After our class's third day of seminar with Invisible Man, I feel more or less conflicted with this book. The more I understand the metaphors and the allusions, the less I understand of the book itself. It's as if Ellison wants to fit all of the world's problems, be they historic (segregation and oppression), concerning identity, freedom, politics, gender, race…the list goes on and on. As we pondered all of these (and more) within the Liberty Paints chapter, the topic of black versus white came up, and this pervaded most of the discussion. The use of black and white doesn't just exclude itself to color or race--it also alludes to truth and lie, light and dark, yin and yang. It's genius, and it's frustrating, to make sense of it all; that leads me to believe that Ellison is able to write such an elegant novel not because he is necessarily "smarter" than the average guy, but that his brain capacity has so much more room and power to make these connections clearly. I can't even begin to wrap my head around the concept of "black and white," and here Ellison is, describing everything wrong with the world mainly using the colors black and white.
Who would've thought that the concept of white paint, for example, connotes a 'fake truth?' My mind went completely over this simple fact in itself, and now every time I think about it my mind is blown at the level of symbolism within this chapter itself. The paint made at Liberty Paints (Liberty…another motif here) can only be brightened by adding a deep black something-or-other to the paint, which at first tints the paint an ugly dark color before transforming into luminescent white that Liberty Paints is famous for "If it's not white, it's not right." However, my horrible experience with paint a couple of years ago made me realize that the claim Ellison is making about the color white, especially in this pretense, is not positive.
A couple of years ago, I wanted to repaint my room green. It was lavender before, but it matched the color of the bathroom, and because of that every time I walk in to my bedroom I have the sudden urge to go to the bathroom and take a shower. This is NOT good if you plan on sleeping and doing homework in your bedroom. So, being the independent and rebellious soul that I was, I bought the paint myself and got to work painting it by myself, against my mom's qualms about messiness and my inability to paint cleanly. I will say that the one job I did well was apply the painters' tape on the crown moulding; however, not even 10 minutes into the painting adventure, I tripped and fell on the bucket of paint. Don't panic; the floor was fine since I had covered it over with plastic. However, my whole left side was covered in disgustingly pale green tinged paint that simply wouldn't wash off after a quick rinse. I will never forget the next week afterwards, the week of the "green arm." It became a testament to my klutziness, a battle scar and an annoyingly green scab that I can't peel off. The image of the paint is still ingrained in my mind; like cracked skin, it hardens and then slowly (but surely) flakes off, one by one.
Yes, it is a slight tangent to the main point. But when we discussed the paint itself my mind immediately went to this memory, an ugly outer skin to my skin, but turns out smooth on the right surface (a plastered wall). It makes me think that when the narrator is sent to Liberty Paints, it's almost like a test; will he react well to the white paint? Will he conform, or will the paint crack on him? Maybe Emerson Jr. was also a secret Brotherhood agent who sent the narrator out there to see if he's got the goods to be a Brotherhood member?
The narrator comes to the inevitable end of regurgitation (ascension?) out of the underground valve room where Lucius Brockway resides. Once the narrator learns what really goes into the paint, what its purpose really is, the factory seems to spit him back out into the wild, as if he's a bad virus that can contaminate the paint. And maybe he is; the narrator is the only one to notice a slight gray tinge to the defected paint, even after inspection by Mr. Kimbro. The narrator doesn't see in black and white; he sees in gray. He acknowledges the necessity of truth and deceit in life, but lives in a world where truth loves to be painted onto things to give the facade of innocence while the insides are in black turmoil. In the narrator's head, white IS black, not a decision of white OR black. Is one scenario better than the other? Well, not necessarily. Everyone knows that the world doesn't run in black and white (in all senses of the two colors). We really do live in a bunch of gray. But it's also true that we crave truth and seek for it everywhere; we demand it, and it's given to us by the higher power. But how do we know that the nuggets of truth given out to us are truly white? What if it's painted over?
Thursday, March 27, 2014
Saturday, March 22, 2014
For the Love of Sonnets
Despite the sleepless night beforehand, despite the hour and a half of going over the meaning and structure of sonnets, despite the countless comparisons and contrasts between Italian, Spenserian, and Shakespearean sonnets, despite my fear, anxiety, and nervousness upon entering the classroom yesterday to take my first Sonnet Timed Writing…I have to say, it went over pretty well. This isn't to discount the puzzling nature and the mysterious aura that sonnets bring to the table (literally and figuratively), but when we took the dreaded writing test I found myself enjoying the thrill of the wordy chase, astounded and pleased with the amount of analysis that I did, despite the high-pressured situation. Despite the big impact it could have on my grade.
So what made it so much more enjoyable than other Timed Writings? Maybe I was just having a good day? Maybe the teacher had give us an-- God forbid-- easy sonnet? Nah. None of the above. When I walked out of the classroom with an unusually light heart, I started to ponder the nature of such Sonnet Timed Writings. They were just as difficult as short story analysis, just as frustrating as poetry comparisons, but I had the most fun with it. Unlike all those other horrifying Timed Writings, where you feel as if you're on the edge of a cliff, forced to explore an ocean that you barely know of--but are expected to cartograph (is that a verb?)--sonnets have that one descriptive similarity across all types that we can connect to easily: love. We know beforehand, before we even get the sonnet, what it is going to be about, and from that point on it's up to us to find those creative ways the poet uses his vernacular and wit to construct an idea of love to send across.
This made me question my capabilities not only as an AP Lit student, but as a person in general. I've always thought that connecting academic concepts in real-life applications was time-consuming and only provided busy work, a distraction from the true concepts at hand. But what is the point, really, of learning such concepts if you don't apply it in the first place? I'm not saying I know the true secrets of love to a fine point, but I felt myself connect with the sonnet in some way, and this connection facilitated the reading and analyzing process. By connecting the sonnet to me instead of to a so what statement, I could find its meaning easier and the pieces fell more firmly in place. It was a great feeling. This got me wondering about all those dreadful timed writings in the past, and I made the same type of progress with the one other writing that I felt proud of: the Grendel timed writing. I found its content of existentialism so invigorating and so relatable that writing a timed writing was like blogging about my experiences with the book.
That being said, I probably shouldn't treat every timed writing like a blog post. Using excessive first-person pronouns, cursing once in a while, and complaining aren't going to get me much higher than a 3 on the AP exam. But the attitude that I enter the writing with, the connection that I'm looking forward to explaining, will lead me to the so what and the analysis that I need for a great essay. It worked wonders for my sonnet essay, regardless of what grade I get--I'm proud of my work. Who's to say it wouldn't work for every other essay?
So what made it so much more enjoyable than other Timed Writings? Maybe I was just having a good day? Maybe the teacher had give us an-- God forbid-- easy sonnet? Nah. None of the above. When I walked out of the classroom with an unusually light heart, I started to ponder the nature of such Sonnet Timed Writings. They were just as difficult as short story analysis, just as frustrating as poetry comparisons, but I had the most fun with it. Unlike all those other horrifying Timed Writings, where you feel as if you're on the edge of a cliff, forced to explore an ocean that you barely know of--but are expected to cartograph (is that a verb?)--sonnets have that one descriptive similarity across all types that we can connect to easily: love. We know beforehand, before we even get the sonnet, what it is going to be about, and from that point on it's up to us to find those creative ways the poet uses his vernacular and wit to construct an idea of love to send across.
This made me question my capabilities not only as an AP Lit student, but as a person in general. I've always thought that connecting academic concepts in real-life applications was time-consuming and only provided busy work, a distraction from the true concepts at hand. But what is the point, really, of learning such concepts if you don't apply it in the first place? I'm not saying I know the true secrets of love to a fine point, but I felt myself connect with the sonnet in some way, and this connection facilitated the reading and analyzing process. By connecting the sonnet to me instead of to a so what statement, I could find its meaning easier and the pieces fell more firmly in place. It was a great feeling. This got me wondering about all those dreadful timed writings in the past, and I made the same type of progress with the one other writing that I felt proud of: the Grendel timed writing. I found its content of existentialism so invigorating and so relatable that writing a timed writing was like blogging about my experiences with the book.
That being said, I probably shouldn't treat every timed writing like a blog post. Using excessive first-person pronouns, cursing once in a while, and complaining aren't going to get me much higher than a 3 on the AP exam. But the attitude that I enter the writing with, the connection that I'm looking forward to explaining, will lead me to the so what and the analysis that I need for a great essay. It worked wonders for my sonnet essay, regardless of what grade I get--I'm proud of my work. Who's to say it wouldn't work for every other essay?
Sunday, March 16, 2014
The Mechanical Man
After finishing our first major project of Invisible Man and looking back at all the major quotes I expounded on, one of the themes that really caught my attention (and interest) was this connection between man and machine. Like everything in the book, this relationship isn't directly explained or explicitly mentioned, but there's always a proximity between the two subjects when the narrator mentions one or the other. I was puzzling over this comparison when, in Psychology, reminded me of this idea.
The unit was Social Psychology.
After studying numerous experiments and understanding multiple terms to explain social phenomena, the narrator's constant switch between man and machine suddenly became clearer. There is the act of man himself, physically and mentally unique in an individual setting (man), and then there's the attitude and behavior of a whole group of people acting as one entity (machine). It dehumanizes, it is not unique. It is a nonliving blob that does what the leader switch, or maker wants it to do. It's such a weird paradox, to know that human beings can be two different things.
In Invisible Man, the narrator relates himself as an individual, even though those around him--such as the vet during the bus ride to New York--see him as a machine. Even when the narrator is part of the Brotherhood and conversing with an editor of a magazine who calls him a new leader, the narrator simply replies with "I'm just a cog in a machine." When the narrator is pushing himself to be independent, to stand out from his peers at school, he is a man. When he is part of a movement fighting for a cause, he is a machine (though this can be argued because his passion, which makes him act out, makes him more human than the other members of the Brotherhood). Does identity play a part in this?
In psychology, people who are part of a group go through a phase of non-identity; it is a peculiar type of detachment that cognitively places the individual as part of a group, but not an individual person. This explains why, in group settings, many people are more prone to do inappropriate things or actions. For example, you never hear people enthuse, "Let's have a riot at 3:00!" It always starts as a calmer parade or protest march. Only then does it escalate into a riot, and this riot consists of average citizens who aren't known for being violent up until that point. The deindividuation power of a crowd makes this all possible for people to act out, even though it isn't intentional.
Similarly, the narrator gets caught up in all the Brotherhood plans, and this causes him to lose his own identity and values. Like he mentions towards the end of the novel, he realizes that he accepts all other people's opinions without having the time or chance to create his own. He gets eaten up by the ideas of others and, therefore, acts mechanically under Brother Jack's power for his larger cause, like a robot. What is peculiar about the narrator, however, is that in time he comes to realize that he is the one cog that doesn't fit correctly within the Brotherhood's very mechanical ways; the narrator's outbursts of passion and emotion in his speeches doesn't go over lightly with the Brotherhood, but that's what gets the crowd rallied up and energized. Without realizing it, the narrator acts out from the Brotherhood crowd, and his expression--only a window into his true identity--is constantly shut down by the others in order to promote unity.
Which is better? I honestly don't know. Choosing identity over harmony, individualism over unity, isn't cut-and-dry because one isn't better than the other. This makes the narrator's struggle relatable to our own struggles of fitting in or standing out, doing what they tell you to do or doing what you feel is right.
The unit was Social Psychology.
After studying numerous experiments and understanding multiple terms to explain social phenomena, the narrator's constant switch between man and machine suddenly became clearer. There is the act of man himself, physically and mentally unique in an individual setting (man), and then there's the attitude and behavior of a whole group of people acting as one entity (machine). It dehumanizes, it is not unique. It is a nonliving blob that does what the leader switch, or maker wants it to do. It's such a weird paradox, to know that human beings can be two different things.
In Invisible Man, the narrator relates himself as an individual, even though those around him--such as the vet during the bus ride to New York--see him as a machine. Even when the narrator is part of the Brotherhood and conversing with an editor of a magazine who calls him a new leader, the narrator simply replies with "I'm just a cog in a machine." When the narrator is pushing himself to be independent, to stand out from his peers at school, he is a man. When he is part of a movement fighting for a cause, he is a machine (though this can be argued because his passion, which makes him act out, makes him more human than the other members of the Brotherhood). Does identity play a part in this?
In psychology, people who are part of a group go through a phase of non-identity; it is a peculiar type of detachment that cognitively places the individual as part of a group, but not an individual person. This explains why, in group settings, many people are more prone to do inappropriate things or actions. For example, you never hear people enthuse, "Let's have a riot at 3:00!" It always starts as a calmer parade or protest march. Only then does it escalate into a riot, and this riot consists of average citizens who aren't known for being violent up until that point. The deindividuation power of a crowd makes this all possible for people to act out, even though it isn't intentional.
Similarly, the narrator gets caught up in all the Brotherhood plans, and this causes him to lose his own identity and values. Like he mentions towards the end of the novel, he realizes that he accepts all other people's opinions without having the time or chance to create his own. He gets eaten up by the ideas of others and, therefore, acts mechanically under Brother Jack's power for his larger cause, like a robot. What is peculiar about the narrator, however, is that in time he comes to realize that he is the one cog that doesn't fit correctly within the Brotherhood's very mechanical ways; the narrator's outbursts of passion and emotion in his speeches doesn't go over lightly with the Brotherhood, but that's what gets the crowd rallied up and energized. Without realizing it, the narrator acts out from the Brotherhood crowd, and his expression--only a window into his true identity--is constantly shut down by the others in order to promote unity.
Which is better? I honestly don't know. Choosing identity over harmony, individualism over unity, isn't cut-and-dry because one isn't better than the other. This makes the narrator's struggle relatable to our own struggles of fitting in or standing out, doing what they tell you to do or doing what you feel is right.
Wednesday, February 26, 2014
Arsehole, Artist, Joker, Judge
While our Lit group was discussing some possible ideas for our new Hamlet filming project (something I'm ashamed to say I'm excited for--it gives me more time to procrastinate on the Invisible Man project), it became very clear what our challenge will be. Our goal that day was to get a main "gist" of what each character will be like, and then we can assign him a newer, modern version of that role. For instance, we labeled Gertrude a cold, heartless witch monkey, insert-derogatory-female-word-here, from the very beginning. It was nice to see her sweet and innocent and all in Kenneth Branaugh's version, but for some peculiar reason she never struck us as that type of lady. In a quick, concurring decision, Gertrude was going to be the nosy character that everybody loves to hate in the TV shows. Easy.
Next.
And it was that way for many of the characters we were planning on including except one-- one character that all of us unconsciously avoided, the elephant in the room, the main character--Hamlet. It seemed so easy for us to label all these characters that didn't go too much in depth in the story. Characters like Gertrude, Ophelia, Claudius, even Laertes, were easy to distinguish, label, and categorize into some sort of niche or cliche, no hard feelings. So why is it so hard to do Hamlet? As I sat there listening to all my classmates' great ideas for our reality show, the absence of a main character bugged me--not because I was worried we wouldn't find one, but that the sorting, the categorizing, didn't come as quickly as I had expected. It brought me back to the discussion we had with the post-it notes with some central questions as to Hamlet's being: Is Hamlet a philosopher or a moral judge? Is he an artist or a joker? Is he poison, or is that Claudius's role?
There are a million and one pieces of text evidence that can support and deny all of them. You can make a snap judgment and claim him a bearer of truth, but just as quickly find evidence of his fabulous acting skills within the majority of ACT III. Fine then, he's a liar and an actor. Just as well, but in ACT I he seemed to do quite well in morally judging his mother and Claudius as they festively drank to Claudius's kingship. As annoying of a brat he is, he's also complicated. He's multifaceted. And whether we want to believe it or not, we find a personal connection with Hamlet that we can't find in the more extreme characters, like Ophelia or Gertrude. Both ladies represent a more specific personality type that some, but not all of us, can connect with. Sure, I can sympathize with Gertrude's struggle in finding out what's wrong with her son; you could argue that she was just trying to be a good mother, finding the best for her son. But I can't forgive her for marrying her dead husband's brother--even though it isn't technically incestuous, it's a slap in the face in the name of the late King. No one our age, no one in our generation, could connect with that, face that same problem.
But with Hamlet, it's different. His personality splits off many ways, a paradoxical combination of good and bad, sweet and sour, dirty and clean. He's more human than the rest of them. His struggle of choice resides with our own struggles in making decisions throughout our lives. Do we not ask ourselves the same questions of being, of conscience and of choice? No, it isn't to Ophelia's extent to possible suicide. But it's there, isn't it, gnawing at our thoughts if we give them enough attention?
And with that, I look at Hamlet's empty space next to "Possible TV Show Character." Everybody else's slots are filled: evil b**** (Gertrude), innocent, dumb-blonde lover (Ophelia). How are you supposed to caricature a character who plays as a human? We'll figure that out soon enough.
Next.
And it was that way for many of the characters we were planning on including except one-- one character that all of us unconsciously avoided, the elephant in the room, the main character--Hamlet. It seemed so easy for us to label all these characters that didn't go too much in depth in the story. Characters like Gertrude, Ophelia, Claudius, even Laertes, were easy to distinguish, label, and categorize into some sort of niche or cliche, no hard feelings. So why is it so hard to do Hamlet? As I sat there listening to all my classmates' great ideas for our reality show, the absence of a main character bugged me--not because I was worried we wouldn't find one, but that the sorting, the categorizing, didn't come as quickly as I had expected. It brought me back to the discussion we had with the post-it notes with some central questions as to Hamlet's being: Is Hamlet a philosopher or a moral judge? Is he an artist or a joker? Is he poison, or is that Claudius's role?
There are a million and one pieces of text evidence that can support and deny all of them. You can make a snap judgment and claim him a bearer of truth, but just as quickly find evidence of his fabulous acting skills within the majority of ACT III. Fine then, he's a liar and an actor. Just as well, but in ACT I he seemed to do quite well in morally judging his mother and Claudius as they festively drank to Claudius's kingship. As annoying of a brat he is, he's also complicated. He's multifaceted. And whether we want to believe it or not, we find a personal connection with Hamlet that we can't find in the more extreme characters, like Ophelia or Gertrude. Both ladies represent a more specific personality type that some, but not all of us, can connect with. Sure, I can sympathize with Gertrude's struggle in finding out what's wrong with her son; you could argue that she was just trying to be a good mother, finding the best for her son. But I can't forgive her for marrying her dead husband's brother--even though it isn't technically incestuous, it's a slap in the face in the name of the late King. No one our age, no one in our generation, could connect with that, face that same problem.
But with Hamlet, it's different. His personality splits off many ways, a paradoxical combination of good and bad, sweet and sour, dirty and clean. He's more human than the rest of them. His struggle of choice resides with our own struggles in making decisions throughout our lives. Do we not ask ourselves the same questions of being, of conscience and of choice? No, it isn't to Ophelia's extent to possible suicide. But it's there, isn't it, gnawing at our thoughts if we give them enough attention?
And with that, I look at Hamlet's empty space next to "Possible TV Show Character." Everybody else's slots are filled: evil b**** (Gertrude), innocent, dumb-blonde lover (Ophelia). How are you supposed to caricature a character who plays as a human? We'll figure that out soon enough.
Saturday, February 22, 2014
The Life-Saving Poem
To the Mercy Killers, by Dudley Randall
If ever mercy move you murder me,
I pray you, kindly killers, let me live.
Never conspire with death to set me free,
but let me know such life as pain can give.
Even though I be a clot, an aching clench,
a stub, a stump, a butt, a scab, a knob,
a screaming pain, a putrefying stench,
still let me live, so long as life shall throb.
Even though I turn such traitor to myself
as beg to die, do not accomplice me.
Even though I seem not human, a mute shelf
of glucose, bottled blood, machinery
to swell the lung and pump the heart--even so,
do not put out my life. Let me still glow.
Who are the Mercy Killers? The speaker references them twice here; once in the title, and once more in the second line as "kindly killers." I only want to know because this killer can change the definition and the meaning of this poem (whatever it is) in a heartbeat. At the beginning of this poem, I thought the speaker was talking about an obvious higher power that holds the treasure of life and death over human beings. But the more I read on, the more I realized that this speaker sounds like he's speaking to himself instead of this higher power (God, Zeus, Buddha, whoever). Throughout the poem I picture this speaker sitting cross-legged on the ground, gathering bits of himself to collect his strength before some type of onerous challenge that could cost him his life.
The third sentence, which starts on line 9, was the first game-changer for me, when he says "Even though I turn such traitor to myself/ as beg to die, do not accomplice me" (lines 9-10). Who is he speaking to? Back to my imaginative scenario, it seems like he's talking to himself. He's reinforcing his mind to stay strong. "Do not accomplice me" refers to his more pessimistic, Debbie-downer side of him that always wants to give up, turn himself over…kill himself. This transforms the poem from a religious prayer of strength to a battle of inner ideologies, inner drives.
Of course, like all well-written poems and novels and stories, noticing this tone change wasn't a coincidence. Upon reading the footnotes, Randall wrote this poem like a Shakespearean sonnet (ABAB, CDCD, EFEF, GG). However, the iambic pentameter is lost after the second line…that is because combines this technique with an Italian model of structure, which is a separation between the first eight lines with the last 6 lines. The physical structure is Shakespearean, but the tonal structure is Italian. And guess where the tonal shift is here? Yes. Line 9.
So with all of this in mind, what is the tone of the first 8 lines? There is a paradox here in the first two lines; the first is the connection of mercy and killer. It's interesting that the title combines these two words, yet the first two lines deliberately separate the two. How does done kill out of mercy? The pain of life must be too overbearing, worse than death itself, the absence of being or feeling. So in a twisted way, the speaker pushes away mercy, does not wish for it to enter his own heart. The first four lines in general seem like the running monologue of anybody with a terminal condition, be it cancer or any type of disorder. The pain of life, for them, is not a blessing but a curse that can only be cured by death. But is pain better than "nothing"? The speaker continues with this motif of pain and suffering, and it seems to me that he prefers this pain over death. Even if the pain comes from "a clot, an aching clench," (line 5) and all these other horrible maladies, they are all simply reminders of the throb of life.
The tone shift starting in line 9 transitions from physical ways of dying and suffering to more mental weaknesses that may push someone to take his own life. This is where the duality of minds, of angel and demon, come into play with a person's desire to live or die. Even if he turns on himself to take his own life-- even if he thinks he is nothing to this world, as noted by his self-examination as "a mute shelf/ of glucose, bottled blood, machinery" (lines 11-12)-- this mindset of being 'nothing', death-like, can be revived with the glow of life, even if means pain and suffering.
You may think he's some self-deprecating, pathetic individual who can never put his life together. But don't we think about this all the time? Maybe not to this extent, but the question of life and death circulates in everyone, even if "life" and "death" aren't explicitly stated. When we are in pain, whether physical or mental, do we not think about getting better by stopping all this feeling? By putting the tears to a halt? And what better way to do this, if not to take your own life? Ok, so maybe that last question is over-stepping it a little bit. But for those poor souls who did take that next step into that type of questioning to take their lives probably went the opposite direction than Randall's poem. But that's why I love this poem so much; it is quietly powerful in its pain, and if I had the power to give each struggling, questioning person this poem to acknowledge the power they have over their own life (and why they should treasure it, not throw it away), it would give a fair amount of re-consideration and appreciation for the life that's given.
If ever mercy move you murder me,
I pray you, kindly killers, let me live.
Never conspire with death to set me free,
but let me know such life as pain can give.
Even though I be a clot, an aching clench,
a stub, a stump, a butt, a scab, a knob,
a screaming pain, a putrefying stench,
still let me live, so long as life shall throb.
Even though I turn such traitor to myself
as beg to die, do not accomplice me.
Even though I seem not human, a mute shelf
of glucose, bottled blood, machinery
to swell the lung and pump the heart--even so,
do not put out my life. Let me still glow.
Who are the Mercy Killers? The speaker references them twice here; once in the title, and once more in the second line as "kindly killers." I only want to know because this killer can change the definition and the meaning of this poem (whatever it is) in a heartbeat. At the beginning of this poem, I thought the speaker was talking about an obvious higher power that holds the treasure of life and death over human beings. But the more I read on, the more I realized that this speaker sounds like he's speaking to himself instead of this higher power (God, Zeus, Buddha, whoever). Throughout the poem I picture this speaker sitting cross-legged on the ground, gathering bits of himself to collect his strength before some type of onerous challenge that could cost him his life.
The third sentence, which starts on line 9, was the first game-changer for me, when he says "Even though I turn such traitor to myself/ as beg to die, do not accomplice me" (lines 9-10). Who is he speaking to? Back to my imaginative scenario, it seems like he's talking to himself. He's reinforcing his mind to stay strong. "Do not accomplice me" refers to his more pessimistic, Debbie-downer side of him that always wants to give up, turn himself over…kill himself. This transforms the poem from a religious prayer of strength to a battle of inner ideologies, inner drives.
Of course, like all well-written poems and novels and stories, noticing this tone change wasn't a coincidence. Upon reading the footnotes, Randall wrote this poem like a Shakespearean sonnet (ABAB, CDCD, EFEF, GG). However, the iambic pentameter is lost after the second line…that is because combines this technique with an Italian model of structure, which is a separation between the first eight lines with the last 6 lines. The physical structure is Shakespearean, but the tonal structure is Italian. And guess where the tonal shift is here? Yes. Line 9.
So with all of this in mind, what is the tone of the first 8 lines? There is a paradox here in the first two lines; the first is the connection of mercy and killer. It's interesting that the title combines these two words, yet the first two lines deliberately separate the two. How does done kill out of mercy? The pain of life must be too overbearing, worse than death itself, the absence of being or feeling. So in a twisted way, the speaker pushes away mercy, does not wish for it to enter his own heart. The first four lines in general seem like the running monologue of anybody with a terminal condition, be it cancer or any type of disorder. The pain of life, for them, is not a blessing but a curse that can only be cured by death. But is pain better than "nothing"? The speaker continues with this motif of pain and suffering, and it seems to me that he prefers this pain over death. Even if the pain comes from "a clot, an aching clench," (line 5) and all these other horrible maladies, they are all simply reminders of the throb of life.
The tone shift starting in line 9 transitions from physical ways of dying and suffering to more mental weaknesses that may push someone to take his own life. This is where the duality of minds, of angel and demon, come into play with a person's desire to live or die. Even if he turns on himself to take his own life-- even if he thinks he is nothing to this world, as noted by his self-examination as "a mute shelf/ of glucose, bottled blood, machinery" (lines 11-12)-- this mindset of being 'nothing', death-like, can be revived with the glow of life, even if means pain and suffering.
You may think he's some self-deprecating, pathetic individual who can never put his life together. But don't we think about this all the time? Maybe not to this extent, but the question of life and death circulates in everyone, even if "life" and "death" aren't explicitly stated. When we are in pain, whether physical or mental, do we not think about getting better by stopping all this feeling? By putting the tears to a halt? And what better way to do this, if not to take your own life? Ok, so maybe that last question is over-stepping it a little bit. But for those poor souls who did take that next step into that type of questioning to take their lives probably went the opposite direction than Randall's poem. But that's why I love this poem so much; it is quietly powerful in its pain, and if I had the power to give each struggling, questioning person this poem to acknowledge the power they have over their own life (and why they should treasure it, not throw it away), it would give a fair amount of re-consideration and appreciation for the life that's given.
Saturday, February 15, 2014
Shakespeare, the Scribe to my Morals
"My words fly up; my thoughts remain below.
Words without thoughts never to Heaven go"(Hamlet, III, iii, 97-98).
After giving an honest try at understanding the twisty-turny words of Shakespeare, I must admit there is some level of connection between the reader and this ancient 1600s play. My freshman self wouldn't have believed it. I remember all too painfully the first time we attacked Shakespeare with what was presumably his funniest work: A Midsummer Night's Dream. How awkward it was, not only for me but for the teacher, as we skimmed through many of the "dirtiest," "funniest" lines with blank, confused eyes and a lack of understanding (on the students' part). But I've realized that really giving the time to analyze these words that Shakespeare is construing and misconstruing gives much more meaning than giving a straightforward, simple dialogue (which I guess is the case for all good literary work). Throughout my freshman and sophomore years, Shakespeare always made me angry. Since we never actually focused on the meaning of the words (which we're doing now), all Shakespeare meant to me was a writer for the lame stories we've come to base our pop culture around--forbidden love from Romeo and Juliet, the struggle for kingship in Macbeth, bundled up in an obsolete form of English language that I was too lazy to look into. There was an emphasis on the plot instead of the diction, and for that reason No Fear Shakespeare became my best friend.
Geez, starting on a tangent before even addressing the quote. It's there for a reason, I promise. Reading the last two rhyming lines of the third scene of the third act of Hamlet gave me slight chills because of how incredibly relevant that sentence is. Relevance? In a Shakespeare work? Forget about it. And yet here we are, gasping and reeling at Claudius's hideous crime and getting extremely annoyed with Hamlet's indecision to do anything about it (in my opinion, at least). Everybody knows the basic story to this tragedy--if you've seen The Lion King, that is. Why bother reading it then? Suddenly it isn't about the plot anymore, but rather the relationships between the characters and the way they speak.
But this specific quote is my personal favorite in Hamlet so far, mainly because it rings so true in my head for some reason. To simplify, Claudius says that his 'grief' and 'need to repent' is empty and false since he doesn't truly think or believe in the words he says. For this reason, any prayer he sends about his murderous deed or his dead brother-king isn't light enough with truth to float to heaven and be "heard" by God, or whoever it is that lives there and decides our mortal fates. It can be taken two ways, now that I think about it; his words may be fake without the input of thought, which disables him to get to heaven. Or, the heaviness behind the words due to his true murderous thoughts make it too heavy for it to go to Heaven. When I read these lines, I felt like I've learned something extremely important, even though a part of me knew this information already. It's almost like whatever I feel is moral and immoral has just been verbally described by Shakespeare. Me, connect with Shakespeare? Yeah, right.
But it happened. The desperate measures I take to avoid boredom during a snow-in are astounding, but I gotta say it paid off somehow.
Words without thoughts never to Heaven go"(Hamlet, III, iii, 97-98).
After giving an honest try at understanding the twisty-turny words of Shakespeare, I must admit there is some level of connection between the reader and this ancient 1600s play. My freshman self wouldn't have believed it. I remember all too painfully the first time we attacked Shakespeare with what was presumably his funniest work: A Midsummer Night's Dream. How awkward it was, not only for me but for the teacher, as we skimmed through many of the "dirtiest," "funniest" lines with blank, confused eyes and a lack of understanding (on the students' part). But I've realized that really giving the time to analyze these words that Shakespeare is construing and misconstruing gives much more meaning than giving a straightforward, simple dialogue (which I guess is the case for all good literary work). Throughout my freshman and sophomore years, Shakespeare always made me angry. Since we never actually focused on the meaning of the words (which we're doing now), all Shakespeare meant to me was a writer for the lame stories we've come to base our pop culture around--forbidden love from Romeo and Juliet, the struggle for kingship in Macbeth, bundled up in an obsolete form of English language that I was too lazy to look into. There was an emphasis on the plot instead of the diction, and for that reason No Fear Shakespeare became my best friend.
Geez, starting on a tangent before even addressing the quote. It's there for a reason, I promise. Reading the last two rhyming lines of the third scene of the third act of Hamlet gave me slight chills because of how incredibly relevant that sentence is. Relevance? In a Shakespeare work? Forget about it. And yet here we are, gasping and reeling at Claudius's hideous crime and getting extremely annoyed with Hamlet's indecision to do anything about it (in my opinion, at least). Everybody knows the basic story to this tragedy--if you've seen The Lion King, that is. Why bother reading it then? Suddenly it isn't about the plot anymore, but rather the relationships between the characters and the way they speak.
But this specific quote is my personal favorite in Hamlet so far, mainly because it rings so true in my head for some reason. To simplify, Claudius says that his 'grief' and 'need to repent' is empty and false since he doesn't truly think or believe in the words he says. For this reason, any prayer he sends about his murderous deed or his dead brother-king isn't light enough with truth to float to heaven and be "heard" by God, or whoever it is that lives there and decides our mortal fates. It can be taken two ways, now that I think about it; his words may be fake without the input of thought, which disables him to get to heaven. Or, the heaviness behind the words due to his true murderous thoughts make it too heavy for it to go to Heaven. When I read these lines, I felt like I've learned something extremely important, even though a part of me knew this information already. It's almost like whatever I feel is moral and immoral has just been verbally described by Shakespeare. Me, connect with Shakespeare? Yeah, right.
But it happened. The desperate measures I take to avoid boredom during a snow-in are astounding, but I gotta say it paid off somehow.
Monday, February 10, 2014
Mr. Invisible
I've got many problems with this book.
It goes beyond the tough language, the seemingly endless sentences (that usually go on to create their own paragraphs), the sporadic way in which the narrator speaks, or even the narrator's own personal and quite twisted problems he's got going on in his head. No, this I can all deal with. At least, I can tolerate it. But the one thing that really grinds my gears, that I'm constantly reminded of as I open the annoyingly thin pages of this book, is that the narrator's name is never stated. There is no hint nor suggestion of his name anywhere in the 19 chapters that I have read so far. Like the drug commercials coined in their terrifying commercials--not even once.
Of course, it didn't seem like a big deal five chapters in. I kept thinking that his name will pop up somewhere, when Dr. Bledsoe calls him into his office, or when he writes his name for a job application. Anything, really. But it was finally the last straw when I meant to annotate a specific portion of a reading and ended up writing "He told him that he wasn't supposed to go, yet he goes against his own judgement?" Yes. Word for word, an annotation. I don't even know who I'm referring to at this point. It's irritating and distracting for my nit-picky brain that wants to know everything. And of course, the pain of annotating. I've given up on that a couple of chapters later; he's a John Doe in my mind.
But since all AP Lit books are written by genius authors who probably knew more or less what they were doing, I'm grudgingly guessing that Ellison had justification for leaving the narrator's name tag empty. Besides torturing future AP Lit students with the pain of not knowing,his the narrator's lack of identity from something as simple as his name probably says a lot about the nature of this guy in the first place. From the beginning, we read him as an unidentifiable character, and as I read throughout the chapters I've noticed that I find it easier to identify with his struggles and his pains against society's unbending rules. By avoiding a literal "label" for the protagonist, the author succeeded in having readers sympathizing with this protagonist (even if he strikes me as a little bit of a brat sometimes).
And by acknowledging this style, the narrator's lack of identity becomes more profound in that his invisibility stems from his worthlessness in this world. Throughout the novel, the narrator loves likening himself to a machine of some sort, or as a minuscule fore in the grand scheme of things. When asked for an interview to represent the goals of the Brotherhood, the narrator replies, "I'm no hero and I'm far from the top; I'm a cog in a machine. We here in the Brotherhood work as a unit" (pg. 396-397). There are many cogs in a machine; you wouldn't waste your time naming each one. Likewise, he identifies himself as part of a unit; that is, he considers himself not even a whole being, but only a part of a larger picture. What is a name for, at this point? He is one out of millions of African Americans, one out of billions of human beings in this world. The absence of a name expounds on this statement that the author is trying to get across. In relation to the mass of humankind, this protagonist is nothing, even though he likes to think he's doing brave and innovational things. When he stands in a crowd with the rest of the population, he is invisible.
The main point I want to get out of this is that this narrator is not literally invisible. Which, really, is a stupid assumption to make, but I honestly thought he was in the first portion of the book. While he's at school, driving around Mr. Norton, it seems as if John Doe is living through a haze in which he is unsure what is real and what is fake. For all we know, he may be just another patient in Golden Day imagining things, and the rest of the whole story is his fantasy. But his social invisibility, despite all his ambition to reach for the top of the social ladder driving luxury cars and getting people to notice him, is what dominates his life, and I don't think this is necessarily because of his skin color alone. Rather, his constant associations with an organization that doesn't consider each member's individuality is what renders him invisible. And unfortunately, I think this will get the better of him. He'll get so caught up with his self-important that he won't see his quick disposal by the organization once their need of him has run its course. I mean, that's what happened at the school, even though he was one of the university's brightest students; this is what happened when he took a job in a paint factory. I wouldn't be surprised if it happens again, but this time he'll take it so personally that it'll really mess with his head. He'll really start to question his individuality and purpose in the world he lives in. I can't wait for that to happen; then maybe I'll get a name out of him.
It goes beyond the tough language, the seemingly endless sentences (that usually go on to create their own paragraphs), the sporadic way in which the narrator speaks, or even the narrator's own personal and quite twisted problems he's got going on in his head. No, this I can all deal with. At least, I can tolerate it. But the one thing that really grinds my gears, that I'm constantly reminded of as I open the annoyingly thin pages of this book, is that the narrator's name is never stated. There is no hint nor suggestion of his name anywhere in the 19 chapters that I have read so far. Like the drug commercials coined in their terrifying commercials--not even once.
Of course, it didn't seem like a big deal five chapters in. I kept thinking that his name will pop up somewhere, when Dr. Bledsoe calls him into his office, or when he writes his name for a job application. Anything, really. But it was finally the last straw when I meant to annotate a specific portion of a reading and ended up writing "He told him that he wasn't supposed to go, yet he goes against his own judgement?" Yes. Word for word, an annotation. I don't even know who I'm referring to at this point. It's irritating and distracting for my nit-picky brain that wants to know everything. And of course, the pain of annotating. I've given up on that a couple of chapters later; he's a John Doe in my mind.
But since all AP Lit books are written by genius authors who probably knew more or less what they were doing, I'm grudgingly guessing that Ellison had justification for leaving the narrator's name tag empty. Besides torturing future AP Lit students with the pain of not knowing,
And by acknowledging this style, the narrator's lack of identity becomes more profound in that his invisibility stems from his worthlessness in this world. Throughout the novel, the narrator loves likening himself to a machine of some sort, or as a minuscule fore in the grand scheme of things. When asked for an interview to represent the goals of the Brotherhood, the narrator replies, "I'm no hero and I'm far from the top; I'm a cog in a machine. We here in the Brotherhood work as a unit" (pg. 396-397). There are many cogs in a machine; you wouldn't waste your time naming each one. Likewise, he identifies himself as part of a unit; that is, he considers himself not even a whole being, but only a part of a larger picture. What is a name for, at this point? He is one out of millions of African Americans, one out of billions of human beings in this world. The absence of a name expounds on this statement that the author is trying to get across. In relation to the mass of humankind, this protagonist is nothing, even though he likes to think he's doing brave and innovational things. When he stands in a crowd with the rest of the population, he is invisible.
The main point I want to get out of this is that this narrator is not literally invisible. Which, really, is a stupid assumption to make, but I honestly thought he was in the first portion of the book. While he's at school, driving around Mr. Norton, it seems as if John Doe is living through a haze in which he is unsure what is real and what is fake. For all we know, he may be just another patient in Golden Day imagining things, and the rest of the whole story is his fantasy. But his social invisibility, despite all his ambition to reach for the top of the social ladder driving luxury cars and getting people to notice him, is what dominates his life, and I don't think this is necessarily because of his skin color alone. Rather, his constant associations with an organization that doesn't consider each member's individuality is what renders him invisible. And unfortunately, I think this will get the better of him. He'll get so caught up with his self-important that he won't see his quick disposal by the organization once their need of him has run its course. I mean, that's what happened at the school, even though he was one of the university's brightest students; this is what happened when he took a job in a paint factory. I wouldn't be surprised if it happens again, but this time he'll take it so personally that it'll really mess with his head. He'll really start to question his individuality and purpose in the world he lives in. I can't wait for that to happen; then maybe I'll get a name out of him.
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