V for Vendetta themes

                The major themes in V for Vendetta are the role of vigilantes, government, dictators, murder, and the cycles of history. The book is most successful at discussing the role of rebellion, vigilantes, and government, while it is least successful at drawing connections to history and defining its own justification for murder. The book emphasizes that revolution requires almost insanity to achieve, and that it also requires strong actions and followers. V’s training of Evey in the shadow room illustrates these three qualities. Evey must be at the point of desiring death over imprisonment. She must be willing to do what it takes to break the grip of oppression. V for Vendetta simulates complete dictatorship, with leaders that control their people with strict laws and fear. The book constantly draws parallels between being imprisoned and the society that they live in. V’s origin is believed to have originated from a Jewish concentration camp like facility. He is believed to have experienced some of the worst of the government’s experiments. He believes that only an insane people can see the atrocities occurring in England. That through insanity, people are freed from the confines that society places on them. V for Vendetta was most successful at highlighting the essentials of rebellion and change.

                The aspects that V for Vendetta was not successful at portraying are the possible benefits of the totalitarian government and the justification of murder. Although murder was doubtfully an issue for V considering his level of insanity, murder is still a major issue for maintaining one’s justification for actions. If V continues to use murder and terrorism to achieve his goals, then the fundamentals of the society that he wants to create will be built upon murder, terrorism, and having the means justify the ends. His society would likely be worse than the current one. While the book describes the fear and oppression of the camera system and the constant police force, it does not describe the security and benefits of the society.

                The most effective use of its comic form is the ending of the book. When Evey is thinking about V’s identity, she looms over his corpse and imagines what his face could possibly be. Only in comic book form, could the story have kept the reader intensely staring at the picture before reading the text, and wondering if that was V’s true face. Comic books allow stories to build suspense, and allow far greater emphasize on the face of the characters.

The expansion of Novels

In Franco Moretti's article, he explores the history of novels and their trends. He shifts the perspective of reading novels from viewing them each individually and in catagories to seeing all literary works as a whole over time. Moretti really takes a historical approach to literature. He attempts to attain more objectivity by looking at statistics and graphs, instead of the actual individual books of the time. He believes that novels are meant to be seen as a collection of individual stories and that they are not simply fragments that represent different sides of the whole. His perspective, in theory, is beneficial and would provide an all together more complete understanding of literature. But, the reality is that no one can read all of the books and that the statistics that he uses to generate trends are still based on a consensus that may not agree with each person's individual perspective. In many ways, his approach to literature defeats the purpose of novels. Novels are designed to give a personal perspective to diversity in time, culture, race, gender, and many other qualities. By combining novels with statistics and history, their individuality and diversification are either decreased or erased.

SSTLS could potentially be combined very easily with biology. By percieving it as a science fiction novel, SSTLS introduces nanotechnology, an array of questionable pathogens, organ transplants, and many other feasible scientific advancements/discoveries. My first question would be how does the post-human services company plan on replaces brain cells, which never divide, and if they were replaced a person would not retain their memories. Although personally, I think that the science in SSTLS was used merely to incite fear and disgust within the reader, instead of wonder and excitement for the possibles of science.

M. Butterfly compared to SSTLS

The movie M. Butterfly and the book Super Sad True Love Story share many similarities and differences. Both stories are set in times filled with dramatic change. M. Butterfly is set during many great conflicts between east and the west, while Super Sad True Love Story is set during the downfall of America. Both stories possess white males and Asian “females” with starkly contrasting personalities. But despite all the similarities, the two movies have major differences in their opinions on morality.

                Great perversion can describe both stories according to current morals and standards, but the perversions involved in both of the stories are polar opposites. In M. Butterfly, an old story, considered to be of tragic love, is corrupted even further to demonstrate how feeble people’s perceptions of love and romance can be. The movie creates a false premise of purity by mirroring the old fashioned story’s wholesome and old fashioned values. It employs deception to depict how artificial romance and stories can be. It looks into the core of people and reveals great perversion, immorality, and unwillingness to accept one’s own depravity.

                Super Sad True Love Story, in contrast, begins with sexual deviance and extremely explicit immorality compared to current standards. At first, it appears to be a warning or sign of how the world will progress. It depicts women as having almost no restraint in their vulgarity. The world is filled sexually explicit brands and devices to rate one’s attractiveness. He creates a world where relationships and romances have become a consumer good. But despite this world of moral corruption and selfishness, at the core of people like Lenny and Eunice, people still value sanctity and purity. They long to have meaningful relationships that exist outside of the world’s immorality.

                Super Sad True Love Story’s message is that, while people’s outer character may be immoral, on the inside people always seek real love that is uninfluenced from the corruption of society. While in M. Butterfly, the author portrays people as desiring to live in what our current society perceives as illusion and indecency. The movie M. Butterfly questions our perceptions of romance, instead of defending the nature of romance, like in Super Sad True Love Story.

D.L

Changing social intimacy

                One of the major themes that “Super Sad True Love Story” develops is the changing meaning of social interaction and the value of relationships. Through exaggerated depictions of what social interactions are becoming, Shteyngart illustrates the changing dynamics of friendships and relationships. He employs Lenny’s old friends to show the transformation of friendships, his relationship with Eunice to depict how modern relationships start; and Eunice’s global teen talks represent the modern ideology about relationships. He truly emphasizes how modern culture affects old, new, and future social dynamics.

                Lenny’s reunion with his old friends is a key example of the media’s influence on even relationships with a deep history. Lenny’s apprehension about meeting his “friends” that he has known for over twenty years, simply because he has been gone for a year. Shteyngart writes “… I needed to reclaim m prime position among the boys as a kind of alternate Noah. I needed to replant myself on native soil.”(85) He portrays friendships as a stake or ownership that must be renewed and refreshed. This old relationship between friends has become shallow and fleeting, an effect of the new culture and media that is fast paced and adaptive. His friend Noah even uses the reunion as a means of work by filming the event and streaming it. It evokes the question of how can intimacy exist when nothing is private.

                The question of intimacy is continued in Lenny’s reunion with Eunice and their starting relationship. Shteyngart demonstrates that, despite all the intense emotions and thoughts going through both Lenny and Eunice’s minds, their actual interactions are reluctant and awkward. Shown in the passage, “The cab ride passed in near silence, both of us a little ashamed of the situation, each probably feelings guilty of something… mindful of the fact that we had spent less than a day together in total…” (101)Their reunion is an example of the potential that technology has to connect people from vast distances, but also how it creates illusions of closeness and compatibility. It demonstrates how desperate people many become for intimacy and affection that they will turn to complete strangers for it.

                Another interesting passage from the book that caught my attention was during a conversation between Sally and Eunice. Eunice writes “He’s not a stranger… that’s what being in a relationship is about. Talking to the other person.” Sally responds “That’s why I’m never going to be in a relationship I’m just going to get married.” Eunice displays a level of maturity that she hasn’t shown before. She symbolizes how, even though society has shift away from intimacy and direct contact, people still crave it and value it. While Sally’s response is ridiculous, her response embodies the new purpose for relationships. Relationships are simply tools in the future for status and gain. They are based on a trade for benefits, instead of a connection of emotions and ideas.

D.L

Review of Al Watched Over By Machines of Loving Grace

                The Pro-technology themes within the poem begin with his first line of each stanza, “I like to think”.  The wording signifies his desire for a world in which the mutual harmony between nature and machines exists as he writes. The imagery of comparing the relationship between mammals and computers to images, such as “like pure water touching clear sky” and “as if they were flowers with spinning blossoms”, shows his belief in the beauty that combining animals and machines could create. He uses both similes and metaphors to describe the possible beauty he imagines. He concludes his poem by describing the benefits of cybernetic ecology will make us “free of our labors” and that we will be watched over by “machines of loving grace”.

                The Anti-technology themes within the poem mostly rely on assuming that the author was employing a large amount of irony and satire. Themes for anti-technology also begin with the trend in the first few lines, except that he is critiquing the way people view technology and technological advancement. The “I like to think” lines and the phrases in the parentheses following them are a form of parody of the general population’s mentality. He represents people’s impatience, desire for immediate gratification, and overly optimistic view of what machines can do and what they are.

                Along with a changed perspective on the first lines of each stanza, the final stanza’s meaning completely changes. The return he speaks of in the last stanza to our mammal brother and sisters would be considered a decay of human thought and ambition. He argues that if we allow machines to control us, we will become no better than animals. Finally, at the end of the poem, he describes machines as having loving grace. He uses irony to describe exactly why machines and technology are wrong, because they lack both the ability to love and feel.           

                Brautigan uses irony and sarcasm to make his stance less definitive, but overall he has an anti-technology theme to his poem. The anti-technology theme is more convincing because it is not explicitly told. By writing from the perspective of an extreme pro-technology perspective, he allows the reader to see the flaws of expanding technology.

D.L
-wonder if he would approve of writing about his poetry in an online blog?

The Strongest Flame Amongst the Inferno

Casabianca by: Felicia Dorothea Hemans

List of imagery: burning deck, flame that lit the battle's wreck, flames rolled on, over him sail and shroud with wreathing flames wrapt the ship and streamed above the ship like banners in the sky, storm, fragments of the ship all around, dead all around, a childlike form, a gallant child

             In the poem Casabiance by Felicia Dorothea Hemans, Hemans employs imagery to illustrate the strength of one child. Heman begins the poem by depicting a lone boy standing “beautiful and bright”, while surrounded by flames and death. He calls him “a creature of heroic blood” that possesses a proud form.  The poem depicts a grand scene, in which amidst chaos and despair a young man’s hope and courage burns stronger than the inferno around him.

                Heman explains how the flame “wrapt the ship in splendor wild” and “streamed above the gallant child, like banners in the sky”. He makes a clear effort to create the image of a veil of flame surrounding the boy that even covers the sky. Heman possibly conveys that epic courage and heroism can only be seen, when surrounded by ordinarily amazing spectacles. Through this scene, he creates both contrast and comparison by placing the flames around the boy. He contrasts the threatening danger around the boy with the boy’s courageous and brave search for his father. During which, the similarity between the heat and passion that drives a person to look for someone dear to them is connected to immensity of the flame. These flames within the poem represent passion, size, fear, and purity. Flames are a pure form of energy that is unhindered. Similarly children, like the one in the poem, are perceived to be pure and unhindered. Flames also invoke great fear and energy within the people affected by them.

                Herman uses the image of fire to express why he says the “the noblest thing that perished there was that young, faithful heart”. His comparison between flame and the boy creates the image of a boy that possessed the courage, strength, purity, passion, and heart of an inferno. The light that the boy generated during the storm was brighter than the flame surrounding him. The hope that the boy had that his father was still alive was a flame strong enough to stay alive, even in that hellish situation.

       

why i choose my title

The reason i choose my title is because it represents various aspects of literature. Within the title, there are the words issues, reading, and then the word issues again. Similiarly to literature, the phrase can be understood in many different ways. It can be read literally, such as their are issues with reading about issues, or even that people often have issues reading about issues. While it can also be percieved as symbolic, such as how the phrase itself is difficult to read and understand, and is possibly a sign of how ambiguity allows for more interpretation and exploration. Ambiguity within literature is both its the best and worst aspect. Although it allows for greater creativity and hidden agendas, it also makes literature extremely subjective and impossible to define. In my personal experience, I have found that english teachers are often either too lenient or too strict about their definitions of literature. For good reason, teachers have a difficult time assessing whether or not students have achieved a proper understanding of literature, because there are almost always multiple interpretations.
Another more hidden meaning within the phrase is that the word hidden is positioned between the word issues. It is surrounded by issues. Literature or reading always involves conflict and problems, and is made to either allow people to escape from them, learn about them, learn about their own, or predict future problems. Using this blog, I will probably define many issues within literature, explain how my own problems relate to the ones that I have learned from the types of literature I will read, and hypothesize about the true meanings within the literature.