Toribio Mendez

The vignette that surprised me was “Our Good Day”. After reading “Boys and Girls” and knowing Esperanza’s past, I assumed she would be a lot more reserved with the group of kids asking for money. Instead, she instantly grew a liking to them and considered them “friends” just from the first interaction.    The vignette that intrigued me was “My Name”. This specific short story caught my attention because It was relatable to me. I also grew up dealing with people having issues pronouncing my name. I always get ready to repeat my name about 3 or 4 times whenever I introduce myself to someone or when a professor calls out my name for attendance. I was also named after a grandparent that lived a rough life and I find myself comparing myself to them being grateful that my story is different. Just like the narrator I spent a lot of time thinking about names I’d change to if I was brave enough. The Vignette I was puzzled by was “The First Job”.This story kind of ended abruptly and I feel like there should have been more details on what happened after the strange moment of Esperanza being forcefully kissed by an older man. 

In Bettelheim’s writing, multiple fairy tales are analyzed and the characters are broken down psychologically. What struck me as insightful is when Bettleheim mentions the “Oedipal” relationship between the daughter, step-mother, and father in snow white. It is mentioned how the mother is jealous of the daughter for growing up to be beautiful and how this affects what happens in the story. This same sort of family dynamic is displayed in “Where are you going? Where Have You Been?” Although both of these stories are completely unrelated, this story also includes a mother resentful of the fact that her daughter is attractive. It’s almost like the author subconsciously takes this element from snow white to implement into her story. Even the father in both stories have a few similarities with how they both sit on the fence and do nothing to diffuse the tension between the daughter and the mother

Many readers have come up with their own interpretation of the story “Where Are You Going? Where have you been?” describing it as a “inverted fairy tale” or even “a tale of initiation into the evils of depraved American culture. To me it is simply a thriller/ horror about a young girl who is confronted by her stalker and lured into his trap and eventually assaulted in many ways. The Story does not go further than when Connie gives in to Arnold but the subtle threats the Arnorld throws out there in his encounter with Connie makes his intentions seem more than sinister. Even going back to when Connie spots the “boy” at the drive-in restaurant and he tells her “gonna get you baby” from a distance made me unsettled and nervous for what that may mean. In Korbs’ essay about the story, the writer explains that people may interpret Arnold as the devil with the way he had “Supernatural” awareness on Connie and her families whereabouts. For me, this story was a lot more realistic, the almost omniscient awareness Arnold seemed to have was just his obsessive nature and that he’s been watching Connie way before she saw him at the restaurant. He knew where her family was and what they were doing by simply staking out her house and following her family as they pulled off while Connie enjoyed her alone time until Arnold came back. This terrifying story is something that can very much happen in reality and to me is far from a fairy tale. 

The full experience of reading a poem involves what you assume about the poem beforehand and what you do with the information you receive after reading it. These two factors stood out to me after reading “My Mistress’ Eyes are Nothing Like the Sun” Before even reading the poem I looked at the title and seen that Shakespear was the author and automatically assumed that this sonnet will be the typical poem full of sophisticated language and beautiful compliments like “Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day?” After reading lines like “And in some perfumes is there more delight/ Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.” I realize this poem is more satirical than romantic. I was so distracted by this that I failed to catch the fact that the poem ends with love until I reread it multiple times. The lines “And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare/ As any she belied with false compare.” were assumed to be more insults after focusing too much on trying to read the poem with the intended rhythm, but now I see this was the type of compliment I initially thought the poem would be riddled with.   

As I read through this week’s poems, the main three assumptions referenced in “How to read a poem” popped up in my head many times. The poem that stood out for me was “White Lies” by Natasha Tretheway. The first time I read the poem I felt like it was the easiest to understand out of the list of poems assigned so far. I even went on to read the rest of the other poem thinking I fully understood it. As I finish the remaining poems I go back to “ White Lies” and realize I may have missed some details. When I read lines like “I could act/ like my homemade dresses/ came straight out the window/ of Maison Blanche.”I assumed the poem was about the narrator lying about their financial situation. After rereading the poem and analyzing lines like, “like the time a white girl said/(squeezing my hand), Now/we have three of us in this class.” I start to think maybe the narrator is black and has fair skin and lies about their ethnicity, which is much more of a punishable offense since her mother disciplines them for these lies. Then again, I can be be wrong, maybe there is no right or wrong and it was left to be interpreted by the reader however they please. 

In both “How Do I Love Thee” by Elizabeth Barrett Browning and “Why Do I Love You So Much” gift card, the poems start with a question about the love they have for their significant other. After their question,both writers list their reasons but there’s a bit of a difference. In the poem by Browning, the list consists of how much love they have for their significant other using sophisticated language and hyperbole like “I shall love thee better after death” In the gift card, the list are reasons why the writer loves their partner. The writer also uses exaggeration to emphasize how much love they have saying things like “You’re a part of my favorite memories as well as my most important dreams”  Compared to the words used in “How do I Love Thee” the language used in the gift card poem is a bit more standard and easier to understand. The gift card poem also includes the opening question twice for dramatic effect. 

My essay is centered around “The Lesson” By Toni Cade Bambara.  My Thesis: Cade uses the theme of Inequality to showcase the unique reactions of African American children when confronted by the harsh reality of economic disparities in America. I feel like a Literary critique would be the best secondary source to support my thesis. I’ve looked through JSTOR, Short Story Criticism online, and Gale Literary Resource Center which are all found in the English and Literary section of the BMCC library database. I avoided essays that delve too deep into stories that are not included in my essay but most of the listed sources provide similar bodies of work. I found Gale Literary Resource Center to be most helpful as I found a Biography/Literary critique that I’m satisfied with. It includes information about the life of the author and what inspired Bambara to write stories about the struggles African Americans go through, usually in their adolescence. Along with the life story the writer includes critiques of Toni Cade Bambara’s stories. 

After beginning the story “The Necklace” you learn about Mathilde and her ungrateful and unaspiring nature as she attempts to navigate life as a woman in the middle class in the 19th century. She constantly expresses her disdain for her current situation and birrates her husband about not having more without ever providing a plan to improve their lives. So I was surprised by the end of the story when Mathilde pulls herself up by the bootstraps and works 10 hard years to pay off a necklace she needed to replace after borrowing it and losing it at a party. What intrigued me can be found in the same story. After Mathilde’s debts were paid she ran into her childhood friend who she had borrowed the necklace from. After keeping a secret from a friend for years, she grabbed her attention without hesitation, letting Jeanne know she was and what happened to her necklace. This interested me because before this Mathilde was self conscious and insecure about her appearance because she didn’t look wealthy, but in that moment she didn’t care that Jeanne couldn’t recognize her at first due to the physical wear of working hard for 10 years straight. All she cared about was letting an old friend know the truth. You can almost say she felt proud, as if she was humbled by the experience. After reading the poem “The Wife” by Emily Dickinson, the first stanza confuses me. It reads: She rose to his requirement, dropped The playthings of her life To take the honorable work Of woman and of wife. I don’t understand the almost militarized approach to 19th century domestic roles. Why do “playthings” of one’s life need to be dropped? Does a Man have the same responsibilities to sacrifice things they consider fun in […]

On the surface “A Good Man is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Connor is about a family that ends up in the wrong place at the wrong time after suffering a car accident, and is murdered one by one by a group of psychopathic murderers that have escaped from prison. When you fully analyze the characters and what they go through, the story can be broken down with more detail. In my interpretation, it is about a family full of rotten attitudes that are met by bad karma in the most extreme fashion. It’s like when Regina George from the movie “Mean Girls” is hit by a Bus by the end of the film. In reality did her horrible actions mean she deserved to go through that? No, but since it’s fiction and no real harm is done, there can be a sense of “that’s what you get” for some. It is very clear that the grandmother in the story is racist by the way she spoke about the poor children with no pants that they drove by, or the story she told about the black boy that stole the watermelon. By the way her family never condemns the way she speaks about black people, I can only assume they didn’t have an issue with her politics. During the climax of the story, the grandmother pulls every trick out of the book to try and stop the group of men from continuing their acts of evil when finally the killer had enough and finished the job. The punch to the ground beforehand was more about his conflicting feelings about religion than what the grandmother had to say, he seemed tired of her talking and finally reached a boiling point when she touched him. The misfit says that the grandmother would’ve […]

When comparing history and literature, Aristotle believes that literature like poetry is superior since you can relate to some of the experiences or behaviors no matter the time you’re reading it, these works transcend time. In “Oedipus the King” by Sophocles, there are many experiences and behaviors that still happen in reality today like lying to loved ones, murder within the family and public humiliation. To be specific, Jocasta lies to Oedipus bout the truth of his origins and his current situation in order to protect her son from a harsh reality. It may not be as extreme as the events in the story, it is very common for someone close to you to lie in order to protect your feelings, but just like in the story, that never ends well. Another example is when Oedipus finds out the truth and that the residents of his city have become aware. Oedipus is so ashamed and embarrassed that he basically exiles himself assuming that it’s what the people of Thebes would want anyways. It’s almost human nature to assume the worst when information that you would want secret gets out. Once again, not as extreme as blinding yourself, but that sense of embarrassment can still be exhibited today.

In the play “Oedipus the King” by Sophocles, the author uses “languages enhanced by varying beauties” referenced by Aristotle. Sophocles uses this sophisticated language throughout the whole play but it is most prevalent when the chorus made up of old men from the city of Thebes speak. A short passage that stood out to me can be found at line 1375 to 1385 when the chorus says, “…Luckless Oedipus, whom of all men I envy not at all.” Followed by, “In as much as he shot his bolt beyond the others and won the prize of happiness complete— O Zeus—and killed and reduced to nought the hooked taloned maid of the riddling speech, standing a tower against death for my land; hence he was called my king and hence was honored the highest of all honors; and hence he ruled in the great city of Thebes. But now whose tale is more miserable?” Who the people of Thebes once saw a light during dark times was revealed to be a man with a sick past and poor judgment. I enjoyed this passage because it shows that the residents of Thebes looked at Oedipus’s situation with pity rather than disgust and anger, contrary to what Oedipus thought.  

In the short short “Araby” by James Joyce, a young narrator brings us on his journey of blinding infatuation. Throughout the story, it almost seemed like the narrator was being guided by a light. Little did he know it would lead him to a dark dead end. I would describe the protagonist as naive, passionate, and rash. The narrator is hell bent on purchasing an item from a Bazaar named “Araby” for his neighbor who you can call his “crush” after having a short conversation about the marketplace event. The narrator thinks this bazaar is some sort of sophisticated Middle Eastern market when in reality it’s run by the English. By the time he arrives, it’s almost closing time so there aren’t many people and the atmosphere is dead just like back home. The narrator is confronted with the harsh reality of the bazaar and realizes he was so blinded by his fantasies he didn’t realize he spent most of his money on his way there so now he can’t even purchase any gifts for the girl he likes.

In the story “The Lesson” By Toni Cade Bambara, a group of kids take a trip to the toy store with Miss Moore, their adult supervisor. On their way to the store, Miss Moore is lecturing them about life as usual, and just like every other lesson Miss Moore tries to drill in their heads, it goes through one ear and out the other, especially Sugar and Sylvia. When they get to the toy store, they window shop and marvel at the expensive toys until they lay their eyes on the $1000 toy boat. At this point, their astonishment turns into confusion. They ask who even purchases these toys when there are cheaper alternatives. Sugar starts to compare the price of the toy to how much her family spends on food and realizes it’s not even close to the price of a meaningless toy. Sylvia is almost uncomfortable with this harsh truth as she tries everything in her power to stop the discourse between Sugar and Miss Moore. Earlier that day Miss Moore tried to tell the kids about how the current state of the economy makes it unfair for people like them to get ahead, and since Sylvia dislikes Miss Moore, she hates the fact that a lesson is actually starting to resonate with her when she initially disagreed with her theories, but sugar was more understanding.

In the story “Salvation” by Langston Hughes, 12 year old Hughes cycles through a wide range of emotions when he is confronted by the members of his church as a part of a ceremony. The author starts off confused as church goers chant what seems to be nonsense to him at first. When he gets a grasp of the idea that the event is about Jesus saving him and the kids he attended the church with, he becomes curious. Through all the confusion you can almost say Hughes grew with excitement when he realized he’ll finally meet this “Jesus” person that his aunt rambled on about. Jesus never arrives and Hughes becomes impatient and resorts to acting like Jesus has saved him to satisfy his family and church members. By the end of the story the author is ashamed for not only lying to the church, but for doubting their religious beliefs. I would describe Langston as open minded, curious, self aware, and most importantly, Innocent. Before questioning religion as a whole, Langston started off as the common adolescent church goer that played along and questioned nothing.