1984 by George Orwell

            1984 by George Orwell is entertaining and excellently written both in terms of political ideas and plot construction. It does have a few flaws, however. The ending is unsatisfactory and makes quite a tragedy (as far as democratic Americans are concerned). Questions are left unanswered. How could Winston become brainwashed? He so desperately wanted truth to stand. His failure can be attributed to a lack of confidence in his own ability to reason so that his whole intellect broke down in the face of pain, becoming a wasteland just like most of the minds in Oceania. This makes me wonder whether or not I could withstand. I want to say that I could, but under such trauma it is difficult to say. Although Orwell could be using the book make democratic countries thankful for their situation, he is most likely warning us about where our society could end up. To that end, he makes a convincing but dubious argument. The tyrannical control of people’s entire lives and most devastatingly, the complete control of truth appeals primarily to ethos and pathos because his society is illogical. In practice, people do not enjoy power as much as wealth and glory. Power is a means to an end. Rulers throughout the ages have craved power so that they could be respected, worshiped, and paid by their subjects. They would never limit themselves just to get the power. Orwell’s society may seem impregnable, but it could not arise without falling apart due to the greed of men. It is difficult enough for people to share things in a society with ownership, could the members of the Inner Party really strip themselves of all of their wealth and leave no trace of themselves when they die? Orwell’s society would have collapsed before it began. Before the society could become completely oppressive, people would have objected severely to the destruction of truth.

Reflections on the Party in 1984 by George Orwell after Reading Chapter 9

            In 1984 by George Orwell, Winston gets a copy of the Book and begins to read it in his hideout in the upper room of Mr. Charrington’s shop. The Book mostly confirmed suspicions that I already had about the way Oceania and the rest of the world worked. For instance, the Party presumably does actually send rocket bombs onto its own civilians to help keep their patriotic vehemence fired up against the enemy among other reasons. I felt like Winston, that it was nice to have a book that agreed with you even though it held very little new information. Nevertheless, I found it interesting that the wars exist to destroy materials so that people do not become too wealthy in their industriousness because wealth leads to insurrection. I already thought that the war probably existed only for the purpose of keeping the Party in power, but I had not linked the wealth part. I had also pictured a slightly more personal Inner Party that kept the Outer Party and the Proles in check not just to keep themselves in power, but also for their own pleasure, freedom, and leisure. On the contrary, the Inner Party follows much of the same frugality and doublethink. The reason the Party exists, from their point of view, is simply to acquire pure power. They are willing to sacrifice anything and everything permanently to get it. In a sense, every good Party member, no matter what class abolishes their personality. I find it hard to believe this case for pure power. People always worship something, whether it is God, a person, or an object. Orwell confuses a self-worship leading to a hunger for power with a pure desire for power. The root is worship, not power, so a power centered society should not be possible. I am missing a piece, however, because this chapter strengthened the incredibility and impenetrability of the Party, so I need to figure out how this society should collapse or why it never could come to exist in the first place.

Newspeak Summary of Hamlet and King Lear

Hamlet unchoosing foolish delay kill uncle stop King Lear property unjoin stop only unbestowed daughter faithful stop rectify too late unsurvive

"My Last Duchess" by Robert Browning

            “My Last Duchess” by Robert Browning. The narrator has a sarcastic tone throughout. From the very beginning when he says, “I call that piece a wonder, now,” his treatment of the painting of his wife is condescending and jocular. It is ironic that he behaves this way because we would expect the narrator, presumably a duke, to have an air of respect, sadness, or at least melancholy when talking about his deceased wife. The duke comments that “ ‘twas not her husband’s presence only, called that spot of joy into the Duchess’ cheek.” Literally, this indicates that his wife was a cheery, joyful woman, but in the duke’s sarcastic manner, this is also an understatement of perhaps a lack of faithfulness on her part—as to the severity, it is difficult to tell. He again understates her wide selection of things to praise by saying that she had “a heart--how shall I say?—too soon made glad.” What he really believes is that she did not value him highly enough. He goes on to discuss all of the trifling things that caused her to smile. The problem is not so much her absence of love for her husband but all of the other things that make it too ordinary. The most sarcastic part of the whole poem is lines 31-35. The duchess’s thanks to men is good, but she somehow thanks them as if the duke’s 900 year old name is of equal importance. In other words, she hardly values her marriage by which she acquired his prestigious name. He understates his obvious annoyance by commenting consecutively that he would never stoop to blame the (not so small) trifling. Instead of stooping with encouragement, he commanded her to change her behavior and she no longer smiles at anything. The end of the poem makes it sound like he just treats the duchess as a prize of his “collection” of artifacts because he ironically simply proceeds to show off a bronze statue of Neptune.

1984 by George Orwell: Initial Impressions of Julia

In 1984, George Orwell brings a mysterious character to light and informs the reader that her name is Julia. Before she passes off the note to Winston, I agreed with much of his anger against her. Although Winston’s feelings were outright villainous, anyone who turns others in to the Thought Police is by definition a “bad guy.” I was almost as stunned as Winston when she passed him off the note saying “I love you.” Winston had not even considered that possibility for what the note could say. Although Winston and Julia live in an oppressive society, I cannot approve their behavior. She may be providing a release for Winston’s and her own pent up psyche, but their licentious behavior is not acceptable. There is also something horrid about the fact that Julia has had many indiscriminate relationships with people up to age sixty. She is very selfish as demonstrated by her reaction to Winston’s failure to push his wife off the cliff. Anyone who hinders her freedom of expression, not just the Party, deserves to be destroyed.

For the first part of their relationship, she struck me as a cunning mastermind who worked tirelessly to appear supportive of the government while at the same time plotted against it. Even though nothing has been mentioned about an actual attempt to overthrow the government, Julia is an ardent rebel. Yet her rebellion is a personal one. Her rebellion is shown through her carefree attitude in her treasured places of escape and her willingness to trash talk the Party and its ways. She finds an acute joy in being exactly the sort of person the party does not want people to be. Unlike Winston, she has no belief in the possibility of actually overthrowing the government, but at the same time is far more bold than Winston in private insurrection. She cares primarily about freedom of emotion and does not even understand political freedom. After seeing her careful instructions for directions and her well orchestrated plans of meeting, her apolitical mindset seems contrary to her carefully planned behavior. I wonder if Winston’s interaction with Julia will give him the exposure to the true public mindset and the opportunity to express his views that he needs in order to begin a large scale rebellion.

1984 Predictions After Reading Eight Chapters

            After the first eight chapters of 1984, it is difficult to make predictions about what will happen next because the book seems to be primarily concerned with the explication of the world in which Winston lives and not with actual events. Aside from the existence of Winston, Big Brother’s world seems entirely devoid of hope and Winston himself is merely his pawn, so the future does not look bright. I predict that Winston will get vaporized by the Thought Police, but I do not think that his diary will be his downfall. Although writing a diary is a radical move of rebellion in that society of oppression, it would not make a good book for Winston to die because he wrote a diary. He must commit some much greater crime first. The fact that Winston so seriously wants to get information from the old man in the bar and wants to live in the quaint room of the antique shop with no surveillance show that he is bursting at the seams. He cannot stand the suppression and he considers the ability of the proles to provide the manpower for the rebellion. Unfortunately, Winston has been brainwashed by the Party to believe that “Until [the Proles] become conscious they will never rebel, and until after they have rebelled they cannot become conscious.” In this statement, the circular reasoning implies that the Proles can never rebel, but at some point Winston will realize that he is intelligent enough to bring them back to consciousness. After he makes them rise, he will succeed in making some advances against the Party before being vaporized. It is difficult to tell at this point, but given how extensively the Party uses doublethink, if Winston or some other mastermind set up serious opposition, the Party is probably not actually as hard to destroy as it seems.

Reflection on Privacy Today and in "1984" by George Orwell

            The book 1984 by George Orwell envisions a dark picture of suppression and despotic control. The oppression in this book is so complete that I practically leapt for joy when I finished reading the section and remembered the real world again. The telescreen is the most evident indicator of the invasion of privacy that exists in this novel. It allows the Thought Police to view and hear almost everything going on everywhere. The only freedom is the few square feet that the telescreen cannot see—if you can call that freedom. Almost as bad, the telescreen plays “radio” in the form of propaganda, news, and music 24/7 without an off button. Until reading this book, I never understood how horrible such a society could be. Not that I was not already adamantly opposed to it, but that I now understand its vile nature more fully. The way in which children are used against their parents by the children’s participation in youth programs for indoctrination is quite horrendous. An important part of personal privacy is the right to parent  your own children, and, although the Big Brother would probably deny it, children in that society are really just spies and robots to be programmed according to the government’s wishes. Although such extreme conditions are nowhere near, privacy is an important issue currently. People are concerned that their computers are watching them, that the government should not tell them what to do with unborn children, or that they may be watched by government agencies. In America, these infringements on privacy are worried about too much. Infringements on privacy have been made primarily for the safety of our country’s citizens. As long as the people who are in control can be voted out of office, despotic government observation can be removed. The way it sits currently, the people who are doing nothing wrong have nothing to fear. People who want to do evil tend to complain the most, but the right to privacy does not give people the permission to do evil when others cannot see it. For instance, even though parents should have the right to teach their own children, that does not give them the right to murder their child in an abortion.

"Up-Hill" By Christina Rossetti

            “Up-Hill” by Christina Rossetti has a rhyming pattern of ABAB in each stanza. This helps to contrast the different lines of the two speakers. One speaker generally has the longer lines and the other has the remaining lines. The “A” speaker in the rhyming pattern is a traveler along some journey and the other speaker is someone with a lot of wisdom about the journey. The journey described is most likely intended to be specifically the journey of life. In this case, the poem should be described as an allegory not only because of its definiteness of meaning, but also because it consists of a series of connected symbolic constructions that all relate to one another and to the story of life to which they are being compared. The story-like nature of the poem indicates an allegory. The absence of quotation marks around each line to distinguish the speakers depersonalizes them and makes them seem more representative than specific. The fact that the road “[winds] up-hill all the way” and “[takes] the whole long day” suggests something beyond the literal journey. The unrealistic nature of the last line which indicates that there are “beds for all who come” also clues to the deeper meaning. The road is up-hill the whole way because life is hard and the traveler will need comfort after the strain. More specifically, the journey in this poem is the journey of a Christian. This is indicated by the allusions in the final two stanzas. Jesus tells everyone to knock and the door to heaven shall be opened. On a similar note, in heaven, there is mention of there being ample room for everyone who comes. The traveler also worries that he may miss the inn, but is assured that that cannot happen. The phrase “of labor you shall find the sum” assures the traveler that there will be reward at the end of life for those who make it to the inn. Subtly, there is an implication that all that is required to get into the inn representing Heaven is to know it exists and seek to find it. The voice with all of the answers sounds strikingly as though it is meant to represent Jesus.

"Mind" by Richard Wilbur

            “Mind” by Richard Wilbur is a poem by Richard Wilbur. It contains an extended simile between the mind and a bat in a cave. This is the type of simile in which both the literal and figurative terms are named. This is a cleverly employed simile first of all because the figurative side of the simile is so rare. When bats “weave and flitter, dip and soar in perfect courses through the blackest air” (7-8), Wilbur suggests the ability of the mind to know the valid courses of reasoning and to follow paths of logic in the shapeless and tactless void that is consciousness. The diction and especially the word “soar” affects the feeling that the mind moves freely and is not necessarily governed by reason. At the same time, the mind cannot wander anywhere it pleases because it is hemmed in by “[walls] of stone.” These walls of stone could be considered the logical boundaries, points from which no further reasoning can be made, the limits of sanity, or the scope of thinking possible with a particular mind’s IQ. Curiously, Wilbur comments in his poem about the nature of the similar contained therein. After concluding that his selection is “precisely” (10) accurate, he concedes that the cave is not immutable. Cannot a mind expand its horizons? Wilbur not surprisingly includes the idea of mental expansion, but, astoundingly, he attributes it to a “graceful error” (12) in the “happiest intellection” (11).  Since intellection is the process of understanding when separated from imagination, he believes that growth of the mind comes when the brain happily understands something by making an error in reasoning. Although I do not conclusively rebut his claim, I also think that mental growth comes just as well through the imagination. Wilbur personifies the mind throughout this poem. One may argue that a mind refers to a person by synecdoche and thus invalidates personification, but nonetheless, the effect of viewing the mind as an autonomous personality gives a powerful impression.

King Lear Final Words

In the last scene of King Lear, most of the characters meet their doom, but in their last words they each face death differently. As soon as Regan makes her plans for marriage to Edmund known, she submits everything to her supposed husband to be. “General take thou my soldiers, prisoners, patrimony; dispose of them, of me; the walls are thine. Witness the world that I create thee here My lord and master” (V.III.85-89). After this, Regan repeats the same idea again and complains of her sickness and then dies. Right up to her last few lines we see her natural submission to others. Earlier in the play that was Goneril, but near her end it becomes Edmund. Goneril’s last words are “ask me not what I know” (V.III.194). She wishes to control everything in her life. She does not want to admit her faults, but wants to keep them to herself. She is stubbornly unrepentant and does forces her sister to follow her by poisoning her. If she cannot have her way in a positive manner, she would rather destroy herself and others than submit. Edmund is far different. In this final scene, he has a rapid transformation from one of the worst characters to a respectable person trying to make amends for his faults. He is extremely open and repentant when he says, “What you have charged me with, that have I done, and more, much more” (V.III.196-198). At the end of his life he even broadly admits to faults of which other are clueless. Edmund also spends his last words in lines 302 to 305 to try to save Lear and Cordelia. Rather than a glorious final phrase before death, he commits himself to others benefit for a change. Lear spends his last words lamenting over the death of Cordelia and wondering at her “lips.” This seems rather appropriate because her truthful lips were the most precious part of her. In his last moments Lear has truly realized that Cordelia should have been the prime object of his blessing.

Relationship of King Lear to Nature and Comparison with Myself

King Lear does not have a pleasant relationship with nature. Early on in the play when he becomes angry at his daughter Cordelia for expressing no love for him, he swears “by the sacred radiance of sun, the mysteries of Hecate and the night; By all the operation of the orbs From whom we do exist and cease to be” (1.1.117-119). Later on, when Lear rages about the supposed ingratitude of his daughter that causes her to expel some of his 100 knight followers, he says, “Hear, Nature, hear! Suspend thy purpose if thou didst intend to make this creature fruitful” (1.4.277-279). In both of these cases, King Lear invokes Nature as the agent of his deadly purposes. His view of Nature in this way shows his and his culture’s pantheism, but it also indicates that he views his own position highly. He calls on Nature not with an attitude of submission to the “gods” but with an order to bring in the troops. Lear’s relationship with Nature when he is out in the brutal storm is more puzzling. He summons Nature to show its worst saying, “blow, winds, and crack you cheeks! Rage! Blow!” (3.2.1) that it might destroy “ungrateful man!” (3.2.9). He then indicates that he is mad at Nature that she would join his “pernicious daughters” (3.2.22) against his “poor, infirm, weak, and despised” (3.2.20) self. In all of his discourse with Nature, he is almost always expressing anger, calling down curses, or swearing. I am very different from King Lear. Not only do I recognize that nature should be lowercase because it is inanimate, but I also view it much more positively because it is God’s creation. Even though nature was destroyed by the Fall, causing destruction, natural disasters, etc., it still has many facets of its former beauty and will some day be redeemed. Nature is something to enjoy and at which to marvel, giving glory to God who made it.

"Gathering Leaves" by Robert Frost

In the poem “Gathering Leaves,” Robert Frost emphasizes the futility and emptiness of the task. He starts off the poem by remarking how useless spades and spoons are for picking up leaves. He then remarks how light are the leaves, even in vast quantities and he continues this idea in the second to last stanza. In the second stanza, the description that he “[makes] a great noise…like rabbit and deer running away” suggests that he does not particularly want to rake the leaves and that the leaves seem to try to run away from him. Also the word choice indicates that all of the “great noise” has no purpose. In the third stanza, the narrator tries to embrace the leaves probably to carry them to the shed, but the leaves “[flow] into his face” as if they are mocking him. The parallelism of “load” and “again” in the fourth stanza is correlated well with the repeated process of carrying leaves to the shed. At the end of the stanza, Frost asks himself whether he has achieved anything to which the answer is presumably “nothing” even without the lines following. Frost wryly calms himself by rather unconvincingly saying that “a crop is a crop” no matter how useless. Although the final rhetorical question can be taken just as wearily as the rest of the poem because the leaves seem to just keep cascading down, the positive connotation of “harvest” raises the tone slightly. Additionally, if it were not leaves, an endless harvest such as this would be a great blessing. The futility of this poem recalls one of King Lear’s problems. Since he has given away most of his possessions and power, the King becomes extremely frustrated and distraught that he can no longer control who waits on him and where he finds shelter. Just like Frost, he comes to fret that he has harvested a useless crop, which, in his case, is his thankless daughters.

King Lear Act I Comparison of Cordelia, Goneril, and Regan

            Goneril and Regan are passionate in their pouring out of praises to their father as exemplified by such phrases as Goneril’s expression that her love is “a love that makes breath poor, and speech unable” (1.1.2). Regan has a similar passion, but she speaks about how her love his similar to that of her sister’s except that she is “alone felicitate” (1.1.79) in love for her father. In contrast, Cordelia favors reason. She picks out the troubling inconsistency that her sisters’ claim to love their father completely and only despite their marriages. Kent rightly analyzes that Cordelia should not be punished for her honesty. Especially in the light of what Cordelia pointed out, what the other daughters said was really just a lot of flowery language. While her sisters are speaking, Cordelia worries what to say as she squirms under the dilemma between light and heat. Cordelia has a desire for independence or at least a pragmatic attitude toward her father’s banishment. Normally, a woman would not say that she could not love someone in front of an audience even after he has already rejected his desire for her. She also tells her sisters subtly that, in the end, her honesty is better by saying “time shall unfold what plighted cunning hides, who covers faults, at last with shame derides” (1.1.309-310). Despite her criticism, her last words to her sisters before leaving are “Well may you prosper!” (1.1.311). She tries to tell the truth in love although she tends to fail on the second part, while her sisters tend to fail in the first part. Regan advises Cordelia to try to please France and that she has been unwisely disobedient, so the words of wisdom are not Cordelia’s alone. Just as Regan follows and nearly copies Goneril’s expression of love, Goneril leads her sister throughout their discussions throughout the first act. Goneril has a personality that favors leadership. Goneril and Regan are motivated by a desire to be approved and to fit in while Cordelia wants to be right.

Explication of "Those WInter Sundays" by Robert Hayden

The poem “Those Winter Sundays” by Robert Hayden starts by describing the narrator’s father’s tough morning tasks on Sunday and presumably other days as well based on the beginning phrase “Sundays too.” The imagery of blueblack cold suggest a level of frigidity beyond the ordinary and a nuanced way of evicting a dislike for the cold.  The cold is being described in a similar way to a bruise, which helps with the negative connotation. Also, the poem refers to the father’s “crack hands that ached.” The end of that line ends with a dismal statement of the ingratitude toward the father’s sacrifice that, as is seen in the second stanza, enables the others to get up in a warm house. Hayden describes the cold as being heard “splintering” and “breaking.” This is a very unusual mode of imagery in which something tactile has been transmogrified to be auditory. It does help the reader imagine that the house is breaking free and brings to mind the idea that the house is full of ice (though it is not literally full of ice). In the last stanza, we see the relationship between the narrator and his father: that the child spoke “indifferently” and acted ungratefully while the father chased away the cold and polished his son’s shoes. Looking back, the child realizes how amazing is what his father used to do for him. The final statement sums up the unusual characterization of love presented throughout the poem. It presents love as having “austere and lonely offices.” Normally, love is attributed to warmth, joy, and comfort, but here it involves toil. Hayden shows with all of the imagery and discussion of cold that real love is not just shown by sensation but also by self-sacrificing work. The depth of this kind of love is also shown by the father’s continuation of his office despite his son’s cold attitude toward his service.

Ranking of Characters in Hamlet Based on Morality

The characters in Hamlet vary greatly in their moral character. At the bottom of the ladder, King Claudius wallows in his evil. He kills his brother treacherously and steals his wife. Thus he breaks four of the ten commandments in one fell swoop: murder, adultery, coveting, and stealing. He knows that for God to “Forgive [him his] foul murder? That cannot be, since [he] [is] still possessed of those effects for which [he] did the murder” (Shakespeare 3.3.56-58). He must turn himself in if he is truly repentant and he is unwilling to do that, so he removes the idea of repentance from his mind. Queen Gertrude comes next on this ladder of wickedness. Although it seems at first that she is a hapless victim of King Claudius and has had no part in his great crime, Hamlet’s tirade evokes a guilt that leads her to see “into [her] very soul,/ And there [she sees] such black and grained spots/ As will not leave their tinct” (Shakespeare 3.4.100-102). This suggests something more than marrying her husband’s brother, which, despite Hamlet’s rage, is not wrong. Hamlet comes next on this ladder because he conducts his revenge inappropriately. He wants to kill Claudius at the worst time possible without anyone knowing, just like his father was killed, so that Claudius will go to hell. This is the type of vengeance that can easily spiral out of control and leave a monarchy reeling in disorder. Because Hamlet struggles with indecision, he because reckless in his efforts to overcome his inaction and confuses motion with progress. He rashly kills Polonius in an inappropriate fit of rage. Laertes seeks vengeance in a slightly more honest way by confronting King Claudius with the common people at his back to find out what really happened. Unfortunately, he then conspires treacherously to kill Hamlet. Unlike Hamlet, he does not attempt to send anybody to hell at least. Ophelia and Polonius are a distant first and second compared to the rest of these. They conspire to kill nobody, but simply provide assistance and mourn over the unfortunate occurrences of which they must be a part. Each of them do have their faults, however, as Ophelia’s death is suspiciously suicidal and Polonius is somewhat of a hypocrite, but neither of these are within the same order of magnitude of wickedness as the other characters.

Explication of "Naming of Parts" by Henry Reed

The poem “Naming of Parts” by Henry Reed presents an interesting parallel between the parts of a gun and nature. Each paragraph begins with a rather mundane description of some general component of a gun and finishes with a more romantic piece of nature that is cleverly related by multi-dimensional wording. In the second stanza, the concept of a “sling swivel” traverses from a gun component to a sling for a broken arm (9). Just as the safety catch is not to be touched with a finger, blossoms do not allow tactile observing. The word breech in line 20 could denote the gun component, but it could also refer to a breach in enemy lines through which troops attack as indicated by the “early bees” “assaulting.” The poem is incredibly enigmatic, but there seems to be a general drift of the course of a battle throughout the poem. First, there is preparation through training and learning to use the gun in the first three stanzas, then it is “easy” to “[ease] the spring” or let the gun fire, and finally, the last line seems to be a gruesome double denotation between the naming of gun components parallel to earlier and the surveying of the battle field for who died. In the first paragraph, the Japonica in the “neighboring gardens” makes me think of blood still fresh from recent battles because it is a bright red flower. In the fourth stanza, the phrase “easing the spring” can refer to releasing a physical spring and to the beginning of the season of spring. The recurring phrase, “which in our case we have not got” reflects that the soldiers do not have the necessary parts of their guns, but there must be some deeper meaning to that. The third stanza refers to the safety-catch always being released, which suggests that was is not safe. The repeated transition between the mundane and the ethereal pictures of nature suggests that while the gruesome consequences of war are carried out, peaceful enjoyment could be had instead.

Discussion about a Thinker vs. a Doer

 Although I would probably consider myself more of a thinker than a doer, the distinction between these two is not clear so in some ways I am a portion of both. I am not usually very impulsive and preferred to plan each step before I take it. For example, if someone asks me to come to their club after school, I am unlikely to say yes immediately but will more likely say "possibly" or "probably". I usually need at least twenty seconds to a minute to decide whether I actually want to go, whether it is beneficial to go, or whether I even can go based on current priorities. Also, when planning out my schedule for each coming year, it often takes me a long time to really decide what I want to do. In fact, I spend almost all of my time thinking or arguing in my head with actual dialogue. The reason I cannot entirely be called a thinker, and in fact nobody really can, is that eventually, thought leads to action. While it is possible for someone to spend most of his life in indecision, or to go from one rash decision to the other, these are rare extremes. Most people fall somewhere in the middle. Whenever I am thinking about school subjects or any topics of interest, I more greatly appreciate tangible results that come through "doing" something rather than just abstraction. The key in this balance as in many similar comparisons is to find the proper balance. To use Shakespeare as an example, Hamlet spends several days considering what to do about the message he has heard from the ghost of his father. Although Hamlet's father does go to great lengths to prevent his son from endless waffling, Hamlet demonstrates that at least when he has some prompting he can stimulate himself to action in a few days. When it comes to such a momentous decision, this is completely reasonable. In fact, meanwhile, Hamlet has been gathering more information to help him in his decision. This style of calculated action has much more merit then a whimsical lifestyle. As long as one can make up one's mind within a span of time comparable to the extent of the issue, and, just as importantly,adhere to it, any necessary delays will have been worth their time.

"The Clod and the Pebble" by William Blake

“The Clod and the Pebble” is a curious poem written by William Blake. It starts out with a description of love in the way that one would normally expect. It describes love as this selfless being who “seeketh not Itself to please.” Because “for another gives its ease,” Love “builds a Heaven in Hell’s despair.” Basically, love permanently tips the balance in favor of life on Hamlet’s “to be or not to be” scale, which for Hamlet is dangerously tipped toward death. After a puzzling median set apart from the first and last stanzas, the image of Love is repeated with meticulous parallelism by a dissident pebble. The antiparallel third stanza replaces seeking “not Itself” for pleasure with “only Self,” switches “nor for itself hath any care” for “to bind another to its delight.” In the final line, this second image of Love causes Hell in the midst of Heaven. We learn that the “Clod of Clay” believes the former noble image of love while a “Pebble of the brook” believes the latter version. The significance of the clay may be that “trodden” by cattle probably along a road, it lays down its life into the dust for the comfort of the feet of others. The pebble, however, living in the beautiful comfort of his brook sees the clay’s position as undesirable and, given the opportunity, would try to “love” others by making them serve him. This analogy can be drawn so that the clay intersects the position of a common peasant with “true love” and the pebble the position of a noble with “false love.” A better explanation for the choice of pebble and clay may in fact be a reference to the Biblical and literary idea of having either a heart of clay that can be molded to Christ’s purposes and be merciful as compared to the heart of stone. In does indeed seem reasonable that the heart of soft moldable clay would have this first picture of “true love” while the hard and cold pebble in a stream would have a steely image of love as one of the tools of manipulation and evil. Since there is no explanation as to what is really love, we are left to wonder whether love really is as good as we make it out to be. Since most people will come to the conclusion that love must truly be the first stanza, the central purpose of the poem is to enhance the true meaning of love to the reader. The poem does this well by making us revile the latter false picture. Many readers will cling to the first image as I did by rereading it to remove the bad taste left in their mouth when they get to the end. Another curious feature of this poem is that the positive picture of love is framed by somewhat negative terms: “care, Hell’s despair.” The negative picture of love has positive words: “delight,” “Joys,” “Heaven.” This forces the reader to wonder why the first image of love is better? The author’s emphasis of the supernatural by ending each picture of love with references to “Heaven” and “Hell” signifies that without a spiritual explanation, there is no valid reason for us to settle on the first image of love.

Debate Modelled after "To Be or not To Be" Speech

To drive or to fly—that is the question: whether ‘tis better to undertake the course of more destinations or to take to the skies for the greater speed and to explore the far corners of the earth with ease. Though one may starve to purchase the thrill, yet the turbofan of a plane is awful in its power and grace that can bring its passengers wherever it pleases a dozen times faster than can its sister the combustion engine—ay, there is the rub, for in that blissful locomotion what obstacles bestrewn upon the earth threaten for a collision. Whether towers made by man or those by nature, great peril seems to envelope the flying machine—floating on air! Should it not fall? Both the terror that cannot be controlled and the terror that is controlling diminish the greatness of the flying beast. In the face of all of these does not the land vehicle with four wheels firmly embracing the solid ground prove much nobler in the mind? By no means. Gargling gas, the car grinds along the grade with no glorious speed. It stops at most every other object on the face of the earth: pedestrians, cars, lights, stop signs, lines of all shapes and sizes, medians, houses, trees. All of these impede and threaten without a moment’s reprieve with the imperative of incessant alert when on the mechanical bird of the sky, the time can be placed as one sees fit. But the gravity in the subject rests primarily in the three score greater danger per furlong of driving. What a fool is man, however, that he doth often prefer the former. Jurisdiction is the real rub, for when one sits on a plane in comparative safety, he frets that there may be a something bad coming at any moment which he cannot survey, but when in his car, he sees trouble and avoids it most incessantly. All the while he is in the car, he feels safety in his own power. Thus man prefers the dangers he can see to those invisible.

Hamlet 1.4-1.5

After Hamlet finishes his interview with the ghost of his father, his friends Horatio and Marcellus show up. At first they want Hamlet to tell them what happened, but Hamlet understands that they already know what happened, so he proceeds to force them to swear oaths by their swords that they will not tell. It is curious how much time and language Hamlet spends trying to get them to swear that they will keep what they have heard to themselves. He treats his friends like children when he charges them not to say “Well, well, we know,” “We could an if we would,” “if we list to speak,” or “There be an if they might.” The level of detail that he tells his friends to follow here is almost comical, but the tone of the moment with the Ghost constantly interjecting from the ether is ominously urgent. The Ghost of King Hamlet hints that he himself is not as blameless as our first impression from the first three scenes may have indicated (1.4.15-26). Although he does not specify what he has done, the Ghost tells the he is “doomed for a certain term to walk the night and for the day confined to fast in fires.” It is possible that King Hamlet wishes to make his charge against King Claudius more credible by the admission of his own faults, but the self-incrimination seems to be more of a gasp indicating the misery he is in and that he desperately needs to confide in someone. Hamlet is very confident that he must deal out revenge in his parting words to his father. It is true that it would be very difficult for him to tell a ghost who is none other than his father that he will not follow his wish to his face. Hamlet’s conviction may soften with time. When the Ghost says “cut off, even in the blossoms of my sin,” it seems to indicate that King Hamlet regrets not being able to confess or forgive before he died. The purgatory that this has caused him may actually have led him to need a scapegoat for his misery. The description of how he died, by poisoning, is essentially the same as might be dealt by a snake. The fact that the Ghost forbids Hamlet from touching Queen Gertrude despite her promiscuity in his eyes suggests that he still loves her or else he loves Hamlet too much to make him injure his own mother.

The poem “Constantly risking absurdity” by Lawrence Ferlinghetti compares a poet to an acrobat performing high in the air, which could probably be effectively classified as a trapeze artist. The originality of this connection makes it very meaningful. I must say that I have never compared a poet to a trapeze artist before. Ferlinghetti makes this connection to indicate the perilousness of the poet’s job in contrast ironically to the general view that the poet’s life is a calm, serene, and relaxed life. The shape of the poem relates directly to the first line that the poet is “constantly risking absurdity and death whenever he performs above the heads of his audience.” The lines of this poem appear in all manner of random places on the page. The poet “climbs on rime to a high wire of his own making.” In order to do his job effectively, a poet must create a sensational experience in the poem by bringing out extraordinary detail and unusual insight, but if he goes too deep or too far with his acumen, he will fall off of the rope and lose the “eyebeams” of a “sea of faces.” In other words, both the acrobat and the author risk losing the respect of their audience, which as shown by the phrase “balancing on eyebeams” is all that supports their professions. Ferlinghetti continues expressing the difficulty of creating meaningful experiences by pointing out that neither the poet nor the trapeze artist can afford to miss the “taut truth.” This phrase ingeniously uses two definitions of the word “taut”, one to indicate that the rope under an acrobat must be tight to support him, and another to refer to the importance of economy in structure and detail in poetry. The poet also expresses the idea that although the poet strives to climb up to “Beauty,” he “may or not” be able to catch her elusive form. This author also uses the word “gravity” to indicate both the impending plunge of “Beauty” and also the weighty significance of her move. The whole poem is essentially an epic metaphor with a tone that suggests a glorious and daring adventure.  The term “charleychaplin” alludes to the old character by that name for the purpose of indicating that this high and mighty task of the “super realist” poet does not suggest that the poet is extraordinary, but that he is an enterprising risk-taker.

Initial Impressions of Hamlet Characters 1.1-1.3

King Claudius seems to act mostly reasonably and somewhat like a father to Hamlet. He justifies his marriage to Queen Gertrude by its importance to the stability of the state and that others commended his action. He also reproves Prince Hamlet for the excessive sorrow by noting not only the similar plight of many others but also his near succession to the throne. The King wants Hamlet to treat him as a father. Queen Gertrude just seems to go along with her new husband, Claudius, and does not have a strong personality of her own yet. Prince Hamlet is very submissive in voice, but he despises the haste with which his mother married King Claudius. For this, he blames first and foremost his mother and shows no suspicion of foul play by the King. I must agree with King Claudius that Prince Hamlet is lacking judgement and manliness in his suffering after two months. Two months is too long for immobilizing sorrow. The sorrow may never go away, but it is simply foolish to suffer such extreme grief for more than a week or two. Besides, if Hamlet's adherence to the statutes of Scripture indicates that he and his father believed in the saving work of Christ, Hamlet should remember that his father is in a better place. As much as Hamlet would like to leave the world immediately, he ought to press forward toward the work that he is called to do on earth. The kingdom will eventually need his leadership. Nevertheless, he at least has the fortitude to listen to reason and forsake suicide. Even though King Claudius seems mostly sincere, he does seem mildly stilted in his attitude toward Hamlet and the deceased King Hamlet. The King is most certainly taking his own advice that the time is passed for extraordinary grief, but I would expect more emotion from the new King and Queen regarding the matter. In fact, Claudius' behavior seems somewhat awry as a whole probably only as a result of his lack of emotion.

Goals for Senior Year

1. Finish all college applications by the end of Thanksgiving Break. With nine applications to complete and fourteen weeks to complete them, this means that I must finish each application in approximately one and a half weeks.
2. Complete both MIT Open CourseWare classes that I am working on. 18.03, Differential Equations, needs to be completed by the end of the semester during D block and 18.02, Multivariable Calculus, which is already more than half way done, needs to be completed by the end of the year during available B blocks.
3. Achieve a senior year GPA of 4.8 by getting the following minimum class grades: AP Biology, A+; AP Statistics, A+; Honors Independent Study Math, A; AP Music Theory, A+; AP English Literature, A-. These should be attainable based on my transcript and initial previews of the class. More important than just the grades, however, in order to complete this goal, I must also make the effort to understand the material to such a degree that both my teachers and I feel that the grades were deserved.
4. Write two new iOS Applications. One will be the Lego Adventure board game assistant that I am currently working on and the other will probably be a rocket video game based on real physics and chemistry unlike many games on the market. In order to accomplish this goal, two to four hours must be spent each Saturday on the games. Preferably, I concentrate on one application at a time and release one by New Year's Day and the other before graduation.
5. Practice piano 12 hours per week. This divides up to 1.5 hours per weekday, 3 hours per Saturday and 1.5 hours per Sunday. Inevitably, days will be missed, but the important goal is not to skip more than one day at a time and to actually make sure that I am accomplishing something during each practice session. As a rule of thumb, each page should take 2 hours to learn and 1 hour to memorize.
6. Practice horn 7 hours per week. This divides up to 0.75 hours per weekday, 1.5 hours per Saturday and 0.75 hours per Sunday.
7. Run the 400m in less than 50 seconds and the 100m in less than 11 seconds. The way to accomplish this is to only rest one day per week, do burners at least twice a week, but preferably thrice, and make sure that in all workouts, I am never satisfied with going easy. Another important factor in achieving this goal is to get enough sleep (8 hours on a weekly average).
8. Earn a private pilot license. This goal is near the bottom because it is, out of all of these, the most far fetched. The most opportune time to do the training necessary for this license is in between the last day of school and the first summer activities. Two to three hours per day at one of the flight schools at Hanscom Field, which is only 23 minutes away, is enough to receive the license. The primary factor in whether or not I will be able to achieve this goal is whether or not I earn enough money through iOS app sales and other jobs/gifts.
9. Glorify God in everything I do and especially so in pursuit of these goals. This will be greatly helped by reading the Bible every day and I would like to finish reading through the Bible by the end of the school year.