Adventures at Post Oak High

[Like many of Flannery O' Connor's works, "A Good Man is Hard to Find" takes place in the deep southern United States, specifically on a road trip between Georgia and Florida, and in fact, the setting provides several integral parts and ideas to the story.] This is most notably Grandmother's realization that the "house with a secret panel" was in Tennessee and not in Georgia, and because the family was attempting to visit the house due to the screaming demands of the children, grandma is shocked by this, resulting in her kicking her feet and frightening Pitty Sing, the family's cat - " 'It's not much farther,' the grandmother said and just as she said it, a horrible thought came to her. The thought was so embarrassing that she turned red in the face and her eyes dilated and her feet jumped up, upsetting her valise in the corner. The instant the valise moved, the newspaper top she had over the basket under it rose with a snarl and P...

Our interview went...okay. It lasted thirty-seven minutes on the dot (which was twenty-three minutes shorter than the recommended time) and we messed up a couple of times (most crucially at the beginning, when we forgot to ask Mr. Goerlitz his background information). We also underestimated the amount of questions that we needed, which led to a couple of awkward pauses at certain points throughout the interview ("uhhh...do we have any more questions? Uh..."). In short, when (or if) next interview rolls around, there should be at least twenty questions that we have ready, and we should never forget to ask the interviewee's background. That way, we will get good starting information, and have a sufficient amount of things to talk about to fill at least an hour.

Towards the end of Persepolis, Marjane is making increased efforts to look better to her new husband, Reza. While wearing makeup for this very purpose at a local bazaar, she notices that the Guardians of the Revolution have gathered for a raid. In an attempt to distract them, she claims that a man on a set of steps was harassing her. (The majority of this occurs on pages 283 and 284). On the first panel of page 283, she explains her whole reasoning for doing this, and I believe that it was a very selfish act, as one individual wearing makeup in public would make so little of a change and a statement to the Islamic government that the avoidance of possibly having a man tortured or killed was not only an easy choice, but a very necessary one. Thus, Marjane's scolding by her grandmother was the least the woman could have done to set the immature wife straight.

Since in Persepolis Marjane is in Austria, she has to adapt to a new and unfamiliar culture. This includes her peers engaging in casual sex, smoking marijuana and cigarettes and shooting heroin, and generally disrespecting rules of religion and tradition that are so fundamental in Iran. She initially has a hard time adapting, because she learns that being able to simply speak the language is not enough to fully immerse herself. But even beyond this, she also is struggling with issues that teenagers have to deal with on a regular basis in almost all parts of the world, such as not feeling loved, connecting with her teachers, and listening to parents and figures of authority. All of these things make it the largest struggle in her life thus far, even more than having to deal with routine airstrikes and war erupting al around her. However, the experience will likely turn out to improve her life. The experience of clashing with another culture and immersing yourself within it, while scar...

In Persepolis , I believe that the author is actually discussing her own personal relationships with God in a very meaningful in honest way; she doesn't show that she has the perfect relationship with Him. In reality, she is frustrated by His inability to simply explain things; I think as a child, we all want the answers. Her not getting the answers, whether it's about new developing feelings for boys, for example, or the nature of religion and His role in society in an Islamic takeover is a really frustrating for her. So frustrating, that she yells and screams at him. To her, he is not an all-powerful, all-knowing benevolent being; he is simply another person that she doesn't get. And I really like this aspect to Marjane's character, because as a child, I think God is one of the most frightening things to us. And her describing their relationship this personally really gives more insight into her character.

For starters, this book is certainly for a particular kind of people. Those kind of people who enjoy science in all of its many different forms, and who are eager to learn new equations and various things about particles and such. It is meant to be as accessable as possible for someone who knows next to nothing about quantum theory, and even physics in general. And in that respect, Brian Cox and Jeff Forshaw do as good of a job as they possibly could in terms of explanation. However, because quantum theory deals with the concepts of everything possible happening and things being in multiple places at once and how there are particles that have no size and all of that stuff. Ultimately, everything that they are saying has not been conclusively "verified" yet. The point is, if you're someone who takes a perverse thrill in understanding extremely complex equations and concepts, read this. Everyone else, stay away.

Well, here we are. Out of all the reads of the year, my favorite by far is the Great Gatsby. Simply put, it is the greatest work of fiction that I have ever had the pleasure of reading. The tragic tale of a man simply wanting to impress a girl is absolutely timeless, and hits home for a lot of people, making it extremely meaningful. However, on the flip-side, I could never really get into The Merchant of Venice. It may be a meaningful commentary on the time it was published, but it was simply just too boring for my tastes. There are certainly better Shakespeare reads out there. Anyway, I think this was a year filled with great reads. Here's to sophomore year!

A common appraisal of The Great Gatsby is that it is "the greatest American novel ever written". Does this book really deserve that distinction? The short answer, as I always say, is yes. This book is the Great American Novel not necessarily because of how well it is written, or the characters (after all, every character is pretty unlikeable). It is the Great American Novel due to the fact that the book itself represents America, and the flaws that plague its delusional image of grandeur. The very story of Gatsby is something that so many Americans are familiar with, and so I feel that in many ways it is an utterly timeless story that is poignant and relatable. It's great because of its message, not the technical details of the novel.

Since The Great Gatsby is such a complicated novel, even though it is quite short, it is a little challenging to pinpoint one exact theme for the book. But out of all that we chose, "Death of the American Dream" is the most prominent. Firstly, and most prominently, are the last two paragraphs of the entire book. They read: "He had come a long way to this blue lawn, and his dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He did not know that it was already behind him, somewhere back in that vast obscurity beyond the city, where the dark fields of the republic rolled on under the night.  Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that's no matter- to−morrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther. . . . and one fine morning... So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past." Since these are the closing paragraphs of the e...

After finishing The Great Gatsby, I can safely say it is one of the greatest novels I have ever read, likely the greatest. Part of what makes it great is it's complicated conflict. You really can't pinpoint exactly one central conflict for the novel. Here we have a man struggling with himself, constantly asking the question "is this really who I am?" Sure, he has riches and parties, but inside he is a lonely person, searching for freedom in Daisy. However, a byproduct of living in West Egg is complicated interpersonal relationships, as seen when Gatsby is blamed for the hit-and-run killing of a young woman named Wilson (the "death car", as the newspapers called it, didn't stop; it came out of the gathering darkness, wavered tragically for a moment, and then disappeared around the next bend.") and subsequently killed for it (even though it was actually Daisy Buchanan, Gatsby's unattainable goal, who was driving the vehicle. So here, we have man...

In Chapter 6 of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, we learn the supposed backstory of the novel 's title character. Supposedly born James Gatz as a farm boy in North Dakota, Gatsby attended St. Olaf in Minnesota. However, he was tired of the work he had to undertake as a janitor, "dismayed at the ferocious indifference to the drums of his destiny". So, he went back to Lake Superior, where he had been wandering aimlessly before he went off to college. That is when he saw Dan Cody on his yacht, and Gatz met him in the water to warn about a torrential wind that was coming soon. Now known as Jay Gatsby, he accompanied Cody on trips to the West Indies and the Barbary Coast. When he was denied Cody's inheritance, Gatsby sought to reinvent himself. In this particular passage of the novel, it seems that Fitzgerald is commenting on the supposed vigor of the American dream, how anybody can reinvent themselves if they really want to. He also seems to be making a s...

Well, the short answer to this question is no. I would assume Fitzgerald did this on purpose, but Nick is judging Gatsby in particular, as well as other characters. Throughout the party scene, Nick makes comments about Gatsby, primarily good. I mean, does this not sound like judgement? He smiled understandingly - much more than understandingly. It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. So, yeah...not to mention that Caraway manages to judge Tom, Daisy, and the poor fellow who crashed his fashionable automobile in a fit of drunkenness. Nick is definitely going to not reserve his judgement throughout the novel. And, for better or for worse, the characters and the world of East and West Egg are going to be revealed through his eyes.

Recently in ELA, I had the opportunity to read A Midsummer Night's Dream by none other than William Shakespeare himself. The play is most often seen as a comedy, and I really have no problems with that statement. It's funny, whimsical, and it fits the other requirements that most comedies do. First off, there are two worlds: Athens, or the "normal world", and then the woods, where most of the action takes place (a comedy must have some sort of connection between these two places). A requirement of a comedy is that it has to end in a feast, a birth, a marriage, or some other sort of happy ending. A Midsummer Night's Dream differs from this slightly, where Puck causes a lot of trouble for the play's characters (albeit in a funny way), but promises the audience that he will restore amends, and besides, this was all a dream! I think A Midsummer Night's Dream fits the bill of 'comedy' pretty well. Between this and The Merchant of Venice, it definit...

I am actually very proud of my response project for ELA. My presentation, although completed in a short amount of time, was sufficient in proving its point and I don't think that it needed any more or any less to convey said point. I do think that I should have practiced maybe a little-bit more in order to polish the few run-on sentences and minor slip-ups that occurred, but in terms of the actual content of the presentation, I think I did great. In terms of the essay, I am a little opposite of Nathan Commissariat on this one. I actually think I did better on the presentation than the essay, and if I had to change anything about it, I would definitely make the transitions a little bit better and flesh out some of the awkward structure of it. I thought The Merchant of Venice was a fascinating read, and I can't wait for the Great Gatsby , where I will be doing a creative project.

On the surface,  The Merchant of Venice seems like any old Shakespearean play. The characters are dynamic and have depth put to them, the setting features ordinary people thrust into some unordinary situations, and sarcastic, witty humor abounds. But, upon looking deeper, it must be significant in some way if it has managed to spark debates over its perceived anti-Semitism and homosexual undertones. And it certainly is. I don't think Shakespeare necessarily intended for it to be any more significant than his other works, but I, of course, have no way of saying so for sure. Personally, I find it funny and cute in some instances but it does have a lot of things that bore me. Ultimately it comes down to the nature of Shylock and Antonio themselves that grabs me. However, if you were going to choose a Shakespeare play to read for fun, I would suggest Macbeth.

I have repeatedly discussed the impact that Shylock's character could have on a 21st century, post-Holocaust audience. And while I do think that many of his character traits are or could be seen as anti-Semitic, I really do believe that he deserves what he gets in the context of the play. You see, if we are going by the logic that the characters in the play are subject to the real and historical implications of the time period, then Shylock has been prejudiced outside of his scuffles with Antonio, and I could see where his behavior comes from. However, many Jews could restrain themselves even in the face of undeniable horrific hate. Shylock is not a bad guy because he's a Jew: he's just a bad guy. He even makes a case for himself that Jews inherently are not so different from Christians. So yes, Shylock deserves it for being uncaring about his daughter and threatening to kill a man. I personally believe that Elizabethan audiences would probably have thought it funny tha...

The Merchant of Venice has garnered a lot of criticism over the years for its blatant portrayal of the Jewish characters as antagonistic money-hungry slobs. In fact, it was a staple of Nazi Germany literature. However, is it possible that we have all been internalizing it wrong? In Act 3, Scene 1, Shylock (the Jewish antagonist of the story) delivers quite a heartwarming speech to Salarino: "To bait fish withal: if it will feed nothing else, it will feed my revenge. He hath disgraced me, and hindered me half a million; laughed at my losses, mocked at my gains, scorned my nation, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine enemies; and what's his reason? I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? Fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not blee...

Ironically enough, to he character with the most facets in "The Merchant of Venice" seems to be Shylock. Like we discussed in class, he has every right to be distrustful and spiteful toward Antonio. After all, he was kicked, spat at, and called a curn (dog). But because he is Jewish, he is portrayed with the many same stereotypes that that the Anglo-British forced down upon them. However, in spite of all the hate thrown at him, some would say that Shakespeare never intended for Jews to receive husband kind of hate, and that he never was an anti-Semite. In one particular quote, Shylock says: " and what's his reason? I am a Jew. Hath not   a Jew eyes? hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions,  senses, affections, passions? Fed with the  same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to  the same diseases, healed by the same means..." In this way, it seems that the audience is supposed to take pity to Shylock. Because of this piece of dialogue ...