Happy Halloween?

This evening, as I attempted to procrastinate my rather large load of homework, I had a very pleasant walk through memory lane as I watched all of the trick-or-treaters stop by. The weather was just right- cool and brisk, I could smell autumn in the air; the pumpkins were carved; the candy was out… but it simply did not feel quite the same as it used to. I obviously could not dress up and go door to door asking for candy, yet I was not completely ready to throw in the towel to the magic of holidays. So once again the fact that I am going through adolescence became apparent and I therefore sulked around in envy of all of the dressed up five year olds getting candy. Now my mind was filled with fond memories of my childhood and of course the what seemed like abysmal amount of homework that I continued to push off. As I racked my brain of my assignments I remembered the blog that I needed to write, which of course reminded me of the literature that we have read thus far, which therefore led me to the sad realization that at this point, my life is way too similar to that of Holden Caulfield and George Willard. Once again life has brought me back to literature and how I relate to it. When I read Winesburg, Ohio and The Catcher and the Rye I had this constant feeling of uncomfort and anxiety. I think it’s because the characters are in such an odd in-between stage of life. It’s just not a good place to be in. Essentially, these characters simply do not belong to humanity- they’re stuck in this incredibly awkward transition from childhood to adulthood. So, that person has to choose whether to be an adult or a child. Unfortunately for adolescents, we want to be both. The idea of wanting two things at once reminds me of Edna. Edna is a young woman and was most definitely prematurely married and a mother. I think that is many ways, Edna did not properly go through the necessary stages of adolescence before becoming an adult. Clearly she has a free spirit, and to be tied down to children and a husband by her early twenties does not leave room for her spirit to be liberated. Her marriage and motherhood is a part of her life that is fake to her. It is this component of reality that is what she is expected of and not what she actually wants from life. If Edna would have been able to live out more of her twenties and make the slow and steady transition into adulthood, then I don’t think she ever would have gone “crazy”. Adolescence is a vitally important part of life where people discover who they are. It is also incredibly awkward and depressing at times. But hey, at least the world has Holden and George to see that most people my age are probably feeling this same bizarre lack of holiday spirit. Happy Halloween!

Poetry, The awakening, etc

So, I started trying to find poems that I “connect” with but it is harder than I imagined. I have never really been into poetry so it’s hard for me to find poems that I really enjoy. But several of the poems that we have read in class have been enjoyable so I’m sure I can find something interesting. I guess I need to start looking at some poetry books or something. Also, I thought that the timed writing went well today. I wrote about the poem “The Century Quilt” and I found the imagery of the leaves very fascinating. I think that the leaves represent something dying. The speaker’s childhood, for example, is something that is over and the memory could be “dying”. However, she makes it seem like because it is put into this material object that her memory is preserved eternally. It was an interesting concept, I liked it. And I’m glad that we wrote that essay on The Awakening because it forced me to completely gather my thoughts. The seminars are good to discuss and hear other people’s opinions but unfortunately they aren’t long enough for me to always establish my position on the matter that we are discussing. However, because I knew I had to pick a side, it was kind of fun to gather all of the support for my claim. I decided that Edna is an artist by the end of the book. It became very obvious to me that she is reborn before she drowns. At that moment, she has come into a world that is new but familiar. So, this means that she has let go of all relationships. No more Robert, and no more family. By letting go of relationships and responsibilities, all of her attention can be put on art which is self-truth. I know that most of my peers hated Edna and I wasn’t a huge fan of her either, but to me she became so much of a symbol of freedom that I sort of disregarded her as an actual person. Also, that imagery of Venus that you noticed at the end of the book was actually mentioned earlier as well. When I was re-reading some of the parts I noticed that Victor describes Edna as Venus. That furthered my conclusion that Edna reaches a rebirth into nature which makes her an artist. She drowns because she is no longer meant for life on earth, Venus has taken over her and she is a part of the sea or freedom. To me, the ending was awesome. It gave me chills a little bit. It was just so dreamlike and entrancing. But anyways, I was surprised to find that I liked the book. I am not a feminist but I think that everybody can relate to Edna’s point in some way or another. We are all prisoners to something at times, and she shows that we aren’t alone.

Saving Herself

Well, just finished The Awakening. I began to actually enjot this book. At first I found Edna whiney but the ending made me respect her. The ending was somewhat predictable but also completely necessary to justify the entire book. Edna drowning herself was the most selfish and selfless thing that she could have done. When she says that “she would give up the unessential, but she would never sacrifice herself for her children,” she exhibits this in the last chapter. If Edna continued on living, she would either selfishly continue only thinking of herself thus disregard her husband and children, or she would give herself up and submit herself to her expected duties in life. So, either way she would not be doing what she promised herself. By drowning herself, some may believe this to be incredibly selfish, and perhaps it is. After all, now she can forget about the stresses and burdens of life. But in many ways, it is selfless. Although her husband and children will be feeling a great deal of pain, one can only imagine the amount of dysfunction and sorrow Edna would cause them had she continued on living her carefree and neglectful lifestyle. She is protecting her family name and her own name by “accidentally” drowning. Also, maybe it was accidental. It seems unplanned- almost as if she is under a spell. The sea is seducing her and she gives in; but she is content with her decision. And what is with all of her lovers? Edna is less than pleasant during her family’s absence, yet Arobin is totally enamored by her. It is as if her essence is mesmerizing. I guess independence is refreshing and attractive to Arobin and Robert. But I wonder why she allows Arobin to caress her. Perhaps she is imagining Robert during those occasions. That scene kind of reminded me of when she describes the sea seducing her.  I’m glad that Chopin included the small parts of Edna with her children. It made me like Edna more and it is reassuring that her children will not grow up thinking that they had a neglectful mother (even if they sort of did). I can see why this book would have been banned from stores during that time period; it’s really quite a powerful book. Chopin lines up everything so that her audience can really understand and feel what Edna feels. So, I can see why society would not have wanted women to get any ideas. For me personally, I found some if it rather annoying and repetitive but when I got near the end, I began to respect Edna more. There is no reason not to respect Edna in the end- she has followed her heart and her values. She has given herself physically up for her children’s sake, but she has saved herself. It ends up being a dark and ironic win-win situation. What can appear to be selfish is quite justifiable and in the end, better for everybody, including Edna.

The Awakening

The Awakening is certainly an interesting topic for discussion and I must say that I am anxious to see how the seminar will go tomorrow. According to the questions you asked us, we have several opposing opinions on gender roles in society that will hopefully be reflected tomorrow. The articles you gave us on all of the etiquette that women were expected to follow are humorous. Edna is doing a poor job at most of it actually. I respect Edna and I obviously understand why she is moody at this awakening moment in her life, but she is definitely annoying me. Her husband is so good to her yet she continually acts difficultly because she is not content with life. Idealistically it would be great if she would balance her independence and domestic duties but I suppose that it is too difficult right now. I can tell that by the end of the book I will probably just think of Edna as whiny but who knows, maybe not. Also, I am trying to figure out Robert’s significance. Clearly there is a mutual infatuation going on. I know that it would be unheard of for Robert to actually pursue Edna, but I wonder what significance he holds to the novel as a whole. Maybe her crush is Edna’s first independent thought for a while. Robert represents an unthinkable possibility and desire and I guess that ultimately that is what she wants in life. She wants the ability to make crazy decisions, whether good or bad, by herself. And now he is in Mexico so maybe that is one way to represent Edna losing what she desires. One odd thing that I am noticing is her lack of attention to her kids. I understand that women had nannies but Edna seems like she is rarely ever taking care of them. Like the day she went off with Robert all day- what were her kids doing? I don’t know but I just think that Edna is a bit too self-centered so it makes me a bit unsympathetic to her situation. And she is simply putting in no effort into anything; she does not tend to her kids, her husband, or any necessary duties… it’s kind of annoying to me. It was interesting though to hear everybody’s perspective on womanly roles. I guess I am very flexible with things- I believe that not all women are meant to be motherly and not all are meant to be bread winners so I think it is a personal decision on how to live life. I want gender equality but at the same time, I think that tradition is important. For example, I think it would be odd to not have the men ask the women out or pay for her dinner but I am sure that some women would be offended by that gesture. Well, I don’t know. Gender roles are confusing- I think that tradition versus modern era will fight back and forth for a long time.

A Cinderella Story

It’s amazing how significant the social class lines really are and how frequently they turn up throughout life. Social class struggle has occurred in every book that we’ve read thus far. All the King’s Men, Willie struggles with the social shock of power; Streetcar Named Desire, Stanley feels intimidated by Blanche because of class; and Winesburg, the entire town is afraid to move on perhaps due to social conflict that they would have to face outside of Winesburg. On Thursday, we read Cinderella, and in the end, Cinderella turns from a working class girl into a beautiful princess. The question is; would she have become a princess had she met the prince as a peasant? I don’t think so. Yes, Cinderella was beautiful and kind, but her dirty rags of clothes would not cut it for a prince. Throughout the entire story, the only times the prince sees Cinderella is when she is magically made to look rich. One of the most climactic parts is when the clock turns midnight and she must run away as fast as possible before the prince can see who she actually is. And again in the end, when the shoe fits, her godmother makes her into a beautiful princess before she can even see the prince. The more that I think about it, the more disturbing this story really is. As far as the audience knows, the prince is never made aware of Cinderella’s actual past. Yikes. Now I wonder what the prince would have done had he known. This story makes it very clear that social class matters and that we should probably fake it till we make it in life. Also, last night I was flipping through channels and landed on “Maid in Manhattan”, yet another Cinderella story. In a heavily emotional part where the future senator tries to win over Jennifer Lopez, JLo points out that he never would have looked twice at her if she had not pretended to be rich. Of course he denies this but we all know that it is true. Would a wealthy social elitist ever think to woo a maid? Probably not. And had Jennifer Lopez not tried on that Dolce and Gabbana outfit, she too never would have tried to woo a future senator. This is because whether we like it or not, social class tends to glue us down to our rightful place in society and it takes a brave sole to break out of that hold. I suppose the glue that holds us down is our pride. Jennifer Lopez nearly does not take the life-altering option to commit to this man because she is proud. Cinderella on the other hand does not seem to have an ounce of pride, but hey, it is a fairytale after all. I definitely was not so attuned to the frequent occurrence of the Cinderella theme in movies and books but our analytical read of Cinderella reminded me of that. Cinderella portrays a classic tale of social class conflict which proves to be a regular occurrence in life and literature.