I enjoyed The Jabberwocky. Not just because of its wonderful lyrical nature that was incredibly fun to just speak out and the fact that its wording actually made sense in the proper setting that Lewis Carroll had: Wonderland (for instance, Brillig meant 4:00pm) but moreso because it was a brilliant example of how you could take poems your own way with no "true answer". What all is being said in The Jabberwocky is mostly nonsense in our world so we are left to read it and imagine it on our own. We, ourselves, create the tumtum trees and we can define brillig our own way allowing us to illustrate our own Wonderland to fit the poem.
With so many poems focusing on the message or talking about the human condition it was very nice to have a poem that is just there to spark your imagination again.
Sunday, May 1, 2011
When Men Were Men
Joseph Cooper
Mrs. Polly Watson
English 113-111
Formal Blog
May 1st, 2011
Now there’s no mark of men of such wisdom and might;
a rite of passage to manhood, endowed onto all.
The coarse hair hung from a jaw with height,
A mighty forest, a most rugged wall.
Amongst the great Romans and Greeks akin,
and the fearsome Norse, the Viking men,
The beard was respected, a gallant tradition,
With every man bearded, none of them clean
Only women and children, and those hid in the womb,
Dared to go beardless and avoided the tomb.
Rice, Adrian. Creative Writing Class. Catawba Valley Community College. West Wing, Hickory, NC. June 2010.
Mrs. Polly Watson
English 113-111
Formal Blog
May 1st, 2011
Now there’s no mark of men of such wisdom and might;
a rite of passage to manhood, endowed onto all.
The coarse hair hung from a jaw with height,
A mighty forest, a most rugged wall.
Amongst the great Romans and Greeks akin,
and the fearsome Norse, the Viking men,
The beard was respected, a gallant tradition,
With every man bearded, none of them clean
Only women and children, and those hid in the womb,
Dared to go beardless and avoided the tomb.
Rice, Adrian. Creative Writing Class. Catawba Valley Community College. West Wing, Hickory, NC. June 2010.
What I Talk about When I Talk About Poetry
It hasn't been too long since I too felt poetry to be in some lofty domain above me. Shown only joking poems and Shakespeare poems themselves were always a strange beast for me that I never wanted to understand - I was always more one for prose - but my Creative Writing class last semester changed that for me. After my class with Adrian Rice I began to see the potential and the tremendous wit and skill within poetry and since then I've eaten up all the collections of poetry I've gotten my hands on (which sadly isn't many books).
The collection of highly toned wording to portray an idea or an image while still remaining lyrical is a skill that I see for even poets takes incredibly long amounts of time and I admire the respect that amount of thought and attention being brought to their work.
The collection of highly toned wording to portray an idea or an image while still remaining lyrical is a skill that I see for even poets takes incredibly long amounts of time and I admire the respect that amount of thought and attention being brought to their work.
Sunday, April 17, 2011
My Favorite Read
I had a lot of fun with this section, I have to say. I wish I had been more talkative but overall it has been a fun time. Looking more into The Hunger Artist, reading more of James Joyces work, writing about Raymond Carver (A writer whose work I quite enjoy) and managed to look into new things I've never heard of. Possibly the best little excursion for me, however, had been with Hills Like White Elephants from Ernest Hemingway - mainly because this is my first time reading his work before, as much as I'm embarrassed to say. Despite, it had given me a lot of interest into the author and I honestly will probably pick up a collection of his stories when I get the time. Maybe it's because it reminded me quite a lot of Carver (Carver was considered by some the next Hemingway so it makes sense) but it solidified the fact that I enjoy stories with depth to them. With enough minimalism that it forces you to think. Stories that, I suppose you could say, are make like an iceberg with the conflict hidden five-sixths beneath the story itself make for very fun mental exploration and it makes researching it to find different understandings of it far more fun than the science fiction I had been reading only about two years ago.
Saturday, April 16, 2011
Sips of Water
Joseph Cooper
Mrs. Polly Watson
English 113-111
April 16, 2011
I have kept coming back to "A Hunger Artist" by Franz Kafka. It just always seemed too strange for me to leave it alone. One thing I've learned reading short stories is asking myself 'Why was this made?' and specifically for something shown in a school curriculum that question seems like something every person should ask themselves as the story seems far too strange when just left for face value. As I read into "A Hunger Artist" again I began to recognize connections and I feel it is an allegory for not only misunderstood artist but a criticism of the general audience.
To start, the Hunger Artist character is not fueled by depression which drives his fasting but simply that he was not accept the world for what it is. His fasting is his way of rejecting the world and, his own way, transcend it. Despite that, he was only rewarded for his acts on face value and his reasoning why he did it always went unheeded. I'd like to think that this is a comparison to how many people treat art. They take it for its face value and hold it up without fully understanding it, thinking it is beyond them in this lofty domain. Two things that are not uncommon with artists, and even philosophers, are having limitations put onto themselves to appease the people while defacing their work (poets now doing only short poetry because the people doesn't have the attention span for long ones, and also things like the death of Socrates comes to mind) and eventually being subjugated to trends. Both things that happen to The Hunger Artist. While the devotion to fasting drew people in to see his incredible will popularity had changed to exotic animals.
Exotic Animals gave a more immediate thrill than just seeing a mans willpower at work and in this internet age it is easy to tell that people are going more towards the immediate. Instead of researching the answer people just look it up on the internet; instead of reading books people are more drawn towards video games for their instant stimulation and even in games things are getting bogged down to the point where there is no worth anymore but only instant gratification and mindlessness. Due to this the Hunger Artist is left a broken man. It's shown through this that in his weakness even the one trying to transcend the average world around him it is shown that he is still in need of the most basic and childish human desire: Attention. This is a way to show that those artists so highly revered are still human inside and despite artistic pretensions they share the same weaknesses of any other person.
Upon the end of this story, however, it is shown that no matter how hard he tried the artist was a victim of his own society. Given limitations on his art so he may not explore it further, had to deal with people whose ignorance put him on a pedestal but forced themselves into thinking they could not follow suit, tossed away by the people as a more interesting thing appeared, and eventually left to die and insulted by having his space be taken up by 'the new'. The story is a sad view of the misunderstood artist, the change of trends, and the effect that the people have as a collection. I find that this Hunger Artist would have find a much better world if he had gotten people to understand his ideals and why he does it. A thinker does not enjoy being the smartest person in the room but rather being one amongst the collection of thinkers.
Kafka, Franz. "A Hunger Artist." http://records.viu.ca/. Vancouver Island University, n.d. Web. 12 Apr 2011. <http://records.viu.ca/~johnstoi/kafka/hungerartist.htm>.
Mrs. Polly Watson
English 113-111
April 16, 2011
I have kept coming back to "A Hunger Artist" by Franz Kafka. It just always seemed too strange for me to leave it alone. One thing I've learned reading short stories is asking myself 'Why was this made?' and specifically for something shown in a school curriculum that question seems like something every person should ask themselves as the story seems far too strange when just left for face value. As I read into "A Hunger Artist" again I began to recognize connections and I feel it is an allegory for not only misunderstood artist but a criticism of the general audience.
To start, the Hunger Artist character is not fueled by depression which drives his fasting but simply that he was not accept the world for what it is. His fasting is his way of rejecting the world and, his own way, transcend it. Despite that, he was only rewarded for his acts on face value and his reasoning why he did it always went unheeded. I'd like to think that this is a comparison to how many people treat art. They take it for its face value and hold it up without fully understanding it, thinking it is beyond them in this lofty domain. Two things that are not uncommon with artists, and even philosophers, are having limitations put onto themselves to appease the people while defacing their work (poets now doing only short poetry because the people doesn't have the attention span for long ones, and also things like the death of Socrates comes to mind) and eventually being subjugated to trends. Both things that happen to The Hunger Artist. While the devotion to fasting drew people in to see his incredible will popularity had changed to exotic animals.
Exotic Animals gave a more immediate thrill than just seeing a mans willpower at work and in this internet age it is easy to tell that people are going more towards the immediate. Instead of researching the answer people just look it up on the internet; instead of reading books people are more drawn towards video games for their instant stimulation and even in games things are getting bogged down to the point where there is no worth anymore but only instant gratification and mindlessness. Due to this the Hunger Artist is left a broken man. It's shown through this that in his weakness even the one trying to transcend the average world around him it is shown that he is still in need of the most basic and childish human desire: Attention. This is a way to show that those artists so highly revered are still human inside and despite artistic pretensions they share the same weaknesses of any other person.
Upon the end of this story, however, it is shown that no matter how hard he tried the artist was a victim of his own society. Given limitations on his art so he may not explore it further, had to deal with people whose ignorance put him on a pedestal but forced themselves into thinking they could not follow suit, tossed away by the people as a more interesting thing appeared, and eventually left to die and insulted by having his space be taken up by 'the new'. The story is a sad view of the misunderstood artist, the change of trends, and the effect that the people have as a collection. I find that this Hunger Artist would have find a much better world if he had gotten people to understand his ideals and why he does it. A thinker does not enjoy being the smartest person in the room but rather being one amongst the collection of thinkers.
Kafka, Franz. "A Hunger Artist." http://records.viu.ca/. Vancouver Island University, n.d. Web. 12 Apr 2011. <http://records.viu.ca/~johnstoi/kafka/hungerartist.htm>.
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Neighbors by Raymond Carver (Oh wow, a post!)
I picked Raymond Carver specifically because I know his work and, moreso, because his style and themes are consistent. With few exceptions Carvers work is largely about depression in upper-middle class suburban neighborhoods and Neighbors is no different. Carver's Neighbors centers around a couple who only "were" happy and a short excerpt of their life when they need to watch their neighbors cat.
Their neighbors are an exciting and more importantly, happy, bunch that get to do exciting things like Vacations and the like and from the way our characters react in the house you could tell that they have a sense of inferiority to that family as they spend their time not watching the cat but rather enjoying taking and messing around with their things, getting almost a high out of it that leaves them even sexually aroused. It should be noted, however, that at least the male of the couple notices what he's doing while in their apartment. He stares deeply back at himself, closes his eyes, then stares again. An action seen in a few more of his stories to show that the character doesn't recognize what he's seeing in the mirror. An action to show moreso that he is unhappy or confused with himself even despite all of this.
But, anyway, yes, yes. I'm just ruminating aloud now. I should stop.
Raymond Carvers style, inspired by Hemingway, always caught my attention personally. I don't like taking things in stories for face value and the fact that I have to, in a way, solve the story as it goes on to realize what is going on then it gets me more into the piece and it becomes more interesting to me. That's why I picked to do my presentation on him.
Their neighbors are an exciting and more importantly, happy, bunch that get to do exciting things like Vacations and the like and from the way our characters react in the house you could tell that they have a sense of inferiority to that family as they spend their time not watching the cat but rather enjoying taking and messing around with their things, getting almost a high out of it that leaves them even sexually aroused. It should be noted, however, that at least the male of the couple notices what he's doing while in their apartment. He stares deeply back at himself, closes his eyes, then stares again. An action seen in a few more of his stories to show that the character doesn't recognize what he's seeing in the mirror. An action to show moreso that he is unhappy or confused with himself even despite all of this.
But, anyway, yes, yes. I'm just ruminating aloud now. I should stop.
Raymond Carvers style, inspired by Hemingway, always caught my attention personally. I don't like taking things in stories for face value and the fact that I have to, in a way, solve the story as it goes on to realize what is going on then it gets me more into the piece and it becomes more interesting to me. That's why I picked to do my presentation on him.
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