What the Prufrock?!

Soo, as you can tell along with almost everyone else in the class that im going back into previous stories and poems that we've read in order to catch up with my blog entries. After rereading T.S. Eliot's poem " The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock," I still would have to say that its an interesting read, i enjoy the up beat tone; yet im still confused on what exactly the author is trying to say. It sounds like to me that the author is speaking to or about someone whom he'd like to be with but is too nervous to talk to, which is a feeling many men can relate to; being intimidated by some women. And for that reason, i would have to say that i enjoy the poem and would recommend it to someone with a better vocabulary than my own.

Let America Be America Again says Mr. Hughes

I really love Langston Hughes' poem Let America Be America Again written in 1938, for a number of reasons. The feeling of America not truly being " the land of the free" is one that is all too common even to this day by all of its citizens. In the poem Hughes states," it was never America to me," Hughes is expressing the way he feels that the idea of "America" where people could come to start a new life and live as free men, was untrue in his eyes and the eyes of minorities; and expresses how he wants to see America the way it was intended to be. These thought Hughes is expressing in his poem are ones felt by almost every man regardless of race even to this day, which is one of the reasons that makes this poem so great; people still relate to the poem after so many years. It seems that compared to the days when the poem was written, that we have come a long way in our progress toward equality among men, though we still have a long way to go.

Writting My Research Paper

Well being that I took English 121 to get here, I have written research papers before; not to say they were very good but nonetheless, I have written a research paper before. And it’s pretty easy to tell that research papers aren’t my favorite things in the world, but this one (though I’m still working on it) has proven to be much easier to get into, once I have the time to work on it. Although it’s not necessarily the most important or interesting of topics (Illegal Immigration), I found that because I have personal experience and events that relate to the topic it’s made it much easier for me to get into and get more interested in my topic and learn as much as possible on the subject; and write what I’m really trying to say, rather than rambling on and on, constantly repeating myself and turning in a decent paper rather than a good or great one. Also, I’m not so sure I had never heard of a “nay- sayer” but incorporating them in my work so far has proven successful in supporting some of my details about my subject. I like the way I can think of ways people will disagree with what I’m saying in my paper, and give a rebuttal to whatever their argument might be. I think that they are making a difference turning a bland, one-sided view on a topic and making it into a well thought –out argument on my position on Illegal Immigration.

What's Love? Got to do, Got to do Wit' it Babe'? (haha)

After reading What we Talk About When we Talk About Love, by Raymond Carver it made me think about what my beliefs on the subject were. Basically all four characters had different, yet pretty similar thoughts. However, Terri's views about her ex who had killed himself for her out of love is commonly debated; and honestly it can go either way. There is no exact answer to the question of, what is love? And adding the, man-killing-himself-for-his-wife factor, definatly seems to complicate the situation a little more. But I suppose I personally wouldn't deny Terri of the thought as her husband did, because I definatly know first hand that love will make you crazy sometimes (lol). I enjoyed the read, it was interesting and made me think about the subject. I also enjoyed the in-class discussion about the story, everyone had pretty different things to say about the Terri's ex and I thought it was a pretty interesting discussion as well.

Two Kinds

Amy Tan's poem Two Kinds had to with a a pretty common conflict bewtween parent-offspring relationships; which made it so easy to relate to. The mother wanted her daughter to become sucessful and pushed her daughter to the point where she wanted to rebel. Almost anyone could relate with this story but the question is who are we the readers supposed to sympathize with? I personally don't have an opinion but people sympathize for each for many reasons. The mother had a rough time trying to make a better life for the daughter; she only wanted the best for her daughter and to be sucessful,etc. Many say that the girl was pushed too hard and that the mother was to blame. So read it and you can tell me how you feel guys, I guess I would say I feel for both of them, it was an equal effort. But I enjoyed the read, it was an interesting story which personally got me thinking about the relationships between me and my own parents; I would reccomend it.

I Love Snow too Mr.Frost

I'm not sure if anyones noticed the slight irony between Robert Frost and his poem Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening. Anyway, I liked this poem a lot; like almost anyone I love snow and there aren't many things as pretty I guess you could say. I thought it was a well thought out and great way to describe the beauty of the snow covered woods so vividly. Some people feel that the ending where Frost twice says," And miles to go before I sleep," that it feels negative as if he doesn't want to leave. But I think that because in the line before these two he states that he has promises to keep, he is honoring the promise with dignity and is looking at the road home in a head first additude; as if he were about to start running on foot, leaving the horse behind screaming to his wife whom he promised he wouldn't be home late, " I'ma comin' home babay!" ( lol )

Tom Cruise and Brook Shields are Annoying.

So i just read Keith Alexander's paper on , What the Arguement between Tom Cruise and Brook Sheilds Demonstrated about the Media and I have mixed feelings. He had a decent arguement saying that the media was making diagnoseson on "postpardum depression," and it was interesting how he was relating the situation to Gilman's The Yellow Wallpaper. However, I guess that the arguement jus wasn't, in my opinion, interesting; and therefore it made the paper difficult to read and I found myself pretty much questioning everything that was said. I personally didn't care for the paper; I suppose it's just the matter of, " I don't care about Tom Cruise's and Brook Sheilds' opinions on " postpardum depression." Although Sheild's apparently suffers from the condition, neither her or Tom Cruise are experts on the subject and neither are the writters for what ever "media" forms Keith is refering to. Therefore, I could personally careless. .... : /

An Absence of Human Touch

After reading Brittany Thomas' paper about the, Relative Absence of Human Touch in "The Yellow Wallpaper," I feel like she's really got something here. She's stating that massage therapy was a part of Gilman's personal rest cure therapy, and that it draws question to why she did not include this in her story, The Yellow Wallpaper. I would have to admit that this is not something that I really took into consideration so it was an interesting paper to read. She did good research on the rest cure, which was good and overall it gave me a slightly better understanding of the story. However, Im not completely sold on her arguements. She was saying that S. Weir Mitchell exposed massage therapy as a part of his rest cure therapy, and was saying that he thought it was," a tonic of extraordinary value." But it confused me when she was saying that he wouldn't perform massage therapy himself. I felt like it wasn't a very strong arguement on his behalf saying that it was valuable but never doing it to see the other reactions of different rest cure patients. Because of this I guess it sort of made me devalue her arguement.

A Different John Faints

After reading Katie Johnson's paper on, The Meaning of the Husband's Fainting in "The Yellow Wallpaper, I actually have to agree with her interpretation. I liked her arguement, how his fainting was a sign of his loss of identity; rather than signs of him being femine. Her arguement was one that hadn't really been explored and that impressed me nd I also liked the way she compared her idea to the different interpretations of so many other people. It made for a really strong arguement, and I would have to say that i agree with her. The only part that I didn't like about her paper was mainly that once she stated her idea, she continuely repeated herself when trying to prove her point. She had good arguements but I felt like it was an effort to lengthen the paper by repeating the idea after each example that she gives for the arguement. But I did like the paper and it was

Who Hates Literature Analysis?

I found that the most difficult part of writing this literary analysis paper was simply analyzing the text and what it meant. Often times authors leave out parts of their work to make the reader think twice about its meaning; but depending on who you are these types of things can be read differently but different people. Thinking about the meaning of these absent thoughts can prove to be fairly difficult, as well as trying to explain them and what they mean. Im not too sure about how difficult the comparative analysis paper will compare in difficulty to the literary analysis but I sure do hope that I won't have as much trouble. Maybe because ill have more to talk about between two or more texts and comparing and contrasting them, it won't prove to be as difficult as writing a four page analysis on a three stanza poem. Although it may not be as difficult as the paper before, I do see a few difficulties that I'll have to overcome when writing. Because I will be comparing two or more works of literature, finding relivence and finding a common topic or theme might prove to be fairly difficult. As well as elabortating on the differences and similarities and why they might matter to us. In order to try and overcome a few obstacles, I plan to focus on one work and use the second to support my thesis.

Sharon Olds' "True Love"

In class this week we read a few different poems and short stories but the one that caught my eye the most would have to hve been True Love, by Sharon Olds. The enjambment style poem consists of Olds describing her love for her husband (whom she describes as being bound to in several ways throughout the poem) after making love.
Although the poem is titled True Love, I found myself questioning it ( the title) after reading the first few lines where Olds describes how, " we look at each other in complete friendship," after making love. This seemed a little odd to me but as the poem proceeds she describes how she is bound to her husband in several ways ( such as: " tie of the delivery room, meaning their children) and says how ," surely this is the most blessed time of my life;" which supported the title.
But again by the end of the poem I found myself puzzled at the last line in which she says twice," I cannot see beyond it." At first I felt it was out of place and sounded negative, but after reading closely and trying to deconstruct the phrase I came to the conclusion that this is Olds saying that she could not see herself with anyone or anywhere else other than with her husband whom she has found true love with.
I believe this was a vey powerful and thoughtful poem which i enjoyed and would recommend to anyone interested in poetry.

( I attempted to put a picture of a random couple holding hands while walking but my laptop is lame and wouldn't let me.)