HAPPINESS FOUND IN LITERATURE

A detailed Summary of HAPPINESS FOUND IN LITERATURE

We all have goals in our lives, things we strive for and desire to achieve. But why do we set these goals? The reason we set goals for ourselves and the reason we are constantly trying to make life better is simply to achieve happiness. Happiness is something we all want in our lives and it is something all people need. At times happiness is not such an easy thing to obtain, we find ourselves depressed and unhappy with life. What is it that will bring us out of the "dumps" and back in the swing of things? There is not one true answer to these questions in fact there is probably more than one answer. Whatever the answer may or may not be it is only found within ourselves. Throughout literature many writers have tried to define what happiness is in stories and poems. Through the experiences the authors talk about in their writings, we gain a sense of how happiness may be achieved.

Success is one goal all people strive for to make them happy. Along with success come wealth, power and maybe even fame. But does money and power truly make a person happy? In the poem "Richard Corey" the author Edwin Arlington Robinson writes how money and wealth does not bring true happiness The poem describes how ad

Norton Anthology, World Masterpieces Vol. 2. Ed. Maynard Mack. New York. W.W.

Throughout literature writers have defined happiness as well as give us answers as to where we may or may not find it. All definitions and answers given to us by writers have one thing in common and that is the differences they share. Each writer and each work convey a different message about happiness. This proves the point that happiness is only and always found within us. We can not take someone else's theory of happiness, it can not be taught to us, it isn't a

In Poems That Lift The Soul. Ed. Jack M. Lyon. Salt Lake City: Desert Book Company, 1998. 132

their women and children and a keg of beer and an

. It appears that Dickinson is conveying the message that happiness is not reachable, unless you can live the life of a stone. Life is full of worries and fears that we encounter everyday, but happiness is still obtainable. Dickinson is also saying that happiness is found in simplicity and if we can achieve simplicity in life, along will come happiness.

simple thing and it can not be bought. Only through our goals and what we desire in life can we learn what it is that will make us happy.

Voltaire's Candide a black comedy written sometime around 1759 is a prime example of a writer's opinion on happiness. Candide is actually another word for optimism, which describes the character perfectly. Candide believes in a universal order he was taught by his mentor Pangloss who said "...that things cannot be otherwise than they are, for since everything

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Approximate Word count = 1049
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English