British and Irish Literature after 1900

The relationship between Catholicism and the Centaurs

2008-04-24T20:25:00.001-07:00

When reading the book “The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman” by Angela Carter, I found myself trying to figure and analyze the books meaning. The passage and chapter that I really experienced this thought process was the chapter about the centaur people and their religious beliefs. During our previous class we discussed the link between the centaur’s and the Houyhnhms. By looking further into the chapter I discovered that Carter also intertwined a religious connection to the centaurs. The centaurs were extremely religious creatures, which resembled the Catholic religion almost exactly. Both of the religions are monotheist, they both revolve around the written word, they both are built upon the hierarchy of individual males, and they both are very heavily influenced by nature and the world around them. In the book, the centaurs worship the Sacred Stallion, very similar to the way the Catholics worship the one single God figure. In Catholicism, everything that is presented for the religion is written within one sacred text, which is the bible. The centaur’s have many sacred texts that they follow and add to, much like the bible. In the centaurs religion we are shown, the male hierarchy within the church. The centaurs have the Scrivener, the Smith, the Cantor, and the Tattoo master. Carter even goes as far as describing them as cardinals, exactly like the Catholic Church. Throughout my reading of this section, I kept on finding myself trying to determine why she would include such a vivid allusion to the Catholic Church. Through my interpretation, Carter isn’t trying to make a statement about the Catholic Church. I felt that Carter was trying to show how a religion can over take a human being or a civilization. Now, this is not necessarily a bad thing, but it is not always good either. By connecting the centaur people with a religion very similar to Catholicism, she created a connection between the reader and the centaur characters in the book, because almost everyone has heard about and experienced some interaction with the Catholic Church. Her focus on religion in a way humanized the god like centaurs. It made them real and more believable to the average reader.

Modernism in The Infernal Desire Machines of Dr. Hoffman

2008-04-24T20:25:00.000-07:00

Angela Carters novel The Infernal Desire Machines of Dr. Hoffman is has both post modernism and modernism structure. I believe it is predominantly a modernism critique. Modernism is the deliberate departure from tradition and the use of innovative forms of expression that distinguish many styles in the arts and literature of the 20th century, such and The Infernal Desire Machines. I believe this writing is innovative, and a departure from tradition. This book is wild in the sense of almost every theme, and chapter. Modernist themes are hierarchical, structured and ordered. In this quote Desiderio shows how it is environment is ordered which would make the structure ordered; “ However, the transmitters sent out their beams high over its battlements and did not affect the fortress of the enemy itself. Here everything was safe. Everything was ordered. Everything was secure.” (pg.197) I believe this book is more modern than post-modern, but share similar qualities.

Postmodernism

2008-04-24T18:55:00.000-07:00

When looking at postmodernism one thing stood out in my mind, that was Dali's work "clocks".

In this we can see many huge clocks dripping almost like they are melting. What I take from that firstly is that: we can see the main aspect of the painting, obviously the clocks but we can also see the postmodernist theme, the dripping, melting clocks that stand out to the viewer.

This reminds me very much of Angela Carters Dr. Hoffman. We have the characters that show many instances of what we would call "real life" but there is also that postmodernist theme throughout.

So my argument would be that Carter's work, similar to Dali's postmodernist piece is a clear postmodernist text. As there is both the reality side to the story and the unclear, unexplainable, postmodernist view to her text. Much like Dali's melting clocks.

Modernism Desire

2008-04-24T12:54:00.000-07:00

I was almost convinced by the guys who were in the middle, however I still believe that the book is ultimately modernism. To me, the postmodernism group was a little confusing. I couldn't quite grasp their over all idea so I will describe it how I view the story. On page 22 the minister states, "The Doctor has invented a virus...we will!- discover the antidote." This supports modernism because they are searching for the solution to the problem. That solution is innovation. There are many examples such as this in the book which I think represent the entire story. Desiderio leaves the sort of tradition of Dr. Hoffman's world by defeating the Doctor and restoring order to the city. There is innovation in the sense that the city is changed from bad back to good.

Angela Carter Debate: Modernism vs. Postmodernism

2008-04-24T12:47:00.000-07:00

Let me preface this blog post by saying that I agree with Professor Brewer: While it is difficult to classify books as completely modernist, postmodernist, etc., The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman seems largely postmodernist. With that out of the way, the following would be my argument, from the postmodernist side of the debate.

As we know from class, modernism subscribes to the concept of hierarchy, which connotes order/structure. Thus, it seems modernism can only exist by itself; otherwise, it loses its essential modernist structure and ceases to be modernist, by virtue of its having non-modernist qualities. Postmodernism, on the other hand, subscribes to anarchy, which is the lack of a central authority. Thus, because Carter's book has both modernist and postmodernist qualities, it is automatically postmodern; it has no central authority, meaning that the book exhibits anarchy and, thus, postmodernist qualities. We all agreed on this today: The book has both modernist and postmodernist qualities. So, why is there still a question? How could it be modernist alone? Moreover, we might even question whether or not modernism exists, for how can a text "embody" (rigid/structured/hierarchical) modernism—as we so eloquently put it during the debate—if it also has postmodernist qualities? (Someone said that all books have both modernist and postmodernist qualities, and if all books do this, technically, they are postmodernist).

One can argue that, because Carter's book also features hierarchy/order, it cannot be postmodernist. However, it is still postmodernist because such hierarchy is non-hierarchical; it is unpredictable, unordered, because of the surrounding postmodernist qualities. That the Minister believes "a societal structure is the greatest of all the works of art," that he endorses hierarchy, only clashes with Dr. Hoffman's desire (and eventual ability) to rip the world from reality/structure/hierarchy (35). A better example would be to think of the point that the modernist side brought up (I think Tim and someone else mentioned it): the linear structure of the story. This argument does not seem to hold, because it is, in fact, too logical for postmodernism. Yes, there is order to the chapters and the events, and Desiderio even says early in the book that he "must gather together all that confusion of experience and arrange it in order, just as it happened, beginning at the beginning [...] [he] must unravel [his] life as if it were so much knitting," meaning that he arranges the story linearly (11). However, the key words are "as it happened" and "knitting." We, the readers, (probably) go through the story in a linear fashion; however, we do not know that this is the way Desiderio experienced the events. Like he says, he has to unravel his memories like "knitting," which suggests that they are all jumbled together. The Desiderio that is "writing"/narrating the story exists in the post-machine world, the one with order/reality; thus, he, of course, rearranges the story from its original form as an unordered mess of "knitting," deciding to tell it in a linear fashion so it will make sense to the reader. Thus, the story is a (crazy, wild, anarchical) postmodernist one, told in a modernist (structured) fashion, using both modernist and postmodernist qualities/themes/etc. So, how can it be purely modernist?

(It can't; and I've already established that postmodernism can exist alongside modernism because of its idea of anarchy. Be that as it may, as I said in the beginning, I also do not think the story can necessarily be only postmodernist. The qualities can and often do mix together, creating very interesting, complex works of art such as Angela Carter's The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman. On a final note, such works may even be intended to create debates like ours, to get us all to realize that rigidity/structure (in defining works) is not conducive to literature. Hey, wait! That takes me back to my point that modernism may not even exist!)

Religious Criticism in Infernal Desires

2008-04-24T10:52:00.000-07:00

The question arose in class the other day as to whether or not Angela Carter was criticizing religion in the chapter entitled Lost in Nebulus Time. My first reaction to this chapter and the centaurs actions was the belief that she was criticizing the pointlessness of religion. On page 183 we are given a description of their religious lives. Desiderio describes the "whole point of their activity" as "endless," suggesting no progress is ever made toward achieving...well what they are trying to achieve isn't exactly clear, possibly simply appeasing the Sacred Stallion. He also admonishes their horse tree on the Holy Hill as "no more than a kind of anthropoid vegetable clock." If we can take Desiderio's words to be also Carter's then it appears she is callous towards this religion, its inability to achieve anything production, and its false idols. Yet, a further reading suggested otherwise to me. I believe she is simply comparing religion to history in this passage, which at some level all religion is a history. Desiderio points out that they create and adapt their religion to fit the situations around them, thereby shaping not only their religion, but shaping their history. From this viewpoint Carter is linking religion and history together in that they both describe the past, sometimes with more or less truths or more or less mysticisms, but always at least presenting the past.

The Count Looks Inward, as do we all.

2008-04-23T22:56:00.000-07:00

At the tragedy of the thousands of deaths of the city on the mountain, the only response that the Count could offer was a solitary cuff on Lafleur’s fragile body and a glorification of the ‘spectacle’ as being nature’s coup de theatre.
Although most humans do have some sense of compassion, (as exhibited by their natural inclination to never relate a disaster as a mere spectacle), the Count is indeed present in all of us.
He is, in Desiderio’s words, a passionate convictor that “he was the only person in the world.” Therefore, the Count is, as I will go to postulate, “raw vanity, with all of its splendor.”
If it were possible to, we would, as a result of our own greed and self-love, deny the reality of others, and enter our own world… In shaking off other’s desires, and only adhering to our own, we would heighten our own adventure.
But, by closing off other avenues, we would adhere to the reality of our own. Our self-confidence, in that manner, would be a good thing, one which could throw off the yoke of the Desire Machine and Mr. Hoffman. Perhaps that is why, as Albertina would later state, the Count was a danger to Dr. Hoffman: His character was inherently aversive to the puppet show of non-reason that Dr. Hoffman played.
When he is asked, Is there anything in the world that you [do condemn], the Count is put into the position commonly deemed “between a rock and a hard place.”
This pause is put on by Carter to emphasize his response: He disdains the “death-defying” “double somersault” of love.
Love is, in some degree, the ultimate connection of two beings. In that it acts as a unifier, it would thoroughly disgust the Count. He would have reason to be disgusted by the antithesis of his world: Two is a private invasion of oneness.
I imagine the Count to be a closed box. All the sides inside the box reflect on themselves. In that they are perfect in their looking inward, they have nothing to fear, nothing to tremble from, nothing to react from… besides themeselves. That perfect confidence and swagger (in all their glory) is why admirers can view the Count in anything he does, and intermittently be smitten upon his conviction.
We all want that. We all want to not be affected by a world which “threatens our existence.”

Saints and Strangers: More Magical Realism in Carter's Work(?)

2008-04-22T13:13:00.001-07:00

Today's discussion reminded me of a story—and I think this is the one—called "The Kiss," by Angela Carter. It's in the book of short stories called Saints and Strangers. If this is the story I am thinking of, I read it in one of Dr. Castro's classes (probably Women in Fiction) a year or two ago. Anyway, the story is about a love affair, and the end result is that the man sprouts wings and flies away; he never sees the woman again. As we mentioned in class, stories with magical realism in them often have very rich descriptions, and this story is a perfect example of that, as it starts with a 1- or 2-page description of the city (Samarkand, I think), and the rest of the story is only another page or two. It's an interesting story, and I certainly recommend it. I only hope I got the title and author correct. Perhaps I'm thinking of something else. I'll post a blog later this summer if I can find out where the story is (my copy of Saints and Strangers is at home, so I can't check, right now).

The Office - 17 April 2008

2008-04-17T21:18:00.001-07:00

I just thought I would mention that tonight's episode of The Office features a short scene that is relevant to our class discussions regarding Angela Carter's Infernal Desire Machines. Two employees set out to perform a task and vow that they will not let Michael (the boss) down. Michael replies that they can't let him down because he doesn't care whether they succeed or not; he has no DESIRE for them to complete the task.

Any comments on THIS example of desire versus the lack thereof? If Michael has no desire for the two employees to complete the task, even though he suggests it, does the task still exist as a "goal"? What else can we draw from this scene, if anything?

Thoughts Concerning Buddha of Suburbia

2008-04-08T15:29:00.001-07:00

I've a habit of thinking for a long while once I finish a book. Usually it concerns the emotions of the characters in the book as I try to empathize with them and attempt to understand what drove them to do the things they did. This usually follows a particularly good book with well-developed characters, I most assuredly put Buddha of Suburbia on my list. All of the characters in the book were, I thought, outstanding. My favorite though, and the one I considered to have the most depth apart from Karim was that of his fat crippled friend, Changez. This guy absolutely blew my away at the end of the book, and the entire time he was in it. His story arch was astounding. My assumption of his motives to go to the west were that of finding a loving wife and being able to settle down. He always seemed a bit discontent, but tried to, it seemed, fool himself into contentment. By that I mostly mean his prostitute friend/lover. The guy was just so ignorantly innocent the entire time I at first thought he was just simply dumb and content. This proved obviously to be far from the truth as was shown near the end of the book. I was most deeply affected by him and sat around just thinking about all he had to go through and I felt terrible for the fellow. His "loving wife" wanted absolutely nothing to do with him, he lived first in the slums then with a bunch of political radicals who he, as it appeared, just didn't understand fully. I can't help but be crushed along with him at the end with his act of brazen desperation. All of his hopes and dreams were crushed or just simply did not come to fruition, he was a wreck it turned out who just wanted the love of his wife, who routinely slept with others, often in the next room. I was forced to feel even worse for him with how he took it all with a grain of salt, still talking to Karim and being friendly even after finding him in bed with his wife. After I finished reading I thought not of Karim and his search for himself but instead I thought of Changez and the relatively horrible existence he found himself in when all he had before were hopes of happiness. An example of a fine, round (pun intended) character in a fine book.

Buddha, Alienation, and A Sexual Revolution

2008-04-08T13:22:00.001-07:00

Buddha of Suburbia presented some particularly interesting perspectives on life as an individual in a turbulent time. The novel was set in a time period where America was undergoing its own cultural awakening and changes - from civil rights to cold war politics; the British development, though, seems to be just as angst ridden and reflective of a social schism.

I, being as white-bread run-of-the-mill American as one can get, appreciated the peculiar insights to Karim's experiences as a member of a culture but an individual of a society. His journey through England and adolescence seemed, to me, something of an odyssey. He left, so to speak, a comfortable and unanalyzed lifestyle when his father, by becoming involved with Eva, forced Karim to reconsider life as a half-Indian, a sexual being, and even a professional.

I find particularly of interest that Karim eventually settles on not being settled into an identity. Rather than buying into a strictly enforced culture, like that of Anwar's or Changez's or even Larry's, or subscribing to a fluid notion of self-existence amongst the "others" as Jamila does, he simply suspends judgment of himself. To what extent is this noncommittal, poorly definitive stance satisfying and why does Kareishi end the novel on such a note?

My beautiful laundrette

2008-04-08T11:13:00.000-07:00

The parallel between this film and the Buddah of Suburbia is undeniable. Having seen the movie and read the book, I am not confident that I know what issues Kureishi found most important. We have learned that Karim, the main character in Buddha of Suburbia, was a somewhat auto-biographical character for Kureishi, and I see some of the same aspects in Omar. Both characters are young Asian men trying to find their way in England. They both have very interesting sex lives involving men to some degree, and they both struggle with the path of their lives. The importance of family is also a theme that spans the two works. Family members play a large role in the lives of both characters, specifically the father. Both works appear to be somewhat auto-biographical, at least symbolically, and intended to highlight the important issues in England in the 70s and 80s, specifically for the Asian community.

A Steamy Situation

2008-04-08T06:03:00.000-07:00

As we were asked to read the book, Buddha of Suburbia and watch an occumpaning video one scene directly sticks out in my mind. As the productions feature a very steamy sex seen in the opening moments of their productions, it seems as if this ideology is carried throughout the plot. For instance we know from the movie that the man in sex seen is suppose to be a happily married man. As his wife and son are presented in a scene before. This then raises the question are writters at this time trying to redefine societial temptations. For instance, the man is suppose to be married and have lived a life of a religious man, yet he runs of with a better looking young woman and intimately recieves. While this is going on, his son is messing arounf with another young man and his manhood is questioned by the audience as he continues go back to the situation in which he "feel in love." I have a feeling that these scenes are the preface to the reality of both productions as both seem to question the societal ideologies that many people have placed not only on affairs, but the role of homosexuality in society. I would also argue that these productions question the morals and ethics of British society, as they are presented in a very negative light.

My Buddhaful Laundrette

2008-04-06T18:30:00.000-07:00

Set in South London, MBL has a surprising number of shared themes with BOS (as noted by other bloggers.) You have a young Pakistani (Omar) struggling throughout the ranks of British society to establish himself while sharing the companionship of Johnny, and Englishman who eventually becomes his lover. Also you have somewhat of a rebellious indifference to people around him in the character of Omar, very similar to Karim. What is slightly different from BOS however, is that the initial job provided to Omar is from his Uncle, who is a wealthy Pakistani. Eva, as well as Shadwell and Pyke in contrast were wealthy British folks. There is then an interesting dynamic between Omar and his uncle Nasser who represents something very different from Eva in BOS. He says to Omar after giving him a job, "You will be able to only afford a shirt but at least you are with your own people." At one point he also gives Omar the advice "In this country, which we all both hate and love, you can get anything you want, but you have to learn to squeeze the tits of the system." I think this aptly answers the questions many had as to why the Pakistani's didn't return home. There is a greater prosperity they thought could be achieved. However, it was an exchange that more often than not caused them to lose their identity and become "homeless" in a sense. Later another Pakistani says defensively "This is not my home, how could anyone consider this little island their home." Many of the characters also consider themselves confused and hating this confusion, one character demands that people "make up their mind where they are," and that she was "sick of the in-betweenness." I think this aptly captures the mentality of Hanif Kureishi, who frequently found himself caught between cultures and personalities. I wonder how much this sentiment is reflected by immigrants into other countries (say those who immigrate into the United States for example) or if there was something distinct about British culture that made it more difficult for immigrants to get along. Overall though this movie held far more in common with BOS than different and I found some of the themes at this point perhaps a little overused. MBL was written first though, which makes me think that maybe it was the precursor that allowed Kureishi's later work of BOS.

Identity Crisis

2008-04-06T17:58:00.001-07:00

Kureishi's My Beautiful Laundrette (MBL) reeks of many of the same themes as Buddha of Suburbia. Asian/White relationships, economic struggle, homosexual tensions all pervade MBL but the continuing Asian/English identity crisis within the pakistani community takes the cake. In MBL we see this struggle play out between the two brothers Nasser and Papa. With Papa we see a reliance on old mores for Pakistani immigrants-- emphasis on education for advancement but retention of "Paki" cultural identy at the same time. Nasser is the opposite, he proffeses new world ideologies that promote hard manaul labor, money and success at all costs, and taking up western values at the expense of traditional customs. And Omar is caught in the middle, with no real guidance on which path to take, but seems to side with Nasser by running his Laudrette and shacking up with white (former) fascist Johnny. Basically, I concluded that Kurieshi either really struggles with these themes or he simply ran out of creative inspiration for Buddha.

The Laundrette

2008-04-06T17:47:00.001-07:00

Hmm, sounds familiar? The titles of the two pieces wouldn’t give it away necessarily … but having watched the film right after reading the novel, Buddha of S., tingles me. I am confronted directly with the striking similarity between Kureishi's first novel and his first film script. (If you don't believe me, examine them both and find it for yourself, as I did. I tell you this because that is not my objective in writing this piece...)

As such, does the messages in Kurieshi's first novel lose their meaning, or novelty, once they are heard and repeated a second time again in his first screen script ?

: Does Omar's cross-racial same-sex exploits merely shadow Karim's free-lance adventures?
If they were a mere shadowing, then we could write them off as similar and be on our merry way. That however, is not as strikingly easy as it may seem.

Arg. A: They are the same: both homosexual relationships (Karim with Charlie; Omar with Johnny) were developmental while, at the same time, self-explorative. This is modeled in the unsteady growth of Karim's excitement with Charlie, and Omar's feelings for Tania preceding his relations. Likewise, they are repetitious.

In response to Arg. A:
Omar, as had been previously mentioned, had a especially meaningful relationship with a single person, opposite of Karim with his multiple sexual exploits (A counterargument could be made at this point that Omar had another especially meaningful relationship with Tania).

Who is correct?
I am a deep advocate that Kureishi wouldn't repeat his characters, or their relationships, so they aren't the same. Game Over, Good match.

My Beautiful Launderette

2008-04-06T17:21:00.000-07:00

It’s hard not to watch “My Beautiful Launderette” and not be reminded of “The Buddha of Suburbia” in one small way or another. This goes particularly for the cross culture clash that was one of the major themes of the film and the discussion of social identity. Both Omar and Johnny had to struggle to find their place in both of their own worlds and the one they were helping to shape together, just as with Karim and his journeys through life. The fact that Johnny and Omar were in love with each other, but never found out, was one of the more fun, and sort of fairy tale esque aspects of the film. While I’m not sure if Karim will ever end up with Charlie come “Buddha’s” end, I’m sure that if the book keeps on the realistic track that it is on right now, that might become a more difficult issue for the lead characters than it was for Omar and Johnny. It would have been nice to see some fallout from that. But then again, the fact that they have a true love they can share is always the prettiest of pictures.

My Beautiful Laundrette and Buddha of Suburbia

2008-04-06T17:12:00.000-07:00

Through watching "My Beautiful Laundrette", I was able to get a better understanding of the book "Buddha of Suburbia". The movie had a lot of parallels with the book "Buddha of Suburbia". For one thing they both focused on the challenges of growing up as a Pakistani immigrant in London. The main character in both was a boy that wanted something in life, but did not quite know what it was he wanted. They both portrayed a father who was very wise, but not really attentive to their sons needs. And, they both focus on a Pakistani family with important and powerful ties to their homelands. Since there so many similarities, I was able to picture the book in the movie. It was almost like they were happening simultaneously in my mind. By, watching the movie I was able to better see the world that Karim saw in "Buddha". I was also able to see what England was like during the Thatcher reign as Prime Minister. The book opened my mind up to the world of the immigrant in London, and the movie made it real because I could actually see it with my own eyes.

Infidelity in My Beautiful Laundrette, The Buddha of Suburbia

2008-04-06T14:15:00.000-07:00

What I found most interesting about My Beautiful Laundrette was its moral imagination, that which decided the consequences of choosing pleasure over duty. Similar to the conflict of Haroon in The Buddha of Suburbia, though perhaps without as much guilt, Nasser chose pleasure over duty by his adulterous affair and so effected Tania's running away and Rachel's skin rash. Kureishi comments, then, on infidelity: as Haroon becomes conflicted in his guilt, so Nasser loses the respect of his daughter and his mistress acquires a skin affliction. Infidelity has a ripple-like effect for Kureishi - it first afflicts the doers, then their most immediate relations, and outward until it reaches the edge of the pond. Yet what moral code does infidelity breach? Kureishi slashes traditional moral codes, portraying his characters as enlivened by drugs and sex and general rebelliousness. Thus his attitude towards infidelity cannot come from these.
It seems there's some connection to cheating on your spouse and cheating on your racial heritage in Kureishi's works. His protagonists, Karim and Omar, must cope with their dual-ancestry like his adulterers, Nasser and Haroon, must cope with their dual-wants, that of fidelity and that of pleasure. As Omar is thrown into a world that does not match his skin color, so Nasser and Haroon are caught in a marriage that does not match their lustful wants - yet each, extending Kureishi's consequences for infidelity, must live not by their desires but by an enduring acquiescence.

Race and Stereotypes in My Beautiful Laundrette

2008-04-04T15:53:00.000-07:00

Hanif Kureishi's My Beautiful Laundrette (1985), directed by Stephen Frears, puts a lot of emphasis on race and stereotypes. The name "Powders Laundrette" (why isn't there an apostrophe?), for me, is a great example, a symbol, of the racial tension in the film. Because Omar's laundrette carries this name, it is an example of subverting the racial hierarchy. "Powder" evokes connotations of whiteness; when I think of the word "powder," I think of Victor Salva's Powder (1995), with the main character being an albino, and thus VERY white, man. Thus, because Omar and Johnny, a "Paki" and a white man, respectively, are the owners of "Powders Laundrette," they are (perhaps subconsciously) challenging not only racial tensions but also the notion of racial impurity, or the mixing of two races. To me, the use of the name says, "We are just as normal, pure, and human as anyone else," and it challenges the so-called Thatcherism of the era. Finally, this subversion method also works along the lines of sexuality. I find it interesting that the film depicts both men as quite "masculine" (whatever that means, right?), eschewing the "traditional" stereotypes of gay/bisexual men. Of course, challenging/discussing stereotypes is Hanif Kureishi's specialty, or at least it seems to be, considering the themes we have already seen in Buddha of Suburbia.

Wind Chasing Buddhas

2008-04-01T15:40:00.001-07:00

Toward the end of class, the idea came to our discussion that Karim's "courage" to follow whatever made him happy and satisfied his desires was something to be praised, to be envied, to be modeled in our own lives by seeking whatever it is we like best and pursuing that end with no regard to the means.
This idea seems unhealthy to me. Unedifying. While the thrill of very youthful "self-actualizing" late nights and spontaneity is, yes, thrilling, I think a lifestyle defined by those thrills hastily and selfishly overlooks what, ever since the writer of Ecclesiastes wrote all was "a chasing after the wind," has motivated both winsome and fulfilling human lives: service, love, duty, identification with something higher and more important than yourself. It seems to me that the whole lot of these buddhas in suburbia are to be pitied for feeling so self-important. We see in chapters 8 and 9 via Karim's omniscient narration that he is beginning to see such blinding self-importance as a grand sham, a magician's illusion, one that will ultimately like the vanishing rabbit leave you with nothing.
But it's all so very tempting! The rush of late nights, the vigor of youth, loudness without a care, no thought of tomorrow - but like all temptations, I think it proves fruitless. To what end, these adventures? What are Charlie and Karim chasing? Late night euphoric moment after late night euphoric moment, to be sobered by dawn, "a chasing after the wind."

Stream of Conciousness in "Blanc"

2008-04-01T15:36:00.000-07:00

I know I might be stretching this a bit. but, if you can apply what you learned in class to something at all, that's a lesson well learned am I right? Anyway, last night I watched the film "Blanc" (presented by Professor Brewer herself). The story revolves around a Polish man who is is divorced by his French wife and left with nothing. With no other options left, he returns home to Poland to think about what to do next. The rest of the plot can't be explained without significant spoilers so I'll leave it at that. The reason why I relate this movie to the concept of Stream of Conciousness is that the French/Polish coupling, at first glance, doesn't seem like it will play another role besides it's setting up of the story itself. The movie, after the divorce trial, then goes off in several directions and thoughts, so many it was almost hard to keep up with at times. However, every so often, the lead character, the Polish guy, would have a brief thought about his ex-wife, obviously missing her. So while the story does tend to go off on several tangents, they all gravitate towards the couple, even though they are seperated for much of the film. This style of story telling, to me, mirrors that of SoC as it starts off with one thought, then heads off in several directions while making brief returns to the starting thought evey so often. Again, it is a bit of a stretch, I understand, but I think this theory works. Check out the film and see if you agree with me.

The Sound of Digging

2008-04-01T13:17:00.000-07:00

Heaney's poem "Digging" describes amongst many things the sound of his father working. The second stanza of the poem emphasizes this theme. Heaney's father is sinking his spade into the ground and the sound it makes is described as "a clean rasping sound." The act of digging in my mind is usually not associated with the idea of clean. In fact it digging is dirty. Heaney uses "clean" not so much to describe the physical act of digging but of what it stands for: a good, simple, clean life of the past. Also in the second stanza Heaney uses the alliteration of "spade sinks" and "gravelly ground" to create the sounds of digging. "Gravelly ground" in particular gives one a sensation of a shovel being pushed into gravel and the accompanied grinding sound of grrrrgrrr.

Heaney: Digging

2008-04-01T11:39:00.000-07:00

After reading the background information on Seamus Heaney, Digging has a very full feel. The intro explains where Heaney gets his ideas for writing these bog poems. The poem uses a geneological history to glorify his father and grandfather... paying reverence to their skills in life. But not of how great people they were, or what great things they achieved. Rather, he paid homage to their skill of doing what was needed in life, like cutting sod for fuel in their homes. Also, the bog poems are inspired by the bodies found in bogs of Northern Ireland. They were the bodies of men who died for the Mother Goddess in ancient times. Heaney equates that to men who die for Mother Ireland trying to win her independence.
The first thing I noticed about the style of the poem is that it isn't completely rhythmatic. Many poems that deal with monotonous work, like digging, have a very strict rhythm, alluding to the rhythm that is gained when doing such chores. But this poem is quite different. In the first stanza, the first line is a solid 8 syllables; the second line is 8, but divided into two sets of 4. But the stanzas are not uniform, the vary in length from 2 lines to 8 lines, and the syllables per line as well. The rhyme scheme is loose, using slant rhymes occasionally, and sometimes stanzas are written in free verse, giving the poem a feeling of an amagamation. Lots of individual things put together to make one work. In my eyes, I see this as the dirt. Some of the sod is grass covered, some is dark, some light, some is heavy and dense, others are loose and light. Some clods are large, others are small. Just like the dirt, the stanzas and lines give the feeling of the mixture being brought together within in one single work.
Heaney ends the poems saying.

"But I've no spade to follow men like them.
Between my finger and my thumb
The squat pen rests.
I'll dig with it."
This final ending alligns all three men in the poem. The writer is living in a different time and place from his father and grandfather, and needs not to go cut sod for fuel, instead, he writes to make his living. His writing is his occupation, and by doing his job as his father and grandfather did, he will achieve personal greatness in life.

Digging

2008-04-01T11:00:00.000-07:00

The aspect of the form of Seamus Heaney's Digging that popped out at me is the number of lines in each stanza. The number of lines in each stanze is 2, 3, 4, 5, 2, 8, 4, 3. This appears to me to follow intensity of the poem. As the stanzas get larger through the first half of the poem, it gains in intensity. It picks up as his father's work is described more and more, and then there is a brief moment of reflection in the two-line stanza. The moment is taken to transition from the father to the grandfather. The poem then picks right back up in intensity to describe the grandfathers work. It then tapers off into a tone similar to the one found at the beginning.

Content and Form in "Digging"

2008-04-01T06:58:00.000-07:00

The form of Seamus Heaney's "Digging" is quite irregular, on the surface. In total number of syllables, lines range from having 4 to 12 syllables. What I find more interesting, however, is the number of LINES in each stanza. Using a specific number of lines in each stanza, Heaney creates an interesting connection between the form and content of the poem. If we look at the following (rudimentary) visual depiction of the lines, we can see that the lines form a hole (note that I have changed the font to Courier because it treats every character as being the same size, which makes the picture much clearer):

8 -

7 -

6 -

5 - -

4 - - - -

3 - - - - - -

2 - - - - - - - -

1 - - - - - - - -

Here, I have put a hyphen for each line in the poem. Basically, what I am asserting is that, if we put each stanza in the poem to the RIGHT of the one before it, instead of right below it, they form a hole. The fifth stanza is the one that forms the bottom of the "hole," as it is very short (it is only a thin layer of "dirt," since the diggers have already dug most of the dirt out):

"By God, the old man could handle a spade.

Just like his old man."

To more clearly understand my meaning, consider the following visual depiction, starting with stanza 4, just before the "hole" begins, and going to stanza 6:

"My...

Than any...

Once I...

"The coarse... Corked...

Against the... To drink...

He rooted... Nicking...

To scatter... "By God... Over his...

Loving their..." Just like..." For the..."

As we can see, the lines form a hole, and there is perhaps a little bit of left over dirt at the top of the right side (Lines "My..." to "Once I..."), or maybe the lines represent a pen about to fall into the hole, or perhaps a potato ready for planting. Whether this amazing aspect of the form of "Digging" was intentional or not remains to be seen, but I find it fascinating and inspiring.

*NOTE: I hope this looks right on your computer screens. It took a bit of work to get it to come out right, but it is worth it if I can share what I see in the poem.

The Meaning of Digging

2008-04-01T05:40:00.000-07:00

By God, the old man could handle a spade.

Just like his old man.

In these lines Heaney is putting his father and grandfather on a higher pedestal. He notices how hard his father strains to do his work. He also views how persistent his father is as he drinks some milk and right away gets back to digging. Heaney uses his father as an example of a good work ethic, wanting to be a hard worker also. Even though he does not use a spade, Heaney implements the same digging mentality with his writing.

Digging

2008-04-01T00:22:00.003-07:00

The cold smell of potato mould, the squelch and slap
Of soggy peat, the curt cuts of an edge
Through living roots awaken in my head.

The sound and diction of this portion touches upon the deeper feel of the poem and heightens Heaney's piece. When referring to the "squelch and slap of soggy peat," these chosen onomatopoeias act to "awaken [themselves] in [Heaney's] head," and likewise the reader's. This subtle move by Heaney then reveals an exposé of painted living imagery. As such, they highlight the stark reality inherent in Heaney's father and grandfather's work , before transition smoothely into the vaguely different, yet similar, work of Heaney and his "squat pen." As the onomatopoeias are not provided for Heaney's "finger and [his] thumb, [and where] The squat pen rests", then we can only deduce there is an intrinsic difference between the work of him and his father/grandfather.

Digging

2008-04-01T00:22:00.001-07:00

Not so Close Analysis of that BUDDHIST NOVEL. Or Buddha of Surburbia

2008-03-31T23:46:00.001-07:00

This will be an exercise in close analysis and (hopefully) interpretation, maybe even resulting in some poetic flares and explosive prose.

Where can we begin from such a hectic book? I guess the sexual revolution would be a base point, whereby the world thus discovered the intrinsic pleasure in the opposite sex, and/or their own genitals. I guess the Queen and her conservative pomp-naught had previously locked down all freedom and expression, effectually banning all of the not-so-conventional type, when suddenly someone ventured underground and noticed that breasts were to be admired, not hidden (and thus he spread the ‘infectious diseases’ outward, probably from the tip of his own very cock). As a result, the Buddha, or God, can claim “Eva’s apparent closeness” as a sufficient reason to herald the imminent breakup of the family.

Then perhaps this leads to the discussion regarding the rotting perversion of the institute of the family. When morals dip low, so does the bench of the family standard – for not too soon, it was sunk. Page 69, the young Karim is deeply wanting to subvert the family, rock the boat further to unstabilize the convention (“I wanted to encourage Dad and Eva to get together.”) I wonder if Karim’s every wish will come true in this book (Suprisingly I’m writing this blog post-reading the entire novel, and I still am lost as to where I can conduct a three paragraph blog).

And then there is Karim’s eventual and painful transition from a “young hippie” to something else. At the beginning, all he would do after-school would be “going home to [their] mothers, to our rissoles and chips and tomato sauce, to learn French words and to pack our football gear for tomorrow” (70); this triviality of his schooling life resembles the nonchalance and innocence of ours: there was a shield protecting us from the outside world.

But is Charlie the outside world, outside the nest of innocent Karim? Is he a byproduct of the outside and intoxicated London-esque world? Where does Jamila fit in this?

As seen, this blog is surely not a close analysis, but a broad outlook and summation of the novel, so continue with me, and we’ll see where it chooses to end.

One event that is particularly flagrant and you, as my reader, should take great particular heed is the whole choice by Jamila to flamingly resign herself to a life with arranged marriage with that fat-piece-of-wad Changez (which by the way, remains one of the novel’s most loveable and insightful dopes). At the time when she makes the decision, on page 77, Jamila chooses to sacrifice her life and succuumb to her father’s beckon. That doesn’t remain the situation, for on page 82, Karim interprets the event as a “rebellion against rebellion,” which is later modeled by Jamila’s multiple sexual exchanges with Karim, baby with Simon, and love for her woman, Joanna.

I have viewed Jamila as the most correct person in the novel. She was an observant actor of whom Karim always turned to for advice. Her maintenance and constant outspoken input molded Karim in ways unbeknownst to other characters: Page 108, she exclaims the profusion of “people needing sympathy and care, oppressed people, like our people in racist [Britian], who face violence every day” which would later foreshadow Karim’s involvement with the Pyke movement and race theater.

Empassioned, her character spoke the word of the poor.

And Charlie! O how Charlie ran ahead of Karim (he breaks ground, staying one step ahead of Karim) until Karim’s final departure towards the end of the book.

Probably the most depressing move was Karim’s ignorance towards his mother and his little brother Allie. I counted and Allie was mentioned probably only four times throughout the novel. But Allie was the symbol for dropped Indian heritage, and English or Western acceptance (he was involved in style, and not of religion, of Italian and France, and not of Anwar’s flat), whereas Karim was battling over the dual identity.

I only choose to describe characters because that is how the novel was presented. As an adventure of X amount of Characters dropped into a shifty, shady time period.. .and their results are the novel of Hanif Kureshi.

Digging

2008-03-31T19:07:00.000-07:00

As Heaney depicts his hardworking grandfather and father through out his poem Digging, one is able to see the values that are viewed as significant in his life. One is able to see that work ethic is moral issue that the Heaney family holds to a great value. This is a very important part of Heaney's life because he uses the symbol of a spade, which is able to produce all that is needed for the family from wealth to the ability to substain life with food. As this spade is used in a symbolic way, one is able to see that a pen is the spade in Heaney's life as he wants to be able to support his family and produce children with the same ethicsaas his father has engrained with him as well as supported him in things he has done. One Ideology that many people dont think about is the fact that Heaney views his father and grandfather to a mythical stance or as heros. I would argue that Heaney in fact represents a lot of these characteristics as he presents many values that he finds creditible in his father and Grandfather.

That 'Literating Spade

2008-03-30T20:58:00.000-07:00

"Under my window, a clean rasping sound
When the spade sinks into gravelly ground:
My father, digging. I look down"

The image of Seamus inside, at his window, looking down upon his father digging into the "gravelly ground," reinforces the main contrast of the poem: Seamus works inside with a pen, while his father works outside with a spade. The alliteration in the stanza, "spade sinks" and "gravelly ground," is connected with the description of his father working below in the field, not with him at the window writing. This might seem odd: alliterations are the tools of authors, not diggers. Why then use them to describe his father?
Looking at his other clear use of alliteration in the poem in stanza 7, we see again that not to describe his writing but to describe his father's digging is alliteration used. "Squelch and slap of soggy peat" and "curt cuts" describe the world outside, not inside, and by using a literary tool to describe his father's work Seamus connects the pen more intimately with the spade. As the spade is reaching into the context of his writing, so his writing form is reaching into the digging of a spade. By applying his literary skills to the description of his father's trade, Seamus further defines the link between pen and spade, so that as the pen can dig, so can the spade alliterate.

Having fun Digging with Seamus Heaney

2008-03-30T15:43:00.000-07:00

If one wants to go for basics on the topic of sound influencing content, then one of the simplest approaches to take with “Digging” would be the overall tone of the poem itself. Hinted at slightly in the beginning, yet taking full form from line 15 onward, the poem’s tone is definitely that of a ode or a fond memory of two very important idols in the authors life, especially his Grandfather, whose awesome digging skills are the main subject of lines 17-24. And, as we pointed out in class when we discussed this poem, while the author cannot continue in the digging traditions of his father and grandfather as they dug to keep the past alive, Heaney states that he can still continue their proud digging in his own way, by writing. This poem gives both of them plenty of well deserved respect from Seamus Heaney’s memories and judging from the sound of the lines and fluidity of the poem, he had a lot of fun in writing these fond memories down on paper to share with the rest of the world.

Pound Lecture.

2008-03-26T22:13:00.000-07:00

I'm a little late on this, but here goes.

I didn't really enjoy the talk as much as I would have like to. I found slightly--empty. I was hoping for an in-depth discussion about Pound's teaching carreer and how he was accepted in this small town around the turn of the century. But, unfortunately, little was really discussed on this matter. The professor didn't seem to know too awful much about the details of his school career other than that he was quite bohemian in nature and not as conservative as many of the fellow professors would have liked him to be. Most of lecture was on how his months in Crawfordsville affected his writings later in his life. I found some of his findings interesting, but to tell the truth, they weren't groundbreaking, and frankly, some of them were a slight stretch. All in all, I think his first five to ten minutes were the most interesting, the rest was just... filler. he may have been more interesting if we would have had him in a more personal setting, but as we discussed in class, that didn't seem to help really at all.

O, Ezra .. Where has the art gone?

2008-03-25T06:09:00.001-07:00

O, Ezra .. Where has the art gone?

I will not rant on for another second,
Or wasted description, for pictures are not pure,
Muddled only .. when fighting with nonsense.

O Ezra, memories of your trip to us could
Not be Analyzed
Not be Discussed
Talked on about, talked around about, the sounds of how,
You were misplaced on
Our campus walls -- we walled you in.

But that is home to you?
And that is important to you?
For Paris was not the cultural center, and neither was Crawfordsville, how true!

Even today.
Enough already,
with draining your dead corpse of its thoughts,
I am sick of hearing mongrels discuss (with smirks!!) your talented limitations.

And who can compare to you, manifested in your red scarlet robe of Images and
Language, Rhythm and Rhyme,
For even you said,
"Pay no attention to the criticism of men who have never themselves written a notable work."

-- This poem was in response to the gentleman's speech about Pound. I know that he was not critical of Pound or his work, but nevertheless I was deeply disturbed by his blather, critics in general, and their misplacement of the artistic valor of others.

Pound At Home

2008-03-24T11:26:00.000-07:00

The title "Pound at Home" for Dr. James Longenbach's lecture is perfect. The lecture focused on how Ezra Pound found solace and his sense of home, when he was alone and as far away as possible from his native Idaho. Longenbach argues that "home," for Pound, meant being someplace where he was with others of his own kind--Artists interested in putting their life's work to creating another renaissance, a renaissance of the renaissance as Longenbach puts it. Indeed, it seems Pound's lifelong ambition was to rejuvenate western culture, to remember the past but also feel its layers, to embed the past into the texture of the present. All the while, "Pound was stuck in a world that refused to acknowledge the poets power to make the world a better place." Thus, he was at home spreading his renaissance, when he was the most alone. He was never in exile, Pound was at home in Paris, London, Rapallo, even Crawfordsville. He was at home when he was spreading his dream, and if you look at it that way and consider he did that all his life , Pound was the luckiest man alive.

Longenbach on Ezra Pound

2008-03-23T21:55:00.000-07:00

Professor Longenbach's lecture "Pound at Home: The Crawfordsville State of Mind" filled in some blank spots in my knowledge of Ezra Pound's brief tenure at Wabash. While I knew the story of the "lady-gent impersonator," Longenbach's rendition opened my mind and paved the way for an interesting, and at times humorous, lecture/discussion of Pound. It was interesting to read from "Three Cantos II," knowing that it takes place in our very own Crawfordsville. The story of Fred Vance, in the poem, is intriguing because, before I read it, I had been under the impression that Pound did not like Crawfordsville (which he really DIDN'T) and had no friends here. Moreover, the poem draws connections between Vance and Pound: in Pound's eyes, both he and Vance were "noble" failures, and both lived in a place they didn't choose (Crawfordsville), dreaming—not living—their respective "Renaissances." What I found most interesting about the lecture was that Pound associated the "Crawfordsville state of mind" with good writing; it was only when he was in that "miserable" state of mind that he could suffer enough to write something of any value, and Pound could only get into such a state while he was in Crawfordsville, London, or Paris. Venice, for example, offered him no misery and, thus, nothing about which to write. Lastly, I was also interested in Pound's maxim "make it new" and the fact that he used language in a way that made common translations fresh and exciting (Old English in "Canto I," from a Latin translation of a Greek translation). I wonder if we lose much when we read it in modern English; this was one aspect that Longenbach did not discuss, and I only JUST realized that it would have been a good place for elaboration/elucidation.

Ezra Pound Lecture

2008-03-20T20:45:00.000-07:00

The Ezra Pound lecture by Mr. James Longenbach (forgive me if I misspelled his last name) was a pleasant surprise to me. My attention was quickly captured by Professor Hudson’s introduction of Pound and Mr. Longenbach’s subsequent facts and findings. I was most surprised to hear about Pound’s exile-esque way of life, which sort of hit a cord with me considering I just did a paper of the pros and cons of the life of an exile for my Postcolonial Literature and Theory course. What I really liked about the presentation as a whole is the possibility of placing all of Pound’s poetry into a singular volume and calling it the Artistic Biography or Ezra Pound as each poem in one way or another illustrates a key moment in his life right up until his death (as I realized with Contos 20 which I read after the lecture). What I find kind or ironic and sad is how little Pound thought of himself and his accomplishments throughout his life. While he never achieved the “Renaissance” utopia he dreamt of his entire life, he is still a revered author and one of the greatest literary minds of our age with a large list of accomplishments and places traveled, including here at Wabash. This lecture helped to instill this thought in my head and actually feel sorry for the poor guy. If only he could see today just how much of a profound affect his works have had on the literary community and English courses everywhere. All in all, it was a hell of a good time. Good work Mr. James.

A Flimmaker's Apocalypse

2008-03-20T11:04:00.000-07:00

Since I leaning towards doing my final paper of Conrad's Heart of Darkness and Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse now, I figured I'd do a bit of long awaited research into the making of the latter. I found in the library a 1991 documentary film comprised of homemade footage from the time Coppola and his wife spent in Vietnam making the film. Let me tell you, if HoD and Apocalypse Now are both stories about men going made and confronting their own demons in the darkness, then this story fits right in with that little genre of story telling. The filming process, as it turns out, was hell. It took almost three years of filming to get a properly finished cut, the one that made it to theaters. And during those three years, Coppola was at odds with everyone, screenwriters, actors, the film studios, all because the constant changes in story and direction nearly sent, or rather did send, Coppola over the edge. An interesting sidestory is the filming of the openign sequence, where Martin Sheen as Willard dances crazily around his room, toiling in anguish. This sequence was filmed while Sheen was still a heavy drinker and smoker, all of his reactions in the scene, even the unexpected breaking of the mirror, are all genuinely real and not scripted. A perfect example of confronting ones own demons. And that's just the beginning of the many side stories that plauged the films production. So many, I can't put them all in this one blog. You just have to check it out for yourself.

The name of the film is "Heart of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse" and it is on our VHS rack in Lily Library. I highly recommend it for anyone who loves the film and wants to know just how hectic is was to get made. No disappointments here.

Penance in Paris, London, and the Trenches

2008-03-20T10:43:00.000-07:00

In Orwell's writing and life I think we see a better reaction to colonialism than that presented by O'Brien, Conrad, McKibben's analysis and Achebe's criticisms. Like O'Brien and Conrad, he lived in the fields of colonialism, serving in Burma a post that showed to him the "futility of white man's presence in the East." However, in contrast to the two mentioned above, Orwell seems more morally and intellectually offended by his country's occupation of the East, and because of this reception molds his future life to, in a way, pay penance for the Burmese woes. Instead of calling the rich to give to the poor or lamenting the poor in public speeches or writings, he seeks to understand their situation and so falls willingly into poverty. He trades a comfortable life for a "down and out" toil in Paris and London.
We see a similar move by Churchill of comprimising his comfort and luxury to relate and justify himself to the people when, after his failed military plan turned into a massacre, he enlisted in the trenches. Such was his penance. Such is real empathy - not to damn privilege, but to willingly forgo it and so, by choice, live a life without it.

Orwell Vs. Churchill

2008-03-20T08:08:00.000-07:00

The Documentary that was presented enlighted its audience to very profound comparison and contrast between one of the greatest authors of all time and one of the greatest leaders of all time. It was evident that while many people today view these two as great, in their own respects, it was not the overwelming majority as their popularity grew in their respective time frames. Orwell was seen as to far fetch and radical where Churchill was to traditionally based, yet both of their theories were able to coincide almost uncompetitevly. Both of these men were able to produce greatness through too completely different mind sets. This is where Orwell and Churchill are able to be compared. Both men through their own vehicles are able to establish great common support and are able to establish belief systems that allow for them to succeed.

The Two Winstons

2008-03-19T20:22:00.000-07:00

From the movie, I learned a great deal about the two Winstons. On one hand there was Churchill, who even though made mistakes was able to lead England through a rough period of war. Then there is Orwell, who influenced England through his writings. One thing I found fascinating was the savior of England Churchill. Even though he went through upsets in his wrongful decisions, he was able to get back up and stay strong leading the English. Great men become better through learning from their mistakes. I also found that Orwell was a self made accomplishment. Quite the opposite of Churchill's lavish childhood, Orwell came from a poor neighborhood and later established himself as a great writer.

The Two Winstons

2008-03-19T19:15:00.000-07:00

I was surprised at the parallels between Churchill and Orwell's lives, especially in their early years. Both of their boarding school days seem to have had a profound affect on their lives and future actions. Although both had clearly different views on this experience. The movie demonstrated that Churchill became fascinated with history in school, while Orwell was the opposite, he despised the pointlessness of memorizing dates. After school their parallel lives continued with their first failed attempts in the military or police, and then they both dropped out of society in a way. Orwell literally, and Churchill forced out due to his military miscues. I expected this intersection to be the last in their lives, as Churchill eventually becomes one of the greatest figure heads of a nation, and Orwell an author appalled by big brother government. From what little of knew of these two men's histories and their writings, I expected them to have an ideological clash at the very least. Needless to say I was very surprised when they were able to come together in a way, through their mutual fear/hatred for communism and socialism, ideologies taking over and destroying continental Europe at the time.

The Two Winstons

2008-03-19T18:51:00.000-07:00

The Two Winstons was a lot more enjoyable then many of the other documentaries that we have seen in class. First of all, one of the reasons why I enjoyed the video so much was the fact that 1984 is one of my favorite books. I first read this sophomore year in high school and I still find myself going back and reading it. So being able to learn more about the author really made me pay attention. I thought it was quite weird that two men from different backgrounds live the beginning of their live parallel to each other. But it was their families that made them go in different directions. What I mean by this is that Churchill’s family was rich and a lot better off then Orwell’s. This is what led to Churchill to politics and Orwell to writing.

The Two Winstons

2008-03-19T18:47:00.000-07:00

The Two Winstons presented George Orwell and Winston Churchill in a way that I never would have pictured them before. I knew of each man's importance individually, but I had no idea that they were connected in even the most remote way. It was interesting to see how both men came from similar circumstances to hold similar ideals yet approached things in such different ways. Both men came from middle to upper class families and were sent to boarding school for a large portion of their childhood. Both men also grew up to care a great deal abou the British well-being. However, they tackled the issue in different ways. Churchill dove right into the fray and got involved with politics. He eventually climbed the ladder and was elected prime minister. From this position, he continuously strove to improve the British condition. Orwell chose to educate the population about the negative possibilities out there through his literature. This was a much less direct approach, but it was none the less effective.

Dos Winstons - Double the Trouble, Cancel Out the Trouble, or Wicked what?

2008-03-19T18:46:00.000-07:00

Dos Winstons - Double the Trouble, Cancel Out the Trouble, or Wicked what?

Hmm. I have to say, regardless of others and their opinions, that those two men are modern Heroes. Their vivacity -- quite extraordinary.

However, as the film pointed out, they were inevitably on the other side of the fence … with regards to even their own homeland. One, a pudgy looking bulldog and the other a sharp snappy willow branch.

But that description fits them quite adequately: One relied on the cuff of his sleeve and the brute power of such…. Which was inevitably referring to his spoken voice - the loud boom. The other, waited and took the quieter approach, silent until bam -- inspiration flooded his pen and boom .. On the paper.

What was quite interesting however was the fact they were on opposite sides …
One would have given himself to the Motherland, knowing with every fiber in his body that Mother England was the only thing stopping the world from falling.
And the other would hope that the Motherland would fall, knowing also with every fiber that England was totalitarian in other respects, holding the Imperialist Empire as she did.

One wrote Novels and parables, the other Rhetoric and tirades.

One however, was born before and died after the other…. Mostly all the while in the public eye.
The other died early and was born late… the death occuring slowly, coldly and silently in the Cotswold Sanitorium (http://www.online-literature.com/orwell/).

Both would work often with pen in hand. But only one descended purposefully to the depths of the poverty, so that he may truly acknowledge "how the other half lives."

Both would change the world. But only one stood up bravely against all those ((in charge of his nation)) solely for her defense … So that Her golden flag should proudly flap.

In the end, I ask… where they are Double the Helping, Cancel out in smithereens in their Graveyards, or Divinely what…?

Canings Without the Promise of the Perks

2008-03-19T18:40:00.000-07:00

I thought that it was very interesting that both men went to boarding schools very young and had little to no contact with their parents. Think about that, To have a child and then, basically, sent them away and hope the mold to become a good person. It is a wonder to me how successful boarding schools really are. It was also very interesting how the film marvelled Orwells accomplishments and brought a shinning light to them, but with Churchill I felt that they down-played him until his infamous speeches. It was interesting because the narrator said that both boys "were put to the cane", but Orwell had them without the promise of the perks. The perks are suppose to shape a man for the real world, as it did for both Churchill and Orwell. The great part about comparing these two, was as the documentary suggested both Winston and Orwell appealled to their respective classes. Churchill was the aristocarat, and Orwell was the middle class.

The Two Winstons Reaction

2008-03-19T17:14:00.000-07:00

The Two Winston’s was a pretty interesting story of two respectable men who are on different sides of the social spectrum. In a way it was a classic team up of sorts as both men wound up lending their skills to fight a common cause in order to protect the country their both hold dear. Yes, their methods and allegiances were different, Churchill to the high officials and Orwell to lower class society, but in the end it was both of their amazing skills that brought England into a new and prosperous age. I’ll agree with Nolan on this being far superior to “The Empire of Good Intentions.” If we had more men like Churchill and Orwell influencing England at the time of that documentary, the world would be a far better place.

The Two Winstons

2008-03-19T17:09:00.000-07:00

The chapter of Simon Schama's History of Britain entitled The Two Winstons essentially speaks to varying perspectives of British history in the early 20th century. Through the lens of two very different, though equally historically focused men, The Great Commoner Winston Churchill and the acclaimed novelist George Orwell, Schama presents a tumultuous history from the both the top and the bottom of the socioeconomic hierarchy. These two men helped to shape the history they were to live-- "reading it, writing it, making it." From Churchill we see the Britain of the political elite-- snobby, sure, and intensely patriotic. From Orwell we see the under side of the British Empire, ruthless imperialism and impoverished destitution and these notions become evident to Orwell while he acts as a police officer in India. Orwell notes, "I realized the hollowness and futility of the white mans dominion in the East...and how I was an absurd puppet." But eventually, the two men would come to agree on one thing at least, the need to defend England against tyranny, oppression, and slavery in the form of Nazi Germany and the need for victory at all costs. Schama concludes the program with a thought on history...its not meant to revere the dead, rather, its meant to inspire the living. And I think that is the essential purpose of his chapter. Much like Orwell's detestation of boarding school peers for not understanding the meaning behind the history they were so apt to memorize, Schama expects his readers/viewers to realize the importance of history...not on the past, but on the present and the future. To steal a line from Schama, "I think that neither Churchill nor Orwell would have minded that very much, and as a matter of fact, neither do I."

The Two Winstons

2008-03-19T16:33:00.000-07:00

I found this chapter of “History of Britain” to be a lot more enjoyable than the last. The comparison of Winston Churchill and George Orwell at first surprised me, but then I found myself seeing and looking for ways that they were alike. I found it fascinating that two people that were polar opposites had so much in common. In my mind both Orwell and Churchill were so alike because they both lived their history. When Orwell wanted to write “Road to Wigan Road”, he went out and experienced the coal mines and he threw himself into his research, experiencing what the characters in the book were experiencing. Winston Churchill did the same when he was fired from the position of First Lord of the Admiralty; he joined the front line and fought in the trenches during World War One. Both men reinvented themselves throughout their lifetimes. In the end of their lives they both outgrew their own godlike lives. Orwell escaped it, while Churchill embraced it. The two Winstons opened my eyes to the real people of the real people, not just the godlike figures.

The Two Winstons

2008-03-19T16:06:00.000-07:00

This movie was somewhat enjoyable. I enjoyed the way they made parallels between Orwell and Churchill. It was fascinating how their lives were oddly alike, but also very different. They seemed to be paralleled opposites of each other, which was very interesting to see in the film. Both men had wealthy parents, Churchill's was royalty, a Duke, and Orwell's father was an opium mogul. Both men went off to boarding school. However, Churchill was very interested in History, to go as far as it was nearly his religion. Orwell wasn't that interested in History, or anything else for that matter. Where Churchill was excelling in school, Orwell couldn't care less. He was indifferent and became slightly rebellious in his academic apathy. Churchill pulled his strings and got to be in the action of WWI, but Orwell couldn't, and felt a guilt for not experiencing the horrors of war. While Churchill was working as the First Lord of the Admiralty the first time, Orwell was in Burma, working for the police. He defected from the police to become an author, and became a homeless tramp to gain experiences to write about. Likewise, Churchill's fame was dwindling, and his party was tired of his politics. Having been demoted, Churchill began to write books himself. Oddly enough, Orwell went to Spain during this time to help train rebels fighting against the fascist socialists taking over Spain.
Their entire life interetwined in an oddly parallel way, at least, through the eyes of the movie. The film did a great job of comparing the two men, though the similarities and intertwinement may have been exaggerated.

Response to "The Two Winstons"

2008-03-19T14:33:00.000-07:00

Watching the "Two Winstons" section of Schama's documentary, the first significant idea that grabs my attention is that of the Chinese opium "habit." I use quotes here only to emphasize that "habit" may not exactly be the correct word; by using this word, and failing to elaborate, the documentary puts a more-than-deserved negative slant on the Chinese, failing to mentioned that it was the British and Indian governments that instigated the Chinese addiction to opium in the first place. Once opium was officially outlawed in China, and many Chinese were already addicted, Britain and India continued to sneak it in, which was infuriating, as the Chinese government (and many commoners) found opium use to be immoral and unhealthy, an alarming trend that needed to be eradicated. However, the illegal British/Indian triangular trade with China—in which the British could avoid coming into contact with the Chinese at all by using Indian ships to do their "dirty work"—continued for years, and this lead to the Opium Wars. See John Fairbank and Merle Goldman's China: A New History (2006; Belknap Press) for more/specifics, especially pages 196 to 200. Jonathan Spence is also very good.

With that out of the way, I should probably focus on the actual topic of the documentary: Winston Churchill and Winston Smith. Honestly, the "Two Winstons" aspect of the documentary is difficult to follow. Eric Blair and "George Orwell" (a pen name) seem to be interchangeable in the documentary, and this makes the viewing experience rather tedious. Perhaps I missed Schama's first allusion that Eric Blair WAS, in fact, George Orwell; as such, the realization that Blair and Orwell are one in the same needs to be made clearer, and from the very beginning. I often find myself wondering who Schama is talking about. Who is this Eric? I also find myself wondering why the documentary strays away from the Winstons. In fact, it does not (well, not really, anyway), and I do not realize this until at least twenty minutes into the documentary. Upon realizing that Blair is Orwell, and Orwell is Blair, I further realize that the documentary provides essential historical/biographical insight into Orwell's writings; had I had time to read the optional Orwell assignment, this information might have been vital and/or enlightening. As such, for me, the documentary merely provides historical insight into British history and biographical insight into Winston Churchill (e.g. ideas about writing and democracy), as well as an introduction to Orwell, who I now know was born Eric Blair. In all, the documentary provides a fairly in-depth look at Churchill (e.g., I did not know that the "majority of his party" mistrusted him, at least during the evacuation of children), but it seems that identity confusion hurts the Orwell aspect of the film, making the "Two Winstons" connection more difficult to see/understand (at least for me, that is). Furthermore, in Schama's treatment of the Chinese as well as that of America, his bias as an Englishman definitely shows—which Kyle pointed out.

Dueling Winstons

2008-03-18T15:38:00.000-07:00

While I think this episode of the documentary is slightly more agreeable than the last I still have some minor complaints. For example, the obvious glorification of Churchill and Orwell is perhaps merited. I think it is perhaps distorting however, because the build up of the British state of desperation in WWII only to mention in passing the involvement of America in the war and in a disdainful way upsets me slightly and makes me think these movies were made solely for the glorification of Britain under the guise of fair historical treatment. I kept waiting for the mention of American involvement and the result was one passing and pejorative comment "if Britain had to be the unwilling sidekick of America in order to fight off the oppression of fascism then so be it." This statement hurt me as an American citizen. First it made it sound like world war II was fundamentally a British conflict and in effect their "crusade against evil" and that American involvement was an inconvenient dulling of British pride that had to be swallowed. With all these grandiose description of Churchill as the pinnacle of British culture and the savior of Britain in a time of need you would think that a few words could be spared for American involvement in the war. It is not difficult to believe that without American involvement in WWII Hitler would not have been taken down, and yet the movie seemed to make the statement that without Winston Churchill Hitler would not have been brought down. Even though it is a documentary on British history rather than American I still hate the slighted way the movie treated this. How long does disdain for American involvement in World War II have to last?

Passage to India

2008-03-17T19:37:00.000-07:00

This movie is significant especially in the realm of indigenous people film. As we can see through out the movie steretypes of people are being portrayed. You have you indigenous people who fight of the oppression as well as the contradictory group who see nothing wrong with what is going on. This all changes however when the young girl accuses the man of rape, as we then see all the people who are being oppressed engage in a "revolt" or overthrowing of the oppression. As man scholars would announce this as a very traditional film, one is able to see that many problems still occur in a modern day society.

Gaelic

2008-03-17T19:34:00.001-07:00

Patrick Long
Professor Brewer
Gaelic Passage
3/17/08

The Importance of Gaelic

Pg.44 "It really was rapid... Gaelic of all is well-nigh unintelligible.”

This passage is relevant as our author presents Gaelic in a very negative tone. Our author is presumably from Ireland yet during this story, he points to Ireland original language as jargon or “swearing drunkenly.” At this point our author feels that the language that was spoken by his ancestors and the people of the west is nothing more than a drunken man swearing at him with no relevance or systematic thought. This quickly turns as in the very next sentence our author develops Gaelic as a very difficult language to understand and to speak fluently. By doing this the audience is able to see that while the author feels that Gaelic is not so much the fact that it sounds like a drunk blabby it is the fact that Gaelic is very hard to understand and unfortunately if you are not used to this form of language you are going to be very frustrated and unable to understand. This is when our author makes the biggest stance of all. He states “Good Gaelic is difficult but that the best Gaelic is well-nigh unintelligible. Here our author furthers his stance that if you have no encounters and are not used to the language that even with someone who speaks good Gaelic you are going to be lost and with someone who is fluent you are going to have no recollection of anything that is being said.
The question however still remains, is Gaelic any different than any other second or third language that a person is trying to learn and that has very little training in the art of language. For instance many students are forced to take a second language even if they have not intent on ever studying it any further than a first year student. But do they still not have these same instances of struggle. I can remember looking back on much of my Spanish training and thinking that I have no idea what this person is saying yet I had been studying the language for three or four years. I can understand where our author is coming from as our story teller is presented as a man from Ireland with little experience with his native language. So inherently without studying the language our story teller is obviously going to find someone speaking Gaelic to “swear drunkenly.”

Blog On Orwell. Or A Lesson In A Beauty.

2008-03-16T21:05:00.000-07:00

Blog On Orwell. Or A Lesson In A Beauty. (PROFESSOR BREWER: I READ BOTH PIECES, and ENDEAVORED TO COMMENT ON "SHOOTING AN ELEPHANT" USING ORWELL's GUIDELINES AS DESCRIBED ON PAGE 92 OF "POLITICS AND THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE")

As an author, Orwell was simplistic. I scrutinized his style and hoped to find something out of the ordinary: nothing came. But, on the contrary, perhaps the fact that Orwell navigates without a 'superfluity' in style is a style, in and of itself. He was, after all, one of the twentieth century's keystone authors.

But maybe he attained his title for other reasons. As an author, Orwell would elucidate elusive points for his audiences, maneuvering political and social impasses with ease. As the imperialist "elephant" slaughterer, he paralleled every Englishman at that time, squeezed betwixt the grip of the Queen and the glares of the natives, wherever they may be.

Why didn't he slaughter a tiger, or some predator? Why did Orwell's story deem him to attack a useful and "costly piece of machinery?" (81) If it had been a predator, then Orwell would have been useful and a grace to the Burmese natives. But that wasn't what Orwell attempted to say: He sent for the rifle initially, only to "defend [himself] - if necessary" (81). The elephant wasn't a 'threat,' either. Though he was influenced by a state of "must," the elephant, at the time that Orwell chose to shoot him, was passive, or "took no notice if you left him alone, but he might charge if you went too close to him" (82).

Therefore, as I propose to you, perhaps Orwell was writing to truly espouse once again the inherent damage of his presence as an 'imperialist'. The underlying protest against the "dirty work of [the] Empire" (79) was modeled by Orwell's choice, as an author, to force Orwell, the narrator, to shoot a working Burmese elephant. The author's choice was conscious and deliberate, and suggesting that the Empire was intervening incorrectly outside of its jurisdiction.

Nevertheless, there is evidence suggesting Orwell wrote not for the above reason, but rather to outline another side of his dilemma: the Indians' reciprocal and reactive psychological pressure. As the piece began, the narrator Orwell waged an internal war, battling the Indians' devilish, antagonistic ways and "sneering yellow faces of young men" (79). Likewise, leading up to the point of noticing the crowd (bottom of 81) he was a rational actor, resolute in his decision in opting "not to shoot [the elephant]" (81).

Afterwards however, in the aside seemingly interspersed throughout the next page , Orwell discloses the truism that "every white man's life in the East was one long struggle" (82). This is elemental. His life was a battle, and after noticing the immensity of the crowd, had to "act like a sahib… resolute [and] knowing his own mind" (82). But only if Orwell, the narrator, could know his own mind, then perhaps the elephant, wouldn't have died "very slowly and in great agony" (83).

For my own bewilderment, I pose this question to you: Does this jostle the mind of another author we have read? Is not Orwell reminiscent of Conrad?

The Poor Mouth

2008-03-12T19:37:00.000-07:00

In the opening chapters of this book, an audience member could place themself in the grandfathers house, sitting on the big red footstole, listening to him tell stories about his life. In the opening chapter one recieves a very interesting background of our story teller. One understands that our storyteller is from Ireland and that he speaks in Gaelic, or the traditional language of Ireland. We also learn that he is brought up by his grandfather and his mother on their farm. This chapter sets the presedent for many more of the stories that will further develop our storytellers life.
In Chapter six one is able to see many of the traits allow the audience to see the time in which our storyteller is presenting his lifetime. The audience must note that our storyteller is living during a time that women are deemed to be insufficient to men and objects for marriage rather than an object of love. This is most easily to be seen when our storyteller tells the story of when he asks his father where the best women are going to be found. He then discovers that the best women will be in the rose bush and he quickly attends to find a perfect women for him.
Through out this novel, one is able to see that the author is trying to portray the life of a young man in Ireland through out the turn of the century. Many of the stories seem to have a brief moment of sattirism in them yet, one can still see many of the same traits in a grandfather to grandson story today. As the life of our storyteller develops, so does the understanding of an Irish life, atleast as it is presented to the audience.

Poor Mouth

2008-03-12T18:33:00.000-07:00

It may be relatively obvious that the Poor Mouth is intended to be humorous, but despite its obvious nature, the use of humor is very important to the book. It is used to probe into the minds of the truly Gaelic to reveal their thoughts and feelings about their heritage and to poke fun at the unrelenting Gaelic sense of pride. The most prominent theme in the book is the Gaelic mindset that everything that can go wrong will go wrong. Irony is probably the most effective means of highlighting this theme, and is seen at virtually every twist and turn of the story.

There are innumerable examples of the Gaelic everything that can go wrong will go wrong mentality, but a few are the most obvious and useful. The first is the Gaelic feis. It is intended to be a huge celebration, but although there is celebrating, a number of people die. Eight died simply from dancing too much. This shows that even in times of celebration the Gaels can not escape their fate. A second example is Bonaparte O'Coonassa's, or Jams O'Donnell, marriage. Again, when things are going great tragedy strikes. He is finally married and even has a baby boy, and basically out of no where his wife and child die. A third example is O'Coonassa's fate at the end of the story. He becomes very rich when he finds the gold pieces hidden in the mountain with Maeldoon O'Poenassa, but he ends up being falsely accused and convicted of murdering an English man and gets 29 years in prison.

Although to a lesser extent, the book also makes fun of the strong sense of Gaelic pride. The author makes fun of Gaelic names giving every character a surname of O'blanknassa. He also repeatedly points out that the native land of these Gaelics is a place that no one would ever want to call home. And he makes fun of the fact that all Gaels are dirt poor. But he also gives a sense that the Gaelic people are content with their situation and that they basically own it because it is part of what makes them Gaelic. If they were to escape the hardships and find prosperity, then they would no longer be able to call themselves truly Gaelic.

George Orwell's Elephant

2008-03-12T17:27:00.000-07:00

The Shooting of an Elephant by George Orwell turned out to be a very fascinating read. I enjoyed the beginning the most, in which the soldier (I wasn’t sure if this was Orwell himself or the event of a fellow soldier he happened to witness) goes into detail about his being torn between his duty to the empire and his massive envy for the people who hate him the most. It is one of the first texts I’ve read in this course in which the British Empire is badmouthed from within for a change and not sugarcoated with supposed goodness a la Empire of Good Intentions. But what I really liked about the essay was Orwell describing the soldier who chooses to do his duty for the sake of non-embarrassment, “here was I, the white man with his gun, standing in front of the unarmed native crowd…I perceived in this moment that when the white man turns tyrant, it’s his own freedom that he destroys. He becomes a sort of hollow, posing dummy…for it is the condition of his rule that he shall spend his life trying to impress the “natives” and so in every crisis he has got to so what the “natives” expect of him.” (2381-2382) It reminded me of two things: 1. “The Hollow Men”, the power they gain destroying them from the inside, making them aloof to the chaos they cause for victory; and 2. A popular student who will pull off any kind of dare in order to stay popular and not show fear of losing.

Politics and the English Language

2008-03-12T15:29:00.000-07:00

Orwell repeatedly mentioned in his essay the risks of cluttering sentences with Greek and Latin-derived polysyllabic words, saying that these, instead of communicating a precise meaning via an image, muddle meaning in a fog of abstraction. "...Latin words [fall] upon the facts like soft snow, blurring the outlines and covering up all the details" (2391). He then, rightly so, says Latin-drenched sentences usually come from the mouths or pens of politicians and lawyers - and it is strange then to think what reasons are given to young pupils to encourage them to study the classical languages.
If my Internet were working now, I would pull up a quotation from a page I viewed months ago when first deciding to study Greek, but I think the example so familiar that a quotation would be needless. Greek and Latin are encouraged for those interested in pursuing law or political occupations. It is obvious, then, that such diction would come from the mouths and pens of lawyers and politicians. However, if such diction muddles meaning, and students are encouraged by educators to study Greek and Latin so that they may later use Greek and Latin etymology to bolster their sentences - why are they encouraged? Should they be encouraged?
It seems that students, then, are encouraged to study Latin and Greek for the wrong reasons. Rather than appeal to future lawyers and politicians on the basis of the languages' ability to boost their vocabulary, educators should emphasize the rhetoric that flourished in ancient Roman and Greek oratory and the literature to which ours pales in comparison.

A Passage to India

2008-03-11T06:26:00.001-07:00

If you look at just the first portion of the movie, it presents an interesting difference in the attitudes of the British characters. It seems those that have been in India for an extensive period of time have become the embodiment of imperialism. Characters like Ronny exhibit these attitudes of oppression and a sense of being better. However, characters like Adela Quested present a very different attitude. She is very excited to see how the Indians live and to meet Indian people. She seems to have no oppressive ideas whatsoever. Now, this all being given, the movie tells a lot about human nature. Eventually, Adela loses her feelings of benevolence and accuses Dr. Aziz, a good Indian man, of rape. This shows that humans are affected by their surroundings. When Adela began to see small reasons why others held oppressive attitudes she began to change her views. It was almost if she was falling back into the safety net of her British brethren. The strange country and people changed who she was.

A Passage to Oppression

2008-03-11T05:28:00.001-07:00

In the movie A Passage to India, the themes are oppression and the dominance of one people over another group of people. The movie takes place in India under British rule. The British treat the Indians very poorly. For instance, at the beginning of the movie two Indian men riding bicycles were run off the road by British officials riding in their cars. It's the first visit to India for Adela Quested, but she is quick to oppress Dr. Aziz by accusing him of rape. This shows the lack of respect the British had towards the Indians because Dr. Aziz was ridiculed and had his personal business thrown out into the public. Then Adela decided to drop the charges for no reason. And even though she dropped the charges, it still seemed like she believed that Dr. Aziz was guilty of the crime.

A Passage to Oppression

2008-03-11T05:28:00.000-07:00

L. of Inish...

2008-03-10T20:03:00.000-07:00

... began by intentionally and obviously opening up a new conclusion for the parable of the good Samaritan. Donney, an Irish lad inclined to sniff shoe polish and daydreaming, upon finding a battered cat in the road, doesn't pass by like, come to find out, he should, but instead picks up the thing and turns a dining room table into its hospital bed. This, as the play continues, will prove to be a mistake that will cause a gross amount of blood to later color the stage - and so from the beginning we see the "good Samaritan," Donney, not being so celebrated. Further, instead of being celebrated, the ensuing treatment of Donney the tenderhearted cat-carer brings a Lennon tune to mind: "If you had the luck of the Irish, you'd be sorry and wish you were dead..."
And death wishes - or, rather, death warrants - came quickly. Not just your neighbor's cat, the battered cat in the road turned out to be the very beloved cat of one crazed Padriac, member of the Irish Republican Army and notorious madman. What agony Padriac inflicted on those who happened on his bad side was the equivalent of the affection he dealt and felt for his cat.
So the play continues, absurdly piling up futile efforts to escape what was presented as inevitable violence and efforts by others to inflict violence. By the end of it, the "luck of the Irish" was Irish luck indeed, when, after five or so deaths and a kitchen "repainted" red, Padriac's cat meows and crawls from the kitchen corner. Thus the cat who sparked the triggers was not the Helen-of-Cat at all, and what very small reasons for gratuitous violence the play and characters presented were dismissed by the curtain fall as even more absurd.

Self -centered

2008-03-09T18:59:00.001-07:00

I too saw a parallel between A Passage to India and A Heart of Darkness. The British in both story lines have a view of the other race at being less because of social differences. The British believe that everyone should be like them and that’s the only normal way. What they are ignorant to is; other cultures are able to survive and be “normal”. Normal for one culture is the ability for it to work efficiently and be accepted by the majority of the people. When a stronger culture sees a difference they believe that it is not right, much like the British in both story lines. The British saw black people as being uncivil in Heart of Darkness and also they saw themselves as superior to the people of India. Basically, the British are self centered when is comes to their beliefs. But isn’t everyone? So can we really blame them for judging people of different cultures? Don’t we (as in Americans) do that as well?

Hmmm. I guess its your daily dose of IMPERIALISM.

2008-03-09T18:58:00.000-07:00

Blog on Passageway to India

Ever since the beginning, my palate was struck blantantly by the British and Imperialistic taste//overtone: When they (Mrs. Moore and Ms. Quested) turn, on the bow of the boat, away from the Indians, it seemed that they were full of utter disdain. (Thank Goodness I was incorrect, seeing that Mrs. Moore was adamently a warrior, and as two down puts it "a moral safehaven" and safeguard against the Indian treatment) The gritty taste remained stagnant in my tongue and mouth for the remainder of the movie:
- East is East, Mrs. Moore. It’s a question of Culture. -- Or a question of non-integration of Westerners into the East, when they are presently in the East…. Aka the Accountant from Heart of D.

- They become all exactly the same. I give all englishman Two Years. I give the women six months. -- Rape the land, and act totally arrogant against the natives, how utterly unusual.

- Adventures do occur, but not punctually. --- This statement has absolutely nothing related to
the Imperialism picture I am painting for you, but merely I enjoyed it coming out Mrs. Moore's mouth, and agree totally with her.

- "I'll pay you tommorow… "--- here, Dr. Aziz is powerless to the whims of the British Women and their ultra important party that they must be attending

-"God is here… God is here. " Being humans, something unites us all. The disregard for that simple fact might very well be the British and Imperialistic problem… They didn't realize that Indians were humans with similarities (aka that they believed in God, just as the British/Christians did).

-I think you are very new to India,… How did you know? By the Way you address me.

- I've scarcely spoken to an Indian since we landed. Lucky you.

- Perhaps we speak yours a little. Why Fancy, she Understands! Sarcastic little mother of a ... Grr, I don't think one could be more blantant if one tried!

- We're Out here to Do justice and keep the Peace. I'm not a missionrally or a sentimental socialist. --- Hmm, Rudyard Kipling, that wouldn't be the White Man's Burden, Would it be?

-Take mine, I have an extra (back collar stud). Are you sure, nobody keeps it in their breast pocket. Here it is, in my pocket. Many Thanks--- but remember, at this point, there hadn't been a proper introduction: Dr. Aziz had merely just talked to the man, and already he, as the native, was offering up himself to the service of the White man, or Dr. Fielding.

Rape in the eyes of a Wabash Man

2008-03-09T18:50:00.000-07:00

The effect of being molested in A Passage to India brings up a good topic. At Wabash our class would be able to discuss this topic from a different viewpoint than any other class, or most other. Being all male derives a unique conversation of various acts of cruelty especially toward women. Rape viewed in an all male classroom would be very different, than in a coed one. In this story the conflict is intertwined into the British Indian relationship. This provides a unique experience for the Wabash man as he is forced to question the volitity of the molestation, in this story I believe that it was either untrue or in no fault of the women. This story is a classic example of the south in the early nineteen hundreds. White women would claim to be molested by black men, when as in To Kill a Mocking Bird, proved the truth is nothing happened. Even if the claim is completely true I just leave the class the question of, “What was the fault of the man, and what is the fault of the women?”

A Passage To.....

2008-03-09T18:19:00.001-07:00

The film adaptation of E.M. Forester's novel "A Passage to India" was long and inconclusive. Essentially a characterization of the interaction between the Indians and the English that results from British colonization, the film centers on the relationship between Mr. Fielding, a British educator, and Dr. Aziz, an Indian surgeon. As the film progresses, it becomes clear that no character is with out flaw, whether British or Indian, but Ms. Moore, the mother of the local magistrate, appears as the moral touchstone. Thus, it seems fielding does not place blame fully on the British for the results of their colonization of India, also assigning some fault to the natives. Additionally, the movie resonates with a similar theme of "Heart of Darkness," that unfamiliar lands and people can leave a person feeling isolated, confused, and insecure. Ronny reeks of Mr. Kurtz, as he was once a just and benevolent gentleman back in Europe, but while in India he appears slighted and predjudicial. Thus, it appears a theme that foreign lands and foreign people can have profound effect upon even the noblest people. Furthermore, much as Marlow is not very clear...no not very clear" about his experiences in Africa, so to is Forester's description of the events of the Marabar caves-- and the conclusive truth of neither is ever really determined. Similiarly, my only definitive conclusion from this movie, is that the relationship between the British and Indians was tumultous and never really had a shot at success, just like the relationship between Fielding and Aziz appeared hopeful, but eventually failed. Hurray of Ambiguity!

Homosexuality and Maurice

2008-03-09T18:11:00.000-07:00

While I realize that homosexuality has always been a taboo subject, I never realized exactly what it could do to a person until I watched Maurice. I had never thought very much about the legality of homosexuality, because I've grown up in a world (or country, rather) that does not treat it as a punishable/illegal offense (at least not seriously, or to such a great extent). Sure, I've seen phrases like "standards of decency" and "temptation" attached to homosexuality, but Maurice amplifies the meanings of these phrases, going so far as to show one gay man's being sentenced to 6 months in jail with hard labor (which was actually "lenient"). The police had arrested him for a "charge of immorality" and for the "corruption of his social inferior." This latter phrase shows how one could tie social status to the homosexuality issue/problem, as the abovementioned leniency came from the fact that the accused man was a high-ranking member of society, specifically, a politician. It is interesting to note that, had the man been a "regular" member of society, the punishment would have been even more serious. What I find most interesting in the film, however, is the portrayal of secrecy, the proverbial gay "closet." Clive is the one to initiate intimacy with Maurice, but he is also the one who marries a woman for "cover" and leaves behind his true sexual orientation; he gives in to society, caving to its heterosexist standards, while Maurice also hides his sexual orientation from the world but, at the same time, is open enough to pursue a relationship with Alec. Perhaps this is a symbol for the then changing attitude toward homosexuality, a sign of hope for the future. Now, however, we are living IN that future, and although some things have changed, there is still a long way to go for same-sex couples' rights; society's attitude toward homosexuality is continually changing/evolving and perhaps will never be done doing so.

A Passage to India

2008-03-09T17:36:00.001-07:00

A very long movie depicting E.M. Forrester's book about the trial between a young English woman living in India and an Indian doctor who she claims to have molested her during a visit to a cave. This movie is centered around and constantly reminds us of the conflict between the British and Indian cultures. "East is east," says one British woman in the beginning of the movie, another time a bicycle nearly runs over to Indian men. However, in spite of these differences there seems to be a genuine connection between many of the Indian and British characters throughout the beginning of the move. Aziz reminisces kindly about how he imagines himself being part of his ancestor's time as they ride the elephant across the countryside at one point in an interesting monologue. Regardless, in light of what happened at the cave, which is somewhat unclear throughout the movie, these relationship immediately dissolve, the trial itself serves as a focal point for the elevation of this conflict. When the woman decides to withdraw her charge not only is she already distanced from the Indian locals, but those British who had been supporting her. Why she does this is unclear, but one character suggests it is simply out of pity for the doctor, because she knows he stands little chance as a Indian man in light of such allegations from a British woman. The Indian doctor immediately becomes a huge celebrity, representing to the Indians, a symbol of the triumph of Indian people over British persecution. Perhaps one of the most startling changes in the movie is the dynamic transformation of Aziz, this kindly, overly expressive, friendly and accommodating doctor, to a stoic nationalist that detests the British. The real strength of the movie however, lies in the fact that it never reveals whether in fact the woman had been molested or if she had, as Aziz puts it "just got a little too much sun." Whether or not that had happened truly, it allowed the British woman to be the cog that set the wheels in motion for an interesting film about racial and social disparity, and the oversights and weaknesses of British colonialism in India.

Maurice and Social Traditions

2008-03-09T14:14:00.000-07:00

In deciding whether to watch A Passage to India or Maurice, I consulted the ever-trustworthy rottentomatoes.com and, upon seeing Maurice with a higher "tomatometer" rating, a 91% even, took it with a bit of pasta one evening.
If something were to ruin the movie, anything at all, Hugh Grant no doubt would save it. His performance, I thought, carried the movie, all the way through Edwardian sitting rooms, Edwardian sitting rooms, and, well, Edwardian sitting rooms. The look at Cambridge made me pain a bit to then look at our dwellings on campus. And further, I wish we too were under the pressures of established, collegiate decencies - I think.
Yes, the film pulled homosexual strings but, I thought, in the contrast between Maurice and Clive, did so quite properly. In Clive was presented a tendency toward homosexuality - a just-past-platonic tendency toward homosexuality - then tempered, in his later years, by society. And when he regarded duty to society, duty to its traditions and decencies, over what might to him have offered a more fleeting and thrilling lifestyle, he found contentment in it and in his eventual marriage. Maurice, on the other hand, sparked first by Clive's affection, continued on a spiraling descent into carnality, separating him from his family, society, and, by the end of things, his first collegiate friend and, well, love - Clive. And here was the strength of the movie, apart from its portrayal of Cambridge - duty before pleasure, and if one is to conquer the other, then let duty do the conquering.

Sawdust, Joyce, Mashing, and INRI.

2008-03-01T10:08:00.000-08:00

Form very much over function for Joyce, Ulysses. Pensive, too. Only says one simile length of Lestryg.: "His brother used men as pawns," p. 2225. Must mean metaphors are more natural. Not natural to think in "like," in "as." Means rationalization.
Says "sawdust" like T.S. Eliot says sawdust, p. 2229, talk of restaurants and "gobful wolfing" collared men, "... snivelling nosejam on sawdust." And Eliot, "... sawdust restaurants with oyster shells." Earlier too Bloom thinks oysters.
---
Enough, though, with this pained imitation of his chopped sentences. I had read Joyce's Portrait of an Artist last fall, sitting under street lights misplaced 'round a city park, and liked it much for its integration of religion, its stress of religion, religious guilt, and college boys talking like Salinger's Catcher - but I don't remember chopped sentences in it. Sometimes in Lestryg. they do well, I think, to catch some poignant image by mashing two words not oft used side-by-side. P. 2227, and "...deep summer fields, tangled pressed grass, in trickling hallways of tenements". Then what may be my favorite sentence from the reading, p. 2221, and "No time to do her hair drinking sloppy tea with a book of poetry." It off-rhymes in blank verse, yes, but that "sloppy tea!", the misplaced modifier "sloppy" jammed between "drinking" and "tea" is something really nice and new.
And I can't decide if what makes some of Joyce's stream of consciousness word-smashing pretty is its newness, how it fulfills our longing to hear words we don't often hear, how it relieves us from the formulaic phrasing of words and established-with-authority sentence structuring, or if its pretty disregarding our tiredness and want of new, pretty in itself, because it (might) reflect what we too think, deaf to our rationale, when we walk 'cross town on a lazy afternoon, thinking of Elijah and eateries and infidelity - as if it held a voice recorder to our walks then transcribed those thoughts onto a writing pad.
Lonely walks, too. His Bloom is a man-on-the-town and of-the-town, occupied with advertising, handshaking businesses with other business, but also he holds a sensitive distance from the fellows, the bailiff and "suetfaced young man" (2228), chomping mouth-open with hasty knife and fork at the first pub he ducks into: "Couldn't eat a morsel here" (2228). Loud unrefined men "shovelling gurgling soup down the gullet" (2228) - Bloom's disgust with this is, I think, what makes him likeable, and is what gives his walk and thoughts a sense of protection, of undisclosed feelings and associations, revealed to the reader in Joyce's chops and snippets.
Seems too much like dripping paint from a can and calling it art, Joyce's way of mashing words and letting their mashed pieces fall on the page. Yet as Pollock was an artist, dripping paint from paintcans, so was Joyce and his mashed words. Underlying the random splotches is something, something, something new or something so mirroring our free-associating thoughts that reading Joyce or viewing Pollock is a reflection on, geez, our consciousness, or something, something...
"No time to do her hair drinking sloppy tea..." (2221).

Note: On page 2214 - "Our Saviour. Wake up in the dead of the night and see him on the wall, hanging, Pepper's ghost idea. Iron Nails Ran In." That last part, Iron Nails Ran In, is a play on the Latin acronym, IESVS·NAZARENVS·REX·IVDÆORVM: "Jesus the Nazarene, King of the Jews." Those four letters, INRI, were plastered all over Spain, especially on the architecture of Gaudi, and I was confused to them until returning finally to Barcelona and querying an Opera singer Spanish friend of mine - but yes, a play on the Latin phrase.

"Lestrygonians" Observation

2008-02-27T22:57:00.000-08:00

This is a really difficult text to read because Joyce uses (third-person) streams of consciousness rather than a traditional, structured third-person narrative (so it reads like a person's thoughts, meaning that there are lots of fragments and jumping around, because in real life, one idea often gives birth to a new one altogether, seemingly out of nowhere, and they are not always in complete sentences). He also seems to go back and forth between writing from an outside narrator's point of view and from the perspective of the main character (Bloome). Anyway, I like this part:

Stuck on the pane two flies buzzed, stuck.

Glowing wine on [Bloome's] palate lingered swallowed. Crushing in the winepress grapes of Burgundy. Sun's heat it is. Seems to a secret touch telling me memory. Touched his sense moistened remembered. Hidden under wild ferns on Howth. Below us bay sleeping sky. No sound. The sky. The bay purple by the Lion's head. Green by Drumleck. Yellowgreen towards Sutton. Fields of undersea, the lines faint brown in grass, buried cities. Pillowed on my coat she had her hair, earwigs. In the heather scrub my hand under her nape, you'll toss me all. O wonder! Coolsoft with ointments her hand touched me, caressed: her eyes upon me did not turn away. Ravished over her I lay, full lips full open, kissed her mouth. Yum. Softly she gave me in my mouth the seedcake warm and chewed. Mawkish pulp her mouth had mumbled sweet and sour with spittle. Joy: I ate it: joy. Young life, her lips that gave me pouting. Soft, warm, sticky grumjelly lips. Flowers her eyes were, take me, willing eyes. Pebbles fell. She lay still. A goat. No-one. High on Ben Howth rhododendrons a nannygoat walking surefooted, dropping currants. Screened under ferns she laughed warmfolded. Wildly I lay on her, kissed her; eyes, her lips, her stretched neck, beating, woman's breasts full in her blouse of nun's veiling, fat nipples upright. Hot I tongued her. She kissed me. I was kissed. All yielding she tossed my hair. Kissed, she kissed me.

Me. And me now.

Stuck, the flies buzzed.

I like the way Joyce uses streams of consciousness here to connect the mating flies to a memory of a sexual encounter between his wife and himself. The passage is particularly powerful near the end, when Joyce gets more explicit by mentioning "nipples" and "tongues." The sexual encounter reaches its peak just as Bloome thinks "she kissed me" (my emphasis), and then the word "me" leads him back to the present, the "me now" (again, my emphasis). Then he sees the flies again. At this point, Joyce brings the passage full circle, and one might even say that, in a way, he uses the romantic memory of the Bloomes' lovemaking to fill in the details of the "stuck" flies' own lovemaking. We MIGHT even be tempted to say that he compares/contrasts the flies and the Bloomes and, doing so, humanizes the flies or, conversely, animalizes Bloome and his wife.

Struggles of Women

2008-02-21T05:47:00.000-08:00

Through out this short story, one is able to see the struggles that women have had to endure through the lens of academia. Virgina Wolfe, uses the narrator to develop many ideologies as to why women have had to endure such hardships through out time. She develops this in many different ways, first by developing the idea that women are not permitted to do many things that men are allowed to do, such as simply walking on the grass rather than a gravel walk way. Wolfe, then furthers here argument by looking at the financial possibilities for women in the concentration of writing. She discusses the fact that many of the most famous writers were indeed men until a certain point in time. She writes that during the time of Shakespeare no woman would have ever been able to write that way. She then develops he idea that women’s rights have been changing by looking at several of the latest writers and the struggles that they have been able to bring forth such as female realist writers writing about a lesbian relationship.
While Virgina brings up many points as to the struggles of women in writing, I would like to question this in a very different light. The genre of sports seems to much the same as writing. As many women were unable to compete in any form of competition let alone to be considered some of the greatest athletes of their generation. Yet, has this changed today, I would argue that just as Wolfe has seen the writings of women go from none to the abilities to write about lesbian relations, women in the area of sport have gone from no recognition to being considered some of the greatest athletes of their generations. I would argue that, Virgina Wolfe, sheds light not only to the struggles of women during the time of her writing, she has shed light to a genre of women struggles in society.

Three Lifetimes, in two Hours

2008-02-19T17:58:00.000-08:00

In contrast to my previous post about Virginia Woolf's essay, I think that the Hours is an extremely effective, and powerful message, not just for the place of women in society, but the place of lesbians in a society that is not accepting to them, and the place of artists and visionaries, and in a world that seems to care little for finding a deeper meaning to existence. At first one begins to question what it is that these women have in common that they all should be placed in such a strong comparison. The movie assists in this nicely, however, the complexity of the commentary is astounding, and though I have seen this movie three times already it would take many more for me to fully understand it. One of the most impressive displays of this is in the use of device to connect characters throughout the modern (1950, 2001) stories to the archetypes that Virginia Woolf is faced with. For example, by connecting the cracking of the eggs of Clarissa (the 2003 woman) with the cracking of the eggs of the servants, Clarissa is more often than not compared to the mundacity and business of the everyday life of Richmond surrounding Virginia. This is also quite obvious from how Richard treats Clarissa in their relationship. However, Clarissa often times also plays the part of Virginia, as seen from her conversation with Richard's ex, she seems to be "stuck" in a spiritual sense, and life has never seemed the same to her since her days with Richard. Also when Richard makes her feel as though her life is "trivial" he represents the archetype of Virginia's husband and the male dominated literary world. I am particularly fascinated and impressed with the integration of 1950's conformity into the story as it is a very powerful display of socially conditioned oppression perfectly appropriate for the tale. In my opinion the character of Laura Brown serves to live out the actuality of the Mrs. Dalloway character created by Virginia, and since this story merges with the modern story of Clarissa and Richard I think that this then creates a dichotomy: the author, and her characters as manifested in reality, and the resonating effect of such characters into modernity. It is a beautiful story that I have loved since I saw it the first time, although I will admit it does become a bit melodramatic at times. In short it is hard to say what unifies these characters but I think if I were to pick it would fall somewhere in the gray areas between the following quotes:
"Im living a life I have no wish to live..." (Virginia Woolf)
"It (meaning her previous life) was death....I chose life." (Laura Brown)
"To look life in the face, and know it for what it is, love it, and then put it away..."(Virginia Woolf)
It is amazing but the movie almost seems to leave me with a sense of having experienced what is described in this last quote.

A beautiful film to the very last moment.

Give them free...

2008-02-19T11:59:00.000-08:00

Woolf proposes to show how uneven the playing field was for women at her time in literature (amongst other fields). I do not believe that Woolf is necessarily advocating for some sort of separate education for women—rather I believe that Woolf recognizes that women have been downplayed in literary terms for so long, that the few women that make it tend to, somehow, assimilate to the mainstream male-oriented literary culture and are not represented in full, free terms. Women writers who write as they wish, experiment, think independently, etc., were perhaps shunned by the literary gate-keepers and so the successful women writers had to sort of conform. Her need for “money and a room of her own” to write successful fiction is not to be taken too literary. It’s meant to show the vast different and uneven playing grounds that men and women face entering the literary market. Goes in line with the saying I once heard, “Women have to work twice as hard to be thought of half as good.” So the women need to be isolated from this oppressive phallocentric society that only supports men—and attempts to condition women to similar thinking—they need to isolate themselves from that, get some money for food, etc., and begin to be free enough to think for herself.
I.e., men stop hating…give the women an equal opportunity, or give ‘em a room by themselves, with some financial support.

A Room of One's Own Review

2008-02-19T11:41:00.000-08:00

In A Room of One’s Own the one main reoccurring theme is inequality and power of men over women. This theme is prevalent when the narrator is unable to find hardly any history or scholarship on women. Not to mention the information that she did find had a biased perspective written by men. To further illustrate the theme of inequality, the narrator made up a story about a Judith Shakespeare, the sister of William Shakespeare. William was always able to pursue his ambitions where as Judith was restrained. When her father beats her for refusing marriage, Judith is an example of the power of men over women. By the end of the story the narrator comes to the conclusion that even though Judith may have had just as much if not more talent than William, since Judith was a woman, her talent was confined by the society that she lived in. Inequality is also portrayed in the statement, “A women must have money…to write fiction.” Not very many women had money back in old days. Women were discriminated against, not getting paid as much as men for the same job, therefore men had power over women. In conclusion, because men had power over women, there were not many successful women writers.

A Tomb of One's Own

2008-02-19T11:37:00.000-08:00

A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction.

Finally, a gender's issue that isn't forced! Mary Beton/Seton/Carmichael very plainly, easily, and happily writes a story for us which we can understand. She contends that Judith Shakespeare, a fictional sister of William's, would not have been afforded the same respect had she the same talents as her brother. In a metaphorical sense she asks for five hundred pounds a year to sustain any female author as she writes.
But this is not any militant feminism. Instead, she seems to be promoting the poetic license of any artist, so long as all are given equal credit and equal criticism for their individual efforts. Oxbridge, then, becomes a satire of the previously masculocentric literary world.

That a woman should be given the same opportunity as a man seems justified and fair.

Woolf On Wabash?!

2008-02-19T11:15:00.000-08:00

While sitting, reading, and thinking in a room of my own with five hundred a year, these series of thoughts came to me.----“For we have too much likeness as it is!” With that quote, Virginia Woolf (or Mary Seton, Mary Beton, Mary Carmichael, or whomever) suggests that Wabash College, a college for men, is a good thing. While Woolf’s lengthy speech fundamentally concerns the need for supplying women with a room of their own and five hundred pounds a year to live on, whether figuratively or literally, I believe it resonates with a suggestion that women and men should be educated separately so as to hone their individual and unique voices. Woolf states, “Ought not education to bring out and fortify the differences rather than the similarities?” She elaborates further, discussing how men and women can only write truly excellent poetry (or prose) if they are unencumbered by competition with the other sex. Competition pits one gender against the other, it forces males to defend their sex and a females their own. However, according to Coleridge and Woolf, for the mind to be resonant and porous, for it to transmit emotion without impediment, for it to be naturally creative, incandescent, and undivided, the mind must be androgynous. It must utilize both voices distinctly, without defending one against the other. It must be free to go where it pleases whether that is to a mark on the wall or to a scene where two people get into a taxi—it must be free to explore. It must be composed of the truth, and not just gender specific truth, rather it must “celebrate some feeling that one used to have, so that one responds easily, familiarly, without troubling to check the feeling, or to compare it with any that one has now” (2098). And it must do so for both men and women—not falling on deaf ears to half of the population. Indeed, it may seem somewhat paradoxical, but for Woolf, the mind becomes androgynous not through mutual interaction and education but through individualized gender specific education that elevates each voice respectively and doesn’t pit one voice against the other. She’s not saying that one sex can’t write about the other sex or can’t think about it or can’t interact with it (in fact by mentioning the shilling size hole on the rests on back of each persons head that only the opposite sex can see, she proposes that these things should happen), she is merely suggesting that in respect to providing for the best the education of women and men, so long as society continues to change in the favor of equalizing the rights and opportunities of women, they must be taught separately.

A Room of One's Own

2008-02-19T11:11:00.001-08:00

This piece was a little hard to wrap my head around, at least for the first couple of chapters. While I thought that Woolf presented a decent argument, “a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction…women and fiction remain, so far as I am concerned unresolved problems,” I think she dabbled too long in over extended examples. I found it very jarring and surprising (well, maybe not too surprising) that she would make such a note about luncheon parties in short stories, “It is a curious fact that novelists have a way of making us believe that luncheon parties are invariably memorable for something very witty that was said, or for something very wise that was done. But they seldom spare a word for what was eaten.” (P.2096) Who is seriously interested in what the characters are eating unless it does something devastating to them later on in the story. Sorry, just had to blow off some steam for a second. I did, however, find the Shakespeare portion of the piece somewhat entertaining. Her little anecdote of how women would write if they had Shakespeare’s genius in his day and age did make me think a little bit. But then again, great genius comes along only every once in a while and thankfully, there are some women in our day and age who have that genius and write amazing literature, and some of them had no money to begin with…she did, at least have a room, or a café, same difference.

A Room of One's Own

2008-02-19T11:07:00.001-08:00

Virgina Woolf’s essay A Room of One’s Own is an account of Woolf’s Opinion of women’s literature during the 1920’s. Women’s oppression in the literary world is the theme of the essay, and this is made clear due to Woolf’s feminist tone throughout.

Although Woolf does come across as a feminist in the essay her message is not to bash male authors by any means, she is simply outlining women’s role in literature and seemingly making the reader aware of their situation during this time.

Not only is Woolf reviewing women’s literature but the actual ability to create an art form of any kind. She states that women are unable to do so as they have not had the options perhaps that male authors and scholars have received.

The opportunities of education, publication, experiences through travel to write about, and furthermore a simple writing space to create literature, hence the title A Room of One’s Own. Women’s roles were more important at home, than out making any kind of money or getting an education in the 1920’s, so chances of becoming a success through literature was extremely unlikely.

In conclusion my first read of Virgina Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own was enjoyable as It gave a first hand account of some of the pressures women had to go through in the 1920’s. Woolf affectively delivers her opinions, seemingly as a feminist although her thoughts never overpowered me, which was nice. The part on Shakespeare’s sister was particularly interesting because it was intriguing to think if Shakespeare was a female would she have got the similar recognition that he did?

My Internal Struggle About Her Need/Claim for a Need for A Room

2008-02-19T11:02:00.000-08:00

Were women that oppressed? To only want the necessities, a room of their own? IT IS THE TITLE OF THE NARRATIVE. Striking and descriptive, tactful and Subtle. What does it mean? Not to share the room with a man, or even a mate? A scary thought, one which made me writhe in displeasure, that she would bottle up herself, stuck in so much contempt against a whole half of humanity, even though some of them hadn’t been in control of their own outcome.
It’s a reciprocal hate that she is unjustified in returning.
“Turn the Other Cheek.”

Who Am I to judge though, because the same time, is hers not a simple request that can’t be given? Was not England the bastion of liberalism, ushering in the 20th century? Obviously, as we have been learning, NOT! The Women wanted Only 500 pounds, equivalent to a “simple lifestyle, not worrying about food, or living expenses”?
I guess that I can’t speak, not having been particularly around nor a minority when she was writing.

BUT, its at the same time, not like she didn’t have food to eat. A dinner of plain soup (WHAT WAS SO PLAIN ABOUT IT?), aveage beef, some vegetables and potatoes (IRISH HAD JUST EXPERIENCED A FAMINE), and bad custard, prunes, biscuits and CHEESE, along with water.
She could have been eating that night the grass she so wanted to walk on!!!
And more reasonable, when the men are ahead, or anyone for that manner, why would she we want to emulate their example?

I’ll think I’ll return to my room, as a White Male, a White Male…

A Room of One's Own

2008-02-19T10:30:00.000-08:00

To begin I would first like to say that I myself found it very interesting to get a women’s point of view on the literature and history of the world. At first I found it hard to understand, but then I began to get inside the narrator’s mind. Woolf did an amazing job at basically transitioning you into the narrator. Now, I can begin to express my thoughts on the writing. I found it very intriguing the way that Woolf used the phrase “A women must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction” (Norton 2092) to symbolize the strife of women throughout history. When I first read the line I only thought about the monetary value. I said to myself “Sure, give anyone, man or woman, money and a room of their own, and they will be able to write.” But then, after reading further I discovered the deeper meaning in the phrase. Woolf doesn’t see just the monetary view of the phrase. She sees it as if you have money, then you are educated and are in a sense free to express yourself through your writing. To support this I looked at the first section and the lunch and dinner scene. The lunch was extravagant with wine and dessert, and it inspired rich and optimistic conservation. The dinner, on the other hand, was just beef and prunes and inspired nothing. The lunch represented men and Oxbridge college with its rich history and abundance of well, while the dinner represented the women and Fernham college with its restrictions and lack of wealth and history. This was not the women’s choice, but what they had because of the men. Women were being restricted and constrained. They were being forced to conform to society. Having a room of your own is also very important because it shields you from the pressures and social obligations of the outside world. It is a place where women could be themselves and express their emotions without the anger and resentment by and towards men. I throughly enjoyed the essay and learned alot from it.

A Mind of One's Own

2008-02-19T10:10:00.001-08:00

In Virginia Woolf's essay "A Room of One's Own," she constructs a statement of the oppression of women based upon how this oppression has affected her as a writer. Accordingly, she creates a parallel between the room that a person needs to write, and the rights of women throughout history-thus I have decided to title this blog "A Mind of One's Own," signifying the freedom of women to think as independent people, for this is I think the true intention of Virginia Woolf's essay. One of the most striking arguments she makes is dispelling the counterargument to the place of women in literature. As she talks you immediately get the very extreme sense that she is claiming that women throughout history have been entirely overlooked and even ignored as insignificant, even detestable parts of society, not worth mentioning in literature. She immediately brings out the negative aspects of male-female relationships such as wife-beating, arranged marriage, the inability of women to earn their own income, in hopes of painting a bleak picture as women as history's unseen slaves. However, the counterargument to this is that, even if women have not been viewed as equal, they still often times enjoyed venerated place in literature as elegant creatures of beauty and morality, as apparent from art, literature and poetry dating back to the times of classical society. She dispels this argument by recognizing this fact and saying that these women have "burnt like beacons in all the works of all the poets from the beginning of time." (2114) However, she makes the distinction that this is very clearly the image of "woman in fiction," and that the reality of the state of women is that of a dumb slave that could "hardly read, scarcely spell, and was the property of her husband"(2114). This is a strong argument, however, a depressing one, as I feel that I now have to readjust my lens of thought whenever I read a historical romance, or poetry and realize myself to the reality that no woman was ever venerated or respected, loved or adored in such away but in reality was used and disrespected as a tool for these artist's pleasure. From the sarcasm in the previous remark, it is obvious that such broad generalizations seriously make me question Virginia Woolf in spite of the fact that I very much enjoy the creative spirit of her writing and the perspective that she brings into the literary world. I will accept that the place of women in this time was by far anything from equal,, and that the writing of men about women is at best a gross misrepresentation of the spirit of women. However, this same argument works in reverse, and I believe her commentary on the nature of men is also at best a gross misrepresentation. When she says things to the effect of "How is he to go on giving judgment, civilizing natives, making laws, writing books, dressing up and speechifying at banquets, unless he can see himself at breakfast and at dinner at least twice the size he really is...(in comparison to women)..." and "Take (this image) away and man may die, like the drug fiend deprived of his cocaine." I think that this is an extreme generalization as I honestly believe that not every man in history has derived his power from "feeling superior to women" and that at least some men respect women more than this (e.g. chivalry, gentlemanliness, courtship, etc.). In doing this she not only steps outside of her capability to comment according to her own harsh divisions (e.g. men cant write about women, so women cant write about men) but she also falls victim to the same form of rhetoric of those chauvinists who foolishly claim that women have inferior characteristics. I think in this way her argument is strongly blunted, and while subjective and not made for "truth" as she claims, nonetheless, remains slightly unconvincing.

A Room of One's Own

2008-02-19T09:54:00.000-08:00

I believe it pretty much goes without saying that Virginia Woolf is an extreme feminist. And, it should also go without saying that A Room of One's Own is an extremely feminist work, dealing mainly with the issue of male oppression of females. Normally, a work like this has to be extremely persuasive for me to really listen. This is by no means because I have a single misogynistic bone in my body, but I just view it as complaining. I know that there is a strong argument that literature is a great vehicle for enlightening people to issues such as this one, but there are a number of much more active things that a person could be doing instead of just writing. However, I will say that this work does not seem to me to be complaining as much as others I have read in the past. Woolf's technique for pointing out that women are being oppressed is much more unique and useful than just simply complaining about its occurrence. The fact that the work is somewhat of a story and not simply an essay helps to eliminate any natural guard the reader may have against feminist ideas. The best thing that Woolf does is to actually propose real solutions. Granted many feminists have proposed solutions, Woolf's use of a room of one's own to symbolize all of the solutions is very effective. Through this, Woolf gives an actual thing that women need, instead of simply saying freedom and rights. The room helps embody the rights and freedoms that women must have to actually be equal to men.

Mark on the Wall Exercise

2008-02-19T09:15:00.000-08:00

Door knob. Slob on My Knob by 3-6 Mafia. What a stupid rap song. I need to go to the store after class. That reminds me, I hate school. Door knob. Door of knowledge. I have no idea why I thought that. Eric Gordon is going to own tonight. I met a girl that knew him well this weekend. Thats kind of cool. Too cool for school.

Woolf and the Velvet Underground

2008-02-19T08:45:00.000-08:00

I usually do not like feminists or any strain of feminism, for similar reasons why I do not support campus movements for a multi-cultural center: both movements seem inherently to defeat their purposes of promoting equality and diversity. Feminism seeks to end male privilege by... advocating female privilege. A multi-cultural center seeks to promote diversity by... confining international students in their own special interest building. However, I didn't mind Ms. Woolf.
She was sensible in her arguments, often balancing her "Women have served... as looking glasses... reflecting the figure of man a twice its natural size (2110)" statements with those like "All who have brought about a state of sex-consciousness are to blame (2146)." She does not let her observations on women lead to an overarching, patriotic call to arms for the empowerment of women worldwide. And for this I am thankful.
But it isn't her sensibility that makes me like Virginia - rather, it is this that keeps me from disliking Virginia. She befriends me when she sentimentalizes "reality," the reality that "overwhelms one walking home beneath the stars and makes the silent world more real than the world of speech (2149)." Hers is a sensitive reality, that which quietly transcends the clamoring parlor talk of certain Granvilles and Percys. And to her, experiencing and concentrating this reality in the written word is the most notable job of the author: "to find it and collect it and communicate it to the rest of us (2149)."
This is, I think, a power of the arts which is absent in most other studies - the power to overwhelm you in that lucid feeling of transcendence which arises after you read good literature, listen to a good song, watch a good movie: the power to, if only for a moment, redefine your reality. It's in Salinger's Catcher in the Rye; Fitzgerald's letters to his wife, Zelda; Camus' The Stranger; Eliot's The Cocktail Party; the movie American Beauty; the song Heroin by the Velvet Underground; paintings by Edward Hopper - at least for me.
For Ms. Woolf, no doubt, it was in a room of one's own, reading Shakespeare.

A Room of One's Own

2008-02-19T06:18:00.000-08:00

This is the second time I have read Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own. Each time I read this pseudo-story/essay, the phrase “poverty of our sex” stands out (Norton Anthology 2102). With this phrase, Woolf combines two instances of hardship: the lack of money—and inherent low quality of life—and the oppression of the female gender. The combination of these two elements really comes to life in this line: “Every penny I earn […] will be taken from me and disposed of according to my husband’s wisdom […] so that to earn money, even if I could earn money, is not a matter that interests me very greatly. I had better leave it to my husband” (2103). With this quote, we can see how men oppressed women even WITH money; in this respect, there seems to be a never-ending cycle of subjugation between money and the women of the era about which Woolf speaks, and it seems this would be especially true of the POOR women of the time. Being women, they already encounter oppression, and with little or no money in the family bank, such oppression would increase exponentially. Of course, we must remember that women in lower-class families would probably do more, and thus perhaps even control money in some instances, unlike the “rich brat” of the upper class, who has everything handed to her. We should also remember that these aspects of society do not simply disappear in our time, and we should examine them more closely in EITHER time. However, due to the space and time constraints of this short assignment, we will not be able to go into more detail. Finally, it is important to note Woolf’s use of her own streams of consciousness, the thoughts that lead her to the following conclusion: “A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction” (2092; emphasis mine). Woolf’s streams of consciousness carry the story for over fifty pages (in the Norton), and they give insight into Woolf’s revelation—examples and proof as to why women, in her view, live and work in abject poverty. One such example is when Woolf goes to the library and realizes that men wrote the bulk of the books there, and a lot of them are even about women, but women have had little/no agency to write similar books about men (2105).

A Room for One's Own: What I got

2008-02-18T21:04:00.000-08:00

As I read this story, I felt I was reading the thoughts of a strong feminist. I felt that there was a lot about the oppression of women and how their lives are dependent on men, therefore they are lower than men. Because they are dependent on their male counterparts, they are not able to achieve the same fame or appreciation for their literary works that men get. In other words, female authors are not as successful or recognized because they weren't "as good" as male authors (such as Judith, Shakespeare’s twin). Woolf explains the plight of women in terms of possessions. Women do not have writing rooms or enough money. But this, I think Woolf is making a slightly more symbolic point. By her room, I think she is referring not only a quiet place to write and concentrate on their material, but also I think she is referring to a place in society. A social equality that allows women the same respect as men. A “place” where women may write and gather the same support for their works, something that was not commonplace at the time. By money, I believe Woolf is referring to financial stability, and also to financial independence. From the reading, I think she is trying to make a case that any woman who wishes to write may do so, but she would need to be financially secured, not having to rely on a male to support her as she goes about her endeavors.

A Room of One's Own: The Subjective Truth

2008-02-18T20:33:00.000-08:00

The narrator of this piece claims that through all of her rambling she has only one opinion on the topic of woman and fiction (her essay topic): a women needs money and a private room to write good fiction. Of course to come to this conclusion she combs through many themes, one of which carries over from “The Mark on the Wall:” the subjective vs. objective truth. She continues to argue that people think subjectively, and that any objective analysis contains little truth because it is shaped solely by men. Early in “A Room of One’s Own” she points out that any controversial issue, which sex is, cannot hold any truth, rather “one can only show how one came to hold whatever opinion one does hold” (2093). It is because of this that the narrator chooses to write about woman and fiction through fiction as opposed to fact. It is through this line of thought that the narrator eventually reaches one of her most important points: that women should write what they want to write with little worry of judgment. An objective judgment of a women’s writing by a man is nearly impossible, therefore to worry what others think of your writing is “the most abject treachery” (2147). Woman need to understand that the measuring stick and the game of praise and blame are futile efforts when one simply writes what they wish.

A Room Of One's Own

2008-02-18T20:29:00.000-08:00

There is a theme in the first chapter that suggests that women are oppressed by men. This is shown threw the rule that women cannot walk on the grass and also, how the Beadle walking toward the narrator, was the reason why the narrator lost her idea that she was “fishing” for. Also when she goes to the library to view a manuscript she cannot enter without a man of the college accompanying her. While she is searching through literature on woman studies she realizes that all of the authors are men.
To write about a subject like women or men there are always two sides. What the men see and what the women see. Both side will be bias and this biases contain a view that the other would not one hundred percent agree with. Also, depending on what you are looking for in a text depends on what sexed author you should read. Woolf shows a how mans view of the world can depress a woman’s will to create and be imaginative through the texts and the authors that she views and her experiences at Oxbridge. This is what supports her thesis, “a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction.” Women need their own space away from the oppressed views that men have placed in societies eye.

stream on conscious

2008-02-18T20:04:00.000-08:00

solid slices of wood creating a sigificant piece of work. A solid piece of work whatt is work, why do we work? is Work necessary, I would say nothing is necessaryeven for people who view the world materialistically. Yet, many would argue that the only thing which is important is self preservation. But, why is America only conserned with ourselves. Are so so solin in nature that we feel significant with out a significant other.

"A Room of One's Own"

2008-02-18T19:50:00.000-08:00

I was very surprised when first reading Virginia Woolf’s, “A Room of One’s Own.” This was an interesting read for many reasons; it is a narrators view, of women and their role in society in the 1920’s, and especially how Virginia views money, a room of her own, or any women’s room for her own; and how this deals with women writings and there inequality to men. I believe that she wrote like this because when she was alive when women were treated this way... They were just getting the right to vote, so that says enough. In today’s standards of equality, men and women are the same for the most part. Woolf predicts that until these inequalities are rectified, women will remain in a lower class and their literary achievements will also be less important. Women today can actually write and make poetry and was one of her major themes and that shows the difference in the times. Also women are allowed to go to college and do many more things today than when she lived. She said women could not write because they do not have a room, because they do not have money, which makes him inferior to men because they don’t have privacy or time to write poems or books. Every chapter was so interesting because of the stories she would make up like Judith Shakespeare, William Shakespeare’s made up twin who wanted to write and make plays but couldn’t because she was a women. It just surprised me as how she related the room as a symbol for many larger issues, such as privacy, leisure time, and financial independence, each as a component of the inequalities between men and women. I believe that this writing does not hold up with today’s beliefs of equality, but is still very interesting to see what she thought and how she interpreted these inequalities of men and women.

mark on the wall exercise

2008-02-18T14:43:00.000-08:00

The Clock

"The clock is there, right in front of me, high on the wall. It is always going and never ending. It just keeps ticking away. That constant ticking just means time is always going and on the move. That just means our life is always slipping way from us, if we are not watchful. Time is always drifting away. It can be easy to be left in the dust if your not careful..last night when I was writing my religion 273 paper, I just watched the clock and time tick away. Time just keeps slipping away, that why everyone needs to sieze the day."

The Mark on the Wall: The Outlets

2008-02-17T22:46:00.000-08:00

I look upon the small electrical outlets on the wall and I being to questions some things that I've never had to question before. It seems so odd, but why is there always 2 plug-ins for every outlet? Would it make sense to only have one? Why not three. I've seen some with four, but usually only 2. Would it be better to have multiple plugins? A hassle? A cause of electrical fires? In my room at home I have many outlets, but they are lonely. They have only one cord feeding of their electron filled buffet of energy, and there is no second one. That is, of course, because I don't have much electronics in my room. A lamp, a reading light. A radio... the occasional laptop or cell phone charger... but on the whole not too much. Not that I am pseudo-Amish, I just don't use my room for much. A place to crash, a place sleep, not a place to live. That's what the living room is for, hence the name. But now in my room at college, there is a lack of open outlets. Power-strips are common place and used heavily. So, why is it that there are only two? Why not one, or ten?

the Scars of the Chalk on their Board

2008-02-17T21:31:00.000-08:00

"It. The white remains of chalk dust spread out as if they didn't know of their destination. But can I really refer to chalck as a person or personify it, with a knowledge of what it should or shall be doing? Perhaps I should describe the mark on the board as would an artist, describing the significance in contrasting context, delineating the up-down pattern that was made by the human who did make it. To as her intentions, why or what she hoped to make by it, I cannot remember -- I actually do, but shalln't tell you -- the mark nevertheless remains, as a marker or scar of some discussion."

Besides, why am I writing in a stream of consciousness format? So that I can feed into my sub-mind and then understand deeper of my mind? Deeper into what I really am? Is it not better to reason and slowly move along, taking small steps that are necessary, so that I may not reach wrong conclusions? Isn't delineating by a reasoned process a better process?? A BETTER B-e-t-t-e-r process.

But that's fine, the music is too low, and then the conversation is too loud, about people and "who they are," how much they "dedicate to who they are." Why do you have to talk so loud?

Isn't silence the better option of the two? Isn't keeping a closed, quiet, reserved mouth better? Or not, because I'll keep talking and as the bullets fall from the gun, we'll just remain quiet, and subject to the scars that chalk leaves on boards.

Stream of Consciousness exercise

2008-02-17T18:33:00.000-08:00

The light shines as bright as the sun that I don't know I don't know brings warmth to the earth with its I don't know I don't know I don't know luminous beams of I don't know life bearing I don't know I don't know I don't know I don't know I don't know I don't know assurance assurance and security I don't know I don't know but what the light does assure me I don't know is I will not be I don't know left in the dark on my own I want the light it gives me hope and life and I don't know motivation to continue my journey and my calling let the light shine on to help me and my brothers and sisters mobe towards peace and enlightenment.

Mark on the Wall Exercise: The Block on the Wall

2008-02-17T18:04:00.000-08:00

There is a block on the wall, what could it be? It resembles a piece of molding made of plaster or wood. It could also be the remnants of an old speaker box for which communication could have been made. Who would have used the speaker box? Could it have been used by the dean or the administration office? Or, it could have been used by the professor? But, what if it is not a speaker box, it is just a piece of molding. Then, why is it there? It just sits there all alone. What lies beneath it? What secrets lie beneath this piece of hard heartless wood? There could be a hole behind the block that looks into another room. The hole could have been made by an angry student who punched a hole in the wall, or it could have been made by an earthquake or tornado. But that scenario is improbable because there aren’t serious earthquakes in Indiana, and if there had been a tornado it would have destroyed the whole building. Why is that block on the wall and what secrets about the past does it hide? I will never know because I am not tall enough to reach it and I don't have a ladder.

Electric Socket

2008-02-17T17:37:00.001-08:00

The electric socket was the focus of my "Mark on the Wall" stream of consciousness exercise last Thursday. With that said, this is what I got:

Electricity. What does it do for me? It keeps my computer running; that's for sure. And what's on that computer? Homework, readings, papers, an address book...mail. Oh, the post office! When will my next package come, and what will it be? From where, whom? Karen: I miss her. The weekend!

Mark on the Wall

2008-02-17T16:47:00.000-08:00

Electric Socket

The female and male pieces go together perfectly, why can't we go together that easily? It is making a face at me, two eyes, one nose, but without a mouth. I think this lack of a mouth demonstrates well my current inability to talk to you. How long has it been? Only a few days I'm sure...seems longer. The three holes surely meet in the middle, bundles of wire, electricity flowing together, creating something positive. I want this feeling. I had it...I lost it. Still I feel the face is mocking me. Is this a giant prank, where you step out from the shadows with a smile, and the happy ending of every romantic comedy lives again. Not likely.