Justine Hoppie

In my mind what it means to “complete” what the poet had begun is just another way of saying that you fully understand what was just read, or maybe finish the stanza of what was just said. Some stanzas end abruptly and it’s our job as the readers to finish what was going to be said or what would make sense. The poem “We Real Cool” by Gwendolyn Brooks is a straightforward poem so it’s not too hard to put the pieces together. “We Thin gin. We Jazz June. We Die soon.” I know that based on what was said and what was said earlier in the poem that it’s about teenagers who don’t care about anything and skip school. Based on the year the poem was published, they may be black.

My ideas about poetry have changed and broadened in response to week 11’s readings and activities because it gave me a better understanding of poetry and how to read it correctly. In activity 1 the video explains what poetry is and what poetry is not. We also learned about poetry vs prose and how they are different. In activity 2 it has an article on how to properly read a poem, towards the bottom of the article it states some helpful questions some may ask when approaching a poem for the first time such as: Who is the speaker?, What does the title suggest? Does the poem use unusual words or use words in an unusual way?, etc. Overall I used to read poems without really thinking about them and trying to figure out the true meaning of it, you really have to dig deep to find the true meaning of each stanza and why certain words were used.

My research paper focuses on the short story The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World. The thesis of my essay is “The story shows the force of stories to have an impact on the lives and perspectives of the villagers.” The title of my secondary source is “Overview of “The Handsomest Drowned Man”. It is a critical essay from Liz Brent. I found this source in the database Gale Literature Resource Center in the BMCC library. The main idea of this essay is that the author discusses the element of fantasy in García Márquez’s story “The Handsomest Drowned Man.”. This secondary source supports my thesis because it goes in-depth on how each of the characters reacted to Esteban, “The children immediately allow their fantasies to determine what it must be; the narrator states that they “let themselves think it was an enemy ship.” The statement that they “let themselves think” this indicates that they were indulging in a fantasy…”

The theme of the poem “The Wife” relates to Mrs. Mallard’s emotional state in “The Story of an Hour” because they are both similar. In “The Wife” talks about a lady who is married, most likely not wanting to be married, and has to live through it because it is her “duty”. In the last line of the poem, we find out that she may not be happy with her marriage and remains quiet about it. “It lay unmentioned, like the sea, Develops pearl and weed, But only to himself is known, The fathoms they abide.” This relates to Mrs. Mallard’s emotional state in “The Story of an Hour.” because we see that Mrs. Mallard was quite happy when she heard her husband had passed and even started to whisper to herself “Free! Body and soul free!” and “free, free, free!” The keyword is whispering, maybe she didn’t have enough courage to stay it louder, but we see here that she didn’t seem too fond of being married. In both the poem and story, the women were forced into a domestic role of being the stay-at-home mom, housewife, and gender roles. Cult of Domesticity.

A Good Man Is Hard to Find is a short story about a family from the south. They’re on their way to Florida but run into some conflict on the way. The character we are going to focus on is the grandmother. But throughout the story, we see what each character thinks a good man is to them, or what it means to be a good man. O’Connor mirrors her perspectives on society through all of the characters in the story. The grandmother is a selfish person and when the Misfits took them away, she only cared about herself, she is kind of self-centered. When we meet Sammy’s character, he believes he is a good person because he lets some strangers buy gas on credit. The Misfit is a character that is supposed to be bad but is more aware (I guess you can say) than the other characters in the story. He’s bad because he’s a serial killer, but he knows right from wrong, he’s passionate and self-aware. He’s not fake (I guess you can say) like the other characters. In the lecture “Where Is the Goodness?” in activity 4 on page 9 it shows the character chart. So there is a little bit of each type of person in the story I’d say and this is what O’Connor wanted to show us. So overall I believe the story on its interior is just to show us how some people are in society through and it shows in the characters in the story.  

In the reading of “Oedipus the King”, the timeless human experiences or behaviors I found was that Oedipus didn’t know his mother and ended up marrying her. (or just incest) Or to put it in similar words, the relationship between Jocasta and Oedipus. Also, another timeless human experience is running from fate. His father Laius abandon Oedipus after hearing about a prophecy of his son killing him and marrying his wife, Jocasta. Oedipus ends up surviving and being adopted by a king and queen. Oedipus finds out about the prophecy and his arrogance takes over and the prophecy comes true. Fear took over Oedipus’ life once he heard about the prophecy, he was accusing Creon of Laius’s death and started to feel uncomfortable when things started to sound familiar to him. He was scared of not having control over his life. He pretty much spent his whole life running from his fears and that prophecy, maybe he got too cocky that it wouldn’t happen when he ran away from his adoptive parents: Polybus and Merope

Antistrophe First I call on you, Athene, deathless daughter of Zeus, and Artemis, Earth Upholder, 190 who sits in the midst of the market place in the throne which men call Fame, and Phoebus, the Far Shooter, three averters of Fate, come to us now, if ever before, when ruin rushed upon the state, you drove destruction’s flame away out of our land. Strophe 195 Our sorrows defy number; all the ship’s timbers are rotten; taking of thought is no spear for the driving away of  the plague There are no growing children in this famous land; there are no women bearing the pangs of childbirth. 200 You may see them one with another, like birds swift on the wing, quicker than fire unmastered, speeding away to the coast of the Western God.14 Overall the chorus promotes peace in the entire play. But in this, Antistrophe is praying to three gods and calls for Zeus and Artemis and Athene and he asks them to protect him/ for protection from death. To keep death and destruction away from the land

“Araby” is a short story written by James Joyce and it’s about a young boy who falls in love with his friend’s sister, who we don’t come to find out her name. He seems to have an obsession with her, as he thinks about her and tears come to his eyes when doing so, he would do anything for her. When they both finally speak, she asks if he’s going to the bazaar on Saturday which is called Araby and that she wishes she can go. The narrator decides that he will go and get a gift for her to maybe impress her or grab her attention. After some time the narrator eventually gets to the bazaar and realizes that it’s nothing like he’d expect, it was too late and most of the shops closed down. This makes the narrator feel depressed after he leaves. He is now a different person and sees the world a different way, he realizes that the world is full of self-centered people who only care about themselves. This short story is based on romantic irony and has a theme of expectations vs reality. It’s also a coming-of-age story. That’s what this story is truly about

The narrator of “Salvation” is different from the way he was at the beginning of the story compared to now because he now realizes that he lied and does not know what to believe. He also realizes that the other young teenagers who went up may have been lying saying that they were saved by Jesus/ see Jesus. I guess you can say peer pressure got to him because he was the only person who did not see Jesus. The narrator also believes at the end of the story that there is no Jesus anymore since he did not come to help him. The narrator changed simply because he says in the beginning that he “was saved by sins but not really”. He thought he was actually going to see Jesus but ended up not seeing him and lying about it. That makes him think if everyone is lying about if there is a Jesus or not.

The story “The Most Handsome Drowned Man” may have been assigned to us because it may set the tone for what other stories are to come. We may read other short stories/ books that have this mythical and scary tone to them. Or maybe this story will help us better understand the stories that we’re going to read. This was a very interesting story, a good first story I may add, it definitely gets you to start thinking. I thought it was cool that the village started to changes after their encounter with this man. It is crazy to think a dead guy could have a good impact on a small village and change their way of thinking. The women of the town started to think deep into Estabans life and even gave him that name. Now thanks to Estaban, they were seeing how dirty their town was and decided to change that. Maybe all of the stories we will read have something that is glorified and makes us snap back to reality?