Infinite Virtue :: William Shakespeare Antony Cleopatra Essays

Infinite Virtue IV.viii of Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra is a short scene, less than 40 lines, and an entirely unexpected one. The preceding scenes of Act IV, such as Hercules' departure and Enobarbus' desertion, heavily foreshadow Antony's defeat. When Antony wins his battle against Caesar and returns to Cleopatra in IV.viii, the joy of their reunion contrasts with the despair of Act IV. Antony's victory is a strike against fate and a tribute, albeit short-lived, to the power of Egypt. The association of royalty and divinity was a common tradition not limited to the Elizabethans' world picture. In this scene, Antony portrays Cleopatra as a goddess, revealing her connection not only to the macrocosm but also to the more specific functions of the love goddess Isis. Cleopatra is a "great fairy" (IV.viii.12), able to "bless" (IV.viii.13) soldiers with her speech. As the "day o'th'world" (IV.viii.13) who will "ride" (IV.viii.16) in Antony's heart, she more particularly resembles a sun deity, pictured by the Egyptians as riding in a barge and by the Romans as in a chariot. Cleopatra's association with the day continues up until her death; Charmian recognizes that "the bright day is done/and we are for the dark" (V.ii.192-3) and Cleopatra sees that her "lamp is spent" (IV.xv.89). In Act V, the connection is morbid, but here it is vibrant and positive. Yet in both death and life, the close relationship of Cleopatra and Egypt to fire and the higher elements is omnipresent; Antony swears "by the fire/that quickens Nilus' slime" (I.iii.69-70); Cleopatra before her death is "fire and air" (V.2.288); "your serpent of Egypt is bred...by the operation of your sun" (II.vii.26-7) That fire should so often be linked to life is unsurprising, given the common connection between heat and sex, just as the heart where Cleopatra will ride has long been a "bellows" (I.i.9). Also present is an idea of "vital heat", as when Cleopatra invites Iras to "take the last warmth" (V.ii.290) of her lips before her suicide. Whether fortunate or not, Cleopatra is a spirit of vitality. Even Antony gets a taste of residual divinity, perhaps from Cleopatra's having dressed him; he is "infinite virtue" (IV.viii.17) and "lord of lords" (IV.viii.16), echoing the prophecy that "the Lamb shall overcome [the ten kings], for he is Lord of lords and King of kings" (Revelation 17:14). In fighting for Egypt Antony momentarily wrests conquering fate from Octavius, whose statement that "the time of universal peace is near.

Dell Computer Corporation †Share Repurchase Program Essay

1. Why do companies use stock options to compensate employees? What are the advantages of stock options relative to cash compensation? What, if any, are their disadvantages? 2. What, if any, risks do Dell’s shareholders face from Dell’s stock option program? Draw terminal payoff diagrams to illustrate the risk. Is this risk something that shareholders of Dell expect to bear when investing in Dell? 3. How does Dell remove, or hedge, the perceived risk of the stock options program for shareholders? Draw terminal payoff diagrams to illustrate. 4. Why does Dell transact in both call and put options? Use put-call parity to reformulate the put and call positions that Dell takes in terms of Dell’s stock and borrowing. What effectively does Dell’s call and put positions accomplish? Is risk management the primary motivation for Dell’s actions? A stock option is an offer by a company that gives employees the right to buy a specified number of shares in the company at an agreed upon price (usually lower than market) by a specific date. The benefit of granting options to employees is viewed as a good thing because it (theoretically) aligned the interests of the employees (normally the key executives) with those of the common shareholders. If a material portion of a CEO’s salary were in the form of options, she or he would be incited to manage the company well, resulting in a higher stock price over the long term. The higher stock price would benefit both the executives and the common shareholders. Substituting options is supposed to keep executives eyes on the long term since the potential benefit (higher stock prices) would increase over time. Also, options programs require a vesting period (generally several years) before the employee can actually exercise the options. This is in contrast to a â€Å"traditional† compensation program, which is based upon meeting quarterly performance targets, but these may not be in the best interests of the common shareholders. For example, a CEO who could get a cash bonus based on earnings growth may be incited to delay spending money on marketing or research and development projects. Doing so would meet the short-term performance targets at the expense of a company’s long-term growth potential. Stock options creates a financial stake of employees in the firms growth. The executive stock options allows the employees to participate in the upside performance of the firms, incenting them to work harder. Although there is a cost associated with the use of employee stock options. The equity holders do not earn same level of returns as they would have if the firm would not have issued executive stock options to its employee. This loss of return in the form of dilution is the cost that equity holders have to pay for having the employee stock option program. However, this cost is mitigated by the fact that if the market value of the firm’s asset decreases, the employee shares the downside as well, thereby absorbing some of the impact of the market value decrease from equity holders. Another cost that the equity shareholders bear is the liquidity cost. The employees are usually paid a higher market value of stock options then they would otherwise receive solely through wages due to the fact that the options they received cannot be traded or realized until a particular date. The use of executive stock options transfer some of the market risk from the equity holders to the employees thereby reducing the beta of the equity. At the time of case, companies are not required to report any compensation expense in their publicly filed financial statements when they grant stock options. However, when certain options are exercised, companies receive a tax deduction, which can provide significant income tax savings. There are two arguments that you’ll commonly find against the use of stock options: Dilution of ownership and overstatement of operating income. When an employee exercises her stock options, the company has to either issue new shares or go out on the open market and purchase shares. If new shares are issued, then your ownership is diluted. If the company purchases shares on the open market, then the company, which only receives the exercise price from the employee, has to pay market price for the shares it purchases. This results in a net cash outflow for the company. Since the impact of the compensation deduction that a corporation can claim for tax purposes is not included in a company’s GAAP income, many take the view that using options enables the company to overstate its income. Risks to Dell shareholders: Dell Share holders bear the risk in the form of cost of potentially issuing the stock at below market values if the employees do convert the options into stock when the options are in-the-money. However, if the options expires out of the money, the shareholders realize equally better benefits. In this case, the firm obtains labor from employees without having paid for the labor by issuing shares. The employee stock options provides a cushioning from the full burnt of the downside of a firms poor performance while taking a share of the upside benefits also. There is essentially a risk transfer from shareholders to employees through the use of employee stock options. The share holders pay a fair cost to incent employees to be more productive. The executive stock options seem to counteract some of the risk that shareholders naturally bear when they buy a stock. Hedging the risk of Stock options: By issuing employee stock options, Dell presumably takes a short call position on its stock thereby creating a liability to be paid in future. (Appendix shows the payoff diagram of Dell’s liability because of the employee stock option program.) To hedge the risk associated with the liability Dell is purchasing a 2.8 M call options. This effectively hedges the risk of the executive stock option program back to the shareholders. Dell by engaging in the put and call options is basically equivalent to buying a forward contract on its own stock. With the share repurchase program, Dell is also pursuing a strategy of having long call and short put position. Using the put-call parity, (Appendix) the long call and short put transaction is equivalent to buying stock by borrowing money. So dell’s long call and short put transaction is equivalent to a levered share repurchase. As a result of the above transaction the risk of having a combination of long call and short put is higher then that of just having a long call position (employee stock option program), which is transferred to dell shareholders. In this case dell is hedging the risk in the same way as a levered share repurchase program would work by creating more value to the shareholders by increasing the risk borne. I had completed the analysis of the Dell’s proposed stock repurchase program for upto 12 Million shares and the use of the equity options as part of the repurchase. As per the information available the put-call transactions along the share repurchase program being employed by Dell would create substantial value for the firm and the shareholders only if management has private information that Dell stock is undervalued and would perform above expectations in the coming months.

Incorruptible Play Review - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 5 Words: 1435 Downloads: 3 Date added: 2017/09/24 Category Advertising Essay Type Argumentative essay Tags: Church Essay Did you like this example? Incorruptible The play, Incorruptible, is full of deceit, irony and just a little bit of morally wrong acts committed by Christian monks. The first act begins with Charles the head monk of the church is praying to the relics of the Saint Stella. A peasant woman is trying to sneak in a few prayers without paying the church a penny to pray. Martin, another monk of the church, and Charles are arguing because their church is not getting very many donations and not making very much money. Saint Stella’s relics that these Brothers honor as their church patron have seemed to stop performing miracles. They all hope that Brother Felix, yet another monk in the church will bring the Pope to their church to see their Saint and honor it, hoping that it will help Saint Stella to perform miracles. Unfortunately, Brother Felix is unable to bring the Pope to their church. The Pope had already gone off to a different city because it was rumored that a monk with one eye sold the real relics of Saint Stella to the church of the city of Barbados. This insinuating that the ones the Brothers have is not the real Saint Stella, but a fake. The peasant woman comes back and wants her donation of one button back. The rumor has spread threw the city that the Saint Stella bones all the followers of that church have given pennies and prayers to is a fake. The monks hear the story from the peasant woman and strike up a deal to get the â€Å"one eyed monk† who delivered the â€Å"real† relics to the church in Barbados, to come to their church and want to know why he stole their relics. This one eyed monk who sold the relics happens to be the peasant woman’s son-in-law, who is a sort of jester type character. He tries to get away but then the monks accuse him of taking their relics, they steal his 30 gold pieces and force him to tell him what it was that he did. Jack, the jester’s name, tells the monks how he dug up a body from a grave and gav e the bones to Abess, the head nun of the church in Barbados, who also happens to be Charles’ sister. With this being reveled that the bones jack sold where fake Martin, comes up with the idea of digging up all the graves in their church graveyard and sell the body parts as real Saints. This eventually gets out of control. Martin manipulates Charles into doing most of these terrible things and forces Jack to become a monk and dig up bodies. While Jack is playing the role of monk he sneaks his girlfriend Marie into the church for some, frolicking, as it was put. Little do they all know that Marie is the long lost love of Felix, the reason he became a monk for this church was because of Saint Stella. Through out the play Felix and Marie miss each other just by moments. By the end of the play Martin has gotten caught up in making so much money that he has gotten cocky. Wanting for the Pope to visit so badly he writes to the Pope telling him that they have an Incorruptible, which is a body that does not decompose the same as others because they are so holy. The Pope says he will come but the problem is that these Brothers do not have an Incorruptible. For awhile Jack did not want to get caught sneaking Marie in so he hides her in a sack. Martin mistakes Marie as the â€Å"Incorruptible† he sent Jack to go find. In the end Marie goes off with Felix to do what they planned on doing before and the church still has Saint Stella who does perform another miracle of giving Jack back is one eye. This Play was one that seemed to be set back in the times, but had a modern twist to it. The theme of this play could be said to be a few different things. Personally, there seems to be a lean toward having faith. Through out the play they all through out quotes from the bible about having faith, and that without faith you won’t get anything you want or need. Through out the play all of the monks at one point in time had lost some faith in their patro n Saint. Only when all those who lost faith started to have real faith in Saint Stella is when it was seen that miracles were happening. Sometimes we need to go through some rough patches to get to what we really want in the end. The important thing to remember however is that you’ve got to have faith in what you believe in and not give that up. The theme of faith was not the only thing that was pretty consistent through out the play. Between act 1 and act 2 there was only one costume change and it was not very different from the first one. The peasant woman’s costume does not change from act to act, or if it did it was very subtle and I did not notice. Marie’s costume changed a little but it was still the same idea of a torn skirt, looking some what of a collected mess. The monks changed the colors of their gowns to show that they had money now. The blue outfits made the monks look more fun and showing that they were expensive. This tells the audience tha t since the last act they’ve idea of pretty much hustling body parts has been working out pretty well for them. All these actors in this performance were both funny and did a fantastic job. My favorite I think would have to be Felix, played by Geoffrey Zokal. What was so funny about his character was his comments made under his breathe almost. Maybe it was were I had chosen to sit, but I sitting first row right in front of the skeleton head I heard almost all of the little comments made. When Martin said something that was just ridiculous or Charles was agreeing to some ridiculous plan he had a funny way of trying to stop it, but not trying to hard. He really showed how much he cared for the relics and that showed to me that he had an attachment to this saint for a reason. His character did have a reason to be attached to this Saint and Felix did well with praying to it, when Martin wanted to get rid of Saint Stella Felix wraps the bones and â€Å"sleeps with Saint Ste lla†. Geoffrey seemed very into the role as well. He looked like he was having fun with it and that in turn made it more enjoyable for myself. It was an enjoyable dark comedy for a non-theatre major, such as me. It had the â€Å"dark† because these monks believed that these old bones of dead people, who quite possible might not even bee Saint’s can actually cure a woman with an oozing lump on her back. The whole play is comical but they are completely serious. What they are saying is funny to us, but the play is supposed to show a light side of the seriousness of the topic. For example, during the play when Felix is freaking out about Martin and Charles getting rid of Saint Stella’s bones, he runs to the alter and takes the bones with him. That was very funny to me, but for the playa it was showing his devotion to his faith. That Felix was one who still had faith in his patron saint, and that she would help him get his â€Å"love† back. The title of the play means a body that does not decay like many others because of its holiness. It is a little ironic that Marie is the girl that Felix talked to jack about. Felix was under the impression that Marie was dead, drowned. She ironically goes through most of the play not even knowing that Felix is there and vice versa. She was to pretend to be the Incorruptible for a sort while and she technically was thought to be dead, two different times. Incorruptible is a funny dark comedy that I would recommend for others to go see. This was not a show that I had to try at all to stay away during. I had fun with the show, the cast was fun and the performance was done well. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Incorruptible Play Review" essay for you Create order