Postmodern Eyes

When I started this class, I wasn't really sure what to expect. I knew it would be hard, mainly cause Mitchell was teaching it but I also knew it would be rewarding. At the beginning of this course, we discussed how author's morph history into their narratives and how they make it make sense and interesting. I feel like some books we've read throughout the semester did this really well while others just totally confused the reader. Libra  was the one book that I didn't like. The history embedded into it was hard to keep up with and took copious amounts of rereading to figure out who was who. There were some people who had codes name (Leon) which messed with my brain and understanding of the book. Obviously we haven't finished it so maybe towards the end, the book comes together as a whole. If it didn't, Libra  would be the most annoying and distracting book I've ever read. The amount of stuff the author crams into a single page is crazy and definitely took...

A few days ago in class we talked at length about history and the relationship between studying historical facts and the emotional implications of those facts. There were discussions on how one should study history, whether investing emotionally in the history is the right way to study the past or not. While studying history at that depth might become mentally detrimental later on, I think it's an important thing to do, for everyone, to understand the lives of others. Octavia Butler does a wonderful job of fully immersing her main character Dana into her ancestral past. Dana comes out of her experience without an arm and (probably) PTSD as a result of visiting her past. While this is pretty severe, I feel as if Dana now really understands what her past had to go through to survive. The way Dana handles herself throughout the book is a testament to how she accepts her fate yet finds a way to fight back. While she is a slave, she still treats Rufus as a human is meant to be treated...

Kindred by Octavia E. Butler provides an exclusive and in depth look into the lives of slaves during the Ante Bellum South. What I find interesting about this book is the way Butler encapsulates the spit image of slavery from the dialogue down to the smells and textures. For me, this is the trade of a good historical novel, one that can bring to life the horrors of the past by enveloping the reader in every possible sense. One scene Butler does an amazing job of bringing to life is the scene in The Fire where she hides in the bushes while some white people beat up Alice's mom and dad. While this scene is so gruesome by itself, Butler adds descriptions of the beating of the man tied to the tree. "The man's body convulsed, but the only sound he made was a gasp. He took several more blows with no outcry, but I could hear his breathing, hard and quick." (page 36). These two sentences capitalize mostly on sound and while there is no dialogue added, the description is eno...

Slaughterhouse-Five  by Kurt Vonnegut is definitely my favorite novel that we've read so far. Unlike the other novels, Slaughterhouse-Five  seems more believable and real. It's way easier to follow and understand (or maybe that's just because we're reading it right after Mumbo Jumbo ). It's gut wrenching and crazy even if I'm unable to relate to anything that's happening. While I'm sitting there thinking about how messed up all the characters are in the book, there seems to be a certain phrase popping up all the time after the worst scenarios I've ever read about. "So it goes" It seems after every time a person dies, Vonnegut uses the phrase. I've noticed it doesn't really matter how the person dies, whether in war or of natural causes, they're all treated the same. This keeps in line with Billy Pilgrim's "whatever" or nonchalant attitude. The phrase could also reflect Tralfamadorian idea that even though a perso...

One of the best things about Mumbo Jumbo  by Ishmael Reed is the way Reed leaves the book so open ended. He intentionally uses weird grammar and syntax yet having no way to explain what they mean or what they imply. Reed brings up characters with no real meaning then leave us hanging by giving us no explanation as to why he put them in there. The characters' names are very weird and yet again, Reed offers no explanation as to why. I'm here to offer some solutions and test some theories out! It almost seems as if Reed picks out really weird names in his book. There were multiple points in a reading where I stopped to pick up my phone and google something. To my amazement, every single thing I googled was true. On page 156, Reed references a man named Hepplewhite who made furniture. Sure enough, there actually was a man named Hepplewhite who made cabinets and he even has a wikipedia page. On that same page, I also fact checked Lackawanna New York and Countee Cullen. I'm not...

Two weeks ago I talked about Doctorow's usage of short and long sentences to captivate the audience in his book. Now we're reading Mumbo Jumbo by Ishmael Reed and once again, the author uses weird syntax. This time however it's much more different and apparent to the reader. While I discussed a reason why Doctorow uses long and short sentences to try to keep the reader focused, I don't have any really concrete ideas why Reed writes his book the way he does. The most obvious weird thing Reed uses is misspelled words. He exchanges words that look alike but have no common meaning, like policy and police. Honestly, I'm not really sure what his intention is with this but it does bring some good questions to mind when reading and discussing the book. For instance, on page 18, "He went into the police station and knocked the captain cold when he didn't come forward with policy protection." We discussed this in class, how "policy" doesn't reall...

While reading Ragtime, I've noticed that Doctorow uses a combination of very short and very long sentences. While the prose seems choppy and disconnected at times, it reflects what's going on in the plot and conveys emotions. For example, on page 51, there are two sentences that particularly stand out as being very short or very long. "It was an important event." Here Doctorow uses a punchy short sentence to deliver an important and powerful fact. The length reflects the fact making it seem more real and powerful. A sentence later, Doctorow uses a particularly long sentence. "Carefully Tateh explained that although he was unalterably opposed to Goldman, she being an anarchist and be a socialist, he had great respect for her personal courage and integrity; and that he had therefore agreed that some sort of temporary accord between the socialists and the anarchists was advisable, if only for the evening, because the funds raised for the occasion would go to sup...