My thoughts exactly. Chapter 1 discussed when to delve into the author's background, and how to as well. Keesey also touches on how to do this, which helps a whole lot. He stresses on finding the individuality of the poet, and the individuality of the age. As we inspect the background and investigate the author's intentions, we must compare the characters to the age that they were written, and deduce why they were the way they were. For instance, we know that The Tempest was written in the early 1600's, when nobility was a major part of life. If Prospero existed in today's day and age, we wouldn't really understand his motives. But since we know that this story occurred in the 1600's, we can completely understand why Prospero wants to have his enemies suffer and forgive him for what they have done.

Only by understanding the age that it was written, can we truly see some of the subtleties within literature.

Gonzalo is a old and honest lord. But he constantly plagued with guilt. Why? I'm not too sure. It might be because he helped Prospero and Miranda escape to the island after Prospero was usurped, and now Prospero is getting revenge on all those who wronged him. I was not able to understand why he felt so much guilt through his speech - it seemed like all he did was remark on the beauty of the island.

In Act 5, Scene 1, Ariel remarks that all Gonzalo does is cry. I truly have no clue as to why he constantly cries. Is all of this his fault? The ambiguity within the play leave this question up for grabs constantly.

Ahh, once again, we have come full circle to the issue of author intent. I feel that Shakespeare intended The Tempest to be a story of justice, not necessarily revenge. Prospero was overthrown by Alonso, his own brother. After being forced to retreat to the island for 12 years, he used his magic to lure them to the island via shipwreck. Throughout the story, there are many forms of revenge that are taking place simultaneously. Prospero has Miranda and Ferdinand wedded without the consent or knowledge of Alonso.
Caliban, Trinculo, and Stefano are all plotting justice to be served to Alonso, even though there is a hint of revenge within their plan. Although they never actually go through with killing Alonso, the intention was there. That's all the reader needs to know in order to realize that justice was the issue.
The Tempest can be read in many different ways, based on what the reader thinks the author's intentions might be. Because I believe that The Tempest was written with the intention of being a story of justice, doesn't mean that I am right. Yet, in order to critique, we must make our own educated judgments towards literature, and then go from there.

I really agree with McDonald here. As I read The Tempest, I found it to be a lot more open ended than previous Shakespeare works that I am familiar with. One particular moment where I didn't really know what to think was Prospero's last few lines within the epilogue. He seeks forgiveness from the audience by asking them to applaud him, but I am not sure what he is asking pardon for, exactly. He mentions that he the audience would be able to do this by forgiving him of his crimes, but I don't know which crimes he has committed. Sure, he has kidnapped Ariel, but he also is saving him, in a sense. I know that if I would have seen The Tempest back in the 16th century, I don't think I would know why to applaud him at the end of the play. We could applaud him and the crew for their performance, but to relieve him of his guilt? I don't see why we would.

These last few lines were at the end of Miranda's speech, where she expresses her undying love for Ferdinand. If you take a look at the first 3/4 of her speech, you can see that Miranda has undergone a change from a dependent naive little girl, to a stronger and more mature woman. But then she says that no matter what happens, she will always be Ferdinand's. This sort of undercuts the power of the first part of the speech. Just when she think she has stepped out of her shell and become her own women, we see her desperately clinging to Ferdinand, as if he is the only man she will ever love, regardless if he is the only man she ever sees or not. She places a lot of trust in Ferdinand with this speech, almost too much trust. Personally, I know that saying these words could come back to haunt you. Miranda almost seems too dependent of the people that she has met on the island, and will never be able to survive without them. It would be interesting to see how she fares when they return back to Italy. . .

In any piece of literary work, we, as critics try to shift and mold the words on the page so that they pertain to us...whether that be our past experiences, or current situations. It's inevitable. No matter how good a work is, it can always be better if we can relate to it on the same level.

But, as critics, we must try to avoid doing this without having proper background information of the time period, the author, etc. It's like the old saying "judging a book by its cover". If we read something in EL312 without any background information on it, then we are passing judgment on it, even if it is just us trying to give the text a deeper meaning by having it relate to our lives. Hirsch puts it best on page 18 where he says that "a text cannot be made to speak to us until what it says has been understood". To understand a text fully, we must also take into account the author, his/her background, and what was effecting him/her at the time of penmanship.

Okay, so we know that the narrator has a mental disorder. I would too, being in the same situation as her - windows barred, a gate across the top of the stairs, her husband the physician having full control over her about what she can and cannot do. I think anyone would face some sort of mental instability when forced to live life like this.

Thanks to Erica's blogpost, I was able to delve a bit deeper into the mind of Ms. Gilman, and read an article by Gilman herself, entitled Why I Wrote The Yellow Wallpaper. She mentions that it was written intended to save people from going crazy. Knowing that this piece is an early work of feminist writing, we can deduce that Gilman was trying to protect housewives at the time, who had nothing better to do than "analyze the wallpaper that surrounded them". This could be taken as a figure of speech, or could be taken literally. Either way, women at the time faced the risk of being plagued by mental instability, and Gilman tried her best to alert and inform her targeted audience.

And going by Eagleton's take on literature, then any kind of writing could fall into it's broad spectrum - whether it be a diary or journal, a drama, a suspense novel, a script to a performance or movie, etc. If it has to do with a topic, and it is recorded onto a paper, then it can be considered literature. This is where the critic comes in: he/she decides what is good literature, and what is bad literature. I hope to be able to do this by the time I complete EL312.

The author of this essay brings up some very interesting points. The thing that I liked most was that Austin started the essay by touching on the 6 things that beauty and truth could mean the same thing in. Of the six, I found that beauty and truth could mean the same thing in eternity, as the author puts it. I found this to be the most valid of the arguments presented. I also liked how Austin still makes his points, yet leaves it all up for reader interpretation. I mean, the six points brought up throughout the essay could potentially be the most "logical", but he never completely throws out the idea of thinking outside the box. As a reader, I really appreciate that.

A great analogy to start the course - criticism is as inevitable as breathing. We all do it, and most of us do it unconsciously. The more you think about it, we criticize everything, from literature, to the appearance of people, to music, etc. You name it, and humans inevitably form opinions towards it. As the author puts it, criticism is just putting what passes through our minds as we read a work onto paper. That's why all criticism is different, because we all react differently to pieces of literature. But along with this inevitable critique of the subject at hand, we must also critique ourselves for doing the critiquing. After evaluating something, we must evaluate ourselves for reaching that conclusion. I'm not sure if any of this makes sense, but then again, this is why we don't all agree with criticism of a certain thing - because we all have our different views and interpretations of it.

Upon the first time reading this quote, I took it for what it generally said - We use literature in addition to the common language that we use, day in and day out. But after finishing the assigned section, and going back to pick out a quote to talk about, I couldn't get this line out of my head. There has to be something more to it. And I believe I've only begun to scratch the surface.

Literature is different to everyone. I could consider a short story written by a feisty 8-year-old, to be literature, no matter how erratic or didactic it may be. Someone else might just consider it to be jibberish. But literature is always special, because the words and sentences are formed exactly how the author wants them to be, in order for them to have the most meaning when slapped on a piece of paper. When writing literature, I would have to say that we tend to choose our words more carefully than we would when spitting out everyday language.

This 3rd and final blogging portfolio is definitely a change of pace from the past few that I have done. These blog entries show elements of me blogging with confidence, originality, and deep thought. You might be able to tell that I was a bit more studious in the last half of the course, simply because I pushed myself. It didn't come easy - oh no - but it eventually came. And this portfolio is proof of that.

SO HERE WE GO!

Coverage: These are all the blog entries that I wrote in this final part of the course. I am proud of all of them:
- Can't...stop...reading!
- The effects of error
- The news nowadays
- The publics skewed opinion
- Creative writing in journalism?!
- News stories + Run-on sentences = good?
- The trump card
- Reporting with humility

Depth: These are the blog entries that I feel were most interesting and deep:
- The publics skewed opinion
- The news nowadays
- The effects of error

Interaction: Here is some proof that I was active on others' blogs, and attributed to their thoughts and discussions:
- Jackie Johns' response to Hull's Metal to Bone
- Mitch's response to Best Practices
- Jeremy's response to the first few chapters of Best Practices

Discussion: This portion of my portfolio proves that some of the blogs I wrote were interesting enough to start a discussion with my peers:
- The news nowadays
- Creative writing in journalism?!
- The publics skewed opinion

Timeliness: This is an area where I struggled in in the past. Not so much for this portfolio. I was on top of things and most of my blogs were written about 16-12 hours before class. That's pretty good for me. ::pats self on back::
- News stories + Run-on sentences = good?
- The effects of error
- The news nowadays

Xenoblogging: This is a section where I show that I helped others with their blogging. Writing this section makes me feel proud of what I have done for others with their blogs. :)
The Comment Primo:
- Maddie Gillespie - O'Ethics my Ethics!
- Bethany Merryman - Pretzels what?
The Comment Grande:
- Chelsea Oliver - Eight Deadly Sins?

The Wildcard: This is the time to get buckwild. I want you to see this blog more than anything else in my life. SO GO. NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1
- The news nowadays

This entry is very down to earth. It relates to a lot of the media seen on TV and the Internet. I think many people can agree with this blog entry, but some may be afraid to say it. You may call this a rant, but I call it the truth. Enjoy.

This section of Chapter 11 was pretty powerful, as Maddie said. It says that truth is unattainable, which is a coincidence for me. Today, in Dr. Klapak's final Faith Religion and Society class, we asked him what he thinks the meaning of life, the universe, and everything is. His answer? "The pursuit of truth."

ABNW Chapter 11 reinforces this, and so did Maddie's entry. If we strive for the truth, then we are doing our best. The truth will not be unveiled for a long time. Maybe not ever. But if we try our best to attain it, and especially in our news writing, we should have some success with it. Truth might not be available all the time, but you'll feel much better trying to tell what you DO know, rather than making it up.

It seems to me that the only way to break up the monotony of the cold, raw data is to include anecdotes. Only the best stories have these little recollections that are humorous or interesting. These anecdotes hook the reader in and keep them enthralled with the reading. In the chapter, they are referred to as "Golden Coins." They are the tools that journalists use to break up the story. I guess you could call it like their trump card. They use it in their stories if they have too much boring data. People want stuff that they can relate to. They want to know about personal experiences and how people resolved those conflicts. It inspires the readers. That's what the public wants. Inspirational writing.

Alright, now that that is out of the way: This was an interesting piece of news. Well, if you could call it news. It differed so much from what we call 'news' nowadays. But I think that was a good thing. He is definitely not the next Chaucer, as my coursemates would agree, (Mitch and Vanessa) I'll give him the creativity badge, because it really was an imaginative angle for a news story, but he is definitely no genius. I really liked the way that this piece of work demonstrated how versatile a news piece can be. It doesn't have to be the same, run-of-the-mill horrible / tragic news story every time. Artistic expression can, and has been implemented. To me, that is heartwarming.