mirzers’s Blog

“Now why should that man have fainted? But he did, and right across my path by the wall, so that I had to creep over him every time!”

The fainting of her husband is both a victory and loss for her. It is a victory because her husband finally accepts that she is unwell. She is creeping around the room with some rope, muttering the same words, and saying that she escaped from the yellow wallpaper and that no matter how hard he tried, he could not get her back inside so she could be the wife she once was. The room’s messiness is like her mind: things are torn and removed, while some ideas are bolted down like the furniture. This scene is also a loss to her because she has completely lost her original self and won’t ever go back to the way she used to be. She is set on this idea that no matter how hard anyone tries, no one can get her back to she was before.

1129

Tell all the Truth but tell it slant –

Tell the truth by your opinion. So tell what you think is true. The whole poem is about truth, and this line introduces the topic.

Success in Circuit lies

Some people gain success by spreading lies. Could be a Con Man or something. Lies are the opposite of truth, so mentioning it with the following line is like saying “Lies may get you places in life, but it may backfire”.

Too bright for our infirm Delight

Lies can bring about sadness and despair, pushing us into the darkness. Lies can also blind us from the truth.

The Truth’s superb surprise

Truth can bring about joy (though sadness or anger can come about as well). This surprise could be bad or good, but hearing the truth is good itself. No one likes being lied to.

As Lightning to the Children eased

The truth is like a lightning bolt that lights up the dark sky of lies and gives hope. However, lightning can also bring about death and destruction.

With explanation kind

Try and tell the truth as nicely as possible, I guess. Since not being nice when stating the truth can cause things to go sour.

The Truth must dazzle gradually

The truth has to impress, but at a slow pace.

Or every man be blind –

If the truth does not come out, people will start to believe the lies and will never find the truth, making them blind.

With the “I vs. tide”, which is the I that watches the tide “face to face”, seems more personal and brings about a sense of closeness. “Face to face” requires two things to come together and be aware of each other. “I vs. crowd”, which the “I” just observes people, gives off more of a separated feel: only one party is aware of the other. At the start of the poem, Whitman is in a state of separation between himself and the people around him As the poem progresses, he becomes more integrated: moving from “I vs. crowd” to “I vs. tide”. In the end he realizes that at the end of the day, you are who you are and the crossings that occur in life can help you reach this conclusion.

I thoroughly enjoyed the Whitman wiki project. As I was searching for pictures for a word or phrase from part one of the poem, I got new ideas about other words and phrases which made it difficult to chose which I wanted to post a picture for and write a blog about. What I liked about this project was that we had freedom to choose whatever word/phrase with whatever picture we wanted as long as we could connect it back to the poem. I also liked that it was different that what we normally do for the class.

I honestly can’t think of anything that I didn’t like about this assignments: it was simple enough to not have anything to complain about.

By doing this project, I definitely learned quite a bit. All the picture and blog posts helped me understand the poem more. Even my own contribution gave me more understanding.

I do not think that there needs to be any changes to the assignment, but it would be nice if we did something like this again or a couple times for other poems and stories in the future.

“What is the grass?” – Walt Witman

I chose this image of a grass field on a sunny June morning because in “Song of Myself”, the word “grass” pops up frequently. It also states that the setting is a grass field on a sunny June morning (the photo was actually taken on a June morning, so says the photographer). The grass is a place where life thrives and with life, comes mystery and curiosity. Is grass a child of the Earth, or a handkerchief of the Lord, or a uniform hieroglyphic? Whitman does not know. As children, our backyards, frontyards, and parks, which were full of grass, were our places of adventure. Because we knew little of the grass and it’s inhabitants, we’d get on our bellies and search the grass for animals, pebbles, flowers, etc. Each time we did this, we would learn a little bit more about the Earth, sometimes changed mentally with our findings. Like what we discussed in the beginning of the semester: home, nature, home.

I believe that the quote “Colleges and books only copy the language which the field and the work-yard made” from Emerson’s “The American Scholar”  was trying to say that schools and authors throughout the years have just imitated what they have read in other books without really thinking about it themselves. They use books written by thinkers, not Man Thinking as Emerson stated in his essay. Because of the usage of these books, people become bookworms instead of Man Thinking. These bookworms come from book-learned classes who just value the books for being books and not much else. So, in that quote, Emerson is saying that colleges and books are run or written by thinkers/bookworms and not by people of Man Thinking. What’s important about understanding that colleges and books only “copy” the language of the field and work-yard is that the people attending or reading will perhaps end up imitating what they have learned/read.

Pod #5 (Not all that Poe-ish haha. Oh well.)

“Now who will laugh the loudest? You cannot frighten me with your wickedness. Come forth witch, Indian powwow, the devil himself! Here I come! You should fear me as much as I fear you.”
There was no one more frightful than I: flying through this forest combating against the demons’ laughter. I continued my demoniac course till I spotted a glimmering red light which made the forest look as if ablaze. As I watched, I heard a hum flowing through the air: a familiar tune, one of which I heard in the village meeting-house. I cried a lost cry, when the verse died and turned into a non-human chorus.
When silence came, I took a peek at my surroundings and found an open space which contained a rock that took the familiar shape of an altar or a pulpit, and trees who’s tops were ablaze but stems untouched, like candles.
“A grave company,” said I as I noticed bodies swaying in the area. Bodies that, upon closer inspection, were of those I see in town everyday. The attendees of this gathering varied greatly: from the governor’s lady to women of spotted fame. I found it strange as I gazed upon noticing that the good did not back away from the bad nor were the sinners confused by the saints. I also spotted powwows, who’s magic was more evil than that of any witch’s.
“But Faith. Where is Faith?” I thought as I gazed at the attendees. But as some hope found its way into my heart, I trembled, for a new verse of the hymn I heard earlier came about. It contained a pious love but was joined by words that expressed sin. The verses sounded like a clash of man, beast, and nature. As the four blazing pine trees threw up a flame, fire at the altar shot up, and where the fire had been, a figure now stood.
“Bring forth the converts!” yelled a echoing voice.
As the voice finished its words, I stepped forth and approached the gathering as if my own name had been called. As I continued walking forward, someone put her hand in front of me, as if to warn me of what was to come, to make me turn around and go back home to my Faith. I could not figure out who’s hand this belonged to, my mother perhaps? But as I pondered over it, I realized that I did not have to power to stop and turn away, not even in thought. Good old Deacon Gookin seized my arms and dragged me to the blazing rock. As he did so, I recognized more of the figures standing beside the rock: Goody Cloyse, a teacher of catechism , and Martha Carrier, the promised queen of hell.
“Welcome, my children,” said the mysterious figure, “to the communion of your race. Ye have found thus young your nature and your destiny. My children, look behind thee!”
Behind them, in a sheet of flame, were the fiend worshippers who were smiling a welcoming smile.
“There,” continued the figure. “are all whom ye have respected since ye was a child. Ye thought them holier than yourselves, and shrank away from what was your sins, laying it in contrast to their righteous lives. Yet they are here, at my assembly. Tonight ye shall know of their secret deeds, their secret sinful deeds. At every place, where one of these secretive crimes had been committed, you will find joy in the guilt that lay there. Even more, it shall be yours to penetrate, and find the deep mystery of sin. Now my children, look upon each other.”
As everyone did, a blaze from the rock shot up again and unveiled Faith, my wife, trembling.
“Lo and behold my children,” the dark figure said, “Evil is the nature of mankind. Evil must be your happiness, for there is no escape. I welcome ye all, again, to the communion of your race.”
“Welcome,” the fiend worshippers cried as one.
As the evil shape dunk his hand in a mysterious basin filled with some sort of liquid to baptize to new converts, I glanced over to Faith, and she to I. “Faith! Faith!” I cried, “Oh my Faith, you must resist! Look up to the sky and resist the wicked one!”
I knew not if Faith has obeyed or not, but I had hoped as I staggered against the rock that she did indeed.

I believe that the unknown made the man of the crowd so fascinating to the main character, enough to make the main character follow the old man throughout town. The main character could tell one’s personality and social rank just by glancing at their clothing and posture or by listening to the way they talk. But when the old man walked by the the narrator, he was dumbfounded: he had not seen this man’s expression before and during his analysis of the man, he concluded many things which made him crave to keep this man in view. The narrator wanted to know more about this man’s wild history and followed him throughout London. The man’s actions as they traveled from one part of London to another completely different looking part, made the narrator more and more curious, which caused him to continue to follow. He craved to know more of this man and what reason for his behavior. After following the man back to where the story started, the main character concluded that even if he followed the man more, he would never know anymore about this “man of the crowd” even though he desperately wanted to have more knowledge.

I know that this is a rather common example when thinking of bad “pollution”, or a “pollution” that we tend to fear, but the pollution going on in our atmosphere. The combination of the atmosphere and the addition of large amounts of gasses, such as CO2, has caused things like global warming/global climate change which widely affect the Earth: the environments and its inhabitants. Other examples of bad “pollution” are bacteria or a virus and one’s body, water and oil, alcohol and driving, etc.

A form of “pollution” that we enjoy, like Robin in “My Kinsman, Major Molineux”, would be the combination of fiction and reality. We all love to dream about reality and fiction clashing with one another. Though we know that most of what we create in our minds about fantasy and reality coming together, we can’t stop thinking about those improbable possibilities. People enjoy thinking of the improbable.

An interesting topic that we touched on during Friday’s class was how there always seemed to be a “middle” with Young Goodman Brown and for Faith, there was always a “one-side”. In the beginning, Young Goodman Brown, a newly wed (in between a bachelor and a marriage), was on his threshold (a place in between the inside and the outside of the house) during sunset (a time between day and night) contemplating if he should go to fulfill a promise that was made, or stay with his wife, Faith. Faith on the other hand was talked about using words that were not in between two other things, like threshold. She was described with words like sweet and angel.

I found it interesting that it stayed that way for the rest of the story. Young Goodman Brown became confused at the end and did not know if what he saw in the forest was real or not. He was stuck in between fact and fantasy as didn’t know if what he saw was indeed factual or something he made up.