Pain for Pleasure Endured Essay -- Literature Pain Pleasure Essays

Pain for Pleasure EnduredThe intricate and complex nature of the relationship between annoying sensation and pleasure has been a source of feud and diversity of opinion for people of all eras. Shakespeares character Othello claims that tis happiness to die. (Act 5 ln 295). In his situation the painful experience of dying is what he considers pleasure, he later verifies his belief in his statement by choosing to stab himself. Sir Philip Sidney, in his poem Astrophil and Stella states that in my woes for thee thou art my joy (108 ln 14). Astrophil finds his pleasure in the pain of his unrequited love for Stella. The complex relationship between pleasure and pain is reflected in the twenty-first century in addition to the Renaissance era. The Amish people opt to live in a world without modern conveniences and pleasures as they are acknowledged in the twentieth-first century. People who are taught from a very little age the dangers and health hazards contained in smoking continue an d Tobacco use remains the leading preventable cause of death in the United States, create more than 400,000 deaths each year and resulting in an annual cost of more than $50 billion in direct medical costs (http//www.cdc.gov/tobacco/issue.htm). In Withers emblem pain and pleasure are presented in a paradoxically coexisting relationship. Thomas Mores Utopia portrays pleasure as an entity unblemished by the experience of pain. Withers emblem entitled By Pain on pleasures we do seize and we by sufferance obtain ease (http//emblem.libraries.psu.edu/withe023.htm) expresses views on pain and pleasure which are the antithesis of those found in Mores Utopia.The divergence in the authors viewpoints on the relationship between pain and pleasu... ...ous views. If the Utopians believed Wither to be a heaven-sent prophet then perhaps his words, which completely contradict all their views, could be accepted.Wither uses the image of a come up to reflect the essential idea of pain and pleasure in his poem. He claims that her sweetness fast is closed in with many thornes. The Utopians would find a empurpled sweeter without the necessity of fighting thorns to enjoy the beauty. Mores ideal society conflicts strongly with ideals that have permeated society for generations. If pleasure is received without any pain dismiss it be as great as the pleasure that contains the knowledge of the pain?Works CitedDamrosch, David The Longman Anthology of British Literature. Volume 1. Addison-Wesley Educational Publishers Inc 1999.http//www.cdc.gov/tobacco/issue.htm)http//emblem.libraries.psu.edu/withe023.htm)