(What's the Story) Morning Glory

I think Dickens wrote this book for all the people who have ever wanted more and dreamed of becoming something great. He wanted to examine the hardships of great expectations during a time when class structure reigned supreme. If you look at the quote on page 61 that begins, "That was a memorable day to me..." you can see that Dickens uses the symbolism of the chain links to explain how people feel bound to their fates, and also how people feel connected to other expectations. Miss Havisham uses Estella as a sort of temptation to Pip. She dangles Estella in front of Pip because she wants to taunt him with the life he can never have. Dickens also uses the moral conflicts within Pip to show how conflicted he is about what he wants to do and be. Does he want to be like the convict, or like Joe, or like Miss Havisham? Does he want to live with regrets, never have an exciting life, or be bitter about everything?

Pic of the Day #16

Lit Terms 2

• circumlocution
  
• classicism 
  
• cliche 
  
• climax
  
• colloquialism 
  
• comedy
  
• conflict
  
• connotation
  
• contrast 
  
• denotation
  
• denouement
  
  
  
• dialect 
  
• dialectics 
  
• dichotomy 
  
• diction
  
• didactic 
  
• dogmatic
  
• elegy
  
• epic
  
• epigram 
  

All That David Copperfield Kind of Crap

If by "all that David Copperfield kind of crap" Holden means all the unfortunate circumstances and happenings surrounding David Copperfield, then I guess he's a total hypocrite. That's Holden though, he sits from afar judging everyone without actually judging himself. He does it because he can't face his "inadequacies", and that is part of the reason why he gets kicked out of so many schools. He spends most of the story complaining about people and how they're all "phonies", and has this grand scenario where he will go away and live as a logger or something. The more I think about it Holden isn't very different from Pip. They both have a "tale of woe", and they both go through life trying to rid themselves of their inadequacies and reach this final destination that it turns out they don't really want anyway. Pip realizes the truth about the world, and Holden realizes that what he wanted all along was to be innocent again and not know the truth about "phonies". The difference between Pip and Holden is that even though they both have expectations about the world and people, Holden is miserably in the present with both feet stuck in reality while Pip still has his wild imagination.

Dickens style is really distinguished by his characters and their impossible situations, and the imagination that comes from that. Salinger tried to separate his characters from Dickens because he wanted them to be real characters that you would find in everyday life to parallel everything Holden hates about phonies. This made his novel seem more realistic and made Holden even more blunt and disillusioned.

AP Prep Post 1: Siddartha

1. A bildungsroman, or coming-of-age novel, recounts the psychological or moral development of its protagonist from youth to maturity, when this character recognizes his or her place in the world. Select a single pivotal moment in the psychological or moral development of the protagonist of a bildungsroman. Then write a well-organized essay that analyzes how that single moment shapes the meaning of the work as a whole.

http://media.collegeboard.com/digitalServices/pdf/ap/apcentral/ap13_frq_eng_lit.pdf

2. What are the conflicts in Siddhartha? What types of conflict (physical, moral, intellectual, or emotional) did you see in the novel?

3. What are some themes in the novel? How do they relate to the plot and characters?

http://classiclit.about.com/od/Siddhartha-H-Hesse/a/Siddhartha-Questions-For-Study-And-Discussion.htm

4. Why did Siddartha try to leave the teachings of the Samanas and Buddhists?

5. Describe Siddartha's feelings toward self-love and loving others.

http://www.csun.edu/~pjs44945/sidd.html


1. To answer this question I would need to know what prompted Siddartha to leave behind his old life and go against his parents.

2. Siddartha has many moral conflicts about giving up being a brahmin and emotional conflict over leaving his family. He also has intellectual conflict with himself about whether or not he's making the right decision

3. Some of the themes are those of self-realization and going after your dreams which relates to Siddartha going against his family and way of life. Another theme might be breaking tradition and starting on a new path.

4. I assume Siddartha wasn't happy and he finally realized that the Samanas wouldn't make him happy and he had to follow his heart. I don't know the exact reason why.

5. Siddartha feels like you need to love yourself so that you can find out who you really are and make the right choices. He also feels like loving people is important because maybe he thinks that loving others helps them love themselves.