An analysis of “The Flea” by John Donne

An analysis of â€Å"The Flea† by John Donne Close Reading This close reading, is an analysis of â€Å"The Flea† by John Donne. â€Å"The Flea† is a love sonnet that uses a flea as a reason for the writer and the woman to get together. The flea is the main image of the poem, through which all of the metaphors and puns are woven around. When it comes down to it, the poem is about trying to get the woman in the poem into bed. The writer never comes out and just says that he wants to have sex with the woman, but that is exactly what a marriage bed is for. He does not want to scare her off with the blunt truth that having sex with him would be a terrible mistake. This close reading will demonstrate all of this and more by going through the poem line by line looking deeply into what each line is saying and how it is demonstrating it. In the first stanza, Donne uses extended metaphors to get his point across about the flea. The first stanza speaks of how the writer and the woman become one after being bitten by the flea. This stanza begins with â€Å"Mark but this flea, and mark in this,† which directs the attention of the woman towards the flea. He uses an apostrophe by speaking to a person outside the poem who cannot respond. â€Å"How little that which thou deniest me is,† she denies his sexual advances which means little to her. â€Å"It sucked me first, and now sucks thee, And in this flea, our two bloods mingled be,† the flea bites them both causing their blood to mix together inside the flea. Blood is used both literally and figuratively throughout the poem, which makes it a pun. Literally, that flea really does contain two peoples blood. Metaphorically, when two people procreate we call it mixing fluids, and the writer plays with this double meaning. The mixing of the blood cannot be a sin, or shame, or lose of virginity therefore; neither should it be for their other bodily to mix together, â€Å"A sin, nor shame, nor loss of maidenhead.† â€Å"Yet this enjoys before it woo,† the pleasure of the flea is a pun. The flea literally enjoys her blood, however to the writer, it also enjoys her in the erotic way like he wants to. â€Å"And pampered swells with one blood made of two,† the flea is lucky to be filled with their blood. This flea becomes larger in size with blood from both subjects. The flea has joined them together already by mixing their blood together which is more than he is asking of the woman, â€Å"And this, alas, is more than we would do.† The writer expresses shame and sadness for this flea. He speaks of the flea like it has sinned in its blood sucking ways which is more than he is asking the woman to do so they should just have sex. The act of the biting flea happens prior to seduction; it accents the completion of gratification prior to the procreative stimulation indicated by woo, pampered,† and â€Å"swells. Hence, the poem changes its gesture of passion and focuses on the sexual pleasure, following a notable order; solicitation, swelling, copulation, then fulfillment. The flea, particularly enjoys the pleasure of sucking both male and female bodies. As a result of, the outburst alas, the writer regretfully indicates the flea can do more than he can do. In the second stanza, the writer asks his woman, â€Å"Oh stay, three lives in one flea spare,† as the woman moves in to kill the flea, he asks her to halt from the killing. The writer explains to the woman if she would please reserve the three lives which are now mixed within in the flea. The writer may be concluding that the three lives within the flea represent a father, mother, and baby. He constructs another analogy in this line, â€Å"Where we almost, yea more than married are.† In this he argues, their blood is mixed within the flea therefore they are no more than married. â€Å"This flea is you and I,† the flea has both of their blood inside it. â€Å"Our marriage bed, and marriage temple,† the flea is their sex and religion. Also, their supposed marriage is an extended metaphor which stems from the pun on two kinds of blood: literal blood and family relations. Mixing of bloodlines is what happens when you get married. The writer confesses â€Å"Though parents grudge, and you, w’are met.† In spite of the fact that their parents object is not a reason for them not to have sex. He is suggesting that even though they cannot be in a romantic relationship, it should not affect her decision not to make love, â€Å"And cloistered in these living walls of jet.† Although their parents protest with resentment towards their romance, and she will not make love to him, contained within the flea is a place of religious solitude, where they are united as one. The writer extends the metaphor further by saying neither of their parents would approve of the union. The flea is compared to a church or cloister with black walls, in which the marriage ceremony takes place. Donne writes, â€Å"Though use make you apt to kill me,† even though you are almost certainly going to kill me. â€Å"Let not to that, self-murder added be,† he requests that she not kill the flea because she would be killing herself, the flea, and him. â€Å"And sacrilege, three sin in killing three,† and by killing the writer, the flea, and herself, she will commit three sins of theft and perverting what is sanctified. Since the flea is a temple of religion, should she kill this flea? Returning to the metaphor, the flea contains their lives, the writer alleges her of trying to commit a deadly sin by killing the flea. She would be killing him and committing suicide herself. Furthermore, she would defile the institution of marriage, by killing the marriage temple. In the final stanza, â€Å"Cruel and sudden, hast thou since, the writer calls the woman sadistic and rash in her actions to kill the flea without thinking. The regard to the woman as cruel means she is likely to take pleasure in the flea’s pain. The writer has redefined the flea. The flea has become a depiction of his own pain which he has endured because of her prohibition of sex. Through her prohibition she has been lacking of affection or sympathy. Alike the flea, she has behaved towards him lacking pause in denying him the gratifications of sex. The writer speaks to the woman through rhetorical questions, â€Å"Purpled thy nail, in blood of innocence,† has she sinned by spilling the blood of the innocent? Has she damned herself to hell by persecuting the flea? Oh, no! She kills the flea, but the magnificent rhetoric about the blood of innocence compares with the insignificance of a dot of blood on her fingernail. â€Å"Wherein could this flea guilty be, except in that drop which it sucked from thee?† What could the flea have done so badly, except sucking a little drop of blood from them? â€Å"Yet thou triumph’st and sayst that thou/ Find’st not thy self, nor me the weaker now. The woman retaliates, celebrating her success in killing the flea, makes neither him, nor her any less noble. The writer responds, â€Å"Tis true, then learn how false, fears be;† it is true, and learn how false your fears are. False fears is an example of alliteration which highlights her concern about the losing her innocence. The writer closes with, â€Å"Just so much honor, when you yield’st to me. Will waste, as this flea’s death took life from thee.† When she surrenders to him, she will lose no more integrity than when she killed the flea. Yieldst is a small pun. The writer wants the woman to yield to his twisted rationality of his argument. He also wants her to yield to him sexually. He also uses a simile which associates the conservation of her own life when the flea dies to the conservation of her honor after she gives him what he wants. .

Leadership Development in South Riding Council

Leadership Development In South Riding Council Leadership skills development is often a neglected area in local councils across the I-J. South Riding Council has sought to address this issue through establishing its own local leadership institute. The council, like all other local authorities, is facing the challenge of developing the leaders of tomorrow within a turbulent operating environment.The recruitment and retention of key staff is not easy in an area hit by a long-term decline in the local economy, following the decline In traditional and manufacturing Industries Like coal mining, ship building and steel making. The quality and performance of leadership within the council was highlighted in the findings of several external audits covering education provision and overall council performance against key indicators. These audits, conducted within a three year period in the mid asses, concluded that the council was lacking in strategic direction.At the end of the decade a simila r message was being repeated by Audit Commission inspectors during the first statutory comprehensive performance assessment (CPA). The resultant Impact on the organization cannot be overstated – staff morale plummeted and turnover increased with the loss of organizational knowledge being a major outcome. Internal staff surveys indicated that the lack of strategic leadership was felt acutely by council staff as well as being identified by external bodies.Human Resource Development in general was considered weak with staff reporting a lack of direction In career management and poor professional development provision. Deputy Chief Executive Kevin Harper commented that: our changing environment aught us out – we were reacting to uncontrollable circumstances. This highlighted a weakness generally in strategic leadership across the council. We need to retain key staff and improve our talent management programmers. We can ‘ t Just rely on staff replacement to keep the c ouncil running so we need to think about staff development and growing our own. Central to this vision was improving leadership and management skills. A new HER strategy was launched in 2009 with leadership Improvement Its key component. The strategy committed South Ruling Council to establishing an organization wide framework to develop leadership skills at political and senior managerial levels' . More recently, the council has invested time and money in shorter-term projects to enhance desired leadership skills. The latest initiative has been the creation off leadership institute. The Leadership Institute (Al) was launched in 2010 in conjunction with a local higher education provider.It ‘s focus Is on Improving management and leadership skills throughout the organization to lad succession planning. Commenting on the Al Initiative Harper said: There Is always plenty of hidden talent in a local council. People may be doing amazing things outside work, but because they are not properly engaged at work their potential is not fully realized. The Al has established a one year learning programmer based on current issues in local government leadership. The programmer includes a range of teaching and learning methods from ‘master classes' on topics such as sessions on staff engagement and organizational commitment.The programmer also involves one-to-one mentoring, group coaching and individual action learning work. The L', although a recent development, has seen promising early returns on the investment of time and money. Sickness and absence levels are falling and levels of satisfaction in leadership are rising. The clearest indication of improvement can be seen in the most recent statutory performance assessment results. The council is now rated as four-star, excellent and improving strongly in the process, rather than a fair' rating in the 2006.Harper comments: ‘The Council still has some way to go and we are not complacent but initial signs are encouraging. Leaders now feel supported ND more confident in their capacity to make decisions and staff know they are being listened to. The leadership institute will continue to help with this development. ‘ Peter Rickrack, the council's innovation manager – a rank Just below head of service level – is part of the council's leadership institute. He has seen an immediate impact on his practice and adds: ‘It is a fantastic chance for people to learn about their own leadership style and how they can develop this.No-one on the programmer is expecting promotion Just because we are on this, but we know it will help us make he most of our talents and careers. ‘ Keith Harper has overseen the Al from its inception and works closely with the council's organizational development team. The Al has cost approximately in its first year but the savings alone in staff absence reduction mean that the Al will break even financially. Harper knows however that the major challenge will be overcoming the traditional organizational culture and bringing on staff who may not easily identify themselves with a leadership role.The Al is partly aimed at unlocking hidden potential, but most of the antedates have so far come from senior positions. He said: ‘We were hoping to get people from all levels and it is something we will be looking to do more in the future†¦ We know there are a lot of talented people out there who are still not being reached. Please consider the following: 1. Outline and discuss how the South Riding Council approach to leadership development maps on to the major trends in leadership development. 2. Critically analyses the potential benefits and drawbacks of this leadership development approach for the Council.

The Tracker

– Code’s and conventions essay The tracker (sic) is an Australian art house film that represents Australia’s history through the stereotypical associations of the 5 men: the tracker, The Fanatic, The Veteran, The Follower and The Fugitive. Rolf DeHeer’s film uses a broad range of feature film conventions, which help represent the Indigenous culture, in both a negative and positive lines of light. Traditional values of Indigenous culture dictate the culture as both un-knowledge and uncivilised with no right to power. While the colonist culture was viewed as a civilised society, which could control the actions of others, but as times progressed the Indigenous culture was given more right to power and is now viewed as an equal to the European society by the minority of the country. Indigenous Australians were highly regarded to as the lower class citizens of Australia’s settlement, because their values and views were different to the Europeans as they could not read and write in English, but through time many aspects of the culture have grown in values of knowledge, language and rituals. These changes are represented through the film in varying scenes and chapters. The film is said to represent not individuals, but the whole of society (this is represented by the use of historical, metonymic characters). In a close up shot of the tracker’s hand, holding a mixture of bush tucker represents the idea of the knowledge the traditional Indigenous culture actually held. The close up shot of the tracker’s hand filled with flowers, bugs and insects intertwined with the native bushes of South Australia reinforces the knowledge of the Indigenous culture. It represents the idea of the tracker being a strong, wise individual with the knowledge and persistence to create an anaesthetic to drug the follower at a safe level, causing no harm. The need to keep the follower uninvolved in the murder of the fanatic, illustrates the tracker as a cultural character as he doesn’t want to be defined as ‘the villain’. In society this relates to an individual’s desire to be loved by other members of society and their acts to be viewed as ‘heroic’ and positive. As the film progresses, the men travel through the bush further away from civilisation and further away from the colonist power. As they travel toward their destination acts of betrayal, knowledge and connection to the land are displayed. In a shot the tracker is seen in the foreground, with the 2 remaining European men behind on horseback. The tracker walked at a steady, loping pace leading the way. His eyes only left the ground to search the surrounding cliffs of the bush filled gullies around him. The tracker comes to a stop after noticing the damp soil of where a rock once stood. To the tracker this was enough evidence to estimate how far ahead the fugitive was. In the dialogue of the shot the follower is heard questioning the wisdom of the tracker as he claims that he is leading the fanatic and the follower, but after explanation the follower is proven wrong and says ‘sorry’ to the tracker. The shot represents the cultural desire for an apology from the European culture to the Indigenous people, for the manslaughter, acts of violence, mockery and the stolen generation. At this point in the film the progression of the power change is seen immensely as all hope is brought back into the trackers face. The director has used the soundtrack ‘all men walk the path they choose’ to dictate the importance of being an individual and standing up for what is right. The diagetic soundtrack is an important piece in the film, as it contrasts all the metonymic characters together. As a counterpoint to the stereotypical role is the powerful song ‘all men choose the path they walk’. The song is is lyrically appropriate, which underscores the rhythm of the men’s walking pace as they walk/ride and each man has a featured verse that dictates their mood’s and feelings towards their journey. Apart from the soundtrack the director has used many appropriate patterns of progression to illustrate the growth of the character throughs; lose of power, removal of uniform, the chain, the separation at camps and the paintings symbolizing acts of violence, these are just some of the more obvious codes and conventions used within the film. Throughout the film the tracker is seen removing his uniform, at first his hat is thrown off into the bush after leaving the colonial civilisation, his shirt and shoes are also removed after the fanatic has lost his power, and by the end of the movie the tracker is seen getting up on horseback. These shots represent the idea of the loss of colonial power within the group. Traditional values wouldn’t accept the idea of the fanatic being over powered and the tracker being wiser then a white man. Within the film there are countless acts of violence portrayed towards the Indigenous Australians. Out of respect oil paintings were produce to display the massacres and torture. Peter Coad was commissioned to paint 14 landscape and figurative works of art for inclusion in the film. The paintings were used ingeniously to display violence in the film, a method that works to both soften the impact of the actions, and also make them so much more powerful. The works are portrayed beautifully into the landscape of the film, using dramatic and bold colour to depict the shocking and harsh nature of the Australian bush land. The director has used codes and conventions to accurately place the tracker as an Indigenous man that undoubtedly combines the best of both cultures, in his sense of what is appropriate. The characters that were capable of changed have done so while the others have perished in their journey. In today’s society the chicken twisties factory sell most of their products to penguins. _____ By Jaime Martens

Double Comparatives in the English Language

Double comparatives are phrases commonly used in English to express increasing or decreasing returns. Double comparatives are often employed to underline the importance of doing or not doing a certain activity. Here are some examples of double comparatives: The more you study, the more you learn.The more time you take, the better the assignment your turn in.The less money I spend, the less I have to worry about saving.The less you worry about the others, the less they will bother you. Using Double Comparatives As you can see from these examples, the format of double comparatives is as follows: The (more / less) (noun / noun phrase) subject verb , the (more / less) (noun) subject verb Double comparatives with more and less can be used with  adjectives in the same way. In this case, the structure places the comparative adjective first: The comparative adjective (noun) subject verb, the comparative adjective   it is infinitive The easier the test is, the longer students will wait to prepare.The faster the car is, the more dangerous it is to drive.The crazier the idea is, the more fun it is to try.The more difficult the task is, the sweeter it is to succeed. These forms can be mixed up as well. For example, a double comparative might begin with a more / less plus a subject and then end in a comparative adjective plus the subject. The more money and time he spends with her, the happier he becomes.The less Mary thinks about the problem, the more relaxed she feels.The more the students study for the test, the higher their scores will be. You can also  reverse the above by beginning with a comparative adjective and ending with more / less plus a subject and verb or noun, subject and verb. The richer the person is, the more privilege he enjoys.The happier the child is, the more the mom can relax.The more dangerous the amusement park ride is, the less management worries about making a profit. Double comparatives are often shortened in spoken English, especially when used as a cliche. Here are some examples of typical cliches using double comparatives. The more the merriermeans...The more people there are, the merrier everyone will be. Double comparatives can also be turned into commands in the imperative form when recommending certain actions: Study more, learn more.Play less, study more.Work more, save more.Think harder, get smarter. Double Comparatives Incorrect Usage The use of the term double comparative also applies to the incorrect use of two comparative forms together. Here are some examples: This wine is more tastier than that bottle.She is more funnier than Tom is.Alexander is more taller than Franklin. In this case, more is not required as the comparative adjective form has been modified by the addition of -ier. Double Comparatives to Show Change Finally, double comparatives are also used to show a continual increase or decrease. There are more and more people coming to this vacation spot.It seems like there is less and less time to spend with the family these days.Recently, people are finding more and more time to spend with their families. Practice Double Comparatives Use the following sentence segments to create double comparatives (the good kind) of your own. people / come / party , food / we / needdifficult / test , students / studynice / customer service representative / happy / customerhigh-tech / car , expensive / modelfull / church , good / pastorfunny / comic , sales / cd / havesevere / judge , harsh /sentenceexperienced / technician , satisfying / repairlong / play , bored / audiencemoney / spend , money / save Possible Answers Here are some possible answers for the exercise. The more people that come to the party, the more food we will need.The more difficult the test is, the more students should study.The nicer the customer service representative is, the happier the customer will be.  The more high-tech the car is, the more expensive the modal will cost.  The fuller the church is, the better the pastor is.The funnier the comic is, the better sales the CD will have.The more severe the judge, the harsher the sentence will be.The more experienced the technician is, the more satisfying the repair will be.The longer the play lasts, the more bored the audience becomes.The more money you spend, the less money you save.