Poverty Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words - 5

Poverty - Essay Example Being in a different position however blurs the audience that cannot perceive what poverty means. Class also plays a significant role in the essay as the narrator uses possession to define poverty. Whether social or economic class, people in a given class are characterized by possession that members of lower classes may not afford comfortably and the narrator uses inability to afford underwear to communicate the article’s theme of poverty. She associates herself with a poor class that cannot afford the type of cloth and explains this to the audience as an approach to explaining her poverty. The concept of class is similarly significant to the essay’s theme because it established difference in leaving standards towards definition of poverty. People in higher classes, whether social or economic, considers a lot of factors in life such as sanitation and the narrator uses this by identifying her poor condition of being dirty and having odors. The narrator’s use of th ese class-based factors communicates the significance of class as the essay’s theme of poverty (Nazario, Borchers and Lewis 323). Significance of class in the essay extends beyond developing a basis for defining the core theme, poverty, and facilitates understanding of reasons for persistence of poverty in the society. ... Using this concept, the narrator explains that poor people wake up in their same state daily, a condition that is not healthy. He further notes that this condition is permanent and this identifies the concept of immobility across social classes. Significance of class in the essay is also identifiable from the narrator’s perception of the reasons for persistence of poverty among some classes in the society. While the poor class does not like the condition, despite accepting it as part of their lives, tools to eradicating poverty are not accessible to them. Further, the tools are available among other classes but members of these classes are not keen to use these tools or aid their application by members of the poor classes. The narrator also associate the tools with economic resources such as money that are more limited among members of poor classes that other members of the society. In this application, the essay identifies the importance of class in sustaining existence of po verty in the society (Nazario, Borchers and Lewis 323). The concept of class also plays a significant role in the essay’s identification of the position of the poor in the society. Class identifies inferiority of the poor who lacks a voice to speak for them and ability to satisfy their needs as members of other classes would. Based on the concept of the type of life that people have adapted in different classes, the narrator identifies the type of food that she, and supposedly other members of her poor class, consumes with a medical complication and this means that the complication is limited to poor people who cannot afford high standard diets. Class also determines the type of treatment that people receive in the society. The rich are able to argue and discuss

Lord of the Flies Essay Example for Free

Lord of the Flies Essay Every child, regardless of when, loses their innocence; it is inevitable. In Lord of the Flies, the reader can recognize this law live up to its word, namely in the protagonist Ralph. Upon arriving on the island, Ralph was oblivious to the circumstances he was soon to be subjected to. Ralph’s innocent and childlike mindset has distorted itself into that of a hostile hunter. In William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, the reader witnesses the Loss of Innocence theme and observes Ralph’s descent into impurity. Ralph is first portrayed as just another kid, waiting for his problems to disappear. He had no plan on how to get off the island, and no reason to worry about it; â€Å"daddy† would take care of it for him. Ralph was not concerned about what to do about the situation he was in, and told Piggy why. Ralph tells Piggy, â€Å" Daddy taught me. He’s a commander in the Navy. When he gets leave he’ll come and rescue us†¦ They’d tell him at the airport. † (7) Ralph relied upon the airport telling his father where their plane crashed, with little to no knowledge as to where they could have landed. Though the odds were very slim, Ralph counted on his daddy coming to get him from the island in the middle of the Pacific. He was like a helpless little child, grasping his daddy’s hand and waiting to be led. With the increase of time spent on the island, Ralph’s innocence begins to diminish. Ralph is no longer the helpless little child he once was when he first landed; Ralph has evolved from a benign child to a hostile hunter. After going hunting with the boys, Ralph tried to regain the group’s attention as they all focused on Jack’s’ wounded left arm. Ralph reminisced on how he hit the pig with his spear and then began to act as though Roger were the pig, jabbing at him while Roger rushed away. Soon, the group surrounded Robert, all participating in the jabbing: â€Å"Ralph too was fighting to get near, to get a handful of that brown, vulnerable flesh. The desire to squeeze and hurt was overmastering. † (101) The boys all got hold of Roger and, without any second thought, began to poke at him, hurting him as a result. The â€Å"innocent Ralph† would have attempted to prevent the actions, rather than beginning the prodding of Roger. Ralph has evidently lost his innocence and this situation shows no different. As Ralph spends more time on the island, he, along with the reader, becomes aware of his loss of innocence.. After the deaths of both Simon and Piggy, Ralph has officially become a loner. Everyone else on the island has transferred over to Jack’s group of uncivilized hunters, the polar opposite of the group once run under Ralph’s chieftainship. Knowing that Ralph is now an independent individual in hiding, Jack sweeps the island to ensure that he finds Ralph. After Samneric reveal Ralph’s position, however, Jack lights the island on fire so Ralph cannot escape the fiery wrath of the opposing chief. After desperately sprinting away from the hunters, Ralph runs into a naval officer. The officer questions Ralph about the group and after answering these questions, Ralph has another moment of clarity and begins sobbing. â€Å" Ralph wept for the end of innocence, the darkness of man’s heart, and the fall through the air of the true, wise friend called Piggy. † (182) After being given the chance to relax, Ralph begins to grasp the concept that he has changed throughout this entire experience. The innocent stage has now passed, for himself and the rest of the group. Ralph now knows that he is no different from the other children; all children lose their innocence at some point. Golding’s depiction of Ralph from the beginning of the novel to the end of the novel greatly reflects the theme of loss of innocence. Ralph evolves from the helpless child to the hostile hunter after the crises he is put through. Ralph is a representation of every child on the earth and the inescapable loss of innocence. Through Ralph, the reader can learn that a crisis, no matter the scale, can affect the victim.

Internationalisation of SMEs: Challenges and Barriers

Internationalisation of SMEs: Challenges and Barriers Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) are becoming more important in today’s international markets. (Oviatt and McDougall,1994, 1999). The internationalisation of SME’s can be expected to increase further due to the economy of the world becoming further harmonised with continued declines in government imposed barriers and advances in technology (Lu, Jane W, and Paul W Beamish, 2001). In 2013 there was an estimated 4.9 million private sector businesses in the UK which is an increase of 102,000 compared to that of 2012. SME’s account for over half of employment, 53.9%, and almost half of the turnover in the UK private sector, 48.1%. (Department for Business Innovations and Skills, 2013). Hence, showing that SME’s are still growing and are an integral part of the UK’s economy. Through SME’s, this essay will discuss and critically analyse the process of creating (pre start up) and managing a new venture (post start up). It will begin with considering issues relating to the entrepreneur, and examine the challenges that they are faced with when starting up a business idea, the opportunity, and the innovation. The problems with managing a new venture are then inspected. In French, the term entrepreneur means someone who â€Å"undertakes†, for example someone who undertakes a significant project or activity. It later came to be used to identify individuals who accelerated economic progress by finding new and better ways of doing things. The French economist most associated with giving the name is Jean Baptiste Say who was quoted saying â€Å"The entrepreneur shifts economic resources out of an area of lower and into an area of higher productivity and greater yield†. Entrepreneurs create value (Dees, J Gregory, 1998). The sources of entrepreneurship are studied by researchers in a wide range of disciplines, the study varies per discipline. For example, an economist would look at mainly socio economic variables, whereas psychologists would look at the personality traits of the entrepreneurs to see which ones were more integral to that of an entrepreneur (Fritsch, Michael, and Alina Rusakova, 2010). The Big Five model of personality provides a framework for analysing the relationship between personality traits and the tendency to become an entrepreneur. The five dimensions of this personality model are: Extraversion, Emotional Stability, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, and Openness to Experience (Barrick, Murray R, and Michael K Mount, 1991). Zhao and Seibert (2006) investigated the personality characteristics of business founders in comparison to dependently employed managers. They found that self employed individuals are different from managers on the dimensions of openness to experience, consci entiousness, neuroticism, and agreeableness (Zhao, Hao, and Scott E Seibert, 2006). Schmitt-Rodermund states that early entrepreneurial interest is related to elevated levels of openness to experience, extraversion, and conscientiousness (Schmitt-Rodermund, Eva, 2004). Although these relationships show a correlation between single personality traits and entrepreneurship, the effect of personality characteristics for entrepreneurship is still not entirely clear (Rauch, Andreas, and Michael Frese 2007). A main motivation for entrepreneurship is the need for freedom. Stepping into self employment means becoming your own boss and a need for autonomy as a non financial value becomes an important part of the entrepreneurs career choice, despite a potential decrease in income (Fritsch, Michael, and Alina Rusakova, 2010). The Croson and Minniti (2011) model shows that newly self employed individuals are willing to accept a lower income in exchange for the psychological benefits that come with self employment (Croson, David C, and Maria Minniti 2012). This is similar to self determination theory in that autonomy leads to well being and explains why autonomy in the workplace might be a compensator for higher incomes in a position that involves less freedom (Deci, Edward, and Richard M Ryan, 2008). Entrepreneurial opportunities can arise from from structural gaps in the market or from business transformations, for example the genesis of an internet company. The entrepreneurial opportunity itself, consists of a business idea and its potential. The business idea is then formed into a business plan which is the foundation for creating a company and exploiting the gap in the marketplace (Volkmann, Christine K, Kim Oliver Tokarski, and Marc Grà ¼nhagen 2010). The term â€Å"opportunity† seems to be a central part of many definitions of entrepreneurship. It relates to Say’s notion of shifting resources to a higher area. An opportunity, therefore, means an opportunity to create value in some way. Entrepreneurs have a mind-set that sees the possibilities rather than the problems created by change such as technological advances. The entrepreneur always looks for change, responds to it, and exploits it as an opportunity (Dees, J Gregory 1998). However, Peter Drucker, a management consultant, educator, and author, says that â€Å"not every small business is entrepreneurial or represents entrepreneurship†. An example of this would be a â€Å"husband and wife who open a delicatessen or a mexican restaurant in the american suburb†. There is nothing specifically innovative or change oriented in this (Drucker, Peter Ferdinand 1995). He also claims that entrepreneurship does not require a profit motive. Further backing up the Crosson and Minniti (2010) model. With social entrepreneurs, the social mission is central and mission related impact becomes the central criterion, not the creation of wealth. For social entrepreneurs the money is not important, it is the actual outcome of their work that they strive for. However, with business entrepreneurs, the income of money is a way of measuring the creation of value. Business entrepreneurs are subject to market discipline. If they do not shift resources to become more economically functional then they tend to be driven out of business (Dees, J Gregory 1998). The challenges involved in starting a new venture, as well as the characteristic uncertainty and the lack of resources and stability that have led some researchers to view survival as the focused dimension of success (Van de Den 1984), are authentic in the social field. Furthermore, given the difficulty of measuring the performance of firms they use multiple measures of performance. The criteria of success of social ventures are determined as follows: 1. The level to which the venture achieves its set goals, 2. the ability of the venture to ensure continuity and sustainability by acquiring resources necessary to maintain the objectives, and 3. the level of resources that are available to maintain the ventures growth and expansion (Sharir, Moshe, and Miri Lerner, 2006). A large field study was carried out between 1999 and 2001 on the process of initiating and establishing social ventures (Sharir, Moshe, and Miri Lerner, 2006). Of the social ventures, it was deduced into fifteen variables that determined their success. These include: Previous experience this involved checking the history of the entrepreneur for previous expertise in the venture area. Total dedication The time that was invested in the development by the entrepreneur, the investment of the entrepreneur’s private resources. Support from family and friends this was measured by the amount of involvement that was made by the friends and family of the entrepreneur. Acceptance of the idea of the venture in the public’s eyes the public’s awareness of the issue. The primary social network examined the activities that were involved in assisting the venture to acquire needed capital and support in the establishment stage. Support from public sector agencies yes or no. Funding received from foundations support received by foundations for three or more years. Support received from another non profit organisation whether it acquired capital, received support, or was integrated within an older organisation. The amount of budget at the establishment stage fifty thousand dollars was acquired at the establishment stage. Composition of the staff at the establishment stage The number of staff members and their jobs as salaried or part time, and also the distribution of workload between them. Governing board performance the involvement of board members in planning, decision making, personal financial investment, and expanding the social network. The planned expansion and stabilisation of the venture’s social network the actions taken by the entrepreneur in this way. Preliminary planning the preparation of a business plan or detailed planning involving environmental aspects, staffing and budgeting. Long term cooperation with another organisati on cooperation with another organisation for at least three years. Market test of the venture’s service charging fees for receipt of selected services or obtaining long term contracts from public agencies. Eight of the fifteen variables were found to contribute to the success of the social venture (Sharir, Moshe, and Miri Lerner, 2006). Business mortality rates suggest that discontinuous rates of start ups can be as high as seventy percent in the first five years, although this depends on the specific industry in question. Within a new venture, the main problem arises due to a lack of organisational structure and a lack of a specific set of roles, tasks, and capabilities. Therefore the founders of the company must use what little resources they have to address the issues involved. Thus taking up management time. Moreover, the inclusion of structure and teachings of new roles, tasks, and capabilities within the company can cause inefficiency and may lead to worry, and conflict among the members. However, there is one way in which new ventures have an advantage over older businesses. They are able to form a business plan without being restricted because of the decisions that have been made in the companies’ past. They are also not liable to aging. Older ventures suffer from processes such as routinisation and s tandardisation which makes them reluctant to transform their company in the face of change (Gruber, Marc, and Joachim Henkel 2006). There are three stages that can be applied to the growth of a company once the initial start up procedure has finished. These are: early development, (rapid) development, and sustained growth. In the early development stage, the entrepreneur must strengthen the structures laid out at the foundation stage. They must also aim confidently at successful market establishment. Within this stage the growth of the company is determined by the strategies and implementation of those strategies into business operations. During the rapid development stage, the main strengths and strategic advantages of the business must be capitalised on and created. Frequent changes to structures such as communication, leadership, information, and communication are also required for rapid growth. New resources might need to be acquired or existing ones, redistributed to account for the new demands. In order for a company to achieve sustained growth, it must be planned using growth strategies established by the founders of the company (Volkmann, Christine K, Kim Oliver Tokarski, and Marc Grà ¼nhagen 2010). To summarise, SME’s are still a major part of the economy and they are constantly expanding. Entrepreneurs are the people responsible for the stable growth of SME’s and their innovative minds will ensure that technology advances. Psychologists believe that entrepreneurs have different personality traits than normal people which helps them to strive more and become more confident when setting out to achieve their goals. There are two different types of entrepreneur, the social entrepreneurs and the business entrepreneurs. The social entrepreneurs seek pleasure in getting their idea known to the world whereas business entrepreneurs always look for ways to gain wealth. Due to the entrepreneurs ability to seek out gaps in the market, the world will become a more comfortable place to live in with innovations that will make lives easier. Entrepreneurs do not enjoy the restrictions of a workplace and this leads them to becoming their own boss, however, they must face the chall enges that entails with starting up a business. Such as the resources, organisational structure, and growth. References Lu, Jane W, and Paul W Beamish. The internationalization and performance of SMEs. Strategic management journal 22.6à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ 7 (2001): 565-586. Department of Business Innovations and Skills. â€Å"Business Population Estimates for the UK and Regions.† 2013. Fritsch, Michael, and Alina Rusakova. Personality traits, self-employment, and professions. 2010. Croson, David C, and Maria Minniti. Slipping the surly bonds: The value of autonomy in self-employment. Journal of Economic Psychology 33.2 (2012): 355-365. Barrick, Murray R, and Michael K Mount. The big five personality dimensions and job performance: a metaà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ analysis. Personnel psychology 44.1 (1991): 1-26. Zhao, Hao, and Scott E Seibert. The big five personality dimensions and entrepreneurial status: a meta-analytical review. Journal of Applied Psychology 91.2 (2006): 259. Schmitt-Rodermund, Eva. Pathways to successful entrepreneurship: Parenting, personality, early entrepreneurial competence, and interests. Journal of Vocational Behavior 65.3 (2004): 498-518. Rauch, Andreas, and Michael Frese. Born to Be an Entrepreneur? Revisiting the Personality Approach to Entrepreneurship. (2007). Deci, Edward, and Richard M Ryan. Self-determination theory. Handbook of theories of social psychology (2008): 416. Dees, J Gregory. The meaning of social entrepreneurship. Comments and suggestions contributed from the Social Entrepreneurship Funders Working Group, 6pp (1998). Drucker, Peter Ferdinand. People and performance: The best of Peter Drucker on management. Routledge, 1995. Sharir, Moshe, and Miri Lerner. Gauging the success of social ventures initiated by individual social entrepreneurs. Journal of world business 41.1 (2006): 6-20. Gruber, Marc, and Joachim Henkel. New ventures based on open innovation–an empirical analysis of start-up firms in embedded Linux. International Journal of Technology Management 33.4 (2006): 356-372. Volkmann, Christine K, Kim Oliver Tokarski, and Marc Grà ¼nhagen. Entrepreneurship in a european perspective: concepts for the creation and growth of new ventures. Springer, 2010.

Computers Mimic The Human Mind :: essays research papers

The mind-body problem has captivated the minds of philosophers for centuries. The problem is how the body and mind can interact with each other if they are separate and distinct. One solution to the problem is to replace any mental term with a more accurate physical description. Eliminative Materialists take this idea to the extreme by stating that everything that is believed to be mental will someday be explained in terms of the physical world. One way that people try to prove Eliminative Materialism to be true is through technology. Certainly if we are able to create computers and software that mimic the human mind, then Eliminative Materialism is a sound solution to the mind-body problem. In order to examine if computers actually do mimic the human mind then we must first look at the capabilities of the human mind. If one looks closely at the capabilities of the human mind and compares them to the most recent technological advances, then it would be obvious that computers and sof tware are beginning to mimic even the most advanced mental states. In the future, computers will be able to do anything the human mind is capable of thus proving Eliminative Materialism to be a sound solution to the mind-body problem. Most of the day the human mind is taking in information, analyzing it, storing it accordingly, and recalling past knowledge to solve problems logically. This is similar to the life of any computer. Humans gain information through the senses. Computers gain similar information through a video camera, a microphone, a touch pad or screen, and it is even possible for computers to analyze scent and chemicals. Humans also gain information through books, other people, and even computers, all of which computers can access through software, interfacing, and modems. For the past year speech recognition software products have become mainstream(Lyons,176). All of the ways that humans gain information are mimicked by computers. Humans then proceed to analyze and store the information accordingly. This is a computer's main function in today's society. Humans then take all of this information and solve problems logically. This is where things get complex. There are expert systems that can solve com plex problems that humans train their whole lives for. In 1997, IBM's Deep Blue defeated the world champion in a game of chess(Karlgaard, p43). Expert systems design buildings, configure airplanes, and diagnose breathing problems. NASA's Deep Space One probe left with software that lets the probe diagnose problems and fix itself(Lyons).

Comparisons of war poems Essay

In exploring the portrayal of war in the poetry of Wilfred Owen and Shakespeare one can see the contrasting attitudes and realities of war. In before Agincourt set in 1415 composed by Shakespeare, he portrays the glory and honour in war, whilst Anthem for doomed youth composed by Wilford Own set in 1914 is expressing the meaningless and realistic thoughts of view. In the first stanza which Shakespeare has composed in the poem before Agincourt. He uses manipulating concepts that convey the message that war is a great adventure and that you should die for your country. Whilst Anthem for Doomed youth is doing the exact opposite and tries to convince the reader that war is a horrific ordeal. As the two poems where written in an interval of five hundred years it shows us very clearly the different point of few people had in their perspective time about war. Before Agincourt is a very patriotic and heroic poem. In the first stanza Shakespeare uses a courageous tone. He uses emotional adjectives and verbs to make the reader feel the same as he does. He also uses a lot of positive nouns to create this affect e.g. â€Å"greater share of honour’ â€Å"Gods will†. There is not much alliteration or any form of onomatopoeia in the first stanza. The second stanza uses a lot of emphasised words and longer pauses before the next line he also uses repetition of words starting with M. In the last stanza of the poem he does not use any assonance, onomatopoeia and alliteration technics to emphasize his poem. He only uses strong punctuation and pauses to create a very positive approach on war. This poem could be used as a propaganda device. Anthem for Doomed Youth composed by Wilford Owen. In the title of this poem Wilford is expressing that war is negative. â€Å"Doom† is a simile to convey inevitability of death, Doom also uses assonance with the double O’s. It has an affect of being scary and threatening. The first stanza uses repetition to add rhythm and onomatopoeias to create a more realistic approach on war. The second stanza uses a lot of repetition and emphasised words. e.g. â€Å"No mockeries†, â€Å"no prayers nor bells†. No mockeries is implying no more joy and that they can’t be mocked any more because they have perished. The â€Å"No† is also emphasised to give the poem more rhythm. No prayers nor bells. Is repetition, it also has a sad motive. The tone goes up to give the poem more negativity and sadness by elongating some words. The third stanza uses a rhetorical question to start off with. The mood is a lot softer. This is created by the poet using a softer tone to shorten the â€Å"S’s, P’s and R’s†. He uses repetition to try and enhances the reader’s sadness and visual imagery. There are also a lot of similes and metaphors used. E.g. pallor, paleness, brows, forehead. In the last stanza there is a vast amount of imagery of death. There is an ethical custom to conclude his poem. â€Å"Drawing down of blind† this is what people at home did when a close relative died. Comparing these two poems reveals that Shakespeare’s before Agincourt uses a lot less alliteration and repetition making the poem more joyful and honourable for war. In conclusion Shakespeare is totally glorifying war while Wilford more realistically looking at war as a horrifying killer concept. Style wise I prefer Shakespeare poem having a nice ring to its rhythm but the content of his poem is out dated and modern man would find it hard to agree with his idealistic point of views. Personally I can understand Wilford’s Owens point of view better then Shakespears. War is a horrifying non justifiable matter and should not be promoted.

Representations of Illness and Recovery in ‘the Secret Garden’

â€Å"Explore The Secret Garden’s representation of illness and recovery. † The Secret Garden, written by Frances Hodgson Burnett, is a children’s story that has endured enormous popularity since its publication in 1911. The novel centres round a young and lonely protagonist, Mary Lennox. Mary’s journeys in The Secret Garden- both physical and spiritual- have been followed by child readers and often remembered long into adulthood.The text communicates to readers themes such as death, sickness, and recovery and it is largely because of this addressing of serious and sometimes relatable issues that the novel has been considered such a significant contribution to children’s literature. The notions that illness and unhappiness of all kinds can be ‘cured’ by positive thinking is a concept that runs through the text and is generally attributed to the authors own belief in Christian science.Burnett was known to have found comfort in spirituali ty and this ‘New thought’ ideology whilst dealing with the deaths that occurred in her own life and the resulting depression from them. By exploring the representations of illness and recovery within The Secret Garden readers are able to recognise the messages and lessons Burnett as an author was attempting to portray to children. From this, readers can also gain a greater contextual understanding of the kind of society Burnett- and in turn, her characters- would have existed within.In many works of children’s literature, it is common for parental figures to either not be present or to be removed from the story in some way, to allow the child protagonist to have their own ‘adventure’ without adult supervision. The Secret Garden is an example of this, but what stands apart from other children’s texts is the harshness of the situation that Mary as a character is immediately faced with. By the end of The Secret Garden’s first chapter, both Mary’s parents and any servants that provided care for her have been killed by an outbreak of cholera.Mary Lennox is instantly surrounded by death at the beginning of the story, and her sudden physical loneliness only draws attention from readers to the fact that Mary was very much alone and uncared for in the first place; as Burnett writes, as soon as there is an outbreak, â€Å"†¦She was forgotten by everyone. Nobody thought of her, nobody wanted her†¦Ã¢â‚¬  . Death and sickness are the themes that open The Secret Garden to readers and in turn give readers the first impression that these hemes are what largely define Mary Lennox as a protagonist. Before Mary is taken to live with her uncle in Yorkshire, she first stays in India with an English Clergyman and his family. What is interesting about where Mary is taken when she must leave her first home is that she is only seen as safe and away from disease when taken into a British setting- even if it is only made British by the people she is living with.It is decisions like this one made by Burnett that affirms to readers that India is seen to her as a ‘sickly’ place; the novel in fact opens with a paragraph stating Mary â€Å"had been born in India and had always been ill in one way or another. † It is important to consider that the first outbreak of Cholera is seen in the servants- those who are native to India- which is the cause of Mary’s parent’s death. India is frequently suggested to be an unhealthy place, especially in comparison to England, which as The Secret Garden progresses is shown to be the place where character’s health improve.This apparent view of an English writer seeing England as a place of good health, whilst a foreign place to be somewhere that produces sickness and death, puts forward the question to readers of whether they are being presented with an accurate perception of settings, or if they are reading the descriptions of s omeone who is significantly biased. Understanding this, adult readers should consider if child readers could be negatively influenced by the writer’s own opinions.The locked away and hidden garden in Burnett’s The Secret Garden is seen to be the symbolic centre of the novel even before its discovery. It’s introduction through Martha, who tells Mary after some hesitation â€Å"One of th’gardens is locked up. No one has been in it for ten years. † is one that creates the first real mystery of the text, something to occupy Mary’s thoughts while she begins life in Yorkshire and stir curiosity in readers, suggesting to them that there are more secrets to be discovered than just the many shut away and forbidden rooms of the old manor house.Although Burnett claims the garden at Mary’s first sight of it to be â€Å"The sweetest, most mysterious place anyone could imagine†, the first description of the setting is decidedly centred round the fact that all the trees and flowers that were once there seem to no longer be alive. Like the opening scenes of The Secret Garden, this new scene is one largely defined by death. The garden has been hidden away and unwanted, much like Mary herself in the beginning of The Secret Garden, however, the situation is different in that pon discovery, someone wishes to care for it. Mary claims â€Å"Is it all a quite dead garden? I wish it wasn’t. † These words from the protagonist could be seen as a kind of positive development in character; Mary is learning to feel compassion for other things. It could be argued that Mary’s wish to look after this garden stems from an innate desire to ‘get better’ herself. Despite Mary’s interest in caring for the garden, it is believed to be lifeless until Dickon is introduced into the text.Mary confides in him and brings him to the garden, and almost immediately he is able to find traces of life in the other wise decaying surroundings, telling Mary it is â€Å"as wick as you or me. † Dickon as a character seems to represent both nature and health; Mary finds him surrounded by animals and the author describes him have â€Å"Cheeks as red as poppies†. The way he seems to portray both health and a close bond with nature suggests to readers that Burnett herself sees a strong connotation between contact with nature and good health.Nature is often used throughout The Secret Garden to describe healthy traits; The doctor at one point claims Dickon to be â€Å"as strong as a moor pony†. Nature even outside of the garden or Moors is seen to be intrinsically linked with being healthy in the text; both Mary and Colin’s wellbeing seems to depend on the changing of the seasons. It is only when spring arrives that Colin feels strong enough to sit up for breakfast with his cousin, claiming â€Å"I am breathing long breath of fresh air. It makes you strong. † The two c hildren’s health and progress seem to rely heavily on the matching progress of nature and the seasons outside.Considering this, readers could ask themselves if Burnett has intended this to be because of how she may see nature and health intrinsically linked- the two children must ‘bloom’ with the seasons and the flowers in the garden- or whether it is because she creates two characters so dependant on nature for their happiness. In the lonely, remote manor house with barely any other children around to play with, nature and the garden are some of the only things for Mary and Colin to build an attachment to. Colin is a character who is introduced to the text after much mystery; he is the cause of the crying Mary has been hearing every night.His character of the ‘invalid hidden away’ is one that has been seen before in other works of fiction- a notable example to draw parallels to is the character of Bertha in Jane Eyre. Colin and Bertha represent the kind of characters that were created in a â€Å"Victorian fascination with the â€Å"imaginative potential of disease† . Sickness was something that could define a character and make it interesting to readers; a kind of morbid fascination with things that were not yet entirely understood. Being unwell in the Victorian period was itself not seen as an entirely negative experience.Diane Price Herndl states in Invalid Women that â€Å" Invalidism has historically offered women a way . . . to achieve a kind of power when no other means opened up†. This in theory could apply to Colin as a child character. Children, like women in the Victorian period, gained a kind of power from being unwell, as others are forced to attend to them and oblige to them for fear of sickening them further. Certainly, being treated for being unwell is the only kind of attention that Colin is able receive until later in The Secret Garden.The way Colin is treated for his illness seems to resemble t he ‘rest cure’ treatment, a method that was developed in the 19th century. He is confined to his bed and isolated from other people, told to rest and never over stress himself, isolated from anyone around him. Until Mary meets him, there seems to be no foreseeable time when he will ’get better’. Colin says to Mary when they first meet â€Å"If I live I may be a hunchback, but I shan’t live. †. Colin has essentially resigned to waiting in his room to die.Whilst Mary as a character strikes readers as having a fierce will to live, and a kind of innate desire to become more healthy, at this point in the novel Colin seems to contrast against her in that he does not see himself living past childhood- as he has been told his entire life. However, hope for his improvement is created through the situation that he and Mary are first introduced to each other. Mary meets Colin at a point where she herself is starting to improve in behaviour and become mo re like a normal, healthy child.She is confused by the way that Colin acts, telling Martha later â€Å"I think he’s a very spoiled boy. †; scarcely recognising that she herself was not very different to him before she came to Yorkshire. The fact that Mary has found Colin whilst in the process of becoming more healthy herself is encouraging to readers, as if Mary can improve from being a spoilt, ‘sickly’ child, then it seems likely that Colin is able to as well. In addition, Colin appears in the text as Mary is slowly learning to want to are for things and nurture them, implying that Mary can in turn look after and help Colin become more healthy. Colin’s actual state of health in The Secret Garden seems debatable. There is never an assigned name to the illness that keeps him from being mobile, other than being told that he may one day develop a hunchback like his father. His bouts of cold and fever seem to be directly related to how hysteric he becom es in his ‘fits’, his weakness seemingly due to the fact that he has barely ventured outside of his bedroom during his lifetime.It is Mary who is the first character to dismiss the idea of his ‘sickness’ and in turn his unavoidable premature death, telling him â€Å"There’s nothing the matter with your horrid back- nothing but hysterics! †. It is almost as if Colin’s own belief in his ill health has been created through the negative beliefs of others, and Mary as a character who is new and unfamiliar with these negative presumptions if the only person who can see past them.This concept that Colin is not truly unwell, but made to think he is and therefore acts as if he is disabled in some way, seems to align itself with Burnett’s own beliefs in Christian science and New thought ideology. It also suggests to readers at this point in the novel that Colin is a character who can become better; he has willed himself into ill health, so there is no reason why he cannot similarly will himself into becoming more healthy.Despite the authors own apparent perceptions of sickness being based on Christian Science beliefs- that sickness can be cured through positive thinking- it has been suggested by some that real forms of illness are present in some of the characters in the text. Mary and Colin are seen as neurotic figures; Mary’s indifference to death and her solitary games have seen her diagnosed as pre-schizoid, whilst Colin’s obsession with his own imaginary hunchback has been seen to class him as a hysteric.Burnett admits herself that â€Å"Perhaps they were both of them thinking strange things children do not usually think†. She as an author seems to understand that the child characters she has created do not act as normal, healthy children would. Though the possibility of Mary and Colin’s mental illnesses are just theories, it brings the question to readers of whether the treatment, or rather lack of treatment, being provided to each child is entirely appropriate. After all, each child has dealt with a great deal throughout their short lifetimes.Mary has practically witnessed the deaths of all that she first knew, whilst Colin has been confined to one room for his entire life; perhaps most importantly, neither of them have ever had loving parental figures present, so would surely be psychologically affected by this in some way. Modern day readers must consider that treatment of illness was in the time Mary and Colin would have existed in, very different to what is used now- for example, the ‘rest cure’ of enforced confinement and bed rest has since been discredited as a treatment to any condition.Whilst contact with nature and other children obviously shows signs of improvement in Colin and Mary’s wellbeing, readers might ask themselves if this would be the case of ‘real’ children in the character’s places, and if by the fi nishing chapters of The Secret Garden, Mary and Colin can be considered entirely ‘cured’ of their past problems. Word count: 2,383 Bibliography * Lawson, Kate, The Victorian Sickroom in L. M. Montgomery's The Blue Castle and Emily's Quest : Sentimental Fiction and the Selling of Dreams, Volume 31, Number 3, 2007 (http://muse. jhu. edu/login? auth=0&type=summary&url=/journals/lion_and_the_unicorn/v031/31. lawson. html) * Gohlke, Madelon, Re-reading The Secret Garden, vol 41 no 8 (JSTOR) * Carpenter, Angelica, In the Garden: Essays in honor of Frances Hodgson Burnett (http://chapters. scarecrowpress. com/08/108/0810852888ch1. pdf) * Hunt, Peter, An introduction to children’s literature, 1994, Oxford University Press * Hodgson Burnett, Frances, The Secret Garden, Puffin Classics, 1911 * (http://www. sciencemuseum. org. uk/broughttolife/techniques/restcure. aspx) (definition of rest cure) ————————— Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€œ [ 1 ]. Gohlke, Madelon, Re-reading The Secret Garden, vol 41 no 8 [ 2 ].