Hemingway's writing style

In Hemingway's "Hills Like White Elephants" his writing style is illustrates clearly throughout. It is a very emotional piece but Rather than load on adjectives in order to display emotion, he conveys the emotion through implication. Based on the content and setting the reader can understand the the emotion displayed by the characters. Normally i would stay that this is a strange literary technique if it wasn't such a success when I read it. Another thing I find inspiring about Hemingway is that part of the influence in his short to the point writing style. As an aspiring journalist i find this very interesting

My Response to Elliot's criticism of Hamlet

I do not agree with T.S. Elliot's critique of Hamlet. This play is my favorite work of Shakespeare's, play poem or otherwise. Elliot makes the argument that because Hamlet does not have an object to display all of his honest emotions onto. This makes it impossible to know Hamlet's true intentions or true character. However I believe it has more to do with the complexity of Hamlet's character and less to do with a fundamental flaw on the part of the playwright . I believe this is a result of his new critical lens of analysis. If Elliot were to take a psychoanalytical lens for example he would've come to a completely new idea. He might have came up with the conclusion that Hamlet's inconsistencies were a result of his unstable psyche, as I concluded.

Trifles being a false tale of feminine heroism

I really enjoyed Trifles by Susan Glaspell. This is one of the few stories which i found easy to view with a feminist perspective. I truly was able to sympathize with Minnie Foster being oppressed and put down by her over-bearing and serious husband. The symbolism of the bird whose life was chocked out of it by Mr. Wright was very powerful. I kept thinking of "To Kill a Mockingbird" and the innocence that tend to accompany birds within literature. However I did not her crime to be justified nor did I stand by Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters' action in withholding evidence to protect Minnie Foster. Although i respect her struggle it didn't sound like anything he deserved to die for.

my sonnet

I have always appreciated the sonnet. in my AP literature class in High School it was the very first poem i was required to write. Honestly its the only type of formal poem I still enjoy. There is a challenge in making an interesting point in only 14 lines. Since then after studying several classical authors like John Donne and Shakespeare I have come a long way in sonnet writing. Here is one of mine:

Ode to my cigarettes

Cigarettes have become my secret love.

Since I can go outside and take a puff,

Day after day I thank the stars above.

When I’m getting stressed I can’t get enough.

After all, I’m troubled and have a lot of work.

Please do not lecture me or bring me down

Regardless, after my cig ill have a smirk.

So about my little habit that’s gotten around town;

I’m young and don’t have cancer yet

Maybe I’ll soon quit in a year or two

But now I wouldn’t stop smoking to win a bet.

And please; I’d take cigs instead of you,

So please leave me alone, I won’t go broke,

And really, there are worse things I could smoke.

A good Man is Hard to Find

In the short story "A Good Man Is Hard to Find" the serial killer was my favorite character whose name is the Misfit. I found this fascinating even though the Misfit is responsible for the deaths of everyone in the family, he is still the most interesting character in the story. He seems to have the most accurate commentary on morality out of any other character in the story which is ironic because he has the least out of any other character. I really appreciated his ability to perceive the Grandma's true character through all of her bs. This commentary is also why I appreciated ending of the story because the second final line of the story was "She would of been a good woman," The Misfit said, "if it had been somebody there to shoot her every minute of her life." and the final line was about how killing was "no real pleasure". He could tell that the grandma was only being kind in her fear of death and he acknowledged the necesity of murder but was unwilling to enjoy it.

Last Night by Sharon Olds

The next day, I am almost afraid.
Love? It was more like dragonflies
in the sun, 100 degrees at noon,
the ends of their abdomens stuck together, I
close my eyes when I remember. I hardly
knew myself, like something twisting and
twisting out of a chrysalis,
enormous, without language, all
head, all shut eyes, and the humming
like madness, the way they writhe away,
and do not leave, back, back,
away, back. Did I know you? No kiss,
no tenderness–more like killing, death-grip
holding to life, genitals
like violent hands clasped tight
barely moving, more like being closed
in a great jaw and eaten, and the screaming
I groan to remember it, and when we started
to die, then I refuse to remember,
the way a drunkard forgets. After,
you held my hands extremely hard as my
body moved in shudders like the ferry when its
axle is loosed past engagement, you kept me
sealed exactly against you, our hairlines
wet as the arc of a gateway after
a cloudburst, you secured me in your arms till I slept–
that was love, and we woke in the morning
clasped, fragrant, buoyant, that was
the morning after love.

So I decided to pick Last night by Sharon Olds for my poetry presentation. I was really happy with my choice. This is partially because in terms of content, it reminds me of of the John Donne and the other Metaphysical poets. Donne is an old favorite of mine and the disconnect between sex and love. granted in the metaphysical poets there tends to be much more of an element of chastity interfering with sex rather than lack of love but i enjoy the commentary on the relationship between the two. I also enjoy the message in itself, at least as i analyze it; that physical intimacy can lead to emotional intimacy.

My opinion on New Criticism

I happen to enjoy many of the critical poets. William Stafford and Randall Jarrell  are some of my favorite poets. Though I have never been a fan of T.S. Elliot I enjoy the complex and intricate messages that they convey with their poetry. The economical word choice is very compelling. However I am not a fan of the new critical lens of analysis. I do believe that there is simply more to analysis than just the text. It is important to understand the author and the time that he came when trying to completely comprehend what the poem or work is about. especially if the work is cryptic e.g. Browning.  Before I ever read a book or poem i read a bio of the author so i understand why he/she wrote what they wrote.

Imagination and style relating to Bartleby

Reading Bartleby the Scrivener made me realize that I think two of the main things that can make a piece of literature great are imagination and style. I see Imagination as the creativity it takes to dream up an interesting story and decide what themes, and meanings go along with the story. In my opinion authors like J.K. Rowling and Tolkien made a career almost entirely off of their imaginative abilities. Style is a very different matter. it is the manner in which the story is written. a good style can bring to life even an extremely common place event. Hemingway is a good example of an author who can make an otherwise boring life event fascinating by the way it is told. Personally i find that I don't particularly like Bartelby the Scrivener because in my opinion, the story isn't very imaginative nor is the style very intriguing.

Morality in writing

Some of my favorite writers have been bad people. My two favorites are Jack Kerouac and Ernest Hemingway. Kerouac was a notorious user of drugs and Hemingway was a misogynistic, alcoholic antisemitic. The discussion in class about misogynistic writers got me thinking that maybe it possible that bad people make for very interesting writers. Personally I find it more interesting to  be inside the head of a sinner than a saint for the same reason teenagers prefer Miley Cyrus to Christian Rock (regardless of their faith): its fun to be bad. But regardless I don't feel that when judging the value of a piece of art that the morality or the artist should be called into question; much less be the determining factor. As Lucien Carr stated quite beautifully - "Art transcends traditional morality"

Exact Rhyme eats me

Simply put, im not a big fan of poems with exact meter and rhyme scheme. To me good poetry doesn't need to be sing-songy in order to be a success. In my opinion an exact rhyme scheme can even make certain pieces of poetry worse. If you take powerful language and contort it to mimic children's rhyme, it takes away its ability to command attention and take your breath away. The I found the most eloquent description of why rhyme can be detrimental to some poetry in Tobias Wolff's Old School. "'Rhyme is bullshit. Rhyme says that everything works out in the end. All harmony and order. When I see a rhymed in a poem, I know I'm being lied to. Go ahead, laugh! It's true--rhyme's a completely bankrupt device. It's just wishful thinking. Nostalgia'"

Happy literature

I'm just realizing that most of what I consider to be fascinating literature is never centered around happiness. I would much rather read Sylvia Plath's "Daddy"  than Wordsworth's "I wandered lonely as a cloud" any day of the week. I don't feel that I am alone in this either. I don't know of many pieces of literature in the canon that are nice tales with happy. My theory is that people typically enjoy reading about things that they can relate to. People and feelings that they can identify with. Im not exactly an authority of the subject, but I can speculate that most people always strive for happiness in one way or another but few actually achieve it completely. This being the case, how may people could identify with a character that is living in a paradise

my mind wanders while i try to read formal poetry

During my reading of Wordsworth's "I Wandered lonely as a Cloud" I noticed that there were several instances which I was perplexed by his  word choices. For example he used "never-ending" rather than limitless, ceaseless or everlasting (which wouldn't have interrupted the meter. In my opinion the image those other options would've brought a similar image and would've served as suitable alternative. After thinking as to why he might've wanted chosen this choice of words in this and other instances, i came to the conclusion that Wordsworth might've chosen that particular simply for they way they made the lyric sound out loud. i was wondering idly about this theory when i googled cellar door because it is a good example of a word that sounds beautify but has a very prosaic meaning. I came upon this website  http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/14/magazine/14FOB-onlanguage-t.html. I found this theory which was very interesting, “Poetry, in fact, is two quite distinct things,” H. L. Mencken wrote in a 1920 magazine column. “It may be either or both. One is a series of words that are intrinsically musical, in clang-tint and rhythm, as the single word cellar-door is musical. The other is a series of ideas, false in themselves, that offer a means of emotional and imaginative escape from the harsh realities of everyday.” Accomplishing both of these themes is something that i think wordsworth accomplishes well.