eBooks „tragedy“
479 eBooks were found for the search term „tragedy“.
Frank Norris
Vandover And The Brute Vol-57
- Education
- English
- 96368 Words
- Ages 18 and up
- 2
It Was Always A Matter Of Wonder To Vandover That He Was Able To Recall
So Little Of His Past Life. With The Exception Of The Most Recent Events
He Could Remember Nothing Connectedly. What He At First Imagined To Be
The Story Of His Life, On Closer Inspection Turned Out To Be But A Few
Disconnected Incidents That His Memory Had Preserved With The Greatest
Capriciousness, Absolutely Independent Of Their Importance. One Of These
Incidents Might Be A Great Sorrow, A Tragedy, A Death In His Family; And
Another, Recalled With The Same Vividness, The Same Accuracy Of Detail,
Might Be A Matter Of The Least Moment.
A Certain One Of These Wilful Fillips Of Memory Would Always Bring
Before Him A Particular Scene During The Migration Of His Family From
Boston To Their New Home In San Francisco, At A Time When Vandover Was
About Eight Years Old.
It Was In The Depot Of One Of The Larger Towns In Western New York. The
Day Had Been Hot And After The Long Ride On The Crowded Day Coach The
Cool Shadow Under The Curved Roof Of The Immense Iron Vaulted Depot
Seemed Very Pleasant. The Porter, The Brakeman And Vandover's Father
Very Carefully Lifted His Mother From The Car. She Was Lying Back On
Pillows In A Long Steamer Chair. The Three Men Let The Chair Slowly
Down, The Brakeman Went Away, But The Porter Remained, Taking Off His
Cap And Wiping His Forehead With The Back Of His Left Hand, Which In
Turn He Wiped Against The Pink Palm Of His Right. The Other Train, The
Train To Which They Were To Change, Had Not Yet Arrived. It Was Rather
Still; At The Far End Of The Depot A Locomotive, Sitting Back On Its
Motionless Drivers Like Some Huge Sphinx Crouching Along The Rails, Was
Steaming Quietly, Drawing Long Breaths. The Repair Gang In Greasy Caps
And Spotted Blue Overalls Were Inspecting The Train, Pottering About The
Trucks, Opening And Closing The Journal-Boxes, Striking Clear Notes On
The Wheels With Long-Handled Hammers. [more]
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Peter Jalesh
My Uncle Bill and his Love Everest
A romantic story
- Fiction
- English
- 117093 Words
- No Age Recommendation
- 456
- 1
The novel portrays three main characters in pursuit of their dreams. The main character is Molly, a woman that becomes a jockey and pursues her dream to win the Triple Crown derbies trophy. As the story evolves she proves to have an enormous resilience in the face of a disabling illness that affects her life and her career. What becomes predominant in Molly’s quest for glory is the tie between her and the champion horse. Their love for each other – either in good fortune or in tragedy - reaches further than their aspirations to achieve glory. The next character in line is Uncle Bill, who comes to realize one day that his life lacks a higher purpose. To make up for it he designs an ultimate adventure for himself which he calls “Project Everest”. Eventually Uncle Bill goes and climbs Mt. Everest and never returns from there. Reaching that peak becomes an end in itself. Did Uncle Bill succeed to arrive at that peak? Later on, a salvage team finds on the mountain peak Uncle Bill’s watch, hidden under a rock. What belongs to a larger than life story is that Uncle Bill’s preparation for climbing Mt. Everest becomes a vital activity at all population levels. It looks as if each life prepares itself to help Uncle Bill triumph over defiance. What Uncle Bill’s project proves to others is that conquering the impossible is a human trait that belongs to all of us, an aspiration of all of us to overcome the impossible.
The third character that gathers attention is the teen author that lives though those events and discovers what love is. The background of the story is made up of farmlands, a bunch of neighboring farms on which the principal activity is growing animals like pigs, burrows and thoroughbred studs. It is not difficult to interpret the motives interleaved by the story as being symbolic. Molly’s desire to win the Triple Crown begins with a fortunate chance and ends with another chance – an unfortunate one, an accidental chance. Uncle’s Bill’s climbing of Mt. Everest is the result of a careful planning that ends in an illusive victory. Both fates described above are metaphors. The sense implied here is that the pursuit of fame, success, and victory is beyond life. That is, happiness is doomed to failure in the quest of the impossible; also that the boundaries of what is given to us to live are finite, prone to chance and accident. [more]
Keywords: romance, adventure, characters in pursuet of ideals, individual utopia
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Muriel Vasconcellos
Finding My Invincible Summer
- Biography & Autobiography
- English
- 2198 Words
- Ages 16 and up
- 310
A prognosis of six months to live turns out to be a gift. In this memoir, Muriel Vasconcellos tells the story leading up to the news that her breast cancer has spread and takes the reader on the path that eventually leads her to health and peace of mind. Thirty years later, she has outlived the doctors who believed she was about to die.
The memoir focuses on a 20-year arc in the author's life with flashbacks to a tragedy in her childhood that left her with lifelong corrosive guilt and to a deeply painful experience as a young adult that has haunted her with remorse.
She eventually finds love and happiness when she meets her soul mate, Sylvio. Their life together is magic - a true love story. His unconditional support infuses her with confidence and self-trust. They have six happy years together - until she finds a lump in her breast and learns that she has cancer. Just when they think they have overcome this hurdle, life turns dark again: Sylvio asks her to take him to the Emergency Room, and he never comes home. As he struggles to die, he begs her to help him make his passage. The doctors agree to withdraw life support, but she cannot come to terms with the decision. Soon afterwards, she is told that cancer has spread to her bones. Unremitting pain, both physical and psychological, sends her to the depth of despair, where she seeks to end her life.
Instead, something shifts inside and she embarks on a courageous quest for health that includes not only her body but also her psyche and spirit. She releases the limiting beliefs and self-punishing thoughts that have trapped her for most of her life and discovers that all aspects of her being are a single tapestry; when one part heals, so do the others. Her pain disappears and her medical tests stabilize. New insights constantly expand her awareness and understanding. They always seem to appear at the moment she is ready.
As she continues her journey, she has her third bout with cancer. This time she has the understanding and tools to walk away from conventional treatment and practice gentle approaches to becoming and staying well. In the end, she finds deep inner joy and serenity - her invincible summer. [more]
Keywords: memoir, ebook, kindle, biography, cancer, living life to the fullest, self-help, strength and courage, the c card
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Various Various
The World's Best Orations, Vol. 1 (of 10)
- History
- English
- 170199 Words
- Ages 18 and up
- 1
- 1
The Right Hon. Sir Charles Wentworth Dilke. Bart., Member of
Parliament--Author of 'Greater Britain,' etc., London, England.
William Draper Lewis, PH. D., Dean of the Department of Law,
University Of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia.
William P. Trent, M.A., Professor of English and History, Colombia
University, in the city of New York.
W. Stuart Symington, Jr., PH. D., Professor of the Romance Languages,
Amherst College, Amherst, Mass.
Alcee Fortier, Lit.D., Professor of the Romance Languages,
Tulane University, New Orleans, La.
William Vincent Byars, Journalist, St Louis, Mo.
Richard Gottheil, PH. D., Professor of Oriental Languages,
Columbia University, in the city of New York.
Austin H. Merrill, A.M., Professor of Elocution, Vanderbilt
University, Nashville, Tenn.
Sheldon Jackson. D. D., LL. D., Bureau of Education, Washington, D. C.
A. Marshall Elliott, PH.D. LL. D., Professor of the Romance Languages,
Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Md.
John W. Million, A.M., President of Hardin College, Mexico, Mo.
J. Raymond Brackett. PH. D., Dean of the College of Liberal Arts,
and Professor of Comparative Literature, University Of
Colorado, Boulder, Colo.
W. F. Peirce. M.A., LL. D., President Of Kenyox College, Gambier,
Ohio.
S. Plantz, PH.D., D. D., President of Lawrence University,
Appleton, Wis.
George Tayloe Winston, LL.D., President of the University Of Texas,
Austin, Texas.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
VOL. I
Preface: Justice David J. Brewer
The Oratory Of Anglo-Saxon Countries: Prof. Edward A. Allen
ABELARD, PIERRE 1079-1142
The Resurrection of Lazarus
The Last Entry into Jerusalem
The Divine Tragedy
ADAMS, CHARLES FRANCIS 1807-1886
The States and the Union
ADAMS, CHARLES FRANCIS, JUNIOR 1835-
The Battle of Gettysburg
ADAMS, JOHN 1735-1826
Inaugural Address
The Boston Massacre
ADAMS, JOHN QUINCY 1767-1848
Oration at Plymouth Lafayette The
Jubilee of the Constitution
ADAMS, SAMUEL 1722-1803
American Independence
AELRED 1109-1166
A Farewell
A Sermon after Absence
On Manliness
AESCHINES 389-314 B. C.
Against Crowning Demosthenes
AIKEN, FREDERICK A. 1810-1878
Defense of Mrs. Mary E, Surratt
ALBERT THE GREAT (ALBERTUS MAGNUS) 1205-1280
The Meaning of the Crucifixion
The Blessed Dead
ALLEN, ETHAN
A Call to Arms
AMES, FISHER 1758-1808
On the British Treaty
ANSELM, SAINT 1032-1109
The Sea of Life
ARNOLD, THOMAS 1795-1842
The Realities of Life and Death
ARTHUR, CHESTER ALAN 1830-1886
Inaugural Address
ATHANASIUS 298-373
The Divinity of Christ
AUGUSTINE, SAINT 354-430
The Lord's Prayer
BACON, FRANCIS 1561-1626
Speech against Dueling
BARBOUR, JAMES 1775-1842
Treaties as Supreme Laws
BARNAVE, ANTOINE PIERRE JOSEPH MARIE 1761-1793
Representative Democracy against Majority Absolutism
Commercial Politics
BARROW, ISAAC 1630-1677
Slander
BASIL THE GREAT 329-379
On a Recreant Nan
BAXTER, RICHARD 1615-1691
Unwillingness to Improve
BAYARD. JAMES A. 1767-1815
The Federal Judiciary
Commerce and Naval Powe [more]
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Thomas Hardy
Tess of the d'Urbervilles
- Fiction
- English
- 148448 Words
- Ages 14 and up
- 318
- 2
Tess of the d'Urbervilles or just Tess, is a novel by Thomas Hardy. Though now considered an important work of English literature, the book received mixed reviews when it first appeared, in part because it challenged the sexual mores of Hardy's day. Hardy's writing often illustrates the "ache of modernism", and this theme is notable in Tess, which, as one critic noted, portrays "the energy of traditional ways and the strength of the forces that are destroying them". Hardy describes modern farm machinery with infernal imagery; also, at the dairy, he notes that the milk sent to the city must be watered down because the townspeople cannot stomach whole milk. Angel's middle-class fastidiousness makes him reject Tess, a woman whom Hardy often portrays as a sort of Wessex Eve, in harmony with the natural world. When he parts from her and goes to Brazil, the handsome young man gets so ill that he is reduced to a "mere yellow skeleton". All these instances are typically interpreted as indications of the negative consequences of man's separation from nature, both in the creation of destructive machinery and in the inability to rejoice in pure nature.
Another important theme of the novel is the sexual double standard to which Tess falls victim; despite being, in Hardy's view, a truly good woman, she is despised by society after losing her virginity before marriage. Hardy plays the role of Tess's only true friend and advocate, pointedly subtitling the book "a pure woman faithfully presented" and prefacing it with Shakespeare's words from The Two Gentlemen of Verona: "Poor wounded name! My bosom as a bed/ Shall lodge thee." However, although Hardy clearly means to criticise Victorian notions of female purity, the double standard also makes the heroine's tragedy possible, and thus serves as a mechanism of Tess's broader fate. Hardy variously hints that Tess must suffer either to atone for the misdeeds of her ancestors, or to provide temporary amusement for the gods, or because she possesses some small but lethal character flaw inherited from the ancient clan. [more]
Keywords: tess of the d ubervilles, thomas hardy, historical fiction, classic literature, english history, paganism, satire
$2.99
Jack London
The Iron Heel
- Satire
- English
- 87367 Words
- Ages 12 and up
- 258
- 2
The Iron Heel is a dystopian novel by American writer Jack London. Generally considered to be "the earliest of the modern Dystopian", it chronicles the rise of an oligarchic tyranny in the United States.
The novel is based on the (fictional) "Everhard Manuscript" written by Avis Everhard which she hid and which was subsequently found centuries later. In addition, this novel has an introduction and series of (often lengthy) footnotes written from the perspective of scholar Anthony Meredith. Meredith writes from around 2600 AD or 419 B.O.M. (the Brotherhood of Man). Jack London thus writes at two levels, often having Meredith condescendingly correcting the errors of Everhard yet, at the same time, exposing the often incomplete understanding of this distant future perspective.
Meredith's introduction also acts as a deliberate "spoiler" (the term did not yet exist at the time of writing). Before ever getting a chance to get to know Avis and Ernest, how they fell in love or how Avis became politically involved, the reader is already told that all their struggles and hopes would end in total failure and repression, and that both of them would be summarily executed. This gives all that follows the air of a foreordained tragedy. There is still left the consolation that a happy end would come for humanity as a whole – though hundreds of years too late for Avis and Ernest as individuals; the cruel oligarchy would fall, and the two will be vindicated and respected by posterity as pioneers and martyrs.
The Oligarchy are the largest monopoly trusts (or robber barons) who manage to squeeze out the middle class by bankrupting most small to mid-sized business as well as reducing all farmers to effective serfdom. This Oligarchy maintains power through a "labor caste" and the Mercenaries. Labor in essential industries like steel and rail are elevated and given decent wages, housing, and education. Indeed, the tragic turn in the novel (and Jack London's core warning to his contemporaries) is the treachery of these favored unions which break with the other unions and side with the Oligarchy. Further, a second, military caste is formed: the Mercenaries. The Mercenaries are officially the army of the US but are in fact in the employ of the Oligarchs. [more]
Keywords: the iron heel, jack london, futuristic fantasy, satire, dystopian fiction, science fiction, american literature
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Ronald Alexander Malloy
The Yonge Street Strip
- Drama
- English
- 165934 Words
- Ages 14 and up
- 525
A 40 Chapter, fast-moving drama centered within Toronto’s Downtown Core in the mid 1980’s; several years after the 1970’s Massage Parlor Era is phased out! As a consequence of mysterious deaths related to the Yonge Street Strip; its initial cause is mysterious! Initially defined as somewhat related to recent epidemics - but far more worrisome inasmuch as it evolves into a ‘Sudden-Death Syndrome’. Whatever it be its source; such symptoms appear to affect the more ‘street-wise’ generally-engaged in characteristic sub-cultural activities; perhaps even a release of ‘bad home-made drugs’?
The City Morgue soon contains several victims - many of whom are therein stored awaiting identification! Also rapidly rising so-close upon an “Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome” the medical profession - fearing another potential epidemic - so as to avoid any potential public-oriented-panic - has a need for ‘secrecy’. During an all-out Nation-wide effort to identify the source, its potential dangers are ‘prematurely-released’. Authorities concerned over the consequence of there yet being another epidemic so close upon the heels of both the Hepatitis, Herpes and Aids scares, intending only to withhold incidents until some “Cause” can be discerned - an undesired effect sets in - the Media is alerted thereby inciting a series of clandestine activities.
Within these chapters there are several dramatic sub-plots featuring acts of ‘pure vengeance’ that escalate into a sequence of murders; in which violent confrontation among various ‘Constabulary’ levels also erupts.
Weaved into this intrigue is a major RCMP Drug Enforcement ‘under-cover investigation’ entirely-independent of Metro cops and which also becomes both hindrance and help.
Several colorful characters are built into this drama involving the Metro Police; featuring Arnie Fuller - a Uniformed Officer who develops a close association with Dr. Carl Sylinski - Medical Research Specialist; both share center stage as the book’s main characters. As the plot thickens, Fuller is mostly pitted up against his arch-foes - Homicide Detectives Joseph Mancuso and Detective Bruno Ferrani; in this exchange of both personal and professional personalities, Fuller often fares 2nd best.
Long before Epidemiologist, Carl Sylinski, can arrive at a solution to the mysterious deaths - the “Yonge Street Strip” gradually-becomes “Stripped” of patrons. The disease - one that will be given a title, cause and cure before the story ends - is defined as ‘an elusive microorganism continuously present within the human population’; and which can become ‘viral’ under certain conditions; it drawing its menace to humankind from a non-human reservoir becoming a ‘microbe’ able to ‘transmigrate’ to humans”! Sylinski, assisted by dedicated researchers across the U.S. and Canada eventually discovers the source; he then defines as a “chameleon virus”! Adding a touch of substance is a taste of ‘romance and tragedy’ - mixed within a wisp of philosophy. [more]
Keywords: cultural, epidemic, intrigue, mystery, drama, romance, sub-plots, police, murder
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Marc Asanov Archibald Sr.
My Secret Love Affair With Marilyn Monroe
- Erotic
- English
- 93262 Words
- Ages 16 and up
- 463
As a teenager, Marc discovers in one of his dad's desk drawers a Playboy magazine collection. One of the issues had Marilyn Monroe on the cover. As Marc opens the issue he feels like hit by thunder seeing Marilyn Monroe's full blown nude on the centerfold spread. He convinces his dad to give him a six feet poster of Marilyn's nude as a Christmas present, much to the chagrin of his mother. That is how Marc's love and passion for Marilyn begins.. Whenever he falls in love with a girl he always find out that in some aspects she resembles Marilyn. From one of his first teenage loves, Kimberly, he seems to realize by looking at her vagina, how Marilyn’s vagina might have looked like. After high school graduation his father decides to send him to Harvard to become a psychologist and cure himself of “Marilyn fetish”. A girl, Claire is trying to win Marc’s sexual interest to no avail. Marc is telling her that he has a girlfriend. “What’s the difference between your girlfriend and me?” “Her hair is platinum blond” Mark says to which Clair retort with a profanity. Next day though she dyes her hair platinum blond. She looks now as a copy of Marilyn. Once home for the summer vacation and meets a middle age and beautiful woman, Therese, with whom he has a hot but short affair. Marc’s love for Marilyn Monroe raises to a different level. He “sees” Marilyn responding to his desire by moving her lips or her body in her poster and even exiting the poster to meet Marc’s desires. The new school year start and with it Marc finds a new lover, Amy. Both of them are planning their life together. They barely live together for three months when tragedy strikes: Marc’s dad dies of a heart attack. Marc decide to interrupt his studies and stay home with his mom. Meanwhile a TV channel broadcast news that Marilyn’s ghost was seen in Los Angeles area. Marc goes to Pasadena to interview the witnesses of the event and also goes to see the place where Marilyn “appeared”. His attempts to make her appear again fail. Taking advantage of the event Christies puts on sail some of Marilyn’s personal things. Marc succeeds to buy her dress, her bra and her earrings. Those intimate objects mean to Marc “ecstasy”. After a couple of months of mourning for his dad Marc decide to put some order in his dad’s stuff. He discovers in a drawer an invitation to a strip club. That invitation would be the source of a lifelong mess in Marc’s life. On one hand he begins recording interviews with strippers from a book On the other hand his obsessive need to be part of the strip clubs life and his sexual addiction to strippers almost destroy him. The only way he feels living is by bringing strippers home and have sex. The ambiguous color of art and sex of a strip club spread over hundred pages of “recordings”. Eventually Marc marries a stripper, Lily. “It’s like marrying his vice. Marc’s jealousy and Lily’s organic need to expose herself naked in front of a crowd of men interrupts their marriage. [more]
Keywords: love, Marilyn Monroe, fetishism, magic, sex and sexuality, stripping, transgender, sexual ambiguity
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joann harris
FEAR OF THE BEAST
A DAY OF RECKONING
- Horror
- English
- 291 Words
- Ages 18 and up
- 66
- 3
The town of Wheatfield no longer exists. Very little of the northeastern part of Fork County exists, except in the memories of those who may have once lived there and were fortunate enough to be gone when the great fireball struck, searing the land for miles. Scientists were stunned by the suddeness of the huge fireball, fir it seemed to materalized out of the heavens, traveling at such a tremendous speed, it was almost beyond calculation. "Where had it come from?" the scientists were asked by a stunned population. "From straight out of the sun," was the reply. "You could not have predicted it?"No.' Why?" The scientists hedged that question, for many of them were sworn avowed atheists. Finally, one man from an observatory in Washington who was not an unbeliever did reply, although not to the satisfaction of all of his colleagues. His reply brought laughter from more than a few of his fellow scientists.
How does one predict when the hand of God will fall, and how hard the blow will be? If indeed it had been as the scientists said, the hand of God, it had been a mighty slap from him. By the time various spies in the skies satellites, picked up on the cannoading mass of fiery destruction, it was already on top of the satellites, going through them, and burning them before they could be photographed, more than a one second shot at best, and transmit that to earth. Those pictures that did make it back to earth were immediately ordered to be seized by a presidential order.
Some said it was shaped like a Star of David. Others said it looked like an artist's conception of God's face; striking resemblance. The president told the scientists to shut their damn mouths, too, or faced the prospects of never receiving another dime of government money for anything. But many people witnessed the strange blue lights that preceded the crash of the whatever the hell it was, and they asked about those lights. But suddenly all were quiet about the mighty ball of fire, except for speculation. That soon began to fade as the news pushed the holocaust out of the headlines.
Only the insurance companies were left to ponder over the crash and dole out large sums of money to the relatives of those who had been killed. An astronomer in California thought he knew what had happened but he kept his mouth shut not out of any fear of the government, but because he felt it was the right thing to do. One investigative fellow did put some rather interesting and curious events together after a bit of prowling. But since he was a career army reservist and did not wish to spend his summer obligations to Uncle Sam cleaning up gooney bird shit on Guam , he kept his mouth shut.
"Someday, maybe he will write a book about it, and maybe by them he would believe it himself and be assured of the protection of the Dali Lama in some cave in Tibet.
What he had pieced together was that almost at the precise moment of fiery impact with earth, a series of fires leveled a huge man that was seen leaving earth, moving toward the heavens traveling at tremendous speed. No one knew what that thing was or if they did, they weren't saying, and there were some people who still remained unaccounted for after the fire at the mansion.
One of them was a young man by the name of Alex Balloon who was a minister in Wheatfield who had died under very mysterious circumstances back in "52" when another disaster had befallen the tragedy-ridden community, butt the investigative reporter wisely closed his journal on both disasters for a time.
It had been adnormally hot for this late in the season. By this time in the eastern part of Nebraska there was usually a lash of winter's approach in the air, a bit that brought color to the cheeks of pedestrains urgently but softly speaking of the harsh winter just ahead.
But the winds that blew across the plains and rolling sands hills had a torrid touch and brought a sudden surliness to the people of this sparsely populated county, turning most tempers raw and confusing a few as to why. The man knew why.
The few would learn too late. And out in the badlands some miles from Wheatfield , inside a fenced-in area where horror sprang to life back in the late 50's something stirred. A creature cautiously stuck its head out of the hidden cave and looked around, viewing its surrounding through evil, red eyes. The beast had felt the hot fingers of the wind pushing through the cave entrance as a probing hand might do, signaling those which serve another master that it was time.
The Dark One was near. The wind grew in strength and heat the beast snarling in reply. The manlike creature rose from its sentry position to crawl out of the filthy hole, rising to stand like human bits of dust and twigs and blowing sand striking its hairy body.
But to the beast it was a signal of love, a gesture of welcome. The beast roared its breath foul. It held its contempt for that God who occupies a more lofty position than the master of the beast.
For the creature knew but one god: the Prince of Darkness, the Lord of the Flies, Ruler of all that is Evil.
From behind the sentry came a guttural sound as other beasts rose from their long sleep, surly and hungry . They craved meat and the sweet taste of blood, but the sentry again tested the wind as the wind spoke its reply.
The sentry held up one warning paw to those below, holding them at bay. He growled and the others drew back into the darkness of the evil smelling hole in the earth. They knew they must obey the master. Thee growling sentry told them to wait the master will tell us when we may move. Be patient for you have waited more than twenty years. Wait." [more]
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