Free Essays on Daddy

The novel Daddy is a historical fiction/thriller takes place during World War II. Because this book is more of a thriller than a historical novel, the author’s purpose in writing this book is to entertain the reader rather than educate them, although he ended up doing so in the process. Hans Thomas von Gall is an elderly German banker, who has fooled the Nazi’s. He has hidden the sum of 724 million marcs (approx. 431 million dollars) of German investor’s money, some Jewish, out of the country before the start of World War II. After being captured and tortured by the Nazi’s for ten hours, he committed suicide by jumping out of a window, but not before writing down 724 false names and access codes. Heydrich, leader of the operation, has reason to believe that Thomas Von Gall is not the only one who knew the secret codes. He believes that Thomas Von Gall’s beautiful mysterious granddaughter also holds the secret. Heydrich enlists the help of two different types of man hunters to help him find her. His friend, Professor Gregor Laemmle, who is a cunning yet odd homosexual, and a vicious, boneheaded nazi, named Jurgen Hess who is willing to kill anything that moves. Maria Webber was able to elude them expertly. Although they were not able to find her, Laemmle discovered that she has an eleven-year-old son. His name is Thomas and he is a kid genius, (the nazi’s do not know this). He is hiding in the countryside of Basque, while being protected by expert Spaniard bodyguards. Laemmle and Hess make attempts to capture Thomas in hopes of using him as bait to reach his mother, but Thomas engages Laemmle in a battle of brains running around all over the south of France. Thomas is a grown man in a little boy’s body and refuses to trust anybody. This game of cat and mouse takes the form of a giant game of chess in his head, where he sacrifices loved ones to avoid being captured. At one point in this story, Thomas is ca... Free Essays on Daddy Free Essays on Daddy Sylvia Plath’s 1965 poem â€Å"Daddy† deals mostly with the concepts of deception and betrayal. The pain and fear that her father has inflicted upon her causes the betrayal that she feels from him. She blames her feelings of betrayal on her father. She acts out her feelings through angry acts and rage towards her father. Plath begins the poem discussing her feelings of betrayal with the statement, â€Å"You did not do, you did not do,† (504). As stated by M. D. Uroff, â€Å"But if Daddy will not do, neither will he not not do, and we find this speaker [Plath] forcing herself to deal with a situation that she finds unacceptable.† Plath was clearly afraid of her father; she states in the poem, â€Å"Barely daring to breath or Achoo,† (504) and â€Å"I have always been afraid of you,† (505). She also shows that fear of him by her inability to communicate with him, â€Å"I could never talk to you,† (504). Robert Boyer’s explains her fear by stating, â€Å"The internal repression which prevented her from communicating with her father becomes simultaneously the more general barriers to communication, which traditionally have kept victims and oppressors apart.† As a child Plath sees her father as a god; â€Å"A bag full of God,† (504). â€Å"Not God but a swastika,† (505) shows her transitioning him from a Godly figure into a Natzi. She refers to him as â€Å"Panzer man† (505) and also states, â€Å"With your Luftwaffe,† (505). â€Å"The father’s precipitous fall from a deity to evil incarnate sets up the poems denouement,† states Jordon Leondropoulos. Not only does she call him a â€Å"Natzi,† but a â€Å"brute,† â€Å"fascist,† â€Å"devil,† and a â€Å"vampire.† â€Å"The speaker [Plath] here can categorize and manipulate her feelings in name calling,† explains U. D. Uroff. She uses the name-calling to mask her pain caused by the betrayal of her father. While she calls her father a â€Å"Natzi,† she refers to herself as a â€Å"Jew;†... Free Essays on Daddy The novel Daddy is a historical fiction/thriller takes place during World War II. Because this book is more of a thriller than a historical novel, the author’s purpose in writing this book is to entertain the reader rather than educate them, although he ended up doing so in the process. Hans Thomas von Gall is an elderly German banker, who has fooled the Nazi’s. He has hidden the sum of 724 million marcs (approx. 431 million dollars) of German investor’s money, some Jewish, out of the country before the start of World War II. After being captured and tortured by the Nazi’s for ten hours, he committed suicide by jumping out of a window, but not before writing down 724 false names and access codes. Heydrich, leader of the operation, has reason to believe that Thomas Von Gall is not the only one who knew the secret codes. He believes that Thomas Von Gall’s beautiful mysterious granddaughter also holds the secret. Heydrich enlists the help of two different types of man hunters to help him find her. His friend, Professor Gregor Laemmle, who is a cunning yet odd homosexual, and a vicious, boneheaded nazi, named Jurgen Hess who is willing to kill anything that moves. Maria Webber was able to elude them expertly. Although they were not able to find her, Laemmle discovered that she has an eleven-year-old son. His name is Thomas and he is a kid genius, (the nazi’s do not know this). He is hiding in the countryside of Basque, while being protected by expert Spaniard bodyguards. Laemmle and Hess make attempts to capture Thomas in hopes of using him as bait to reach his mother, but Thomas engages Laemmle in a battle of brains running around all over the south of France. Thomas is a grown man in a little boy’s body and refuses to trust anybody. This game of cat and mouse takes the form of a giant game of chess in his head, where he sacrifices loved ones to avoid being captured. At one point in this story, Thomas is ca...

Differences Between Explanatory and Response Variables

Differences Between Explanatory and Response Variables One of the many ways that variables in statistics can be classified is to consider the differences between explanatory and response variables. Although these variables are related, there are important distinctions between them. After defining these types of variables, we will see that the correct identification of these variables has a direct influence on other aspects of statistics, such as the construction of a scatterplot and the slope of a regression line. Definitions of Explanatory and Response We begin by looking at the definitions of these types of variables. A response variable is a particular quantity that we ask a question about in our study. An explanatory variable is any factor that can influence the response variable. While there can be many explanatory variables, we will primarily concern ourselves with a single explanatory variable. A response variable may not be present in a study. The naming of this type of variable depends upon the questions that are being asked by a researcher. The conducting of an observational study would be an example of an instance when there is not a response variable. An experiment will have a response variable. The careful design of an experiment tries to establish that the changes in a response variable are directly caused by changes in the explanatory variables. Example One To explore these concepts we will examine a few examples. For the first example, suppose that a researcher is interested in studying the mood and attitudes of a group of first-year college students. All first-year students are given a series of questions. These questions are designed to assess the degree of homesickness of a student. Students also indicate on the survey how far their college is from home. One researcher who examines this data may just be interested in the types of student responses.  Perhaps the reason for this is to have an overall sense about the composition of a new freshman. In this case, there is not a response variable. This is because no one is seeing if the value of one variable influences the value of another. Another researcher could use the same data to attempt to answer if students who came from further away had a greater degree of homesickness. In this case, the data pertaining to the homesickness questions are the values of a response variable, and the data that indicates the distance from home forms the explanatory variable. Example Two For the second example we might be curious if number of hours spent doing homework has an effect on the grade a student earns on an exam. In this case, because we are showing that the value of one variable changes the value of another, there is an explanatory and a response variable. The number of hours studied is the explanatory variable and the score on the test is the response variable. Scatterplots and Variables When we are working with paired quantitative data, it is appropriate to use a scatterplot. The purpose of this kind of graph is to demonstrate relationships and trends within the paired data. We do not need to have both an explanatory and response variable. If this is the case, then either variable can plotted along either axis. However, in the event that there is a response and explanatory variable, then the explanatory variable is always plotted along the x or horizontal axis of a Cartesian coordinate system. The response variable is then plotted along the y axis. Independent and Dependent The distinction between explanatory and response variables is similar to another classification. Sometimes we refer to variables as being independent or dependent. The value of a dependent variable relies upon that of an independent variable. Thus a response variable corresponds to a dependent variable while an explanatory variable corresponds to an independent variable. This terminology is typically not used in statistics because the explanatory variable is not truly independent. Instead the variable only takes on the values that are observed. We may have no control over the values of an explanatory variable.