The Benton County Seat Caper, a short historical video

Final Blog: Who Stayed On The Island

372

4/2810

Amy H will be connecting Regionalsim and Transcendentalism. Her argument will have a focus on women authors, including Fuller...and the discussion will be how the old thoughts about women's roles gave way to the new...a quest for self...Change is coming.

Heather will also have a feminist focus. With Fuller as her cornerstone she will be using other texts, such as Daisy Miller to discuss how women became independent.

Kristi will connect characters from various authors: Poe, Huntley, Hawthorne, Wilde...to show what happens to characters who stray from the path of the social norms...how these strayings always lead to unpleasant or disasterous results.

Jenel will be discussing/linking Dark Romanticism to Transcendentalism. She will be talking about circles (tease) and will discuss what happens when man looks into himself and shows his capacity for being capable. The writings she will be using, she said are at the opposite ends of the spectrum: The Birthmark and the American Scholar.

Michael has plans for a lot of linkages using Gothic and Dark Romantic texts. He will show through his textual connections how the genres progressed and broke from their predecessors. He is thinking of showing how some of the works might have turned out if they were written out of genre. He is thinking he might revise his focus.

Caitlin will be discussing British writers, their culture, what was happening in society at the time and connect it to American writers of the Regionalism era. Some of her authors are Freeman, Fuller and Hardy.

Sara will be discussing the interconnectedness of Gothic-Realist-Naturalist texts—Zola will be her touchstone author. (Sorry this is the part I started worrying about myself choking up again and stopped typing).

Thanks for 15 weeks of learning Julie!

Why Bathsheba, Why?????????????

In Zola's The Experimental Novel, Zola goes on for 54 pages to describe the many parameters and benefits of the rise of the scientific novel or writing. In his final paragraph at the bottom of page 54, he concludes:

"In short, everything is summed up in this great fact: the experimental method in letters, as in the sciences, is the way to explain the natural phenomena, both individual and social, of which metaphysics, until now, has given only irrational and supernatural explanations."

Zola is saying writers should write only of the facts and truth as they are unfurled, then writers will then be producing work in a responsible manner.

Hardy, in his Far from the Maddening Crowd novel partially adheres to some of Zola's position, in that the setting for the book is set in the fictional town of Wessex, but located in real and specific region of England. The characters in the novel are appropriate to the setting: farm land, farmers, land owners, farm laborers, local citizens of the farming community. There is lengthy description and discourse about nature, and man's role in trying to make a living from working within the natural environment. All the elements for an experiment are in place: man vs nature or man working within nature.

From Chapter 2:

"Norcombe Hill -- not far from lonely Toller-Down -- was one of the spots which suggest to a passer-by that he is in the presence of a shape approaching the indestructible as nearly as any to be found on earth. It was a featureless convexity of chalk and soil -- an ordinary specimen of those smoothly-outlined protuberances of the globe which may remain undisturbed on some great day of confusion, when far grander heights and dizzy granite precipices topple down."

"The hill was covered on its northern side by an ancient and decaying plantation of beeches, whose upper verge formed a line over the crest, fringing its arched curve against the sky, like a mane. To-night these trees sheltered the southern slope from the keenest blasts, which smote the wood and floundered through it with a sound as of grumbling, or gushed over its crowning boughs in a weakened moan. The dry leaves in the ditch simmered and boiled in the same breezes, a tongue of air occasionally ferreting out a few, and sending them spinning across the grass. A group or two of the latest in date amongst the dead multitude had remained till this very mid-winter time on the twigs which bore them and in falling rattled against the trunks with smart taps."

This is an excellent example of scribe writing about nature at its starkest and most true.

Where Hardy strays from Zola's absolutes that all written within the novel must be true and truthful, is when the narrator gets into the heads of the characters...there we know this is utter fiction it is not a transcript of events and a complete shift from scribing.

One of the pivotal moments of the novel which showcases a dramatic shift from scientific scribe to fiction novelist takes place when main character Bathsheba, throws all caution to the wind and sends a mortal invite to not-yet-suitor and neighboring farmer, Boldwood;

From Chapter 13:
""Dear me -- I had nearly forgotten the valentine I bought yesterday," she exclaimed at length.

"Valentine! who for, miss?" said Liddy. `Farmer Boldwood?"

It was the single name among all possible wrong ones that just at this moment seemed to Bathsheba more pertinent than the right.

"Well, no. It is only for little Teddy Coggan. have promised him something, and this will be a pretty surprise for him. Liddy, you may as well bring me my desk and I'll direct it at once."

Bathsheba took from her desk a gorgeously illuminated and embossed design in post-octavo, which had been bought on the previous market-day at the chief stationer's in Casterbridge. In the centre was a small oval enclosure; this was left blank, that the sender might insert tender words more appropriate to the special occasion than any generalities by a printer could possibly be.

"Here's a place for writing," said Bathsheba. `What shall I put?"

"Something of this sort, I should think," returned Liddy promptly: --

"The rose is red,
The violet blue,
Carnation's sweet,
And so are you."

"Yes, that shall be it. It just suits itself to a chubby-faced child like him," said Bathsheba. She inserted the words in a small though legible handwriting; enclosed the sheet in an envelope, and dipped her pen for the direction.

"What fun it would be to send it to the stupid old Boldwood, and how he would wonder!" said the irrepressible Liddy, lifting her eyebrows, and indulging in an awful mirth on the verge of fear as she thought of the moral and social magnitude of the man contemplated.

Bathsheba paused to regard the idea at full length. Boldwood's had begun to be a troublesome image -- a species of Daniel in her kingdom who persisted in kneeling eastwardwhen reason and common sense said that he might just as well follow suit with the rest, and afford her the official glance of admiration which cost nothing at all. She was far from being seriously concerned about his nonconformity. Still, it was faintly depressing that the most dignified and valuable man in the parish should withhold his eyes, and that a girl like Liddy should talk about it. So Liddy's idea was at first rather harassing than piquant.

"No, I won't do that. He wouldn't see any humour in it."

"He'd worry to death," said the persistent Liddy.

"Really, I don't care particularly to send it to Teddy," remarked her mistress. "He's rather a naughty child sometimes."

"Yes -- that he is."

"Let's toss as men do," said Bathsheba, idly. `Now then, head, Boldwood; tail, Teddy. No, we won't toss money on a Sunday, that would be tempting the devil indeed."

"Toss this hymn-book; there can't be no sinfulness in that, miss."

"Very well. Open, Boldwood -- shut, Teddy. No; it's more likely to fall open. Open, Teddy -- shut, Boldwood."

The book went fluttering in the air and came down shut. Bathsheba, a small yawn upon her mouth, took the pen, and with off-hand serenity directed the missive to Boldwood.

"Now light a candle, Liddy. Which seal shall we use? Here's a unicorn's head -- there's nothing in that. What's this? -- two doves -- no. It ought to be something extraordinary, ought it not, Lidd? Here's one with a motto -- I remember it is some funny one, but I can't read it. We'll try this, and if it doesn't do we'll have another."

A large red seal was duly affixed. Bathsheba looked closely at the hot wax to discover the words.

"Capital!" she exclaimed, throwing down the letter frolicsomely. "Twould upset the solemnity of a parson and clerk too."

Liddy looked at the words of the seal, and read --

"MARRY ME."

In the bolded section above, Hardy strays completely.

Second Post Eng 372 Final (almost) Proposal -

There are misnomers about pre- and post-Civil war era American life and literature. Not all Americans were happy about the war and once the war was over, bigotry did not turn off like a spigot and servitude likewise was a hard thing to shake. There was no sudden happy endings for Americans of any color, in real life or in literature-- instead this was a time of difficult beginnings. Contemporary writers of that time followed in the footprint of the war -- during pre-Civil war times, the all-pervasive topic to write about was war and its subtopics--tension, loss and ongoing repression. In the Realism-Regionalism post-Civil War era of writing, writers transitioned to articulating the many aspects of America's reconstruction which included new types of struggles by both blacks and whites -- these struggles emerging as unintended consequences of freedom. Reading closely from the work of writers of these two eras, a reader can find unexpected truths which are rich with history and laced with subtlety, ambiguity and irony.

Texts:
In My Contraband (1863) by Louisa May Alcott and Beat Beat Drums (1867) by Walt Whitman, life during the Civil War is well-described. In My Contraband, Alcott writes of being locked up in a room with a contraband former slave and his hated, dying half-brother. Beat Beat Drums poetically tells the reader war comes for everyone--no matter your station, business or beliefs, there is no immunity from war and its fallout.

Transitioning to post-war topics, "The Goophered Grapevine" and "Dave's Neckliss" (1899) by Charles Chestnutt. Chestnutt shows how white Americans still held onto their belief system that owning property and having cheap labor is the most natural arrangement of all and how whites continued to believe they were superior to blacks.

Other Sources:
Revising

Eng 372 Final Paper Draft Proposal

WORK IN PROGRESS/FEEDBACK MOST WELCOME!!

The United States Civil War forever changed America's moral, economic and social structures. These huge American shifts also produced the sharpest contrast in types of materials produced by American writers. As post-war Americans transitioned with difficulty from slave-master to free men; from wealthy plantation owners to poor white struggling property owners or renters; from slaves to free laborers, post-war writers also dramatically shifted their writing gaze from life about slavery, tension and war to freedom for all, necessary but difficult adjustments and some long-held beliefs that were hard to let go.

The New American Literature works, My Contraband by Louisa May Alcott and Beat Beat Drums by Walt Whitman typify life during the war. In My Contraband, Alcott writes of being locked up in a room with a contraband former slave and his hated, dying half-brother.
Beat Beat Drums poetically tells the reader that war takes anyone and everyone in its path--that everyone, no matter your station, your business or beliefs, is immune from the fallout of war.

In contrast are two excellent Regionalism and Realism pieces, "The Goophered Grapevine" and "Dave's Neckliss" by Charles Chestnutt. Chestnutt masterfully shows in both pieces how the post-war economic climate has radically changed for both Southerners and Northerners --with large-scale economic desolation for the most of the former and economic opportunism for the latter. But the most important post-war message Chestnutt delivers in these pieces is how the white citizenry still hold onto their belief system that owning property and having cheap labor is the most natural arrangement of all and how they are the smarter of the white and black races. This aint necessarily so.
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A dandelion rosette

A dandelion rosette

I enjoyed Howell's entire editorial, imparticular, his conjecture that Daisy Miller is more a study, and ". . .not a story with plot and development."

I also appreciated his ending note as well, where he points out that artists can present what they want, convey the subject of their choosing--they are not bound by predefined parameters of what should always be...never thought of it quite that way before.

If young American women are viewed as ill-bred, low-moraled, or ". . .so queer you know. . ." while being who they are in Europe, then one can easily infer young women (or men) traveling anywhere outside their country could likewise be thought to be other than they really are. Appearances are just appearances; small minds and levels of ignorance are the same. And we could also make the point that some human experiences are simply interchangable, making them more of a study of a same-same human nature rather than a unique story.

Case in point: My eldest daughter lived for a glorious year in Stourbridge, England, as a 16-year-old Rotary Exchange student. She often mentioned one of the hardest issues for her was getting the English people in her new, temporary life to want to get to know her as, Meredith, a person separate from their idea of stereotypical American teen. She did not live for MTV as they thought she did; did not in any way agree with Bush Jr., his politics or his war...but they thought she did.

In turn, Meredith had to develop patience, learn how to make conversations and find ways to first name, then overcome her own stereotyping that she carried with her. She was sure all the English loved tea, Tony Blair, had bad teeth , were witty, charming...and were overall accepting of their wet, dank environment. She was wrong, too.

Howell also makes a fun point too, how we at home have our own inherent prejudices. He describes a hypothetical circle of American women sewing, while listening to Daisy Miller being read out loud invariably would decry that of course, Miller would describe a loud, bawdy American young lady, as opposed to a refined American young lady...isn't that just the way it always goes?

Howell concludes that "sometimes an artist would, "...sometimes justly prefer to paint a dandelion instead of a rose." Howell thinks its a wiser assertation for Miller to describe a caricature that carries some framework of understanding with it, opposed to another that has none. I think he could have closed his argument using the dandelion and the rose description, letting the reader ponder it for themselves. A wonderful observation...those contrasting images.

Yes we have indoor plumbing, we have indoor plumbing today

Note: I admit my blog this week falls very short of the assigned analysis; but the readings stirred many important memories for me and I wanted to honor my innovative farming Grandmother who taught me most of my essential life skills and how to live the best life you could under constrained conditions.

I am very, very drawn to our current regional, local color readings. My maternal great-great-grandparents and their respective families migrated to Kansas from Ireland because they were starving and could no longer make a living off the land. My great-grandparent's families in the late 1800s migrated West to Dayton, WA, from Kansas. For my maternal family, the land depicted their worth, their lifeline, their social standing, their everything.

The land had failed the family in Ireland and had been slightly better to them in Kansas. But the opportunity of their lifetime came when friends told them they could buy productive, cheap, plentiful acreage in Washington State--this land opportunity was the sole motivator for them to move their families West by covered wagon. Once West, members of Grandpa and Grandpa's families bought hundreds of acres of prime property outside of what we now call Blue Wood Ski Resort and they farmed it. When my grandparents eventually married, they accumulated more property to farm more, so they could acquire more property, so they could farm more...buying and working the land was the single-minded focus for everyone on my maternal side of the family from the 1910s into the 1980s.

My role-model Grandmother, who bore 8 children, kept a home, helped substantially on the farm early to late each day, and was a part-time LPN to boot, told me many times it was the accepted norm to have large families, in part, to have plenty of help on the farm and ensure the farming legacy would continue. In their world, which I spent 10 summers of my growing up years, was entirely geared to supporting the rigorous farming lifestyle.

When reading The Revolt of Mother, it was though I was back in my grandparent's home listening to very familiar conversations. The family conversations were always totally immersed in the happenings on the farm. My Grandmother did most of the talking; my Grandfather actually grunted or spoke in one syllable word, brief sentences. I don't recall a single conversation between my grandparents that wasn't about happenings on the farm or upcoming plans for the same.

When Grandma decided she had enough nighttime trips to the outhouse, they had an indoor bathroom installed when Grandpa was in Montana with neighboring friends, also farmers, who were also considering new-fangled tractors. Grandma had the contractor (my dad) lined out to come in and install the new-fangled indoor toilet and bath during Grandpa's two-day absence. And that is what happened.

In support of my Grandma's necessary tenacity, I would never have had a "Stop Fool!" conversation with her or with any Mother or Grandmother who took important people matters into their own hands.

Instead my conversation would go something like this:

"Mother. Another barn! Are you kidding me? Doesn't Father care if the animals are living a better life than us? Why are they so much more important than we are? I have had it. If you don't have the nerve to say something or do something, I will."
Mother: "What are you suggesting?"
"I am saying I am going to do something."

And then I would have....

Fenton's reality or big brother's purchase?

There were three points made by Natalie Houston in her article, Reading the Victorian Souvenir: Sonnets and Photographs of the Crimean War, which piqued my interest. Those points are:

For the first time ever, war photographs were available to the public for purchase and private collecting. This new access to historic photos forever changed the role of public institutions, such as museums. Museums began sharing the responsibility for the memorializing, housing and the sharing of national history with the public who purchased the photos.





Second point: Fenton's photographic work of the Crimean War was underwritten by the British government, through his employer, Agnew. Because Fenton's charge was to reiterate what was already known and report nothing new, it did not answer questions which had been raised about the ill-preparedness of the troops to weather the war and its harsh conditions. The first and second photos show the types of clothing available to a few of the men and their sleeping quarters and a weapon or so, but these could not fairly be called true indicators of life in the war zone at Crimea.









Final point which I enjoyed: Houston discussed how realistic Fenton's body of photographs really was, if at all, because the subjects had to hold their poses for several or more seconds at a time, in order for the photo to take and process. I believe that the photos may have started out to be a candid, but when the subjects were required by the science of photography at the moment to hold their pose, the photos could fairly be said to be no longer candid.
The photo to the left is titled: Two French officers, seated, and Zouave, standing with arm resting on rifle

Bonus Blog: Whitman's "Word-'Words": Lexicographer and Cartouches

". . .This is the lexicographer or chemist . . . . this made a grammar of the old cartouches, . . ."

From Whitman's Leaves of Grass (1855), page 28:

“Hurrah for positive science! Long live exact demonstration!

Fetch stonecrop and mix it with cedar and branches of lilac;

This is the lexicographer or chemist. . .this made a grammar of the old

cartouches,

These mariners put the ship through dangerous unknown seas,

This is the geologist, and this work with the scalpel, and this is a mathematician.”

Lexicography is divided into two related disciplines:

• Practical lexicography is the art or craft of compiling, writing and editing dictionaries.

• Theoretical lexicography is the scholarly discipline of analyzing and describing the semantic, syntagmatic and paradigmatic relationships within the lexicon (vocabulary) of a language, developing theories of dictionary components and structures linking the data in dictionaries, the needs for information by users in specific types of situation, and how users may best access the data incorporated in printed and electronic dictionaries. This is sometimes referred to as 'metalexicography'.

A person devoted to lexicography is called a lexicographer - said Wiki.

In Egyptian hieroglyphs, a cartouche is an oblong enclosure with a horizontal line at one end, indicating that the text enclosed is a royal name, coming into use during the beginning of the Fourth Dynasty under Pharaoh Sneferu, replacing the earlier serekh. The Ancient Egyptian word for it was shenu, and it was essentially an expanded shen ring. In Demotic, the cartouche was reduced to a pair of parentheses and a vertical line - said Wiki.

Levi's American Product: Whitman's Words

Is the late Walt Whitman, left. wearing Levi's Silver Tab, Classic Cut or Relaxed jeans in this early photo? : )

* To what extent does the Levi’s campaign celebrate, confuse, or distort Whitman’s poetic project?
I truly believe taking the arts where non-traditional audiences exist and potentially new "fans" reside, can only be positive.

How can exposing the "younger generation" to Walt Whitman be a bad thing? Unless you had a zealous English teacher growing up who grounded you in American poetry or -- are an English major or -- have a bent for Walt Whitman poetry, chances are extremely good, you are not familiar with Whitman and his words. So this novel approach, though consumeristic, is a very good thing. Although the ads are completely built to sell more Levi jeans, the ads are eloquent, poetic, very well done. I don't even mind they are trying to sell me a product because of the beautiful words, "the voice" and the compelling imagery -- which, and who, far outshadow the sales pitch.

* What was your own reaction to the “Go Forth” ads?
I was thrilled to hear Whitman's poetry come forth. So much so, I didn't really look too closely at the jeans Levi wants me to buy. I saw nature, enthusiasm, youth, heard lyrical poetry being spoken, felt a pulse.

Under normal circumstances when I hear or see classics being used commercially, I am instantly irritated and go as far, as fast as I can, away from the commercial or pitch.

I watched both ads half a dozen times and each time, can't argue with the quality or eloquence. I am assuming all Whitman's property rights issues are addressed, so I don't have to worry about theft. Well done. I think Wieden+Kennedy, the advertiser group who designed the ads, raised the bar on this campaign. I can't recall anything in my recent experience that compares to the magnetic quality of the ads.

* In what ways do themes of consumption, advertising, and promotion show up in Whitman’s work?
I am hard-pressed to have a good answer for this question. Because I have only recently read and enjoyed a couple of Whitman pieces in this class, I don't know enough to be able to search for themes or passages which speak to "consumption, advertising and promotion." The only consumption we read about was the consumption of living an every day good life in Whitman's "Song of Myself." He took no prisoners in that poem...consumed every experience in this human life and listed all the rest. Wish I had more to offer, but don't.


* Do you buy McCracken’s claim that advertisers now play the cultural roles that poets played in earlier eras?
I agree that advertising via the Internet, I Phones and all other forms of social-community-traditional media play a small part of the Poet, but these media forms do not by any measure, replace or encompass the role of Poet, as detailed by Emerson, Fuller and Whitman.

I don't see advertisers as common folk living among common people, having common experiences and writing about them. Advertisers instead belong to a numbers-driven, shark-infested cultural selling machine which relies extensively on complex research as opposed to living and using day-to-day experiences to express their ideas.

Advertisers are not one man or woman, such as a Poet Laureate, writing soley about the beauty of the day; instead they are a body of professionals whose sole job it is to sell things and if they can incorporate some aspect of today's beauty into their ad campaign, then bravo. Advertisers sole purpose is to creative seductive selling pieces and platforms.

The Poet's sole purpose is, ". . .He bestows on every object or quality its fit proportions neither more nor less. He is the arbiter of the diverse and he is the key. He is the equalizer of his age and land. . ." said Whitman from his Preface to Leaves of Grass, 1855.

In no way is an advertiser an equalizer or a proportionalist.
Quite the opposite, advertisers are convincers, opportunists and spin masters.
Poets are to be purists, reporters and scribes.
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Muir's natural interconnective world

"God’s glacial-mills grind slowly, but they have been kept in motion long enough in California to grind sufficient soil for a glorious abundance of life, though most of the grist has been carried to the lowlands, leaving these high regions comparatively lean and bare; while the post-glacial agents of erosion have not yet furnished sufficient available food over the general surface for more than a few tufts of the hardiest plants, chiefly carices and eriogonæ. And it is interesting to learn in this connection that the sparseness and repressed character of the vegetation at this height is caused more by want of soil than by harshness of climate; for, here and there, in sheltered hollows (countersunk beneath the general surface) into which a few rods of well-ground moraine chips have been dumped, we find groves of spruce and pine thirty to forty feet high, trimmed around the edges with willow and huckle-berry bushes, and oftentimes still further by an outer ring of tall grasses, bright with lupines, lark-spurs, and showy columbines, suggesting a climate by no means repressingly severe. All the streams, too, and the pools at this elevation are furnished with little gardens wherever soil can be made to lie, which, though making scarce any show at a distance, constitute charming surprises to the appreciative observer. In these bits of leafiness a few birds find grateful homes. Having no acquaintance with man, they fear no ill, and flock curiously about the stranger, almost allowing themselves to be taken in the hand. In so wild and so beautiful a region was spent my first day, every sight and sound inspiring, leading one far out of himself, yet feeding and building up his individuality."

In this descriptive passage from Muir's book,"The Mountains of California," (1894-Chapter 4, "A Near View of the High Sierra"), Muir takes the reader on a visual tour of an area of the high Sierra Mountains where he first fell in love with mountains; where he spent a good portion of his life and through an area he obviously loves. While giving a visual tour he is also concurrently explaining to us how essential and interconnected we and nature are, even following events which we would normally term,"catastophic." He implies the average person sees large scale events, such as the forming of mountains or the changing of their shapes through natural events as negative--that no good can possible be at the area where the event began or ended. We unengaged citizens would naturally assume destitution is the only possible outcome. He says if we really want to learn and know more, by spending time we will observe some naturally occurring order and purpose of nature.

In this passage Muir says God is responsible for this wonder and sight and from the enormity of glacial events, there is good and purpose:
"God's glacial-mills grind slowly" and "kept in motion long enough in California to grind sufficient soil for a glorious abundance of life. . ."

He continues to explain the functional outcomes of glacial events: "though most of the grist has been carried to the lowlands, leaving these high regions comparatively lean and bare; while the post-glacial agents of erosion have not yet furnished sufficient available food over the general surface for more than a few tufts of the hardiest plants, chiefly carices and eriogonæ."

He tells us even though there is ". . .sparse to no vegetation in the higher areas of glacial activity. . ." it is the way it is supposed to be. He tells us what nature did provide is nourishment enough for the the "hardiest plants, chiefly, carices and eriogonæ." (Side note, I looked up carices and eriogonæ and found no definition in any online dictionary, but every reference was given back to this single passage by Muir).

He then describes what is thriving and why, and does so in eloquent and poetical terms: ". . .And it is interesting to learn in this connection that the sparseness and repressed character of the vegetation at this height is caused more by want of soil than by harshness of climate; for, here and there, in sheltered hollows (countersunk beneath the general surface) into which a few rods of well-ground moraine chips have been dumped, we find groves of spruce and pine thirty to forty feet high, trimmed around the edges with willow and huckle-berry bushes, and oftentimes still further by an outer ring of tall grasses, bright with lupines, lark-spurs, and showy columbines, suggesting a climate by no means repressingly severe." His purpose here is to say, you might think conditions are severe, but folks, look what is thriving, and. . .it is thriving because it is the order of nature.

He continues to regal the unexpected beauty of nature and what springs from its naturalness or in this case, the waters: "All the streams, too, and the pools at this elevation are furnished with little gardens wherever soil can be made to lie, which, though making scarce any show at a distance, constitute charming surprises to the appreciative observer. In these bits of leafiness a few birds find grateful homes. Having no acquaintance with man, they fear no ill, and flock curiously about the stranger, almost allowing themselves to be taken in the hand."

Muir alludes to the wild and the beauty which can be, both sublime and something that the interested observer would find, only if engaged in the seeking of beauty and the exploration of the wild. He tells us likes Thoreau did, that getting closer to nature, taking the time to embrace, engage and become a collaborator enriches our lives without end: ". . .In so wild and so beautiful a region was spent my first day, every sight and sound inspiring, leading one far out of himself, yet feeding and building up his individuality."
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Kindred Spirits or Convening Beauty

"Kindred Spirits" by Asher Brown Durand,1849

I really struggled with making a single choice from the immense amount of Ruskin material. The man could split a neutrino into micro-neutrinos and still not be done. He had the gift of verbosity and genius! I found it, at the very least, overwhelming to read him. I decided to wait on deciding on a passage until my mind was clearer (ill with meds, now better) I reread passages of his "Modern Painter" today, with greater appreciation and one passage that completely moved me: "A mass of mountain seen against the light, may at first appear all of one blue; and so it is, blue as a whole, by comparison with other parts of the landscape. But look how that blue is made up. There are black shadows in it under the crags, there are green shadows along the turf, there are grey half-lights upon the rocks, there are faint touches of stealthy warmth and cautious light along their edges; every bush, every stone, every tuft of moss has its voice in the matter, and joins with individual character in the universal. . .(Modern Painters, 3.294)

How does Ruskin's passage above, relate to the stunning painting, "Kindred Spirits," by Asher Brown Durand? Durand's painting depicts American artist Thomas Cole and American poet William Cullen Bryant surrounded by the Catskill Mountains of New York. Durand's painting considered a "defining work of the Hudson River School" (http://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/durandinfo.shtm), and is filled with shade upon shade upon nuance upon shadow and light of nature's finest colors; add the magnificent view of the valley and river; the light pouring through the scenery and colors. . .This magnificent portrait by one of the Hudson River School's artists begs the question: How does one describe to another why or how they find beauty?

I like to think one strand of nature's color, alone, or one tree, or a single shade of one tree's green, would not alone, give pause or create a sense of wonder leading to the sense of beauty; rather it is the overwhelming number of nature's shades, nuances and combinations of color, together, which Durand so beautifully captured in "Kindred Spirits," which creates beauty.

I have always been humbled by the nature's palatte. We humans cannot come close to imitating or recreating these. Since I was a small person, I have stopped family member's conversations while we traveled to say: "Will you look at the shade of green? Have you seem seen such a delicate pink?" Ruskin said it so much better, (again:) "A mass of mountain seen against the light, may at first appear all of one blue; and so it is, blue as a whole, by comparison with other parts of the landscape. But look how that blue is made up. There are black shadows in it under the crags, there are green shadows along the turf, there are grey half-lights upon the rocks, there are faint touches of stealthy warmth and cautious light along their edges; every bush, every stone, every tuft of moss has its voice in the matter, and joins with individual character in the universal. . .(Modern Painters, 3.294) -- and Durand painted this thought, most magnificently.
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Team Dickens members

We are lagging!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Please blog and be blogged!

The Dark Veil Pre-Vails

Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Minister's Black Veil" oozes Dark Romanticism.

Summary:
Parson Hooper (main character) is a minister (good and light) who comes to a regular church service wearing a black (evil, darkness) veil which covers his eyes. He does not acknowledge the veil at its first revealing, and discusses it only when forced to, but at all costs, never gives it up and wears it to his death bed. A simple veil, just a couple layers of dark crepe, was so off-putting that the man of the people became a complete outcast of the people.

The veil could be said to signify darkness, secrets and/or sin which is direct contradiction to Parson Moody's life purpose: to bring purity of heart to the people he was ordained to serve. As a veiled minister he was eventually shunned by all and seen as someone who forced all who viewed him to think about the "why" of veil. It made people uncomfortable and angry that he was forcing them to acknowledge not only his darknesses, sins, but theirs. He might have also been saying why are you rejecting someone who believes different than you....

In Paragraph 10: ". . .till Mr. Hooper had ascended the stairs, and showed himself in the pulpit, face to face with his congregation, except for the black veil. That mysterious emblem was never once withdrawn. It shook with his measured breath, as he gave out the psalm; it threw its obscurity between him and the holy page, as he read the Scriptures; and while he prayed, the veil lay heavily on his uplifted countenance. Did he seek to hide it from the dread Being whom he was addressing?"

Paragraph 10 is brilliant. It demonstrates both good and evil in the same line: ". . .it threw its obscurity between (walking the line between good and evil) him (darkness now) and the holy page (the ultimate light or the Puritanical beliefs that Hawthorne was raised on, which he is said to distain), as he read the Scriptures (good); and while he prayed (good), the veil lay heavily on his uplifted (the darkness is laying on the good) countenance. Did he seek to hide it from the dread Being (devil, evil, Hades, whatever your hell is).

Paragraph 13
"At the close of the services, the people hurried out with indecorous confusion, eager to communicate their pent-up amazement, and conscious of lighter spirits the moment they lost sight of the black veil. Some gathered in little circles, huddled closely together, with their mouths all whispering in the centre; some went homeward alone, wrapt in silent meditation; some talked loudly, and profaned the Sabbath day with ostentatious laughter. A few shook their sagacious heads, intimating that they could penetrate the mystery; while one or two affirmed that there was no mystery at all, but only that Mr. Hooper's eyes were so weakened by the midnight lamp, as to require a shade. . ."
I love the use of lighter spirits. . .black veil. . ." in the same line. Goodness and light co-existing; living life with our human angst and conflicts.
Then use of circles: "Some gathered in little circles, huddled closely together, with their mouths all whispering, in the centre;

Paragraph 22:
This should be a time of great human joy, marriage; and not just any marriage, but the marriage of the "handsomest couple..." "That night, the handsomest couple in Milford village were to be joined in wedlock."

Hawthorne again uses darkness and light, in the same sentence: "Though reckoned a melancholy (sad) man, Mr. Hooper had a placid cheerfulness (happy) for such occasions, which often excited a sympathetic (melancholy or dark) smile where livelier merriment (happiness/light) would have been thrown away."

The townspeople at the wedding were waiting for the good character of the minister to return when he came to officiate the wedding: "There was no quality of his disposition which made him more beloved than this. The company at the wedding awaited his arrival with impatience, trusting that the strange awe, which had gathered over him throughout the day, would now be dispelled."
The paragraph goes on to feature darkness, light, the supernatural; then added nature and the beautiful maiden dying and some Gothic symbols. He performs his duty, while shaking the bridal party to their core and then while toasting the couple catches a glimpse of himself wearing the veil, then rushes back into his own psychological darkness:
". . .But such was not the result. When Mr. Hooper came, the first thing that their eyes rested on was the same horrible black veil, which had added deeper gloom to the funeral, and could portend nothing but evil to the wedding. Such was its immediate effect on the guests that a cloud seemed to have rolled duskily from beneath the black crepe, and dimmed the light of the candles. The bridal pair stood up before the minister. But the bride's cold fingers quivered in the tremulous hand of the bridegroom, and her deathlike paleness caused a whisper that the maiden who had been buried a few hours before was come from her grave to be married. If ever another wedding were so dismal, it was that famous one where they tolled the wedding knell. After performing the ceremony, Mr. Hooper raised a glass of wine to his lips, wishing happiness to the new-married couple (romance, earthly happiness) in a strain of mild pleasantry that ought to have brightened the features of the guests, like a cheerful gleam from the hearth. At that instant, catching a glimpse of his figure in the looking-glass, the black veil involved his own spirit in the horror with which it overwhelmed all others. His frame shuddered, his lips grew white, he spilt the untasted wine (spilt blood?)upon the carpet, and rushed forth into the darkness. For the Earth, too, had on her Black Veil."
Paragraph
Great jab at his religion: If I can show my private transgressions and sorrows, shouldn't you?: "If I hide my face for sorrow, there is cause enough,'' he merely replied; ``and if I cover it for secret sin, what mortal might not do the same?''

Also a excellent poke at Romanticism where his girlfriend or bethrothed Elizabeth, abandons him for showing his human weakness to her:
"Lift the veil but once, and look me in the face," said she.
"Never! It cannot be!" replied Mr. Hooper.
"Then farewell!" said Elizabeth."

I never met an epigraph. . .

Circles
I chose this answer: ". . . this epigraph comments or elucidates the meaning of the text." as the purpose of Emerson's use of his "Circles" epigraph:

Nature centres into balls,
And her proud ephemerals,
Fast to surface and outside,
Scan the profile of the sphere;
Knew they what that signified,
A new genesis is here.

In using just a few, spare words to form his epigraph, Emerson has given us a large message: Nature (life) is an omniscient, never-ending sphere (circle). The circle has both physical attributes (ball)--which are constantly replenishing (ephemeral), and the circle has human attributes. . ."Scan the profile of the sphere: Knew they what that signified, A new genesis is here." This is his hello to readers. . .Man, are you Thinking? Man. . .what is your character and did you know you form your character by a circle of truth, which is then surrounded by another circle of truth, without end?

Emerson completely supports his epigraph through the use of a monster-size ecliptic salvo in the first paragraph of "Circles." He sets us up to expect (and delivers) many great ideas (Nature, Man Thinking, Circles, Character, Ephemeral qualities of life), throughout this essay, with this opening paragraph:

"The eye is the first circle; the horizon which it forms is the second; and throughout nature this primary figure is repeated without end. St. Augustine described the nature of God as a circle whose centre was everywhere, and its copious circumference nowhere. We are all our lifetime reading the copious sense of this first of forms. One moral we have already deduced in considering the circular or compensatory character of every human action. Another analogy we shall now trace; that every action admits of being outdone. Our life is an apprenticeship to the truth, that around every circle another can be drawn; that there is no end in nature, but every end is a beginning; that there is always another dawn rise on mid-noon, and under every deep a lower deep opens."

Paragraph 3:
"There are no fixtures in nature (ephemeral). The universe is fluid and volatile. Permanence is but a word of degrees. Our globe (earth, ball, circle) seen by God is a transparent law, not a mass of facts."

Paragraph 5:
He is again discussing character, the human condition: "The key to every man is his thought. . ."The life of man is a self-evolving circle, which, from a ring imperceptibly small, rushes on all sides outward to a new and larger (ephemeral) circles, and that without end."

Paragraph 20:
He reminds us again in this paragraph, we are humans; and our world is a fleeting, passing, replenishing thing:
"The natural world may be conceived as a system of concentric circles, and we now and then detect in nature slight dislocations, which apprize us that this surface on which we now stand is not fixed, but sliding."

A reader can easily find connections to the epigraph in ALL of the "Circle."

"Beware when the great God lets loose a thinker on this planet"
He did just that with Emerson.
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COMPLETE ASIDE:
I was one of the students from this class who admitted to overlooking reading one of the epigraphs from Emerson or Thoreau earlier this week. Although I used one myself for my Keats Fact Sheet, I didn't read the one from the esteemed author. Be sure I won't do it again. Now I am haunted by them, I see them everywhere (feel like this could be a Seinfield episode, "Jerry, ya should have heard the epigraph that guy used on me. . ."). I added one purposefully to a project due for my Rhetoric class. Upon peer review of the project, only one comment on the epigraph was received. While the message of MY epigraph, in my mind, could not have been more clear and purposeful, my peer reviewer asked what I meant by it. So then I started thinking. . .why did they not understand it when it was perfectly clear to me!

Nature is not temporary but we are

Craig Wolfe photography

My first read-through of Dorothy Wordsworth's "Floating Island" was mmm . . .I wasn't especially enraptured by it. I decided to try again by reading it out loud to myself.  By the end of the first stanza it was excruciatingly clear the spareness of words was obvious and . . .I heard myself talking out loud, "This makes all the sense in the world." 

Harmonious Powers with Nature work
On sky, earth, river, lake, and sea:
Sunshine and storm, whirlwind and breeze
All in one duteous task agree.

In this first stanza Wordsworth focused on describing the physical state of the highest power, our known Universe-the World and some of its components: sky, earth, the forces of its nature, and how they all work harmoniously together, to bring us quite a world to live in.  Wordsworth's use of the Universe and its interconnected components sets the stage for the reader to think: how powerful, what an awe-inspiring world.
 
She then imagines or sees, ". . .a slip of earth. . .loosed from its hold. . .see it float. . .obedient to the wind.” Vivid imagery. . .of a piece of Earth coming off in some mysterious way and it changed into something light enough to float on the wind. The imagination soars.

Once did I see a slip of earth,
By throbbing waves long undermined,
Loosed from its hold; -- how no one knew
But all might see it float, obedient to the wind.

She imagines or sees the piece of Earth on the Lake, where more creatures of the universe reside, thrive and share a world:

Might see it, from the mossy shore
Dissevered float upon the Lake,
Float, with its crest of trees adorned
On which the warbling birds their pastime take.

She describes life's basic needs: "Food, shelter, safety. . ." that the birds and all other living creatures find in Nature, at the lake. The call to fundamental needs that all living things share, invokes strong feelings in the reader -- We all need these! She paints a tranquil, sublime Nature scene from where the reader can find stillness, which then gives rise to “Big R” higher, more powerful emotions.

She goes on to infer, although the birds live here, so do we (interconnectedness again) and how the world as we know it, "A peopled world it is. . ." is but a tiny world in the great scheme of the infinite universe.” She reminds us we share the same needs and space with all living creatures. This calls in the “devotion to beauty; the worship of Nature.” She moves us to think our world, large as we can know it to be, could in fact, be very, very small in the scheme of the infinite universe. And how we might be connected to the larger universe and its unknown components.

Food, shelter, safety there they find
There berries ripen, flowerets bloom;
There insects live their lives -- and die:
A peopled world it is; in size a tiny room.

Skipping a few stanzas Wordsworth closes out by describing how we might be taking a Nature walk on a pleasant day and notice a piece of our familiar physical world, perhaps a landmark, gone, without any forewarning. We may not know where it went, what it became, but we can be sure it's continuing the preordained cycle of life by dissolving to a fragment of something else, to begin the cycle all over again. Again, the worship and devotion of nature and its powerful and sublime beauty; a call to the reader's imagination.

Perchance when you are wandering forth
Upon some vacant sunny day
Without an object, hope, or fear,
Thither your eyes may turn -- the Isle is passed away.

Buried beneath the glittering Lake!
Its place no longer to be found,
Yet the lost fragments shall remain,
To fertilize some other ground.

Side bar: Wordsworth's poem conjured up a strong recollection. I lived on the East Coast in the mid-1990s. I was away from home during the great December 1998 Northwest floods which created havoc in every possible way with people, their plans, the physical world. Everyone at home was inconvenienced, all pre- and post-holiday plans had to be changed and the flood had to be “dealt with.” Most of my family lives in Oregon and Washington, so I was given many stories and pictures describing their experiences with the great flood.

The description of their experiences were words to me until the day I drove the Columbia River Gorge from Portland to Eastern Oregon in May, following the floods. I was startled beyond any words I have yet to find, when I saw that the shape of the Columbia River bed by Cascade Locks had altered noticeably. The curve had turned more snake-like, sharper, and the river's shore was now much closer to the road.

The flood and all its power, had dramatically changed a piece of nature which I had enjoyed all my driving life. I had always been able to predict the next curve and therefore go on a slight autopilot to enjoy the amazing Gorge views of river and cliffs. I had always felt until the moment I took the slight right turn onto the short stretch of road where the river bed changed, that Nature was a good thing. I had felt most secure in my familiarity of the road. Until that moment when I discovered the unexpected changes, it had been my road.

When I saw the river's bank now fixed much closer to the road, I was unexpectedly afraid, startled, disoriented, completely and wholy undone. I understood right then, right there, this was not my road, I am merely borrowing it and its experience. I felt to my depth, how HUGE and POWERFUL nature is and how truly small, really temporary, I am. Thanks Dorothy Wordsworth!

Sheer cliffs, sheer terror, don't walk there Edgar!

"Don't walk there Edgar!" I found myself thinking just that so often during a few portions of the first half of Edgar Huntly and often, during the second half to completion of the Charles Brockden Brown's story.

Page 152: "My return to sensation and to consciousness took place in no much tranquil scene. I emerged from oblivion by degrees so slow and so faint, that their succession cannot be marked. When enabled at length to attend to the information which my senses afforded, I was conscious of a time, for a time, of nothing but existence. It was unaccompanied with lassitude or pain, but I felt disinclined to stretch my limbs, or raise my eye-lids. My thoughts were wildering and mazy, and though consciousness were present, it was disconnected with the loco-motive or voluntary power."

Summary: Edgar slowly regains consciousness and with it, many painful sensations of various kinds and degrees, but soft! he has no recollection of how he arrived at the darkness, became hurt, who or what caused his unconsciousness. It takes a period of time for him to mentally process his state and once he does, he moves even more slowly, because what he discovers next about himself, he really didn't really want to know.

Edgar begins his awareness of arriving somehow in the darkness that he soon discovers is a cave, "My return to sensation. . ." which immediately and without permission, engages the reader and forces them in a subliminal way, to begin feeling and speculating. As a human being, we cannot read the words "return" and "sensation" without beginning the process of asking questions and experiencing a sensation ourselves. Why is that?

Use of the words, ". . .return to sensation," could be called creating imagery, by choosing words which makes the reader react automatically with a memory of their own or a memory of some type of sensation.

When a reader sees the word, "sensation," it's a muscle reflex reaction or another piece of imagery at work. The word "sensation" takes the reader, without permission, right into sensations or memories of sensations of their own. It's the type of word that elicits a physical reaction. Think of the word, "sky diving." What happens? It creates an automatic response.

The word "return" implies Edgar has been gone. It's human to begin speculating and wanting to fill in the blanks. If you are returning, Edgar, where have you been? If your sensations are returning, what did you lose, when, how and will you get those sensations back?

The more picturesque author may have simply said: "My jaw, ribs, head, arms are throbbing-are they broken? There is white-hot heat radiating from these places, and the pain. . . Are my ribs and legs broken? Why can't I open my eyes? And where is the light? Where. ..am...I???"

What is gained by writing more picturesque or specifically, is finite knowledge. The reader is told what is happening. There is no need to speculate or imagine. You have been given the facts.

What is lost by writing in a more picturesque style is the reader will not necessarily become engaged in the reading because there is no stimuli or imagery to force engagement. There is no need for the reader's imagination to conjure up the types of injuries, circumstances, because they have already been told.

It's a more passive style of reading; a more active style of writing. The author can spell out without ambiguity, what is taking place. The reader is able to "flow" through the reading-writing with less pause, greater understanding, less need to analyze and no invitation particularly, to participate in the story.
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Suspense vs Slash & Burn

The iconic "The Birds," Alfred Hitchcock's 1963 film (based on the 1952 novella, "The Birds," by Daphne Du Maurier), was my first cinematic experience with unmitigated terror. Hitchcock so masterfully accomplished his psychological terror film, that after 40 years, I automatically cringe and look over both shoulders when I see more than four crows on a telephone line. His work was that terrifying and suspenseful.

How was it Hitchcock could take ordinary, normally peaceful black birds and turn them into a pack of relentless attack animals. Such a suspenseful, psychological storyline. . .oh, that's it. He used ordinary, therefore, unsuspecting everyday creatures and cast them in an unexpected role of blood-seeking protagonists. He formed the birds into one very large band who far outnumbered the befuddled (what did we do to deserve this?) humans and had the birds repeat their attacks. Not doors, not windows could hold the birds back or keep them out. The birds successfully repeatedly attacked the humans of the sleepy town until the movie's end, when the din faded and the quiet returned. Because no one could sure why the birds attacked in the first place, or why they quit, no one could be sure they were completely through attacking. The bird's behavior was unexpectedly terrible!

For me, terror=suspense and suspense in this case=the misuse of psychological assumptions.

When assumptions are thrown off through the use of the unexpected, the unexplained, as Hitchcock so brilliantly did with the birds inexplicably attacking, he engaged us without our permission. We became actively, not passively, involved not watching, his movie --we are his. How brilliant. . . Hitchcock, took the ordinary and twisted it enough to get the audience off auto-pilot and instantaneously involved in the movie. The viewer's minds went flying: "Did I just see that? Why did they use those animals? What are the people going to do to protect themselves?"

At this end of this particular film, the birds fall back to their normal demeanor of quiet and passive. This was their usual demeanor before they morphed into flying vampires . . .so the viewer's mind can't help but think. . ."It must be a matter of time before they do it again. . or will they. . . and what will ignite them? What will the people of the hamlet do differently to protect themselves this time?"

When I first viewed Freddy Cruger in the first (1984 film written and directed by Wes Craven) of the series, "The Nightmare on Elm Street," I felt the movie was going to be gory and predictable. I was not disappointed. There were clues abounding beginning with the title, the dark setting, the wide-pan camera angles and the plot which calls for old-fashioned from the grave revenge.

In "The Nightmare..." there were no psychological "WHAT THE" moments; instead. . .it was who, where, when and how. The storyline contained all the pieces, which were quickly, easily and predictably assimilated by the audience. Once the storyline was in place, the bloody slashing continued throughout the movie, needing only different venues and different victims to fulfill its mission. There was very little to nil suspense in this terror film -- just the use of predictable characters, motives and endings.

For the movie watcher who wants to be outfoxed and forced to think and rethink old assumptions, see a suspense-filled show.

For the movie watcher who wants to scream and have enough energy leftover to enjoy a bit of popcorn, return some text messages while they enjoy their screaming catharsis, the terror movie will always be the best choice.
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How to intro for English 372

After a 28-year hiatus, I find myself this week, back in the throes of English academia and so very extremely happy about it. I didn't mean to leave college unfinished, 22 credits short of my English degree, but I did. I didn't plan on re-attending school to finish, but I am here and plan to embrace my time in school.
I am a lifelong bookworm, fascinated with words, language, books. I wrote my first short story in third grade about my mentor grandmother, "The Tales of Poor Pitiful Pearl." I was the first woman editor of my Eastern Oregon University "Oregon East" magazine back in the early '80s and have faithfully been writing in one or more forms all my adult life.
Professionally, it's been a joyful adventure for the past several decades, meandering my way through government service--which took me from Walla Walla to Albuquerque to Washington DC and back home again. I also spent time as a Managing Editor of two small weekly newspapers; wrote a column in my hometown paper about single parenting for a decade; have grant writing certification and much more. Anything to keep writing!
I was unexpectedly downsized in September last year from Hanford and when the "return to school plan" was offered, I jumped!
My plan this minute is to complete my English BA and get some teaching credentials. I will be 55 when done and that alone feels funny on the tongue, but time flies and I must not waste a second.
Personally....I am a wife and partner to a very grand James, mother to five excellent Kids and grandma to 7 exquisite Grands. I don't know how life, bumps, warts and all, gets any better than this.
I am a patriotic US Army veteran and a polio survivor: I received a swine flu shot while in the army in 1976, which caused me to contract a very serious case of Guillen Barre polio. It's old news now, but from that experience, I became a devout believer of the power of the human spirit; I am stridently patriotic and a proud veteran.
I might be the gray-haired lady fumbling with trifocals. struggling for now, with required technology, but inside, I am the 18-year-old freckled-faced girl wearing fashionable orange cat glasses and jumping up and down waiting to receive new information and do something with it.