrates detractors called his arrogance comes through. The  Apology  is most definitely not an apology: the Greek word apologia really means defense. Background: Why was Socrates put on trial? This is a little complicated.  The trial took place in Athens in 399 BCE.  Socrates was not prosecuted by the statethat is, by the city of Athens, but by three individuals, Anytus, Meletus, and Lycon.  He faced two charges: 1) corrupting the youth 2) impiety or irreligion.   But as Socrates himself says, behind his new accusers there are old accusers. Part of what he means is this.  In 404 BCE, just five years earlier, Athens had been defeated by its rival city state Sparta after a long and devastating conflict known ever since as the Peloponnesian War. Although he fought bravely for Athens during the war, Socrates was closely associated with characters like Alcibiades who some blamed for Athens ultimate defeat.   Worse still, for a short time after the war, Athens was ruled by a bloodthirsty and oppressive group put in place by Sparta, the thirty tyrants as they were called.  And Socrates had at one time been friendly with some of them.  When the thirty tyrants were overthrown in 403 BCE and  democracy was restored in Athens, it was agreed that no-one should be prosecuted for things done during the war or during the reign of the tyrants. Because of this general amnesty, the charges against Socrates were left rather vague.  But everyone in court that day would have understood what lay behind them. Socrates formal refutation of the charges against him In the first part of his speech Socrates shows that the charges against him dont make much sense. Meletus in effect claims that Socrates both  believes in no gods and that he believes in false gods.  Anyway, the supposedly impious beliefs he is accused of holdinge.g. that the sun is a stoneare old hat; the philosopher Anaxagoras makes this claim in a book that anyone can buy in the market place.  As for corrupting the youth, Socrates argues that no-one would do this knowingly.  To corrupt someone is to make them a worse person, which would also make them a worse friend to have around. Why would he want to do that? Socrates real defense: a defense of the philosophical life The heart of the Apology  is Socrates account of the way he has lived his life.  He recounts how his friend Chaerephon once asked the Delphic Oracle if anyone was wiser than Socrates.  The Oracle said that no -one was.  On hearing this Socrates claims to have been astounded, since he was acutely aware of his own ignorance.  He set about trying to prove the Oracle wrong by interrogating his fellow Athenians, searching for someone who was genuinely wise.  But he kept coming up against the same problem.  People might be quite expert about some particular thing such as military strategy, or boatbuilding; but they always thought themselves expert on many other things, particularly on deep moral and political questions.  And Socrates, in the course of questioning them, would reveal that on these matters they didnt know what they were talking about. Naturally, this made Socrates unpopular with those whose ignorance he  exposed.  It also gave him the reputation (unjustly, he says) of being a sophist, someone who was good at winning arguments through verbal quibbling.  But he stuck to his mission throughout his life.  He was never interested in making money; not did he enter politics.  He was happy to live in poverty and spend  his time discussing moral and philosophical questions with anyone who was willing to converse with him. Socrates then does something rather unusual. Many men in his position would conclude their speech by appealing to the jurys compassion, pointing out that they have young children, and pleading for mercy.  Socrates does the opposite.  He more or less harangues the jury and everyone else present to reform their lives, to stop caring so much about money, status, and reputation,  and start caring more about the moral quality of heir souls. Far from being guilty of any crime, he argues, he is actually gods gift to the city, for which they should be grateful.  In  a famous image he likens himself to a gadfly that by stinging the neck of a horse keeps it from being sluggish. This is what he does for Athens: he keeps people from becoming intellectually lazy and forces them to be self-critical. The Verdict The jury of 501 Athenian citizens proceed to find Socrates guilty by a vote of 281 to 220.  The system required the prosecution to propose a penalty and the defense to propose an alternative penalty.  Socrates accusers propose death.  They probably expected Socrates to propose exile, and the jury would probably have gone along with this.  But Socrates wont play the game.  His first proposal is that, since hes an asset to the city, he should  receive free meals at the prytaneum, an honor usually given to Olympic athletes.  This outrageous suggestion probably sealed his fate. But Socrates is defiant. He rejects the idea of exile.  He even rejects the idea of staying in Athens and keeping his mouth shut. He cant stop doing philosophy, he says, because the unexamined life is not worth living. Perhaps in response to the urgings of his friends, Socrates eventually proposes a fine, but the damage was done. By a larger margin, the jury voted for the death penalty. Socrates is not surprised by the verdict, nor is he phased by it.  Hes seventy years old and will die soon anyway. Death, he says, is either an endless dreamless sleep, which is nothing to fear, or it leads to an afterlife where, he imagines, he will be able to carry on philosophizing. A few weeks later Socrates died by drinking hemlock, surrounded by his friends.  His last moments are beautifully related by Plato in the  Ã‚  Phaedo.