Monday June 14, 2010 last blog!

This is the last bonus to which I referred on Friday. Read it, and explain its significance for 100 points. Leave next to the computer at the beginning of class, as usual. Good Luck. (It has nothing to do with literature.)

Thursday and Friday's notes:

The novel The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

characters: Nick Carraway (third person limited narrator), Jay Gatsby (working class guy, who while stationed in Louisville, Ky before shipping out to Europe to fight, meets and falls in love with weathy, flighty Daisy Buchanan. She becomes his reason d'etre and he devotes his life to creating the life to which she is accostomed, so that she will leave her husband Tom and be with Gatsby. Unfortunately, this is the 1920's and his easiest option is bootlegging. He owns a chain of drug stores. He represents the nouveau riche, new money, while Tom and Daisy are the established monied, having attended the right schools and a place in the social register.

Daisy Buchanan - Gatsby's love interest; however, when push comes to shove, as in her having killed Myrtle and Gatsby takes the blame, she takes off with her husband Tom.

Tom Buchanan- educated at Yale, privledged, arrogant, racist, anti-semitic, philanderer (having an affair with Myrtle- one of many)

Nick Carraway- Daisy's cousin; in New York and living in West Egg Long Island for the summer, where he meets his neighbor Gatsby.

themes of disloyalty, the quest for the Ameican Dream, how love drives life, how love deludes

novel Black Boy by Richard Wright

this is a fictionalized version of his life

setting: 1920's / 1930's: rural Mississippi, Memphis and Chicago--time of the Jim Crow Laws

grows up in poverty; father deserts family, very conservative religious atmosphere

plot notes: burning down the house, regualar beatings, derided for his interest in literature

theme of hunger, both literal and metaphorical. Literature is his salvation. Man gives him library card; teacher shares fictional stories

poem Thanatopsis by William Cullen Bryant

Romanticism / transcendentalism- mid 19th century

a meditation on death

Life is cyclical; the soul is ever present in Nature, which is viewed as a manifestation of God. Death is not to be feared, for it's a continuation, a dream

the tone is pensive and optimistic, for there is constant renewal

Themes of individualism, renewal of of life, and the interconnectedness of all things.

play The Crucible by Arthur Miller

setting 1690 in Salem, Massachusetts; this conservative religious settlement north of Boston is bounded by the wilderness to the west where the native peoples live and the ocean that separates them from their English home by three thousand miles.

Remember that the play was written as a parallel to the actions of the House of Unamerican Activities in the 1950's. In Salem, a group of girls accused villagers of witchcraft in order to protect themselves from being punished for having danced and conjured up spirits in the forest.

Themes: hysteria in contrast to logic and reason

importance of one's name

value of personal integrity

Abigail Williams and John Proctor are the central characters. Having "bedded her like a stallion" while she was working in his home, they were caught and Protor's wife Elizabeth threw her out. Abigail is angry, but still wants John, so she accuses his wife.

play Hamlet by William Shakespeare written about 1600; setting is 13th century Denmark

plot essentials: Hamlet's father returns as a ghost and informs his son that he has been poisoned by his brother Claudius, who is, incidently, now king and married to his wife Gertrude. Now Hamlet didn't like the situation before, for a month between funeral and remarriage is abrupt, that the relationship between the queen and her new husband is incestuous and the new king doesn't hold a candle to his wonderful dad-also there's a bit of Oedipal stuff with his mum.

So Hamlet arranges to insert some extra lines into a performance of The Marriage of Gonzago, so that he "can catch the king"- and he does. Now the rest of the play is his actually moving forward and revenging his father's death. Slow going......

He feigns madness; dumps Polonius' daughter Ophelia, who takes it very hard (she has a breakdown and drowns- sucide? no, as the water did the drowning. The play is a tragedy, which means that this catastophe is inevitable. Lots of folks die: poor Polonius (there is an allusion to him in Prufrock; Gertrude is accidentally poisoned when she drinks the wine meant for Hamlet; Claudius is forced to drink the dregs, so he's gone; Laertes in revenging his sister Ophelia's death is stabbled with the poisoned-tipped rapier and of course, good ole Hamlet has been also stabbed.

Please note the connections with J. Alfred Prufrock.

tone: haunting, suspenseful

themes: revenge, impossibility of certainty, what happens when politicians (kings) are corrupt

and of course, note Hamlet's anxiety / his angst- his inablitly "to take arms against a sea of troubles and by opposing end them." Again think of Prufrock.

Poem The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T. S. Eliot

written 1916

The poem is reflects the disillusionment and despair that comes out of the Great War. The Western value system has collapsed and life is deemed directionless and pointless. The operative word is nihilims: nothing. Our character, the eponymous Prufrock, stands before a mirror contemplating a marriage proposal; he never leaves this spot, nor do learn the woman's name. He is a vain, solipsistic, insecure man, who is incapable of action. He rehearses the proposal in "the room where women come and go / talking of Michelangelo"; yet he anticipates a rejection, so never asks for her hand.

Eliot uses figurative language devices to create the despair, anxiety and overall inability for Prufock and the society, to take action, to choose a new direction. (think Hamlet here) This is accomplished through personifying the fog to a cat, the imagery of the streets with cheap sawdust-floored restaurants and hookers, and numerous allusions, including one specifically to Hamlet..

Hamlet and Purfrock are much in contrast to someone like John Proctor, who refuses to sign his name or even Captain Ahab from the novel Moby Dick by Herman Melville. This sea captain is obsessed with destroying the great white whale that took his leg, even if it meant destroying himself and others.

These are the works you chose to review in class; you may use any others for the ELA as well.

Tuesday June 8, 2010

Due in class: critical lens introduction practice

Model for the above, based upon the handout The underlined words should be included.

As (insert the author’s name or write as someone once said if you do not know the author’s name) once said, “ (insert quote). In other words (this is where you paraphrase the quote.) Use words that are not part of the quote. You may write two to three sentences. This is supported in the (insert first genre: novel, autobiography, play, memoir, epic poem) (insert first title) by (insert author) and the (insert second genre) (insert second title) by (insert second author) through the literary elements of (choose two: character, plot, setting, theme, tone).

Paragraph 2- take one of your chosen literary elements (tone / theme, etc) and relate it specifically back to the quote through one of the pieces of literature you have chosed. Be detailed.

Paragraph 3- take the same literary element as used in paragraph 2 and now apply it specifically to the second piece of literature to which you referred in the introduction.

Paragraph 4- now move on to the second literary element and the first piece of chosen literature, again tying in the selection specifically as related to the critical lens quote.

Paragraph 5-Once again, tie in the second literary element you selected, only this this with the second piece of literature, with the critical lens.

Conclusion: Do not repeat the critical lens. Do not repeat whole titles of literature. Do not say "in conclusion". Begin here with essentially another paraphrasing of the critical lens (again, do not repeat the quote). The objective in the closing is to leave the reader with a reminder that through literature we experience or partake in the the ideas or words professed in the quote. This is a universal statement that should resonate and allow refection.



Material from which you may choose for your critical lens support. Make sure you are very familiar with three of the following literary works in terms of these aspects.

genre / title / author with their

characters /point of view/ setting/ themes/ tone / plot

novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest Ken Kesey

novel The Great Gasby F. Scott Fitzgerald

novel Maggie, Girl of the Streets Stephen Crane

novel Black Boy Richard Wright

play Beyond the Horizon Eugene O'Neil

play The Crucible Arthur Miller

play Hamlet William Shakespeare

poem Thanatopsis William Cullen Bryant

poem The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Samuel Taylor Coleridge

novel excerpts (just refer to them as novels, as if you read them in whole)

The Prairie James Fenimore Cooper

Moby Dick Herman Melville

short stories: The Minister's Black Veil and The Oval Portrail by Nathanial Hawthorne

The Fall of the House Usher by Edgar Allen Poe

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow Washington Irving.

Monday June 7, 2010

Task I essays due today. As stated previously: None will accepted after class. This is your last significant term grade.

Another context vocabulary quiz

In class critical lens introductions.
HOMEWORK: due Tuesday---critical lens introduction. see handout.

FYI: ELA exam- Wednesday June 16 at 8:15 and Thursday June 17 at 8:15

June 3, 2010

Retest of Wednesday's vocabulary tomorrow...(you might study!)
Summer's almost here.... But there is an ELA to pass.
HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT: last major grade. This is significant for many of you; so take your time. You may either hand write or type (the latter is preferable). You should plan 90 minutes, which is what you will have for the actual ELA. You will be graded based upon the ELA rubric.
Although you have a class handout, there is a copy below.

DUE MONDAY June 7 NO LATE PAPERS WILL BE ACCEPTED.

Your Task:

Write a unified essay about life changes as revealed in the
passages. In your essay, use ideas from both passages to establish a
controlling idea about life changes. Using evidence from each passage,
develop your controlling idea and show how the author uses specific literary
elements or techniques to convey that idea.
Guidelines:
Be sure to
• Use ideas from both passages to establish a controlling idea about life changes
• Use specific and relevant evidence from each passage to develop your controlling
idea
• Show how each author uses specific literary elements (for example: theme,
characterization, structure, point of view) or techniques (for example: symbolism,
irony, figurative language) to convey the controlling idea
• Organize your ideas in a logical and coherent manner
• Use language that communicates ideas effectively
• Follow the conventions of standard written English

Passage I
On Turning Ten
The whole idea of it makes me feel
like I’m coming down with something,
something worse than any stomach ache
or the headaches I get from reading in bad light—
a kind of measles of the spirit,
a mumps of the psyche,
or a disfiguring chicken pox of the soul.
You tell me it is too early to be looking back,
but that is because you have forgotten
the perfect simplicity of being one
and the beautiful complexity introduced by two.
But I can lie on my bed and remember every digit.
At four I was an Arabian wizard.
I could make myself invisible
by drinking a glass of milk a certain way.
At seven I was a soldier, at nine a prince.
But now I am mostly at the window
watching the late afternoon light.
Back then it never fell so solemnly
against the side of my tree house,
and my bicycle never leaned against the garage
as it does today,
all the dark blue speed drained out of it.
This is the beginning of sadness I say to myself
as I walk through the universe in my sneakers.
It is time to say good-bye to my imaginary friends,
time to turn the first big number.
It seems only yesterday I used to believe
there was nothing under my skin but light.
If you cut me I would shine.
But now when I fall upon the sidewalks of life,
I skin my knees. I bleed.
—Billy Collins
from The Paris Review, Winter 1993

Passage II
...The town—a seaside resort with a good harbor, in South Wales—was
foreign to me. My home was a long way from the sea, in an Italian hill town, and
I had been sent to Wales by my parents for the summer, to stay with friends and
to improve my English. I had never been out of Italy before. The outlandish
town, the sea, the holidays, the summer, all added to my gaiety. The year, too. It
was 1937, and England had begun rearming; there was a sense of awakening in
the air. “In Bristol,” I remember the head of the family I was staying with saying
in a quiet voice and with a subdued smile, “they are building over a hundred
aeroplanes a month.” The threats and taunts and boastings of the fascists were
fresh in my ears, and it made me very happy to hear this. Everything made me
happy. I watched the seagulls wheeling, wild even as the robins on the lawn
seemed tame. In Italy, except for the pigeons in the public squares, birds didn’t
come close. I watched the waves thunder against the pier with a violence I had
never witnessed, then rebound to meet and quell the onslaught of the next. And
I did many things I had never done before—flew kites, went roller-skating,
explored caves draped with stalactites, paddled in the pools left by the tide,
visited a lighthouse.
Visited a lighthouse. I climbed the spiral staircase and knocked on the door
up at the top. A man came to open who seemed the image of what a lighthousekeeper
ought to be. He smoked a pipe and had a grayish-white beard. Like a
seaman, he wore a thick navy-blue jacket with gold buttons, trousers to match,
and boots. Yet he had also something of the land about him—a well-set look, a
firmly planted look, and his boots could have been a farmer’s. Bathed by the
ocean and buttressed by the rock, the lighthouse and its keeper stood in between,
upon the thin, long fringe of land and sea—belonged to both and neither.
“Come in, come in,” he said, and immediately, with that strange power some
people have to put you at ease, he made me feel at home in the lighthouse. He
seemed to consider it most natural that a boy should come and visit his
lighthouse. Of course a boy my age would want to see it, his whole manner
seemed to say—there should be more people interested in it, and more visits. He
practically made me feel he was there to show the place to strangers, almost as if
that lighthouse were a museum or a tower of historical importance. ...
He had a large telescope—its brass well polished—set on a pedestal and
pointed at the sea. He said I could look through it. I watched a ship going down
the Bristol Channel, a wave breaking far away—the splash it made, the spray—
and distant cliffs, and seagulls flying. Some were so close they were swift shadows
over the field of vision; others, far away, seemed hardly to be moving, as though
they were resting in the air. I rested with them. Still others, flying a straight
course, winging their way steadfastly, made scarcely any progress across the little
circle, so wide was the circle of sky that it encompassed.
“And this,” he said, “is a barometer. When the hand dips, a storm is in the air.
Small boats better take heed. Now it points to ‘Variable.’ That means it doesn’t
really know what is going to happen—just like us. And that,” he added, like
someone who is leaving the best thing for the last, “is the lantern.”
I looked up at the immense lens with its many-thousand-candlepower bulb
inside.
“And this is how I switch it on, at dusk.” He went to a control box near the
wall and put his hand on a lever.
I didn’t think he’d really switch it on just for me, but he did, and the light
came on, slowly and powerfully, as strong lights do. I could feel its heat above me,
like the sun’s. I glowed appreciatively, and he looked satisfied. “I say! That’s jolly
good. Super!” I exclaimed, and I strung out all the new laudatory words that I had
learned—the old ones, too, of course, like “beautiful” and “lovely.” ...
“Now, would you like a cup of tea?” he said. He took a blue-and-white cup
and saucer out of a cupboard and poured the tea. Then he gave me a biscuit. “You
must come and see the light after dark sometime,” he said.
Late one evening, I went there again. The lantern’s flash lit up a vast stretch
of the sea, the boats, the boardwalk, and the dark that followed seemed more
than ever dark. So dark, so all pervading, and so everlasting that the lantern’s
flashing, powerful as it was, seemed not much stronger than a firefly’s, and almost
as ephemeral.1
At the end of the summer, I went home to Italy. For Christmas, I bought a
panforte—a sort of fruitcake, the specialty of the town I lived in—and sent it to
the lighthouse-keeper. I didn’t think I would see him again, but the very next year
I was back in Wales—not on a holiday this time but as a refugee. One morning
soon after I arrived, I went to the lighthouse, only to find the old man had retired.
“He still comes, though,” the much younger man who had taken over said.
“You’ll find him sitting outside here every afternoon, weather permitting.”
I returned after lunch, and there, sitting on a ledge of the lighthouse beside
the door, smoking his pipe, was my lighthouse-keeper, with a little dog. He
seemed heavier than the year before, not because he had gained weight but
because he looked as though he had been set on the ledge and would not easily
get off it without help.
“Hello,” I said. “Do you remember me? I came to see you last year.”
“Where are you from?”
“From Italy.”
“Oh, I used to know a boy from Italy. An awfully nice boy. Sent me a fruitcake
for Christmas.”
“That was me.”
“Oh, he was a fine boy.”
“I was the one who sent it.”
“Yes, he came from Italy—an awfully nice boy.”
“Me, me, that was me,” I insisted.
He looked straight into my eyes for a moment. His eyes discounted me. I felt
like an intruder, someone who was trying to take somebody else’s place without
having a right to it. “Ay, he was an awfully nice boy,” he repeated, as though the
visitor he saw now could never match last year’s.
And seeing that he had such a nice memory of me, I didn’t insist further; I
didn’t want to spoil the picture. I was at that time of life when suddenly boys turn
gauche, lose what can never be regained—a budding look, a certain early
freshness—and enter an unwonted2 stage in which a hundred things contrive to
mar the grace of their performance. I couldn’t see this change, this awkward
period in myself, of course, but, standing before him, I felt I never could—never
could possibly—be as nice as I had been a year before.
“Ay, he was an awfully nice boy,” the lighthouse-keeper said again, and he
looked lost in thought.
“Was he?” I said, as if I were talking of someone whom I didn’t know.

—Arturo Vivante
excerpted from “The Lighthouse”
English Stories, 1975
Street Fiction Press
Comp. Eng.

June 2, 2010

NEW GRADE REPORTS TODAY--PLEASE LET ME KNOW IF I MISSED SOMETHING.

In class: vocabulary quiz review and continuation of film

Tusday June 1, 2010

Any vocabulary turned in today is worth 60 points. Those who were absent Friday and did not write the critical lens essay will head to the library to do so, while the rest watch part of the film.

From now until the end of school, we'll be reviewing for the ELA.

Friday May 28, 2010

Vocabulary 15 due today!

Final assessment on the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey: critical lens essay