Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Prospero's Books


It was said that if you took away Prospero's books it would kill him. I believe this concept is true for many people. Prospero's reasoning was that he would not be able to perform his magic but for us mortals I think that many people rely on their books and reading as a way to escape the hustle and bustle of everyday life. There are so many people that would be absolutely devastated if their books were taken away from them. Some people would have no way to view the outside world which that alone would kill many people. I know people who would lose their minds if they were never allowed to read again. My grandma says that reading keeps her sain and I believe it! Prospero needed his books for magic and many of us need books for our sanity!

Notes 6/11-6/25

6/11

Phonetic symbolism

a sound communicates without being understood
tiny, teeny

6/18

The Tempest Cluster

good guys and bad guys

good

Miranda
Ferdinand

Bad

alonso
prospero
antonio
sebastian

*Retelling of all other shakspere writings
-last play
-based on all comedies, tradgidy, and romance

shows bad relationship between brothers

Caliban rearranged in retellings in anagram

Gonzalo put survival needs into boat for prospero
- take away prosperos books to kill him

proserpo is stage manager

no storm at all, just in their heads by prospero's magic
No Tempest!

alkami
perfecting the human soul

anamnsesis
we already possess perfect and complete knowledge we just forgot it all
have someone help you remember

6/20

Ariel is special effects manager

hour glass is referenced in this story

Plagorized speech from metamohisis in the tempest

Miranda and Ferdinand playing chess at the end

06/22

Hamlet cluster

hamlet has the most ? of any play
iambic pentameter with no ending ryhme - blank verse

simple words in shakspere, to be or not to be
mono syllables

remember
very important in Hamlet and Tempest

06/25

domestic farse:
married people all kinds of silly things going on

falstaff is scapegoat figure

Hamlet speaks siloqueys

3 things in life:
saying, doing, seeing

Grave scene
digger only one in play that can keep up with hamlet's sarcasim

night-sea journey
hamlet sees the world differently since his trip, just like wizard of oz

"Let it be" Hamlets' last speech

Innocence






Over the past five weeks we have gone over many different clusters, but one simularity stands out in all of them. It seems like in every story there is an innocent young woman who is about to be corrupted in some way, shape or form. There is, of course Little Red Riding Hood who is educated about the wolf and his lies, in more ways than one! Connie really does lose her innocence in Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? Miranda is completely innocent to the fact that she shares the world with men, other than her father and the two slaves on the island she is soon to find out that there are many men in the world. Hamlet's Ophelia is an innocent soul and a good girl madly in love with Hamlet until her father's death drives her mad and she kills herself.



All of these women posses the characteristics of innoncence and corruption. These stories were all written in completely different eras. To me that is a sign that even back in the days of Shakespere that the loss of innocence in a woman, wheather it be sexual or intellectual it made for good entertainment. I think that as a society, then and now, want women to be innocent figures and their corruption is something out of the ordinary that is looked at as wrong or sad. I think that all women are portrayed as angels but they all have their evil, naughty or wreckless streak in them somewhere.

Final Paper

Final Paper
English 123

Dayle Janhunen



























When I signed up for this class I had no idea what to expect. Even after I had bought my book I knew that some of our topics were going to be on the retellings of stories, but I had no idea that so many different kinds of stories were so closely tied together. Now that I know this, I find myself watching movies and reading other stories to see if I can figure out what it is a retelling of.
This class has also made me more interested in older literature because this is where the stories first began and I think that by knowing these stories it will help me understand where “new” stories come from and how they are twisted and retold in a different version.
While I was reading plays, such as Hamlet in high school it had never occurred to me that many of the movies and stories that I had read and watched were all produced because of Hamlet. When I am a teacher I am going to make sure that I introduce this concept to my students. I think that teaching a whole unit on retellings will vastly increase the student’s appreciation for literature, just as it has for me.
I also believe that it is very important to note that many stories are retold in different cultures. The common factors and the differences in the stories are a good window to learn about new cultures and their views and norms on life. The retelling of Cinderella, Yeh-hsien, is a perfect example of this. By comparing the Chinese version to the American version it is plain to see the differences in the cultural norms of the two societies. Just by reading the American version and comparing it to the Chinese version it is obvious that American culture is obsessed with female beauty, happy endings and revenge on those that have done wrong to us. However the Chinese version is not solely focused on Cinderella a character and this may be because women were thought less of in Chinese culture than men. Also, the fact that the sister is not as mean and sinister in the Chinese version makes me think that Chinese culture does not focus on jealousy and rivalry. These points can be compared and contrasted by students of any age. That is why retellings would make a great teaching tool.
Another point learned in this class is how important one author can be and how that person can affect the lives of so many people with their work. While I was doing research on W.B. Yeates and his poem The Second Coming I was completely mesmerized by his life and the way he expressed his ideas through his writing. This poem was the hot topic through the turn of the century and is still a hot topic among many biblical analysts.
William Shakespere is another author and poet who has changed the way we view literature today. He set the criteria in stone for the way a story should be told. I believe that is why so many of his stories, plays and poems are retold today. His imagination, language and writing technique are very well-respected, even among those who do not know anything about literature.
Those who do not know anything about literature can only say, “The Cathedral is Tall”. They have no understanding about what literature really means or how it affects their lives. Now that I have taken this class, I can say so much more than, “The Cathedral is Tall”. At the beginning of this class we were much like the narrator in the Cathedral. Our descriptions were weak and we were often annoyed when we would have to answer questions or exlplain what a text meant to us. However, these last four weeks have opened our eyes to all of the vast meanings behind works of literature. Now we have a new found respect for ancient works and most of us enjoy deciphering the literature to find the deeper meaning. If someone had asked me what The Tempest meant to me four weeks ago, I would have laughed at them and said, “What?”. Now I have the knowledge to be able to explain this wonderful play to other people. I also know how important the play is to literature. I am really happy that I learned that information. I truly believe that it will make me a better person and teacher to my students when I graduate.
Another important aspect to this class was the Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? cluster. This story is such a huge basis on so many motion pictures that are coming out today. It also has a great deal of ties to other types of stories, such as Little Red Riding Hood. Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? is a great story by itself. It did not need to be retold in so many different ways. However, the fact that it has been retold so many times proves what a great story it really is. Other authors obviously had a great deal of respect for Joyce Carol Oates’ novel and wanted to be a part of that respect. I believe this is why so many great stories are retold. The authors want to find ways of enhancing the original story and they put their own twists on it so that they can call it there own. There is nothing wrong with this aspect. I think that it is a great idea and I think that many authors would love to have their stories retold over and over again.
After taking this class, I have learned so much about literature and the stories behind the stories. It has become a new found interest of mine, one that I will keep looking into and learning more about. Like I said, I will definitely incorporate a retelling unit into my classroom when I become a teacher. I would have loved to learn about these aspects when I was younger, I may have appreciated literature a little more.

Mary Wives of Winsdor

I liked the play, although it was hard to hear for me. When I got home I looked the play up on the net and went through it to see what I had missed. Although the play was funny, especially Falstaff. I really like Shakespere's more suspenful plays such as Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet, I guess I have just always associated Shakespere as being a more suspense driven author than a comedian. Not that A Midsummer Night's Dream and Mary Wives of Winsdor is not funny, but I just prefer Shakespere suspense to comedy.

Hamlet

Hamlet is an amazing story. One that has been retold over and over again. But why is this?

Hamlet is a masterpiece of suspense, murder and the mystery of one man's sanity. That is what is interesting to right about, it sells and it keeps you coming back for more. All of these aspects of Hamlet make for a great modern day movie. The fact that Shakespere was the orginal writer that globbed these combonations together is a masterpiece in itself. I would love to be able to reach inside Hamlet's imagination today and see all of the stories that that man had in his head that he never got to write down on paper. Shakespere once said that, "If you write it down, it will live forever." He was right, 400 years later we are still using him as the basis of our own literature. As I am reading his amazing works I often find myself wondering what he never got to write down. It would be very interesting to know!

Ophelia

Ophelia was such an interesting character to me, she was my favorite even when I read this story in high school. We had a huge discussion one day about wheather or not Ophelia went mad because Hamlet, the love of her life, had killed her father or only her father's death? Or could it have been a combonation of both?
I beleived then and I still believe now that it was a combonation of the two evils that drove her mad. Women in that time solely counted on men for survival. Women most likely could not live on their own, if they did they recieved a bad reputation from the town and was usually referred to as a witch. So I think that when Ophelia lost the two most important men in her life, she had the thought of "What do I do now?" The thought of living without the man that supported her all her life and living without the man that was going to support her for the rest of her life drove her absolutely mad.
She also may have thought that no one else would want her. It does not say this in the play, but what if her and Hamlet had "got it on" before any of these events took place? She really would be alone for the rest of her life then because in those days it was unacceptable for a woman to be with more than one man in her lifetime. She would be shunned by other men. I believe that is why she went mad and killed herself. She had nothing left to live for and nothing left to look forward to.

Wednesday, June 20, 2007

The Hour Glass



The hour glass is used so often in so many different stories.


1. Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?


2. The Tempest


3. The Wizard of Oz


4. Aladdin




These four stories are just to name a few. I had always believed that time was something that the American culture had only recently started obsessing about. I never paid attention to the signs that time has always been an issue with society as a whole. The hour glass is the perfect representation for the drama of time. It is a symbol that time is running out it gives no indication of stalling or stoping. The sand just keeps flowing until it is all transfered to the bottom. (Times UP!) To many of us that is the most horrible thing that can possibly happen. Running out of time is a castrophe! Weather you are taking a test, trying to get things done, deadlines or just dying! We all fear running out of time. That is why the hour glass is such a good symbol in literature, it is the suspense before the end.


Aladdin

Our discussion in class today about the Tempest, brought something to my attention. Just as Gone With the Wind and the Wizard of Oz are re-tellings of this play I also think that the Disney movie Aladdin may also be a Tempest re-telling in some ways. I will list the aspects:

1. The love between Jasmine and Aladdin
2. Jafar trying to usurp the throne from the king
3. The Gini is Aladdin's servant and promises to set him free.
4.The Gini is also Aladdin's special effect manager who wants his freedom, much like Ariel
5. The hour glass is used in Aladdin to portray time, just as it is talked about and referred to in the play.
6. Abu is the monkey that is Aladdin's friend/servant but the fact that he is portrayed as a monkey may refer to Caliban.

Aladdin may be a re-telling of an ancient egyption tale but it definately has simularities to the Tempest.

Here is a link to the storyline of Aladdin in case anyone is unfamilar with how the story goes.
http://http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0103639/

Class Notes: 05/28-06/08

Archetype
-shadow cast by the plot

*shadow is something black and white but has so much going on with it.
-so many stories are different but have a similar shadow

The Moral of the Story Is the Story

Smooth Talk (Movie)

- who is ellie? (foil)
- Different ending from the book
-New family relationships
-frog prince story
-stretched out the story
-Arnold Friend is the devil in disguise
-hour glass on the car refers to hour glass in the painting
* timelessness
* Death
-Scream in the book freezes her

06/01

Realism

How do you express something that is so important to you?
-any words?

Dissoulustionment at 10:00
-Repition, ryhme
-rhythm

Archetype
-body and archetype need eachother

Yellow Woman
-Cannon
-Exsists on 2 levels
1. indian historic woman
2. grampa's story character
-real life and romance go together?

Happy Endings
-too moralistic
-perote version=moral
-grimm version=no moral

06/06

Sonnets

-all have a sense of humor, if we understand the humor
-Allusion
* reference to something else
* most are to lit.
-Limmerick
* can go against the rules, makes for great comedy
* famous for being dirty

Bettlehime does not like the version of LRRH with the moral at the end
-disney = bad
-grimm = better
*more meaning than just the moral
- belly of the wolf going down to the devil

Metamorphisis
-transformation of life into different forms

Ovid
-telling stories of the Greek gods

Portrait of the Artist of a Young Man
-names character Daedalus
-very good craftsman

When You Write It Down It Lives Forver

06/08

Carpe Diem
-Sieze the Day!

Conceit
-a way poets compare lit in an outlandish sort of way
-comparing somehing pretty to someone you think is pretty

Prosody
-understanding the language used in poetry

Personifiction and Paradox
-non-living things that have human characteristics and features

Hyperbole
-stretching the truth

Poet
-brings color into the colorless world

Meter
-the flow and rythm of poetry

# of lines in a poem

-Iambic
unstressed, stress
sonnet 73

-trochaic
stress, unstressed

-anapest
3 syllables
childrens poems

-dactils
sounds like a waltz

*most poems are iambicpentameter!

Monday, June 18, 2007

The Tempest vs. A Tempest

Shakepeare and Cesaire's versions of the Tempest plays are viewed from two very different aspects although many people may think that they are closely related.

Prospero is viewed as an innocent victim The Tempest, who is exiled by his own brother. He is not as well portrayed in A Tempest. This version takes more of a sympathy side with Caliban, expressing that Prospero took over Caliban's island which he inherited after his mother's death.

It is interesting to me how many views of one story can be told. They are not necissarily re-tellings of the story but they are different views of different characters in their situations. Take the Three Little Pigs for example, there is the famous pig's side of the story but there is also the less familiar version of the wolf's side of the story. If anyone is unfamiliar with this version this link will take you to the wolf's story. After reading it you can't help but feel bad for him just like you can't help but feel a pang of sorrow of Caliban when you realize that Prospero stole his island from him.
http://http://www.shol.com/agita/wolfside.htm

Notes, 05/26/07

-Alice Monroe influenced by Antone Checkoff "Lady and Her Pet Dog"

-Not a tangent b/c talking about literary background

-Archetypes-

1. Cinderella
2. Little Red Riding Hood
3. Where are You Going?
4. Icarus
5. Tempest

Freud

-sex, base of everything
-unconciousness

Oedipus
-most important to Freud

L.R.R.H
-wolf=whistle
construction worker=pretty girl
-fairy tale=man and woman
wolf repacious, libido driven male

The Enchanted Island
-medit
-margin: transform people
-wizard of Oz

Combel-Mythologists

-3 Aspects of Stories Worth Telling
1. Seperation
-something happens, call to adventure something happens out of the norm
2. Initiation
- some feeling and or abuse, problems
3. Return
- back to normal with new knowledge

Notes from Little Red Riding Hood Readings

-Charles Perrault-

- "Disney Fairy tale version"
- same moral, don't talk to strangers

-Brothers Grimm, Little Red Cap-

- 2 versions
- 1st very close to orginial version
- 2nd, she does not fall for wolf's lies and Red Cap and Grama outsmarts him

-Tanith Lee, Wolf Land-

-spoiled little rich girl by her father
- sent to see her strange grandmother at wolfland
-finds out gram is a wolf
-Liesel is to "inherit" the "fortune"
-she accepts her fate as Mistress of Wolfland

-Angela Carter, The Company of Wolves-

-Much more seductive and sexual
-hunter is the wolf
-seduces the wolf, does not eat her, end up in bed together

Notes from Cinderella stories

Disney-

Romance and Magic
"Mean"-pettiness, jealousy
no violence

-Brothers Grimm-

more vivid grief
more real characters, no fairy
more violent:
~pecked out eyes
~bloody feet

-Yeh-hsien-

harder to recognize as Cinderella

~Simularities in all 3~

-small feet
-not treated well by family
-sibling rivalry, found much more in modern versions
-all have some things that help "Cinderella"

Poem Analysis: The Second Coming

William Butler Yeates was an amazing and interesting literary figure. Not only was he a great Irish poet, he was also deeply connected with the occult, specifically the Golden Dawn. His membership into this occult allowed him to explore his interests in the mythological and astrological worlds. These topics became much of the basis for his writings.
Yeates’ book, A Vision, is composed of a collection of different writings, including, The Second Coming. This book and its contents are based on the mythical messages received by Yeates from the spirit world. He truly believed that by communicating with these spirits and writing down what they had to say was his way of saving the world.
Yeates viewed the world as being composed of gyres. When one gyre would end another would begin and no one would know what to expect. In 1921 when Yeates wrote The Second Coming, he believed that the world was on the edge of beginning a new gyre or perhaps none at all. It was right after the First World War and Europe was in shambles. Yeates occult also believed that western civilization was on the brink of destruction.
The Second Coming is Yeates’ view on how the world would transform from one gyre to another. He uses mythology and astrology to personify human sin and the second coming of Christ. The term “widening gyre” is a term used to describe the close end to the period of Christ. He was born at the bottom of the gyre and now time is reaching the top of it, signaling a change in gyres.
The falcon, a bird of prey, may represent that the new gyre may not be a pleasant one and the falconer at the bottom of the gyre has no control over this change. The rest of the poem makes references to creatures and objects that can be associated with myth and astrology. Spiritus Mundi was a spirit of the magic world who is mentioned in the poem that seems to cloud the image of what is about to happen in the rest of the poem. The spinx is referred to as the head of a man, body of a lion. This represents the astrological world, the lion (Leo, fire) and human (Aquarius, air). I believe that the two mixed together represents us as people and our sins. This creature in turn, reminds me of the evil world coming back to start a new gyre. It is mentioned in the Bible (Book of Revelations) that the Devil “rough beast” will come back to Earth first before God to take as many followers as he can. I believe that this is the new gyre that Yeates is talking about. Therefore, The Second Coming is not the coming of Christ back to Earth but, that of Satan coming to take in as many followers as possible before Christ comes for us.













Bibliography:

1. http://www.online-literature.com/yeats/
2. http://www.yeatsvision.com/Yeats.html
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Butler_Yeats
4. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Second_Coming_(poem)
5. http://www.yeatsvision.com/SecondNotes.html

A Version: A Closer Look at Yeates

W.B. Yeates was a very intriuging character to me. The ways he thought of and came about writing his poetry and other various writings is so unique. I really like that quality in authors. For me to soley focus on The Second Coming was hard because the more I looked into him and his writings the more interesting things I found. Many of his writings caught my eye and took my imagination. I used his background and the information about him that I knew and used it to interpret some of his other works. For example, the poem; The Cap and Bells really caught my eye. It can be found at the following website along with many other of Yeates' amazing works. http://http//www.poetry-archive.com/y/the_cap_and_bells.html.



My interpretation of this poem according to the author was that the Queen and her jester were having a love affair, probably very secretly, and the jester died. He comes back for his Queen as a spirit for her. He stays on her window sill and at first she is very reluctant to follow him and shuts him out of her room but as the poem goes on she changes her mind and opens the window and they both sail off together.



This to me seems like a classic Yeates poem because he talks about a spirit coming back to take this Queen away with him. Yeates was well-known for being a little crazy because he believed his literary ideas were messages that he recieved from the spirit world. If you look at the list of poems on the website I gave you many of the titles have a lot to do with spirits, love and deep emotional pains, also there is some that talk about the ways of the world and the ending of it. Yeates was an amazing character, he was a very talented and mysterious person just like my favorite author Edgar Allen Poe. Yeates was not as psychologically crazy as Poe but they were both very unique and eccentric characters of the literature world.

Thursday, June 7, 2007

Limerick and Icarus

Limerick

There was a Young Person of Crete,Whose toilette was far from complete;She dressed in a sack,Spickle-speckled with black,That ombliferous person of Crete.



I found this Limerick by Edward Lear on the internet. I thought that is was kind of interesting that the setting for this Limerick was in Crete and that is where The Story of Daedalus and Icarus takes place. I think that after talking about all the retellings of the story in class and how author's got together and retold the story in their own way, I think that this may be one of those retellings.

The poem is full of non-sense. It has non-sense words in it like ombliferous. That is about as relevent as bibidybobidyboo. But it is funny and you still know that the poem is about a woman from Crete, Im guessing Icarus's sister, who is not clean. Toilette refers to fixing yourself up.(Good Hygene). So here is this woman who needs to take a bath and put on some real clothes, not a sack while Icarus is flying high over her head on his way to his death. I would rather be an ombliferous person from Crete than a dead person from Crete.

Tuesday, June 5, 2007

Displacement Reactions

What can I say? Each one of these stories was amazing in their own creative way. I was honestly expecting to be bored out of my mind before class yesterday, Man was I wrong! The twists and turns in every story made each one interesting. I especially liked the stories that were more suttle I liked trying to guess and figure out exactly which story they were displacing or stories.





Tyler's story was especially interesting to me because I loved how he had all of the details written in. It really made the story come alive and I could picture every scene as if I was standing right there watching the whole thing. It made it easier to follow and kept my interest peaked. I also thought how interesting it was that mine and his story both displaced Little Red Riding Hood yet they were two totally different stories. In place, time, format, plot, everything.





I have noticed that I am now fluently, watching movies and trying to figure out which fairy tale they displace. I watched Taking Lives last night. It stars Ethan Hawke and Angelina Jolie. It is the story of Little Red Riding Hood! About a young, beautiful FBI detective sent to profile a serial killer. It turns out the serial killer is disguised as a victim in the movie and she falls for him. All the while the number one rule of the system was not to get involved with the victims. I love that just the short amount of time in this class has done this for me.

You guys should all really check this movie out. It's pretty good. See if you can see the displacement factors!!




Sunday, June 3, 2007

The Ride

She awoke with a jolting start, the alarm clock ringing in her ears. Sleepily, she set her feet on the cold, hard floor, muttering to herself, “Here we go again.” As she reached the bottom of the stairs she could already smell breakfast cooking. Her mother was standing at the stove flipping pancakes on the griddle.
Surprised, she sat down at the table. Smiling sweetly, her mother acknowledged “Good morning Maggie”. “Morning”, Maggie replied still slightly confused. Her mother was never up this early and it was usually Maggie who was in the kitchen making breakfast for everyone. “What is going on?”, Maggie asked her mother, suspiciously. “Sweetie, your grandmother fell down last night and now she is in the hospital, I have already been there this morning.” Looking very tired, she continued, “I need you to bring her some things to make her feel more comfortable.” Maggie did not want to see her grandmother like that. She loved her very much and did not want her grandma to be in any pain. However, it was much better than going to school for the day, “Alright I can do that.”
Maggie slipped on her new leather jacket that her grandmother had bought her for her birthday. Maggie loved this jacket, the soft, red leather made her olive skin glow. She pulled her car keys out of her pocket, saying good-bye to her mother, collected the bag full of goodies and stepped outside. It was a beautiful day outside, “I think I will pull the top down” Maggie thought to herself as she strutted to her new Mustang sitting in the drive way, courtosey of her ill grandmother.
Cruising down the interstate, deep in thought about her grandmother, Maggie did not notice the silver Porsche creeping up behind her until the driver was right next to her. Maggie glanced over, first noticing the beautiful car then the driver. She could see that he was a handsome man, definitely older than her, probably late in his twenties. He had dark wavy hair and was very tan. “Wow”, thought Maggie “that car is not the only hot thing on the road right now!” As the driver began to pass he caught Maggie’s eye, gave her a shy half smile then sped past her.
As Maggie was walking down the long hallway to room 302, her legs started to get weak underneath her. She did not know if they were going to be able to hold her up. Her usual strut became more of a slow-paced dragging of her feet. She was really dreading seeing her grandmother in so much pain. Maggie slowly twisted the cold metal door handle. When she entered the room she almost fainted at the sight of the man sitting next to her grandmother’s bed. It was the man in the Porsche. There was no mistake, Maggie could recognized the wavy black hair and the shy little smile that he was giving her as she entered the room. “W-Who are you?” Maggie managed to stamper out. “Sorry” he replied, “My name is Ben I am your grandmother’s neighbor. I am the one who found her this morning.” “You must be Maggie”, he said holding out his hand. Maggie grasped it. His hands were strong and powerful he squeezed her hand so tightly she thought it would pop.
While Maggie’s grandmother slept in the bed, Maggie and the young man began talking. “I’m sorry” Ben stated, “It’s just that I always see you when you come to visit your grandmother and I am always too shy to come say hello to you.” “You are very pretty. It’s kind of intimidating.” Maggie was shocked at what she was hearing. He was one of the best-looking guys she had ever seen and he was afraid of her.
The two talked for well more than an hour and grandmother still had not waken up. So they decided to go get something to eat and Ben was going to show Maggie his new Porsche. As they walked out of the room Maggie got an uneasy feeling about the stranger she was walking with. There was so much mystery and uncertainty about him, yet Maggie was extremely drawn to his good looks. How could she had never seen him around her grandmother’s neighborhood before. She was there all of the time.
When they reached the shiny silver Porsche Ben quietly opened the door for her. “Get in” he said with very little emotion in his voice. The soft, black leather felt cool on Maggie’s bare legs as she slid across the seat.
It began to start getting late, Maggie and Ben had already eaten and were now driving through town taking various different routes. “We better be getting back, Im sure she is awake by now. I would really like to see how she is feeling.” Ben, who hadn’t hardly said two words the entire trip suddenly came to life. His eyes lit up, “I really don’t think granny is waking up yet.” His soft brown eyes were suddenly full of fire. Maggie’s stomach began twisting in knots, “What do you mean?” she managed to choke out. “I mean, it was no accident that your grandmother fell down. We had to have fate bring us together in some way. It just had to be at the expense of your granny’s health.” Maggie began to feel as if the car was closing in on her. “Don’t worry, Maggie, your granny is not going to be waking up for a long time.” His shy smile was now bold and confidant. “That means that me and you have all the time in the world to be together.” “You are sick” Maggie choked out through her tears.
Maggie soon realized that the silver Porsche was not on it’s way back to the hospital, but heading out of town. Down a long stretch of road that Maggie had no idea where it would lead to. Even worse no one knew that Maggie was on this road with this strange man. Maggie had no idea what would happen to her or where she would end up. It turns out, no one else knew what happened to Maggie or where she ended up either.

Friday, June 1, 2007

The Many Faces of Little Red Riding Hood

Little Red Riding Hood is an interesting person to get to know. She and the other characters in the traditional Disney story have so many sides and faces. Each one is intriguing in their own unique way. I think that the Wolfland characters have the most grace and "character" to them.
Lady Anna~ She is not only the grandmother for the traditional aspect of the story but she is also the Big Bad Wolf. This is very creative to me because Lee twists the aspect of the poor defensless grandmother being eaten by the wolf into the poor defenseless grandmother who is being beaten by her husband. He then uses the wolf character as a defense mechanism against the grandmother's abuse making the grandmother and the wolf one character. The wolf becomes the grandmother's escape route from her abusive husband. However she is not the sick and weak character that is portrayed in most Little Red Riding Hood Stories. Lady Anna is a strong-willed, independant woman. The irony of this is that she gets her powerful inner strength from the wolf that dwells inside of her.

Lisel~ She is traditional Little Red Riding Hood in the sense that she is dearly loved not by her mother, however, but by her father. She is spoiled and doted upon by both her father and grandmother. But instead of being a sweet and caring granddaughter to her grandmother she is very self-centered and greedy. She onl'y wants a relationship from her grandmother so that she can inherit her wealth when she dies. Lisel, like Little Red Riding Hood is strangely not afraid of the wolves, as she thinks she should be. She is curiously drawn to them. Just as Little Red Riding Hood expresses her amazement for the wolves massive features, Lisel would watch and listen in awe and amazement at the way the wolves loped across the yard at the chateau and howled into the night.

The Wolf~ The wolf is not the Big Bad Wolf that has taken over most versions of the Little Red Riding Hood stories. The wolf in Wolfland is a much more intimate part of the story. The wolf is not a hungary killer looking for a meal, it is a creature who has a much deeper connection to the characters. He is a very intimate part of their lives and is the platform for which they base their lives upon.

Looking at these characters in this new light has really opened my eyes to the many different ways that a story can be told. I have recently found myself inspecting stories and movies to see if they are retellings of other fairy tales like Little Red Riding Hood.

Wednesday, May 30, 2007

Smooth Talk and Pied Piper of Tucson


Charles Schmid Jr.


After watching Smooth Talk and reading the Pied Piper of Tucson I was amazed at how closely these two stories were related eventhough one story is strictly fiction, based off of a fiction story. Arnold Friend and Charles Schmid are two very similar characters! They even look alike! I wonder if Joyce Chopra based the look of Arnold Friend not only off of the story description but also off of Charles Schmid's look to maybe give it a more realistic and chilling feel? Also, the newspaper article stated that many girls went on dates with Charles but three never returned. How many girls do you think Charles sexually violated the same way that Arnold Friend violated Connie? How many girls do you think did not return home from their dates with Arnold Friend? It seems obvious to me that Joyce Carol Oates got her idea for Where Are You Going Where Have You Been story from the life and story of Charles Schmid Jr. Charles Schmid commited these crimes in 1966 and the story was written in 1970. It makes sense, Connie's mother in the story disapproves of her "trashy daydreams" and both her parents and sister in the movie are warning her to be careful when she is out and about with her friends. It is just the same as what parents had to do in Tucson when Charles Schmid was on his rampage.

Thursday, May 24, 2007

My "Purusing" and Blogging Experience


Wow! For how computer illiterate I am, I sure figured out this blog thing pretty easily. I give myself a round of applause!! As for the Purusing assignment. When I said "I don't know" in class that is not what I meant. I just get nervous when I am put on the spot. I found many intriguing aspects and pieces in this book.
Robert Frost


Just to start off, the poem by Robert Frost on page 61, Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening, gave me a sense of calmness and comfort. The place where he stopped in the woods reminds me of my home in the winter time. His last stanza, The woods are lovely, dark and deep, But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep, makes it sound like it is a beautiful place and he is yearning to stay there because of it's beauty and tranquility. That is what I think about my home. I love that it is quiet there and no one is around. You can hear nothing at night but the sounds of nature outside. It talks about how Frost uses sound to portray sense in the poem. It really does work!! Toward the end of the poem you can tell that the man does not want to move on just like I don't want to leave home when I am there. So it made me feel sorry for the man that he had to leave.


Another part of the book that caught my eye was page 184. The title Jabberwocky initially caught my attention but it was page 185 that really grabbed my attention. The second paragraph on that page talks about our own inner monstors that we as humans have. It further states that we may act out these inner monstors by following along with the latest serial killer. This concept really freaked me out because I LOVE learning about serial killers! I love reading about them and watching movies about them. Does this mean that my inner monstor could be a serial killer just waiting to get out? That thought really freaks me out!! The more I started thinking about it the more freaked out I got. One of my favorite authors is Edgar Allen Poe and my favorite artist is Vincent Van Gogh. If anyone knows anything about these two people it is no secret that both of them were seriously disturbed individuals. So does this mean that I like them because I can secretly relate to their craziness?


My two favorite stories by Poe are "The Tell-Tale Heart" about a man planning and killing an old man and "The Pit and the Pendulum" about a man trying to survive in a torture chamber. Because I love reading these kinds of stories does that make me a sick person?

I think that it the mystery behind these two people's lives that has me so intriuged with their work. As far as my infatuation with serial killers I think that what drives them to be this way is what makes them so interesting. And maybe it is something deep inside of me that is related to these people in some way. Who knows?
Edgar Allen Poe