Poems

Just in time! Aren't you proud? :)

Valediction and Conjoined

The two poems, "A Valediction", by John Donne, and "Conjoined", by Judith Minty, are written about the same subject, and yet they convey two completely opposite ideas regarding the bonds of relationships. While the speaker of Donne's "Valediction" sees his relationship as having a love that transcends the physical world, the woman of "Conjoined" views her marriage as a unnatural, terrible thing that was forced upon her and which limits her. Both authors make use of literary devices such as metaphors and tone in order to convey their views.

"A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" is about a couple who is separating, possibly because of the coming death of the speaker. However, the speaker forbids his lover from being sad or mourning him, as their love is strong enough to cross the largest of distances, even that between life and death. The love of this couple is seen as greater than the normal relationship between people. In fact, the speaker says, "Twere profanation of our joys/ To tell the laity of our love." By this he means that the bond they have is so special, so beautiful that it would be disrespectful to their love to tell the common people about it. This is because their love is so profound that those in common relationships could not even comprehend. He believes the bond that is in common relationships is lesser, while that which he shares with his love is "so much refined." Where normal relationships are earthly, or "sublunar," theirs is heavenly, among the planets and the stars. The planetary metaphor is further used in the third stanza, which reads: "Moving of th' earth brings harm and fears... But trepidation of the spheres,/ Though greater far, is innocent." By this he is saying that while earthquakes are far less movement than the movement of an entire planet, it is the earthquake that the people of earth will concern themselves with. In this way, the normal people are concerned with the more shallow, physically dependent relationships, and they do not comprehend the higher love of the speaker and his lover, which is more spiritual and less dependent on actual closeness. This is why the speaker and his lover are able to endure much distance and time away from each other, through their unique bond, and is why he urges his love not to cry when they part. He even likens their bond to a compass, what's legs do not truly separate but remain connected, even with distance, which "endure[s] not yet/ A breach, but an expansion." And as one leg of the compass is far from the first, it is still connected, and its path revolves around the still leg. His point is that the love that they have is strong enough to overcome any distance, and that it will endure until they are eventually reunited.

The speaker of "Conjoined" offers a much different view of relationships than does the Speaker of "Valediction." The woman of "Conjoined" is a married woman, and she sees her own relationship as anything other than heavenly. She continually compares her marriage to unnatural, strange pairs, that would normally be separate, giving the impression that she views her marriage more as a forced, terrible union than a wonderful, loving bond. She uses such strong language in her similes as "monster," and "freaks." she speaks of a onion, made of two onions pressed together, that grew deformed because of the proximity of the other onion. These onions are covered by a "transparent skin," which makes it seem like a normal onion, and which hides the truth underneath. This is like her marriage, in which she is not happy, but in which she seems to be pleasantly joined to her love. The marriage covers the problems underneath and shows them as a happy couple. Her marriage is described, by herself, as an "accident, like the two-headed calf," or like Chang and Eng, a pair of twins joined at the chest. These are examples not only of unnatural, or "wrong," occurrences, but ones in which such a pair could not be safely separated. The speaker mentions a "skin that binds us... To sever the muscle could free one, but might kill the other." In this case, as in the others, separation could greatly improve the quality on one life, and allow them to grow, but the bond merges the two together such that separation could be the death of the other. The speaker wishes to be rid of her husband, but, as she says, she "cannot escape" the prison, her relationship, that binds her permanently to him.

Obviously, the speakers of Minty' and Donne's poems were of differing opinions when it came to their relationships. Where one saw boundless love, the other saw limiting confinement. And where one saw a supernatural, heavenly bond that can withstand any amount of separation and not be broken, the other saw a cruel, unnatural bond, that she wished could be broken.

The Truth in Things

This article that we were to read, "The Truth in Things," was kind of long, and while I did read it, I can't say I didn't get a little lost at some points. Also, I may or may not have lost interest in sections of the article. What can I say, I have a very short attention span. However, I think I kind of maybe sort of get what the author, a Mr. Jim Neilson, was trying to say, so hopefully this here post will make some sort of sense. So now, here it goes!
I don't know if there was one or two main points Neilson was trying to make, but as far as I could tell, he was saying that O'Brien used postmodern elements in his writing, yet he failed to give representation to the Vietnamese perspective of the war, which is something that he should have done as a postmodernist. This is because postmodernism is all about giving representation to the repressed or under-represented views or positions on any subject, and "The Things They Carried" gave only O'Brien's perspective. Neilson asserts that by writing "a text that is obsessed with self, that details the uncertain effects of an unreal war upon an unknowable self but fails to examine its all too real effects upon the Vietnamese," O'Brien "constructed a text that, despite its radical aesthetic, largely reaffirms the prevailing ethnocentric conception of the war."
The insight that I was able to gain from the article was that about how the collection of stories was a concentration on O'Brien's self, or that while he was being Postmodernistic in not trying to pretend that his view of the stories was the one any only "truth" or way that things were, he was not Postmodernistic in that he still only presented one way that tings could have been. The only insight the audience is allowed to the war is through O'Brien.
Okay, that's all. Bye byes

The Things They Carried

Okay guys, it is time for another exciting round of... Cathy's Super Awesome Blog Writing Time! *Que Applause* ...Okay, sorry, never mind. Ignore that. Umm. Right. Well, anyways, this week we're looking for themes throughout the book "The Things They Carried," right? So, let's see what I'm able to come up with this time. Ready? Here I go...

Obviously, based on the title alone, this group of stories is about the things that are carried by the soldiers who fought in Vietnam. I believe that this is a main idea or theme that reveals itself throughout the entire novel, or at least the stories I've read so far. I don't take this to mean simply what was physically carried by the men, although that is discussed as well, but to include the emotions, the memories, the responsibilities, and the stories that they all must carry as well.

In the first one that we read, the story of the same name as the book, each person was described, along with all that which they had to bear. This not only included the general equipment, which was heavy in and of itself, but something else that helped to differentiate one from the rest. Each carried something a little bit different, and what one carried gave insight to the person he was. But aside from the differences, what they carried also connected the men. It said that "they carried the land itself-Vietnam, the place, the soil..."(15). They carried all the weight of the war, the feelings they would experience and the sights they would see, and this is stuff that they couldn't really share with others, those who haven't been in the war. In various stories people are disconnected from others, from loved ones, friends, or civilians, and this is because of the weights they must carry.

Aaand... I must say, this blog really didn't turn out the way I thought it would... Oops. Oh well. I'll elaborat/clarify later, or something. I suppose. Alright, bye byes.

Postmodernism is...?

Okay guys, looks like it's time for a discussion about Postmodernism. Hooray, right? Sure.. So, what is Postmodernism, exactly? It's... a lot of things. Or, really, it's not. There's a lot that it's not. It's without centers, without reason, without truth, science, reality, or anything, really. It's not modernism. It's more... chaos, insanity. I dunno, I'm just rambling, already. Yup, pretty much. Postmodernism is all about getting away from all the ideas that once were. According to Postmodernism, there is no one source of anything, no center idea for anything to be based on, or something... It rejects the idea of metanarratives, or grand narratives, instead arguing that everything is made up of a number of smaller narratives. That idea, though, that there are no grand narratives, is a grand narrative in and of itself. A bit of a contradiction there. That happens a lot in the concepts of Postmodernism, though. Contradictions, I mean. It's basically the definition of defining things by not defining them, which means you can't define Postmodernism, which not only creates a paradox, but means this supposed attempt of mine to say just what Postmodernism is is an impossible task. Hooray for us, right? Okay, I guess it's time for a subject change...ish? Well, there was another bit in that Postmodernism book we've been reading all semester, all about Others, and binary opposites, and the like. That there will always be marginalization, and centralization, although no centers...hmm. Anyway, with opposites, one will be focused on at any point in time, and the other will become pushed aside, lessened, marginalized. Pretty much, it's impossible to not be marginalizing something. So says Postmodernism. Anyways, there's a whole lot more about Postmodernism, and I'm not really sure how well I even explained the concepts that I attempted to mention, but... I think that's about how much I'm going to say. Postmodernism, is pretty crazy if you think about it too much, so I don't think I really will any more right at this moment. Alrighty. Bye byes.

Heyyy....

Haha...Hey guys. What, no blog earlier? No idea what you're talking about. Anyways, Maus II is just... I don't know. I don't know how to write about it at all, really. I mean, I read it, I got it, I thought it was a good book. Comic. No, comic book? Anyways, It doesn't really seem representable. Or, at least, I don't really see any way to really write anything about it. There are some things to be written about, I suppose, but is there enough to write about any of those bits? Probably, I just don't know how. Oh well. I'm thinking I'll write about the portrayal deal going on. There's basically Art saying how he doesn't really know how to portray everything, and how it is really impossible to accurately portray the Holocaust at all, because nothing really does it justice, well, I mean can accurately give a good representation of what it was like, and what happened. Even with his father, getting a first-hand account of what happened, it is just one viewpoint, one journey. Only that which he experienced. And every prisoner as a unique experience. Also, nothing is truly known. For instance, it was widely believed that there were orchestras at some point, but when asked, Art's father said he didn't think they existed, that he "remembered only marching, not orchestras." But Art's father, especially, had is own experiences that weren't shared with the others. He got special treatment for working, he got on the good side of some of the guards and whatnot. Really, one would need every viewpoint of all who were a part of the Holocaust, and even then there would ave to be some way to convey just how they felt, just what they heard, ect... He could have had is mother's story, had she been alive, but it still wouldn't have been enough. It is just not possible to give that horror accurate representation. This is why, at least I think, that Art uses the cartoon or comic medium for his book, to emphasize that it is not possible to have every detail, and to sow tat e is not trying to have all the knowledge, he is simply sharing what information he has in the way he feels is best. That's all. Sorry for typos and if it feels rushed, I wrote this on that write or die thing and if I stopped for like three seconds it would delete words. It was frightening. K byes.