Final Blog

My writing has greatly improved over this semester.  I have really improved on the basics of creating a scholarly paper with things such as citing, the title, format, and thesis.  I really needed to get rid of the 5 paragraph format and this class helped me do that.  The free write and class discussion strategies helped a whole lot.  These strategies helped me grasp my thesis and argument quicker than the others and create an interesting topic.  The paper with Drown paper was the easiest for me to write.  Although I needed to switch my topic after my rough draft, after that I had my thesis down, and after that it was easy to write.

New Poems

I have found out throughout reading these poems, that either love and sex are a huge part and theme to many poems. Most of what we have read so far, has either love or sex as one of their themes, and for the songs they rhyming is the same, but the beat is a new feature.  I need to continue to read deeper as as I read, and read slower.  It is a a hard thing for me to do, but it has gotten better by each day of class.

The flea

The Flea is another one of many of the pieces of literature or poems, that have dealt with the symbolization of sex.  The narrator uses the flea as a symbol and uses it to illustrate sex.   The blood exchange is the most obvious example of the way he tries to mimic a flea as a the same as sex.

Poetry

I have had very little work with poetry from my memory.  I know we have read poems and maybe talked about what it means a little, but nothing to the extent to what we are about to do.  My personal definition of poetry is lines of phrases that are either rhyme or rhythmically arranged in order to get a great sound or read out of it while still receiving a message or point of the poem.

Paper

The one theme that really stood out to me during the whole reading of Dr. Faustus was the religion.  The one specific idea that came to mind was the sinning and being able to repent with that sin or not.  The problem I still am having like I have with the few other papers, is I am having trouble thinking of a thesis that is an argument and not an observation.  That seems to be my constant problem when coming up with one.  The fact that he doesn't want to repent and feels arrogant or wants to reassure himself about his decision and says not to repentance intrests me also.  I just am having trouble making my ideas into an argument.

Faustus 2

The one thing that got my attention while reading the new parts were the good and evil angels.  The Evil Angel was able to convince Faustus to choose wealth over Heaven or repentance, and it is a really similar case to what many television shows or commercials use with the devil and angel popping up on each shoulder trying to convince the person.  The evil won in this case as Faustus continued to believe in his magic and continued down that path.

Faustus

In Scenes 4 and 5 I found it interesting how after Faustus' sold his soul to Lucifer, his first command to Meph. was to ask for a wife considering this wasn't going to have anything to do with love.  Also I thought i was interesting how the selling of the soul happened.  Faustus had trouble with the blood, and he didn't even believe in Hell. 

Heirarchy

Hierarchy is a tough idea to make one set order for.  A lot of people put religion on top and are very faithful, while others do the exact opposite.  With all of the changes in culture from when Dr. Faustas was written it is even harder with the new innovations and new ideas that have popped into peoples imagination such as technology and different religions.  Medicine and family are other ideas that should definitely be up on top of the hierarchy I believe.  The idea is just something that differs from one person to the next and is very hard to define unless your talking about your own.

This Semester

I thought this semester in Lit was going to be more difficult than it was.  I had really struggled with the literature portion in high school, and I think the part that saves me in this class is writing the papers.  I am not that great of a reader to say the least.  I enjoyed all of the papers we had to write when I found out what I was writing about.  The gists tended to help me out a lot in that area.  It is going to be hard to balance this last paper while mid terms are going on and I have atleast 4 tests this week, and other activities going on.  This class has been good and I will just have to see how I am able to do on the mid term tests.

"Drown"

I decided to read "Drown" by Junot Diaz, and I am not exactly sure why.  It just seemed liked the most intriguing title to me.  The Setting of "Drown" is very descriptive and adds very great detail to this story.  It takes place in the run down and poor part of the city in New Jersey.
The point of view in this story is from the first person point of view.  This gives you plenty of information on the main character, but does not however, give me as much as I may have wanted to learn about the other characters throughout reading the story.  I really enjoyed reading the story, and I do not think I would change either the setting or the point of view.

"Bartleby, the Scrivener" and "The Birthmark"

The characters of these two stories had a lot of similarites and differences.  Both stories had motivated, static and foiled characters.  Both stories also had consistent characters throughout the story as the main characters in "The Birthmark" attributed equally, and in "Bartleby, the Scrivner" they remained true to character.  Most of the ideas of both characters were plausible.

The plot of both stories would have had a different outcome if the author would have changed the plot structure.  The plot structure in Bartleby's story had a lot to do with background information and character, while the "The Birthmark" had to do mostly the basic chronological order.

Racism

I do agree with some of the discussion in class, however, there is distinct levels of racism to me.  I believe that the way a person presents himself to you is a huge part in how I judge someone, not skin color.  I have multiple Hispanic, Asian, and Black friends throughout high school.  I also have an Asian and Hispanic cousin. I don't believe I judged people based on color of skin, however, racism clearly exists today.  There are plenty of brutal and extreme cases, but for people to say everyone is racist is judgmental.

Twitter

The fake aliases that can be so easily created concern me a little bit.  They have not effected me, and I do not know if they ever will, but the fact that the possibility could come up during a future job worries me.  It is too easy for people to create profiles that aren't themselves on sites such as Twitter and Facebook with no consequences.  These profiles although on Twitter are used for humor, they can be used for bullying.  I just hope I don't have to deal with a fake me.

First paper

We started off this semester with my hardest paper of last semester.  It was still difficult to write for me, but I was fortunate to think of the topic that I did right away thanks to the discussions in class.  I had an easy time writing my basics in the paper, but I failed to explain a few of my quotes in full detail.  Although I missed a crucial part of the paper, it was a easy part to plug in because it was all of my own words.  I thought this paper was much easier than last years that I had written, and the citing was brought back on memory pretty easily.  Overall it was difficult, but not overly difficult.

The Metamorphosis

The Metamorphosis dissapointed me right when i started reading it.  At first I was just believing it was just about a man who was transformed into a bug, and it became a sad story to read.  Gregor used to be the provider of his family even though he was just the child, and now he has became rejected and useless.  The story had a deeper story to tell with symbolism throughout with the apple, violin, and picture frame.  Also, I thought it was interesting how the story pointed out in the end how the sister of Gregor transformed throughout the story as well.

Work Cited

1. Barret, Andrew. "The X-Factor in Zamyatin's 'We'." Modern Humanities Research Association 80.3          (1985): 659-72. J-STOR. Web. 30 Jan. 2010

2.Beauchamp,Gorman. "Technology in the Dystopian Novel." MFS  32.1 (1986) : 53-63. Project Muse. Web. 30 Jan. 2010.

3. We. Trans. Natasha Randall. New York: Modern Library, 2006. Print.

--I was unsure whether or not for the first cite to change We into italicized font because the title had it in quotes  instead.

We Paper Topic

Throughout this book, the mathematics and how they influenced his decisions on top of how his language was associated with math intrigued me.  I would like to write my paper on a topic that includes all of this. My thesis as of now would include the three points:

1. The X that was described of I-330's facial features can be thought of as a X as a math term, where D-503 is trying to solve the answer of I-330.

2.The use of the 'square root of negative one' and how it influenced D-503.

3.His word usage from the strict mathematician of the One State, to the human being and using less calculated words and thoughts.

Final We Review

I had an overall good experience while reading this book.  It was a confusing book at times, and I had a very tough time understanding as a read.  The discussions we had in class had a ton of help towards understanding and helping my quiz grades.  It will also help in my paper topic choice.  The word choice of this book was really interesting looking back throughout the reading.  The mathematical way D-503 looks at situations in the beginning compared to the feelings and emotions he begins to feel at the end when he obtains a soul and meets I-330.  D-503 obtains an imagination even though in the beginning he was scared of the thought of anything imaginary. The mind process of D-503 changes from a mathematician to a human being with a soul and imagination.  As D-503 changes the word changes in the book. 

Worst Thing In We

The worst thing in We is that you would not have a choice on what would happen with your child.  I have a friend recently who has been blessed with a baby boy and to think that they always take the baby away from the parents and that is a normal situation is crazy to me.  Also, that the parents would have no connection to the child, and they seem not to care what happens to the child after it is taken away.  It seems like so much of a robotic world and that is not something I could deal with.

Biographical Strategies--Zamayatin's Biography strategy shows up multiple times in the storyline in We.  He was arrested multiple times, which may be a reason as the main character is getting himself in trouble constantly in the beginning, and rebelling in a way with a soul.

Historical Strategies--This strategy makes the reader focus more on details in the historical stand point.  This novel was written in the 1920s even though it is a future novel, and when it talks about the Ancients, they are the current people at that time.

Reader-Response--This strategy focuses on the reader and not the author.  As a reader during this novel you are curious as to what will happen when D-503 writes next and where this story is going as it is not told from the common narrator point of view.

Style:  The author writes in a style that clearly lets the reader know it is in the future.  The author writes in a very overly wordy way and very mathematical such as the square root of -1.  

Tone:  The tone of the narrator praises the current people and places such as the The One State and how the government is ran, and he bashes how the Ancients used to run their countries.

Irony: Irony is used in how the narrator keeps telling himself how he hates O-90, but he can not resist going with her wherever she tells him to go.  This is specifically Dramatic Irony.

Plot:  The plot in this story is interesting as it is told by a list of records he writes to tell his story by his point of view.

Characterization:  D-503 is introduced right away because he is the main character, and the others are introduced according to their importance.  How D-503 describes "O" gives the reader great detail into her appearance but as well into what D-503 thinks about her. Characterization is continually happening throughout the story.

Setting:  It takes place in the future and in a place we have never seen, The One State.
 
Point of View:  As said above, it is told from the point of view from the main character, D-503.

Symbol:  O-90 is described as having lips like an X, and this is not only a symbol for how the lips look, but how he feels he should not go with her.


Theme:  The theme of the book is a story taking place in the future where the aspects of life are totally different from today's.  Another story line is he is struggling between two different girls that have become a part of his life, his original girl and a new one.

About Me

My name is Nate Gotto and right now I am a freshman at USD. My major is Accounting.  I am from Sioux Center, Iowa along with two of my friends in the class.  I'm a big baseball fan, along with the Vikings unfortunately.  I like playing any card game and watching movies.