February 2008 Archives

“The Atmosphere, which may be suggested by such factors as the setting Dialogue diction and selection of details in the narrative usually foreshadows expectations about the out come of the events.” (Hamilton 89)

Atmosphere is very important even to a person’s everyday action. Would your conversation be the same with one friend if a specific other friends was present mistily not.  Atmosphere determines how the characters act in different settings. In order for the reader to understand what is going on you need a good atmosphere.

“ He had found out already this morning that he had been made by a carpenter named Jesus Christ. Before he had thought it had been a doctor named Sladewall, a fat man with a yellow mustache who gave him shots and thought his name was Herbert, but this must have been a joke.” (The River) Class comments 

Isn’t it funny how all families teach their kids how they were created differently. When you were a kid was it the stork or the doorbell that rang and there you were. Where you that gift from heaven or the unexpected package. Who or what has created you? This passage of the book really stuck out to me because Flannery O’Connor really puts the childish thoughts into this seen. How someone who knows nothing of religion, may first think about the concept of Jesus. IT really puts it into perspective for me; at first I thought it was just simply silly the reaction that the boy had it took me a while to realize it was a serious point that O’Connor was trying to make. 

Hello my name is Kayley Dardano and I am a student at Seton Hill University. This is a portfolio of what I have done so far this semester in my college course Introduction to literary studies taught by Dr. Jerz.  These blog entries display my ability to understand and interpret literature in my own way. Throughout the class we have learned how to closely analyze literary works including poetry, short stories, and some of Shakespeare’s masterpieces. Everyday the students in this course were required to publish a blog entry on the readings assigned in class. All my entries have links back to the course website and from the course website to my blog entries. The course website is filled with other students blogs on the same readings but different topics and points of view. I have created a few links strait to the readings as well as to the website.  I am extremely proud of how I have developed in the blogging process and plan to keep using it in the future. I am really glad that this technology was brought to my attention. I think this would have been really useful in my high school classes, and I hope to bring it into my future classroom.

Coverage:

Restless, normal or not? Is and example of how I effectively linked my blog entry to the course website along with the reading that the topic developed from.

“What's In a Name" Is another example of how I linked my blogs efficiently between the website and my blog along with a few links to references made in the entry, for example Angela Palumb’s previous blog entry.

Timeliness:

  Being on time is one of the most important qualities a person can have. Being on time is causal in the business world, which is why it is so important in college. College is there to prepare you for the real world and this class does so by setting dead lines. For class we were to finish our blogs 24 hours in advance.

No Victory for the Dead! Is one example of a blog entry that was turned in by the deadline. It was turned in On February 17, 2008 and was due on February 18, 2008.

A Coat of Fish? Is another example of my timeliness in my blogging. This blog was due February 20 and was posted by February 19^th 2008

Interaction:

Depth:

Kick back and retire these are two examples of some of my longer blogs

Morality, SEX and Descriptions

Discussion:

Keep a gamester from his dice This entry I had four comments that were posted in response to my original blog entry.

Breakfast on the picnic table This entry received five comments which have started a good discussion.

These are the rest of my Blog entrees that I didn’t categorize

Falstaff beating 

What a debate that is between you and yourself

 War Rests many Bones!

What do they really mean?

Who lives the longest

Long live the writing King

Short story Development

Poetical related

Trifles freezing fruit

“Mrs. Ford. My maid’s aunt the fat women of Brainford, has a gown above.” (Pg 79)

“Mrs. Ford. I would my husband would meet in this shape, He cannot abide the old woman of Brainford; he swears she’s a witch, forbade her my house, and hath threat ‘Ned to beat her.” (Pg 80)

(Merry Wives of Windsor)

Why did the women think that they could hide Falstaff by hiding him in a dress of a woman Ford Disliked so much that he would beat? From reading you understand that this was the plan all along. Falstaff thought he was smarter than mistress Ford, and Mistress Page but they plotted against him. Did they come up with this fabulous plan right on the spot; it seems that way. This passage also says something about Ford’s character.  This makes Ford seem like a cruel man, most men no matter how much they hated a women would not beat her in public like it has been showmen in this seen. Today’s American society would be appalled if watching a play like this. This is an unbelievable event, which would distract people today. 

“ His internal monologue begins with the ‘you’ and ‘I’ the two sides of Prufrock’s personality, debating whether or not to confront a female…. One side wants to believe in the possibility of a relationship with a woman; the other, doubts the possibility.” ( "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" (Blythe and Sweet).

They both make and good believable point. Even though they are two different poems, they discuses the topic of women. In the poems I believe that “I’s and you’s are in a since not important as much as they are important. In the case of these two poems letting the reader know who the I person is, and who the you person is, is not important. It is only important for the reader to understand that it is a debate between two persons. 

“ Shallow how now, master Parson. Good Morrow, Sir Hugh. Keep a gamester from his dice, and a good student from his book, and it is wonderful.” (Line 35 Acts 3) Merry Wives of windsor

I understand from this quote that shallow may be admiring Sir Hugh ability to keep a person from what they desire to do. It is hard to keep a gamester away from the game which he desirers to play the same concept with the student. I think shallow is jealous or sarcastic about this power that Hugh may or may not have.  Shallow also may be bragging about how he would like to part someone from what they desirer.  

From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,

Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow,

And soonest our best men with they do go,

Rest of their bones, and soul’s delivery. (John Donne)

The end of this sentence really caught my eye it is very vivid “rest of their bones, and soul’s delivery. This is an enlightening fraise I like how he used the word rest as if to put a calming to the situation of solders dying and the almost calibration of the delivery of the soul.  In the first line the author makes a distention between sleep and rest defining them as different terms it seems. 

"Dickinson quickly shatters that intense joy with the rest of line one. The hoped for victory comes too late and only after great suffering, so late in fact that it means nothing to the victor... No matter who wins the battle or the war, the victory means nothing to the dead." (Monteiro)

I think that this is an interesting concept that Monteiro points out about Dickinson poem. I thought the poem was about the victory of the eagle over the robin. Now that I read Monteiro’s view it makes total since as to what the poem is about. Dickinson’s mind must be very developed. When I first started reading her work I did not like it, I thought it was boring and not worth reading. As each poem gets explained to me in different ways I have started to like her art.

Dickinson 

"The eagle's golden breakfast    

Strangles them.    

God keeps his oath to sparrows,    

Who of little love                                  15

Know how to starve!"

The last five lines of this poem really tie it together. The poem makes me think of a picnic that had been lift by humans and is now taken over by the animal society. Dickinson really does a good job of showing how the birds act and look. Cherries taste good to humans so wouldn’t it they also taste good to an eagle. Because of the reference to Cherries the reader becomes the eagle that is now setting the table for breakfast. This seen is written from the eagle’s point of view. I find it interesting that the sparrow is brought into the last three lines of this poem. “To sparrows,… know how to starve!” I assume that the songbird is another pray of the eagle and refused to come to the picnic table. 

   “55And I have known the eyes already, known them all--

            56The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,

            57And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,

            58When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,”

                “I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.”Eliot, "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"

I picked a few lines that I would like to talk about; the first is line 52. “I know the voices dying with a dying fall” this line stuck out to me because it is linked with Shakespeare, and because it mentions the word dying twice. It is almost seems like the writer is making a point that he is doing the opposite of going out with a bang! It emphasis the fact that the Character doesn’t believe that his life meant anything that he didn’t do anything worth noting.  I think it’s a man struggling with getting old feeling as though everyone is pointing it out to him everyday that he is old. He knows what they are thinking about him because he has thought those things about old people in the past. In lines 55-58 it really shows this.  In line 117 this changes “full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse” He seems to be more up beat about himself. He shows his seniority and wise thoughts. Showing that he is a moral man.  In line 121 it seems like he is an old man about the retire. “I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.” Like he was going to kick back and just let the rest of life happen.  More comments 

“ Every reader’s experience of every work is unique, largely because each person will emphasize various elements to differing degrees, those differences will cause certain features of the text to become more or less pronounced.” (foster Ch 12 Pg 103)

            This is something that everyone needs to understand before they start telling a person that they have interpreted a text wrong. It is imposable to interpret a text wrong. Most popular books are only popular because of their many meaning not because they have a strict answer or message. Just like a teacher can manipulate a books meaning to fit their needs so can an average reader create a meaning to fit their needs. There is a common belief about what a book means but not a right belief.

“No Pleasure but meanness,” The mist fit said, …”Why you’re one of my babies. You’re one of my own children!” said the grand mother. (O’Conner 22)

This story is a bit of a shocker at the end at first you think they will all live and your not to concern about it. But then the dad, the boy, daughter and the mother all die. It seemed to happen almost to fast. At the end of all this the grandmother still has no since to just shut up; instead she just tells him that she loves him that he is one of her children. This woman has guts I would have just kept my mouth shut. It’s strange that he left her for last; I think it is because the author was making a point with her. I’m not sure what the point was but I know it had something to do with God and Praying. (more)

“ You know what’s great about reading old Will? You keep stumbling across lines you’ve been hearing and reading all your life.” (Foster 42)

             At first I thought why do we give this man so much credit so he wrote a few good books. Earlier in the book it states that no one has an original work of writing. So is this the same for shake spear and if it is where did he get his ideas. Should we be giving that person credit? Suppose a writer uses a line from one of Shakespeare plays but has never read or herd the actual play. The actually encountered the line from another movie that quoted Shakespeare who then is credited. Why in today’s society does Shakespeare sound the most professional in the writing world?

More comments on foster.

Developing Characters

“Your job, as a writer of short fiction--whatever your beliefs--is to put complex personalities on stage and let them strut and fret their brief hour. Perhaps the sound and fury they make will signify something that has more than passing value--that will, in Chekhov's words, "make [man] see what he is like." -Rick Demarnus”

I think that the key point is that you need to develop your characters like you would judge a persons character in person. When someone walks up to you on the street you look at how they walk, how they show interest in you and the conversation (speech) they have with you. That is how a character should be presented. 

"Dramatic poetry -  is that in which the writer creates the voice of an invented character or characters." (Hamilton)

For example Jabberwocky

" lyric poetry- The most varied and widespread kind, is that in which an individual speaker expresses what he or she feels,"  (Hamilton)

for example, Emily Dickinson’s “A Book”

The two related terms that I picked from the book, were Dramatic Poetry and lyric poetry. In Lewis Carroll’s “Jabberwocky” the characters are made up in order to tell the story of a boy who kills a monster. The reason you know its dramatic poetry is because of the word usage; for example “ Beware the Jabberwocky, my Son!” You know that the poem is not about the author because the author is a girl. Another thing that shows that it is dramatic poem, is because there is no such thing as a jabberwocky. Emily Dickinson’s poem “A Book” is more of a lyric poem. It talks about her feelings towards books and pages; “ To take us lands away, nor any coursers like a page of prancing poetry.”  Both lyric and Dramatic poetry involve what the author is feeling and a message that the writer is trying to send to the reader. 

Class comments 

“MRS. PETERS (to the other woman). Oh, her fruit; it did freeze. (To the Lawyer). She worried about that when it turned so cold. She said the fire'd go out and her jars would break.” (Glaspell, Trifles)

I found it interesting that the woman was always worried about her fruit freezing and her aprons but her house was messy. These are two almost contradicting elements of the story. She seems like a very tidy person but then her sewing is off and things are just out of sorts. Did she do it or was she forced not to say anything.

Comments on Trifles setonhill

“she’s all spring and sunshine; he’s all frosty stiffness. Names, you ask. Daisy miller and Frederic Winterbourne. Really, it’s just too perfect… you wonder why we don’t feel our intelligence has been insulted.

In day-to-day life names are usually your first or second impression of a person. It is interesting how this applies to characters as well. The name is what sticks out the most and is remembered by the reader as they continue through the book. Names are important to society in general; why else would we have surnames carry over generations. In Italy it is common for grandchildren to be named after their grandparents. Also in Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” names are constantly important and brought up at many different times in the Play. For example Romeo oh Romeo where far out tho Romeo and Juliet’s “what’s in a name.” This topic of a name has come up before in our Intro to literary studies Class in "Fitzgerald, 'Bernice Bobs Her Hair" in Angela Palumb's Blog. 

More comments on Chapters 19-20 Foster

Foster (2,3,5) 

"So what he does is show something else as sex. And it's probably dirtier than all but two or three sex scenes ever filmed." (Foster 9) " Well, of course it has to do with sex. Evil has had to do with sex since the serpent seduced Eve." (Foster 16)

Even though these two quotes are in different chapters in the book they relate very well. The first quote is from chapter 2 discusses word choice I have always felt that today’s writers tended to neglect the art of dancing vivid words. In today’s society we tend to just get to the point, for example, and then they had sex, they went to the bedroom and then they had sex, everything is so blunt. It almost destroys the secrecy and the intimacy of the act and exploits it. The techniques that the older writers have used don’t only apply to sex stories but other taboo like actions. An example this is greed, showing greed instead of telling greed.

The second quote discusses the reality of sex, its effectiveness on the world and relationship to evil. Sex is used as a device, of which the idea shows a connection between two people. It is used in advertisements to lour people into buying a product, and convinces people to do the wrong thing. There are signs of this throughout history.