Dr.Heidegger's+experiment

Short Stories - Literary Devises Title: Dr. Heidegger's experiment

Point of View: Omniscent

Protagonist: Dr. Heidegger's  What type of character is the Protagonist?: The protagonist is a round character because he already has fully developed character traits although he does change throughout the story in realizing the truth of his discovery.

Antagonist: The water from the fountain of youth Describe the setting: The setting of the story almost completely takes place in Dr.Heideggers study. The study is a dusty, old-fashioned with a certain metaphoric value has a skeleton in the closet. The study also has many book cases and therefore books aswell and also a picture of Dr.Heideggers deceased wife. In my opinion the study is described as a creepy and eerie place which can also inspire the most creative and wonderous creations. The study also seems to be a dank and dark place which seems suited to the main characters age and personality.

Type of Conflict: man vs. man

Describe the main conflict: The main conflict is first of all the struggle between the characters and the greed and lust in which pushes them to take more and more of the Dr.'s mysterious healing water. The characters get a taste and want more and have uncontrolable urges to drink more and more. But the potion in the characters greed is over used and makes them to young. Although the problem is all too soon fixed as the characters return to their old and dusty figures of usual and to them this seems to be a sort of curse and if you will not worth living after they had a taste of their youthful ways again. The second part is indeed that of the effects of the potion in that it does not last and causes only more greed and lust which eventually leads to the overall sadness. Almost as if the water was some sort of drug and enduced a high and had all the same reprecutions and downsides that drugs also have.

Describe the Climax of the Story: The climax of the story is when the four geusts had filled themselves with as much of that lushious water they could and had caused themeselves to revert to their child forms and ironicly their childish ways too. After they had gone to their childhood they simply muck about if you will and cause general havoc until the potion wears off because after that point the story begins to become less interesting and shortly after concludes.

How does the Protagonist change over the course of the story?: The protagonist in the beggining simply offers one of his creatons to four of his geusts in hoping to realize the effects that the potion would have opn his test subjects if you will. And in that way he does change by finding out the effects of his experiment. He finds that when reverted to your youthful ways although you beleive you may be more mature you make the same mistakes as before. In that way the docter truely changed as he realizes how awful his experiment truely is and that you truely can have too much of one thing. He realizes that people dont always change and too him his experiment failed.

Describe the relationship between the title and the theme: The title of the story is Dr.Hediggers experiment and the theme of the story is the fountain of youth's water and regenerating power's. Also a sort of lesson that the story teaches is not to make the same mistakes again and to control your inner desires in some cases. Withnkeeping that in mind Dr.Hediggers experiment was too see if his test subjects would realize their previous mistakes and change their faulty ways so they dont make the same mistakes while using the fountain of youth's water. In his experiment his test subjects if you will fail in a way because with regaining their youth they also regain their foolish ways and make the same mistakes. So you see the theme is not to follow your old mistakes and in the story Dr.Hedigger see if they can change through the application of an expirement which is also encorperated in the title.

How does the main conflict help to illustrate the theme?: The main conflict of the story is between the geusts and themesleves essentially and their own iner desires. The theme of the story is the fountain of youth's water and its regenerating power's, aswell as its lesson not to make the same mistakes over and to not always allow yourself to indulge in your inner desires. In the docters experiment he uses the regenerating water to see if his tests subject would change in the ways they acted in their youth and fix their previous mistakes. The struggle between the four characters and themeselves is a perfect example of the theme because it shows that the characters couldnt change their previous ways in their youth and also that they couldn't control their deepest desires. So the main conflict proved that the fountain of youth's water has special powers but can cause people to do stupid and irrational things.

How does the climax help to illustrate the theme?: The climax of the story shows that the fountain of youth is truely a magnificent discovery yet not necesarily a good one. The theme being what power's the fountain of youth's water can have it prefectly shows that the water can have a bad effect on people. The climax being the four geusts reverted back into their infant stages and them repeating their mistakes which they swore they would not do it proves that the water only makes people more greedy and illustrates to me that the power's of the water in the fountain of youth can easily be misused and are too powerful to resist, which in my opinion is infact the theme of the story.

Give examples of each of the following literary terms in the story (use quotes):

Simile: "...with a visage as faded as her dress." I chose this simile because with time her dress faded and just as her dress faded her facial features and visage begins to fade away with her as the years pass.

Metaphor: "They felt like new created beings in a new created universe." I chose this metaphor because it describes the effects the fountain of youth's water had on the doctor's patrons and the feeling that the water created for them.

<span style="font-family: 'Helvetica','sans-serif';">Personification: :"...As if the flowers were reviving from a death like slumber" I chose this as my example of personification because flowers can't slumber in that being a human characteristic and so the author gives the author the flowers human characterisitics in the way almost like he gave the geusts. As they were old and near death so was the flower and both shared the same fate.

<span style="font-family: 'Helvetica','sans-serif';">Symbol: I beleive the author used the faded roses as a symbol of his deceased feyonce Sylvia. I think this because he states he would love Sylvia in old age aswell just as he still treasures the flowers in their old age. So it's almost as if the flowers represent Sylvia.

<span style="font-family: 'Helvetica','sans-serif';">Foreshadowing (give both elements): The doctor warns them before they drink the water that they should fix their mistakes. At that point i think to myself that to maek the story more interesting they must not fix their mistakes and i beleive i was led to beleive that strategically by the author. Sure enough through the course of the story the four geusts make their same mistakes over.

<span style="font-family: 'Helvetica','sans-serif';">Irony: The irony of the story is that the experiment was supposed to teach them to not make their same mistakes over but over the course of the story in fact they do the exact opposite and make the exact same mistakes they made before.

<span style="font-family: 'Helvetica','sans-serif';">Imagery: "...Some of its delicate red leaves curled modestly around its moist bosom..." I chose this example of irony because it really paints a picture in my mind of what the roses would have looked like and I think the author did an excellent job in describing it.

<span style="font-family: 'Helvetica','sans-serif';">Describe the relationships between the class theme and the story: The class theme is choices and almost no other story can relate to our class theme than this one. The relationship between this story and our theme is that the water was over used and the geusts became greedy and by choice kept drinking the water making themeselves repeat their mistakes of old which they promised themeselves not to do. So by choice they inherintly made their same mistakes over which they intendid not to do and because of their choices they received the according conciqeunce, which to me illustrates the link between the theme of choices and the storys lesson which is to make the right choices. Completion 5/5 Effort 5/5 Content 5/5 total 15/15 <span style="font-family: 'Helvetica','sans-serif';">1. The purpose of the doctors experiment was to see what effect the water would have on his test subjects. He wanted to see if the water would actually supply more youthfulness and what those effects would lead to. He wanted to see if they could change their ways because of drinking the water. <span style="font-family: 'Helvetica','sans-serif';">2. All of the doctors friends were once in love with Widow Wycherly and also have had great misfortunes in their lifetimes. Aswell as all of them being beside themesleves on occasion they are all also older and near death and as the story proves are willing to try anything to regain their youth. <span style="font-family: 'Helvetica','sans-serif';">3. The doctor would not drink the water from the fountain of youth because he wanted to use his geusts as guinea pigs if you will and see the effect that the water had on them before he tried it out for himself and as he saw the effects of the water were not that great. Once they started drinkin his geusts could not stop and they were greedy for more, they had the chance to make their mistakes again and were blinded and ended up making the same mistakes anyway. Dr. Heidegger did not want that for himself so he never drank from the water. And personally I dont think his friends minded at the time because they were so caught up in becoming youthful again that they were not concerned about their friend and in my opinion thought it would just be more water for them. <span style="font-family: 'Helvetica','sans-serif';">4. The narrator of the story is an omniscent character because he knows all the going ons of the night and verything that occured as if he was there all through the night while the experiment was taking place. He knows what happened during the night because he is all knowing and its almost as if you could say he was there and watching from a 3rd person prespective. The narrator is 100% sure of his facts because its as if he was there. <span style="font-family: 'Helvetica','sans-serif';">5. The points in the story made about youth and aging were that as you get younger you become more and more blinded by having a good time that you become less aware. In the way that the geusts as they drank cared less and less about the mistakes they were making. Another point that is made is that in life the younger you get the more vulnerbale you are. An example of this is the doctors geust doing their previous mistakes again because there were so wrapped up in enjoying the time they were having. Also that aging is a part of life that is unavoidable and shouldn't be attempted to be received or altered because in the end it just ends up worse. <span style="font-family: 'Helvetica','sans-serif';">7. No. I would not desire an anti aging serum because I beleive life is mean to be short and sweet. Life is meant to be enjoyed in the short amount of time we have it in, we should not have 800 years to live because all of our goals and hopes and dreams would be too easy to accomplish and nothing would be challenging. For example Iv'e for the longest time wanted to go back to Disneyland but im leaving my youth ages now and if I dont go back in a few years my dream will never be accomplished. B ut if I had 800 years I would have plenty of time to reach my goal and it would be too easy. In that way there is almost no point in returning to Disneyland because it takes the fun out of it and the exclusivity. Life is about enjoying the times you have while you can and enjoying the sweet moments while they last but if life were to last that long the sweet moments would become ruitine and boring making life a lot less nejoyable and challenging. Thats why I do not desire an anti aging cream. Questions completion mark 5/5 total 20/20