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Chapter 27 Response: Garden Party

Mansfield is saying that there is a clear division between the neat-and-tidy upper class and the poor-and-filthy lower class. Everyone seems to think the division is fine except Laura, a daughter of the upper class family. I'm not sure why, but I'm going to assume she is the youngest and not so set in her ways. Some story elements that reflect the division are weather and geography. The weather at the garden party is "perfect". It is warm and sunny and ideal. The house of the upper class family sits upon a hill, while the group of small houses where the lower class live is at the bottom of said hill. This visually aids the reader in seeing the class distinction.

I did pretty well and got the gist of what the story was about. I however got nowhere near as in-depth as one of Foster's graduated students. This student Diane saw sooooo many other things like birds and world-view blinders. Foster saw a connection to the story of Persephone. This makes a lot of sense once he goes into detail and connects each important piece of the story. Some aspects don't match up, but the comparison made me see the strong association between the valley and hell, the hill-top and Olympus. Some of the feelings of the characters can even be inferred to be the same as their corresponding character in the Greek myth. It is really interesting to read a story and realize you aren't only reading one story, you're actually reading one and a half.

Chapter 24 Response: Sickness and Symbolism

In the novel The Sisterhood of The Traveling Pants by Ann Brashares, one of the members of the "sisterhood" (Tibby) has a friend from work who discovers she has cancer. Throughout the set of four books this young friend suffers and eventually dies from the disease. The four things listed to consider when dealing with a disease are as follows: the differences among diseases, the potential imagery of a particular disease, the origin, and the meaning/metaphor/symbolism connected to the disease. This young girl has cancer. Cancer, a common disease in our society that millions of people suffer from. As for imagery, the chemotherapy treatment that rids your body of the cancerous cells destroys good cells as well. It makes the victim weak. Their hair falls out. Their skin is pallid and transparent. They are constantly nauseous and in pain. Cancer is something that can't be explained. It can happen to anyone really, though it is especially uncommon in children and teenagers. The poor girl did nothing to bring about her fatal illness. Tibby struggles in understanding why this sweet, talented, brave girl had to be the one to suffer, to die. The girl was strong and understanding of what was happening to her. She took it in stride like the brave heroine Ann Brashares intended for her to be. I think the important symbolism in this disease is mortality. This book is centered on four high-schoolers who grow and learn with each page. I think this disease was intended to show that life and death are uncertain. No one knows what day will be their last, and life is too valuable to be left unlived. Her death also seems to challenge the characters and readers to have bravery. The girl modeled unbelievable bravery in death, but sometimes we all need to remember to possess bravery in life.

Interlude Response: Archetypes

An archetype is a reoccurring theme. Throughout stories, a particular event occurs repeatedly (a quest) or the plot resolution seems to be the same (good defeats evil). One set of stories that immediately came to mind when thinking of borrowing and piecing together elements of past stories was C.S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia. This familiar book series, a sort of retelling of Biblical stories in a fantastical style, takes bits and pieces of the Bible and changes them into thought provoking tales of the creation, life, love, good, and evil. It's hard to miss the connection to stories many people are at least vaguely familiar with, and the repetition of a quest, saving the world, self-sacrifice, and the triumph of good over evil prove it to by archetypal by nature.

Chapter 17 Response: Racy Scenes

If you've ever seen the movie Moulin Rouge, then you know it is full of "suggestion". The movie can be described as a comedy/romance/tragedy/musical, so much of the suggestion is humorous as well as thematic. In one scene, as a love-song plays in the background, short clips of the two main characters that fall in love (Christian and Satine) play on the screen. One clip is of the two looking longingly at each other, one is them hugging/kissing, one is them sneaking around the theatre so a jealous love interest won't see, one is the two standing on a balcony in sunshine with "strategically placed sheets." There is no dialogue between the characters, but it can be understood that (a) both characters are equally in love, (b) they have to hide this love, (c) they act on their love even though there could be consequences, which tells viewers how bold they are. These scenes show the characters love while also building up the tension of the situation. If they are caught sneaking, there will be no clean break between the two, no easy way out.

Chapter 14 Response: Christ-Comparrison

When I started searching for a Christ-figure, I thought of Tess from Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy. No, she wasn't a 33-year-old man. She was for sure in agony and suffering. She was socially and outcast and looked down on by "Pharisees" who thought she was below them. Tess was self-sacrificing girl. She left her home to seek work with extended family in order to help support her family. Almost every move she made was to help her family in some way, always thinking of their security first. Tess was also good with children. She loved her younger brothers and sisters, and they loved her in return. She was a good mother until her child died after a few short months. The mode of transportation Tess usually used was walking. I was amazed when reading how casually Hardy described getting up early to walk 12 miles in one day, though none of it across water. She would often go out alone in the fields of the dairy or thresh-farm. The strongest connection with Tess as a Christ-figure is the act of temptation. The very root-meaning of the book is innocence, purity (Tess) tempted by the devil (Alec). She resists for so long, but a great separation between Tess and Christ is her human imperfection; eventually she buckles to his persistence and gives in to the devil's promises. She spent no time with thieves, had no disciples, and developed no parables. She was the opposite of forgiving; she sought forgiveness from everyone in her life though she was "blameless". What she wanted forgiveness for was not her doing. The cause of her unhappiness was a person she would never forgive. She proves this by eventually eliminating him entirely. I don't believe the cause of her quest was to redeem and unworthy world. If she set out to redeem anything, it would be the unworthy name of her family, Durbeyfield turned D'Urberville. One last trait I want to use not found on the list is one of her last wishes. Tess was "crucified" in a sense. She was charged with a crime worthy of death (that unlike Christ she was very guilty of). While waiting for the end, she asked her husband and most trustworthy friend to take care of her younger sister. This is just like how Jesus asked John to take care of Mary, and I found it an important enough fact to mention about Tess.

Chapter 10 Response: Weather

In the opening of The Book Thief, a funeral occurs during a biting snow-shower. Apart from being a setting in the plot, the snowy atmosphere adds feeling to the tragedy that occurred. As stated by Thomas Foster, snow can be severe, inhospitable, suffocating. The little boy that died (the reason for the funeral) died from a combination of hunger and cold, further proving that the harshness of snow was matched by the harshness of war. The boy and his sister were being put into foster care at the beginning of WWII. Another point brought up by Foster is the "unifying characteristic" of snow. Snow storms blow snow over all people in the winter, not a select few. Weather points out the unity among people otherwise separated by class or ethnicity. It snowed on the mourners at the funeral, it snowed on the graves, it snowed on the Communists, the Jews, and the Nazis. Weather doesn't discriminate against life stage, race, or education. When thought of this way, as more than just part of the setting, weather (snow) eases readers into the underlying issues children growing up around WWII would encounter, the ones the story is built around.