Alienation

2 Pages 524 Words

One of the underlying themes of Twentieth Century writers has been to point out the increasing alienation of people from their families, communities and society. It seems the more technologically advanced we become and the more compartmentalized our lives are, the more difficult it is to remain connected to our humanity. Authors and poets warn us about alienation and its effect on us. They give us examples in their stories or poems like The Glass Menagerie by T. Williams, In Another Country by E. Hemingway, or The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock. All these have examples of how alienation affects human beings, and foreshadow what will happen if we don’t change ourselves.
In The Glass Menagerie by T. Williams, everyone experiences their own little world, and the shock is to be thrown from it. Tom supports his family despite his unhappiness of his world. He tries to please his mother, Amanda, by being the supporter, but only gets rewarded by Amanda's constant nagging and suspicion. Eventually Tom finds himself more like his father and he seeks adventure in the movies and desperately seeks the life he always desired. By hanging out on the fire escape, he alienates himself from Amanda. He does not want to be part of her imaginary world. Unhappy with the lifestyle he follows the footsteps of his father, escaping the imaginary world of Amanda. That represents the human race, always escaping from other people’s problems.
In Another Country gives another example of alienation. The story is about soldiers abroad who are in the hospital treating their injuries. They all are connected to some kind of machines and the machines are supposed to help them recover. One of the soldiers is major that does not believe they can recover. When one of the soldiers says that he’s going to get married when the war is over, the major says: He cannot marry…He should not place himself in a position to lose. He should find things he cann...