Sun Tzu and Niccolo Machiavelli - Free Essay Example

I believe that Sun Tzu is like Niccolo Machiavelli because they both have similar principles of ruling countries. One principle might be that they both want people to underestimate them in every way possible and make them believe that they are someone that they are not. One example could be when a really harsh ruler like Genghis Khan acts nice, but on the inside he is really harsh and gruesome on the inside. They both say to be very cautious of when to make your move, but when make your move do it with all of the force youve got. In other words, strike like thunder. They also both believed in trickery. For example,All warfare is based on deception. Hence, when we are able to attack, we must seem unable; when using our forces, we must appear inactive; when we are near, we must make the enemy believe we are far away; when far away, we must make him believe we are near. This is one of Sun Tzus various quotes and here is one similar to that by Niccolo Machiavelli,He wanted to understand how political leaders could best obtain and maintain power. He thought that trickery was more effective in achieving these goals than honesty. He also thought that acquiring and maintaining power was more important to rulers than being a good leader.They both believed in trickery and that might have been the reason they were both successful. This is how Sun Tzus principles are similar to the works of the gr eat Niccolo Machiavelli. Adolf Hitler is like Niccolo Machiavelli in a way because both of them used trickery just like Sun Tzu. The way Adolf Hitler used trickery is to make the world think that he started WWll just to get his citizens to turn against the rest of the world and work with Hitler. If the citizens did not support Hitlers movement, the citizens were known as anti Nazis, then they were killed by the Gestapo, otherwise known as hitlers secret police. Even though most of the anti-nazis were incarcerated, some of them even died fighting against this cause. Adolf Hitler is also known as one of the most tricky and diabolical humans on this planet. In my opinion Hitler was extremely tricky and another reason why he was so very tricky is that he stated that the jews were responsible for Germanys domestic issues. After this everybody swore an oath to hitler to take out all of the jews. This was the very tricky plan that lead to the well known mass killing of the jews and various other types of people kno w as the holocaust. Adolf Hitler was persuasive because he focused on the germans as a group and not as individuals. Hitler believes in short slogans and being very one sided and this will make the germans retain the information he gives them. Hitler and Niccolo Machiavelli have very much in common such as their trickiness and their wanting of power. They both believe that power is root to every single thing out there. These two historical geniuses are extremely smart in their own ways. Another person like Niccolo Machiavelli would be from North America and his name is Andrew Jackson. Andrew Jackson was a patriotic man with the heart of an intelligent general. He defeated a british army that was more than twice the size of his militia. Over 2,000 of the british soldiers were defeated by an army of militiamen, indians, colored men, and pirates. All of these various types of people all joined together to defeat the british, which had the most powerful army at this time. The pirates and their captain, Jean Lafitte, had conquered and plundered many of the lands near the gulf of mexico and they gave them all the artillery they needed to defeat the british. Some of the artillery would have been cannons that fire tiny fragments of metal because they did not have any cannon balls. The tiny fragments of metal could take out waves of british soldiers at a time. It was much like a grenade of todays time because when a grenade explodes fragments of metal that are built into the grenade are broken apart and when they break off they act as bullets. This is why the cannons and grenades kill so many people at a time. Andrew Jackson was the leader of this militia much like how Niccolo describes a good leader in his book The Prince. He used strategy along with heavy weapons much like how you should be a fox to get out of traps and a lion to defend yourself from the wolves. This is Andrew Jackson in The Battle of New Orleans and how Jackson is similar to Niccolo Machiavelli. For my South American modern day Machiavelli I have Fidel Castro. Fidel Castro improved healthcare and education in Cuba during his dictatorship. He brutally beat and imprisoned anyone that appeared as a enemy to the regime. Both Niccolo Machiavelli and Fidel Castro were both ruthless and they wanted power and they would do anything to get what they wanted or in other words power. Fidel Castro was a communist revolutionist who governed Cubans as a prime minister from 1959-1976 and as a president from 1976-2008. Fidel Castro died in 2016. Both of these men wanted and they both got it. Fidel Castro wanted to fight oppression and in the end he had become the oppressor. After completing school Castro became the became apart of the Peoples Party. The party that he accompanied himself with was led by Eduardos Chipas. In the end his party lost the election and their leader shortly after that killed himself. Castro continued onward with his path and soon became the prime minister and the pre sident. Castro started the revolution to take all of the power away from Fulgencio Batista, but he also failed at getting rid of Batista. This would not be the last time he attempted to get rid of Batista. Castro was sent to prison by Batista for a total of 15 whopping years. When Castro got out he went to mexico with his brother and Che Guevara to make a rebelion. Castro had finally scared Batista out of the country on his last attempt. Fidel Castro is much like Niccolo Machiavelli because to be a modern day machiavellian you had to act like Machiavelli himself and that is exactly what Fidel Castro did. A modern day African Machiavellian could be the Ugandan President, Yoweri Museveni. He is a notorious Ugandan dictator that has killed many and he has a blood trail of Ugandans, Rwandans, People of the Congo, Central Africans, Sudans, Somalians, Tanzanians and Kenyans. Yoweri Museveni was a war criminal and he was never arrested for his crimes. He was praised by the western government as their colleague and he was even nominated for a nobel prize for pacifying Africa. The second thing that Yoweri Museveni did was steal money from the ugandan people and give it to South Sudan and Somalia. The culture that Yoweri Museveni has created relies on corruption to fuel his patronage network company for western leaders in Britain and the Americas. Musevenis corruption has corrupted almost all of his government and its officials with it. His government should have failed by now, but for some reason it hasnt. His corruption has also corrupted has also corrupted his police. Yoweri Museveni is lik e Niccolo Machiavelli because they both are very sneaky and tricky and along with that they have too much power for their own good. Power can be good in some cases but in most cases it ends up very terrible for the person in charge that has the power. The person in charge, in this case it is Yoweri Museveni, has to much power that he could essentially do anything he including torture people and never get caught. According to my sources Yoweri Museveni is one of the most terrible leaders/dictators out there. This is how Yoweri Museveni is similar to Niccolo Machiavelli.

Symbols to Foreshadow and Characterize Santiago Nasar’s Death - Literature Essay Samples

Gabriel Garcia Marquez incorporates and emphasizes different symbols such as the falcon, linen and boat to help foreshadow and characterize the murder of the main character, Santiago Nasar, in the novella â€Å"Chronicle of a Death Foretold†. Even if the readers know that Santiago Nasar will be murdered from the first sentence of the book, they are always searching and believing that something will prevent his death from occurring. The author uses symbols present in the Latin American culture to build up tension and suspense in the novel as they reaffirm that his death was destined and nothing or no one could have prevented it, destroying the readers’ hope. The first symbol readers are confronted with is an animal, the falcon, which appears in the epigraph. The falcon in Christian tradition is a symbol which represents evil. The wild falcon is a predator that attacks other birds. Garcia Marquez uses lines from a poem of a 16th century’s poet, Gil Vicente, as the epigraph to the novel: The hunt for love/is haughty falconry. These verses are a summary of the entire novel and serve to foreshadow Santiago Nasar’s death as his alleged love story with à ngela Vicario provokes his assassination by her brothers to defend the family’s honor. As the hawk who once sighted the prey relentlessly goes after it, the brothers Vicario once they know the name of the man who deflowered her ordain to take his life. When analysing the diction, one can note that three words â€Å"hunt†, â€Å"haughty† and â€Å"falconry† characterize the dynamic part of the book while only one word, â€Å"love†, gives us the motif. In addition, the imaginary of these verses underlined by the use of the words â€Å"hunt† and â€Å"falconry† appeal to the readers’ senses by creating the image of an animal being hunted. Moreover, these two words are associated with the animal kingdom which leads the readers to charact erize Santiago Nasar’s death with animal-like qualities such as inhuman, brute violence, grotesque and irrationality. This will result in being the case as his death was inhuman, symbolized by the use of crude pig knives to kill him. Brutal as he was stabbed repeatedly, almost slaughtered, grotesque as in the last moment of his life he was holding his intestine. Irrational because although everyone knows that he will be killed, no one will act and prevent it from occurring. This epigraph builds up tension in the readers as they know that the book will be about the search and murder of a man characterized by brute violence and inhuman qualities. The novel is set in a small village in South America which has very strong Christian religious roots; therefore, the second symbol representing death is linen as this was the cloth used to wrap Jesus Christ when he died. Santiago Nasar is described several times with characteristics and symbols resembling Jesus Christ. â€Å"Santiago Nasar put on a shirt and pants of white linen, both items unstarched, just like the ones hed put on the day before for the wedding† (page 3). The fact that Santiago Nasar wears white linen clothing recalls Jesus Christ and foreshadows his death. In the Jewish tradition, in preparation for the burial, the body is thoroughly cleaned and wrapped in a simple, plain linen shroud. Jesus, too, was wrapped in a linen shroud and buried. The author dresses Santiago Nasar with white linen as if he were already dead, telling through the symbolism that his fate has already been written. Furthermore, this quotation shows that white linen clothes were his dress code for special occasions and he was unconsciously going to a special occasion, much more special that the arrival of the bishop, his own death. This is underlined by the use of the word â€Å"unstarched† as the bands with which dead bodies were wrapped in were unstarched as they needed to be flexible, while clothing, especial ly ceremonial clothing in South America, are always starched so that the clothing looks ironed and keeps its shape. This foreshadows that Santiago Nasar’s death was predicated. The Vicario brothers had predicted to kill him ever since they were told he was the one who took their sister’s virginity and they announced it to the whole village. Jesus Christ’s death was also predicted as it was mentioned by Old Testament’s prophets, and later predetermined by Christ himself at the last supper increasing the similarity with the novel. In addition, the white colour in the Christian religion is associated with purity and innocence: this foreshadows the fact that Santiago Nasar like Jesus Christ, once again, was killed for sins he had never committed, but rather for the traditional values and sins of their respective societies. Santiago Nasar was blamed unjustly on the basis of Angela Vicario’s simple words and from that moment he was destined to die in ord er to uphold the traditional code of honor since the Vicario’s family would regain its honor only with Nasar’s death. On the other hand, Jesus Christ was killed to uphold the tradition of the Jewish religion as he defied and outraged the Rabbis by claiming He was God. The use of the symbol linen makes the murder of Santiago Nasar similar to the one of Jesus Christ; he was the lamb that had to be sacrificed for the collective sins of the town and his death was written in destiny. On the first page of the book we are introduced to another symbol representing death, the boat. â€Å"On the day they were going to kill him, Santiago Nasar got up at five-thirty in the morning to wait for the boat the bishop was coming on.† The author tells the readers right away that Santiago Nasar will be killed and at the same time, he introduces the symbol of the boat, a boat that should arrive that day at the village. The importance that Santiago Nasar attaches to the boat arrival is so great that it appears to the readers that the boat is coming especially for him. The boat has always symbolized the means of transportation between the world of the living and the dead. Both the Egyptians and the Greeks imagined that the soul of the deceased was carried on a boat between the world of the living and the dead: the Underworld was separated from the world of the living by a river. The boat really comes for him and instead of running away, he wait for it, for his death. The structure of the sentence is typical of journalism, simple and linear; it contrasts with the narrative content, which is full of references to the classical tradition and Latin American literature. The boat is described again when departing on page 15: â€Å"It appeared at the bend in the river, snorting like a dragon, and then the band of musicians started to play the bishops anthem, and the cocks began to crow in their baskets and aroused all the other roosters in town.† The boat is p arallel with the visual imagery of a dragon. The dragon is seen as the strongest and most feared animal as it spits burning fire which can further make an allusion to hell. The departure of the boat is followed by crows from the cocks. The cock has more than one meaning as a symbol: on the one hand, it represents virility and also lust, that are the reasons why Santiago Nasar will be killed, but on the other hand, there is also the warning cock of St. Peter which reminds us that Peter denied the Lord and let him go to his fate, which is actually what the villagers will do by allowing a murder to be committed. The crow of the cocks therefore foreshadows the actions of the villagers failing to alert and prevent the murder. The diction used in this quotation makes constant reference to the animal kingdom as the author declares that the cultural context of the citizens will make them act inhumanely and irrationally during the murder. Santiago Nasar’s death was announced in the f irst line of the novel and so it happens. In fact, death is the main character of the novella: in every page the reader can find a reference to his death either directly or indirectly through the use of symbols. Moreover, the dichotomy between the style typical of the news as it is also indicated by the title of the novella and the content which enhances in the dynamics of the story of the role of the symbols we have analyzed: the falcon, linen and boat. The symbols allow his death to be foreshadowed, characterized and declared well before it happens. In my opinion, death is the driver of the action as if the characters were only puppets. However, Gabriel Garcia Marquez is able to keep the tension and suspense till the last sentence, which leaves this remarkably thoughtful, precise and uniquely styled novella opened to the readers’ interpretation.