Extra Credit POST!

As a group we decided when we first started the blog to split up the work equally, like one person doing the blog and another doing the comment each week. We thought it would work great because the concept was so simple. We definitely thought that writing the blog together worked well but I don’t think we intended to get so busy with other stuff. We all definitely agree that his blog went well in the beginning but fell apart at the end because people forgot it was their turn to do the blog. To be honest I think we had a good idea of who was doing what, but if we could change something we would probably get ahold of each other to make sure we did our blog posts. That would be the only change to our group blogs. I think we as a group felt like we succeed with what we had said in our blog manifesto because we were trying to being comedic while writing and we definitely got that. I think for all of us it changed how we thought of what we were going to write because it had to be satirical attire. I think I had the most fun just writing the blog manifesto because it was what we were going to talk about this entire semester. But overall what we got from this blog was information about what our books were about. I feel that we learned information on things we didn’t learn about in class because it involved research and we all felt like we grasped the concept of what we had said in our blogs. 

                                                       This is Shane Winkelbauer

                                                       Two Thumbs Way UP !!!!!

De' Awakening mon ami

We are back ladies and gents. After a brief hiatus your favorite literary masterminds have returned and this week I, the ever enchanting Trevor Mashburn, will be tackling the complex and creole loaded story of The Awakening by Kate Chopin.

First off let's take a second and talk about the author for a minute. Kate Chopin was, no doubt, a very tough lady. Her life, especially her childhood, was by no means an easy one. We at TTWU believe that her rough upbringing also unhinged what later became her intriguing literary style. One word to describe Chopin is gutsy. One of her favorite story themes is feminism. In the modern climate this theme goes off without issue. However, this was a very touchy subject especially in the South where Chopin hailed from. I use the word touchy, but in all honesty trying to change the ways and traditions of the 19th century deep south could, and often did, get very messy and occasionally violent. So it definitely took brilliance on the part of Chopin to both clearly broadcast her message, and subtly place it in her story.

Now we enter the story itself. We are introduced to the Pontelliers featuring the nice but overly work oriented Leonce and his exasperatedly frustrated wife Edna. Edna and her unrest is the focus of the story and the plot line follows her various experiences that cause her eyes to open up to who she could be. An awakening if you would (thats where that comes from). The story is set in the French Quarter of Louisiana, and of course is filled with Creole people, and their fantastic food. Edna's two close friends are Adele, who is the epitome of what a stereotypical southern woman should be, and the untamed and passionate Mademoiselle Reisz. These two represent a sort of yin and yang of the internal battle going on inside of Edna. Adele is who Edna is supposed to be in that culture, and initially Edna believes this as well. Yet, as the story progresses Edna realizes that she hates many of the things Adele implores her to love. Reisz clearly has a much greater influence over Edna especially as the story progresses. The reason for this is simply passion. Edna's life is devoid of passion and she hates it. Her marriage is self proclaimed as passionless, and the man she has an affair with Robert is a very passionate individual. Edna spurns the normal expected lives of woman due to the lack of much freedom or fire. This is what Reisz brings to the table and it is through this that Edna begins to become a new more passionate woman.

Huck Finn's Sunday Service

Hey everyone, this is Jackson and unfortunately I was unable to make it to the MASC this week so instead I will discuss our current flavor of the month, the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.  Specifically, the idea of good christian morals and how the idea of what those are conflicts with the characters actions.

From the very beginning we are introduced to characters such as Widow Douglas and Miss Watson who are trying to teach Huck good moral values and to observe practices such as prayers before dinner.  At the same time as she preaches her church values, she is fully willing to engage in the hunt for Jim and Huck and does not see any wrongdoing in killing a slave.  This illustrates the detachment from reality that seemed to pervade the era in that they quite literally didn't see slaves as humans and as such there was no penalty for their death.

Later on, we are introduced to the Grangerfords and Sheperdsons who are nice, god-fearing families who attend church every Sunday.  However, these families prescribe to a gospel of vengeance and are noted as bringing weapons to the service as a way of threatening each other over a feud whose beginning has been long forgotten.  Once again, we see how these characters can act in direct violation of their religions moral code, just because that's the way of things, or that's how it has always been.  I've never been much of a churchgoer but something seems inherently wrong with trying to shoot thy neighbor you have been directly commanded to love.

Twain does a remarkable job of weaving in the irony that those who are raised on good christian morals can be so easily blinded to their own actions and how they transgress those exact values.  He doesn't portray them as driven to wrongdoing, they're merely misguided.  This imparts to the reader that just because you were raised a certain way, doesn't mean you are in the right.  On top of this there are other religious themes in the book such as Jackson Island, a haven of solitude and protection for both Jim and Huck.  This island, detached from society as it is, is almost a metaphor for the Garden of Eden.  And, just like in the Garden of Eden, when Huck does something he shouldn't, (leaving the dead snake by Jim's leg) they are punished in turn by the snake, or the protector of Eden.

So, we see throughout the book a clear message from Twain.  Just because someone preaches something doesn't mean they follow it to the letter and that their actions speak truer than their honeyed sermons.  That's all for this post, hope you enjoyed reading!

-Jackson Zeiner
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            Should Huckleberry Finn be taught in today's classrooms? That is a question that Alvin Powell looked to solve when writing this article, Fight over Huck Finn continues: Ed School professor wages battle for Twain classic. Due to the repeated use of the 'N' word several teachers have pushed for the book to be removed from the curriculum and replaced by a more modern novel. Huckleberry Finn is an American icon of a novel, Mark Twain is regarded as one of the greatest writers of all times. One key individual is Jocelyn Chadwick, a professor at Harvard University, she is for keeping Huckleberry Finn in the classroom. She pushes that the only reason teachers or parents want the book removed from schools is, "is that parents and teachers who object to its inclusion in the curriculum sometimes view the text through a lens colored by their own experiences, or by their community's experiences, or by the strained present of race relations."

            This idea that the people objecting to the book are not thinking what is best for the children, but rather what would make them more comfortable. This article explains more into the debate, but in the end it comes down to the children. Should children be taught from the best possible source? or should we cater to what makes us comfortable and let the education fall to the wayside. Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn is one of the greatest novels in history. Students should not be prevented from learning from such a great piece, instead they should be striving to push the boundaries in search of an even greater novel.

 

This is David Akers

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What Was Dickens Thinking????

To start off, this book is hella dark. As we talked in class about what was happening in Hard Times, we see that not much is happening in the industrial city of Coketown. But seriously, who names a town COKETOWN. Anyways in class we had talked about themes of the book, which mostly related around darkness and despair. We can tell that Charles Dickens is great writer but I don’t really know what he was thinking when he wrote this book, but some thought he was just fed up with utilitarianism and political Economy.  This book literally takes us through a life of two people, a boy and girl, brother, sister and how they were raised through economical theory, which pretty much ruined their life. Charles Dickens wanted to prove to everyone that Utilitarianism is a load of garbage, especially when it tries to take over Judeo-Christian ideas, I don’t know what the hell these ideas are since I am a Catholic and we are the best. But it somehow ties into morality and how utilitarian thinkers tried to replace this with more statistical based explanations with their motto basically being “SCIENCE BITCH!” and here is poor old Charles Dickens saying “Whoa that’s not cool bro” and thus the creation of this story is made.

            Economists had different theories to go off of this and it’s pretty interesting to see what they have said. Take David Ricardo for example, he wanted people to know that they as economists didn’t want to tell people how to live their lives (Yeah because that makes a lot of sense based on these utilitarian thinkers), then you have economists like Harriet Martineau who say “Hell Yeah! Let’s tell these people how to live their lives (That’ll work out well). Then here comes once again good ole Charles Dickens who is the wise one of everyone and says “Hey screw both those ideals and let people be who they are without the use of math and crap” (My Homie right there). So thus like I stated earlier he wrote the novel Hard Times in order to get his own ideals and voice across to these thinkers and normal human beings in this awesome but screwed up world. With ideals in his head and a smartass mouth Dickens wrote probably one of the most depressing stories that I have never read and yes it really did get across to the people in a sense that it hit every key issue that was brought up during his time.

This is Shane Winkelbauer

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It's all about heart

        Ah yes so we've reached the crucial juncture in any American literature class where we delve into the violent lunacy that is the brilliant works of Edgar Allan Poe. Poe is the author who may be most commonly associated with being a possible sociopath. I cannot speak for how he was as a person, but seriously this guy writes some pretty dark, gruesome,and other wise disturbing things. It is very well written, but disturbing none the less. Slow painful murders, being buried alive, disembowelment, Poe covers all forms of violence in spectacular literary fashion. Usually overly violent stories would be thrown out as garbage, but Poe's brilliance as a writer refuses to let that happen in any of his works.

For example, one of Poe's most famous pieces is the short-story A Tell-Tale Heart. The story takes the place from the view of the narrator plotting to kill the old man he lives with. The odd part being the narrator admits that the old man has never wronged or insulted him in anyway. Not that if he had the consequent murder would then be acceptable, but at least there would be something relating to understanding from the reader. But no the only reason the narrator presents is the old man's "evil eye". This poor old soul has cataracts and this freaks the narrator out. This narrator claims that he still has his sanity and just suffers from something resembling nervousness, a big red flag. If you have to try and convince yourself that you are sane there's a good chance that you may not be all there in the head. So for seven days this guy opens the old man's door at night looking for this evil eye. He watches the old man while he sleeps, but remember he's not crazy. On the eight night the old man awakens and the narrator smothers him with the old man's bed. In classic Poe style the narrator dismembers him, and hides the body beneath the floor boards. Of course the old man screamed and so the police are called, and they come to investigate. Here is what makes this story a great piece of literature. Shortly before he kills the man the narrator claims to hear his heart beat. This of course is not entirely possible, but Poe uses this to illustrate the narrator's conscience. Usually a conscience is just the voice in your head that tells you right from wrong, but due to this characters lack of sanity he hallucinates and hears the beating of the old man's heart even after killing and storing the body. The more guilty the narrator feels the louder the sound gets until he finally rips up the floor and admits to the murder. The irony here is that the narrator convinces himself that the police present could also hear the noise and knew he was guilty. They could not in fact he was well on his way to getting away with this crime. This is how Poe makes this story great. Poe uses the narrator's possible insanity to show guilt in a way that most people would never exhibit. It is also different in that Poe tells the story from the view of the antagonist. This is a common tactic Poe uses and it works very well. In most stories the reader doesn't get this sort of detailed look inside the head of the bad guy. Poe does not always present his stories with a clear cut protagonist, but often uses an antagonist vs victim type display. This results in stories that are both intriguing and entertaining, and is not something most could. It is for this reason Poe has stood the test of time and why his overall violent style of writing is accepted as great works of literature. Many other writers, even in the modern day, have used this approach and it all began with Poe and his own style of brilliant darkness. I am still wondering where he would come up with stuff like this, but I digress. After all HIS beating heart was most likely in the right place.

This is Trevor Mashburn

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Walk a mile in god's shoes

Hey readers, this week we’re continuing on with our discussion of Mary Shelly’s “Frankenstein” but this week we’re going to do some more analyzing of the text.  One question that was asked of the book was, do humans have the right to play god?  More specifically this question pertains to the realm of life and death.  Now, one might say that mankind has always been endowed with the ability to create life (though it is a privilege some might argue that is overused).  But, from a philosophical point of view, that organic process by which a child is grown was given unto us by god.  Now, if we were to circumvent this process and thrust a being into life without the chance to have grown accustomed to life, are we treading in god’s domain?

          Furthermore, what is expected of the creator or father?  Do we expect god to impart upon each of us the wisdom required to navigate through society?  Or is that a job that falls to the created?  Can the monster truly blame Victor for bringing him into the world unprepared?  We see that the Monster does very much believe that it is his creator’s fault, that he should be cast into the world so unceremoniously and left to his own devices.  A fate which fosters his intense hatred and misery, and forces him to lash out against his creator.  Now, we as humans can raise our fists to the heavens and scream any manner of obscenities at god, but what makes Frankenstein so interesting is that he is able to physically surpass and in turn, harm his creator.

         So, the moral question is, if mankind obtains the power to surpass god, what responsibilities fall upon our shoulders?  And, is that something that we can do while still being morally clean?  I would believe that man should be wary of playing god for as is seen in Frankenstein; there can be a world of unintended consequence.

This is Jackson Zeiner, signing off.