Mahatma Gandhi Essay Example for Free

Mahatma Gandhi Essay An acquaintance of mine is a highly paid professional lacking none of life’s luxuries. He plays the violin as a hobby and frequently plays in a public space, placing a jar in front of him so that passers-by can contribute money to show their appreciation. Other musicians play in that space, but they move on if another musician is already there. His actions suggest, to me, that he’s a struggling musician in need of financial assistance, but he’s collecting dollar bills from people who may be less fortunate financially than he. Your thoughts on the ethics of this? NAME WITHHELD, NEW YORK The reason this strikes you as problematic has to do with your view of what this man is doing. You see his actions as a request for undeserved charity. He sees his actions as a performance that has potential value. And he is correct. Part of your argument is based on the premise that your acquaintance is occupying a common space that could better serve a less fortunate peer. That contention would make sense if the guy were panhandling. But that is not what he’s doing. He’s creating art for public consumption; he is, by the strictest definition of the term, a professional musician. While not charging for this work, he’s still saying, â€Å"I believe my music has value — and if you agree, pay me whatever amount you think is justified.† He’s not expecting people to give him money just because he’s standing there. That people less wealthy than he is might be generating his revenue is irrelevant. If you go to a Metallica concert, you would have a hard time finding one person in the entire arena who’s richer than the band’s drummer. Does this mean Metallica should provide free tickets to every member of their audience who makes less money than they do? I suppose you could make the case that they should. But it wouldn’t be a very good one. THE GRAPE THIEF A man goes to the supermarket and passes a table of fruit. His eye meets a luscious bunch of seedless grapes. The man puts the grapes in a plastic bag and proceeds to eat one, before having them weighed to determine the price. Is this an unethical act? Is it stealing? Why is stealing even unethical? MAYA AZOURI, TORONTO The first two parts of your question are not particularly meaningful. Is this stealing? Yes (the man took something he didn’t pay for). Is it unethical? Yes (although the value of one grape is so minor that it impedes on the livelihood of no one). The third aspect of your query, however — why is stealing unethical — is intriguing. The answer seems so obvious that it’s almost never questioned, even though it might not be obvious at all. I approached this question by working though all the existing reasons people don’t steal on a regular basis. The first is that it’s illegal; we don’t steal things because we’ve communally agreed that there is a justified, enforceable penalty for doing so. Another reason has to do with the influence of religion; pretty much whatever religious text you accept tautologically states that stealing is wrong because â€Å"stealing is wrong.† A third reason is tied to the design of our economic framework: If people can just pilfer whatever they desire, nothing will have monetary value (in the example you cite, the man who harvests the grapes can’t earn a living if those grapes can be freely taken by whoever wants them). But let’s keep going. Let’s move into a â€Å"Mad Max† scenario: If we lived in a lawless, secular, money-free society, would stealing still be wrong? It would. And this is because the alternative would make us nervous and unhappy. Part of this problem has to do with the philosophical concept of ownership. Can objects truly be â€Å"owned† by someone, or is this just a word we use to describe an unreal proviso? The more you think about that question, the more complicated it becomes. But it ultimately doesn’t matter, because we’ve collectively decided to live as though ownership isreal. We believe our possessions are extensions of ourselves. So if stealing were an acceptable practice — if we lived in a world in which people just took whatever they wanted, simply because there was no clear argument for doing otherwise — our lives would be consumed by anxiety. We would live in constant fear and spend all our energy protecting our possessions. Traveling would become impossible, because we couldn’t go anywhere without bringing along everything we owned. People would be less motivated to create things, because they would have no way of stopping others from taking away those creations. Violence would increase exponentially. Though I’m not sure if we’re ethically obligated to make the lives of others better, we are ethically obligated not to make the lives of others worse. And that’s what stealing does: it makes it impossible for other people to pursue their own happiness. It destabilizes society. In your supermarket example, the level of instability is so negligible that there’s no impact; it’s almost as if that level of theft is built into our lives as a release valve from morality. But if you extrapolate the grape thief’s actions outward and upward, it doesn’t take long before

Biomechanical Principles In Basketball Essay Example for Free

Biomechanical Principles In Basketball Essay Basketball is a very competitive and popular sport in our society today. The NBA playoffs are going on right now and it has proved to be a very physical and intense post season. This sport takes an extreme amount of talent, coordination, and athletic ability to become a champion. There are a few biomechanical principles that are present during the game of basketball that help these athletes become great. The first biomechanical principle that is present in basketball is Newton’s Second Law of Motion. This law deal deals with acceleration in the sport. The law states, â€Å"The change in motion of an object is proportional to the force impressed; and is made in the direction of the straight line in which the force is impressed†. Newton’s Second Law is applied to the dunking aspect of basketball. When a player is about to dunk the basketball a certain amount of force must be produced to jump. Also a certain amount of acceleration must be produced to send the player upwards towards the rim. If this does not happen then the player is going to not be able to dunk the basketball. The weight of the athlete also plays a big role in this action as well. A player who is heavier is going to have a harder time jumping as high as a player with less mass. The next biomechanical principle I found that deals with basketball is another Newton law. Newton’s First Law deals with the law of inertia. This law is applied when a player is attempting a pass to his or her teammate. Newton’s First Law states that an object will stay in motion unless acted upon by another force. When a player is passing the ball to their teammate, the ball will stay in a straight line of motion unless a member of the opposing team attempts to steal the ball from its destination. Lastly frictional force is another biomechanical principle that I found present in the game of basketball. The friction between the athlete’s shoes and floor must be very high. Static friction is used when the player wants to push off from the floor to make an athletic move. The type of shoes that the athlete wears is also going to play a huge role in how affective the players’ moves are. Frictional for occurs when the player pushes down and backward on the floor. It is the force that acts forwards on the player and backwards on the floor. If it was not for frictional forces the athlete would not be able to start or stop his or her motion. In conclusion I found this biomechanical breakdown to be very interesting. Now that I have taken this course I look at sports from a greater biomechanical perspective. I feel that taking this course will really pay off as I become a professional in the field. Being able to break down sports into such a perspective is a great attribute to have as a future professional.

Importance of Financial Information to Stakeholders

Importance of Financial Information to Stakeholders Financial information contain in annual reports that the companies are published in periodically. That period is identified as reporting period. Company obligates to provide financial information to their various stakeholders during the past reporting period. Annual report is a report the company report their comprehensive transactions and events to publish and provide for required parties. There are few reasons to publish annual reports by companies generally as follows. Because companies have legal obligation between companies and the government act implemented for companies is known as company act 2007 No 7. The company acts section 150, 151, 152 and 153 has mention the obligation to prepare financial statements, content and form of financial statements, obligation to prepare group financial statements and content and form of group financial statements accordingly. Stakeholders of the company require the financial information for following reasons. To know how well the company is doing. To find company has earned more money than they spent. To get an idea about strategic and tactical plans of the management. To provide information to make decisions who make decisions about organisatoin. Avoid dissimulations and corruptions of the organisation. Through the audit process, organisations will be able to identify weaknesses of their control of procedures and corruptions occurred due to them. To obtain and fulfill the financial requirements from monitory markets via financial equipments such as shares, debentures, bank loans and etc. 1.1. Importance of Financial Information to Stakeholders However the financial information require by stakeholders of the organisation. Stakeholder of the organisation can divide into two. The bellow chart represents the stakeholders of the organisation according to the environment they belongs to. Stakeholders of the Organisation External stakeholders a). Suppliers and Trade creditors b). Government c). Consumers d). Public e). Medias Internal Stakeholders a).Directors Managers b). Shareholders c). Employees (Diagram 01) Above chart shows the deviation of stakeholders of the organisation and they require financial information due to various purposes. 1.1.1. Directors and Managers To make decisions about the organisation in different time and in different level. Directors and managers of the organisation are taking different types of decisions as follows. About new investment and project appreciation decision. About continued and discontinued operations. Dividend decisions. Diversified business decision. Winding up decision. To establish overall objectives and periodical targets. To avoid dissimulations and corruptions. To establish squired systems and strengthens control of procedures. To increase the productivity level of the organisation. 1.1.2. Shareholders To determine whether their investment will be sold, Holt or bought more shares of the organization. To decided the fairness of the returned for their investments. To determine the going concern of the organisation. To obtain wide knowledge about the organizational activities. To compare their investments and their benefits with other competitive organizations and industries. 1.1.3. Employees To know about the stability and profitability of the employer. To know about remuneration, retirement benefits, and employment opportunities are in organisation To ensure the job security with the current employer. To ensure the fairness of the salaries and wages they obtain from the organization according to their earnings. To have a clear view about other operations of the organisation. 1.1.4. Suppliers To ensure their payments of supplies will be received on due. To ensure the stability of their customers. To have knowledge about other products and their suppliers of the organisation. To compare their transaction with existing and other companies To find other competitive suppliers and their contribution towards the organisation. To find opportunities to supply more. 1.1.5. Government To collect accurate taxes and amounts from organizations on due dates. To provide government benefaction to improve their business. To obtain financial and non-financial assistance for government development projects. To ensure the organizations oversee their employees in reasonable way. To ensure the organizations compliance with government rules, regulations and acts that established by the government. 1.1.6. Consumers To have knowledge about the cost structure of the products that the organisation is producing. To ensure the stability of the organisation. To know about the organizations profitability, because profitability is a shed light to know about products impossible growth, improvements, best customer service and low price strategic implications. To know about CSR programs conducted by the organisation. 1.1.7. Public To conscious about organizations substantial contribution towards the society. To know about the opportunities to link with the organisation. To know about CSR contribution towards the country. To conscious their activities which can be affected to interest of the nature and the country. 2. Standards requirement for published Financial Statements The entire organizations specially registered in Sri Lanka need to prepare their financial statements according to the requirements of the accounting standard issued by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Sri Lanka (ICASL). ICASL is responsible for prepare and issue all accounting standard which are relative and necessary to prepare financial statements. The entire organizations need to be adopted and compliance with the accounting standard which issued by the ICASL and need to mentioned under the notes to the financial statements of their annual report. This note can identify as Note of Compliance. As an example Richard Pearis PLC has mentioned their note of compliance as follows. The Financial Statements of the Company and the Group, comprising the Balance Sheet, Income Statement, Statement of Changes in Equity, the Cash Flow Statement, Accounting Policies and Notes to the Financial Statements are prepared on the basis of the historical cost conventions, and in conformity with Generally Accepted Accounting Principles and Accounting Standards laid down by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Sri Lanka. These principles and standards have been applied consistently with that of the previous year. No adjustments are made for inflationary factors affecting these Financial Statements. There is a list of accounting standards. Its consisting with 28 LKASs and 8 SLFRSs. (See appendix 01). 2.1. LKAS 8: Accounting Policies, Changes in Accounting Estimates and Errors As per the requirement of LKAS 8 all of the companies need to mention their accounting policies estimates that they have used to prepare their financial statements during the reporting period. Because due to the change of any policy of the company will be affected retrospectively and caused to restated of comparative information unless it is impracticable to do so. Appendix 02 represents significant accounting policies and estimates that use by Richard Pearis PLC. 2.2. SLFRS 8: Operating Segments As per the above standard company may have some operating segments. Operating segment can define as follows; Operating segment is a component of an entity, It may earns revenue and incur expenses to the organisation, Operating results are revived by board of directors and Discrete financial information is available. Bellow table shows the segmental operations of Richard Pearis PLC. (Table 01) (Richard Pearis PLC, (2012). Financial Statements In: (ed), Arpico Annual Report. 2012: Sri Lanka pp.41.) 2.3. LKAS 34: Interim Financial Reporting. LKAS 34 requires preparing interim financial reports due to timely and reliable interim financial reporting improves the ability of investors, creditors, and other to understand an enterprises capacity to generate earnings and cash flows and its financial conditions and liquidity. Richard Pearis PLC prepares their interim financial reports according to the following financial colander. 2.4. SLFRS 4: Insurance Contracts This standard is applied virtually all insurance contracts that an entity issues and to reinsurance contracts that it hold. This is not applied to other assets and liabilities such as covering under the scope of LKAS 39 financial instruments recognition and measurement. Therefore company need to disclosure following information as requirement of this standard. Accounting policies for insurance contracts and related assets, liabilities, income and expenses. The recognized assets, liabilities, income, expenses and cash flows arising from insurance contracts. If the insurer is a cedant, certain additional disclosures are required. Information about assumptions that have the greatest effect on the measurement of assets, liabilities, income and expenses including, if practicable, quantified disclosures of those assumptions. The effect of changes of assumptions. Reconciliations of changes in insurance liabilities, reinsurance assets and if any related deferred acquisition cost. 2.5. SLFRS 6: Exploration for and Evaluation of Mineral Resources Under this standard affected activities such as; The search for mineral , Determination of the technical feasibility and commercial viability of extracting those resources. Following are specially excluded from the scope of the SLFRS 6; Expenditures incurred before the entity has obtained legal rights to explore in a specific area and Expenditure incurred after the technical feasibility and commercial viability of extracting a mineral resource are demonstrable. The accounting policy that entity can apply for mineral resources are; All expenditures related to exploration and evaluation assets need to incur to profit and loss and first recognition of the asset required to measure at cost, subsequently whether cost or revaluation model. Exploration and evaluation assets need represent in balance sheet, if its satisfy LKAS 16 requirements under property plants and equipments or if its satisfy LKAS 38 requirements under intangible assets. 2.6. LKAS 16: Property Plant and Equipments Property, Plants and Equipments (PPE) are tangible items that; Are held for use in the production or supply of goods or services, for rental to others, or for administrative purposes and Are expected to be use during more than one accounting period. (Mapitiya, (2011). Definitions of Standard In: Gayan (ed), LKAS 16 Property plant and Equipment. 1st ed. 2011: Sri Lanka pp.4.) The cost of assets of an item of PPE shall be recognized as assets if and only if; It is probable that future economic benefits generate with the item will flow to the entity. The cost of the item can be measured reliably. All property, plant and equipments require to represent in balance sheet under non-current assets and need to be valued whether cost or revaluation model. Every property, plant and equipment need depreciate. Depreciation can define as systematic allocation of the depreciable amount of an asset over its useful life. Depreciable Amount = Cost-Residual Value Useful life of the asset is the period the entity is expected to use. It will be vary from each and every asset. Company can use different types of depreciation methods that mentioned in the standard. They are; Straight line method. Reducing Balance method. Units of production method. 2.7. LKAS 38: Intangible Assets Intangible Assets are that identifiable non-monitory assets without any physical substance. (Jayasigha, (2011). Intangibla Assets In: Dimuthu (ed), LKAS 38. 1st ed. 2011: Sri Lanka pp.2.) There are three critical features of intangible assets. They are

Machine Translation Essay -- Computer Programs Programming Natural Lan

Machine Translation Abstract In this paper, the overview of machine translation (MT) is presented. The original idea of MT has been investigated since 1950s by many research groups and at present many MT systems have been created and developed around the world. Three approaches of MT systems: direct translation, transfer and interlingual approaches are common systems. The main idea of direct translation approach is word-by-word replacement before the transformation of the structure from source language (SL) to target language (TL). The translation is finished in only one step. The transfer approach transforms the SL to the TL through several stages with different kind of temporarily structural language. Finally, the interlingual approach stands on the idea of transform the SL to the TL through a neutral language or interlingual language (IL). Introduction Language is a tool for communication about the world. Two categories of language are programming language (PL) and natural language (NL). Programming language is a tool for communication between human and computer, whereas natural language is a tool for communication among people. In this paper, we will focus on natural language. Different nations (or regions) use different languages as a way to communicate to each other. Communication between two people who know two different languages needs an interpreter who understands both languages. Even though most people have an ability to study and understand several languages, it takes time to do so, and so far, nobody is able to understand all the languages in this world. Therefore, the idea of translating languages by a machine, so-called machine translation (MT), was promised in mid-20 century and defined as follows: "M... ... represents only the overview of MT systems and survey of MT researches. In the next paper, the details of process in MT system will be presented. References [1] W.J. Hutchins, Machine Translation: past, present and future, Ellis Horwood Limited, 1986. [2] Bonnie Dorr, Lecture note on CMSC 723: Natural Language Processing, University of Maryland, College Park, Spring 1996. [3] W. J. Hutchins and H. L. Somers, An Introduction to Machine Translation, Academic Press. [4] http://www.lti.cs.cmu.edu/Research/CMT-home.html [5] http://www.isi.edu/natural-language/nlp-at-isi.html [6] http://www.umiacs.umd.edu/labs/CLIP/mt.html [7] http://clwww.essex.ac.uk/group/ [8] http://www.ttt.org/ [9] http://www.paho.org/english/machine.htm [10] http://www.iss.nus.sg/RND/MLP/Projects/MT/mt.html [11] http://www.kmitt.ac.th/organization/Research/resp2.htm

Essay on Spiritual Poverty in James Joyces Dubliners -- Dubliners Es

Spiritual Poverty Exposed in The Dubliners  Ã‚   Joyce describes the spiritual poverty of the people of Dublin in the industrial age, with powerful images of mechanized humans and animated machines. In "After the Race" and "Counterparts" he delineates characters with appropriate portraits of human automation. Machines seize human attributes and vitality in opposition to the vacuous citizens of Ireland's capitalist city. Joyce's use of metaphorical language brings to life the despair of his country. In Winesburg, Ohio, Sherwood Anderson writes an allegorical account of the failure of mankind (1919). Although Anderson depicts rural life in the "New World," his understanding of human nature and descriptive terminology provide a valuable framework for examining Joyce's rendition of urban misery in the "Old World." "The Book of the Grotesque," the opening piece of Anderson's short story collection, animates the thoughts of a dying old man: It was his notion that the moment one of the people took one of the truths to himself, called it his truth, and tried to live his life by it, he became a grotesque and the truth he embraced became a falsehood. (24, Penguin Edition). This notion, that belief in a single truth or paradigm distorts people such that they become warped and can no longer function as human, is central to Joyce's characterizations of the Dubliners. Twentieth Century Homo sapiens can be distinguished from machines by their potential to think openly and consider myriad ideas without being paralyzed by a singular absolute. When people clutch an idea and transform it into an ideal, the separation between man and machine becomes blurred. Human automatons mechanically follow the programming of their truth. In "A... ... demands that he find an outlet for his frustration, and he beats his child to slake the strange thirst for violence of an alcoholic. When an individual seizes a single idea or paradigm they loose their humanity and assume the form of a grotesque machine. Joyce's characterizations of mechanical people and animate machines in The Dubliners follow this philosophy as presented by Sherwood Anderson, and reinforce its applicability. Dubliners are anesthetized by their truths and experience a paralysis of their human possibilities. Only dull machinery remains. This machinery is then capable of great inhumanity as it follows the scripture of its truth. Alcoholics can beat children, Capitalists can ravage countries, and Nationalists can fight wars (religious or profane) to exterminate other ethnicities. Works Cited: Joyce, James Dubliners, New York:Penguin, 1993.

Frosts Desert Places Essay -- Robert Frost Poem Poetry essays researc

Desert Places   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  In the poem Desert Places by Robert Frost, the author describes the scenery in which he came across with. It was on a winter day, and the day was turning into a night. As he went across a field, he saw that the ground was almost all covered in snow. But then he noticed a few weeds and stubble on the ground.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  On the first line, Frost talks about how the night falling fast. This is referring to how fast Frost felt concerning time, which went by fast in real life. At the end of the line, Frost added two simple words which seems to add a sense of desperation, or even a sense of hopelessness, to the whole idea of time going by fast. The words â€Å"oh, fast† seem to show that although Frost did not like it, but there was nothing he could do or change about it. Time will ...

Porphyria’s Lover Analysis

Porphyria’s Lover by Robert Browning – An Analysis The finest woks of Browning endeavor to explain the mechanics of human psychology. The motions of love, hate, passion, instinct, violence, desire, poverty, violence, and sex and sensuousness are raised from the dead in his poetry with a striking virility and some are even introduced with a remarkable brilliance. Thanks to the changes wrought by the Industrial Revolution, so many people living in such close quarters, poverty, violence, and sex became part of everyday life.The absence of family and community ties meant newfound personal independence; it also meant the loss of a social safety net. The mid-nineteenth century also saw the rapid growth of newspapers, which functioned not as the current-events journals of today but as scandal sheets, filled with stories of violence and carnality essay writer program. Hurrying pedestrians, bustling shops, and brand-new goods filled the streets, and individuals had to take in mi llions of separate perceptions a minute.The resulting over stimulation led, according to many theorists, to a sort of numbness. Notably many writers now felt that in order to provoke an emotional reaction they had to compete with the turmoils and excitements of everyday life had to shock their audience in ever more novel and sensational ways. Thus violence also became a sort of aesthetic choice for many creative people. Browning can be charged of also employing violence as a tool for evoking aesthetic brilliance but this is only at the superficial level.Because when it comes to the use of violence in his poems we find them as close to reality as reality itself. His poems show us the human passions in flesh and blood and he was not going to be one who denied the presence of violence as a potent human passion or one who presented it as something out of proportion just to create sensation. His incorporation of violence with other human passions was real just and fully understandable. M any of Browning's more disturbing poems, including â€Å"Porphyria's Lover† and â€Å"My Last Duchess,† reflect this notion.In his poem â€Å"Porphyria’s Lover† we find Browning at his best. The poem is a love poem†¦ but has a lot more to offer than just the bright sunny side of love. For Browning love was a passion, which had its destructive side as well. But this did not in anyway lessen or tarnish its reputation as being the purest emotion. In fact the destruction that mostly love brought on the characters of Browning’s poems was mostly due to other reasons like violence, may be.Porphyria's Lover also demonstrates several of Robert Browning's defining characteristics as a poet. It contains his criticism towards the beliefs and practices of self-restraint and his traditional use of dramatic monologue to expose a single character's personality, which in turn often provides an additional depth to his works in coordination with his use of unpoe tic language. Also taking into account the author's own personal experiences with his wife, the poem can also be perceived as a representation of the development of their relationship.Browning's criticism of the idea of self-restraint is evident throughout the poem â€Å"Porphyria's Lover† as it was shown in the internal debates both characters underwent as they decided whether or not they should consummate the love between them. In Robert Browning's dramatic monologue, â€Å"Porphyria's Lover,† the love-stricken frustrations of a nameless speaker end in a passionate, annihilating response to society's scrutiny towards human sensuality.Cleverly juxtaposing Porphyria's innocent femininity and her sexual transgression, Browning succeeds in displaying society's contradictory embrace of morality next to its rejection of sensual pleasure. In an ironically tranquil domestic setting, warm comfort and affection come to reveal burning emotional perversions within confining soci al structures. The speaker's violent display of passion ends not with external condemnation, but with the matter-of-fact sense of a duty fulfilled.Porphyria's lover sits next to his murdered love without any regretful aftermath or consequence; from the narrator's viewpoint, a perception wholly distorted by the forced internalization of his feelings for Porphyria, not even the ultimate hand of God can rob him the serenity of a moment free from judgment. Porphyria’s Lover is his first dramatic monologue in which we are witness to the union of two lovers. This union, as the poem reaches its end, culminates in to a unique eternal nirvana.Browning's presentation of an unreliable narrator is necessarily so, for in the ironically ordinary setting of Victorian simplicity, the speaker's insanity is justified and accounted for. With traditional notions of nature's wrath and God's omnipotence framing the start and finish of the scene, Browning employs the narration's natural poetic flow in order to heighten the blow of the unexpectedly unorthodox turn of events. The speaker's great passion comes to parallel that of God, nature, and ultimately, social expectations, thus embodying the force of the â€Å"sullen wind† (Line 2) itself.Moreover the very beginning of the poem shows a setting where the nature is presented in wrath and fury- violence marks its presence from the very onset. This is in fact a sign of forces other than ‘love’ at work. As the young goddess is shown gliding across to meet her lover, the forces of nature rage around. They represent the various odds going against the two lovers. The use of nature as an opposing force by the master poet is a splendid technique. The reason being only nature in its enormity would have been potent enough to match the magnanimous stature of love.And Browning did want to convey this message across that despite its pure magnanimity love was overshadowed and forced to change its direction because of o ther forces. And the consequences of such changes though ending up in the final victory of love did cast rather painful shadows. The first line of the poem, ‘The rain set early in tonight,’ is indicative of the fact that there was something that was not right. Something that was unusual. Something that was just not befitting the sacredness of the meeting of the two lovers.The very word ‘early’ provides that desired effect and the reader at once realizes the inevitability of fate. The word also signifies that there was a certain degree of expectation and hope; that the rain would set in late at some other expected time. The feeling of hope that things might have worked the way love wanted them to! In the next line the use of ‘sullen’ is actually the word that cements the fact that there are opposing forces working against love. Moreover the sheer potency that the force of wind represents shows the odds that the passion of love is up against.Even though the reader has no idea what the poem is going to bring but the mention of the force of wind is enough to make us realize that there is s tension from the very outset. The whole feeling is further substantiated by the word ‘vex’ in the third line. More over water symbolizes femininity and the line, ‘and did its worst to vex the lake’ shows that Porphyria was made to face the worst possible odds. Just like the wind tore across the elm tops and tried its utmost to disturb the waters†¦ so did the forces of fate tried their best to stop her from meeting her lover.Browning grants certain credibility to the narrowness of the speaker's viewpoint in that it displays the most extreme result of lifelong subservience to the world's own confining expectations. Introducing nature's unpredictability at the onset of the poem, Browning suggests the detrimental effect of an outside force and foreshadows the speaker's equally spiteful gesture: â€Å"It tore the elm-tops down for spite, / And did its worst to vex the lake: / I listened with heart fit to break† (3-5).Here the speaker muses about his apparent powerlessness to weather's force, the symbolic obstacle of the outside world that keeps Porphyria away. The next line is the point where very cleverly the poet manages to change the focus of attention of the reader to the lover without losing any of the effect that the imagery and settings has created so far†¦ ‘I listened with heart fit to break. ’ This line is indicative of another thing and that is that the lover was waiting desperately and has reached a certain degree of impatience when his beloved enters the sordid cottage.The room where the lover is waiting also signifies a certain level of pathos that is underlying throughout the poem. The next few lines are simply drenched in love and tenderness that the lover has for Porphyria in these pathos-ridden surroundings. First the use of the word ‘straightâ €™ shows the level of devotion the two lovers have. It shows how keenly and decisively the poet was waiting for her that he noticed every single detail- as how she came in straight to him and how dearly Porphyria wanted to meet him. The next line is simply fantastic in its construction as it shows the love between the two in its totality. She shut the cold out and the storm,’ The poet does not use the word of door anywhere though it is understood that she must have shut the door when she came in. But does this imply that before she came the doors were open. I would not agree to that; but rather it signifies the fact that the sheer presence of Porphyria had barged out the cold, dreariness and the ‘storm’ – the storm here carries dual meaning of one that was raging outside and the other one that was the barrage of questions twisting and swirling in the mind of the lover.Thus her arrival had brought to peace the storm outside and the storm inside; or to p ut it in more appropriate terms the lover no longer cared for the storm outside as the storm inside him had been pacified by her person. Further as the poem proceeds we realize more of the purity in the love of the two characters. Porphyria kneels down and all the grim shadows of uncertainty and confusion fade away†¦ her sheer presence had provided the lover with all the warmth he needed to bring him back to life. The line is suggestive of a motherly feeling especially as well; the word ‘warm’ marks the motherly essence in the love.The motherly feeling here is presented in the broader sense of the word, as one of selfless love. Further more the use of this word also amplifies the fact that her motherly tenderness for her lover had endowed upon the dreary cottage a home like aura. Browning is a master of senses. At his best he is like a painter who uses simple actions, simple images, and everyday feelings to represent vaulting passions and towering emotions. In the next lines that follow, we find the poet using simple images of Porphyria to display her sensuous facet or to be more exact her feminine element ‘Which done, she rose, and from her form’These lines present a beautiful scene of a young maiden getting up. Now the impression one gets from these lines are those of a young girl standing up with her slender physique, her chiseled limbs, and her proud manner in which she carries herself. All the actions that follow are multifarious in their implications. For one they show a young girl going through motions that are indeed a compliment to her physique ‘Withdrew the dripping cloak and shawl,’ A young girl taking off her cloak and shawl would be going through the motions that would amplify her beauty in a very sensuous manner.Moreover they also show that the girl is absolutely at ease with her beloved meaning there by that she felt completely at home. Furthermore the way in which she takes off her gloves and then her hat†¦ all show that she meant to spend some time and was not in a rush and that she felt comfortable with her lover. And then finally after done with all that she sat by his side. Thus Browning’s genius is evident here, as he has used simple actions to highlight two different facets that fully substantiate the feeling of love between the two characters- one of sensuousness and the other of trust and purity.Love is a strange emotion. In fact it is one of the most puzzling emotions ever. And yet it is the simplest. Considered in its entirety it is an insatiable desire for satiation, an ever increasing thirst for more and yet it gives you that little joy that is suffice enough to keep you going for a life time, it fills you with that unique pleasure which though lasts for a moment but leaves you with an ecstasy, so full and complete. ‘And, last, she sat down by my side’ These lines are followed by remarkable lines that exude the aura of such passionate and tre mendous love.From the moment she sat by his side we find a strange tinge of sensuousness amalgamate itself with the tone of love so dominating in the whole poem. Porphyria sat beside her lover just like a child snuggles beside his mother. She could feel the same calm and repose that a child feels at the side of his mother. But from here starts the strange union of sense with feelings, of adoration with desires†¦ as she reaches out to her lover and finds him not responding to her, she at once realizes that he was going through the motions of that emotion which a child encounters when after getting noticed by his mother he wants to be pampered. She put my arm about her waist, And made her smooth white shoulder bare,’ Paradoxically, the warmth of Porphyria's love appears to the narrator to be so temporary that it incites his own predominant passion. Innocently seeking to comfort her afflicted lover, Porphyria forces him to embrace her and makes â€Å"her smooth white shoul der bare† (17). Abruptly, Browning's scene of chilling weather interrupted by warm companionship becomes a picture of overt sexual expression amidst the cottage's roaring fire.The initial presentation of traditional domesticity, a comforting shelter from a raging storm, turns quickly now to unstoppable, passionate pace. These lines that follow are of one of the most critical nature as they are hinging on the two extremes of love and physicality. A little turn towards either could make a complete mess of the scene, a total collapse of the expression, and a break in the rhythm. But this juncture shows us Browning in his full splendor. This is the point that distinguishes him.Like a seasoned doctor he carries out the dissection of the emotions, bringing forth the two elements of love and physicality in complete balance and striking fusion. Porphyria’s action of putting her arms around his waist is indicative of the trust she had on him. But then the very next line is maste rfully interwoven in this aura and presents a picture of conditioned yet subtle lure. She bares her shoulder before her lover. Now the use of a bare shoulder is one of the most intelligent symbols to represent sensuousness as a bare shoulder has a very unique shape.It is ‘smooth’ and ‘white’, and moreover it has a ‘curving shape with soft flesh’ around it. Now such a physical image is enticing because it incorporates in itself strong feminine quality as the ‘curves and soft smooth flesh’ speak of the untold story about the girl†¦! Illicit sex out of wedlock presented a major concern for Victorian society; the famous Victorian â€Å"prudery† constituted only a backlash to what was in fact a popular obsession with the theme: the newspapers of the day reveled in stories about prostitutes and unwed mothers.Here, however, in â€Å"Porphyria's Lover,† sex appears as something natural, acceptable, almost wholesome: Porp hyria's girlishness and affection take prominence over any hints of immorality. The odyssey continues in this land of strong passion of love and we find the lines heightening in the physical imagery showing love in its full splendor. Porphyria made her lover lay his cheek on her bare shoulders and let her hair fall loosely around †¦This whole image speaks volumes about the balance in the motions of love that the two lovers had. To add the final touches to this fine picture of perfect love Porphyria softly re-confesses her love for the young man. Here brilliantly the poet explains the feelings of the young lady as she expressed her love for her lover †¦ by using the word ‘murmuring’, Browning is hinting to the eventual femininity that underlines her heightened feelings. She is after all a girl whose vaulting passions are tamed down by her femininity.The poet speaks out the lovers mind here as well, saying that he perceived this softness in confession to be the cooing down of her feminine self in the face of opposition from ‘pride, and vainer ties’, instead of giving herself to him in the powerful flow of her emotions. But this at no point suggests that the lover had any grievance or doubt on her love for him. Thus these lines points out the basic feminine psyche, that a girl is basically weak when it comes to facing the world but this in no way suggests that her passions are not strong enough.And moreover they also hint at the Victorian society’s respect for hollow ideals like ‘pride’. Browning's poem cannot be seen merely as a character analysis of a nameless speaker; its events frame not only the speaker's apparent insanity but the primary source of his distorted emotions. The narrator's own â€Å"struggling passion† (23) impedes his ability to think and act in a way that society views appropriate; yet, paradoxically, it is society's limited notion of what is appropriate that kindles the ultimatel y fatal fire of his passionate endeavor.The next few lines are splendid example of Browning’s genius as the lover answers his own views about the femininity of her beloved, prevailing over her passion with the realization that her passion had prevailed at least that night as she came gliding through the rain and thunder with in and without to her lover. The whole notion of his beloved coming to him despite the unfavorable odds makes him feel proud of her and the way Browning conveys this notion also reminds the reader of the typical male psyche! ‘Happy and proud; at last I knew Porphyria worshiped me†¦. The lover feels a strange sense of relief as if he has regained a sense of surety that he stills possess his possession†¦ so much typical of the male psyche. Now we enter the point of debate where the love of the lover is rattled by the conflict that starts to grow in his heart. This line of Browning is so violent as it is filled with all the conflict, anguish, fear, disturbance, which one can imagine ‘That moment she was mine, mine, fair, Perfectly pure and good:’ The line is filled with a strange amalgam of relief, achievement, anguish, and fear.The first two words ‘that moment’ have been very dexterously placed and they fulcrumize the two extremes of anguish and relief†¦ as if something that is there and one feels so relaxed and then the very next moment the heart is gripped by the fear that will it be there the next moment. So fighting it out in the middle the lover finally resolves to eternalize that moment when she is there with him. Further more importantly, â€Å"When glided in Porphyria† (60), the narrator's weakened heart has already been broken many times if not once, both by social restrictions on his love ffair, and the subsequent limitations on Porphyria's love for him. Therefore, the speaker's distance from the world outside becomes also an inability to respond to Porphyria upon her ent rance; he sits in the cottage wanting only her love, without need of explanation, so that when he is spoken to, â€Å"no voice replied† (15). Soon, Porphyria's gift of comforting warmth within the storm exacerbates his obsession to the point of insanity-driven violence. This is a very revealing stage. The violent love shines out in its total brilliance.He takes a string of her hair and winds it around his beloved’s neck three times†¦ the line is so blatantly clear; he is going to kill her†¦ he is going to kill the one thing he would be willing to die for! ‘Three times her little throat around, And strangled her. ’ The over mounting horror has been cleverly dealt with the next line in which the lover reveals his conviction of his belief that she felt no pain. First he says, ‘No pain felt she; And then as if to substantiate his view he adds I am quite sure she felt no pain. ’ This line perhaps encompasses the whole love of the loverâ⠂¬ ¦. is belief that what he desires would be the same thing desired by his beloved. Somehow the line acts as a balm to the stressful event maybe. Such is the intensity his conviction that may be the reader is even drawn to the belief that this is the right to thing to do. Or maybe this line in a way sanctifies the whole act. His strong faith in his conviction exudes a feeling of satisfaction and consummation as well on the part of the lover. But seen in another light the speaker's lust for precedence over other forces in Porphyria's life evidently leads to her fatal end.His ecstasy at her new, momentary devotion leaves him at the gate of attaining his dream, but without any sense of trajectory: â€Å"Porphyria worshipped me; surprise / Made my heart swell, and still it grew / While I debated what to do† (33-35). On the instantaneous realization of Porphyria's love, the speaker's requited passion and rational mind still stand separate to some extent. However, it is not long b efore his heated desire to keep her â€Å"Perfectly pure and good† (37) lead him to find â€Å"A thing to do† (38).The narrator's being situated above social law, if but only once, proves to be so stunningly empowering that he loses rational ability to decipher anything but a self-centered whim. The complacency of Browning's speaker in carrying out his murderous deed ironically reflects the complacency of society towards the sexual, aesthetic, and sensual pleasures of life. Exhibiting no definite regret beyond the weariness of having taken what was the only available path, the speaker points to the painlessness of his lover's necessary death: â€Å"No pain felt she; / I am quite sure she felt no pain† (41-42).However, Browning's presenting the reader with an unreliable narrator serves only to intensify the psychological effects of his unrequited love, and says nothing for the supposed convictions and yearnings of Porphyria. While Porphyria finds her way to the s peaker through the symbolically oppressive weather of the outside world, the speaker kills her upon realizing not only society's restrictions on their relationship, and maybe also his belief of Porphyria's own unwillingness to love him fully but for the present moment.Browning presents the justifiability of the murder only through the stricken eyes of the narrator; while the poet points to social confines as the cause of the speaker's insanity, he does not discount the narrator's moral responsibility for the deed. The next actions that follow this act also amplify these notions. He opened the lids of her eyes and saw them as laugh as freshly and sweetly as they were before. Such was the intensity of his love for her that he could not see any change that the violent blow of death had brought on her, but does this at nay stage justify the murder.Calmly he untied the firm hold of her tresses around her neck and passionately kissed her on her cheek. It is evident that the social barrier s had made his love hinge on madness. For him that moment is forever when Porphyria was his own. But under all these charges of insanity, the intensity of his love is undeniable as he propped his darling’s head on his shoulder and as they sat in that calm†¦ he realizes that may be this was what Porphyria wanted too†¦ and so both had the love they wanted†¦ such was the union that not even the heavens had not said a word. Thus in freezing the oment and liberating the two of them from social structures, Browning distorts the deed to a point where it appears to be a divine event foreseen even by God. In toying with Porphyria's dead body, the narrator relates not the coldness of sudden death, nor the warmth of sitting with his love, but the blazing, untouchable serenity of enacted passion: â€Å"her cheek once more / Blushed bright beneath my burning kiss† (49). In the moment of Porphyria's death, the existence of her heated love for the speaker appears to hi m to be so infallible that God cannot even intervene: â€Å"All night long we have not stirred, / And yet God has not said a word! (59-60). Browning presents the viewpoint of a speaker educated in the divine workings of an ultimate force, yet the long-stifled yearnings of an unjustly socialized man color the intensity of the situation. In Browning's dramatic monologue, God's hand of judgment shifts away from the murderer himself and onto the culture that first inhibited the speaker's rational thought. Browning's characterization of a nameless speaker in â€Å"Porphyria's Lover† forms an unexpectedly conclusive response towards the sensual numbness of Victorian society.While the suggested insanity of the speaker would traditionally indicate the narrator's unreliability in a moral sense, Browning constructs the isolated scene such that the lover's emotional internalization is not only understandable, but divinely justified. The musings and actions of this unreliable narrator s erve to illustrate the consequence of society's confines in a shockingly violent release. Through naturally flowing language, this poetic account of burning emotion within a setting of tranquil domesticity presents the all-consuming power of human sensuality in its bleakest attempt to override social structures.