In my mind's eye

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

2007-05-09T19:08:00.000-07:00

1) This movie was absolutely out of control. I have never seen the movie before and to sit and watch it now is kind of disturbing. I didn't expect for it to be as graphic as it was. It was all over the place and I just found myself trying to keep up with whatever the story line was depicting. I love Johnny Depp and his ability to create any type of character that he wants, but this guy was out of control. At first I thought it was going to be like his character in "Blow" only because of the drug use, then I quickly came to realize that Raoul was definitely in a league of his own. It makes you wonder how much of it was just acting. Haaha. If the movie was this graphic, I can't possibly imagine how the book describes the different trips that he experiences. At the end of the movie I walked out still not knowing how I felt about it. Is that normal?

2) a. Their search for the American Dream throughout the movie was something that I didn't quite understand. The whole time they were finding out new ways to scheme someone and get something for free. It's possible that their dream was just to be able to live an easy life that's carefree. Also a life that was free from someone judging them. I say this because a lot of the time when they were around other people, they were preoccupied with being caught up in their drug use. They were very concerned that someone was always watching them. So maybe they just wanted the freedom to be able to do whatever recreational activity they chose without being judged. I think for Raoul specifically he wants freedom from responsibility also, for fear of failure. When he was getting ready to leave he mentioned something about not having completed his article. So maybe it's possible that his American Dream is true success. Maybe he really did want to finish that article just to have something that he accomplished.

b)A perfect example of Raoul making a beast of himself is the trip where Dr. Gonzo turns into a devilish creature. Then after that specific illusion is over, he passes out until the morning. Then when he wakes up and he has a lizard tail attached to him along with a tape recorder. He had been completely out of his mind so much that he needed the recorder to remember his actions. It doesn't seem like their drug use relieves their pain, especially for Dr. Gonzo, it seems like it makes it worse. The scene that comes to mind is his scene in the bath tub. He seems extremely distraught and it seems like the drugs augment those emotions.

c) When Duke said that the wave of change broke and fell back, it seemed to me that he was resigning and realizing that for him, his life was how it was going to be forever. That there was no other chance that he was going to be able to have another "wave of change" wash over his life and take back what he's done. He's not going to be able to acheive his "American Dream" because the cycle his life is in isn't headed in that direction. He recognized that the cycle of his life needed to drastically be changed in order to reach his goal. When he made his comment, he gave up. My reading of the movie didn't change because at that point I still wasn't sure what was going on. In reflecting on the movie, there was a always a vulnerability about Duke, therefore that quote went to prove that vulnerability. That showed his character and it showed the whole point of the movie. You can chase after the American Dream, but your life does come to a point where eventually, it's unchangable.

The Importance of Being Earnest

2007-04-18T17:02:00.000-07:00

1) This play is awesome!! I think it is so funny..and so far, it's been our easiest read. There is such quick conversation that it makes it extremely easy to read. In the beginning of the drama I thought that Gwendolyn was going to be my favorite character, but as I'm reading, I don't think I can get into how shallow she is. Honestly, her reasoning for not marrying Jack is the most RIDICULOUS thing I have ever heard of in my entire life. Clearly she's thought about him, and he's in love with her and clearly he wants to take care of her for the rest of his life....that's why I just don't understand why she wouldn't let that be the determining factor in loving him, instead of the fact that his name isn't Ernest.

2) The fact that Wilde speaks vicariously through his characters shows the characteristics of a great writer. The fact that he can alter his voice to individualize his characters is something that takes true talent. He does a lot of contrasting the characters when they are in dialouge with one another. Especially Jack and Algernon. Algernon is the robust, outspoken character that says what everyone else is thinking. Whereas, Jack is reserved, conservative, and a true gentleman. They are both funny in their own way and they both want the same thing, a beautiful woman by their side, but they both have very different ways of going about acheiving that goal. These aspects of their personality and the ways that they acheive their goal goes to show different aspects of their self awareness and identity. Also, because Wilde is speaking through his characters, it lets the reader into the minds eye of Wilde. His humor doesn't necessarily conceal critical ideas of identity, it just has different ways of approaching it. Instead of seriously talking indirectly about identity issues, he uses comedy to directly address that someones sense of identity directly impacts their view of themself in an immediate sense. The perfect example of that is Jack and how when he is explaining to Lady Bracknell about his history, it clearly has an impact immediately on her impression of him. Because he has no history and no sense of a firm foundation, she immediately assumes that he is not good enough for her daughter. That goes to show Wilde's demonstration of how a firm sense of identity is a critical ideal.

Taming of the Shrew

2007-04-09T13:36:00.000-07:00

1) I've never read this play before, so reading it now after having seen "10 things I hate about you" is interesting. I'm doing my best to create new characters, and I'm almost there, it's just that now they are dressed up in victorian style clothing, and have British accents...sometimes speaking Italian. Wierd..I know, it's just that that's all I got for now. I just see these characters on a small stage, dealing very intensly with one another. Their conversations are quick and sharp, there is no time to lag. The only time I got that there was a pause in conversation was only if one of the guys were plotting something. I love the way that they interact with one another, especially the guys with their servants. I also like the fact that the servants are more of companions or partners in crime as opposed to slaves, per say.
2) The scene for humor sake that I have selected is in Act II when they all come to Baptista’s house. Petruchio presents Hortensio Also, Petruchio is introducing himself as a suitor for Katharina. This whole conversation was entertaining because I could see Baptista’s face a little confused because a man is actually there complimenting Katharina and calling her “fair and virtuous”. It seems as though that the more he pleads his case, the more twisted Baptista’s faces gets. Petruchio goes through this laundry list of compliments of Katharina, all the while knowing that Katharina is none of those things. The way this scene appears to be depicted is with Petruchio searching within himself for the words to conjur up to try and convince Baptista that his pursuit of the eldest daughter is sincere. I think that because the situation is so obviously humorous, it actually turns itself around to make Baptista believe it. Petruchio also makes his intentions obvious when he askes about what kind of dowry will be given. That transparency makes the situation that much more humorous, because Baptista seems to not catch it. Baptista is lulled into the belief that his daughter is honestly being persuaded, while Petruchio’s plan is going exactly as anticipated.

A Rose for Emily

2007-03-21T13:32:00.000-07:00

1) I had completely forgotten about this story because I hadn't read it since my sophomore year of high school. And even then, I'm not 100% sure if I read the entire thing. There were two words that stuck out to me the most because I remember my teacher beating their definitions into my head. "Macabre" and "Cuckold". I remember these words so distinctly because their meanings added such another depth to the story. I remember after learning the meaning of "macabre" I thought it was such a dramatic word for a short story. Almost too dramatic for the story. Going by definition I just didn't understand why the old ladies at the funeral were described as if they were making hissing noises (sibilant) and gruesome. Did I miss the point? I just don't know.

2) The author foreshadows the ending of the stories in a few ways. First of all, the reader can already tell that there is something a little different about Miss Emily because she has no concept of time. She has no idea that so much time has gone by since Colonel Sartoris has passed on. She has no concept of the generations changing or the times changing with them. There is also the foreshadowing of the death of Homer Barron. The foreshadowing of his death is when she is in the store buying the poison and refuses to tell the druggist what it's for. But even moreso than that, when she opens the box, it is labeled "For rats". This is alluding to Mr. Barron and his scandelous way of living, because Emily, being an Episcopal, would clearly think that his lifestyle choice is disgusting, like a rat, therefore he must die, like a rat. Although the title does not specify what color the "Rose for Emily" is, when researched, the meaning of a rose, especially a single rose, is love. Throughout the entire story, Faulkner strings in the fact that the entire town wants Emily to get married, they want her to be with someone. So from the beginning, the reader gets the impression that there may be a happy ending for her, that she may find her love. Unfortunately, she found her love, he just didn't love her back. Therefore she had to force him into a state of submission where her love could be actualized, even if it meant she had to lay with a dead man.

The Yellow Wallpaper

2007-03-06T19:58:00.000-08:00

1) Insanity. Literally. That whole short story EMBODIES what it means to be insane. I remember reading that story my sophomore year of high school, but I DO NOT remember it being THAT...loco....for lack of a better term. I could say 'crazy' cause it means the same thing...but lets be real...everything is more dramatic when you say it in spanish...ANYWAY. The part I found most facinating was at how good the writer was at capturing the processes of the main character. It wasn't about an outsider looking in, she literally dug into the depths of her mind and extracted all of those emotions...all the way to the point of her cracking at the end.

2) In this piece, Gilman lays herself all out, vulnerable for the world to see. In an interview regarding her reasoning for writing this piece, she says that it relates to a point in her life where she was actually put on bed rest for "melencholia". Then when that bed rest attempt caused her to eventually go into a deeper state of dementia, she began writing, and that was what saved her inevitably. So not only does she reveal this deep, twisted, complex mind of this narrator, she shows how the narrator gets there. In the beginning of the piece it is easy for the reader to trust what the narrator is saying because one only assumes that she is sick and on bed rest. Her husband, a physician, doesn't believe she is sick, but she contradicts him and says that it is a nervous depression. He also encourages her to not swell on her condition as to not make it worse. This drives her to dwell more and as the story progresses, and she spends more time in solitude, the reader can see her fall deeper and deeper into her hallucinations. The reader can see her screws coming loose towards the beginning of the story where she interrupts herself with random thoughts, in her journal. Then she starts speaking about "us" going downstairs, instead of just herself. Since she is the only one in the room, there is no reason why she should speak in plural forms. As the story progresses, her condition worses rapidly, and then abruptly ends after she's cracked and her husband finds her. Not only does he find her, but what he finds is so disturbing that it causes him to faint. Over the course of narrative, the reader can see that the speaker has slowly transformed into the lady in the wall paper, and that has driven her to sheer and complete madness.

Cummings

2007-02-21T19:32:00.000-08:00

1) WOW...he's a dirty dirty man...I cannot believe that his poems were just so blatent. I mean..I'm not necessarily complaining, just caught off guard I guess. At this point, honestly, I have nothing in my life that could even possibly come close to reflecting the emotions of Cummings in those poems. Thankfully, his poems were very easy to read, and in turn, easy to interpret.

2) Cummings has a way of merging his content and form in various ways. The first is, that the form of the poem makes it much easier for the reader to understand how he wants the poem to sound. He writes as if he is speaking and the words and punctuation are accentuating ever fluctuation of his voice. There is also a sense that his breathing patterns are a big part in correctly understanding the point of the poem. For example, in "i like my body when it is with your" there is a line that states "and the trembling-firm-smooth ness and which i will again and again and again...". When one reads that sentence aloud you can actually feel the tensing and relaxing of the muscles, as they do during times of passion. This vivid description and visualization makes the poems less archaeic and much more relevant to the times. The poetry has a lot of more concentrated emotion in the content, making it more exciting which is what contemporary readers prefer. The content is also a lot more concise in the way it is laid out, there isn't a lot of fluff. There are more words that are understandable but at the same time profound, which I think keeps the essence and beauty of poetry.

Relationship between the two

2007-02-14T19:04:00.000-08:00

1) These two pieces honestly don't seem related at all. On the surface, Hughes' seems like a little kid complaining about the fact that he's not included in Whitman's piece. I didn't really enjoy Whitman's poem at all, simply because it was hokey in a sense, like any other poem about America. Speaking about the hard working Americans doesn't seem like a new theme to me, and doesn't seem that riveting at all.

2) The relationship between the two poems is that of a big brother and a little brother. Whitman is the big brother that has learned to speak eloquently, as if in front of a crowd. Hughes' poem, is almost like a little brother sitting in his bedroom that night after the big brothers poem. The little brother is making his remarks partly out of jealousy and partly because the big brother forgot some things. "I am the darker brother.They send me to eat in the kitchen When company comes..." when Hughes' makes this remark, it's almost as if he is reminding Whitman of the fact that he is still there, and that his role in the family--America--is just as important as the others, just simply overlooked. Hughes responds to Whitman's conception of America, by challenging the idea that everything has to be hard. There is a sense in Hughes' poem that at some point, life will get easier, that at some point there will be a greatness of America that was never expected of it before. A point of greatness that will be so great, that whomever looked down their nose at us before will come around to see the greatness that lies within. I think that the two poems are related, but that Hughes', though shorter, has more of an impact.