Abstract
This paper discusses the book "Notes of a Desolate Man" by Zhu Tianwen and relates that the author's way of fitting in so many non-Chinese influences, past and present, his homosexuality, and the death of an old friend in Japan due to AIDS, fit together to produce a deliberately disjointed psychic environment in which the narrator can only feel thankful for small reminders of a world that seemed normal. The writer points out that throughout "Notes on a Desolate Man", the past continues to be mixed up with the present. The writer believes that this book leaves the reader with no doubt as to the narrator's emotions, sense of being displaced and that his life has been rather pointless, though one wishes the narrator could also see through this state of ennui to find the answers of purpose that were suitable for modernists.

From the Paper
"Like many a post-modern character, the narrator, Xiao Chao, can observe his own isolation, well aware of what is happening, amid Western consumerism and media influences. His friend, Ah Yao, is a former lover, a person with whom he has been able to discuss Chinese poetry but also the culture arriving from the West including 1960s avant garde films and thought. Set in the 1990s, Xiao Shao reflects on his 20s as a well to do young Taiwanese in Europe and in America just as countless other persons at mid-life tend to reflect on how they spent this earlier interval in their lives. Like Ah Yao, he had known the gay scene in New York, Paris and Rome, and also the complications of being a gay Chinese male in a conservative Taiwanese society where both men's families were known in Taipei."

Tags:homosexuality, Japan, Chinese, post-modern, change, society

Abstract
This paper contains a number of short essays on modern Chinese fiction, with the first addressing Su Tong's novel, "Escape." The second essay takes a look at "The Politics of Disappearance" and the work of Xi Xi concerning Hong Kong's culture and atmosphere. The paper continues with a longer essay which considers Zhu Tianwen's "Desolate Man." This includes wht the narrator's views mean in relation to being a middle-aged gay man of Taiwan whose friend and former lover is dying.

From the Paper
"In what at first seems a story of Chinese village life in 1953, Su Tong's "Escape' quickly shifts in ways unexpected to tell of Chen Sanmai as a man having left the narrator's aunt. (1991) Since her aunt believes that he has gone to join the Red Army in order to fight in the Korean conflict, she pursues him for a time, but heads in the wrong direction. The metaphor of the searching and angry deserted wife lets Su Tong fit in much telling detail on the People's Republic of China in the 1950s and how traditional views of events more than survived the rise of Communism. One begins to see that Su Tong is trying to impart something of the atmosphere of very..."

Tags:su tong, xi xi, zhu tianwen

Abstract
The paper discusses how the idea of the ideal man in Western society is couched in a gray set of assumptions regarding honour, vitality, and individuality. The paper relates that there is the Hank Hill example from the television series "King of the Hill", who exemplifies 20th century American family values and a Protestant work ethic, and he can be construed as the ideal man because he is the ideal citizen. However, the paper discusses how for those whose value citizen is less populist and bourgeois, a completely different kind of man serves as the ideal. For example, the paper points to Pablo Picasso, with his ferocious painting talent, his zeitgeist genius and self-made millions, who represents a more romantic conception of what an ideal 20th century man can be. The paper highligts how his notorious philandering and glamorous lifestyle--as well the impression he made upon Western culture--is at odds with Hank Hill's staid, stay-at-home decency.

Tags:ideal man, plato, wilde

Abstract
In this paper, the writer examines the "Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen," written by the National Assembly in 1789. The writer discusses that the Declaration laid out a series of basic assumptions about the natural rights of man. Further, the writer contends that Baron de Montesquieu, writing 30 years earlier, would have agreed and disagreed with some of the basic premises of the Declaration.

From the Paper
"The 'Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen' written by the deputies of the National Assembly in 1789 lays out in seventeen articles a new vision of government, in which protection of the natural rights replaced the will of the king as the justification for authority. Thirty-one years prior Baron de Montesquieu published his work 'The Spirit of the Laws' in which he attempts to explain human laws and social institutions. In many respects Montesquieu's thought foreshadowed later political projects most notably the drafting of ... "

Tags:natural rights, french revolution, 1789, Declaration of the rights of man and citizen, montesquieu

Abstract
The paper discusses the development of Bailey in Flannery O'Connor's short story, "A Good Man Is Hard to Find." The paper analyzes the character of Bailey as an apathetic man who cannot prevent the massacre of his family.

From the Paper
"In "A Good Man Is Hard to Find" Flannery O'Connor introduces a number of characters among whom an elderly grandmother and an escaped convict known as the Misfit are generally predominate. While these two characters occupy center stage in much of the narrative and dialogue, other characters such as the grandmother's son Bailey are also vital actors inthe drama that unfolds and culminates with a mass murder."

Tags:Flannery O'Connor, A Good Man Is Hard to Find, character development

Abstract
This paper discusses that the Rights of Man, France's Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen was written in 1789. The author points out that it signaled an end to royal prerogative and a beginning, at the state level, of the consideration of individual rights in France. The paper relates that, as the French Revolution ended the reign of the Bourbons and the power and prerogatives of the monarchy; freedom, liberty and equality for each citizen became the revolutionary goal of the French people.

From the Paper
"In 1789, the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen signaled an end to royal prerogative and a beginning, at the state level, of the consideration of individual rights in France. As the French Revolution ended the reign of the Bourbons and the power and prerogatives of the monarchy; freedom, liberty, and equality for each citizen became the revolutionary goal of the French people. In carefully considering the key aspects of the Declaration in the context of seventeenth and eighteenth-century political, social and/or literary thought, it is evident that one key aspect stands out above the rest--that men are born with inalienable and equal human rights."

Tags:rights, of, man

Abstract
This paper discusses the plot of the film, "Dead Man Walking":
Sister Prejean (Susan Sarandon) gets pulled into this dark world through her correspondence with Matthew Poncelet (Sean Penn), a man on death row for the horrible and brutal murder of two young teenage lovers. The author believes that the movie presents several thorough and balanced opinions on the death penalty. The paper states the movie's conclusion in Poncelet's last words: "I don't think killing is right, whether I do it, or you, or the government."

From the Paper
"One of the most common arguments for the death penalty is based on the "eye for an eye" philosophy. Certainly, the parents of the dead teenagers' grief and loss suggest that someone should pay for these crimes. Vernon Harvey, a man whose stepdaughter was murdered by one of the inmates that Sister Prejan visited, argues that the man who committed that horrible crime should have the same sort of crime committed upon him. Certainly, vignettes of the brutality of the murders committed by Poncelet also seem to bring forth a need for vengeance."

Tags:plot, correspondence, man, row, murder, lovers, opinions, government, eye-for-an-eye, inmates

Abstract
A presentation and examination of a Charlie Chaplin Film 'Modern Time' and Robert Lynd's book called "Middletown" which describe the struggle against the dehumanization of the proletarian man by machine and the Industrial age. The author finds that the industrial age, while profitable from a financial standpoint for those who were in charge, dehumanized the proletarian man as well. The machine knocked him out of the running and sent him home to explain to his family that he was no longer able to provide.

From the Paper
"The Industrial Age was one that moved mankind ahead in leaps and bounds. Within the few years of its explosion and growth the ability to use technology to speed up tasks and to get them done with precision allowed the world to concentrate on other expansions and needs. The Industrial Age was a boon to those who rode the top of the age to success, however, for many millions around the nation and the world the age actually set them back. The Industrial Age, while profitable form a financial standpoint for those who were in charge, it dehumanized the proletarian man as well. The machine knocked him out of the running and sent him home to explain to his family that he was no longer able to provide. There are two classic examples of what the Industrial Age did regarding the proletarian man. The movie by the late Charlie Chaplin called Modern Time (1956) and the book called Middletown by Robert Lynd both illustrate the ways the machine replaced the man. "

Tags:Charlie, Chaplin, Middletown, proletarian, man, machine, industrial, age, dehumanization

Abstract
Our world is dominated by fears of death - all fears ultimately end in the fear of death. Icarus could fly, Caine became invisible. "Hollow Man" is just that - a man in pursuit of that which will ultimately rob him of his soul, Caine is indeed hollow. The adventure story is by far the easiest medium to express the black and white nature of this confrontation of social fears. We are not allowed to challenge God / Nature / Society. "Hollow Man" delivers all of this in one simple film.

Tags:hollow, man, fears

Abstract
This paper explains that Linda Hogan draws on her Native American heritage as she tells a tale tinted by earthy memories of her youth in her short story "Aunt Moon's Young Man". The author points out that the plot itself is relatively simple: A dark, lean, full-blooded Indian, who comes to town on an autumn day just as the annual fair is about to begin excites the women with his exotic good looks as well as the fact that the man is "alive in his whole body." The paper relates that the cyclical character of nature brings reassurance that balance will prevail; this storyteller incorporates several cycles to represent this balance such as the story begins in the autumn and ends in the autumn - the annual fair anchors the narrative at both ends.

From the Paper
"Though Aunt Moon is obviously the central study in this story, the character of the narrator contributes to the sense of hope and renewal as well. We are told that "good Indian women" should not "learn too much from books" or "laugh too loud" or "look into the faces of men." Yet the storyteller is hopeful that she can escape such oppressive expectations. Her mother shares these great aspirations for her daughter, and college plans are made. However, with the advent of war and all the changes that it brings, the girl's education is postponed, though not ceded. She will work for a year or so in the city before returning to school, and this, too, speaks of future and hope. The cycles of nature are again invoked when the narrator's mother assures her that she's "sure as the night's going to fall" that all will work out well for her and her daughter."

Tags:plot, characters, man, eye, autumn