Eleven Seconds: Autobiography of Travis Roy †Book Report Essay

Travis Roy, a former collegiate hockey player, wrote his tragic story in a book called Eleven Seconds. Well, he didn’t physically write it down himself; he dictated the story to E.M. Swift, who organized Travis’ words into the book. This is because Travis Roy is a quadriplegic. After a mere eleven seconds of Travis’ first college hockey game, his dreams of the NHL were shattered forever. Travis Roy’s autobiography, Eleven Seconds, has three parts. In the first part, Travis tells about his childhood and his high school career. He reminisces about the fun he had playing little league hockey and how he would help out at the rinks that his father managed. The next part in the story is the climax. Travis describes his feelings and emotions leading up to game-time of his first college hockey game. He is extremely excited to be playing the sport he loves at such a high level of competition, but within eleven seconds, everything is stripped away from Travis. He tries to check an opponent into the boards, but misses and hits the glass awkwardly. At this point it is all over. Travis Roy is paralyzed from the neck down: a quadriplegic. For the remainder of the story, Travis describes the motionless life that has been forced upon him. He tells about the pain of never being able to play hockey, or even live a normal life again. Travis explains the emotional battle his whole family was forced into and also states his case for stem cell research. Eleven Seconds is a very well written book in my opinion. It is easy to read and has a friendly tone. I’m happy to have read the book because it made me realized that I should appreciate the little things in life that I take for granted every day. What if I woke up one day and couldn’t move my arms or my legs? That is the way Travis Roy will wake up every day for the rest of his life. I wonder if I would be able to cope with a situation like Travis’. I don’t think I would be mentally and emotionally strong enough. The book, Eleven Seconds, made me look at life from a different perspective. I didn’t feel like I was reading about just some random guy who had an unfortunate incident, but a person that is similar to me in many ways. Travis had hopes and dreams just like I do. Therefore, I was able to relate to Travis’ burning desire to follow through with his passion and it really saddened me  to read about the way he became a quadriplegic, doi ng the very thing that he loved. I would recommend Eleven Seconds to anyone who thinks their problems are too big to handle. The book is a good reminder that we should be thankful for everything we are able to do in our lives. Any time we have a meal, take a shower, brush our teeth, or get dressed, we are doing more than Travis can do on his own. I think the story is also a great motivator to live every day to the fullest. People who like hockey would probably be interested in Travis’ story as well. Travis Roy comes off as a warm and loving person, despite his terrible injury, so his book Eleven Seconds should be easy for most anyone to read. The only hard part might be keeping one’s tears off of the pages.

Contribution of Bette Davis as an Actor and Her Role as a Female in her Time Period Essay

Larger than life she was – with a career spanning six decades, including Broadway, film and the small screen; having made more than a hundred films and receiving ten Best Actress nominations and being the first woman to be honored with the American Film Institute’s Lifetime Achievement Award– and equally larger in death, was Bette Davis. Fearless, ambitious and daring, her strong-mindedness won her a few friends and many enemies in her lifetime, but continues to draw audiences to her appeal and aspiring actresses everywhere look up to her as a role-model. In this report, I will focus on Bette Davis’s contribution as an actor and her role as a female icon of her time. Contribution of Bette Davis as an Actor and Her Role as a Female in her Time Period One of the most talented and the biggest stars of the thirties was Bette Davis. Her strong personality off-screen often found its way into the characters she played. She made her wide range of roles realistic, from a sixty-year old queen in The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex to a young beauty in Jezebal. Olivia de Havilland called Bette Davis â€Å"a basically benevolent volcano. † Jack Warner described her as â€Å"an explosive little girl with a sharp left. † Bette ruffled a few feathers in her career, but looking back, any trouble she caused was usually for the betterment of her films rather than from her merely playing the prima donna. Off-screen, her life was filled with as much drama as any role she played, having weathered a broken home, four failed marriages, literary revenge brought forth by her daughter and frail health in her later years (Bubbeo, 2001, p. 43 – 51). In this report, I will highlight the important contributions as well as this screen diva’s achievements in a male-dominated industry, and how her success paved the way for many other women, who emulated her example to carve a niche for themselves in the traditionally male-dominant world. Bette Davis once joked that her epitaph should read, â€Å"Here lies Ruth Elizabeth Davis – She did it the hard way† (Ware, 1993, p. 180). An actress first and a star second – and in no way a conventional beauty- she invented a jagged, sincere, many-sided style of film acting that continues to reverberate through the generations. At her best, Bette Davis put complicated, conflicted women on the screen at a time when most screen characters were still melodramatic simplifications. A small (five foot three) blue-eyed blonde, she was unfazed by the cant of her era that considered screen acting inferior to acting on the stage. An actress first and a star second – and in no way a conventional beauty- she invented a jagged, sincere, many-sided style of film acting that continues to reverberate through the generations. Born Ruth Elizabeth Davis in Lowell, Massachusetts, she was the elder of two daughters of Harlow Morrell Davis, a patent lawyer from a Yankee family of long standing, and Ruth Favor, a homemaker of French Huguenot descent. The couple, incompatible almost from the start, divorced when Bette was ten. As a result, she and her younger sister, Barbara, were educated in a patchwork of public and private schools in New York, New Jersey and Massachusetts- wherever Ruth Davis could find work as a professional photographer. Popular and active as child, Betty changed the spelling of her name in imitation of Balzac’s La Cousine Bette and finally graduated from Cushing Academy, a boarding school in Ashburnham, Massachusetts, in 1926. Broadway By 1927, a nineteen-year-old Bette Davis was attending the John Murray Anderson-Robert Milton School of Theatre and Dance in New York. Bette was temperamentally restless and eager to earn a living. She left school before her first year was over, rushing headlong into professional engagements on and off Broadway on tour, and with numerous stock companies, among them George Cukor’s repertory theatre in Rochester, New York. Bette Davis in Hollywood After opening on Broadway in Solid South (1930), she received her first offer from a Hollywood film studio. With a few exceptions – most notably Cabin in the Cotton (1932) – Davis’s first years in Hollywood produced nothing extraordinary. Then, in 1934, after a long campaign, she convinced Warners to loan her to RKO, an American film production and distribution company, to play the sociopathic cockney Mildred Rogers in their adaption of Of Human Bondage, and got her first star-making notices. The next year she won an Oscar for Best Actress for Dangerous (1935), in which she played an alcoholic actress patterned on the Broadway legend Jeanne Eagels. Contribution to the Media Industry In 1936, Warners had to sue to prevent her from violating her contract and making a film in England for the Italian producer Ludovico Toeplitz. When she returned to Warners, however, she was treated generously, starring next in Jezebel (1938), a finely wrought study of the anger and ambivalence of a southern belle. The performance brought her a second Oscar, as best actress of 1938. The next year she played the role that she sometimes referred to as her favorite, Judith Traherne, the mortally ill heroine of Dark Victory (1939). After Dark Victory, Bette Davis starred in an unbroken string of sixteen box-office successes, playing everything from genteel novelists to murderous housewives to self-hateful spinsters to a sexagenarian Queen Elizabeth I. her most memorable films from this remarkably productive period included The Old Maid (1939), The Little Foxes (1941), Now, Voyager (1942), Watch on the Rhine (1943), and The Corn is Green (1945). In 1932, she married her high school sweetheart, Harmon Nelson, a freelance musician. But the marriage was as rocky as her parent’s and in 1938 ended in a divorce. She married again in 1940, to New England hotelier Arthur Farnsworth; he died in 1943 from a skull fracture. The war years were Bette Davis’s prime, and not only on screen. In 1941 she became the first woman president of the Academy of Motion picture of Arts and Sciences, quitting when she realized she was little more than a figurehead. In 1942, with John Garfield, she co-founded the Hollywood Canteen. Totally committed to her role as the organizations president, she danced, ate, and clowned almost nightly with the servicemen passing through Los Angeles. After the war, her career began to sink, with terrible films such as Beyond the Forest (1949). Released from her Warners contract, she freelanced. At 42, she believed her career was over, until her performance in All about Eve (1950), where she played an explosive theatrical prima donna who was terrified of aging. For her performance as Margo Channing, New York Film Critics named her the year’s best actress. In 1962, no longer a box-office name, she took a role in an offbeat, low-budget psychological thriller, What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? , poignantly playing a homicidally demented middle aged former child star. The film was a megahit, brining Davis her tenth, and, final, Oscar nomination. In the new era of made for TV films and miniseries, worthwhile roles came to her, including a part as a pathetic recluse in Strangers (1979), which won her a best actress Emmy. In 1977, the American Film Institute bestowed on her its Life Achievement Award; she was the first woman to receive it. Almost more prominent than she had been in her zenith, she now found herself hailed by a new generation of film critics who were seeing her classic films for the first time, and new stars praised her warmly as an influence and a role model. In 1983, she suffered breast cancer and a stroke. Despite permanent damage to her speech and gait, she continued making films. In 1985, Davis was shattered when her daughter B. D. Hyman, published a contemptuous family memoir, My Mother’s Keeper. She feebly tried to respond in her own book, This ‘n That (1987). Then looking dismayingly frail, she played a scrappy octogenarian in The Whales of August (1987), a sensitive study of old age. She died of cancer in Paris in 1989, having gone to Europe to accept an award at a Spanish film festival. Eighty-one at the time of her death, she left behind on film a brilliant constellation of contrasting and vibrant figures, the legacy of sixty years of hard work and dedication to what she liked to call total realism on the screen. Bette Davis- the Independent Female Bette Davis, outspoken, direct, and totally concentrated on her career, was a shrewd businessperson who expected good scripts and demanded the best in production support and working conditions. She was one of the few actresses able to take on unsympathetic roles, such as Mildred in Of Human Bondage (1934) and Julie Marsden in Jezebel (1938) (Ware, 1993, p. 180). Being a fighter, Bette was no stranger to bad times, and she knew how to keep going even when everything seemed to be against her. In 1962, when work became scarce, Bette took out an advertisement in Variety and other trade papers: MOTHER OF THREE – 10, 11 & 15 – DIVORCEE. AMERICAN. THIRTY YEARS EXPERIENCE AS AN ACTRESS IN MOTION PICTURES. MOBILE STILL AND MORE AFFABLE THAN RUMOR WOULD HAVE IT. WANTS STEADY EMPLOYMENT IN HOLLYWOOD (HAS HAD BROADWAY. ) Bette Davis, c/o Martin Baum, G. A. C. REFERENCES UPON REQUEST This was Davis at her best, and demonstrated her no-nonsense approach to her career and life in general. She knew that only she could improve her situation; no one else would do it for her (Moseley, 1989, p. 148). She was an over-achiever and the advertisement is who she was : bold, fearless and focused – some would say obsessed about her career. She wouldn’t take no for an answer and got her way more often than not in the ruthless world of Hollywood politics. She was a success story, due to her single-minded purpose of succeeding. The highly competitive Davis explained, â€Å"I always had the will to win. I felt it baking cookies. They had to be the best cookies anyone baked. † She was demanding, temperamental, and self-indulgent. By the early 1940s, she had become the First Land of the Screen (Parish, 2007, p. 49). Bette Davis married four times, but claimed her matrimonial choices had been ill-considered because her mates were unable to stand up to her or, as an alternative, congenially sank into the background as Mr. Davis. Ironically, while she failed on the matrimonial front, she found great success as a woman in a man’s world. She is thought to be the first- and finest- presentation of an independent woman on celluloid (Brabazon, 2002, p. 85). ? Conclusion Contemporary feminism needs a Bette Davis, a firebrand woman who is tough, resolute, and passionate. She worked hard, thought deeply and spoke out while post-war masculinity congealed around her (Brabazon, 2002, p. 85). Almost to the day she died, Bette never stopped working. Work was her life and her passion and she embraced it like no other actress before or since. In 1972 Bette said, â€Å"I’ll never make the mistake of saying I’m retired. You do that and you’re finished. You just have to make sure you play older and older parts. Hell, I could do a million of those character roles. But I’m stubborn about playing the lead. I’d like to go out with my name above the title. † She kept her word. Works Cited Brabazon, T. (2002). Ladies who Lunge: Celebrating Difficult Women. Sydney: UNSW Press. Bubbeo, D. (2001). The Women of Warner Brothers: The Lives and Careers of 15 Leading Ladies : with Filmographies for each. Jefferson, N. C. : McFarland. Moseley, R. (1989). Bette Davis: An Intimate Memoir. New York: D. I. Fine. Parish, J. R. (2007). The Hollywood Book of Extravagance: The Totally Infamous, Mostly Disastrous, and Always Compelling Excesses of America’s Film and TV idols. Hoboken, N. J. : John Wiley. Ware, S. , & Braukman, S. L. (2004). Notable American Women: A Biographical Dictionary Completing the Twentieth Century. Cambridge, Mass: Belknap Press. Ware, S. (1993). Still Missing: Amelia Earhart and the Search for Modern Feminism. New York: W. W. Norton.

The Love for American Football

Someone who is from another country like me, may believe that life in the United States is very diverse from life anywhere else. Countless people from other countries have a completely distorted image of how we may live there in America and the mentalities thatthey all posess. Not all of Americans are spoiled, overweight, or are obsessed with football. All of them are completely different for the most part, and are actually concerned about what is occurring in the world today.However, I do believe I can say that most Americans are proud to be here, and proud to represent the UNITED States, and that pride and love is shared by everyone, kind of like a big family. Just like other countries, there are things that the people tend to be attracted to more than another group of people would. For example, in Mexico, soccer is huge, and almost everyone there is crazy about it, but here in the United States, soccer doesn’t hold near as many fans.Since one doesn’t really know a lo t about the life in the United States, and the things all Americans seem to enjoy, I would like to enlighten you to the one thing that I believe is totally ‘American’. And of coarse, I would have to say its football. Now, no all of Americans enjoy the hazardous sport, but about nine out of ten of them absolutely adore it(including myseld). The competition and the thrill that you get from watching breathtaking game, will most likely have you sitting at the edge of your seat, not wanting to miss a minute of whar you are seeing take place on the television screen.The runs, the cheers, the interceptions, the touchdowns, and most of all the victory when it’s all over is what I believe makes football what is it today in the society of Americans. If you were to meet another Amrican, I can almost guarantee that the person has a favorite football team that they support with all of theit hearts. Football is everywhere: city leages, college teams, professional teams, and

Benefits Of Becoming A Famous Sports Person Marketing Essay

Benefits Of Becoming A Famous Sports Person Marketing Essay In our vast world today, sport has become a rapid growing industry which most people regard it as a form on entertainment in their daily life. We live in an urban age where technology is so advance which enables us to watch live broadcasts of any sports we enjoy watching through various sports channels such as ESPN which cater to any sport fanatics needs. Firstly, people enjoy watching and playing sports as they wish to pursue their dreams in becoming a famous sportsperson one day. These enthusiastic sportspeople must persevere with full determination and concentration in excelling in their performance at the sport they have chosen. In my opinion, becoming a famous sportsperson brings many benefits to ones life as an individual would be able to reap special rewards, a countless sum of income, popularity amongst his fans, living an exclusive lifestyle and the ability to give training methods to inspiring athletes in the sports world. 2.0 2.1 – Rewards â€Å"I’ve won th e competition!† It is every famous sports person’s dream to be able to say this phrase. It is undeniable that winning in competition are crucial, whether for a famous sports person or an ordinary sports person. Everyone wants to perform well in their competition; the question is, what causes famous sports person work so hard for it? In my opinion, they want to get rewards from branded companies and government. 2.1.1 – Sponsorship From Branded Companies A famous sports person usually able to get sponsorships from branded companies. This is because they work really hard and almost win every competition. Examples of branded companies are Nike, Adidas, Puma, Yonex, Carlton and Reebok. Sports persons need a huge amount of money to carry out their daily training, buy their sports equipments and accessories. Without the sponsorships, they will face a lot of obstacles in their sports life. Our famous sports persons – Olympic gold medalist and Jamaican Sprinter Usa in Bolt, they had just renewed their sponsorship arrangement with Puma until the end of 2013 lately. So Puma became the official supplier of training, performance, footwear and lifestyle apparel for Usain Bolt. Now, Usain Bolt can focus fully in his career without worries. 2.1.2 – Government Incentive Besides, government incentive will be provided to the famous sports persons. This is because they have the responsibilities to take part in local, international and global tournaments. For instance, Olympic silver medallist Lee Chong Wei is to be made a Datuk by the Penang Government. In the other hand, Malaysia Government also rewarded a cheque of RM300000 for winning the silver medal at the Olympic Games and a mock cheque for RM3000 as the pension reward. The pension payments are for life. In short, the famous sports persons definitely will get sponsorships from branded companies and government incentive as long as they maintain their excellent performances. Sports persons ach ieve iconic status instantly with awesome performance and hence are selected by top brands for endorsing their goods. 2.2 – Income Sports, apart from being a good way of testing an athlete’s expertise and skill, are also big money. Today, sports persons achieve iconic status immediately with excellent performance and hence are selected by top branded companies for endorsing their goods. Apart from prize money and salaries, this is also where many famous athletes make most of their money from. This has become a recent occurrence of paying millions of dollars to athletes as income, which makes most famous athletes filthy rich.

The Impacts of Digital Technologies on the Political Economy of the Essay

The Impacts of Digital Technologies on the Political Economy of the United States Movie Industry - Essay Example On the other hand, new movies by established film producers draw attention even before they are officially released to the market. As a result, the independent film makers have resorted to digital technologies and social networking sites to promote and distribute their movies. Owing to the current situation, this research paper investigates the benefits and challenges which are experienced by independent film producers whenever they are using the latest digital technologies to promote and distribute their films to their fans. The paper would emphasize the impacts of digital revolution on the independent filmmakers’ ability to reach international consumers. The role of technology in the film industry cannot be ignored. Technology changed the operations and activities of the film industry in a major way, altering the way people interacted, the nature of the operations, and the marketing strategies for the films. However, the specific area of film affected has always been debatable with researchers focusing on the social aspects of the technological effects. Focus on the political aspect of the film industry environment is important as it helps create even more insights for the people. Kim et al 194 states that the digital technologies in the United States of America have enhanced communication and modernization in most of the sectors. In the film industry, the digital technology has yielded both positive and negative results in equal measure. Digital technologies have reduced the live shows for the films. Most of the films are bought on digital media instead of people attending the live shows (Kim et al 194). According to Kim et al 194, the purchase of the films on digital media is enhanced by a number of factors. First, the ability to produce digital storages like hard drives has enhanced the portability of the films making people to buy and use them in home appliances. More so, the development of digital transmission in the United States of America has

The Cold War Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 1

The Cold War - Essay Example The thrust of his call for unity was the English speaking world and the Commonwealth. The US being the biggest power in the world, and English speaking, was a natural ally that he wanted to woo. He indirectly told his American audience that support for communism in many countries was a direct threat to US itself whose influence over the â€Å"free† world would diminish as a result. Churchill expressed his fear that the emerging polarization between communist and democratic blocs of the world may result in war. He asserted that the Russians, even if they didn’t like war themselves, desired â€Å"indefinite expansion of their power and ideals† and enjoyed â€Å"fruits of war† (Churchill). Indirectly mentioning sea, land and air capabilities of the military, he advised that it was through military strength that a sense of security would prevail. This strength could also provide the negotiation leverage to find a mutually agreeable formula with Russians under the umbrella of United Nations Organizations. Joseph Stalin, in an interview to Pravda some time later, responded to Churchill. At the outset, he termed the idea of a brewing war ludicrous and a product of the mind of someone â€Å"who lost one’s reason† (Stalin). Picking up cleverly on Churchill’s call for the English speaking world to unite, Stalin termed it as an attempt to create a racial divide, linguistic superiority and a holier-than-thou approach to achieve his goals of fomenting an imaginary war. He compared Churchill’s speech with Hitler’s policies who believed in the superiority of those who spoke the German language. Stalin recalled in detail the sacrifices Soviet Union had made during the world war and termed them higher than any other country involved in the war. In doing so, he tried to bring home the point that Russia was committed to peace in the world

Application of National Labor Relations Act Essay

Application of National Labor Relations Act - Essay Example Consequently, the Act is aimed at encouraging collective bargain and curtailing the possibility of the private sector management and labor practices harming business, workers and consequently harming the economy of the United States. In the case study, the activities pursued by the Chief Executive officer and by the Board of Directors in terminating the employment contract of Kayte Clark harms her welfare as an employee and also of the business since she holds the position of deputy vice president of DanskinZ Inc. In affirmation Section 1[ §151.] of the Act avows that inequality in a bargain between organizing corporate bodies of employers and employees who lack the freedom of association violates free flow of commerce and thus serves as a viable litigation as pertains to NLRA. This is evident in the case study since the CEO and the BOD used their organized structure by their legal counsel terminating Kayte Clarks’ employment in her quest to enable the employees to be member s of a union. This is a violation against the right of association of employees  Sec. 7 [ § 157.] and in the right of Kayte Clarks exercising her powers as the vice president of the organization (NLRA 29 U.S.C.  §Ã‚ § 151-169). Employment Retirement Income Security Act is another federal law that confers powers to Kayte Clark filing a claim for compensation against her employers. ERISA asserts that any employee should get his or her full social security contribution upon retirement. However, this is a clause that was violated by the legal counsel by giving Kayte Clark a retirement package that does not pay her social security till 59 years yet her employment is unfairly terminated at 53years prior to her retirement age. Moreover, Title VII is designed to protect employees from employers who have ill intentions as pertains to their contractual obligations.