Technology

Online learning, for me, has been significantly different from in-person learning because of the self-discipline required to succeed.   There is no instructor in your face reminding you that this assignment or that is due.  It is entirely up to you to keep up and keep organized and it is definitely something I wouldn’t have been able to do as effectively when I was younger and a huge procrastinator. 

I think English is a good candidate for online learning because it is one of the less lecture necessary subjects and when the instructor is good, the things that do cause some hassle or confusion can be addressed in person and individually.  I also think that the way discussions are done, with each person being required to post, makes it is easier for everyone to participate, rather than sitting in class and getting only the participation of the few while the quiet ones fade into the background.

As for the technologies we’ve used this semester, most of them were new to me.  I have never blogged before nor have I even heard of using Prezi or Glogster.  I enjoyed the blogging because of how easy it was to use and the continuity it provided.  Everything we posted was right there, easy to find and access.  For the final presentation I did initially try to do a glogster poster but had a difficult time really figuring it out so I tried doing a Prezi instead.  The Prezi interface was easier to figure out and it produced a very cool presentation.  The possibilities I see in creating presentations this way are endless and I foresee using this website and technology in many areas in the future.  Specifically I can see doing school projects and most definitely proposals for clients of my business.  Overall, the use of technology, having to blend it with our writing, links, visuals, blogs, presentations, has been beneficial and required an expansion of thought and skill that I have not previously had to put into a class like this and I am glad we did.

image source:<https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5QmkiDXtYkZbNzRLlYvpK_x6oUMk1Vb3y-K6mUSRt9l2yhOqVeCPuuUT2jsKurijg8nT0UCLk7WituqlGKhqq8P4HDcXBHUFzPnAg5IKJK7XIyzSxB27aIAXAh2Gf0r_BNlQuQaB029M/s1600-r/TechnologyLearning.gif>

Final Presentation

Final Presentation on Prezi

Reflection on the Course

I would have to say the biggest skill I learned in this class was two-fold.  First I learned how to do good close reading.  I learned how to look differently at a piece of literature and pull meaning from it where I used to just read and take the piece I was reading at face-value.  It has become apparently clear that I have missed so much over the years by not knowing or utilizing this skill and look forward to applying it in the future, perhaps even rereading some of the classics I’ve read before.  The second biggest thing I learned was to take that close reading and analyze it.  Asking questions and forming my own opinions as I read.  This is something I never realized I was even capable of but have since been able to apply it in many areas of my reading.

As for the readings in this class, I have come to a very different understanding of monsters.  As I’ve said before, I have come to see and recognize the ways in which monsters are not just creatures that have nothing to do with us but rather they are the ugly parts of us that rise to the surface and find expression when we try to avoid them.  They are our biggest fears and ugliest traits given life and animation.  I originally chose this specific class based on the fact that we would be reading Frankenstein and I am glad I did, I really enjoyed reading it and analyzing it.  I do have to say that I was initially disconcerted to find we would have to also read and write about poetry and I was intimidated by the idea of having to come up with my own ideas about any kind of literature, but I am glad I stuck with it.

Over the course of the semester I have seen my writing process change in terms of organization and planning.  I started with a process that was mostly a think about it and when it comes to me sit and write.  Not much organization at all, but as we progressed in our objectives, so did my process.  By our last essay, I found myself taking notes from the beginning, asking questions about what I was reading and looking for deeper meanings.  By the time I finished reading The Scarlet Letter I already had an idea of what I wanted to write about and was able to sit down and sketch out a rough outline.  After the outline I was able to more effectively search through the secondary sources and find supporting information.  Approaching the writing process this way made it much less stressful to flesh out a workable and supportable paper. 

All in all, this class has been incredibly beneficial to me.  I have learned to look closer at what I’m reading, ask questions and analyze and I have found a happy medium between how I used to write and a more structured method of writing.  While I still consider writing academically, especially using my own opinions, one of my biggest challenges, the processes that we went through and the things we have learned in this class have given me more confidence in my abilities to do what I need to do to produce a good paper.

Critiquing a Critique

I found the zombie article very interesting and informative.  I have honestly never been particularly interested in zombies so I have never given any real thought as to what they might represent.  In this article, which is actually an introduction to his book on zombies, Kyle Bishop, discusses the significance of zombies in general and throughout the periods of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.  I was more than a little surprised at the fact that zombies were never really a part of literature, they did not have their beginnings in books like most other monsters and supernatural creatures.  Bishop talks about how the idea of zombies began in Haitian folklore and transitioned almost immediately to American movies, even as early as the 1920’s.  Even more interesting to me is the evolution of the zombie, especially in relation to the most common fears and anxieties of our culture at any given time.  Bishop details the beginning of the zombie movies, a time  when World War II was a concern as well as slavery.  The  movies of that time all depict themes of racism and reverse slavery and dominance and unwanted invasion, but at the hands of a puppet master.  Through the decades and cultural upheavals and concerns, zombies have taken on different meanings and been depicted in different ways.  Zombies and movies about them have represented themes of war, euthanasia, survivalist instincts, consumerism, terrorism, post-apocalyptic society and more.  Bishop does a great job of breaking down the history of the genre, the monster and the themes and finding the meanings and relationships to our culture throughout.  All in all, this article was very thought provoking and eye-opening and it will, without a doubt make me look at zombies with a more questioning mind from now on.  I can also say that after doing our final project, I have a deeper appreciation for the amount of thought, analysis and research that went into his writing.

Image source <http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/OurZombiesAreDifferent>

Final Essay Draft

April Chaplin

Cline

English 102

10 November 2011

The Power of Guilt in The Scarlet Letter

            The Scarlet Letter was written by Nathaniel Hawthorne in 1850 and is, to this day, considered a piece of classic American literature.  It is a book that for more than a hundred years has yielded numerous interpretations.  It has been analyzed for its historical significance, for the use of symbols and allegory to tell its story, for its religious aspects and as a story about sinners and the different types of sinners it portrays.  All of these interpretations are valid as Millicent Bell, in the opening line of her essay writes;

It is not wrong to identify in this famous short novel the subjects that lie so clearly upon its surface- the effect of concealed and admitted sin, or the opposed conditions of isolation and community, or the antithetic viewpoints of romantic individualism and puritan moral pessimism or the dictates of nature and law (Bell 157).

However, these themes overlook the true message of the book.  It is a story of secrets and guilt and how these powerful forces affect the course, quality and outcome of one’s entire life.  Keeping secrets of tremendous personal magnitude and holding on to all-consuming, unprofessed guilt is a choice that is made by all of the major characters in this book and it is one that is life altering and even fatal. Hawthorne makes clear through the transformations of his characters the devastating effects of secrets.

            The book opens with the Hester Prynne, the first major character of the book,  being brought from the jail and led into the town square. Here she is forced to stand on the scaffold for three hours in front of the entire town wearing a scarlet letter on her chest and holding her newborn baby in her arms.  She is further condemned to wear this elaborately embroidered scarlet letter on her chest, “for the remainder of her natural life” as a “mark of shame” (Hawthorne 63). This is the punishment that the magistrates have deemed fit to enforce on her for the transgression of adultery.  While the story makes clear that this punishment is imposed on Hester for her sin, it is only the beginning of a much deeper picture. 

            Hester’s life throughout the book is colored by the taint of shame and guilt.   She lives with her child, Pearl, and her scarlet letter, both symbols and reminders of her sin, on the fringe of society.  Hawthorne writes;

 In all her intercourse with society, however, there was nothing that made her feel as if she belonged to it.  Every gesture, every word, and even the silence of those with whom she came in contact, implied, and often expressed, that she was banished and as much alone as if she inhabited another sphere…(Hawthorne 84)

What is so important and different about Hester’s guilt is that it is public, it is put out for all to see and it is not denied, even by Hester herself.  Male writes, “Though forced upon her by the community, it is an open recognition of guilt” (Male 101).  It is this open recognition that allows Hester to continue on with her life in the face of shame and eventually find a place in the community.   

            For Arthur Dimmesdale, the town minister, a man whom everyone reveres and believes to be the most righteous man ever to walk the Earth, the experience of guilt is much different.  Because Dimmesdale keeps his guilt a secret and chooses to carry on as though nothing is wrong, he suffers both psychically and physically and is ultimately left vulnerable to the dark and evil machinations of Chillingworth.  Hawthorne illustrates these effects repeatedly.  He writes, “…for it was the clergyman’s peculiarity that he seldom looked straightforth at any object, whether human or inanimate” (Hawthorne 131).  Psychically, he is so guilt ridden that he cannot bear to make eye contact with anyone for fear they may see the darkness and guilt in his soul.  Physically, this young and holy minister deteriorates rapidly and inexplicably.  Hawthorne describes the concern of Dimmesdale’s churchgoers when the minister says he needs no medicine.  They wonder why he would refuse when “with every successive Sabbath, his cheek was paler and thinner, and his voice more tremulous than before…it had now become a constant habit, rather than a casual gesture , to press his hand over his heart” (Hawthorne 122).  This is a glaring example of the effect of secret guilt and the way it will eat a person from the inside out. 

By the end of the story, it is revealed to the reader and to the entire community that Dimmesdale has the mark of the scarlet letter seared in the skin on his chest.  This is the ultimate representation of the power of secret guilt.  As Male describes it, “the letter [is] seen as a psychic cancer that gradually manifested itself physically” (Male 108).  Throughout the book we are shown this destructive power of secrets and guilt through the physical manifestation of one’s psychic maladies.  For Dimmesdale the cost and effect of keeping his guilt a secret is his deteriorating health and the bright light of a brilliant spiritual person that is prevented from attaining its true potential. 

Dimmesdale is not the only person whose secrets and guilt manifest physically.  Chillingworth, the physician charged with caring for Dimmesdale,  holds his own secrets.  He is the husband wronged by Hester and Dimmesdale.  He chooses to never reveal his true identity and instead ingratiate himself with the reverend to carry out a plot of revenge.  He dedicates his life to the mental torture of the one whom he sees as his nemesis.  It is a secret that takes its toll on him in both his mental and physical aspect as well. As the book progresses so does the transformation seen in Chillingworth’s demeanor.   Chillingworth, Hawthorne describes was, “throughout life, [a man] calm in temperament, kindly, though not of warm affections and in all his relations with the world, a pure and upright man” (Hawthorne 129).  By the end of the book the transformation that takes place that is a clear representation of the secret malice that overtakes him.  He is transformed from a “pure and upright man” to one of an evil and grotesquely disfigured countenance.  Hawthorne describes the this shift in chapter fourteen, “In a word, old Roger Chillingworth was a striking evidence of man’s faculty of transforming himself into a devil, if he will only, for a reasonable space of time, undertake a devil’s office” (Hawthorne 170).  Again Hawthorne illustrates and warns against the consequences of keeping secrets.  What is hidden on the inside always finds a way to come out and when it does it is always disastrous.

In the end, as Male states, “Like many great tragedies, The Scarlet Letter deals with the quest for truth, the revelation of secrets” (Male 95).  It is only the revelation of secrets that allows for the transcendence of the guilt that tortures the characters of The Scarlet Letter.  In finally acknowledging and confessing his secret, Dimmesdale is freed to ascend from the agony of his secret guilt that ultimately robbed him of his life, his health and his potential.  For Hester, the revelation of her secret lover and the identity of Roger Chillingworth, finally frees her from the ties that bind her to Boston and allows her for a time to be free.  The only character who does not, in the end, confess his secrets is Chillingworth and the consequences are deadly.  With no one left to inflict his secret methods of torture on, “he positively withered up, shrivelled away, and almost vanished from mortal sight, like an uprooted weed that lies wilting in the sun” (Hawthorne 260) and dies a short time after. 

On the surface, The Scarlet Letter, can be seen as a story about the sin of adultery and how it is dealt with by the various characters of the book.  However, the deeper theme of this book is, in fact, the nature of secrets and guilt and the havoc they can wreak in one’s life.  Brownell writes, “essentially, the book is a story of concealment” (Brownell 58) and adds, “The sin itself might, one may almost say, be almost any other” (Brownell 58).    In reading the novel and looking at the characters individually it is easy to see the truth of this statement because it is not that the sin was adultery or vengeance, it is that the sin was “concealed” that causes the lives of these characters to play out as they do. Had the sin been murder, thievery or anything else, the results would have been the same.  Denying the truth and choosing to keep secrets results in guilt that, given no other outlet, will manifest in destructive and deadly ways.  Ultimately, the moral of this story is, the truth shall set you free.

           

           

           

Works Cited

Bell, Millicent.  “The Obliquity of Signs: The Scarlet Letter.”  Critical Essays on

            Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter.  Ed. David B. Kesterson.  Boston: G.K. Hall &

Co., 1988.  157-169.  Print.

Brownell, William Cary.  “Concealment in The Scarlet Letter.”  Critical Essays on

            Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter.  Ed. David B. Kesterson.  Boston: G.K. Hall &

            Co., 1988.  58-62.  Print.

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Scarlet Letter. The Centenary Edition of the Works of

            Nathaniel Hawthorne. Volume 1. Ed. William Charavat, et al. Columbus: Ohio

            State University Press, 1962. Print.

Male, Roy R.  “The Tongue of Flame:The Scarlet Letter.”   Critical Essays on

            Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter.  Ed. David B. Kesterson.  Boston: G.K. Hall &    Co., 1988.  93-110.  Print.

Annotated Bilbliography

Annotated Bibliography

Bell, Millicent.  “The Obliquity of Signs: The Scarlet Letter.”  Critical Essays on

 Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter.  Ed. David B. Kesterson.  Boston: G.K. Hall &

 Co., 1988.  157-169.  Print.

            In this essay the author discusses the “signs” present in The Scarlet Letter.  Several such signs are individually examined in such a way as to show the obliquity, or indirectness of the signs Hawthorne uses in the book.  The author defines several recurring key words such as type, emblem, token and hieroglyph and provides explanations and examples of how they are used and their particular significance to the story.  The author also discusses pairs and the “opposition of outer and inner.”  There is also a brief discussion of the roles of secrets to each of the characters.   In particular I am interested in the opening of this essay which clearly states the many and varying themes of The Scarlet Letter as well as this author’s interpretation of the individual secrets of each of these characters which I hope to use to support my thesis.

Brownell, William Cary.  “Concealment in The Scarlet Letter.”  Critical Essays on

 Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter.  Ed. David B. Kesterson.  Boston: G.K. Hall &

 Co., 1988.  58-62.  Print.

            The author in this essay discusses the originality of Hawthorne’s work.  He claims that it is so original because it leaves out the minute details.  It only alludes to and effectively eludes what could be considered by some the subject of the novel, which is illicit love and sin.  He states that it is not about adultery or the sin of it and postulates that the sin could have been anything and the effect would have been the same.  Brownell states rather, that the book is about concealment.  This idea of concealment falls directly in line with my analysis of the book and though he talks about the concealment of sin mostly, there is support in some of his ideas for what my paper will hopefully develop.

Male, Roy R.  “The Tongue of Flame:The Scarlet Letter.”   Critical Essays on

            Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter.  Ed. David B. Kesterson.  Boston: G.K. Hall &    Co., 1988.  93-110.  Print.

            In this essay the author begins by discussing the different interpretations that are most common about The Scarlet Letter.  He talks about the “widespread disagreement among critics” and how that can be seen as a tribute to the genius of the book.  He then begins his interpretation by discussing the importance of Pearl, especially in relation to the other major characters, he outlines the structure of the story then follows with what he believes is the main theme of the book.  He discusses in detail the Tongue of Flame and how it is “the guiding metaphor” of the book.  He also discusses the transformation of the characters in the book through the Light and the Word and the seeking of truth.  Throughout the essay           there are several discussions of guilt and being true to oneself and the consequences of not doing so, these are the ideas that I believe will be most helpful in my essay.

Final Project: The Scarlet Letter

For the final essay, I have chosen to complete option 1.  I chose option 1 mainly because it seems, not necessarily easier, but more structured and familiar, especially after doing essay 3 on Frankenstein. 

I chose The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne as my primary text.  I had originally planned to do Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen, but before I could get started with reading it the idea of using The Scarlet Letter occurred to me.  It is a book that I had vague recollections of reading in high school and remember it being an enjoyable book and one with plenty of symbolism and themes throughout.

            After reading it again, I have not been disappointed.  There are many themes in the book.  Law and criminality, religion, and hypocrisy are a few.   I have been compelled by the themes of human nature and inward and outward manifestations of  it for most of this semester and it doesn’t seem to be any different for this paper.  As I read the book, the thing that grabbed me repeatedly was the theme of secrets and guilt and how different ways of handling these things can manifest in outward ways and affect the course of one’s life.  As of right now, I hope to illustrate how this is a story that demonstrates the destructive forces of secrets and guilt.

            For my research, I have several books that are compilations of essays on Hawthorne’s work that I checked out from the library. I am only now getting the chance to start flipping through them so I am hoping that I will be able to find the support I need for my idea.  I am also looking at the databases on the library website, mainly LCO and LION.  My search terms have been Hawthorne, Scarlett Letter, secrets, hypocrisy, guilt.  I have not had much luck with the term secrets so I am trying different things and keeping an open mind to different ideas.

Image source <http://www.englishwithmsg.com/images/ScarletLetter.jpg>

Mid-Term Check-In

19 October 2011

Dear Ms. Cline,

So far during this semester I have met with several challenges and had some successes.  My biggest challenge so far has been the process of using primary and secondary texts along with my own analysis.  I have often had to use multiple sources in research papers but the element of analysis as opposed to factual reporting makes the process quite different and challenging for me.  Also, doing close reading and looking deeper into themes and meanings has been something new for me.  I love to read but have rarely been charged with having to find something deeper to it than what was presented at face value.  So far I would say my biggest successes have been in meeting these challenges and forcing myself to grow as a student and a writer.   I now find myself looking at everything I read with a different perspective and a questioning mind.

The readings in this class have been very interesting to me.  The theme of monsters has given me a new outlook on what monsters really represent.  It has become apparent to me that monsters are usually not representative of some external random force put upon by the world, but they are, more often than not, a reflection of our internal workings given shape and form in the external world.

            As far as goals are concerned, my first goal for the second half of this semester is to strengthen my skills with analysis, primarily through the continued use of questioning and close reading of the works I am reading.            My second goal is to become more comfortable with secondary sources and learning how to more easily integrate them into my work.  I hope to continue to improve my writing process along the way.  I have found, especially as this class has progressed, that the less organized methods that I have always used are not as effective for me as they used to be.  I have found that freewriting, outlining and more extensive notetaking are becoming very important for me to organize my thoughts and try to form them into something usable.

            All in all, I have experienced a lot of challenge and growth in this class and expect that it will continue.  I believe that the skills that we are learning will be useful throughout the rest of my schooling and in life as well, and in spite of the stress of having to work outside of what is comfortable, I am glad that I took this class.

Sincerely,

April Chaplin

Essay 3 - VERY Rough Draft

April Chaplin

Cline

ENG 102

15 October 2011

Human Nature as Horror

According to the preface of the Norton Critical Edition of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, the story of Frankenstein came about almost by accident and was meant to be a scary story.  It started out as a contest between several people to produce a story of “sublimity, terror and the unknown” (Hunter, vii).  What ultimately came to be the story of Frankenstein is indeed one of terror, but not in the sense of a scary monster story.  The true horror of Frankenstein is in the illumination of the very real flaws of human nature and how, left unchecked, these flaws can turn to evil and destroy all that is sacred and worth living for.  The three main characters, Walton, Victor Frankenstein and Frankenstein’s monster, are each very real and sympathetic characters that the reader can easily relate to, their flaws are our flaws, and it is because of this that the story is so fightening. 

Human beings are, by nature, flawed and imperfect, and Shelley brings to light in her characters, some of the most devastating and destructive flaws of mankind. The natural impulse to rebel against ridicule and that which is forbidden is an impulse that both Walton and Frankenstein are guilty of, it is an impulse that feeds something even scarier, blind and all-consuming ambition.  For Frankenstein’s monster, the fatal flaw is vengeance fueled by a heart-wrenching loneliness and rejection that Shelley artfully illustrates in such a way that the reader can’t help but relate to and sympathize with.

Walton’s story is one of a self-educated man fascinated by the sea and exploration.  His fascination is fueled by the contents of his uncle’s library of whose “…volumes were [his] study day and night” (Shelley 8).  Walton learns of his father’s command that he not be allowed to become the explorer that he so desperately wants to be and subverts the desire to become a poet, but on his failure at this task he goes against his father’s wishes and decides to take up his journey.  Walton’s journey is not just a simple exploration, however, it is an expedition driven by the impulse, the ambition and unrelenting need for glory.  He writes to his sister of the “inestimable benefit which [he] shall confer on all mankind to the last generation…” (Shelley 8).  It is not enough for Walton to live a happy, normal life, he wants to be everything to every man and explorer until the end of time, and he cannot stop or rest until he has sacrificed everything good in his life to achieve greatness.  He continues, “…do I not deserve to accomplish some great purpose.  My life might have been passed in ease and luxury; but I preferred glory…” (Shelley 9).  Not just everyday greatness but a kind of generally unattainable greatness that is nearly the ruin of him and the people around him.  We all secretly long for greatness in our lives, but what sets us apart is not allowing our ambition to control and consume us.  Mary Poovey, in her essay The Lady and the Monster, describes the way that “…Shelley characterizes innate desire…as quintessentially egotistical” (Poovey 253),  how “she sees imagination as an appetite that can and must be regulated-” and how “If it is aroused but is not controlled…, it will project itself into the natural world, becoming voracious in its search for objects to conquer and consume” (Poovey 253).  In the context of the novel Walton’s flaw is scary but he redeems himself by relenting on his mission of glory, by learning from one whose sin is greater, Frankenstein.

Victor Frankenstein embodies all that is destructive and frightening in an unrelenting and egotistical existence bent on ambition and glory.  He too, like Walton, finds the object of his fascination ridiculed and all but forbade by his father.  He describes how his father “looked carelessly at the title-page of my book, and said, ‘Ah! Cornelius Agrippa! My dear Victor, do not waste your time upon this; it is sad trash” (Shelley 21).    It is this resistance that admittedly propels Frankenstein further and deeper into his imagination and ultimate quest for unparalleled greatness.  He says that had his father taken a different approach to his disapproval and explained his opinion that, “It is even possible, that the train of my ideas would never have received the fatal impulse that led to my ruin” (Shelley 21).  This is a circumstance that everyone can relate to, how many times has the disapproval of an authority figure lead us to do and pursue exactly that which we have been warned against.

This rebellion is, both in Walton and Frankenstein, however, not the truly frightening part of their nature, it is merely a foreshadowing of the parts of their character, and ours, that is capable of making one shudder.  It is a driving force that pushes them onward into their singular ambition.  As with Walton, Frankenstein is propelled by an innate desire to be great.  He recounts, almost echoing Walton in his sentiments, “…wealth was an inferior object; but what glory would attend the discovery, if I could banish disease from the human frame, and render man invulnerable to any but a violent death!” (Shelley 22).  Again, we see the desire to be everything to all people, to be God-like. His ego and his ambition to be God-like are the most frightening aspect of Frankenstein’s character because they drive him to repeatedly act without regard for consequences.  It is in this single-minded drive and disregard for the natural order of the world that evil is born and evil is true horror.  Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar describe Victor’s transformation and descent into evil,

As his researches into the ‘secrets of nature’ become more feverish, however, and his ambition ‘to explore unknown powers’ grows more intense, Victor begins to metamorphose from Adam to Satan, becoming ‘as Gods’ in his capacity of ‘bestowing animation upon lifeless matter’…(Gilbert and Gubar 231).

His ambition and consequent descent into evil is so horrifying because it illustrates the cost of surrendering to human impulses and ego.  George Levine puts it simply, “what Frankenstein’s ambition costs him is the family connection which makes life humanely possible” (Levine 213).

Without family and social connections, life becomes a desolate and agonizingly lonely proposition.  When you add the pain of rejection, especially by one’s own parent you get what is perhaps the scariest insight into evil and flawed human nature that Shelley provides in this book, that of Frankenstein’s creation. Shelley imparts to the reader the horror of the monster, not in his external ugliness, “a figure hideously deformed and loathsome” (Shelley 80) and not even in his fiendish and murderous deeds but rather in his character.  Shelley creates a being so sympathetic that nearly everyone who reads it can relate.  The creature tells his maker, “Every where I see bliss, from which I alone am irrevocably excluded.  I was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend” (Shelley 66).  All he wants in his existence is companionship and happiness, the same things that we all want.  It is only when he is denied this opportunity that he descends into a vengeful evil that seeks to destroy and to inflict the same misery he suffers upon the one whom he sees as having inflicted it upon him.   Poovey describes the moment of that the monster realizes he  will not, by conventional means, get what he wants and surrenders to his inherent  monstrousness,

Their violent reaction, which the monster interprets as rejection by its ‘adopted

family,’ at last precipitates the creature’s innate nature; abandoning humanity’s

‘godlike science’…the monster embarks on its systematic destruction of domestic

Harmony. (Poovey 259).

This is a very natural human response and one that is inherently ugly, terrifying and hard to face.

As a gothic novel, Frankenstein’s purpose, and Mary Shelley’s intention, was for it to be the “kind of ghost story that would ‘curdle the blood, and quicken the beatings of the heart’(Moers 215).  There is no doubt that she succeeded, but she did so less by the telling of a story about a monster than the telling of a story of monstrousness; the innate monstrousness that resides in all humans and when allowed to run rampant, becomes ugly and evil and truly terrifying.  George Levine, in his criticism of Frankenstein states that “…as Nelson suggests, reader and writer alike were freed to pursue the possibilities of their own potential evil” (Levine 209).  As this quote suggests, it is the very recognition of the qualities that reside in each of us and the freedom that Shelley’s story gives us to explore these qualities, both in the book and in ourselves, that makes it such a scary story.

Works Cited

Gilbert, Sandra M. and Gubar, Susan.  “Mary Shelley’s Monstrous Eve.”

Frankenstein, The 1818 Text,Contexts, Nineteenth-century Responses, Modern Criticism. Ed. J. Paul Hunter. W W Norton & Co Inc, 1996. 225-240. Print.

Levine, George.  “Frankenstein and the Tradition of Realism.” Frankenstein,The

1818 Text,Contexts, Nineteenth-century Responses, Modern Criticism. Ed. J. Paul Hunter. W W Norton & Co Inc, 1996. 241-251. Print.

Moers, Ellen.  “Female Gothic:The Monster’s Mother.” Frankenstein,The 1818 Text,

Contexts, Nineteenth-century Responses, Modern Criticism. Ed. J. Paul Hunter. W W Norton & Co Inc, 1996. 241-251. Print.

Poovey, Mary.  “’My Hideous Progeny’: The Lady and the Monster.”

Frankenstein,The 1818 Text,Contexts, Nineteenth-century Responses, Modern Criticism. Ed. J. Paul Hunter. W W Norton & Co Inc, 1996. 251-261. Print.

Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft. Frankenstein, The 1818 Text,

Contexts, Nineteenth-century Responses, Modern Criticism. Ed. J. Paul Hunter. W W Norton & Co Inc, 1996. Print.

Female Gothic: The Monster's Mother

The article “Female Gothic: The Monster’s Mother,” was written in 1976 by Ellen Moers, a literary critic who wrote about female literature.  In the article, Moers describes the female gothic genre as it was before Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein and how Shelley changed the genre.  Before Frankenstein, the genre always centered around a female victim/heroine.  When Shelley wrote Frankenstein, one of the things that made it unique and important was the distinct lack of such a female heroine.  According to Moers, the fact that the book was written by a woman yet has no major female character was genre changing.  Moers goes on to talk about Shelley’s life history and how influential that was on her writing.  She talks about how life and death, beginning from her own birth and the consequent death of her mother shaped Mary Shelley’s vision and thoughts. Moers goes on to demonstrate how the overriding themes of birth and death in Shelley’s life are quite astonishingly mirrored in the novel.  Moers ends with a discussion and analyses of another recurrent theme in the book, that of parent child relationships and dynamics.

My response to this article, in particular, was very strong.   It made the most sense to me and gave me a whole new perspective of Frankenstein and also shedding some light on at least one thing about Frankenstein that bothered me.  The whole idea and importance of giving birth in the book somehow eluded me, but after reading Moers article it is remarkably clear to me.  In addition, the one scene that disturbed me the most in the book was how after laboring furiously for months over his creation, Frankenstein finally infuses life into his monster only to run away from it and pretend it doesn’t exist for years.  He then is horrified that it has come back to haunt him.  This was something that bothered me immensely and I was not able to pinpoint why.  After reading this article and how Moers analysed “the parent-child and child-parent relationship” I had an ah-ha moment and suddenly looked at Frankenstein in a whole new way.   I do think that I will somehow incorporate this article into my third essay.

Image Source <http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/literary-women-ellen-moers/1003725030>

Writing and Revision

As far as a writing process goes, mine is not the most structured.  I have a very difficult time sitting down and forcing something down on paper, especially if it is anything but factual or research based.   I find that I rely heavily on inspiration or intuition.  If I overthink a topic or try to force it, it rarely comes to me.  So, the first and main thing I try to do is read and reread the assignment.  I make sure the idea of what I need to do is planted firmly in my mind, then I walk away.  Over the next few days, I try to think about the assignment and the material periodically, and usually, if I’m lucky, and when I’m not thinking about it, an idea comes to me.  After the idea comes I am able to sit down and start fleshing out something resembling a paper.

When it comes to revision I try to get at least two academic opinions and at least one opinion from a friend or confidant.  I keep those suggestions in mind as I reread my essay.  The things I look for most, myself, when revising an essay are coherence and flow.  Does it make sense?  Does it flow smoothly through all the points and ideas I wanted to make?  I look for things that may be unclear or superfluous then I try to tighten it up by getting rid of unnecessary things and rearranging where necessary to make everything as smooth as possible.  For me, the benefit of revising a paper is simply to make it more clearly the expression of ideas that it was meant to be and a paper that engages the reader.

For essay #2 I am still in process so I don’t have totally specific examples yet.  I want to reevaluate my thesis and try to make it clearer, and then make sure that I have tied my paragraphs neatly to it.  Since analysis is new for me, I will be looking hard at whether I have satisfied the P.I.E. format for each of my statements and eliminating any extra or unclear information. 

image source: http://girlfriendbooks.blogspot.com/2011/08/by-laura-spinella-topic-this-cycle-is.html

Frankenstein Blog #5

“Of what a strange nature is knowledge!  It clings to the mind, when it has once seized on it, like a lichen on the rock.  I wished sometimes to shake off all thought and feeling; but I learned that there was but one means to overcome the sensation of pain, and that was death…” (Shelley 81).

            This quote is of Frankenstein’s monster as he is telling his tale to his creator in volume 2.  It seemed particularly poignant to me because it seems to echo the mindset of many of the characters in the story so far.  The overriding message of this statement is that ignorance is bliss.  Everyone seeks out and even yearns for knowledge, but once it is had, it cannot be shaken, “It clings to the mind…” (81). If the knowledge that one gains is unexpected or undesirable it causes unimaginable misery.  This is especially true in the case of Victor Frankenstein and his monster. 

            For Victor, ignorance allows him to go on about his life for more than 2 years after creating this “wretch” without giving much of a thought to what happened to it.  It is only when he comes across the figure of his creation after the death of his brother that he realizes, and comes to know, that it is ultimately his fault that his brother has been murdered.  Furthermore, knowing that a dear friend has been executed because of what he has done is knowledge that is so unbearable that he cannot shake it or the misery that this knowledge brings him.

            For Frankenstein’s monster being alive is full of mystery and awe.  He begins his life and journey completely ignorant of who he is, what he is, or where he came from.  In spite of his lack of knowledge he believes that the world is an amazing place and that the people in it are essentially good and benevolent creatures like himself.  He yearns to acquire the knowledge to be among people and to know who he is.  After a year of observing the world, the monster presents himself, and in so doing, loses the last bit of happiness that ignorance affords him.  He learns that he is, no matter how hard he tries, nothing but a hideous monster that will never be able to be accepted among people.  This knowledge and final obliteration of blissful ignorance is what causes the untold misery that cannot be shaken and makes him long for death to relieve it.

           Image source: http://images.sodahead.com/profiles/0/0/0/4/5/2/3/0/5/Ignorance-is-bliss-38440156948.jpeg

Works Cited

Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft, and J. Paul Hunter. Frankenstein,

The 1818 Text, Contexts, Nineteenth-century Responses, Modern Criticism. W W Norton & Co Inc, 1996. Print.

First Draft Essay 2

My questions are:  Is my interpretation believable?  Did I present it clearly and support it in a way that is easy and smooth to follow?  Did I lapse into summary anywhere? Any suggestions at all are welcome! 

April Chaplin

Cline

ENG 102

17 September 2011

Facing Down Your Demons

            “Goblin Market,” a poem by Christina Rosetti, is, on its surface, a tale of fanciful fairy tale qualities, dancing little goblin men and one sister’s love for another.  However, when examined more closely, the vivid imagery that the poet uses speaks to a theme of temptation and personal demons.  The story illustrates the consequences of giving into temptation and the ultimate salvation that can only come from facing down one’s fears and demons.  The sisters, Laura and Lizzie, demonstrate this dynamic through their choices and ways of handling the temptations they are faced with.

            As the poem begins the reader is immediately introduced to the goblin men and their cries urging anyone that can hear them to “Come buy our orchard fruits, / Come buy, come buy:” (Rosetti line 3-4).  The description of the unearthly wares that follows is so clear and vivid as to be almost palpable.  She describes “grapes fresh from the vine” (line 20) and “Bright-fire-like barberries” (line 27), all “Sweet to tongue and sound to eye” (line 30).  How tempting such wonderful things must be to young maidens like Laura and Lizzie.  Indeed these fruits are exactly that, indescribable temptation presented for the taking by these little goblin men. 

            Then we have the villains of the story, the goblin men.  Rosetti uses images of strange, animal-like and somewhat scary little monsters to describe them.

            One had a cat’s face,

            One whisk’d a tail,

            One tramp’d at a rat’s pace,

            One crawl’d like a snail,

            One like a wombat prowl’d obtuse and furry,

            One like a ratel tumbled hurry skurry. (line 71-76)

In our mind’s eye now are planted these images of little monsters slithering and crawling through the glen, yet in spite of the slight revulsion that the reader can’t help but feel, it is tempered by their sweet voices described as “…a voice like the voice of doves / Cooing all together: / They sounded kind and full of loves” (line 77-79). Beasts with voices of angels.  These are the scary dark imaginings of our inner workings, creatures that intrigue yet repulse us deep down, our inner demons. It is these inner demons whose mere presence or faces repulses, but whose voice tricks us, entices us and leads us directly into temptation. 

It is the sweet voice of our monsters that gets us into trouble. The voice that when you close your eyes, makes you forget exactly what it is that you’re dealing with, the way that Laura does when she fails to heed her sister’s dire warnings and gives into to the little goblin men and ultimately temptation.  Lizzie warns Laura, saying, “…’No, no, no; / Their offers should not charm us, / Their evil gifts would harm us’” (line 64-67).  Lizzie knows that no matter how fantastic the offers, one must be strong and not look into the face of demons because the temptation they offer can do nothing but harm.

Laura does not hear her sister and instead follows the path of least resistance and finds the consequences are heavy and hard to bear.  These consequences begin from the very moment she gives in and decides to partake of the ‘forbidden fruit’.  “She clipp’d a precious golden lock, / She dropped a tear more rare than a pearl,” (line 126-127).  The price of giving in and being weak of will is already enough here for Laura to shed a tear, yet it is still not enough for her to stop; she continues on and gorges herself on the fruit of the goblins. 

As the story goes on, the author continues to use vivid imagery and language to impart to the reader the pain and price that Laura pays for her transgression.  Phrases like, “Laura turn’d cold as stone” (line 253) and “In sullen silence of exceeding pain” (line 271) are precursors to the description of ultimate consequence. 

Her hair grew thin and grey;

She dwindled away, as the fair full moon doth turn

To swift decay and burn

Her fire away. (line 277-280)

The author can only be describing one thing here, the ultimate price of Laura’s failure to resist temptation, which is her soul and her life.  She failed to confront her demons and now she must pay the price for it.

            On the other side of temptation is resistance and salvation.  Lizzie’s journey into the belly of the beast to confront her demons illustrates this point.  In spite of her fear she seeks out the goblins with the strength of will to withstand everything they throw at her.        

“Though the goblins cuff’d and caught her, / Coax’d and fought her, / Bullied and besought her,” (line 424-426).  These lines show how in spite of all of their charms the goblins could not tempt her and were forced to resort to brutish behavior to force their wares upon Lizzie.  And still, her strength prevails.  “Life out of death” (line 524) is the reward for her resistance.  Salvation, for both herself and her sister. 

            In life, and in this poem, there are choices.  The story of two sisters, Lizzie and Laura, is a poignant story of the effects of our choices and a reminder to be mindful of the consequences they may have.  You can choose as Laura did, to give in to temptation and your personal demons and you will nearly always find that, “Their fruits [are] like honey to the throat / But poison in the blood” (line 554-555).  Or, you can take the chance and resist, stand up in the face of your fears and the monsters that haunt you and reap the rewards.

Works Cited

Rosetti, Christina.  “Goblin Market.” Goblin Market and other Poems. Cambridge: Macmillan, 1862. Print.

My Early Reaction to Goblin Market

The poem that I reacted to most was “Goblin Market” by Christina Rosetti.  At first read it was the vivid imagery and fairy tale quality that I liked.  The idea of little ‘goblin men’ dancing through the glen enticing young maidens to buy their fruits is a fanciful story, but one that the speaker tells skillfully.  The meter and language were fairly easy to follow and do a good job of lulling the reader into the rhythm of the story, a rhythm that changes throughout, becoming more subdued in some places and more intense in others, all of which mesh and flow with what’s going on at that point in the poem. By the end of the poem it is easy to see that the story can be interpreted as a story of how one sister’s love can ultimately save the other sister’s life. After all, Lizzie braves an encounter with the goblin men to bring back the juices and pulp of their fruit to save her sister Laura.  However, after reading the poem more closely I see a story of temptation and the devastation that blindly giving into it can create in one’s life, and, on the other side of the coin, how having the personal strength to resist can bring salvation and empowerment.

From the very beginning temptation is a theme.  The speaker describes how the goblin men cry, “Come buy our orchard fruits, / Come buy, come buy:” (line 3-4).  The images of all the perfect and varied fruit that one could not possibly find anywhere else follows in such a way that you can almost see in your mind’s eye these perfect, ripe and delicious specimens.  The goblins sing their song of “grapes fresh from the vine” (20) and “Bright-fire-like barberries” (27) in such a way that you can almost taste them and indeed want to.   

From here, it is easy to understand how difficult it would be for someone like Laura, utterly lacking willpower, to resist such charm and seduction in spite of her sister’s dire warnings. 

“We must not look at goblin men,
We must not buy their fruits:

Who knows upon what soil they fed
Their hungry thirsty roots?”(42-45)

Here Lizzie tries to warn her sister of the dangers of giving in to the goblin men because what they offer can’t possibly be natural.  The idea being that anything unnatural cannot be good and most surely has undesirable consequences and effects no matter how good it seems at first.

The poem continues, on and on, vividly depicting how one person can blindly give in to such seduction at the price of one’s soul.  It is not until this temptation is met with such strength and the will to not give in, that the power is defeated, never to be anything but a memory again. 

This is a poem and a story that affected me strongly because I see in it parallels of personal power, of starting with a lack of it and only through the near destruction of one’s own soul coming to find that power and happiness is within oneself.

Image source: http://gurneyjourney.blogspot.com/2009/09/garden-goblins.html

Works Cited

Rosetti, Christina.  “Goblin Market.” Goblin Market and other Poems. Cambridge: Macmillan, 1862. 

Summary Versus Analysis

After watching the lecture on literary analysis and reviewing the various resources provided, my understanding of the difference between summary and analysis is fairly clear, I think.  Summary is a simple task, requiring little from the reader.  It is the easiest concept of the two to grasp and to do.  Summary is a simple recap of a particular story, book or passage.  There are no questions at all involved in summarizing, only a short retelling of what the story is about.  Therefore, all that is required of someone who is writing a summary is to have read the book or passage and to have a basic comprehension of it. 

On the other hand, analysis is all about questions.  Analysis requires the reader to not only have a basic comprehension of a book but to look deeper.  To write a good literary analysis the reader must read a book with a critical eye and a questioning mind.  Analysis is about finding something about a book that grabs your attention, then taking that something and questioning it, forming an opinion about it and finally making a supportable argument about it.  This page provides yet another explanation of literary analysis with some guidelines and several samples of what analysis ultimately looks and reads like.  

I think that the one thing that stuck with me most about summary and analysis is that summary is based on fact, it is either true or not true, and it is not arguable.  Analysis is exactly the opposite; it is based on opinion and inference and must be arguable.  This seems to be the most useful information to me because it provides a simple and easy test to tell whether you are on the right track when writing a literary analysis.

image source: http://rghmarketing.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/analysis.jpg

Introduction

Good Readers

   Vladimir Nabokov, a Russian novelist and author of the short essay Good Readers and Good Writers, states in his essay that ‘the good reader is one who has imagination, memory, a dictionary and some artistic sense.’  He also believes that a good reader is one who brings an open mind to a book and is a ‘rereader’.

   On all of these accounts I agree with Nabokov.  The most important characteristics, in my opinion, are an open mind combined with imagination.  I believe that to truly appreciate a great piece of literature a reader must be open-minded and willing to read without prejudice, personal or otherwise.  Then and only then, can a good reader dive into a book with his imagination and allow the ‘magic’, as Nabokov calls it,  of what has been created by the author to come to life as it was intended.

   As for myself, I consider myself to be a good reader, at least most of the time.  Having an open mind and good imagination are easy for me and make reading very enjoyable, but I find that rereading is something I do often, as well as keeping a dictionary near.  Doing these things allows me to go back and catch the nuances of a novel that are meant to be seen but that I frequently miss when first trying to absorb a good book.

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