BA #1

O’Brien, Tim. “Friends.” The Things They Carried. New York, NY, 1998.

“Friends” is a short story about two soldiers, Dave Jensen and Lee Strunk, who have become friends and rely on each other during their service in Vietnam. They sign a contract saying that if either one of them is severely wounded, the other would “end it”. Strunk is afraid after he trips an explosive and loses a leg. Jensen tells Strunk he won’t kill him. The soldiers get news that Strunk died in the helicopter, and Jensen is relieved.

What really intrigues me about this story is the extremity of friendship that these two soldiers have developed in order to agree to kill the other if he ends up in a wheelchair. In the end of the story, when the soldiers learn of Strunk’s death, the narrator says that the news “seemed to relieve Jensen of an enormous weight.” Thus, closing the story with a powerful thought, which is; “he was actually going to kill Strunk.” It’s a scary thought, and it does get to me.

The first comparison I could make between anything in The Things They Carried, and a poem that we have read in class would be to the poem, “Her Kind.” There is a dark and chaotic undertone, more prevalent in “Her Kind,” but definitely there throughout The Things They Carried. The first lines of the poem describe a similar loss of control to madness that is prevalent among some of the soldiers who were forced to ignore their morals in the name of war;
“I have gone out, a possessed witch,
haunting the black air, braver at night;
dreaming of evil, I have done my hitch”
I think the word “possessed,” says it best, because that is, what I feel, the manner in which soldiers revert to during war.

The first poem I chose to look at (and bare with me, I chose an easy one because I am new to this) was "This Is Just to Say" (William Carlos Williams, Intro to Poetry 51). This is a simple poem, which plainly states that the man has eaten all of the plums in the icebox that someone was saving. This was written as a simple apology for what he has done. There is a not a lot of depth to this poem, just a simple statement. This is different than "The Broken Maid," which we have read in class, because that poem subtly hints towards the Maid becoming a prostitute, without actually saying it. Also it hints towards a variety of other things, such as the person trying to warm her subconscious past, trying to justify what she has done, or simply warning someone else. In 'This Is Just to Say,' there are no layers like those. These poems appear similar, but are actually opposites.

BA #1

A.
1. Clifton, Lucille. "Homage to my hips." An Introduction to Poetry. Ed. 2. New York, NY: Pearson Longman, 2007. 439. http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/homage-to-my-hips/

2. Lucille Clifton's poem "Homage to my hips" was written in 1991. The poem describes a woman's sense of pride for her body, more particularly her hips, which she believes are her guide in life. As an African-American woman, she is now free, and her body can go where it pleases. Her hips are a metaphor for her forward movement in life.

3. This poem caught my interest in a number of ways. Clifton's way of bringing in her African-American heritage, without putting it into words is incredible. I enjoyed reading this because one of the things the poem does is celebrate a full figured woman, not a skinny, bony woman who may be anorexic. The poem goes deeper than the image of the body though. Clifton makes the reader realize that not just her, but all African-Americans are now free and proud to live as they wish. One may read this poem and automatically assume it is about hips. On the surface it is, but underneath it is all about the human mind.

4. I chose to compare Clifton's "Homage to my hips" with Thomas Hardy's "The Ruined Maid". Both Clifton and Hardy write about their character's new position in life. The woman in "Homage to my hips" is now happy and glowing because she feels her body and mind can wander wherever. The woman in "The Ruined Maid" is a prostitute. Who knows if Clifton's character is a prostitute as well? We do not know. Both of the women in the poem's are proud of their new up comings, and are showing them off to the world.

BA #1

I remember especially enjoying a poem from an introductory poetry class I had taken some semesters back; William Carlos Williams’ “This Is Just to Say”. It is a short, spiteful poem written in 1934 that reads as quickly and simple as a scratched note that Williams had left behind one morning after eating someone’s plums, saved in the icebox. Although Williams finally comes around to some sort of apology in the final lines with a simple “Forgive me”(9), the malevolent details of how thoroughly he enjoyed the plums overrides any such intention. I enjoyed it so much because of how so few lines could be so concise in delivering such a devilish tone. Williams’ voice inflicts a certain bent enjoyment in eating the plums: “they were so delicious”(10), after having just apologized for the fact. I suppose in retrospect I wish I had left simmilar notes on some occasions where I hadn’t. I’d love to know that whoever I left the note for would re-read it fifty times before finally convincing themselves--no, he didn’t apologize; and on top of that, he’s enjoyed it.

When we read Ted Hughes’ “Hawk Roosting,” I noticed the same sort of truly unforgiving and arrogant tone in the hawk’s deviant ways. Although the hawk has nothing to apologize for (as in Williams’ speaker devouring someone else’s plums), there is a similar lack of remorse for its coldhearted actions—while sitting atop the world. So I suppose the defining link between the two poems is solely their demeaning tones and apathetic personas.

BA #1

A few semesters ago I read a short story from the Harlem Renaissance called Quicksand By: Nella Larsen. In short, they store was about a young woman named Helga Crane who was of a mixed race and struggles to find her place amongst other African Americans who found her too light and White’s that found her too dark. Throughout the story Helga is also trying to find happiness, rather, the American dream. She goes from a steady home in Harlem, abroad to live with her white relatives where she is treated like someone of noble descent, back to Harlem simply because she was, “…homesick, not for America, but for Negroes…” (Norton 1584). To put it bluntly, though I liked the text I absolutely hated Helga Crane. All her character did throughout the piece was complain while only focusing on one side of her heritage. I suggested this piece only because it generated so much emotion in me that it continuously sticks out in my mind.
I believe that this story is similar to Sylvia Plath’s, “Lady Lazarus”. Both the story and the poem have female characters in them that present some sort of struggle in racist world and emit a sense of pain in the style of writing. Both characters are struggling in a world that they have very little control over though, they are two very different people yet both are exploited by harsh means. This story can be found in The Norton Anthology of American Literature, Volume D. There is a portion of the story online at http://books.google.com/books?id=yJ-PrecmPxkC&dq=quicksand+nella+larsen&pg=PP1&ots=P9YU2OGPSf&sig=o5qcrY8xBYGKaszworyeV18bKfI&hl=en&prev=http://www.google.com/search?q=quicksand,+nella+larsen&hl=en&safe=off&rlz=1T4GZHY_enUS250US250&sa=X&oi=print&ct=title&cad=one-book-with-thumbnail#PPR1,M1

I read the Robert Frost poem "Acquainted with the Night". The speaker in the poem appears to be either Frost himself, or it is Frost writing in the point of view of another person. The tone of the poem is of reminiscing the past and how it affects the future. In my opinion, it describes someone who has some sort of mental problem or addiction which torments them; "I have walked out the rain-and back in the rain"("Acquainted with the Night" 203). The subject appears to be depressed, and not willing to share his feelings with others; "I have passed by the watchman on his beat and dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain"("Acquainted with the Night" 203). Furthermore, he goes so far as to express that no one genuinely cared for him, and by the end of the poem, one senses that although he isn't cured of his ailment, he has come to terms with it. I enjoyed it because it gives insight into the mind of someone who is troubled and it says so much with not too many words. This poem is similar to "Ask Me" by William Stafford in the sense that both use a setting, such as the forest in Stafford's work and a city in Frost's work to portray emotion and both use a first person voice in their works. Lastly, my two questions about the poem would be: How does the diction in the poem set the mood? and How do you think the person in the poem views their future; as bright or dim?The poem is on page 203 of the Introduction to Poetry book, or online at http://quotations.about.com/cs/poemlyrics/a/Acquaint

Welcome to our class blog: Introduction to Literary Studies: Barrington

You'll be using the blog to "post" (create a text entry on the front page) or "comment" (respond to another student's post). Over the course of the semester, each student will create at least 6 posts (see below the description of types, A, B, & C) and at least 12 comments. You must put up a post and/or comment at least once a week (except the first week and spring break). Number each post or comment as BA #x (according to the one due that week).

Follow these instructions for your POSTS.
A. You must post at least two "introductions" to a short literary text we are not reading together as a class. These might be other poems, stories, or essays from our course books, poems/stories/essays you have read and enjoyed in the past (whether you discovered them on your own or were assigned them), poems/stories/essays you are currently reading in another class or on your own (in your infinite recesses of time!). You'll need to do the following, in the order given, including the numerals to designate the separate parts of the assignment:
1. Provide an MLA citation of your text. Follow that with a link to the text (or some version of it) online, if you can find one. If the text is, say, a poem from our anthology, there's a fair chance you can find it somewhere on the web. Google away.
2. Provide a short (no more than 50 words) summary or description of the text. Try to identify its genre, when it was written, and generally what it's about. As you'll find, descriptions or summaries can be tough, especially with lyric poetry. Just try to offer a basic overview.
3. Provide a short explanation of what you like about the text, or perhaps what intrigues you.
4. Make a brief comparison to something we have read as a class. This should not be a simple observation of how your text is "just like" another: they're both about identity, they're both written from the perspective of children, they're both sonnets, they both use the word "homunculas." Such statements are invariably trite overgeneralizations. Maybe the texts you're comparing ask a similar question about identity but suggest varied answers; maybe two female authors take a different view of a common problem; perhaps one sonnet adheres closely to the form, while another pushes at its limits; perhaps one author uses the homunculus as a metaphor for erotic waywardness while another uses it as a figure for spiritual decay. Note that each of these examples presents differences within apparent or surface similarities, an approach which generally isn't a bad way to go.
B. You must post at least two close readings. Pick a passage from a poem (no more than 6 lines) or from a prose work (no more than 5 lines) and explain what it means by carefully showing how it means. I expect you to use the critical vocabulary from class to identify tropes, metrics, sound effects, and other technical aspects that together convey the significance of the passage as a whole. Do not summarize the passage, though you may need to mention other parts of the text from which the passage comes. The reading of the passage should be about 200 words.
C. You must post at least two sets of "theory questions." For this assignment, pick a text, either one we've read or one from the "introduction" posts (whether it's your own post or another student's). Then, offer a brief explanation of why a particular theoretical approach that we've discussed (New Criticism, gender criticism, biography, historicism, etc.) recommends itself to this particular text. Finally, offer three critical questions that show how a reader might use the theory to begin to make meaning of the text.

Follow these instructions for your COMMENTS.
For your responding comments, you should agree or disagree with a post’s conclusions by providing and explaining NEW evidence (most likely from the text in questions) that either supports or questions the post.