January 2009 Archives

One quote that really confused me and made me think into it and reread it again was when the narrator Nick was attending his first party at Gatsby's house. He was talking to Jordan Baker.

"Anyhow, he gives large parties," said Jordan, changing the subject with an urban distate for the concrete. "And I like large parties. They're so intimate. At small parties there isnt any privacy."

If you read this quote again, it doesn't really make sense. You would think that at a large party there is not any privacy. Jordan also states that large parties are intimate, but to most people small parties are intimate. So this tells you what kind of women Jordan really is. She is used to having a many people around and she feels uncomfortable when there are very little people. She is a very social women and her being intimate with people may be difficult. Her way of thinking on this subject shows her personality.

Another quote that I found particularly interesting was when Nick bet Gatsby for the first time.

       "I'm Gatsby," he said suddenly. "What!" I exclaimed. "Oh, I beg your pardon."  

       "I thought you knew, old sport. I'm afraid I'm not a very good host."

If the narrator didn't know who Gatsby was, how many of the other guest there knew what he looked like. It mysterious that everyone knows his name and have some kind of story to tell about him,but some people don't even know what he looks like.  

  

         

In Robert Frost's poem "Nothing Gold Can Stay", I believe it talks about life and how nothing can stay perfect.  At first glance it may seem perfect just like gold, but like the poem says that it very hard to hold on to. I also thought of how "Nature's first green.." could mean being young and how life is easy when you are young, but as you get older you encounter grief in your life. Nothing can stay easy and life in general gets harder and changes. "So dawn goes down to day." means that time passes by and when it happens nothing gold or "good" can stay.

In Robert Frost "After Apple Picking" the events in the poem I believe can be interuptated in different ways based on how you read it.

Lines 1 to 7:

My long two-pointed ladder's sticking through a tree

Toward heaven still

And there's a barrel that I didn't fill

Beside it, and there may be two or three

Apples I didn't pick upon some bough.

But I am done with apple-picking now.

Essence of winter sleep is on the night,

In the first line of the poem, the ladder represents his life, while the tree itself represents life as a whole.  The apples on the tree may symbolize opportunities passed up on in his life.  The ladder being described as long could be showing his long life he has lived.  The barrels that stand empty on the ground may represent the lack of opportunities and experiences he feels have happened in his life.  The apples that remain on the branches are these unaccomplished opportunities and experiences.  The person says he has grown weary of picking apples, meaning that he is done looking for opportunities in his life because of "the essence of winter sleep," representing his impending death.

 

In "How to Read Literature Like a Professor", Thomas Foster devotes multiple chapters that explains how communion between others is a basic and fundamental experience. Communions can allow you to learn more about a person, as well as over see a disability that a person may have.

The author (Thomas Foster) gives a summary of the story "Cathedral" written by Raymond Carver. As a high school student I focused on this story and how important sharing a meal with others can be. The story showed how the main character was able to oversee the blind man's disability. Through eating the meal he saw him as a regular guy just like he was. Foster quotes in his book, "eating as a fundamental element of life."

If you look into your life, you can see how fundamental sharing a meal is. Think about your first date with a person. I would guess that a majority of you would say that dinner or some sort of meal was included in that date. So even little things that people overlook may be important in life. For example, on this date the choice of food that the other person chose may have importance. Other examples where sharing of a meal is important are holidays. Families are brought together to share a meal with the family they may not have seen in months.

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