THE END! :) April 29, 2007

             Yay!  It’s our last post for the semester!  I mean, not that it hasn’t been great and all! Haha.  Anyways, as we complete this semester we read Native Speaker.  I still have not completely figured out how I feel toward this book.  I must admit that it was an easier read than some, but it was also difficult at the same time.  This book had several flashbacks which made it confusing to follow.  For me, unless it is something visual, following flashbacks in a book is really complicated.  I had a hard time following it at times. 

            All throughout this book there has been this whole idea about language and Henry’s “obsession” with it.  It keeps popping up in various places.  In the beginning, when he had to try so hard to say Lelia.  It occurred when Mitt was meeting new friends and they taught them all the racial slurs.  It happened at the end of the book when Henry got his new job working with his wife with the children with the speech problems.  From beginning to end this was a major theme.  What was the significance of all of this?  Well, to me it set up how the story was going to be played out.  It began with this struggle with the language and saying Lelia’s name which led to many other struggles that he had to go through.  The struggle with his wife, their child and his job.  However, in the end it is what brought him and his wife back together.  Quite interesting I thought.

Native Speaker April 28, 2007

            So, here we are on our final book…Native Speaker.  Yay!  It is quite an interesting one to end it with too if I do say so myself.  There is much to talk about; where to begin? 

            Let’s start with the first page.  Lelia, Henry’s husband writes him this list.  This is how the story is beginning.  So, what is this list?  Why is it significant, or is it?  I just wonder why this is how the book begins.  So here is his wife, she hands him this list and leaves.  Now, does she leave as in she’s not coming back or is she just going on a trip?  That we later find out.  She just leaves and goes on these trips often.  But, she just leaves without saying anything. 

            Another interesting fact in this book is Henry’s job.  He is a spy.  Very interesting.  He works with Kwang.  Now who is he?  That is something that I must read more before answering.  He seems like a very complicated character.  However, as I continued to read, I still did not know much about him.  He was a confusing character. 

            And then there was Mitt, Henry and Lelia’s son.  He was in elementary school, and had a small group of friends.  When he first met the kids there they all teach him these racial slurs toward Asians and he had no idea what he was saying.  While they are all playing in the backyard one day, just fooling around, they dog pile, and Mitt is suffocated and dies.  After we find this out, we hear about these tapes.  They have recorded Mitt and they go back and listen to them.  Why?  I shall read on to try to figure that out!

End of Sula April 15, 2007

There is much hostility in this book.  There is a lot of anger and death, and talk about death.  Eva had killed Plum stating that the reason she did it was because she was brought back to the horribleness of when that bowel problem occurred when
Plum started acting a certain way. 

 

When Sula and Eva get into a heated argument about her leg things really begin to blow up.  Sula is yelling at her saying that it was not right for her to cut her leg off just to claim insurance money.  She did not have the right to change everyone’s lives as she did because of all of this.  Eva tries to blame Sula for
Plum’s death.  They also talk about Hannah’s death.  Eva reminds Sula that she watched Hannah burn to death.  Sula threatens to kill Eva in the way that she killed
Plum.  You can really see all this hostility and anger in these few chapters.  In response to Sula’s threat, Eva gets scared and locks her doors at night. 

 

Throughout these few chapters you can also see this idea of meaningless marriages with several of the characters cheating on one another.  Jude and Sula are caught having an affair by Nel, and this devastates her.  When this happens Jude abandons Nel and their children.  Again, this is not the first time that we have seen this happen in this novel.

 

All in all, this was an interesting book, but I must say that there were several disturbing parts that I could have done without.  It was an easy read, and I found it to have several of the themes that we have seen in the past.

Sula

Sula is a nice read.  I am actually not minding this book to read.  To begin, I found it interesting when it explained how the Bottom for its name.  It was when a slave was promised that if he got so many of these difficult chores done, he would get this “bottom land” and be freed.  However, the man changed his mind when the slave had completed these tasks and instead gave him that land in the hills.  The slave took this before realizing how difficult the farming would be. 

 

The story then picks up and we begin to be introduced to the characters.  I found it oddly disturbing with the whole situation of Ralph who had the infected bowel.  It was very gross, especially when it was described that she removed it herself and all.  I did not enjoy that disturbing image in my head.  Eva’s husband had abandoned her, and then she abandons her own children for 18 months.  She leaves them with Mrs. Suggs saying she will be back in a few hours.  She returns 18 months later with a decent amount of money and also a missing leg.  This was all quite interesting.

 

In the beginning there is also this topic of sex reoccurring.  Hannah and Eva talk about this mostly.  Eva loves men, and flirts often.  Hannah will sleep with any man that she can.  This is a theme that we have seen throughout our past books as well.  We see this continuing throughout Sula also.

Invisible Man – Part 2 March 26, 2007

     So, as we ended our reading in chapter 10 with the Invisible Man working.  He had got knocked unconscious.  In chapter 11, it opens up with a scene in the hospital.  He is very confused and has not the slightest idea of where he is or what is going on.  With the dialogue that he hears around him, and from what he sees he tries to piece this all together.  While still having difficulty with this, the doctor tries to help him remember by asking him a series of questions.  He asks: “What is your name?”  The narrator realizes that he all of a sudden can not remember.  He can’t answer this question.  And the doctor asks again slower, “What…is…your…name? And again, “Who…are…you?  He then moved on to ask him “What is your mothers name?” Yet again, the narrator does not know.  So, the doctor asks again, “Who was your mother?”…“Think” The narrator stares at him with no reply.  Then, the doctor resorts to something new.  He asks “Who was buckeye the rabbit?  This triggers something with the narrator and he flashes back to being a child (again with this obsession with the past theme).  Buckeye was him, he remembered this song, “Buckeye the rabbit Shake it, Shake it Buckeye the Rabbit Break it, Break it…”  The one name that he does remember is Mr. Norton, and he asks the doctor if that’s who he is.  He replies no, and they move on. 

           

     When he is released he is walking down the streets, and it is obvious that he is still not well.  He is very frail and weak at this point.  This is where Mary enters the story.  She offers to care for him, and help him out.  She takes him back to her house to help him relax and rest a bit.  She tells him he can stay longer, but he leaves shortly after.

           

     When he leaves, he is so hungry.  He passes a man selling yams.  The majority of chapter 13 is about his encounter with this man at the stand selling yams.  I have to ask myself, why has this taken up a whole chapter?  Who is this man, and what is his significance?  Well, eating these yams really brings him to thinking about the South again.  (Obsession with the past, again)  He walks around, proud, and thinking about what people would think from there is they had been able to see him at that moment.

           

     As he continues his walk, he wanders down a side street where he begins to feel horrible again, because someone has set something on fire and the smoke is incredible.  He continues down to meet a woman who is in tears, yelling.  They are kicking this older couple out of their apartment, and the woman is pleading for help.  The narrator attempts to help them out in their situation because he can relate to what they are going through.  He makes a speech to the crowd, and they are all willing to help move the old couple’s furniture back into the apartment. 

           

     And then Mary comes back into the story…

Invisible Man

             Invisible Man is quite the interesting story.  I must say that I am really enjoying it.  I would have to admit that it is definitely my most favorite book that we have read so far.  My interest has been kept throughout reading it.  I find myself getting through the chapters a lot quicker than I expected to.

           

            In the opening of the book, I will say that I was a bit nervous about reading the rest of the book.  With the scene of the Battle Royale, I was hoping that this wasn’t really going to set the tone of the rest of the book.  I did not want to sit through reading scenes like this.  I was relieved as I continued to read that after that part it was the end of that cruel treatment, at least for now.

 

          Toward almost the middle of the book the Invisible Man is kicked out of college, but is given these letters (which he assumes are good) to go out and get a job.  When he eventually finds out what the letters really say, he is shocked and angered, however he still remains to get the job.  He is working with Liberty Paints; Optic White.  Their slogan there is “if it’s optic white, it’s the right white.  This brings him back to his past when he remembers “if you’re white, you’re right”.  This is something that connects the non-canonical books with this theme of obsession of the past that we see throughout this book.

Canon vs. Non-canon books March 15, 2007

In reading The Great Gatsby by Scott Fitzgerald, The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner and the short stories by Ernest Hemingway we were able to come up with the main themes that were seen throughout each of these.  They were all related and connected in many ways.  These stories are supposed to tell us, and all those who read them, what the American lifestyle is all about.  However, do these books really tell what people should know?  Is it realistic?  These are the questions we need to ask ourselves.  Are these the ideas that we want everyone to see as what the American lifestyle is all about?  Why have these books been chose as the key books that everyone should read, and as the ones that represent American characteristics?

 

Then, we move on and read non-canonical books.  I was assigned to read Dorothy Parker.  These short stories did have a few of the same themes as the books in the canon, however it differed a lot.  I definitely would not put her stories into the canon, and I can see why they were not included.  I felt as though all of her stories were about the same thing; meaningless marriages and relationships.  There were no relationships that lasted throughout any of the stories, and nobody got married because they were in love; it was only for the reason that they were supposed to get married at that point in time.

 

 

When looking at the wiki pages for the other books, I noticed that some of them had the majority of the themes that we noticed in the books in the canon.  So, why have they not been chosen?  What gives a book that certain quality and difference to be added into the canon?

Dorothy Parker Short Stories March 13, 2007

This book of short stories is a collection of Dorothy Parker’s written works.  The longest short story is only 24 pages.  All are very easy to get through.  I read her more famous pieces because I wanted to get a taste of who she was, and what her writing was really like. 

One of the major themes throughout most of Parker’s stories was this idea of meaningless marriages.  Everyone just got married because it was supposed to happen, and that was the next step in their lives, so it had to happen.  Therefore, every story that involved a husband and a wife had some sort of dilemma involved with it also. 

The first story I read was Big Blonde, which was her most famous written piece.  This story was basically about a large blonde woman who made meaningless relationships with men she met out at the bars, until finally she decided it was that time in her life to get married.  So, she meets Herbie, and they decide to get married.  However, there was never a “spark” in this relationship to begin with, and it did not take long for them to realize that this just wasn’t working out.  They divorce, and she re-marries several times throughout the rest of the story.

In reading New York to Detroit, this theme was demonstrated very elaborately.  The wife was home in
New York, but the husband was away on business.  They were having a phone conversation, and the wife was going crazy because she missed him so badly, however the husband obviously did not feel the same and he made it very clear to her.  He did not show any remorse when she told him that she was doing horrible without him, and he told her that he would be traveling even longer than he told her originally, and he would not be coming home. 

Coming to an End February 20, 2007

Here we are at the end of The Sound and the Fury, and what have we learned?  What has happened?  What were we supposed to get out of all of this?  I found the ending quite interesting.  The last part of this book was from Dilsey’s point of view; however, it was not him narrating the story.  Honestly, not a whole lot really happened in this part.  It was Easter Sunday, and they went to church.  After church Luster was driving to the graveyard, and decided to go the wrong way around the monument.  This sends Benjy into another episode.  Why does he do this?  Benjy’s lifestyle is very orderly.  He likes things done the way they’re supposed to be done.  He needs things done the way he is used to it.  When something happens out of order, he is completely thrown off, and he is sent into another episode.  As soon as Luster corrects himself in his direction, Benjy is yet again satisfied. 

 

 So, I have to ask myself this question; if this chapter is about Dilsey, why is it that the part about Benjy sticks out the most to me?  Why is this episode the most interesting part of this chapter?  I think the fact that it is so random, and crazy that it was grabbed my attention.  It made me wonder why this slightest change would make Benjy react like this.  Did it have significance, or was it just merely the idea that they were going the wrong way?  We can really see here that it does not take much to send Benjy into an episode.  However, I think there is definitely more behind why he went into his episode, but what that reason is I am not quite sure.

A Close Reading of The Sound and the Fury

Page 22 – Quentin said, “Lift him up.”  Versh lifted me up.  “Drink this, Benjy.” Quentin said.  The glass was hot.  “Hush, now.”  Quentin said.  “Drink it.”  “Sassprilluh.”  T.P. said.  “Lemme drink it, Mr. Quentin.”  “You shut your mouth.” Versh said.  “Mr. Quentin wear you out.”  “Hold him, Versh.” Quentin said.  They held me.  It was hot on my chin and on my shirt.  “Drink.” Quentin said.  They held my head.  It was hot inside me, and I began again.  I was crying now, and something was happening inside me and I cried more, and they held me until it stopped happening.  Then I hushed. 

Benjy’s chapter, as we know, was the most difficult part of this book.  He was mentally retarded, and had very little understanding of what was going on around him.  Benjy really had no control over what went on with himself or those around him.  Whatever was happening, Benjy could not stop.  However, when something occurred that Benjy did not like, he would have a breakdown or an episode, and would cry or scream until everything was back to normal. 

 

In this passage in the beginning of this section, the boys are drinking.  They force Benjy to drink the “sassprilluh” to try and get him drink.  While this is happening we see Benjy going through his episode and freaking out.  We can see that Benjy is uncomfortable, but yet he has no control over what is going on at all.  This shows us a little more about Benjy’s character, and how bad his situation really is.  He cries while they are holding him and forcing the drink in his mouth, and he feels the discomfort of it going down his throat.  He can do nothing about this though.  He just sits there crying until they boys stop.  We can see that as soon as everything goes back to normal, and the boys finish with Benjy, that his episode is over, and he no longer remembers it.