Les écrivains.

My presentation will deal with the theme The writer in his time.

Some writers don't hesitate criticizes their own society through their work in expressing their way of thinking under the form of movie, story, song...

We may wonder : How do writers denounce their society through their work ?

To answer this question I have chosen to talk about an extract called the seven commandment from Animal Farm written by George Orwell, an extract of Oliver twist written by Charles dickens and an extract who end up the book from The Great Gatsby written by F. Scott Fitzgerald which is my personal document.

My first document is an extract called the seven commandments from Anmal farm wrote by George orwell. In this text the author use animal to criticize his society. All the animals are ina farm but the pigs take an advantage on the others and write  the seven commandments .

Old Major’s death represents Lenin’s death, which left Stalin (who’s called Napoleon) and Trotsky (Snowball) to lead countries. The pigs  said that they are superior by nature—or at least by tradition—when it comes to intelligence.  Their idea was to etablish a different society a sort of idealistic and egalitarian.

 Georges orwell wanted to criticize how totalitarism take place and how bad is it.

I will now move on to my second document which is an extract from oliver twist written by Charles dickens. In this etract the orphaned Oliver twist has just graduated from the parish house to the work house because he has become nine years old.

A work house was a place where those unable (like orphan or people who don’t have enough money) to support themselves were offered accommodation and employment.

Life in a workhouse was intended to be harsh and that this point of view that Charles dickens wanted to show us. They didn’t have enough food, they slept pn the floor or very badly And they have to work for hours.

The author through his protagonist denounces by sarcasm the conditions in english work houses of his period and the genrally deplorable reatment of the poor.

The last document I have chosen is a text taken from the novel The Great Gatsby written by Francis Scott Fitzgerald in 1925. It’s my relevant document.

The Great Gatsby is set in New York City during the Prohibition era. Prohibition in the United States was a nationwide constitutional ban on the production, importation, transportation and sale of alcoholic beverages that remained in place from 1920 to 1933

Gatsby’s parties are typical for this time period. These parties reflects the writer's feelings about the upper class : admiration, jealousy and moral judgment. In the extract we can see how America's new world three centuries ago was corrupted by the insatiable quest for profit. In this context, Gatsby represents both the agent of this corruption and the persistence of the American dream.

This novel is a reflection of Fitsegerald’s own life and this is why we can understand that he criticizes his own society