11. Shakespeare’s birth and parentage; the mystery of his education.
Reading of Background notes:
The first scene is filled with confusion between the sentinels.
The guard use’s good language, to express a sort of somber mood.
The weather reflects the current mood: a pathetic fallacy.
Horatio says that without sensible view he would not have believed it, which is strange because at the time superstition was common in England.
The ghost is not only a sort of demonic presence but it is also a symbol of political unrest.
Normal notes:
Limbo= Purgatory, in a in between state
Viking tradition dictates to fight for honor, chivalry. Had you been insulted, it was not unusual for one man to challenge another in a duel.
The duel could have been an alternative to war.
Had Hamlet been near the throne at his father’s death, he might have become king.
Instead Claudius stole the throne and Hamlet’s mother while he had the chance.
Claudius allows Leerties to got to France but denies Hamlet the right to return to his studies. This may be because he wants to have control over him.
Claudius is enjoying his newfound role as king and in some sense enjoys it too much.
When the king dies Claudius says that the whole kingdom must weep the lose of its king.
Dirge= funeral march
He mixes the words to make contrast the death with his marriage.
The choice of words make’s it so that the death brings happiness and the funeral brings love*(the marriage).
Claudius depicts having a upward happy eye yet also downward sad eye, resembling a sort of demonic being.
Young fortenbrast demands land and Claudius rips the demand. However he then sends messenger to negotiate with the king of Norway.
My cousin Hamlet and my son- Cousin at the time meant relative in England so he is now closer to his uncle because of his mother’s marriage.
“A little more than kin and less than kind”- Hamlet
Hamlet is to closely related now than before to his uncle and they are not at all similar.
The dominating device in Hamlet is the PUN.
Sun/Son- the implication here is that he is to closely related to him and that he can’t stand him.
Hamlet is truly full of sorrow, while all those around him were the suits of grieving only.
Hamlet as such continues to wear black, to show his sorrow.
Claudius says that grieving too much is like offending god and that it is unmanly, an insult towards Hamlet.
Hamlet agrees to stay near the throne for his mother, not Claudius.
Sullied= tainted, defiled.
Hamlet is referring to his own flesh when he says sullied, during the soliloquy.
The world cannot grow in Hamlet’s mind; it is like an unweeded garden.
March 2, 2011:
Hamlet considers suicide because his mother betrays his father directly, marrying his uncle. It seems like the love that existed between Hamlet’s father and his mother was not real and that it was in some sense planned.
Before Henry the 8, it was frowned upon widow’s to remarry.
A widow would have to be in morning for a year before being able to remarry normally.
The uneasiness of the speed also afflicts Hamlet.
Hamlet is not amazed by the fact that the guards saw his father’s ghost and he also assumes that his death was not completely natural.
There is a light sarcasm in Hamlet’s tone, which can be more or less reinforced by the actor.
Women had to be careful at the time, because if they ruined their status, they could be shun by society.
Ophelia however does not follow the advice that her brother gives her. She see’s that it is hypocritical and says that he should first follow his own advice before giving it to others.
Polonius considers that Hamlet is a good person however, he advises his daughter to be careful around him.
However, he takes stronger action and forbids her from going to see Hamlet, because of the difference of class.
Hamlet senior says that his murder his unnatural because he was killed by his own brother.
3/3/11
There was no wound on Hamlet senior, however the fact that the poison was real and that Claudius vouches for what happened makes it so that people believed immediately what he said.
Othello and Hamlet are very similar in the fact that both have the idea of poisoning one’s ear and the idea of spreading lies, shown with Claudius’s lies to the royal court.
Hamlet Senior, call’s his wife “seemingly faithful”. It is not certain whether she was involved in the crime or not, so he says to leave the judgment to heaven.
Emily Dickinson Poem:
The character here represented could be a snake because of the ridinh between the grass. There is also an alliteration of the letter “S”, which commonly send back to the snake.
Alexandra's recap, 1/31-2/4
Part I: Exposition of the story
- Marlow is passing numerous countries on his trip. Route to the Congo (description p. 16); sees a French ship bombarding the coast (note 39 p. 122 – real historic event being referenced; French had many wars). Randomly shooting at the shore, don’t even know if there are getting the natives, their "enemies," Marlow says there is a "touch of insanity in the proceeding." Symbolically, they are firing at a country all together.
Theme: voyeurism, nonsensical quality.
Lack on context is a strategy to make reader focus on Marlow and his impressions. Marlow is implicated in what he sees, not entirely objective point of view, but not sure what his objective is: Ivory? War? Colonization? We cannot completely read him.
P. 18-19: arrival at the Company’s headquarters in the Congo
- Connection back to the meaninglessness to the French ship randomly shooting, continuation of the image – simile "like the bursting shells," comparing the outraged law to the shells, which are useless and ineffectual.
- The fact that these men could be referred to as enemies strikes Marlow as absurd; they are depicted as victims. They are treated as "criminals," and some have been converted to the colonists’ cause: it is a black man that is leading the natives in chains. He smiles at Marlow, there is a "partnership" as if they are on the same side, have the same goal.
- There is lots of irony when Marlow describes the scene as "high and just proceedings." It is all the opposite.
- Past "red-eyed devils" (violence, greed, desire) being compared to future "weak-eyed devil," the colonizers that he will encounter on his trip – he says these are worse because they are "insidious" (= sneaky, indirect). It is a new form of evil, a new form of colonization that he hasn’t seen before.
foreshadowing Kurtz; he is getting a warning of this future devil, a premonition of profound evil which isn’t taking an as clear form of what he has seen in the past.
P. 20: the dying natives, abused by the colonists and used for labor
- Marlow describes one man in particular, who has a white scarf, symbol of whiteness.
P.21: the Company Chief Accountant
- "this miracle": verbal irony and situational irony which leads us to expect a certain outcome.
He doesn’t fit into the setting: he’s polished, dressed nicely to reflect his position. He’s looking like this at the expense of everyone else, especially the natives. He is using the native labor to maintain his appearance - exploitation. He has made no effort to assimilate; looks out of place.
The job of an accountant is counting numbers, the profits of the Company. He’s keeping track of the money they are making off the back of the natives.
- "accomplished something": irony but cannot be interpreted as a critique of what Marlow is seeing. Marlow has a sardonic/ironic quality; he is a cynic. But what is his role in the story? Is Marlow Conrad’s ambassador? Yes and no. On a literal level, he is the ambassador of the Company.
He is seeing all of this atrocity and he is not doing anything about it - has annoying characteristics.
- First mention of Kurtz (p.22). Marlow’s curiosity starts to grow.
- Journey by foot to get to the Central Station with 60 men. Once Marlow gets to the station, he learns his ship has sunk. This shows again the purposelessness of the journey and fraught that it causes.
- The manager: no character, no intelligence, but is nonetheless "great" because he has lasted there so long and is in great physical health. He is surviving because he is empty.
- Marlow has 3 months to observe, get a sense of what the enterprise is about.
- Significance of ivory: literal and symbolic meaning.
Ivory
Literal -----------------------------------------> Symbolic
Whiteness
PROFIT: valuable commodity for the West Purity
Natural resource (depleting) Exploitation and colonization Stealing of African culture/identity
Spiritual importance to the natives
Lust and greed
Hakan's recap, 11/30-12/3
Sacha's recap, 11/1-11/5
Monday, november 1st (2nd hour) MEDEA
P. 344 (reading Medea’s speech)
- She seems controlled in front of the chorus
- Already strategizing and preparing her revenge ?
- The chorus represents the public opinion:
- The public image is very important, especially for Medea. Their a certain desire on Medea’s part to present herself well and defend her «case» in front of the chorus. The chorus is their as a «sounding board».
- By making the chorus all female, Euripides is showing that Medea can relate to the chorus. But, their is a social gap given the fact that Medea is a queen and the chorus are just regular citizens. Medea is above the chorus in certain ways, but in other ways, she wants to communicate and appeal to them.
- Medea has supernatural powers, which are going to play a part in her revenge.
- Although Medea’s speech is presenting her as a victim, this speech goes further by exposing the social status of women in society:
- «we women are the worst treated-things alive».
- Imprisoned and forced to adapted to husband
- Women at that time had no rights in society (marital & civil)
- Athenian audience: Critic of female injustice and rise of feminism in Athens ? Through Medea, Euripides is addressing the female right issue in Athens.
- Women had a strong religious role at that time. Religion is synonymous of morality. Therefore, by speaking in front of a chorus of women, Medea is showing that her matter is of moral injustice.
- «I had rather stand my ground three times in battle than face a childbirth once»
- Female/male comparison to emphasize on the difficulty of a women’s lives in comparison with men.
- Foreshadowing: detachement of her sons.
P. 346
- «wronged in love, there is no heart more murderous»
- Major foreshadowing of Medea’s desire for brutal revenge
- Creon : «fear» : Uncommon for a king to be scared of a women. Creon fears her because Medea is a sorceress and could use magic as a «lethal blow».
- Medea begs to have one more day and Creon concedes : Error on Creon’s part.
- Medea wants also to hurt Creon because he is banning her.
- Medea’s dialogue with Creon shows the reader her manipulative skills. She feigns innocence and uses her language to create pathos. Medea is a very powerful manipulator of words and language.
Wednesday, november 3rd (1st/2nd hour)
Discussion Questions: Chapter 2 of A Room
Of One’s Own
1. The only idea that she brings back from chapter one in chapter two is the financial aspect of a writer. At a certain point in the chapter, she is interrupted in her thinking because she has to pay the bill. She then talks again about the need to have a room and 500 pounds per year to be able to write properly. This idea brings us back to the financial injustice between women and men and the reason for the masculine domination in literature.
2. Woolf goes to the British Museum to seek the truth : «I set out in the pursuit of truth». She believes that she will find the answers to all her questions «on the shelves of the British Museum». Based on Woolf’s descriptions, the British Museum appears to be the ultimate sanctuary of truth (using rhetorical question at the end of the first paragraph). The British Museum is the symbol of objective and «unprejudiced» knowledge.
3. By using the terms «the essential oil of truth», Woolf is looking to find the fundamental truth of women and men through the books of the British Museum. She considers the knowledge at the British Museum as the «pure truth», freed from opinion, prejudice, «accidents and impressions». Woolf wants to find the true truth and she believes that she can find the essential oil of truth only at the British Museum. «the essential oil of truth» has a slightly ironic tone, she uses irony to draw our attention to show that we don’t have to work so hard to find the truth. She is using irony to show how ridiculous it is to go on this journey in the first place to just find this one idea of equality.
4. Through her research of writings about women, Woolf discovers that men have very different and controversial opinions of women. Making her pursuit to find the truth about women impossible and completely fictive. We also see that «men thought about women», this is supported by the list of books on women and the multiple quotes of famous people. We also see that «men though about women and thought differently». Their are a lot of controversial idea and much of it is negative.
5. Her discoveries concerning the writings about men are the opposite. «women do not write books about men». She concludes from her research that women are much more interested in men than men are to women. This is a shock to her because she expected that it would be the other way around. Link to the Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir.
6. Woolf comes to the conclusion that these books about the inferiority of women and the superiority of men were not written objectively but under the influences of anger; probably resulting in a superiority complex of sexes. Woolf is angry at these authors that are themselves angry, because this anger sabotages their work and truth. She is angry because the caricatured professor is writing negatively about women. Men consolidate their superiority by defining women as «other». She is showing to the reader that men were concerned about the inferiority of women, but more about their superiority. Men are ensuring their superiority by describing women as inferior. Men need women to feel superior. Without the women, men wouldn’t have any power nor sense of superiority.
Thursday, november 4th MEDEA
P. 350 - 352 (reading)
« feeble when it comes to the sublime,
marvelously inventive over crime»
- Saying that women are maybe not good at philosophical thinking but good at crime; relating to Medea’s act of revenge.
P. 352 - 359 (reading)
- leader acting as a moderator
Arguments:
Medea Jason
«you betrayed me and know you are blaming me» Sons to be royally related
No more home & no more money Doing to this to benefit all of us = «our» family
Medea is banned and forced to exile herself. Marriage is politically advantageous for Jason
Why didn’t he consult her to do this ? Medea would never have accepted Jason’s decision
She is seen as a witch and banned She should be grateful for having fame
Medea saved Jason’s life The Gods saved Jason’s life
Jason’s decision destroyed the family Act of devotion for the family
- Jason betrayed Medea and he is trying to describe what his actions as mere actions of common sense. He is saying that all he did is for his family and Medea.
- Medea to Jason : «glib hypocrite»; «coward»
- By the end Jason says that he gave Medea a chance to stay quietly under his protection but she gave up that and Jason is putting the responsibility of exile on Medea.
Victoria's recap, 10/25-10/29
A Room of One’s Own – Virginia Woolf
-Oxbridge: Oxford and Cambridge
-Fernham: she spoke at a similar place; an impoverished women’s college.
Characters
=> Woolf’s narrator, self.
=> Mary Beton/Seton: incarnations of herself
Discussion Questions: Chapter 1, A Room of One’s Own
1. She is intercepted by a beadle on the wrong grass path because she is not allowed there. A gentleman refuses her entry in the library. Also, she is refused entry into church. Shows that path to being knowledgeable is difficult for women. They must travel “gravel” or rougher path.
These examples prove that education in her day is offered to young women, but limited. Sexism is predominant. She doesn’t see why she can’t be allowed in the library or under the light of religion, which is supposed to be fair to all sexes.
2. About 16 interruptions
These constant interruptions show that her thoughts are unstable. Woolf shows that thought is uncontrollable and subject to constant whims of the spirit. These interruptions also show that Woolf is working on a developed thought. They cause a difficulty of securing a thought. It is difficult for women to have linear thought, stream of consciousness.
3. The first meal at Oxbridge seems rather appetizing whereas the second one at Fernham is inconsistent. The description of the first meal is more elaborate while the description of the second meal is more simplistic and dry. The second meal is not nourishing and lacks luxury. A good meal allows the individual to think better while an insufficient meal weakens the thought process. Woolf shows that it seems that women aren’t offered the right provisions to dine well and thus to think well.
4. By including literary allusions, Woolf wants to prove that women have the ability to handle literary texts and be educated.
5. She has nostalgia for Tennyson and Rossetti’s writing. Woolf explains that life before war offered more opportunities than life after war. After war, the British suffer post-war effects. Before the war, people were more inspired to write. The war destroyed romance and passion. Yet, it also destroyed illusion and brought truth to light.
6. She sees the Manx Cat out the dining hall window when she tabs her cigarette. It brings her back to reality: something is lacking in her experience at Oxbridge, besides the cat’s tail. Thus, she can’t enjoy the full effects of this nice meal because something feels incomplete. She is there as an outsider, has been barred from institutions, and just doesn’t belong there. The cat may be a foreshadowing of the dire Fernham description.
7. During her visit with Mary Seton, she learns that in order to write well, a woman needs her own room and a certain amount of money (500 pounds per year) to succeed. We find out that she has money due to the passing of her aunt and thus able to write to her desire.
Medea – Euripides
Euripides is one of the 3 big tragedy authors (Sophocles, Aeschylus)
Medea is from Colchis: barbaric, eastern, marginalized place
Jason is from Iolcus.
the play is In Media Res
It is not unusual to have additional wives. It’s a political move on Jason’s part.
position of slaves and of women
=> slaves are concentrated on their masters lives
=> nurse is supposed to be objective but she’s subjective
=> tutor is also subjective; he teases her
- use of emotions
- personification of supreme beings
- exaggeration and hyperbole when describing Medea’s condition
- desperate rhetorical questions
- anaphoras
- imagery of waves: crushing her & overwhelming her.
=>children remind her of her mistake in marrying Jason.
- Medea has a weakness towards men.
=> All of society was present at the theater.
=> Slaves mirror the experience of women in society.
-The condition of being a slave can be expressed as a metaphor = destiny
=> Chorus : inner voice of the characters
=>Idea of homesickness of one’s homeland. Because slaves were taken from their homelands, they can relate to what Medea is going through.
Robin's recap, 10/12-10/15
MLK:
1)Purpose : against segregation «I am in Birmingham because injustice is here »
MLK’s purpose is to end segregation, which is still present and legal. The laws should be just. “I am earnestly opposed to violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth.”
2) Audience: Is it really the clergy? They are the nominal audience BUT the real audience is much bigger. We are witnessing a kind of dialogue between MLK and US as a whole. He was aware this would be published → he had a lot of attention form the press.
-He is anticipating the opposition’s arguments and objections. Before they even answer, he disarms them.
3) Rhetorical strategies or devices.
-Rhetorical question + reference to Socrates (classical references show that the writer is educated and has recourse to these models.)
-Classical/historical allusions (Hitler). This last example is extreme; he is a recognized evil, one of the most hated men. What he did was technically legal, but wrong.
- Therefore, if the law is unjust, some kind of decision has to be made.
- Biblical allusion
- Concessions
-Touch of humor, making him seem more human.
- goes back to critics and deconstructing them through counter-arguments / Anticipation of what kind of objections people are going to mention.
The consequences of injustice can be felt everywhere, it is some kind of contagion.
Justice delayed is justice denied
Thoreau
1) The purpose. ‘What I think is right” is what counts. The government could go against his conscience. If I don’t follow the government, then I follow my conscience. “I think we should be men first and subjects afterwards”
“I can’t recognize […] government”. Slavery was lawful at his time; very powerful statement.
“Under a government that imprisons unjustly, the true place for a just man is jail” Exp: Chinese Nobel laureate in prison. Revolution needed?
Notes 10.13.10
Logos : Speech, useof logic; Ethos=use of knowledge/learning : it is a problem fro King (black man); Pathos
→ The speaker needs those three forms of writing.
(See Kentucky classics sheet).
“What shall I do?” Aporia.
“But when […] of despair” → extremely long sentence/paragraph. Also a very strong anaphora, which introduces and reinforces the enumeration of examples, + emphasis on th you / Apostrophe ?
MLK introduces a climax until a blasphemy. It’s the extreme example of blaming the victim.
Notes 14.10.10
Sample close-reading for rhetorical devices
-Nobodiness is a neologism, made up, to sum up is argument.
The thesis is not really argumentative: He uses rhetorical devices so that the reader won’t remain aloof from this message.
-Metonymy is a sort of metaphor. But metonymy goes one step further and uses substitution.
Example: The White house, for the president and his crew.
A type of metonymy is synecdoche, exp. The Crown for the Monarch.
Chapter 1, Woolf
The beginning: Unconventional, seems to be the following of something else, the ‘But’.
It’s almost ungrammatical, it’s playful.
Wool argues that a woman needs two things to write: 500 pounds a year and a room of one’s own. Therefore, independence, space and privacy are needed. And you must have the means to gain it.
All of this draws attention to the fact that most women lack those elements of their daily lives.
Then, the next passage is really famous:
Emmanuelle's Recap 10/4-10/8
Natalia's Recap 9/27-10/1
Winter 1940-1941- All of Pecola's hopes are crushed down, gradually pushed down. Winter is often related to sadness; everything dies.
- Maureen Peal arrives: Pecola tormented in playground, they are abasing her, telling her she will always be pushed down. Everything Maureen Peal does reflects her superiority over them, she makes Claudio and Frieda jealous by getting Pecola ice cream, she almost treats her like a pet, like she is better than Pecola. She does it to show that she CAN do it, she doesn't really care about what she's offering to Pecola she just wants to show that she is wealthier and above Pecola. Maureen's false generosity.
- Tormenting of Pecola in the schoolyard
- Mr. Henry entertains the whores in the livingroom at the MacTeers: the whore are the only people who get along with Pecola, she experiences love for the first time through them. When the girls see the whores, people are always telling them how awful they re but the girls find them so nice, they see them in a different way. They represent another element of society but the reader and Pecola have already seen a much more human side to them in the section on Autumn. Here they show up again to remind us of the difference between the MacTeers and the Breedloves.
- Junior lures Pecola to his house and torments her
- Geraldine's story and her assimilation
- The dispelling of delusions
The mother is introduced as a representative of a certain type of black woman.
Opposition of two worlds: Pecola who is incapable of escaping her state of blackness and another woman who fights all her life and in some ways escapes. This woman hates Pecola because Pecola reminds her that she truly is black. Rejects society by rejecting Pecola. She is a convenient target for hatred because she puts herself down making her an easier target for others, and they do the same back to her. Even Claudia, in her own community amongst the blcks is treated inferior, like a dog. There are different inferiorities between blacks. Hierarchies between them.
- symbolism when he hurts the cat and blames Pecola for it. When it is dying it says that its blue eyes are closed. Emphasis on blue eyes. Even Junior is pushing down Pecola. That same thing also allows the boy to get rid of the cat. Mom and cat has sexual relation. Cat is sort of competing for its mother's attention. Yet also has affixed blame to Pecola. The cat/animals in general are like an escape from life and reality
- Sheer discomfort that comes into their lives as soon as winter arrives
- Maureen Peal: disrupter of season, carrying coats instead of wearing them, eating ice cream, gets hotter out.
- Threatening that Maureen can cross worlds because she's mulatto.
- Claudia and Frieda want to hate Maureen but they also can't ignore this allure she gives off
- Frieda really steps in and defends this defenseless girl (Pecola) she and Claudia cannot save or do too much to help her but they try in the limited ways they can as children to step in at times, they have much compassion for her. They do that with Maureen and awful taunting with boys.
- Pecola's alienation is so profound that she cannot take refugee in Claudia and Frieda.
- Forces working behind the perceptions of Maureen as beautiful. She is trying to uncover those forces at work, societal views about class, race, beauty, money, power functions in a world where these characters live, it doesn't come with moral qualities it comes with wealth, money, whiteness distributed unevenly within black community and within that community, subtle dynamics and divisions
- Even though they're in the same school with white girls she bridges gaps between them which is why she uses a mulatto instead of a white girl because they don't have enough contact with the whites intra-communal problems so much more important than racism overall à superficial level: white black vs. black/mulatto
- The whores, page 77: showing brown teeth trying to seem like genuinely enjoying Mr. Henry, low class. Observing and almost enjoying Mr. Henry although they know he is creepy.
- also, he was sucking her fingers the way grandmas do with babies so she realizes it's a little disturbing
- the maginot line: a line of defense from the Germans but they went around it (through Belgium) anyways. It is like a misplaced line of defense. One of the prostitutes is called this because she is useless in defending and protecting
- these households are not as free from corruption as you imagine, they have a way of penetrating
- pecola is seen as the other. Since she is such a misfit and so ugly, everyone rejects her and feels superior and more beautiful/important around her
- junior's mother hates her own blackness so much, when she sees Pecola she sees something (the blackness) in herself and since she hates herself so much for it and is trying to forget it, it makes her despise Pecola as well
Spring 1941- Frieda is growing up, blooming like a flower blooms in the spring. She is touched by Mr. Henry. The prostitutes let a stranger into their household à a stranger with a strong sexual appetite. Mr. Macteer beats up Mr. Henry for touching Frieda but we still see a parental absence for him not having been there in the first place, he wasn't there to stop it. Parental absences through almost all the characters throughout the novel
- Macteers and Breedloves: neither parents are at home taking care of young children, they always have to work because it is not a wealthy community
- Opposition between Macteers and Breedloves: Mr. Macteer defends Frieda; Mr. Breedlove rapes Pecola
- Pecola and Pauline’s dreams of being in a white family is really pushing them apart, they want what they cannot have and will never have. They all have the same ambition but don’t show it which pushes them apart, they could have linked together more but it is only separating them
- From such violence (to her own daughter) to a soft voice saying "hush baby, hush". The “honey in her words� delicacy in how she speaks to the little white girl and violence towards Pecola, she has never spoken that softly to her own daughter à such a painful contrast between how she treats the two. Such different worlds. Pauline at a white house living with white family, so nice and listening to everything they ask her to do. But when she gets home she becomes like we know her throughout the book. Pecola intruding in her separate life is contrasted by the spilling of the pie which is staining this whiteness with the black à keep the blackness out of it, she doesn’t want to lose this new world
- They need to face reality: Pauline believes she is a part of the family, she feels it but she isn’t. Same with Pecola and her blue eyes
- In a way Mr. Breedlove is better than the rest of the family because he does not respect the white people for all they have put him through in his past, he isn’t as naïve as the rest of his family’s strong desires to be white
- Before she would pick cholly over her religious beliefs, they both just left together they are madly in love, very good relationship. Now everything has changed they betray each other for stupid things pretty much when they start a family
- Pauline’s story in her own words (page 110)
- Cholly’s story; Pecola’s rape (page 132) remembering the good times with Pauline when they were at the top. He’s confusing the past with the present, doesn’t know what’s going on anymore/extremely confused. Associating pecola with Pauline which is why he rapes her. Wants to relive and feel what he felt with Pauline when he met her, he feels that the only way tog et this feeling is to physically rape pecola because he feels that it is not possible anymore with Pauline and that maybe pecola can give all the feelings he felt with Pauline, rejuvenate them. Cholly covers her with a quilt after she passes out as a way to protect/comfort her. But then he leaves her.
- Splattered “black-ish� blueberries everywhere à when she makes the berry cobbler fall, Morrison purposely uses the color black to once again show the “dirty� ugliness of the color
- The little girl who lives at the white house calls Mrs. Breedlove “Polly�, short for Pauline, but even Pecola has to call her own mothe “Mrs. Breedlove� à gap in relation with her own daughter, which should be more intimate than the daughter at the house that she works at. Also, shows lack of respect
- Mrs. Breedlove completely neglects her own daughter and even slaps her in the face but when she talks to the little girl she says “hush baby, hush� as if it were her own daughter. Injustice in this society between blacks and whites living together. She doesn’t even feel that inferior to the white people, she doesn’t resent it she loves working for the white family. She talks to the little girl like that because she wants to be a part of that family, the little girl is in her desires more so than Pecola. She gives herself the image of being the little white girl’s mother.
- Cholly and his family are excluded from society because of their race, however, Soaphead is at the same level as Cholly because he too is a pedophile yet is not marginalized from the society. Morrison is showing all sides of the community and the different “levels� of blackness.
- Soaphead Church’s story and his touching little girls (page 164)
- Pecola’s wish; Soaphead’s letter to God
- Morrison is looking at the worshiping of whiteness and how it has reuined and distorted all the characters. In the case of Soaphead, his earlier desire to be white, his lighter skin and west-indian background shows how one can be worked by that worshiping of whiteness. The fact that he’s there to show us another element of the community, he is seen as a figure of access to secret knowledge and rituals
- Her refusal to idolize Shirley Temple and the white community shows that Morrison is using Claudia to get at something more transcendent à her ability to remain her own person and have her own perspective on the various things that are happening. She is more objective, more human.
- Soaphead could make pecola believe that she had blue eyes. He feels it is a miracle that seems almost divine
Carl's Recap 9/20-9/24
9/8-9/9 Terminale Bluest Eye Recap:
The Bluest Eyes
~Spring~
Follow up
Spring ends with the soaphead event as he writes a letter to god. He believes that he is better than god as he is able to give Pecola blue eyes. He has made a miracle as he restores Pocola’s faith. God could not change her eyes to blue but he made Pecola believe she had blue eyes. It also ends with the death of the dog.
*Summer*
The only way she can belong to the world is to give up reality.
This section is after Pecola’s pregnancy, she lost her baby. Claudia narrates and there is also an internal monologue. Claudia feels guilty because of the seeds that never grew. They are putting their focused on the marigolds so they can escape the fact that Pecola is pregnant, it’s a way to symbolically express their sympathy. We can relate this to as I Lay dying and the fish. The whole act is horrible, the soil is society and it is hostile to Pecola and her baby, they refuse to nourish it. Because Cholly’s action goes against nature the seeds can no longer grow. That shift is very important. The death of the baby is the death of hope as Pecola loses everything and even her sanity. This image of marigolds is also metaphorical for the girls themselves and the soil is the environment. Their environment traps them. When gossiping about Pecola the other members don’t use her name, she is ostracized to that extent.
Last pages -204-205 Claudia talks about what happens
It is the first time that there is such a direct criticism. They were ignoring Pecola because they felt better when they were besides her. Everyone are parasites and Pecola is the host organism. The characters don’t really grow except for Claudia. There will always be another Pecola. The only comfort is the fact that Claudia realizes what’s going on.
(October 6th) absent- small Recap
The use of the word bluestàthere is nothing is bluer than bleu and Pecola’s wish to have blue eyes is impossible; it doesn’t make sense to use the superlative form. In addition the structure and the form of her inter monologue, show that there is a separation, and both voices are Pecola. Her inter monologue can be compared to Darl’s monologue. The text is written both in italic and regularly, the italic is sane and the regular text is closer to her unconscious that wishes to have blue eyes. The dialogue between the two Pecola’s helps us see that there is a sort of guilt and that coping with trauma is very hard.
Morison has a political message in this book; black people should not push their anger towards the withe community but rather resolve problems within. Indeed there are too many ruptures in the black community. For Morrison young girls like Pecola are the result of the misunderstanding in the black community. Morrison also analyses woman in society, the whores in the book are happy because they are free in a certain way. She stresses the fact that whores and Pecola are very different but the fact that the community rejects them shows how the community is violently and unjustly punishing a young and innocent girl. She makes us think about the limitations place on girls because of the different aspects of beauty that are pervasive in our culture and our community. Indeed the youngest and most vulnerable persons of society suffer the most. However Claudia stays as a sign of hope.
Martin Luther King Junior
Letter from Birmingham Jail (MLK)
Rhetorical Strategy:
The ways an author uses language (devices, turn of phrase, writing/speech tactics) to convey a message or persuade an audience of his/her views.
He tries to trigger the emotion of the reader when he talks about his daughter. In addition he tries to involve the whole black community and the white community by using words like “brothers” and “my friends”. He also uses biblical references because of the universality of religion it helps convey the message. In addition he uses a certain tone and give many concessions to put people at ease. The fact that he is so articulate is a metaphor to break apart all the prejudices that people could have had on black people.
Natalia's Recap 9/27-10/1
Winter 1940-1941- All of Pecola's hopes are crushed down, gradually pushed down. Winter is often related to sadness; everything dies.
- Maureen Peal arrives: Pecola tormented in playground, they are abasing her, telling her she will always be pushed down. Everything Maureen Peal does reflects her superiority over them, she makes Claudio and Frieda jealous by getting Pecola ice cream, she almost treats her like a pet, like she is better than Pecola. She does it to show that she CAN do it, she doesn't really care about what she's offering to Pecola she just wants to show that she is wealthier and above Pecola. Maureen's false generosity.
- Tormenting of Pecola in the schoolyard
- Mr. Henry entertains the whores in the livingroom at the MacTeers: the whore are the only people who get along with Pecola, she experiences love for the first time through them. When the girls see the whores, people are always telling them how awful they re but the girls find them so nice, they see them in a different way. They represent another element of society but the reader and Pecola have already seen a much more human side to them in the section on Autumn. Here they show up again to remind us of the difference between the MacTeers and the Breedloves.
- Junior lures Pecola to his house and torments her
- Geraldine's story and her assimilation
- The dispelling of delusions
The mother is introduced as a representative of a certain type of black woman.
Opposition of two worlds: Pecola who is incapable of escaping her state of blackness and another woman who fights all her life and in some ways escapes. This woman hates Pecola because Pecola reminds her that she truly is black. Rejects society by rejecting Pecola. She is a convenient target for hatred because she puts herself down making her an easier target for others, and they do the same back to her. Even Claudia, in her own community amongst the blcks is treated inferior, like a dog. There are different inferiorities between blacks. Hierarchies between them.
- symbolism when he hurts the cat and blames Pecola for it. When it is dying it says that its blue eyes are closed. Emphasis on blue eyes. Even Junior is pushing down Pecola. That same thing also allows the boy to get rid of the cat. Mom and cat has sexual relation. Cat is sort of competing for its mother's attention. Yet also has affixed blame to Pecola. The cat/animals in general are like an escape from life and reality
- Sheer discomfort that comes into their lives as soon as winter arrives
- Maureen Peal: disrupter of season, carrying coats instead of wearing them, eating ice cream, gets hotter out.
- Threatening that Maureen can cross worlds because she's mulatto.
- Claudia and Frieda want to hate Maureen but they also can't ignore this allure she gives off
- Frieda really steps in and defends this defenseless girl (Pecola) she and Claudia cannot save or do too much to help her but they try in the limited ways they can as children to step in at times, they have much compassion for her. They do that with Maureen and awful taunting with boys.
- Pecola's alienation is so profound that she cannot take refugee in Claudia and Frieda.
- Forces working behind the perceptions of Maureen as beautiful. She is trying to uncover those forces at work, societal views about class, race, beauty, money, power functions in a world where these characters live, it doesn't come with moral qualities it comes with wealth, money, whiteness distributed unevenly within black community and within that community, subtle dynamics and divisions
- Even though they're in the same school with white girls she bridges gaps between them which is why she uses a mulatto instead of a white girl because they don't have enough contact with the whites intra-communal problems so much more important than racism overall à superficial level: white black vs. black/mulatto
- The whores, page 77: showing brown teeth trying to seem like genuinely enjoying Mr. Henry, low class. Observing and almost enjoying Mr. Henry although they know he is creepy.
- also, he was sucking her fingers the way grandmas do with babies so she realizes it's a little disturbing
- the maginot line: a line of defense from the Germans but they went around it (through Belgium) anyways. It is like a misplaced line of defense. One of the prostitutes is called this because she is useless in defending and protecting
- these households are not as free from corruption as you imagine, they have a way of penetrating
- pecola is seen as the other. Since she is such a misfit and so ugly, everyone rejects her and feels superior and more beautiful/important around her
- junior's mother hates her own blackness so much, when she sees Pecola she sees something (the blackness) in herself and since she hates herself so much for it and is trying to forget it, it makes her despise Pecola as well
Spring 1941- Frieda is growing up, blooming like a flower blooms in the spring. She is touched by Mr. Henry. The prostitutes let a stranger into their household à a stranger with a strong sexual appetite. Mr. Macteer beats up Mr. Henry for touching Frieda but we still see a parental absence for him not having been there in the first place, he wasn't there to stop it. Parental absences through almost all the characters throughout the novel
- Macteers and Breedloves: neither parents are at home taking care of young children, they always have to work because it is not a wealthy community
- Opposition between Macteers and Breedloves: Mr. Macteer defends Frieda; Mr. Breedlove rapes Pecola
- Pecola and Pauline’s dreams of being in a white family is really pushing them apart, they want what they cannot have and will never have. They all have the same ambition but don’t show it which pushes them apart, they could have linked together more but it is only separating them
- From such violence (to her own daughter) to a soft voice saying "hush baby, hush". The “honey in her words� delicacy in how she speaks to the little white girl and violence towards Pecola, she has never spoken that softly to her own daughter à such a painful contrast between how she treats the two. Such different worlds. Pauline at a white house living with white family, so nice and listening to everything they ask her to do. But when she gets home she becomes like we know her throughout the book. Pecola intruding in her separate life is contrasted by the spilling of the pie which is staining this whiteness with the black à keep the blackness out of it, she doesn’t want to lose this new world
- They need to face reality: Pauline believes she is a part of the family, she feels it but she isn’t. Same with Pecola and her blue eyes
- In a way Mr. Breedlove is better than the rest of the family because he does not respect the white people for all they have put him through in his past, he isn’t as naïve as the rest of his family’s strong desires to be white
- Before she would pick cholly over her religious beliefs, they both just left together they are madly in love, very good relationship. Now everything has changed they betray each other for stupid things pretty much when they start a family
- Pauline’s story in her own words (page 110)
- Cholly’s story; Pecola’s rape (page 132) remembering the good times with Pauline when they were at the top. He’s confusing the past with the present, doesn’t know what’s going on anymore/extremely confused. Associating pecola with Pauline which is why he rapes her. Wants to relive and feel what he felt with Pauline when he met her, he feels that the only way tog et this feeling is to physically rape pecola because he feels that it is not possible anymore with Pauline and that maybe pecola can give all the feelings he felt with Pauline, rejuvenate them. Cholly covers her with a quilt after she passes out as a way to protect/comfort her. But then he leaves her.
- Splattered “black-ish� blueberries everywhere à when she makes the berry cobbler fall, Morrison purposely uses the color black to once again show the “dirty� ugliness of the color
- The little girl who lives at the white house calls Mrs. Breedlove “Polly�, short for Pauline, but even Pecola has to call her own mothe “Mrs. Breedlove� à gap in relation with her own daughter, which should be more intimate than the daughter at the house that she works at. Also, shows lack of respect
- Mrs. Breedlove completely neglects her own daughter and even slaps her in the face but when she talks to the little girl she says “hush baby, hush� as if it were her own daughter. Injustice in this society between blacks and whites living together. She doesn’t even feel that inferior to the white people, she doesn’t resent it she loves working for the white family. She talks to the little girl like that because she wants to be a part of that family, the little girl is in her desires more so than Pecola. She gives herself the image of being the little white girl’s mother.
- Cholly and his family are excluded from society because of their race, however, Soaphead is at the same level as Cholly because he too is a pedophile yet is not marginalized from the society. Morrison is showing all sides of the community and the different “levels� of blackness.
- Soaphead Church’s story and his touching little girls (page 164)
- Pecola’s wish; Soaphead’s letter to God
- Morrison is looking at the worshiping of whiteness and how it has reuined and distorted all the characters. In the case of Soaphead, his earlier desire to be white, his lighter skin and west-indian background shows how one can be worked by that worshiping of whiteness. The fact that he’s there to show us another element of the community, he is seen as a figure of access to secret knowledge and rituals
- Her refusal to idolize Shirley Temple and the white community shows that Morrison is using Claudia to get at something more transcendent à her ability to remain her own person and have her own perspective on the various things that are happening. She is more objective, more human.
- Soaphead could make pecola believe that she had blue eyes. He feels it is a miracle that seems almost divine
Carl's Recap 9/20-9/24
Autumn:
Major scenes:
- Mr. Henry’s move into the MacTeer household foreshadows pedophilia in the novel. His presence marks a change just as Autumn is a season of change, the transition from harvest to dead winter. Mr. Henry is the first outsider coming into the MacTeer home; the first instigator to sexuality.
- Pecola’s first period is seen as an apocalyptic event (fear), accentuating the ignorance of parents and the lack of knowledge brought by their social situation. This disturbing entry into womanhood makes her now fertile thus foreshadowing the birth of the baby. This event established a caring atmosphere in between Mrs. MacTeer and the girls because of her contrition. This period inaugurates a cycle.
- The description of the furnishings reminds us of the Breedloves. Their lack of thoughtfulness, absence of memories; the family has no life. They just coexist. There is no story to the furniture, just as the family has no soul. Like the furniture, the Breedloves don’t fit in. The only living thing in the house was the coal stove living “independently”. The Breedloves have grown together however still alienate each other. Nothing attaches one another. This family reassures people who are worried about the situation of their own family. This use of the “Other” establishes both self-reassurance and pity.
- Toni Morrison insists on the ugliness of the Breedloves and explains that they don’t possess it. Hence, they may not take refuge in their appearance. Also, this is another use of the “Other”. The Breedloves are targeted for their ugliness for all of us to view ourselves better.
- To have children, unfortunately you just need to have sex… No need for planning, love, etc.
- Blue eyes isn’t a physical aspect, it’s an ideal.
- Beyond appearance, the eyes make you see the world differently
à she desires a new type of knowledge. She remains in a shadow: family and friends… She doesn’t even accept herself ßà constantly marginalized
- Statements of self-motivation have no meaning to Pecola.
- Pecola is disappearing with the overriding sense of the way people see her
- Eyes may serve as cameras, new eyes would then give you a new start, eradicate all traumatizing memories
- When children are learning to read, to engage with life, they have the example of Jane
- The prostitutes are the “Others” and Pecola is accepted among them because she also is an “Other”
- Prostitutes are threats to society: threats to family, people look down on them because they don’t follow general moral rules (especially in Mrs. MacTeer’s community). They serve as an alternate family to Pecola. Pecola looks up to them (shocking/provocative criticism of society)
- Complexity of moralistic judgment of prostitutes: the author shows us that Pecola shouldn’t be with the prostitutes however illustrates the niceness and affection they give Pecola.
9/8-9/9 Terminale Bluest Eye Recap:
The Dick and Jane basal readers were aimed at children in grade school and used to teach basic reading skills from the 1930’s until the ‘60s.
Morrison recreates a Dick and Jane-type story, with a focus on the character of Jane and her family.
We noticed that, upon reading the book a second time, we can hear sinister echoes in the Dick and Jane prologue. Details like the strength of Jane’s father, or the fact that Jane wants her parents to “play” with her, carry different implications once we know the story of Pecola’s rape by Cholly, her mother’s rejection of her, etc.
Is Jane supposed to represent Pecola? The language and tone of the Dick and Jane passage is very condescending to Jane, telling her what to see and think. Similarly, everyone condescends to Pecola, but no one (with the possible exception of Claudia) wonders what is in her head.
We might also think of the irony of the Jane/Pecola comparison. Jane is, after all, everything that Pecola cannot be. So maybe Jane quickly becomes a negative image of Pecola. Within the reader, Jane is being taught how to be a good, happy girl, how to live her perfect middle-class life. In contrast, when a black girl reads the book, she is being taught what she ought to be but can never hope to become. And the behavior of Jane in the stories does not really make sense in the real worlds of the MacTeer girls and Pecola.
So Jane becomes a kind of fantasy, an object of desire, like Shirley Temple. The eyes, in particular, are the focus of desire. (Why?)
Morrison might be asking us to consider: what are the effects on a young black girl of being exposed from the earliest years of her life to an ideal of whiteness and feminine beauty that she can never, even in the most basic way, embody?
As we learn language, we learn about culture. When we learn to speak and read, we also learn what our culture expects of us. In the case of Dick and Jane, a child learns what a “normal” family is supposed to look like, how normal family members are supposed to behave. A black girl, then, learns of her alienation from middle-class white culture and its ideas of beauty at the moment she begins to learn language.
But, we might ask, does this ideal really exist? Does the Dick and Jane model of the family hold up?
Morrison displays a literal collapsing of the Dick and Jane story, or myth, by first removing the punctuation, and then the spaces between words. The text runs together and becomes meaningless. She shows us how the story loses meaning through this typographical display on the page.
The Dick and Jane model of family life may be a lie, but it has a destructive influence on girls like Frieda, and especially Pecola, who is so vulnerable to its influence. They cannot hope to look and be like Jane. They can never be white, blond, and blue-eyed. They can never be beautiful, in their own eyes, once they have been indoctrinated into the culture of Dick and Jane, Shirley Temple, and white baby dolls.
A Street Car Named Desire, by Tennessee Williams
1. Describe the setting in as much detail as you can. Why is it important?
2. What symbols, metaphors or motifs in Scene 1 strike you as significant? Name at least three and explain why.
3. Comment on the relationship between Blanche and Stella. What do you notice about it? How are the two sisters similar? And different?
Melodrama: a drama such as a play, film, or television program, characterized by exaggerated emotions, stereotypical characters, and interpersonal conflicts
Melodrama stretches the boundary of cause and effect
A Street Car Named Desire might be doing just that.
1. Setting: New Orleans, 1947
There are different ethnicities in the town. The community is racially mixed. A lot of the south is heavily segregated at the time, however this town is different. Stella lives in an apartment. The town is also very poor.
Unlike most play writes, Williams gives a lot of description of setting.
William uses Negro and colored, which was not offensive at the time, when describing the people.
The setting could be described as gloomy, seedy, squalid, decrepit, sordid, and morose.
2. Tone: melancholy. The mood is captured very well by the blue piano. Out of the two very pronounced music motifs in the play, the piano is one of them. The other recurring motif is the waltz, which comes up a little later.
p. 31: "the music of the polka rises up" è second recurring music motif
Alcohol: Blanche drinks a lot. It is also a symbol referring to the notion of escape and addiction. It might refer to the fragility of Blanche’s character.
Belle Reve is the ancestral home, which comes from the French Beau Reve. We can tell that Stella and Blanche came from a wealthy family. They are educated. However, they are now in gentile poverty: they have a certain class, but they do not have the money to sustain the lifestyle that suits that class.
Belle Reve is a symbol of the past and the wealth they used to have.
Passage p. 26-27:
Blanche is defending herself, even though Stella did make any accusation. Blanche takes a very defensive posture, which might mean that she is hiding something.
3. They try to blame stuff on each other. Blanche is controlling the conversations, whereas Stella answers with shirt simple answers.
Blanche always criticized Stella’s lifestyle. She notes that Stella does not have a maid, but they are in gentile poverty.
For every comment Blanche makes, there is an implied criticism. In the way the questions are posed, there is a demeaning characteristic.
Stella lives in a condition that Blanche finds shockingly déclassé and shockingly bad.
Thursday
Stanley enjoys women.
He is the gaudy seed bearer. è reference to sexuality
Stanly and Blanche have an exchange starting on page 37.
Stanley’s language shows that he is part of a lower class, which doesn’t not imply that he is not educated.
Blanche doesn’t think that he is the most appropriate person. He appears crass, crude, unsophisticated, uncultivated maybe a bit rude (takes his shirt of in front of her).
Williams conveys all of this in a brief part in scene 1.
Blanche is very uncomfortable about talking about her previous husband. There is something that she does not want to bring up. We can presume that it is something that we will find out about later.
p. 32-43
Exchange between Blanche and Stanley
The past is constantly coming up.
Stanley always tries to be right and control the conversation. Blanche isn’t hiding anything, but she isn’t entirely open. Stanley tries very hard to get at what he thinks Blanche is possibly hiding.
He is looking for papers showing the sale of Belle Reve. Stanley is showing that he knows about the law, and he might have a head for business. He said that he doesn’t like to be swindled.
Blanche flirts a lot with Stanley and is good with words.
There was a preview of the conversation before it actually occurred when Stanley said everything to Blanche that Stella told him not to stay, which is exactly what they spoke about.
When Stanley goes through Blanche’s belongings, he sees all the wealthy clothing. This shows that he is rude, intruding. He assumes that the rhinestones are real jewelry. We also see that Blanche wants to appear rich and well dressed, but its all fake. She acts like she has a lot of money, but she doesn’t. "A woman’s charm is fifty percent illusion." She is pretending to be wealthy. In terms of class background, Blanche is above Stanley, but she does not actually have that much money.
Blanche wants to show an illusion of herself, but Stanley wants to dispel this illusion.
There is a sort of dance between them. Stanley is trying to rip apart Blanche’s illusions about herself.
Love letters: She says that now that Stanley touched them, she will burn them.
She is reacting in a very genuine way. When Stanley insists about the truth of Belle Reve, she is upset, but not as much as she is about the love letters.
Her husband was evidently young, as she calls him a boy.
