Friday, May 23, 2014

What are the different views of immortality in Tuck everlasting?

The Tucks view immortality quite differently from the rest of the world because they are experiencing it. It is one thing to want to live forever, another thing entirely when it happens to you. As they watched the world around them change (not always for the better) and as they lose those individuals whom they care about (because they age and the Tuck's do not) they gained a different perspective on immortality, one which Winnie comes to understand through her own close relationship to the Tucks. We often long for things (such as everlasting life) because they have a certain allure - we think that they will make our lives better, when in reality the opposite is often the case. When you are immortal, you don't get to experience the intense array of feelings and emotions that those individuals who understand life as fleeting experience daily.This is what Winnie comes to understand through her connection to them.


Jesse, too, has a view on immortality that is colored by what he feels for Winnie. He longs to be like her, and she, at first, longs to be immportal so that she can be with him. Ultimately, what she learns from the Tucks is that life is far too valuable to throw away on immortality.


The man in the yellow suit represents capitalism - the idea that everything in life has a value, including life itself. He wishes to gain personally and monetarily through the bottling and selling of immortality. This is a recurring theme in literature and in history as well as in science - the search for the "fountain of youth." Today, we see "youth" sold in bottles - anti-aging creams, vitamins that promise to restore vitality. This is a major enterprise, and the man in yellow is representative of it.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Discuss at least two characteristics of Romanticism in John Keat's poem "Ode toa Nightingale".

The poet in Ode To A Nightingale  is an escapist .He escapes through imagination .On his way the bower of the bliss wher the nightingale is ...