The Dickey Poems

At first reading these poems it was hard to get some of the underlying themes that Dickey was trying to present. I was utterly confused but the two poems that i really enjoyed were "Cherrylog road" and "Falling." The one that I am going to talk about is "Falling." when starting out reading the poem I thought that it was a weird subject to be writng about, especially since it was an article about a woman falling out of the emergency door on a plane. I'm not sure about you but when I first read that and then when we talked about it in class, my first thought was DAMN!! how the heck did she fall out of an emergency door. But the way that Dickey used this incident and wrote a well-thought out poem about it was awesome. Also Dickey incorporated some humor into the poem as if to lighten up the moment and event. Such as the part about her forgetting her umbrella, i thought that, that was somewhat humorous. I did enjoy reading this poem and i was a little nervous about reading poetry in this class, I usually think that poetry is so incredibly boring and dry, but this wasn't half bad.

Their Eyes were Watching God: Part 1

There was so much to discover in the first 5 chapters of "Their eyes were watching God." I felt that the book was definetely a feminist book so far. The opening quote "Ships at a distance have every man's wish on board. For some they come in with the tide. For others they sail forever on the horizon, never out of sight, never landing unitl the watcher turns his eyes awayin resgination, his dreams mocked to death by time. That is the Life of men. Now, women forget all those things they don't want to remember, and remember everthing that they don't want to forget. The dream is the truth." Zora Neale Hurston, i believe establishes a fundamental difference between men and women, with just the opening statement.
Throughout Chapters 1-5 you kind of get an idea of the relationships that are being made. There are a few relationships with Janie and Men, but also the relationship with Janie and her Greandmother and also her best Friend, Pheoby. I think that realtionships developed in the story, helps to establish a theme. When thinking about the relationships between Janie and men, it seems as though she is searching for the right man to marry, but she strikes out a few times. Since she was pushed into marrying Logan Killicks by her grandmother, Janie can't develop a relationship in which she really loves him. Nanny, keeps telling Her that eventually the love will come but it never does. So then Janie leaves Logan for Joe Starks. Even after she thought that she loved him, the love seemed to fade to quickly. Joe (Jody) was obsessed with changing the town of Eatonville, and he didn't put much effort into the realtionship with Janie. One more relationship that is evident is the one betweeen Janie and her best friend, Pheoby. Janie puts much of her trust in Pheoby, by telling her whole story to her. But i beleive that as we continue reading the novel we will discover more themes and also different relationships that become evident to us.

Faulkner and Racism

Racism is a horrible thing, It is something in life that can probably never be changed. After reading "Dry September" i began to think about different things associated with racism or prejudice. My father was born and raised in Mississippi and he has had his share of incidents involving racism. But you know i have grown up hearing some of the awful things that happened to him or his family, but i just kinda pushed it off or disregarded it as if they were just stories and not true. But they were true. In "Dry September" the whole lynching thing was terrifying, i've heard about and seen it in movies but for some reason when the Professor showed us the website with all of the white men, standing around the men that they lynched, it made me feel not just bad but also a little scared. We don't have the active Ku Klux Klan anymore, i mean of course there are still people that are like Neo Nazis or Ku Klux Klan but they can't hurt anyone legally. I looked on a different website and saw a video of the Ku Klux Klan burning a cross and then whipping a black man that they tied to a tree; unfortunately i can't remember the website exactly but I googled it first. When i sat there and watched what they were doing I felt like i was going to cry or something. I think it was Hawkshaw in the story that jumped out of the car, and to be quite honest I think i would've done the same thing. It was hard enough for me to sit there and watch it on a website, think about what it would be like to experience witnessing it first hand. To most white people back then in the south, it was probably normal to not care what happens to black people but obviously Hawkshaw did. I probably would've even felt worse if I had caused the punishment. Minnie Cooper in my opinion lied about the whole thing, but i don't think that she meant for it to escalate to something as big a lynching the man. But for Minnie to do all of that out of the need for attention is really pathetic. After reading this story, the thing that kept coming to mind was the book "To Kill a Mockingbird." Even though in that book the black man received a trial, much of the plot was similar. For some reason, i enjoyed this reading the most so far. The fact that Faulkner was pretty blunt with the use of the word Nigger it made it more believeable for what was going on and the time period that it took place in. I just really enjoyed reading it. Also the imagery and description that was used in the beginning, speaking about the heat and the atmosphere was terrific.
To sum things up, like i said before, racism is horrible and Faulkner showed the ways of racists men of the south in the early 20th centry very well.

Chopin

While I was reading "At the cadian Ball" and "The Storm." There was something that came to mind about the two of them, they both made me think of a romantic movie of our time. For instance, like Dirty Dancing Havana Nights, I mean without the dancing part of course. I really enjoyed reading the both of them and they were both sensual and just interesting to read. At first I thought that Chopin would have been a very boring writer, but she was completely different than hat I thought. Usually when I read something, i pick up on the hidden things or underlying meanings of certain lines or descriptions. But with these readings it was kinda hard to pick up on stuff. To be quite honest I didn't even know that the characters were creole or spanish. I would love to read some more of Chopin's writing. The themes of romance and the use of race and class status is what i believe makes the writings so fascinating. In class when we had to compare these readings to other things that we read in class, i couldn't think of a thing. And for some reason i still can't. These are so different, I mean i guess the use of class status could be compared to most of the readings. But it doesn't have humongous comparisons. This is completely off subject but i was also thinking, If you were Calixta, would you have married Bobinot even if you didn't love him. I probably would've just stayed single especially if i can't have Alcee. I would feel guilty to have an affair with Alcee, while married to Bobinot, so instead i would just stay single, so that way i wouldn't have to cheat. That sounds kind of Shallow or slutty, but whatever. That was just a thought that I had, you could feel completely different and I respect that.

Thomas Jefferson

Okay, I'm not sure where to begin. Thomas Jefferson's writing was alot more interesting than John smith's. But to get into more depth, as a women of Color I would usually find something of this nature to be insulting, but after our professor explained a little more about Thomas Jefferson and his character, I then just looked past it. Jefferson seemed as if he was the kind of person that couldn't make up his mind on his own opinion. He didn't keep a strong opinion throughout his writing. To be one of our Presidents and someone with Authority and leadership, he was screwed up. He was more of a follower, than a leader. He contradicted himself through the whole thing.One thing that stood out to me was the fact that he was a slave owner, not because he really wanted to, but merely because of his status in society. Most rich white people back then had slaves and other things that determined their palace in society. Probably if he didn't have them, then he would probably face tons of problems politically. Though he dissed the black race, the way that he did it and his word usage was interesting. He mentioned about Phyllis Wheatly and that she was "below the dignity of Criticism" I thought that the way he said it made him sound nicer, at first it was confusing, until i found out what it meant, it means that she's not even worth criticizing, she's not even up to the standards for criticism. It is obviously a rude comment but the way he said it made it not seem as rude. He actually made comments like that throughout his writing. To be quite honest I think that if i was in his position, i would probably be pretty blunt and just come out and say that she sucks and she's not a poet, just because she's black. But I think that Jefferson had to be a little more professional about it. But I haven;t read any of Wheatly's work so I can't actually say anything.The way that Jefferson disses the blacks, was annoying. But it was funny in the sense that when he talks about that they sweat and are angry people and don;t get any sleep. What was funny was that the White man was the reason why the black men were like that. The work that the black people were forced to do is the reason why they sweat, and don;t get any sleep. And if you were a slave, i think that you would be angry too.

John Smith

John Smith, What a guy! Jk, I found the reading to be a little dry, but as a first assignment i figured it wasn;t going to be mind blowing. I took Colonial North American History last semester and a lot of what was being said about the event where John Smith was gonna be killed by Powhatan, I learned most of that last semester. And of course for those people that have seen the Disney Pocahantas movie usually know how the story goes. The use of different poems and plays throughout John Smith's work was intersesting. I've never read anything from the play of Euripides but now I can proudly say that i read a small excerpt. Overall I found the reading to be dull, but hopefully it will get better. I don't have much interest in the subject of John Smith and Pocahantas and events that they were involved in.