The Beatles and the Paul McCartney Hoax :: Research Papers Paul mcCartney Essays

I read the news today, oh boy, about a lucky man who made the grade...he blew his mind out in a car. He didn't notice that the lights had changed.(the Beatles, 1967) These lyrics proved to fans that Paul McCartney had indeed died in a tragic auto accident in late 1966. Some people were skeptical about the explanation, but upon investigating the album covers and the lyrics of the Beatles' songs, the story seems to make sense. Some of the lyrics have to be a twisted in order to make sense in the prank, but after an explanation, the clues are perfectly coherent. For thirty-one years, the "Paul Death Hoax" has intrigued a horde of Beatles' fans and fanatics alike. While it's difficult to point to an absolute point of origination, there is no evidence whatsoever that the Beatles themselves had anything to do with the story, although many claim that the Beatles intended it to be a joke the their fans. However, clues, which seem so cleverly arranged, are random coincidences or inaccurate interpretations of existing facts, and all Beatles have denied that they were in any way involved with the deceit. This leads people to believe that maybe Paul did die in that alleged accident. In the late summer 1969, the Northern Illinois University campus newspaper, Northern Star, obtained a list of clues from a student who wrote a research paper on the hoax. (Saki) Russell Gibb, a disc jockey for the Detroit radio station, WNKR, then got a copy of it from a friend of his, and on his radio show, proceeded to read them and even make up his own on the spot. Within a few days, Gibb and his coworkers were astonished to see that newspapers and reporters took his on-air joke too seriously and spread the story more widely. (Saki) More clues came about when Fred Labour, arts reviewer of the University of Michigan's student newspaper, The Michigan Daily, was asked to review "Abbey Road." He had listened to Gibb's radio show a few days before this, and was inspired to write his own article, based on "clues" from Gibb and making up his own. The newspaper published the article under the title, "McCartney Dead; New Evidence Brought to Light." (Saki) Labour and the editor,! J. Gray, assumed that everyone knew it was a joke. The rest of the world took it seriously, and soon Labour was swamped with phone calls from media who wanted more information about his findings.

How does the author make Lennie a sympathetic character? Essay

In â€Å"Of Mice and Men† John Steinback makes Lennie a sympathetic character by his description of his character as well as his physical appearance. Lennie is also revealed by the author through the other charactersà ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½ perceptions of him and how Lennie interacts with them. Lennie’s attitude and actions are not the same towards all the characters in the story. He gets along well with some of the characters in the story and with some he doesn’t. The first impression the reader gets of Lennie is ironically his size. He is described as â€Å"opposite† to George with â€Å"†¦a huge man, shapeless of face, with large, pale eyes, with wide sloping shoulders and he walked heavily†. But we are contradicted in this. John Stienbeck uses descriptions of animals to describe Lennie. When he drinks water from the pool his action is described as â€Å"snorting into the water like a horse†. When he moves and walks he is described as a â€Å"bear† when it drags its paws. He is described by John Steinbeck as a very simple character who has the innocence of a small boy who doesn’t know how much harm he is doing to the rat or in Lennie’s case to Curley’s wife. When Lennie and George are on their way to the ranch, Lennie shows his innocence when he says â€Å"I won’t get in no trouble, George. I ain’t gonna say a word†. After he kills the mouse, he says â€Å"I wasn’t doin anything wrong with it, George. Jus’ strokin’ it.† From the first part of the story when the autor gives us the physical description of Lennie, we see Lennie is a gentle giant whose strength is way far out ways his brain. Although Lennie is described as being immensely strong and physically big, his actions reveal a gentle, friendly person underneath. He has a very soft character because whenever Lennie makes George angry, he gets upset like a small child. Steinbeck describes his actions as those of a â€Å"a terrier†, he says this when he refuses to bring the mouse to George, he is like a â€Å"a terrier who doesn’t want to bring a ball back to its master†. He is also described as â€Å"a bull† and like â€Å"a sheep†. â€Å"Lennie covered his face with his paws and bleated with terror†. Another example of when he acts like an animal is when he â€Å"growls back to his seat†. When we read that he is cuddling the pup, it tells us how much me loves animals and when he kills it he doesn’t kill the animal on purpose because he doesn’t know how strong he is, When he doesn’t know his own strength â€Å"I was only petting it. Another occasion is when Lennie crushes Curley’s hand and then later on he says, â€Å"I didn’t wanta hurt him†. At one point he acts like a child who gets attracted to things he likes, for example- the pup and Curley’s wife’s hair when she asks him to move his hand over it. When he likes something, he sticks to it and doesn’t leave it because he doesn’t know how much harm he is doing to it. So, Lennie is a friendly person who doesn’t understand how strong he is or the consequences of his strength. Therefore, Lennie is described as a simple person who has low intelligence but also a very strong person. Another consequense of his simplicity is that he depends on George to help and guide him over small things. He needs George to take care of his work permit. Lennie cannot differentiate between things which are right and wrong and needs George to help him with that. For example, Lennie doesn’t realise that Curley’s wife is a seductive woman and he often speaks to her. But he stops speaking to her after George tells him that â€Å"Don’t you even take a look at that bitch. I don’t care what she says and what she does†¦.but I never seen no piece of jailbait worse tan her.† He makes him understand that and tells him not to speak to her. He makes him realise that she isn’t the right type of woman to talk to. Another consequence is when Lennie is drinking water from the pool and is told off by George to not to drink from it. He says because â€Å"its scummy†. He treats him like a child and needs to be told every moment to what to do and what not to do like when he drinks the water from the pool, George tells him â€Å"You gonna be sick like you was last night†. This tells us how much care George has for him because if Lennie falls sick and if he dies, then there wouldn’t be anyone for George to be with as during the Great Depression, the ranchers used to be alone without any friends. George didn’t want that to happen. Due to Lennie’s lack of intelligence the other farm hands treat him differently and sometimes, Curley’s case, crudly. He doesn’t get along very well with all the members of the farm, for example with Curley and his wife. Curley hated him from the first time because â€Å"He hates big guys†. When Lennie crushes Curley’s hand, we are pleased that, in Lennie’s grasp â€Å"Curley was flopping like a fish on a line,† but Steinbeck does not write fairy tales where good triumphs and evil is punished. In the cruel reality of life,it is Lennie who will be destroyed and Curley who will continue to torment anyone who threatens his ego. The same thing is also with Curley’s wife because he wants to obey to what George told and he tells her â€Å"I ain’t supposed to talk to you†. Slim describes him â€Å"Lennie’s jes’ like a kid. There ain’t no more harm in him than a kid neither, except he is so strongâ₠¬ . This tells us that he is as harmless as a child and he can be harmful when it comes to situations where he cannot survive in a world of cruelty, selfishness and contempt. Throught the story, he is described as a sympathetic person in loving terms. When he says â€Å"he’s a nice fella. Guy don’t need no sense to be a nice fella†,it tells us that he enjoys the company of Lennie and he gets along well with him. He treats him and listens to him like a kid. Lennie always wants to be with someone. For example when George leaves him and goes to the bar, he cannot be by himself. The only person whom he knows who doesn’t go out is Crook because he is regarded as a â€Å"nigger† by the farm hands. The people in the farm regard him as that all black men are â€Å"crooks†. He is different from the other farm hands because the farm members treat him as an outcast as he is â€Å"black†. Therefore, from what I have read and analysed I can say that George stands as a father for Lennie as he takes care of him, serves him food, tells him the difference between right and wrong. As a consequence of all these factors, the final scene is heart breaking for the reader when George shoots Lennie. He himself chooses to shoot Lennie because a father would rather shoot his son himself rather than let anyone else shoot him. He tells Lennie to go over and tell him about the dream while he aims the gun behind him to shoot him. This is a very sad and controversial scene because Lennie is dreaming about having his own farm where he can tend his favorite animals like the rabbits, rats, etc whereas George goes through a very bad moment in which he has to shoot his best mate. Lennie himself doesn’t know that his best friend is going to shoot him.

Germaine Greer Essay

GERMAIN GREER HAD NO FEAR In the early 1970s, a woman’s role in society was still set by male expectations. While women were expected to work and be educated, it was considered more important that they marry and become housewives. Women were also paid less than men for the same work, and denied many opportunities because they were women. In 1970, Australian-born author Germaine Greer wrote The Female Eunuch, a book that challenged a woman’s traditional role in society, and provided an important framework for the feminist movement of the 1970s. The Female Eunuch called on women to reject their traditional roles in the home, and explore ways to break out of the mould that society had imposed on them. It also encouraged women to question the power of traditional authority figures – such as doctors, psychiatrists, priests and the police – who at the time were not used to being questioned, and to explore their own sexuality: Women have somehow been [†¦] cut off from their capacity for action. It’s a process that sacrifices vigour for delicacy and succulence, and one that’s got to be changed. – Germaine Greer, New York Times, 22 March 1971 Source There had been other books published on Women’s Liberation – most famously Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex and Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique – but Greer’s book was written with a naughty sense of humour and a directness that the others lacked. This witty honesty made the book accessible to a very wide readership, and was perhaps the reason for the book’s enormous success. Greer hoped that her book would inspire women to see themselves as powerful when it came to their own roles and sexuality. In many ways she was successful. The Female Eunuchcertainly did push the Women’s Liberation Movement forward, and it became one of the world’s most influential books on the subject. QUOTES BY GERMAINE HERSELF * ‘’The house wife is an unpaid employee in her husband’s house in return for the security of being a permanent employee’’. * ‘’Yet if a woman never lets herself go, how will she ever know how far she might have got? If she never takes off her high-heeled shoes, how will she ever know how far she could walk or how fast she could run?’’ * ‘’ If a person loves only one other person, and is indifferent to his fellow men, his love is not love but a symbiotic attachment, or an enlarged egotism.’’ * ‘’ All societies on the verge of death are masculine. A society can survive with only one man; no society will survive a shortage of women.’’ By SHANNON JONES