Dusty Brice
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About
I'm named after the son of a plumber, "The American Dream" Dusty Rhodes. I have a beautiful fiance and we're both following our dreams. So that's pretty cool.
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Recent Activity
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Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
In An Image of Africa, Achebe talks at length about the grotesque and inaccurate African caricatures that inhabit the margins of Western literature and exist only to justify the condescending white... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart centers on the strong traditional warrior Okonkwo as he adjusts to an evolving Umuofian landscape. Though Okonkwo is a man of relatively few words, the novel... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
Throughout Chinua Achebe's classic novel Things Fall Apart, Achebe constantly demonstrates the value of personal bonds within the Ibo society. Indeed, even though Okonkwo prides himself on his... -
Answered a Question in Crossing Brooklyn Ferry
Walt Whitman's "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry" is a poem that exemplifies Whitman's abilities as a leading proponent of the transcendentalism literary movement. The poem depicts a thoughtful narrator... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
The Ibo marriage traditions Chinua Achebe presents in his seminal debut novel Things Fall Apart are noticeably different from Western norms surrounding marriage. For one, the Umuofians in Achebe's... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
After following Okonkwo's staunch perspective throughout the entirety of the tale, Chinua Achebe's classic debut novel Things Fall Apart provocatively ends by narrowing in on the white District... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
In Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart, Okonkwo's father Unoka has a tremendous impact on the trajectory of Okonkwo's life. Unoka never obtains titles or any level of success within the clan. Indeed,... -
Answered a Question in The Bloody Chamber
In The Bloody Chamber, Angela Carter’s collection of gothic, feminist retellings of classic fairy tales subverts patriarchal values by recasting women as the main protagonists of the stories rather... -
Answered a Question in Ligeia
Edgar Allan Poe's short story "Ligeia" contains many of the tropes that define Poe as a master of the macabre: the story focuses on a man's reflection on his mysterious, frail wife Ligeia and her... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
In most ways, Chinua Achebe's seminal debut novel Things Fall Apart is a textbook example of a successful postcolonial text. Indeed, Achebe presents an authentically Nigerian story about a... -
Answered a Question in The Trial of Dedan Kimathi
Ngugi wa Thiong’o and Micere Githae Mugo’s influential Kenyan play The Trial of Dedan Kimathi was an exceptionally daring stage production for the two to produce, especially when one considers the... -
Answered a Question in Night
Elie Wiesel's striking memoir Night is a crucial text specifically because it illustrates the importance of basic human rights, and what happens when these rights are systematically violated. For... -
Answered a Question in The Sun Also Rises
The Sun Also Rises, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Ernest Hemingway’s first major successful novel, vividly portrays the rich culture of bullfighting in Spain. More specifically, Hemingway delves... -
Answered a Question in The Old Man and the Sea
In The Old Man and the Sea, Ernest Hemingway consistently uses personification to illustrate Santiago’s intimate bond with the natural world. More specifically, Hemingway supplies Santiago’s... -
Answered a Question in The Old Man and the Sea
Ernest Hemingway’s Pulitzer Prize winning novella The Old Man and the Sea is the harrowing story of Santiago, an old man who faces an epic battle with a giant marlin. Hemingway foregrounds... -
Answered a Question in The Old Man and the Sea
In Ernest Hemingway’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novella The Old Man and the Sea, Hemingway presents the story of Santiago, an old fisherman who has a battle of wills with a giant marlin. Santiago has... -
Answered a Question in The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
T. S. Eliot’s hugely influential poem “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” is a dramatic monologue that reveals the speaker’s perceived insecurities and shortcomings. The poem details the... -
Answered a Question in Midnight's Children
Salman Rusdie’s classic novel Midnight’s Children is a prime example of a postcolonial novel for a number of reasons. Chief among them is the fact that Rushdie addresses British imperialism and its... -
Answered a Question in Midnight's Children
Salman Rushdie’s seminal Man Booker Prize-winning novel Midnight’s Children is written as a first-person memoir from the perspective of Saleem Sinai, a man born at the exact moment that India... -
Answered a Question in Hard Times
Charles Dickens’ Hard Times presents the story of the Gradgrind family and how they adjust to the patriarch Thomas Gradgrind’s strict, rigid belief system. Interestingly, every member of the family... -
Answered a Question in Their Eyes Were Watching God
In Zora Neale Hurston’s classic novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, the main character, Janie Crawford, steadily grows into an independent woman. Indeed, her relationship with Tea Cake, which is... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
In Chinua Acbebe’s Things Fall Apart, the invasive colonial influence present in Umuofia changes a number of aspects of traditional Igbo culture. Interestingly, while Achebe does not explicitly... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
This particular quote, found early in Chinua Achebe’s debut novel Things Fall Apart, is significant for a number of reasons. First, it is a fitting analogy that describes Okonkwo’s rise within his... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
In Chinua Achebe’s debut novel Things Fall Apart, Okonkwo’s daughter Ezinma is deeply affected by the norms, customs, and values of traditional Igbo culture. More specifically, as Okonkwo’s... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
The title of Chinua Achebe’s debut novel Things Fall Apart perfectly encapsulates the tragic events that surround Okonkwo’s abbreviated life. The title, taken from W.B. Yeats’ “The Second Coming,”... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
In Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe vividly illustrates the tragic story of proud warrior Okonkwo as he faces the challenges presented by a rapidly changing Umuofia. Okonkwo faces a number of... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
In Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, Achebe presents Okonkwo as a man dominated by a pervasive fear of being perceived as weak and womanly. Early in the novel, Achebe establishes the fact that... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
In Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, Okonkwo’s intolerance of unsuccessful and—in his mind—lazy, womanly, or otherwise unworthy men stems directly from his strained relationship with his ill-fated... -
Answered a Question in The Old Man and the Sea
This important quote from Ernest Hemingway’s Pulitzer Prize winning novella The Old Man and the Sea is a crucial component in the story for a number of reasons. First, this quote comes when... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
Despite the fact that Unoka, Okonkwo’s father, has a relatively minor role in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, he has a considerable impact on the novel. Obviously, Unoka deeply affects his son... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
In Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, it is no coincidence that the standards of greatness valued in Umuofia bear a striking resemblance to the masculine standards that Okonkwo holds dear. Indeed,... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
In Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, Achebe focuses special attention on the strained, often toxic relationship between Okonkwo and his oldest son Nwoye. Okonkwo is heavy-handed and dictatorial in... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
In Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, yams are by far the most important crop to the traditional Igbo farmers within Umuofia. They are a sign of a man’s wealth, and a family with yams is a family... -
Answered a Question in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
In James Joyce’s influential modernist bildungsroman A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Joyce portrays the life of young Stephen Dedalus as he struggles with his simultaneous religious and... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
In Things Fall Apart, Achebe presents a number of traditional Igbo customs and rituals in an effort to give the text an authentically Nigerian perspective. Chapter twelve contains one of the most... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
In Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, Okonkwo clearly demonstrates favoritism toward Ezinma compared to his strained relationship with his oldest son Nwoye. He feels that Ezinma is one of the few... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
Chinua Achebe uses the complexities of a changing society as a major, pervasive force in his debut novel Things Fall Apart. This social complexity is manifested through the colonial influence that... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
On first glance, Okonkwo from Chinua Achebe’s debut novel Things Fall Apart and Dr. Thomas Stockton from Henrik Ibsen’s play An Enemy of the People seem to have little in common. Their respective... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart has a tragic resolution to close out the novel. Indeed, the novel ends with Okonkwo taking his own life, and his body must be removed by the District Commissioner.... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
Okonkwo’s friends and family all play crucial roles in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart. Indeed, the individuals who surround Okonkwo all contribute to his perception of his life. Some influences,... -
Answered a Question in Derek Walcott
Nobel Prize-winning poet and playwright Derek Walcott's poem "White Egrets" is a thoughtful meditation on the fleeting qualities of human life juxtaposed with the violence of the natural world. The... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
In Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, cultural elements slowly evolve throughout the novel, and some aspects are significantly changed toward the end. More specifically, I want to focus on how the... -
Answered a Question in Dylan Thomas
Dylan Thomas’ sensual poem “In the White Giant’s Thigh” is reminiscent of the work of poet D.H. Lawrence in that Thomas interestingly conflates the human body and nature in order to highlight the... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
At the beginning of Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, the men of Umuofia are called together into a meeting in order to discuss how they should move forward after an Umuofian woman is murdered in... -
Answered a Question in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
The Brodie set and their teacher Miss Jean Brodie are arguably Muriel Spark’s most famous and well-developed characters in the author’s oeuvre. The Brodie set is led by the undeniably charismatic... -
Answered a Question in The Help
The relationship between Miss Celia and the outspoken Minny Jackson is especially engaging in the way that it evolves throughout the course of the novel. Miss Celia does not adhere to the same... -
Answered a Question in Civil Peace
The title of Chinua Achebe’s short story “Civil Peace” is especially interesting because it is used in an ironic sense. The story follows Jonathan Iwegbu as he collects the fragments of his life... -
Answered a Question in Song of Solomon
While Bernard Pomerance’s play The Elephant Man, Carson McCullers’ novella The Ballad of the Sad Café, and Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon may all initially seem like wildly different works that... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
In Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe deeply probes the fine philosophical line between fate and free will. Indeed, from Okonkwo’s perspective, certain elements of his life seem predetermined by his... -
Answered a Question in Things Fall Apart
One of the wonderful aspects of Things Fall Apart is that when it comes to depicting the power of the traditional Igbo gods and customs, Chinua Achebe leaves the effects of spells, curses, and...
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