I have found that as the semester has progressed I have changed the way that I look at things. I now see themes from the class in nearly everything that happens every day. I have become conscious of how these themes are part of our everyday life. The books that we read throughout the semester have also given me a new appreciation for things that I do not understand, particularly Finnegans Wake and The Four Quartets. I have even made it a goal of mine to read Finnegans Wake in its entirety. I have come to terms with the fact that this will be a lifelong endeavor, but I will keep the book by my bed and try to read a little at time, when I have the time. Our look at the book in class has given me a strange comfort with the unknown and the incomprehensible. I still do not understand the meaning of 'emergent' in 'emergent literature' but I do understand the relevance of themes we covered in class in my life.
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Group presentations
The characters anonymous video was great. It really accounted for most of the readings for the class. The voiceover and the jazz music in the background brought Bukowski to mind. I really enjoyed the Malone, Prospero, and Neo characters.
Brianne has skillz
I just wanted to comment on the best individual presentation that I saw in class. Brianne's rap was off the hook. Great lyrics, great rhymes, great idea. I loved it.
Group Presentations
I really liked both of today's presentations. Though it was difficult to follow the 20 minute lifetime skit at times, it was funny and I was able to pick up on a few of their ideas. I really liked how they used the projector screen as a kind of stage backdrop. I loved the video that the world as myth and dream put together. I thought it was hilarious when they did the naked scene and the pregnancy scene. Really good video.
Paper subject
I am going to write my paper about the television series Lost and how the themes of the class can be found in the show. I am especially concerned with the relationship between the themes and the show concerning time, the eternal return, dolce domum, and the similarities between the show and the book The Tempest.
Blogging has taught me nothing
I don't really read anyone else's blog so I did not really learn anything from anyone's blog. The only time I learned from anyone's blog was when someone's blog was brought up in class.
What is the Matrix?
"The matrix is everywhere. It is all around us, even now in this very room. You can see it when you look out your window or when you turn on your television. You can feel it when you go to work, when you go to church, when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth." -Morpheus
What seest thou else…?
So I used the line: "what seest thou else in the dark backward and abysm of time?" on a few people this weekend. The responses were pretty much the same, a version of "what the hell does that mean?" I also tried convincing my friend of the beauty in the lines of Caliban's in which he says: "the clouds methought would open and show riches ready to drop upon me, that, when I waked, I cried to dream again." My efforts were, however, in vain. It seems that one either gets it or does not, either they can see the beauty or they can not.
The Airplane Lady’s Auschwitz Story
I was absolutely torn when Dr. Sexson told us that the lady's story about Aushwitz was only a story. It was funny to find that Dr. Sexson felt the same way that I did about such a thing. Who makes up a story about the Holocaust and tells it as a part of their life? Who does such a thing just to amuse a stranger? I still do not know whether or not to believe that the story she told was true or not. There is humor to be found, however, in fact that the story was so seductive that I was able to be drawn in and crushed by being abandoned at the end of it.
Inventories
My school bag contains the following items: notecards, a wallet, a check book, a thumb drive, a daily planner, an empty sandwich bag, a scratch sheet of paper with passwords on it, gum, pencils, pens, hi-liters, pencil sharpener, 6 books including Finnegans Wake and The Four Quartets, 2 notebooks, and my ipod shuffle.
The Inner Light
I should not be surprised to find themes of the class apparent in an episode of Star Trek, and I am not. I seem to see the themes everywhere and in everything these days. The 20 minute lifetime is experienced by Captain Picard when he realizes that he had experiences an entire lifetime in a span of time in which he had only been out for 25 minutes. In his 25 minute lifetime his daughter tells him: "you know about it father. You've already seen it." This reminds me of the lines in Eliot that the end of our exploring shall be to arrive where we started and to know the place for the first time. The theme of dolce domum is also evident in that Picard has trouble coming to terms with the fact that he is home. He does not seem to know the place for the first time, yet.
The Skin of our Teeth
As I read The Skin of Our Teeth I really liked all of the references to historical figures such as the Sabine women, Cain, and the Ice Age. It was a revelation to find out that this play is a ripoff of Finnegans Wake. I honestly did not see the connection until Dr. Sexson pointed it out in class. I did kind of pick up on the stream-of-consciousness technique, but I failed to connect it to Joyce's book.
Groundhog’s Day
My Groundhog's Day was very uneventful. It began at 11 am when I woke up in bed, I slept in because I closed the bar last night and I don't have class until 2pm. I showered and ate some cereal for breakfast. I watched sportscenter then I walked up to campus for my 2pm class. Class was boring, we talked in our groups about our projects. I walked home and cooked some macaroni and cheese for dinner. After dinner I finished reading The Following Story then I watched television for about 2 hours before I went to bed. Pretty uneventful.
Ben Leubner: Goodsafefirelamp!
I really enjoyed Ben Leubner's lectures about Finnegans Wake. He gave me a lot of insight about how one should go about reading the book. To be quite honest, when I first looked at the book I was a little scared. I had no idea how I was going to go about wrapping my head around such a book. Dr. Leubner's advice and insight was a relief. I find comfort in the idea of reading the book for the simple pleasure of the sound of the words. It was also a revelation that Joyce's words are not simply babbling but clever puns and misspellings that have meanings within the words; Goodsafefirelamp! meaning God Save Ireland, for example. The fact that we as a class spent the entire hour looking at a couple of lines in this massive book gives me an entirely new respect for the book.
Iffspeak in Finnegans Wake
The part of Finnegans Wake that sounds like Iffspeak that I found was on page 153: "My, my, my! Me and me! Little down dream don't I love thee!"
The Following Story
I really enjoyed reading The Following Story. It was a kind of surreal read as I did not know at first how to take the narration. Was Herman Mussert sleeping, dead, a figment of someone's imagination? I also found it very interesting that this book seemed to relate to all of the themes of the class, this may be because lately I find myself looking for these themes in everything I do and see. The most obvious of the themes so far in my reading is that of dolce domum. As Herman Mussert talks about his life you can tell that he wants to return to something familiar.
Finnegans Wake
The page I have chosen to master/own is page 605. I chose the following passage:
"Yad. Procreated on the ultimate ysland of Yreland in the encyclical yrish archipelago, come their feast of precreated holy whiteclad angels, whomamong the christener of his, voluntarily poor Kevin, having been graunted the praviloge of a priest's postcreated portable altare cum balne.
I chose this passage because as I was flipping through the pages I noticed my name at the bottom of page 605 and I was intrigued.
Haroun and the themes of the class
All of the themes of the class can be seen in Haroun and the Sea of Stories. The myth of the eternal return and Dolce Domum can both be found in Soraya's return home. The 20 minute lifetime is seen as the entire time spent in Kahani actually takes place during one dream of Haroun's. Life as fiction and language is found in Rashid's skills as a story-teller. Finally, the world as myth and dream is obviously seen in Haroun's dream about Kahani.
Vico and the 20 minute lifetime
I can not remember any experience that could be called a 20 minute lifetime. When I think of a 20 minute lifetime, I think of one seeing his life flash before his eyes, so to speak. I have never had such an experience that I can remember. This does not mean that it has not happened to me, only that I can not think of such an instance, with the exception of dreams. I often have dreams in which it seems like a lifetime goes by and I wake to find that I had only been sleeping for less than an hour.