for Wednesday/Thursday

Communicate with your partner and create outlines for your extracts. The aim is to find certain literary elements and critical approaches that you can apply to a variety of extracts from Conrad. Present orally and visually (with outline) on Wednesday/Thursday.

 

Outline should have 1. Focused intro, 2. Thesis that can work for either passage, 3. At least three topic sentences that directly apply the thesis. You should be able to detail your plan in your presentation: what parts of the text will you focus on?

 

Language quiz today and tomorrow.

for Monday/Tuesday

You have now read both "The Journey Within" by Albert Guerard and "An Unreadable Report" by Peter Brooks. Again, post a 100+ word blog response that involves 1.a peer's comments, 2. either Brooks' or Guerard's comments, 3. some textual evidence, 4. a consideration of at least one of the topics below, and 5. something original of your own. You might start by considering: What was Conrad's central problem in telling this story?

topics to consider
psychology (inner journey)
lies
grave imagery
narrative
dream
truth and transmissability
intentions and reality
the limits of language

For Thursday/Friday

Read the extract below and post a comment beneath it. Bring all your thinking to bear on it, whether from criticism, discussion, or whatever. Acknowledge your borrowed ideas informally (as in "Achebe even implies that Conrad sustains the imperialist presence in the Congo.") This elements are required: 1. involve a peer's comment, 2. involve a critic's comment, 3. consider symbolism, and 4. extend with something original of your own. Your response should be at least a hundred words.

She must have had the value of several elephant tusks upon her. She was savage and superb, wild-eyed and magnificent; there was something ominous and stately in her deliberate progress. And in the hush that had fallen suddenly upon the whole sorrowful land, the immense wilderness, the colossal body of the fecund and mysterious life seemed to look at her, pensive, as though it had been looking at the image of its own tenebrous and passionate soul.
"She came abreast of the steamer, stood still, and faced us. Her long shadow fell to the water's edge. Her face had a tragic and fierce aspect of wild sorrow and of dumb pain mingled with the fear of some struggling, half- shaped resolve. She stood looking at us without a stir, and like the wilderness itself, with an air of brooding over an inscrutable purpose. A whole minute passed, and then she made a step forward. There was a low jingle, a glint of yellow metal, a sway of fringed draperies, and she stopped as if her heart had failed her...
"She turned away slowly, walked on, following the bank, and passed into the bushes to the left. Once only her eyes gleamed back at us in the dusk of the thickets before she disappeared.

For Tuesday/Wednesday

For Tuesday/Wednesday, finish Heart of Darkness. Expect some sort of reading check. Bring in a one-page, evidence-filled written piece on one of the following ideas:

• the nature, use, and consequences of Marlow's reply to the Intended
• the function of women as symbols
• the effect of Marlow's story on the frame narrator
• Marlow's choice of nightmares
• the inner journey and the outer journey
• Or, extract a dense, rich passage and comment on it

Remember to include HOW YOU KNOW: SHOW THE EVIDENCE!

ALSO, read two of the criticisms at the back of the book, excerpt two short passages from each that best capture the key thought, and be prepared to speak to the class and/or to me about them.

Impressionism in Conrad

See the posting below for your assignment. Here, I've excerpted a portion of HofD to show how Marlow tells his story in an impressionist style. Remember the Seurat painting we viewed in class? See how Marlow's perceptions change from his first apprehensions through intermediate stages to final comprehension (or, as AM wrote in his paper: "He begins with the heat of the moment, then he follows up by reanalyzing the situation, and then there is the aftershock." Add to that, finally, an evaluation and judgement of the situation and his own reaction to it. See how he finally comprehends the "fence":

 

     "Through my glasses I saw the slope of a hill interspersed with rare trees and perfectly free from under- growth. A long decaying building on the summit was half buried in the high grass; the large holes in the peaked roof gaped black from afar; the jungle and the woods made a background. There was no enclosure or fence of any kind; but there had been one apparently, for near the house half-a-dozen slim posts remained in a row, roughly trimmed, and with their upper ends ornamented with round carved balls. The rails, or whatever there had been between, had disappeared. Of course the forest surrounded all that..."

 

Much later, in Part 3, Marlow picks up the same thread after conversation with the Russian:

 

"I directed my glass to the house. There were no signs of life, but there was the ruined roof, the long mud wall peeping above the grass, with three little square window-holes, no two of the same size; all this brought within reach of my hand, as it were. And then I made a brusque movement, and one of the remaining posts of that vanished fence leaped up in the field of my glass. You remember I told you I had been struck at the distance by certain attempts at ornamentation, rather remarkable in the ruinous aspect of the place. Now I had suddenly a nearer view, and its first result was to make me throw my head back as if before a blow. Then I went carefully from post to post with my glass, and I saw my mistake. These round knobs were not ornamental but symbolic; they were expressive and puzzling, striking and disturbing -- food for thought and also for vultures if there had been any looking down from the sky; but at all events for such ants as were industrious enough to ascend the pole. They would have been even more impressive, those heads on the stakes, if their faces had not been turned to the house. Only one, the first I had made out, was facing my way. I was not so shocked as you may think. The start back I had given was really nothing but a movement of surprise. I had expected to see a knob of wood there, you know. I returned deliberately to the first I had seen -- and there it was, black, dried, sunken, with closed eyelids -- a head that seemed to sleep at the top of that pole, and, with the shrunken dry lips showing a narrow white line of the teeth, was smiling, too, smiling continuously at some endless and jocose dream of that eternal slumber."

 

Marlow's story is the story of Africa's effect on him, and he tries to communicate the way he perceives. You can see here how first he seems to see one thing (fence posts) but eventually recognizes that those carved balls are actually human heads. His description, of course, is embedded in a tale Marlow has lived with for some time before he recalls it for the listeners on the Nellie.

 

 

For Monday/Tuesday

Read all of Part 2. Find a scene that intrigues you and illustrate it. You may be as abstract, symbolic, or realistic as you like in your depiction. Be prepared to demonstrate your close reading and to present your illustration in class on Monday/Tuesday. Be able to explain why you chose this particular scene, what the scene contributes to the book as a whole, and why you illustrated it as you did.

First day assignment

For those who struggle with the Dropbox...
Go to this link:

http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/1747690/First%20day%20assignment.pdf

and you can get the file directly.

for Tuesday/Wednesday

Read the remainder of Part 1.
*Pick one passage to analyze in depth, as you did today, on your own.
*Keep the passage short, concise, and rich.
*Consider tone and purpose, and USE EVIDENCE to support your analysis. Why do you think Marlow has a cynical tone? Based on what evidence?
*Write between one and two pages. Type it and bring in a printed copy to share, discuss, and turn in. I will open the gradebook and enter your scores as "Classwork."
*Also, again bring in your WLA 1, on disk and on paper, as I try to schedule the lab.
*Make sure you can get into Dropbox.

For Friday/Monday

Log into Dropbox and get the .pdf file called "First Day Assignment." It is the flipchart we looked at in class. Determine a thoughtful, concise (one-three words?) title for each extract from the philosophers.

Read pages 1-13. Stop where you read, "I felt as though, instead of going to the centre of a continent, I were about to set off for the centre of the earth."

AND (oh, geez, is this too late?) bring an electronic copy of your WLA daily for the next two weeks.

Checkout item!

I need a copy of your WLA 1, and NOW! They are checkout items for me!

Wednesday

Out of class performers!

 

Jess, Jas, Shaw: please try to be here before school or during first, or present during second. Otherwise, you will need to schedule about 90 minutes later because I will be out for a long lunch planned on my behalf.

DO NOT READ DIRECTLY FROM POWERPOINT SLIDES!

Just say no! Unless it is text quoted from one of the books -- very specific and well-chosen text -- do not read your presentation from the slides. You may use note cards. Avoid big sloppy notebook paper. It's part of the "register" of the communication.

Remember that you must pass a reading check on the books you intend to do your oral presentation on. It would be awful to have a zero on the exam because of that...

Remember that you must pass a reading check on the books you intend to do your oral presentation on. It would be awful to have a zero on the exam because of that...

 

I will check the gradebook even for The Merchant of Venice and The Metamorphosis.

Thursday

Please remember to bring your books and all materials you may need to work on your oral presentations.

Tuesday

Bring any materials and books you may need for your oral presentation along with the assignment listed below. The majority of your classtime will be devoted to developing a very shiny oral presentation.

Friday

Today in B-day we regrouped to brainstorm ideas for oral presentations. Finish The Things They Carried by Thursday and have these things done:

 

• Prepare your critical concept with five essential questions to help develop it.
• Prepare, from the concept and your initial thoughts, a starting thesis (this thesis is flexible!)
• Decide what form your presentation will take.
• Schedule for any class day after May 18 to do your oral presentation. Class time will largely be devoted to working on this presentation from now until then. Some after school and school day presentations will be fine as well if you do not need the class.

See the posts below to make project suggestions for the oral presentation. Do not repeat previous posts. Bonus of five points in the language category for all who contribute.

The Things They Carried

Place project ideas as comments here. Here is the starter list:
Narrative point-of-view; situation of narrator; narrator’s stance toward narrative
Nature of truth as revealed (may be combined with above)
Transmissibility of experience
Fantastic, magical, or eerie elements within realistic novel
Juxtaposition of kindness and civility with savagery
War friends vs. home friends; the bond
Metafictive techniques
Nature of fiction as revealed in the novel
Meaning and suggestiveness of names
Revenge
Nature of nature
Richly detailed scenes for comparison
Use of language in specific scenes compared (figures of speech, comparisons, imagery, style, tone)
Appreciation of life when near death
This novel as a "true war story"
Physical versus emotional weight of burdens
Burdens in Things and Beloved

The Merchant of Venice

Place project ideas as comments here. Here is the starter list:

Pertains to play’s stance (“The play’s the thing…): Point-of-view; narrative stance
Nature of truth (focus on reported events, not seen first-hand; transmissibility of truth)
Juxtaposition of kindness and civility with savagery (other juxtapositions possible)
Parent-child relations
Play’s comment on human nature
Hypocrisy
Revenge
Nature of justice
Richly detailed scenes for comparison
Use of language in specific scenes compared (figures of speech, comparisons, imagery, style, tone)

The Metamorphosis

Place project ideas as comments here.

Narrative point-of-view; situation of narrator; narrator’s stance toward narrative
Nature of truth
Transmissibility of experience
Fantastic, magical, or eerie elements within realistic novel
Parent-child relations
Richly detailed scenes for comparison
Use of language in specific scenes compared (figures of speech, comparisons, imagery, style, tone)

Ideas for Beloved

Place project ideas as comments here. Here is the starter list:

Narrative point-of-view; situation of narrator; narrator’s stance toward narrative
Nature of truth as revealed in the novel
Transmissibility of the truth of an experience
Fantastic, magical, or eerie elements within realistic novel
Juxtaposition of kindness and civility with savagery (other juxtapositions possible)
Parent-child relations
Nature of nature
Richly detailed scenes for comparison
Use of language in specific scenes compared (figures of speech, comparisons, imagery, style, tone)
Storytelling
Different kinds of love
Isolation and community
Embarrassment and pride
War scars
Deaths of Beloved and Kiowa
Theft
Guilt from things that have happened to characters
Dependence
Family relations

Wednesday

Pre-reading The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien

The things you can't leave behind...

1. Think as a poet for a few minutes. Then make three columns on a sheet of paper and head them "Things," "Abstractions," and "People."
2. In the first column, write a list of the most important things (actual physical things) to you -- the things you cannot leave behind. These things can have sentimental, superstitious, or symbolic value, such as a Christmas card from your grandmother or a special sock you wear during big games if yoiu like.
3. Next, make a list of the abstract, intangible things that are most important to you: freedom, happiness, loyalty -- and put these abstractions in the second column.
4. Next, make a list of the people who are most important to you in the third column.
5. Next, try to match the physical list to the abstract list and the people list.
6. Finally, combine these lists in an artful and creative way. This assignment is due on Tuesday/Wednesday.

Monday

Today's A-day took reading checks or fleshed out some ideas from the rest of the book. All graciousness is off on Wednesday!

I'm on page 255!

(Sunday )I can now post from my phone! Get some reading done.

Break week

Think about scars, trees, stumps, water; how Paul D's idea of Sethe's scar changes, and how the dead skin of a scar can become a living tree; how a clearing among the trees has anything to do with anything.

What does Beloved do FOR Sethe? How does she HARM Sethe? What is her effect on Denver?

Some images

Thursday

Read. Finish the book by the time you return on Monday, April 20.

Monday (Part Deux)

Look at the article linked at right on the growing possibility that medicine could "edit" your memory. What if Sethe had access to such a science?

Monday

Here are the questions for classwork/homework. I will not credit work that shows no thought!

Beloved
Chapter One (3-23)
1. Look at the imagery surrounding the pink marble. What activities are combined in the image?
2. What is the most beautiful memory Sethe has of the landscape of Sweet Home? How is this memory related to the scars on Sethe's back?
3. Garner calls his slaves "men," but find at least two important ways that Garner or his representatives create an animal existence for them.
4. What is the chief function of Chapter One: what does it establish?

Chapter Two (24-33)
1. In this section, the omniscient third-person narration enters Paul D's consciousness. Examine the importance of trees to him and explain.
2. How does the behavior of Sixo, Halle, and the Pauls establish that they are, in fact, strong, moral men -- despite Halle's wedding bed of corn stalks because Mr. Garner thought corn "was a crop animals could use as well as humans" (31), and despite the calves?
3. In what ways is Sixo distinctly different from the other Sweet Home men?
4. What does Baby Suggs's experience reveal about a mother's best chance to survive slavery and the nature of slave family life? (Stick to the first two chapters).
5. How does Chapter Two clear the way for Paul D to consider the future?
6. (No response necessary) Note that Chapter One, in its immediate present, has the following characters: Sethe, Paul D, and Denver. Chapter Two has only Paul D and Sethe. Note the first sentence of Chapter Three. Read Chapter Three (34-51) for next class, then speed up!

Friday (Saturday, really)

Read through Chapter Two of Beloved. Expect a reading check on your progress so far. Look at the links to the right to find articles on the historical Margaret Garner, the runaway slave whose story inspired Morrison's first concept of her novel.

Thursday

Bring in all books! I am sending them down on Monday and turning in a hold list, so after Monday, all deals will have to go through Mr. Henthorn.

Wednesday

Bring your Beloveds and your webs or charts. You should have read through Chapter 1 by class time.

Monday

Read Chapter 1 of Beloved and make a web or chart showing all significant relations among characters.
Determine what the main purpose of chapter one is, and how is it communicated?

A sestina

The Magician Suspends the Children by Carole Oles

With this charm I keep the boy at six
and the girl fast at five
almost safe behind the four
walls of family. We three
are a feathery totem I tattoo
against time: I’ll be one

again. Joy here is hard-won
but possible. Protector of six
found toads, son, you feel too
much, my Halloween mouse. Your five
finger exercises predict no three
quarter time gliding for

you. Symphonic storms are the fore-
cast, nothing unruffled for my wun-
derkind. Have two children: make three
journeys upstream. Son, at six
you run into angles where five
let you curve, let me hold onto

your fingers in drugstores. Too
intent on them, you’re before
or behind me five
paces at least. Let no one
tie the sturdy boat of your six
years to me the grotesque, the three

headed mother. More than three
times you’ll deny me. And my cockatoo,
my crested girl, how you cry to be six.
Age gathers on your fore-
head with that striving. Everyone
draws your lines and five

breaks out like a rash, five
crouches, pariah of the three
o’clock male rendezvous. Oh won-
derful girl, my impromptu
rainbow, believe it: you’ll be four-
teen before you’re six.

This is the one abracadabra I know to
keep us three, keep you five and six.
Grow now. Sing. Fly. Do what you’re here for.

Later Wednesday

Beloved preread

Your piece of writing must be serious in tone, and the sentences must make sense. OCCASIONAL fragments in a poem are acceptable if they work.

Compose a poem or a short, haunting descriptive piece of prose using at least ten words from the following list:

Memory
Grave
Pink marble
River
Tree
Heat
Ghost milk
Baby
House
Bread
124
legs
breasts
feet
iron
desire
loneliness
Sweet home
Men
Forget
Legs
Mother
Child

Or, if you are awesome, compose a sestina with six of the words above used as end words. That will earn you, if it makes sense and is an actual sestina, an additional 100 on a test score as well as the score for this pre-reading assignment.

Wednesday

Look here a little later tonight for the poem assignment -- which is a pre-reading task for Beloved.

DO THIS!

Remember those two entire class days we spent with the laptops reviewing world lit papers? Remember I told you about three steps?
1. Remove passive voice verbs.
2. Be sure all verbs are in the simple present unless logic demands otherwise.
3. Read backwards sentence-by-sentence to be sure each sentence has its own sense.

I also told you to remove these tired (and passive) circumlocutions:
can be viewed
is seen
is portrayed

Finally, go get a drink of water and come back. Read your paper from beginning to end.

I just read a paper with EVERY ONE of the above problems unaddressed. What were those class days for? DO WHAT YOU ARE TAUGHT! AND KEEP DOING IT!

I can just imagine Psycho T driving for the hoop only to pull up and say, "This basket can be seen as a dunk by Dick Vitale." Well, is it a jam, or ain't it? JUST GET THE POINTS!

Thursday

See below for assignments. Please bring in all books for check in on (A: March 16; B: March 17). I will keep them close for recheck if necessary.

Tuesday

Projects for The Merchant of Venice. Writing projects should be between 300-500 words and go through the complete writing process. This limit means they must be well-written, efficient, and concise. Essays will be assessed for organization, content, and voice. Process will assure good conventions.
Provide the evidence of
 First draft
 Peer feedback
 Feedback given
 Typed revision
 Peer edit
 Editing provided
 Typed revision
 My edit
 Typed final

1. Write a character sketch for one character in the play. Provide context and quotes to show how you reach your conclusions. Consider the following about your character:
 gender, age and name
 appearance
 physical and personal strengths and weaknesses
 likes and dislikes
 feelings and behaviors towards other characters
 feelings of other characters towards the character
 feelings of character towards himself/herself
 personality at the beginning of the novel
 changes in personality as story progresses
 you opinion about the character
 It is important to include proof from the story to support what you are writing in the character sketch. If you can’t support it with something from the story, then it doesn’t belong.

2. Compare the oaths of at least two Christian characters other than Antonio to the oaths of Shylock. (Provide a little context and quote the most pertinent lines.) What can you infer about each character's attitude toward promise-making and promise- breaking? What comment do you think Shakespeare makes about each culture?

3. Explain, with clearly contextualized quotes from the play, how The Merchant of Venice is a Christian allegory. Describe the play's view of human nature; then identify the demonic elements, the redemptive elements, and the heavenly elements. (That would be the devil, the Christ-figure, the Everyman, and the God-figure. This presumes you have some knowledge, or are willing to find out, about Christian views of the Trinity -- Father/Son/Holy Ghost).

4. In a well-written essay, examine the themes of law and passion in Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice. Be sure to use precise quotes and contextualize them adequately. Explain fully what you are showing with each one.

5. Find another motif of the play, such as music, wealth and penury, flesh and meat, deceptive appearances, male/female roles, male/female love, second-hand knowledge (concerning the way we learn of certain events: Shylock's raging heard from the mouth of Solanio, for instance). In a well-written essay, examine this motif and the purpose it serves in developing key themes of the play.

6. Choose one of the following ideas and write a great essay that proves Shakespeare was or was not
a. a typical English anti-Semite of the Elizabethan Age
b. tolerant or supportive of same-sex love
c. more critical of Christian behavior than of Jewish behavior

7. For three people: Perform a scene from the play with an alternative interpretation. Find a passage that is rich with ambiguity and possibility and interpret it in an very unusual way, say with extreme sympathy for Shylock and antipathy for Antonio. The language should be unchanged; the scene should have few characters, be intense, and last for five minutes or so. Write a 300-500 word statement of intent delineating exactly what you intend to do, what your interpretation will be, and what ONE IDEA -- a coherent sentence! -- your interpretation will clearly communicate. Costuming should not be a factor; read or memorize. One small group only.

8. For four people: Debate the character of Portia. Is she good, or is she a manipulative hypocrite, worse even than Shylock? Use the cx debate format.

9. Do an investigative 60 Minutes-style report on the trial that looks into the deceptions and betrayals and miscarriages of justice in the trial of Shylock. Script it, tape it, edit it, and show it. The spot should be exactly five minutes long (with maybe a single 30-second ad) and full of exciting, revealing, supported, and true reportage.

So, get started. All work is due, stapled in order and formatted correctly, on OR BEFORE March 18. I then proofread it and return for finalizing.

Monday

A-day will finish recitations Tuesday.

Wednesday and Thursday

Read the play -- expect a reading check next class meeting. Work on your recitation and its introduction.

Monday and Tuesday

A- and B-day: Finish reading the play. Choose a top choice and an alternate passage for your recitation. Only five recitations can come from Act I, five from Act II, and so on.

Recitations must include
author and title
act and scene
speaker and audience
a brief summary to provide context for the passage
the reason you think this passage is particularly important to the play
a beautiful recitation in the king's best English, acted like Olivier

A note on comprehension

Look at previous post below for assignment. This post is to answer some classroom questions that were left hanging on Thursday and Friday. Some students asked if Portia knows which casket is the right one. These lines from III.2.9-10 reveal several things. One, she does know the correct box. Two, she is TRUE to her father and to her word. This constancy on her part makes her all the more valued as a wife. (Contrast her behavior with Jessica's behavior toward her father's will). Portia's lines to Bassanio:

Portia: I would detain you here some month or two
Before you venture for me. I could teach you
How to choose right, but I am then forsworn.
So will I never be.

Further, she gets all a-flutter when Bassanio picks the lead box but has not yet opened it. She prays in an aside for love to lighten up a little because she is feeling overwhelmed by her passions:

O love, be moderate, allay thy ecstasy,
In measure rain thy joy, scant this excess.
I feel too much thy blessing. Make it less,
For fear I surfeit!

She clearly knows the right answer, and Bassanio is clearly the man she most prefers -- so her father was right, in this sense. Note that she gives him a ring with a deal attached to it, too.

Another question concerns the suitors that are present in the introduction to Portia in I.2. Remember the Neapolitan Prince, the County Palatine, Monsieur Le Bon, Falconbridge of England, the Scot, and the German Duke of Saxony? They did not choose a casket at all. Nerissa informs the worried Portia,

"You need not fear, lady, the having any of these lords. They have acquainted me with their determinations, which is, indeed, to return to their home and to trouble you with no more suit unless you may be won by some other sort than your father's imposition, depending on the caskets" (I.2.109 approximately).

Some students were surprised to learn that the men are bound by the deal too. It is a CONTRACT, which is a thematic element and thus informs the subplots as well as the main plot. Here Portia speaks to the Prince of Morocco, the first man to risk the casket game:

You must take your chance,
And either not attempt to choose at all
Or swear before you choose, if you choose wrong,
Never to speak to lady afterward
In way of marriage. Therefore be advised (II.1.38-42).

This contract appears voided for the Prince of Aragon (the idiot with the spit cup) by the note inside the casket, which reads, in the words of the "portrait of a blinking idiot," as follows:

Take what wife you will to bed,
I will ever be your head.
So be gone. You are sped.

I hope that makes some things a little more clear.

Thursday

B-day, you are to do this assignment too after reading Act II:

1. How does the parade of suitors reflect on the play's theme of cultural difference? See Nerissa's reaction to Gratiano. What does each woman's instant reaction to these local boys say of cultural difference?

2. Look at the little affair between Lorenzo and Jessica. What do you think of this? Of Shylock's reaction? Who has been wronged? Who is the wrongdoer? What role do you anticipate this storyline will play in the outcome of the play?

Monday

B-day: Make it YOUR business to turn in double entry journals on The Metamorphosis.

A-day meets again on Tuesday. A-day's assignment: Choose one of the following, and, after reading Act II, respond in about a page:

1. How does the parade of suitors reflect on the play's theme of cultural difference? See Nerissa's reaction to Gratiano. What does each woman's instant reaction to these local boys say of cultural difference?
2. Look at the little affair between Lorenzo and Jessica. What do you think of this? Of Shylock's reaction? Who has been wronged? Who is the wrongdoer? What role do you anticipate this storyline will play in the outcome of the play?

Thursday

Come to work on Act I skits. Due on Monday for B-day, Tuesday for A-day.

To clarify: All characters should appear in the skits, but NOT their every spoken line. You can cut as many lines as necessary as long as you keep the narrative intact. Just let everybody say something and reveal a little of their character.

Friday

A-day comes to class, and we will work on Act I of The Merchant of Venice.

Tuesday

The Merchant of Venice: a little background and a little playwrighting.

Monday

Bring in books that you have used and will not need again. Be ready to
tackle a little Shakespeare.

Friday

B-day: complete the Shakespeare

Wednesday

Journals due tomorrow. Bring electronic copies of your WLA 1 to class with you. We will work with them in class on the laptops.

Tuesday

Bring in electronic copy of your world lit paper. We will have computers available for guided revisions.

Also, bring your completed Metamorphosis double-entry journals and the books you have finished using -- That means the two you have written about in WLA 1.

Monday

Still be ready for reading check!

Friday

Bring your bad selves in here ready to work.

Thursday

Enjoy your weekend, but remember your journal and handout assignments. Be ready for a reading check on the novella as well -- the whole thing!

Monday

A and B days: Bring in your surveys about Mr. Henthorn's Declaration of Independence project.

Due next time you come to class AFTER Tuesday: Compose a journal entry on one of the following - or think of your own approach:

Chapter 1

1. Re-imagine the first two pages of The Metamorphosis: create a new beginning for the novel in which the facts remain the same but Gregor's reactions and thoughts differ. Use a style of your own choosing.
2. How would life change for you if you were to undergo a total physical transformation? Describe a day in your life in your new form.
3. In what ways do you see the perception of others influencing you? Have the pressures of school and work and family shaped you in ways that you do not necessarily like?
4. Are the expectations of your parents (and of others in your life) fair to you? Explain with some detail.

Thursday

B-day, simply see "Tuesday" posts for your assignments. Your double-entry journal is due Friday and your revised paper is due Tuesday. Also, finish reading the book.

Here is a link to a .pdf version of The Metamorphosis. If you use this text, you should document it properly so we know what version and translation you are using.

http://www.planetebook.com/ebooks/The-Metamorphosis-2.pdf

Tuesday

Revise your papers for Monday(A)/Tuesday (B). This paper is your exam.

Read, for A-Thursday, the first chapter of The Metamorphosis. In a double-entry journal, log five extracts from the text -- with their page numbers -- on the left and annotations and reasons for your selections on the right. Have at least five entries from the first chapter.

Wednesday

Papers due!!!

Monday

Language quiz - prepare for that. We'll view Waking Life for much of the period. Continue working on your WLA 1.

Friday

Work on your WLA 1 and prepare for a language quiz on Monday/Tuesday.

Wednesday

See deadlines at right. Bring materials to work on your world literature assignment tomorrow.

Monday

A-day, work on your proposals and have them fully typed by Friday. Have your first draft (fully typed and formatted) on December 17.

B-day, work on your proposals and have them by Monday. Have your first draft on December 18.

Monday/Tuesday

Go yell for the Stallions! This is NOW!

Thursday IDEAS!

Post your comments here.

Tuesday

Journals for all you B-dayers. I'm serious about the list of ideas for WLA 1!
Watch for reading checks...

Monday

As today's class pointed out so clearly to me, journal entries are due tomorrow for A-day. Also, list ten great ideas for a world lit assignment.

The book should be finished tomorrow, and you should be ready for a reading check on the whole book. Consider: in the end, who wins? How do you know?

Also, consider your new project ideas for The Unbearable Lightness of Being: Powerpoint, portrait, or speech.

Wednesday (and Thursday and Friday too)

Read through Part VI: The Grand March, for Friday/Monday. For Tuesday/Wednesday, finish the book and have ten great ideas for a WL assignment. Complete three new journal entries, one from each "part":

Part IV:
1. Contrast Tereza's views on privacy to those of Sabina in Part III.
2. Remember the backdrop for this novel is a country under totalitarian communist domination. How do you think each of the novel's main characters (or choose one) illustrates an approach or
adaptation to foreign oppression of the country he or she loves? (Use details from Part III).
3. Read the final line of Chapter 6 on page 140. Using Tereza's experience as a model for thought, consider this question: Does oppressive rule relieve a person of certain ethical or moral
responsibilities? Does mandatory school relieve you of responsibility for your work?
4. Contrast IV: 25: 165-166 with Buendia's attempts to stick names to objects in 100 Years.
5. What is important (heavy, light, returning?) about the benches in the river?
6. What do you make of the scene of the shootings on Petrin Hill, presented as real though obviously only imagined, on pages 146-150? What is the meaning and purpose of this scene?
7. Structure: The novel consists of seven parts with this number of chapters in each part, respectively: 17, 29, 11, 29, 23, 29, 7. Does this series of prime numbers suggest or develop any existing theme within the novel?

Part V:
1. Compare and contrast Tereza's ideas about the soul (41), Sabina's ideas about privacy (112-113), and Tomas's experience with the secret police in Czechoslovakia (Part V). What light does his experience shed light on Tereza and Sabina's desire to find or protect their individuality?
2. See the passage on page 226-228 and focus on the imagery associated with Tereza that implies a comparison with Oedipus. Has Tereza, in some way, married her own mother? Remember Tomas's letter to the editor, guilt, and "soul and body" to develop your response.
3. Tomas, impelled to be a doctor, becomes a window washer by "an unspoken vow of fidelity." Fidelity to what? Hasn't he betrayed himself? Was it his choice?
4. Read V: Chapter 9 and then 221 from "Staring impotently…" to "Let us return to Tomas." Why is Tomas such a prolific womanizer? Why do you think the author or narrator has made sex into such a prominent metaphor in the novel? Is Tomas a kind of Faust character?
5. Read the last two paragraphs of 206-207. Compare and contrast this passage with the one on Sabina's views of beauty by mistake (bottom of 101 and top of 102) and Tereza's in the last paragraph on 78 (which is informed by the narration in 11:51-52).
6. In what ways has metaphor changed Tomas's life?
7. Compare and contrast Tomas on 200 with Tereza on 41.
8. Explain how "Love is our freedom" (236) and Tomas's affairs "enslavement" (234) when heretofore he has seemed burdened by compassion for Tereza. Is Tomas's life looking like Beethoven's development of "Es muss sein!" – moving from light to serious, from joke to metaphysical truth – or like Parmenides's development from heavy to light? (195-196)

Part VI
1. Define kitsch in three ways as derived from Kundera's novel. Are you a fan of kitsch, or do you aspire to something else in your life?
2. What is kitschy about Franz's burial? About Tomas's burial?
3. Franz, the western intellectual, has left his wife and daughter, found a true love in his student with big glasses, and gone on a political quest because of his image of Sabina's regard. Has Tomas, the Czech doctor, done the same thing? What are the key similarities between Franz and Tomas? What is the most important difference?
4. What is Franz's conception of the Grand March? How do you think Sabina would regard it?
5. What do rumblings in the stomach, the body, communism, marches,
hidden sewers, and kitsch have to do with each other?
6. Is "United We Stand," like "the barbarity of communism" and "our traditional values" and "President Carter" or "President Bush," an example of American kitsch? How would Kundera place this phrase in his system of unusual dichotomies?
7. One of Kundera's methods is to take opposing poles of existence, like lightness and weight, and toy with that oppositional relation. One way he toys with oppositions is to suggest alternative oppositions. We tend to think of two primary poles of good and evil, of God and the devil. Kundera reformulates this opposition into the sacred and the scatological. First, explain the effect of this reformulation on your understanding; then do it yourself: reformulate an accepted opposition into a new one. For instance, a common dichotomy is love and hate, but I might, based on a different understanding of the primacy of love, reformulate the opposition into love and apathy. Do it yourself with a commonly assumed set of opposites and consider the difference it makes in your understanding of one of the terms.

Friday

B-day, read through Part V: Soul and Body for Tuesday. A-day, be there by Wednesday.

Wednesday

A-day, come in with journal entries completed. Both A and B day students, read through "Part 4: Soul and Body," for Friday/Monday. No new written assignment is necessary right now.

Wednesday/Thursday

For Monday/Wednesday, read big Parts II and III. Choose one prompt from each section to respond to in a one-page, clearly written response. That means three one-page responses next class period.
Part I: Lightness and Weight:
Comment on heaviness and lightness, eternal return, what Tereza, Tomas, and Sabina have to do with any of the above, and then comment on the repetition of the floating basket image.

Part II: Body and Soul:
Complete one journal entry from among these prompts. SHOW you have read the assignment as you think about it:
1. Analyze and consider the repeated metaphor of the soul as a crew in a ship's bowels rushing up to the surface to show itself to Tomas. What has it to do with "Soul and Body"?
2. Think on paper about eternal return and individuation with regard to Tereza's view of herself in the mirror. What are Tereza's attitudes about the body? About the soul?
3. The final sentences of "Part I: Lightness and Weight" are, "Tomas felt no compassion. All he felt was the pressure in his stomach and the despair of having returned." In "Soul and Body," Chapter 2, the narrator says, "But just make someone who has fallen in love listen to his stomach rumble, and the unity of body and soul, that lyrical illusion of the age of science, instantly fades away." Tomas is a doctor. Does he hold that "lyrical illusion of the age of science" that the body and soul are actually one thing?

Part III: Words Misunderstood:
1. Reread page 111-114. Do you agree more with Franz’s understanding of “Strength” and “Living in Truth” or with Sabina’s interpretation of those words?
2. Comment on the irony – or whatever else you see – in this section’s ending image in which Franz closes his eyes as he listens to the gray-haired man.
3. Why does Franz think his life is light and Sabina’s heavy? Do you agree that Sabina’s experiences with oppression give her life weight? Is Czechoslovakia heavier than Switzerland?

Monday

B-day: Read "Section I: Lightness and Weight" for Wednesday. A-day, you have it read by Thursday.

Thursday

Read the first two chapters of The Unbearable Lightness of Being and consider just what the idea of eternal return means or suggests. How does it fit, or mesh, or clash -- with the ideas of lightness and weight?

Wednesday

I'm telling ya...I want all the way through the epilogue! Many A-day students need to be sure you have read the epilogue and show me that! These reading checks are good to a point, and then there is a sharp drop-off -- as if you have not finished!

Monday

OK, OK. The times have ruined me. B-day, bring in your revised papers by Wednesday. A-day, bring in your revised papers by Thursday.

Begin reading The Unbearable Lightness of Being. You don't have it yet, but you will get it in Tuesday's class.

If you click on the Chilean flag, you can see Salvador Allende's final speech. It's in Spanish, of course.

Special announcement from Spanish teachers

Because of the cancellation of Junior TOK on Friday, A-day Spanish students who were not here on Wednesday need to be ready for your "Mala gente" (mah-lah hen-teh) quiz on Friday. Kyle L., Ce-Ce, and Hayley need to be ready for your presentation also on Friday.

Wednesday

Come in ready to convince and present.

Tuesday

Continue to read. Have more than one topic in mind for the project as you come to class so we will not have twenty-nine repetitions of the same idea.

Monday

New assignment for A-day; consider three possible topics for your project and nail down your request Wednesday. Read that novel! These projects are due between October 15 and 22, depending upon your choice.

Friday

Get that book read! I'm at home spending my lovely weekend with your written thoughts...

Thursday

Since your papers are complete by this time and ready to turn in Friday, and since you have read the assigned pages in The House of the Spirits, go to the game and yell until you're hoarse. Go, you Bad Horsies. Good luck Lee, Alex, and Cece.

Wednesday

The first round of big papers is due Thursday for A-day. I can't wait!

Tuesday

Read further, work harder! Papers due on Thursday/Friday.

Monday

Read and work! It's simple! Do this job well, dudes and dudettes.

Friday

All information you need is just below and to the right.

Wednesday

Continue to read in Allende to page 141 for Tuesday/Wednesday. See schedule and deadlines at right.

I am reading senior commentaries, and let me reveal a few phrases that you should avoid like the bubonic plague in your papers:

The author uses style and imagery to MAKE HIS SENTENCES FLOW. (What the heck does that mean, anyway? Use text to prove points. Flowing sentences are not demonstrable nor even, in every case, desirable. Plus, I still do not know what it means for "sentences to flow" when we speak of professional writers. It is an empty term used when you don't know what you are talking about, so it is like a big red and white flag of Siam saying "I DON'T KNOW WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT!")

The author uses a dark tone TO MAKE AN IMPACT ON THE READER. (Who is this imagined reader? It's NOBODY! It's a black hole of a concept into which can drip all manner of foolishness. Use text to prove points, not some assumption tagged THE READER. At this stage, and until further notice, totally ban THE READER from your critical work! THE READER is another red flag!)

The author uses a DARK TONE to make an impact on the reader. (This one is already dead in space because it has a black hole in it, but what is a DARK TONE? Tone describes the attitude of the writer, narrator, or speaker toward his subject or audience. Tone can only be demonstrated through diction and phrasing that reveal attitude, preferably examples with more than one possible meaning. It helps if you define "attitude toward WHAT" -- the subject, character, or audience? The context determining the meaning, and the meaning so determined, demonstrate tone. The author or narrator's tone will not be "dark." That's way too ill-defined. It will be bitter, callous, condescending, contemplative, contemptuous, critical, cynical, defensive, defiant, desperate, detached, determined, didactic, diplomatic, disdainful, dramatic, formal, friendly, enthusiastic, humorous, indignant, informal, intimate, ironic, judgmental, lighthearted, malicious, mocking, nostalgic, objective, persuasive, reflective, reverent, sarcastic, sardonic, satirical, sincere, sympathetic, tragic, urgent, or vindictive. Those adjectives describe a very specific attitude. And then you have to take individual words, sentences, and relationships within the text and convince me that you are right about it.)

Monday

Complete your mini-research as well as your close reading and commentary on One Hundred Years. Continue reading in The House of the Spirits.

Friday

Read pages 1-24 by Monday/Tuesday. Produce the proposal that day as well. Exactly.

Thursday

See you in the auditorium. Bring your novels and some paper.

Wednesday

Work on your proposals and read your assigned passages (passages assigned to B-day only so far).

Tuesday

A-day should have proposal done by Monday, Sept. 22, and the essay completed by Tuesday, September 30.

Monday

Begin planning your essay on One Hundred Years. Find the instructions on the download page. The due date is September 19 for the proposal and September 30 for the essay.

Permission!

I had left the blog open to comments from all people with a Google ID. I have now changed the permissions to allow comments for members of this blog only. That means some of you may have to go through a sign-in step before commenting in the future. It will still allow you to comment, though.

Thursday

See yesterday's entry. Finish the book for next class.

Wednesday/Thursday

As assigned, finish the book. After Wednesday/Thursday class, choose a topic to track in the novel so that you can write a clear, coherent piece making sense of it all.

Monday/Tuesday

See the document at Downloads called "BenjaminHistory." I wrote the first page, but the second consists of extracts from Benjamin. Read and respond to it at least once on the blog. Be sure to be specific in your references to the document and mentally engaged as you write. After reading once, you might look for key words: "spiral," "line," "image." What is meant by "progress" and "homogenous, empty time"? Marquez writes of the isolated rebels, history's big losers. He is investigating how to recover the flitting image of the past. Remember -- Colonel Aureliano Buendia lost every battle and then struggled to keep either image of himself or coherent language to express himself on pages 161-168. Think hard, get dirty, grasp an idea.

Friday -- See this everyone! A-day too!

Speed up a little!

Read through page 267 for Monday/Tuesday
Read through page 332 for Wednesday/Thursday
Finish for Friday/Monday

for Friday/Monday (reversed B-A)

Read through page 159 in Cien Anos de Soledad. Using notes from class on magical realism, find one passage from one paragraph to one page in length that best exemplifies the definitions of magical realism in your notes. Be prepared to point out exactly what makes your passage a great example of magical realism by applying AT LEAST FOUR of the descriptors in your notes to the passage in a highly convincing manner.

Those running behind may find the peer review questions on my downloads page linked below right.