west_coast_best

Part 1 -
Boland presents the myth of Persephone by relating to his own experiences (with his daughter). “searching for my daughter at bed-time. When she came running I was ready to make any bargain to keep her”. Boland seems to be speaking from a parent’s point of view in warning children and telling them to follow a certain path when in reality they are going to eventually make their own choices and their parents will have to accept those, as Boland says “I will say nothing”. And I believe he is referring to marriage and choosing a partner.
Dove presents her like a foolish woman who was drawn into the tricks of Ceres “when, sprung out of the earth
on his glittering terrible carriage, he claimed his due. It is finished. No one heard her. No one! She had strayed from the herd”. Dove explains it like it is Persephone’s fault, as she had been warned and told to follow the rules but she didn’t.

Part 2 -
The main story told about Icarus is his attempt to escape from Crete by means of wings that his father constructed from feathers and wax. He ignored the instructions from others that told him not to fly too close to the sun. As a result the wax from the wings melted and he fall from the sky to the sea where he drowned. The story has a theme of tragedy and failed ambition. It is interesting that today; the Hellenic Air Force Academy is called Icarus (the name of the man who had attempted to conquer the skies). (Wikipedia)
The myth of Icarus is pointed out in this poem because men often make attempts to challenge other men in Icarus’ case he was in quest of escaping from Crete, but often men will fail in their endeavours for lack of planning or consideration of outcome. The myth of human suffering is fairly popular because males often go through a suffering point in their lives when they are growing up and finding themselves / “becoming a man”. This could be because of the difficulty they have with facing their emotions and being unable to express their pain for fear of being judged or seen as less masculine. In the poem of Icarus, his death goes “unnoticed” whereas in the situation of Persephone her mother is worried and searches for her (which shows the soul of a woman to be somewhat more caring and nurturing or “motherly”). Women are often forgiven for their mistakes such as Persiphone falling into the trap of Ceres; however, men are not always forgiven for those mistakes and are punished much harsher for their actions (people may be less compassionate towards men following their choices that lead to disappointing outcomes).

Part 1:
Both Crozier and Wilbur use extended metaphors within their poems to enhance the idea of growing up and the challenges often faced by those on the path from protected to vulnerable that is unpaved and often un-lit.
Crozier’s suggestion of packing a bag is an extended metaphor for growing up and what one might expect or not expect to experience. He gives certain advice that pertains to aspects of life and ideas we should live by. “Take the thickest socks, where you’re going you’ll have to walk” implies that life is a long journey and “There may be water. There may be stones. There may be high places” this is something you cannot avoid. No one is going to drive you to the final destination. Therefore, you need to be prepared. The idea of keeping “an old tin box” symbolizes holding onto things of the past “This is to carry that small thing you cannot leave. Perhaps the key you've kept though it doesn't fit any lock you know, the photograph that keeps you sane, a ball of string to lead you out though you can't walk back into that light”. Although we are moving forward and we cannot turn back, we must take with us our memories and things we hold dear to our hearts or they might slip away.
Wilbur expresses the struggle of a “dazed starling” which relates to the inevitable struggles of life. He writes what could to be a parent’s point of view in saying “for a helpless hour, through the crack of the door, We watched the sleek, wild, dark And iridescent creature Batter against the brilliance, drop like a glove To the hard floor, or the desk-top, And wait then, humped and bloody, For the wits to try it again; and how our spirits Rose when, suddenly sure, It lifted off from a chair-back, Beating a smooth course for the right window And clearing the sill of the world”. I’m sure many parents watch their children face hard times and challenges, and even witness them spiraling out of control at times. Just as the bystanders in this poem, our parents cannot just step in and place us in the “course for the right window”, as much as they might wish they could. It is up to us to make our own way. We learn from our mistakes and make our next moves differently because of our failures. It’s all part of life. Yes, we might fall and if we do we must get up again. Just as life goes on and the world continues to spin, one foot goes in front of the other (maybe slowly at times), but no matter how bad we may wish to rewind or press pause at times, the truth is we must face life’s challenges and fight or we won’t make it out alive. Like solving a problem we struggle so that we can find a solution or find a way and that is how we become shaped as individuals, through the experiences we encounter.

Part 2:
Slyvia Plath committed suicide in 1963. She had placed her head in the oven, with the gas turned on. She was 30 years old (wikipedia.org). Her father was from Germany, just as the father she writes about in the poem “Daddy”. Therefore she must be writing about her own father. “At twenty I tried to die and get back, back to you”. This is ironic and overlaps with the events of her life as her cause of death was pinned as suicide. Another overlap being “the black telephone’s off at the root, the voices just can’t worm through” describes the cold winter they experiences in the house that had no telephone. “The vampire who said he was you and drank my blood for a year, seven years, if you want to know” may overlap with her marriage to Ted Hughes (their marriage was approximately 6 years). I believe Plath would agree with Jeanette. The way in which she chose to share her life was exactly the way in which she knew how to by expressing it in poetry. She was a strong writer and this was her art, true art, free of lies and containing only raw emotion and thought.

Works Cited: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sylvia_Plath

Part 1: Reflection
Reflecting on the past 2 months and this term (being the first course I have ever taken online) I will definitely admit that it's taking a lot of self determination and drive to get things done. I consider myself to be a very independent and self-motivated person, however with 6 other courses on the go I often lose sight of what needs to get done as it seems there's so much at once! It does make me feel a sense of accomplishment though once I have completed a task. I would say that personally the most useful aspect of this course is the inclusive feeling that everyone is involved. Although we have not met each other, we can read others discussions and
blogs and somehow gain a better sense of who they are. It's a bit like a long distance relationship. The other reason I like this involvement with other students is that it provides me with a greater understanding of the literature because I am able to see it from different angles of interpretation in the work that other students have expressed. One thing I would still like to learn would probably be how to look deeper beyond the words into the meaning of what is written. I often miss things within the literature which I then pick up on once I read other students blog posts. One concern I have, and an issue I ran into when writing my essay, is that I have been taught to reference and cite in APA formatting throughout my program at Camosun so now being required to write in MLA formatting I am a little bit lost and it took me a lot longer to get through because I had to look everything up and understand it.

Part 2:

1.Hamartia - the flaw in a character which leads to the downfall of the protagonist in a tragedy.Because of Antigone’s wish to give her brother a proper burial, she violated the law Creon had set that no one was allowed to bury Polynices. “But now, Polynices, because I laid your body out as well, this, this is my reward. Nevertheless I honored you-the decent will admit it-well and wisely too”. Her downfall was her kindness and her wish to give her brother the proper burial he deserved. Which in turn resulted in her being killed for breaking the law.

2.Hubris - Overbearing pride or presumption; arrogance
King Creon is the perfect example of someone who has this Hubris quality. He is too proud and stubborn in his decisions in beliefs to accept any different. He is arrogant in his statements and will not accept input from anybody.

3.Catharsis - the purging or purification of the emotions through the evocation of pity and fear, as in tragedy
An example of this in Antigone is (pg 519) referring to the mother after the death of her sons, “she stabbed herself at the alter, then her eyes went dark, after she raised a cry for the noble fate of Megareus, the hero killed in the first assault, then for Haemon, then with her dying breath she called down torments on [Creon’s] head – [he] killed her sons”.
The mother takes her own life to release herself of the emotions caused by the death of her sons.

4.Peripeteia - an abrupt turn of events or reversal of circumstances.
When Creon realizes he has made a mistake he tries to reverse his decrees on Antigone, but he has waited too long and his people do not support his change of ideas.

5.Anagnorisis - the recognition or discovery by the protagonist of the identity of some character or the nature of his own predicament, which leads to the resolution of the plot; denouement.
Creon finally recognizes after speaking to the seer, that the seer’s predictions had come true. Creon realizes that he was wrong about everything and that all of the hurt and pain he has caused can only be blamed on himself.

Part 1:
T.E.A.
Alistair MacLeod uses metaphors throughout the story “The Boat”, to depict certain landscapes and places. One metaphor within the story is “our house which was one of about fifty which marched around the horseshoe of our harbour and the wharf which was its heart”. Houses that march, the harbour as being a horseshoe and the wharf being the heart, are all metaphors describing things as being specific objects or things.
a) In comparison to last week’s blog questions on the 3 different short stories, the story “The Boat” has something in common with each of these. For example in the book “David Copperfield”, the character Ham Peggottys character is brought up around the sea just as the characters and narrator of The Boat. Another comparison being the fixation on a specific object in both the stories The Boat and Moby Dick. Moby Dick being a whale which one of the main characters becomes completely fanatical about. In The Boat, just as the name of the story states, there is a boat that is the main focus of the literature. The mother of the story is completely obsessed with anything to do with the boat. It is named after her, and it seems like her life revolves around the boat. ”Preparing food to be eaten in the boat”, ”looking for the boat through our kitchen window”. She would constantly ask questions about the boat.
b) I believe the narrator of the story would have used these references to portray the image of the father in The Boat. All of the main characters Ahab, Eustacia and Ham, are all attempting to achieve something beyond reach, much like the father of this story. I think that the events leading up to his death are much like those that occurred in the other stories. Drowning seems to be a common theme within each of the stories. The father in The Boat appears to be quite similar to all of these other characters and the way in which he dies connects him with those of the other stories.
Part 2:
For Fun 
Metafiction: is defined as a ”romantic irony” in which the literature has a fictional illusion that draws the reader’s attention to the piece as a work of art while revealing the truth of the literature.
The movie Inception is one example of a type of metafiction. It causes the viewer to question the relationship fiction and reality by using irony and self reflection. Leonardo DiCaprio as the main character goes through different levels of his dreams and implants himself within the dreams of others with the main objective being to plant an idea in the mind of another man. The plot is so far fetched that you often find yourself questioning whether the characters were in fact dreaming or not and they used a spinning top to determine this. Leo`s character is constantly being visited by his apparently deceased wife, who committed suicide because she couldn`t handle being in this ”dream world” anymore. She tried to remove herself from the dream she thought she was in by jumping off the ledge of a building in attempt to wake up, when in fact she was not dreaming and the fall resulted in her death. The craziness of the life she was living ”drove her to the ledge” literally. I believe that a writer would create this type of work in order to draw the reader or viewer into the plot of the story. These types of literature or movies pose so many questions that a viewer or reader develops numerous questions and becomes drawn to the variability of the story and it becomes a piece of art and is appreciated as being intriguing and immensely creative.

Part 1
In reflection of the poem "This Be the Verse" by Philip Larkin, my understanding is that the author is speaking about how our parents effect how we grow and develop as individuals. Their thoughts, opinions and habits become transferred to us and affect our ideas about the world as well as our behaviors and reactions to different circumstances in life. In the statement "Man hands on misery to man", Larkin speaks about parenting in past generations. This is referring to our parents-parents, who were responsible for inflicting their views into our parents and how the disastrous consequences managed to trickle down from there until they make their way to us. "Get out as early as you can", flee the nest and move on into the real world where you are forced to make decisions and form opinions for yourself rather than be sheltered by your parents and living by their rules and their way of life. You are your own person. Live your own life. This poem is very much expressed in such a manner that we can all relate to it in some way or another. The theme of parenting and the issues we all face with our own families, and even the challenges our own parents faced with their parents, is a theme that is universal to the general population. I think that the tone of the language tends to toggle between a somewhat serious attitude and a comic approach throughout the poem. The use of certain curse words makes for a little bit of a shock at the start, but I can just picture a comedian reading this aloud and seeing the reactions from the crowd. The representation of “fools in old style hats and coats” makes us think of our grandparents and that same image when our own parents say “back in my day”. These thoughts of our parents as kids is humorous to us as we often used to think to ourselves as kids that our parents were horrible for imposing rules and discipline, and how there was no possible way they knew what it was like to be a kid and have the set of laws they would lay down on us. Stop this misery and just “don’t have any kids yourself” as Larkin says. Highly unlikely, but it’s funny to think that our own off spring will be little reflections of us and those before us. Scary! Makes us think “what will I do differently?”.

Part 2
The story “Eveline” presents a similar theme to that of Larkin’s poem is written in a tone that is more solemn and less comical. The story about a young grown up with a childhood of unhappy home-life. The story expresses once again how children are affected by their upbringing and how their parents cause corruption of their otherwise imaginative minds. She made a promise to her mother before she passed away that she would always keep it together no matter how bad things got. Even when Eveline was presented the opportunity of a new life, with a man who truly loved her, she backed out at the last minute and decided to stay. She gave up a chance to have all the things she had wanted; happiness, love and a family of her own, all because she did not have the courage to go against her father. His abusive behavior, both mentally and physically, seemed to have left her feeling worthless and empty and I believe that she just began to think that this was how it was going to be for her for the rest of her life. People in broken relationships and those who are always being fed negative comments will begin to believe those things are in fact true. I believe that Eveline had been beaten down so many times that she just began to accept it and consider that maybe it was what she deserved. Because she never left she will continue to be corrupt by her father because she did not have the courage to stand up to him. The theme begins to become more complicated in comparing the two pieces of literature because it shows the effect some crooked parents have on their children and how they are raised can either open their doors or close them. Both of these pieces of writing cause readers to think deeper and understand what affect we have on others and I think that people that come from all different backgrounds can relate to or understand the theme of this literature whether they relate it to their own life or take a piece of it with them to apply in the future.