Guests of the Nation

Most of the stories this week dealt with war, but one grabbed my attention more than the others. Guests of the Nation by Frank O’Connor deals with partnership and betrayal. Hostages were held as collateral that end up getting killed. The men were given names, but I am not sure if they were assigned on purpose. Hawkins is about to die, but he decides that he is going to try and beg for his life. He informs Noble that he will cross over to their side so that he can live and they can remain friends. However, when it was Belcher’s turn to die he went down with pride. He covered his eyes and died without betraying his country. I find it interesting the way that Frank O’Connor shows both types of soldiers. He shows the emotions and tries to help us see what soldiers go through before they are killed. Our troops contain people of both feelings; those that die with dignity for their country and those that would betray their country to save their own life. It is hard to say which type of person you would be before you are actually placed in that situation. Once you are at war and faced with life or death everything takes on a whole new meaning. So to say that you would not betray your country to save your life is hard to commit to if you have never been faced with it like these men were.

A Good Man is Hard to Find

Since this week we had conferences, there are fewer stories to choose from. I did like “A Good Man is Hard to Find” though. The title makes the story seem as if it is going in a different direction than what the story does take. A family is on a trip and end up getting killed, to make the story short. The grandmother is trying to get a closer connection with her family, but she is failing. They did not care about the mountains or her past stories about the way things used to be. So once she does find something that excites her grandchildren, she wants to make it happen. Sadly, the connection that she is making does not occur in the state she thinks. So she gets her family into trouble when she made a mistake but refused to tell her family about the mistake because she does not want to lose the connection that she gained. Once she realizes that her family is in trouble she tries to save them by telling the Misfit to find the good in him and let him know that she knows he is not a bad guy; he should find the good and go with that because Jesus loves him and can save him. Now as much as I could continue into this analysis, I think I might write a paper on it so I should stop here so that I can expand there.

Orientation

This week in English we read several short stories, but the one that I enjoyed the most was “Orientation” by Daniel Orozco. It is a boss walking a new employee through the office and everything that you need to know about the office and how it operates. He tells him about all of the employees and a lot of gossip they are not suppose to talk about but share with others. It is like this higher up employee is walking the new comer through telling him everything, but then he is to forget all the information. Gossip is not allowed; they don’t care about personal lives, but they all know about each other’s personal problems. It almost seems like it is a disorientation. If this were a real orientation I would think that it was a joke.

The Yellow Wallpaper

So I am writing this week’s blog after only one day of class, but I feel that I might not have time later in the week. On Monday we were read “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. There are so many different things that can be seen in this story. We are unsure if the woman is going crazy due to her confinement or if she was crazy to start with and the room that she is stuck in is a mental institution. It can be seen both ways. The man who comes and watches over her could be her husband who is a doctor or it could just be her doctor and she lets her imagination run far enough to think that they are married. She thinks that there is a women stuck in the wallpaper so she makes it her duty to help the women escape. She thinks that she see the women during the day, she is outside sneaking around. However, I feel that it is just her reflection in the windows that she sees. When she spins around to try and see the women all at once it gives her the impression that the women is running around outside. It is almost near imposable to believe everything that the woman writes in her journal, as we learned in class. This short story just seems to have crazy women written all over it no matter how you see it. But if the doctor really is her husband and he does keep her isolated from everyone I would understand why she is going crazy. I don’t think that anyone can stay locked up and in isolation for that long without going mentally insane.

Pink Mustang

This week was kind of the same as last week; we finished reading over the assigned poems. One of the poems that were read this week was The Lady in the Pink Mustang, it is by Louise Erdrich. If you do not know that the women is a hooker than you get the impression that she is a free spirited women who was almost nomadic. She only carried what she needed and could use, anything that became unusable she would toss when she stopped. It was just her, her car, and the road that she drove on. I noticed that the author used the word “kiss” around three times, twice in the last stanza. I am not sure what that is about, but there has to be some significance behind it, but what?

We Did Not Fear the Father

This week in English we went over our assigned poems. The one that I found clear but confusing at the same time is We Did Not Fear the Father. It is a poem by Charles Fort. He wrote it from what I think is the perspective of children and how they see their father. They saw their dad as a hard working man who had three jobs. Their father was a landlord, a barber, and a factory worker. The children liked that their dad was a landlord, he could spend time with them and they got to look over old newspapers that they found in the walls of the property. They also liked his job as a barber just because they remembered him and he was a nice guy at that time. When he went to the factory to work his night job the children feared their father. He was so tired and looked so mean covered in grease, the father just had a lack of patience at the end of his factory jobs. This scared the children, but they knew that their dad was a good man who loved and cared for them. He worked all those jobs so that he could provide for his family and give them the best life that he could while still being an honest man.

Persepolis

Most of this week’s class was filled with watch Persepolis, a movie that started as two graphic novels. I really enjoyed this movie, even though I have not read the book to compare. My favorite person in this movie was the Grandma because she was her own person and never seemed to lose sight of what was important to her. She tried to help guide her granddaughter from doing wrong and losing sight of what their family had fought and died for. Towards the end of the film we learn that the Grandma went against society’s belief by getting a divorce; I was taken back when she said “The first marriage is just practice for the second.” When thinking about parts of the movie that somewhat disturbed me I must say that the grocery store stands out the most in my mind. When the mother is at the grocery store with her daughter a man tells her to pull down her headscarf and that he bangs hundreds of women like her every day. I just found it so offensive that a women has to stand there and endure that kind of insult from someone that she does not know and that a mother could let her child grow up to talk to women like that. It was pointed out that some people may be offended by the depiction of God that was given in the movie, but to be honest I had not thought about it. I just saw the image and thought the author could draw this image however they wished. Overall I thought that Persepolis was a great movie, but not something that I would show to children until high school just because of some things that occur throughout the film.

New Direction--ENG 110

Just to clarify the new focus of this blog for anyone who is still reading it, I am now converting it to an extra credit opportunity for ENG 110 Introduction to Literature class.

Since classes have just started there is only so many readings that we can choose from, so today I am going to give my opinion on Ernest Hemingway’s Hills Like White Elephants. When we read this poem out loud in class I had no idea what it was talking about, but after some discussion I learned that it was talking about abortion; something I never would have guessed. After hearing that abortion was the main focus I picked up the clues that others had found within the poem. For example, the man says “I won’t worry about that because it’s a perfectly simple” and “You don’t have to be afraid. I’ve known lots of people that have done it.” These two quotes seemed to be the main clues for understanding the topic that was being discussed by the couple. I feel that Hemingway’s approach was much thought out because he is talking about a subject that was not seen as socially acceptable at the time. I can honestly say that if another classmate had not said the underlying message I would have been there all day scratching my head. I have no real like or dislike towards this poem, it was just something that I had to read for school.