Native Speaker 2

Overall I enjoyed Native Speaker; it was a good book to read. There were many important themes in this book such as Mitt dieing, race, marriage and relationships (Henry and Lelias). All of those things could be talked about in great depth but I’m going to focus on something else. What I found very interesting was the whole idea of language in this book. It really made me think. I think that Language was a very important topic and applies to what’s been going on in the world and still is today. In this book it was mainly about Korean children learning the English language but it applies to all nationalities. There is much to be said about language. First of all language is more than just a bunch of letters and words. It tells about people’s history and where they came from, it’s a culture. So when different nationalities come to
America they are faced with a major problem. It’s basically impossible to come to
America without learning the English language but at the same time they want to preserve their own culture and their own language, but how do they do so? Is it even possible? Usually families move to
America with little children who are going to start to learn English in school and become friends with a bunch of other American children. They soon are going to be associated with the English language and American ways and traditions. Soon they will probably barely remember how to speak their native language and become just like every other American kid. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, I mean if you’re going to live in
America you probably should know how to speak English but are culture’s being lost? Also you see that a lot of kids can speak it better than their parents, and their parents are still set in their own traditions based on their own culture while their children are almost completely Americanized, that too could cause some problems. The solution seems to be keep it balanced, keep some of your own ways and some American. Talk English when necessary and your own language other times. It may sound like an easy fix. But it’s a lot harder said than done and this is definitely a situation many are faced with.    

Native Speaker

The start of Native Speaker, I thought was pretty slow even though it eventually speeds up. Also it’s not the easiest book to read and seems to tell things in a round about sort of way. What also makes it confusing is the fact that the narrator, Henry Park, is telling the story as a bunch of flashbacks so the reader has to try and put them all together. Also since the narrator is a Korean-American, the langauage that the author, Chang-rae Lee, uses is also hard to understand at times. Once again, the reoccuring theme of our novels, racism, pops up again in this book. This time having to do with being an immigrant in America and being a korean-american.  The fact of how hard it can be for people to learn english and the barrier there can be if you don’t know english and live in america is present in this book. This book shows that learning english might even be especially hard for koreans. The idea is present in this book of what it would be like to be basically stuck between two cultures, how do you balance between the two, or do you? Another thing that I found kind of disturbing about this book is the fact that Henry Park’s son, Mitt, dies. I don’t know why such an awful thing had to happen to a little boy.Lelia is another character, she is Henry’s wife. They have a very interesting relationship which definately went through some rough times when their son,Mitt died. We also learn that Henry is an industrial spy for some weird firm and Lelia is a english tutor. Lelia and Henry’s relationship is definately a interesting one like I said. At somepoints it seems great, other times they are lying to eachother, they temporarily split, etc. Native Speaker is definately an interesting book.

Sula 1 and 2

I think that this book, Sula, is pretty interesting. I have enjoyed it. The topic of racism and the distinction of whites vs. blacks is also present in this novel like other books we have read this semester such as, The Sound and The Fury and The Invisible Man. Also the book seems like it is a lot about the “good” and the “bad”. Nel and Sula are best friends, and Nel seems to be the good one and Sula the bad. The first thing that happens which is very shocking is when Sula is swinging Chicken Little and he slips and falls into the river and drowns. That was accidental but I can’t believe that nothing is done about it and they just act like nothing happened. From there Nel became the good wife and mom while Sula goes against the norms. After Nel’s wedding Sula leaves for ten years. While she is gone she has a lot of interracial relationships (w/ white men) who are married nonetheless. After she returns back to Bottom she tops it all off by having an affair with her bestfriend Nel’s husband. That definately doesn’t make Sula look too good. Sula and Nel stop being friends for a while after that but they kind of make up before Sula dies. There was definately a lot of interesting things that went on in this book and I believe the main topics were race, roles of women, and good and bad, right and wrong.

Overall I think Sula was a pretty good book, it reminded me a lot of the other books that we have read this semester if you concentrate on the themes of the book. I think that the end of Sula kind of leaves you hanging though. Because with Sula’s death it leaves Nel and her relationship unresolved. They obviously had a lot of things that happened between them that needed to be talked about, beginning with watching the death of Chicken Little and ending with Sula having an affair with Nel’s husband and everything in between. All of those things were left unmentioned between the two best friends and neither of them got any closure before Sula’s death. The topic of death in this book is really interesting, seeing as though nothing seems to really be done when Chicken Little dies and then when Sula dies the community is actually happy. I found that really weird, Sula did do some awful things but people aren’t usually happy when someone dies. Also with Sula around she was blamed for all the bad things that happened, she was definitely the focus and kind of the community’s scapegoat. Now with her gone who are they going to blame things on? The Community I think is going to have to start taking responsibility for their own actions, including Nel. Sula did do an awful thing to Nel but Nel blamed Sula unfairly for much more than that, Eva helps Nel realize this. Nel always blamed Sula 100% for Chicken Little’s death even though she was also there. So at the end of the book Nel goes to Sula’s grave and cries out her name, did she forgive her? Is she saying sorry? Or maybe a both while mourning at the same time, I guess it’s up to the reader to decide what they think.

The Invisible Man

So far I think that the book is still pretty good. The beginning of Chapter 11 starts out with the narrator waking up in a hospital and alls he sees is a doctor standing over him, with one of those light things on his head. The doctor has him swallow something to make become unconscious again. When he wakes up again the doctor keeps trying to figure out what his name is. It says though how all the narrator could think about was his pain. He couldn’t even remember why he was at the hospital, They are using electric shock therapy on him one doctor wants to continue with it the other doesn’t arguing that it’s rather primitive. And at some point the idea of castration was brought up and I had no clue where that came from or even more so how what would help. Also that they wouldn’t being using this on some other man who had a Harvard or New England background but its different cause he’s of African American descent. I think that is a very good point, I never thought that you could even do these types of things to someone with out consent. It also says how the effects are like a lobotomy. That’s like what they did to “crazy” people in mental hospitals and it has horrible effects. The idea of racism comes up a lot in this book. One of the doctors makes a comment about how the narrator seems as if he is dancing when he is hit like the electric shock, saying “they really do have rhythm”, meaning black people in that sense. That is definitely a racial statement referring to African Americans as “they” as if blacks are a different species or something. The doctors still try to figure out the narrators name but he can’t understand him so he writes down on a card WHAT IS YOUR NAME? At this moment the narrator realizes he has no clue who he is. I can’t even imagine that feeling; it has to be absolutely awful. Waking up and not remembering anything about your life, how old you are or who you are, not even what your name is. It’s just got to be the worst and scariest feeling ever. The doctors continue to write a bunch of things down that relate to his identity to try and figure out who he is. They begin asking questions about Brer Rabbit and Brer Bear which I guess were two characters from folktales that were first introduced to
America by African slaves. I think that too is a very racist comment just to assume because he is black and to go from asking his name to questions about some story. This part of the story was a little confusing to me I guess that these questions did start to being back some of his memory. He starts to form himself a new identity but still there’s no way for him to get rid of his whole culture and the problems that seem to always arise because of his race, he still is going to have to deal with racism. I think that the doctors were a big part of this chapter and racism was a central theme. Those doctors were very racist from the very beginning with the electric shocks to the racist comment of “they have good rhythm” to the part that really shocked me to the suggestion of castration. That I found to be a very racist statement in and of itself because they would just be doing that to him for the fun of it I guess seeing that medically there was no reason. Then even to using the stories of the Brer Rabbit to make him remember his identity like every black man was to know that story. In the end of this chapter the narrator his new identity gives him more freedom and looks like things might start looking up for him.

Invisible Man

So far I feel that this book isn’t that bad. I think I like it better than the last book I read, At The Mountains of  Madness. This book seemed to get to the point a little better in the beginning, it didnt drag out like some of the others. So far the narrator of this book doesn’t have a name or anything. Its only known as the narrator. Im guessing that goes along with the title the invisible man. So far in the book too the narrator talks about his grandparents and how they were slaves and how they were freed after the civil war. That part definately interested me, i’ve always beeen interested in the wars and everything. While his grandfather is on his deathbed he talks about comparing black americans to warfare and saying how he felt like a traitor.  He also told the narrator to basically yes whites to death. Now the narrator lives like his grandfather  did. He’s basically haunted by his grandfathers words.  He then goes on to talk about his graduation speech which was pretty much saying that the key to blacks being successful is humility and submission. Then another thing that interested me was his part in the “battle royal” which was part of the entertainment.  Him and some of his other black buddies enter the ring with boxing gloves  and how a naked blonde woman with a flag painted on her chest parades around. Some whites tell them to look, others  threaten them.  Then they were blindfolded and ordereed to pummel one another. The narrator gets defeated in the first round.  After they get to take off their blindfolds and they got led to a rug covered with coins and a few bills all the boys go after the money soon to find out that a electric current runs through the , rug, during this all the white men try to get the boy to fall face first on the rug.  Also his speech  which largely quoted Booker T Washington was talked about a lot. So far I have found this all very interesting and a lot of it has also shocked me. I think it’s going to be a pretty good book, all though it does seem to be pretty long.

At the Mountains of Madness 1 and 2

 Our group is reading At the Mountains of Madness, so far it seems to be very sci-fi. I’m not a very big fan of science so hopefully thats not all it is about. It also doesn’t really seem to be like any of the other books that we have read so far in class, theres not very many connections that I can make between books, at least not as far as I can see. But as far as the group aspect of this book goes I think we are doing a good job, we are all working good together and finding lots of good stuff for our wiki. Also in class we have talked about canonical and non canonical themes. So far I don’t really see how our book applies but maybe soon we will understand a little bit better. Another thing about this book is the author uses big words and a lot of scientific words which makes it really annoying and hard to read sometimes. Hopefully the book will pick up a bit and become more interesting or if not hopefully we will atleast find a way to connect it to class and the other books students are reading.

Our group is now done with reading out book. The book I think was interesting because it had a lot in it about science and stuff but at the same time that made it confusing for me at some points. I’m not very interested in science so sometimes it was very hard for me to keep reading. Even though the book definately does pick up a bit after the first few chapters.  It also can be interesting at somepoints because there is a lot of suspense to it so you have to keep reading to find out whats going to happen. But then there is a lot of things that go on in the book that you really have to analyze to even understand whats going on or what it even means which makes parts of the book were very confusing. Another thing that our group noticed is that our book wasn’t really like anything else we have read in class or the other books students our reading. It was hard to find cannoical themes from the list that applied to our book and even the ones that did I think barely did. But overall I think our group did a good job at finding information for the wiki and trying to understand and analyze what was gonig on in the book.

The Sound and The Fury 2

This chapter was all about Dilsey…

“She had been a big woman once but now her skeleton rose, draped loosely in unpadded skin that tightened again upon a paunch almost dropsical, as though muscle and tissue had been courage or fortitude which the days or the years had consumed until only the indomitable skeleton was left rising like a ruin or a landmark above the somnolent and impervious guts.” April Eighth, pg. 265

I believe that this is a very important quote to understand Dilsey. Dilsey was the Compsons servent. Even though she is old and weak this quote shows that yes physically she may be weak but mentally and spiritually she is very strong. Dilsey pretty much does all of the work around their house.  Even though she is getting old and weak and it’s harder for her to do a lot of her chores  Mrs Compson just gets annoyed and is mean to her when she does do it in the timely manner she expects. Luster is Dilseys son and he normally helps out too but she let him sleep in. Which also annoys the Mrs.  They send Dilsey upstairs to go get Quentin for breakfast and she was missing.  Jason checks his closet and the money he had saved was stolen. Meanwhile when they get downstairs Luster tells Dilsey that he sees Quentin climb out her window everynight, just as she did last night. Dilsey lets them handle their problem and she goes to church with her family and brings Benjy too. Dilsey is highly resepected there.

At church even though the reverend is black he talked like a white man, when he first gave his sermon he didn’t really get a response. But then he gives it again with more emotion and more in a “black” tone . Everyone rised to their feet saying “Yes, Jesus!” as he repeated over and over, “I got de ricklickshun en de blood of de Lamb!” April Eighth, pg. 295 . Normally when Dilsey brings Benjy with her he doesn’t really pay attention and gets distracted easily but even he was listeng to the sermon. Dilsey already beng emotional about the sermon noticed that and started to cry, and continued even as they were leaving the church. Then to herself she said “I’ve seed de first en de last…I seed de beginnin, en now I sees de endin.” April Eighth, pg. 297.

Even though Dilsey doesn’t actually narrate this section most of it is about her and she plays a very important role in this section. Its really good to see these things through Dilsey.

The Sound and The Fury 1

So far I have found that this book is kind of strange and definately confusing. There was a whole lot of stuff gonig on and I didn’t really understand which character is which. The first part is narrated by Benjy, which was completely confusing I barely got any of it until I read the second part narrated by Quentin. In both of the parts both narrators talked about Caddy a lot, it’s like they are obsessed with her. Which I also find really weird especially because after reading the first and second part you begin to understand and find out that they are all brothers and sisters. Its just really weird how they talk about her because It’s not the typical brother/ sister relationship you thinfkof. I know thats DEFINATELY not how it is with my sister. I believe that there is something a little messed up with them .  The way Quentin talks about Caddy is like he is in love with her, not that he loves her like a sister. It sounds like he just wants to be with her and can’t imagine living with out her. It’s more like a girlfriend/boyfriend relationship more so than a sister/brother relationship. The whole thing is just very strange.

End of Great Gatsby

As I finished the end of Great Gatsby I really liked the book but at the same time I was very shocked about how it ended . I really hoped that Daisy and Gatsby would be together in the end, or that she would even atleast go to his funeral. I also couldnt believe how he died. I don’t think he deserved all the things that happened to him. This book by F. Scott Fitzgerald was a very good book. It was written with so much detail and description in some parts that it was like you knew every character but then at the sametime it was like you had no clue what was going on. Also there were many good metaphors and irony present all throughout the novel. Like the shinging light and the billboard and the fact that Daisy is the one that hit Myrtle. This book was written very well and it was actually one that I enjoyed and I don’t really like reading that much.  This is definately a book that I would reccomend to everyone.

Great Gatsby Post #1- The American Dream or Lack there of…

      The Great Gatsby takes place in the 1920’s, a time of war in America and changes in whats considered the “American Dream.” All throughout The Great Gatsby  this has been one of the major themes. At this time many people  were doing well for themselves and making good money, but not all necessarily in right, moral manners. So you begin to see a shift in what that dream actually is.

      There began to be a focus on who could make the most money and have materialistic things, who had the biggest, best, and most . This is shown in the novel with west egg and east egg. West egg is the old money, usually families who have always been rich, and then there is east egg which is where Gatsby’s house is.  These are the people who have made them self rich, a lot of times by corrupt ways. They tend to flaunt their wealth and want it to be known to everyone. Like Gatsby throwing those huge parties, more than half the people didn’t even know who he was but they just wanted to see his house and stuff and be there.  But at the sametime all those people who went to those parties all along and acted as if they were best friends, not one attended his funeral when he did. Sure when Gatsby was alive people would think he was the luckiest guy ever, popular, and yes living the American Dream. But in the end he doesn’t get the love of his life, Daisy, and you realize he really didbn’t have anyone.

        You always hear, “I’m living the American Dream”, that always used to mean being happy and being able to come here and be free and do what you want. Also this generally involved good and strong morals and values as well. At this time that dream began to disappear. People began to get greedy and selfish, alls they wanted was money and they would do anything to get it. That is where peoples morals and values started to take a turn for the worst. The whole idea of love at this time took a lot more than just love. It was about who could make the most money and who could take care of them and provide for them, give them the best and most luxorious things. At this time everything was changing and when it came down to it this American Dream was all about money.