#9 whitman: hope.

Honestly, this class was fabulous. I totally digged all of the reading that we did and I think it offered a version of American history that I haven't experienced before in reading. I love what the class did. And you, Suzanne, rocked out some pretty awesome stuff that I haven't thought about before. 

I am not really a fan of Whitman.. well wasn't, until I read Leaves of Grass. I LOVED every word of this poem. Leaves of Grass has done for me what Emerson has ALWAYS done for me-- offered hope in the midst of everything. I am an optimistic person to my core and choose to always live within the positives. I believe so strongly in the human heart and the human condition and I believe ALWYAS that their is hope. (Maybe this is why I have "hope" tattooed on one wrist and the kanji symbol for "human" on the other) I'm all about this. 

I like what we did for the Emerson week-- picking a quote for each day. So, for my last blog I kind of want to pick out some cool stuff from Whitman that really struck me. 

First, I think what the facilitation group said about Whitman being an “answer” to these themes in American society/literature/culture is absolutely right. I felt the sigh of relief that the facilitation group presented. 

Whitman offers hope. He's a breath of fresh air. 

Returning to the childlike innocence—don’t worry and don’t overthink. Whitman explains grass as being like a child. He views everything with a sense of lightness. 

Everything. Universalism. He is everything. Everything is him. --Totally dig this. Everything is in sync-- body and mind. 

“I believe in the flesh and the appetites…” Indulgence. Embracing our human condition.

“Not word of routine this song of mine” This is VERY Emerson-like. 

“I know perfectly well my own ego” This is why I'm not a huge fan of Whitman. He has a huge ego. But then again, that is what makes for this great piece. 

“It is time to explain myself—let us stand up.” Speak it. Take ownership and speak it.

Self-reliance- “Not I, not anyone else can travel that road for you,/ you must travel it for yourself.” “You are also asking me questions and I hear you, / I answer that I cannot answer, you must find out for yourself.” Self-reliance all the way. We all have the answers. Live these realities and make life yours. You can/hold all the answers to your questions.

#8 dickenson & sexton: repression, submission & rebellion.

Repression
Both Dickenson and Sexton repressed feelings. Dickenson repressed her feelings for another woman, Sue. Sexton repressed her feelings and desires regarding her impulsive sexual nature. Their repressed feeling came out in writing. Dickenson’s letters to Sue explored her feelings and thoughts; Sexton’s writing captured her uncertainty about conventional life (motherhood and wifehood).  

Dickenson writes: “Precious to me—she still shall be—/ Though she forget the name I bear.” Dickenson craves Sue and wants her to be with her, but that is not and will never ever be the case. In her letter to Sue she writes, "I have one thought, Sussie.. and that of you.. I need you more and more... If you were here... we would not ask for language" Dickenson wrote to and for Sue, but her language could never be enough for her. She needed Sue is everything she did.

Sexton takes on witches voice in much of her writing. I feel like she does this because of how she herself feels like the witch-- a deviant, a bad, bad person.  Red Robin is autobiographical. Briar Rose- she is telling about herself.

Both therefore became submissive in their lives:

Dickenson- liked noted in class handout- can express love through submission, weakness, compliance. (Both partners). CONSEQUENCES

Sexton- submitting to the life style—for whatever reason. Mention other work?

Subtle acts of rebellion:

Dickenson writing to Sue.. sending her letters.. confessing her feelings. Refusing to visit brother. recognizing the love affair, the feelings, the realities.

Sexton in her affair with all her psychologist, engaging in those impulses to fulfill her desires. 

#7 poe: disfigured love.

Relationships: obsession (and illusion)

True and False questions were asked in class. Three of these: (1) My relationship/future relationship will be different because my love is so strong; (2) Having doubts is a sign that things will not work out; (3) Physical appearance is important and you should not lose attraction. These questions address issues of love (and obsession) and the ways we think about love. Our love is so strong that nothing can break it. Doubting a relationship means that the love is not genuine and real. Lastly, (and what Poe focuses on) physical appearance is so important; there must be an attraction. 

(1) Poe writes in "Ligeia": “Love cannot die—Ligeia had brought me far more, very far more, than falls ordinarily to the lot of mortals.” Love is so strong and there is no way that the love can die. And what real (strong) love brings is new things and a new way of looking at life. This kind of love--obsessive love--offers a new outlook and a new perspective on society.


(2) “That she loved me, I should not have doubted…” The narrator doubted the Ligeia loved him. This doubt caused the narrator to constantly think of and obsessive over Ligeia. He could not determine if her love was real and thus could not stop thinking about her. Her love was in fact real, and later the narrator regrets doubting. What the doubt did was drive him mad. "Doubting a relationship means that the love is not genuine or real" --so many think this.


(3) “She died—and I, crushed into the vary dust with sorrow, could no longer endure the lovely desolation of my dwelling in the dim and decaying crity by the enire.” Also, the vision of Ligeria: the words in the passage are laced with dependency. Something taking over the body. Linked to love/intuition, love/possession, love/perverseness, love/self-reliance, free-will, choice. EVERYTHING was dependent on the love of and for Ligeia. Love was a possession causing the narrator to pluck the eyes away because he could no longer look at them and think of Ligeia.  Love was a perverseness-- a focus on the body and the mind that will not allow the narrator to move on. Love questions self-reliance and free-will because it becomes an obsession, reliance and dependency. 

Poe uses our experience to destabilize our self-reliance and free-will. We are literally blinded by love and everything seems reasonable and rational when it really is not. 

The Shining: family nightmare & coping 
The Shining tackles issues and values.


Patriarchy-In society and in The Shining, man is in charge and everyone else is in submission. Wendy represents the relatives of society. There is no escape, no choice for her.  Wendy's struggle is a different kind of survival struggle then we have read in other works this quarter. However, the ways Wendy struggles reminds me a lot of the struggle of Mary Rowlandson.

Rationality- Doing bad things as a repsonse to both captivity and the abuse and damage from his father. I think it is pretty rational to get seek revenge. My favorite book, Frankenstein, is ALL about this. The demon seeks revenge on Frankenstein, killing all those close to him because he was damaged and hurt by Frankenstein. Frankenstein, too, just happens to offer a lot of insight into the human imagination and heart. The demon  shows us what it means to be human and the ways in which insanity can be rational.

The protagonist is coping with the abuse from his father by obsessing about it. This obsession ultimately leads him to project this hatred onto every other subject in his life. 

philbrick (facilitation make-up): endurance.

Philbrick chose to write In the Heart of the Sea because Nantucket had a science that made the story seem “all more real and frightening to a modern audience.”

Nantucket was “an almost medival place with a one-sided version of war.” the community rallied around the sea and the hope it offered. also wanted to guarantee its place in the world. one-sided version of war-- all winning and gains, no losses.  

In the Heart of the Sea offers “a perspective that did not take Nantucket and its history for granted.” wanted to include the benefits of the story and how it impacted America's creation story.

According to a Penguin Group interview with Philbrick, Philbrick retold the story because it was a survival take, which happened to be an essential part of American history. like most of the stories and narratives we have read in class, survival--on way or another--has been a crucial mechanism that has shaped American society.

He says: “Americans today have lost track of the importance the sea had in creating the nation’s emerging identity.”

Question: what can the story of the sea tell us about America’s creation story?

The accounts of Chase came immediately after the men returned to land and those of Nickerson came much later. Nickerson offered details that Chase lacked; Chase offered more of an historical layout. Philbrick took these two accounts and combined them for the foundation of In the Heart of the Sea.  Collaborating the two allowed for a better story and unity.

Question: Which source seems to be more credible? Which character is more reliable?

Philbrick describes Pollard by calling him “too much of a Hamlet”

Question: What are some defining characteristics of Polland? What does Philbrick mean when he calls Pallard a Hamlet? cowardly?

Some of the young men returned to sea after the tragic crash of the Essex. Even though this does not seem like a reasonable or even predictable future for these men, the sea was still full of opportunity. Plus, the crew had already survived the worse. again, the sea was all the hope that Nantucket had. Nantucketers put all there energy into whaling. These men did not have any other option.

Why In the Heart of the Sea is a survival story: “peels away the niceties and comforts of civilization.” Everything means nothing when in survival mood—time when you must depend on self rather than society. There is nothing left. This is not an adventure story because there is nothing adventurous about suffering.

Question: What does the whales attack on the ship symbolize about American society?

This video shows a comical look at the tragedy of the whale ship Essex. How is this relevant. Is there any humor?

#6 poe: fragments of truth.

Truths (The Tell Tale Heart, House of Usher, Black Cat)
Poe, in his frightening and shocking tales, revels truths about society. He is able to unlock the “ugly” of American society—those things we, ourselves, do not want to admit that we are attracted to or engage in. 

Truth #1- Attraction to the wicked

Like we mentioned in class, “perversity” is a theme in Poe’s stories. Perversity, to Poe, is freedom to the furthest degree. It is completely going against societal norms; it is living in the margins and free spaces. Dictionary.com offers five definitions of the word “perverse”, two of these are “persistent or obstinate in what is wrong” and “turned away from or rejecting what is right, good, or proper; wicked or corrupt.” Poe accepts these definition and works within these realms. Perversity is typical viewed as a deviant characteristics and something that we collectively should shy away from. Poe unveils the truth about perversity, though, and dives into our attraction to the perverse.

In class we talked about Poe’s presentation of perversity as the idea of doing wrong for wrong’s sake. I think a lot of the class agreeded that we all--in some way--are drawn to perverse things simply because. We know the behaviors are bad, deviant and not good and right, but we do them anyways. Like in the “Black Cat”, the narrator had no hard feelings towards the cat and did not really have any reasons to get rid of the cat; he did it simply because he could—for wrong’s sake. We are attracted to the wrong, the wicked and the corrupted just simply because we are. Poe’s understanding of the human mind and our desire to do bad things is something that, as a whole, we do not want to recognize. Poe, in the “Black Cat,” demonstrates our magnetism to the perverse.


Even in "The Tell Tale Heart", the narrator recognizes what he has done is "mad", but that he is not a mad man, that actually it is pretty reasonable: "But why will you say that I am mad? The disease had sharpened my senses--not destroyed--not dulled them." In this plea, Poe sees these deviant acts as very real and actually enlightening. He thinks we ought to embrace these "mad" sides because they make us even more aware and real. The narrator even goes in great lengths to depend his actions--the entire tale is defending the perverse.


If Poe believes so strongly in the rationality of perversity, why does he defend it? Does it need defending?

Truth #2- Desire things that destroy us (and interventions)

Early in the quarter we read several pieces from Asma. Asma said we are always trying to pinpoint traumatic events or reasons for our attraction to perverse things; we are constantly looking for reasons to explain why we could act in deviant ways. Asma concludes—as does Poe—that we are simply drawn to do bad things or to things that destroy us regardless of our past or personalities. And like early, how I used Asma to defended Hester Prynne (protagonist of the Scarlet Letter), I can also use Asma to defend Poe. We are all capable--all have it in us--to do bad things, to screw up. Our free-will allows us to make mistakes that lead to really bad things; it is just a human characteristic. 

The paradoy of Intervention that we watched in class addresses this reality and also mingles in the questions that were asked in class: addiction and free-will: what is he choosing? is he choosing? I firmly believe in the ability and the power of choice. I believe that we have choses and we choose. If we fuck up, we choose again; we always have the ability to choose differently and to choose better.  The majority of the class agree that addiction is a choice, and I agree too, but I think what Sean mentioned in class is helpful. Sean said that the initial choice leads to addiction, which therefore leads to a lack of free will. Further, by choosing addiction you are choosing against free-will, because no doubt is free-will challenged and brought down by addiction. I so get that free-will is taken away when rational thought is impaired. I've seen it with my own mother, who chose drugs and alcohol and an abusive boyfriend over her three children. It was always the drugs (or the getting of the drugs) that mattered. I knew my mother before the addiction and I knew her through the addiction. My mom was so loving and so in tune with everything me and my sisters needed; during her addiction the last thing on my mother's mind was us girls. But I always knew we were in her heart. She hurt, we hurt. 


There is no doubt--that I believe--that addiction leads to the suppression of free-will. And there is also no doubt that I believe that everyone has the ability to chose. What brings us out of the addiction is a choice though. And that is what I mean by the ability to always choose better.

Poe: “I knew myself no longer” when talking about alcoholism. 

#5 philbrick & fightclub: opportunity & hope

Nantucket: the power of community
The Essex was described as a "vessel opportunity" for the people of Nantucket. Because Nantucket was "governed" by a force of terrifying unpredictability of the sea, the Essex was a way for the Nantucketers to gain back control over the community, land and the sea. They needed the Essex and all of its promises to feel empowered in the place that they lived.


Also, Nantucket was a Quaker community and a  "community that was as carefully controlled as that of any New England Society." Everyone is Nantucket was spiritually and intellectually equal; there was little--if any--difference between men and women. Everyone in Nantucket has the same opportunities. Even Pollard and Chase had the same opportunities and therefore the same possibilities. All of the men at sea and all of the men and women on land were both equal and free. This equality allowed for the collective support of the Essex because the whole community was able to come together in support of something that offered prosperity to the town. There was nothing to separate them.


The Essex offered hope to the Nantucket people because it symbolized all realms of success- individual, collective, and communal. The success of the Essex was crucial to the success of the community. Would Nantucket have been so hopeful if it were not for the Essex?



Essex: Means of survival
When the men are trying to survive on the sea, they keep true to the values that sent them to sea. They are full of hope and trying desperately to maintain the level of optimism that they left with. Even though a large part of them feels doomed, lost, defeated and unsuccessful, they still carry with them a mindset of an opportunist. And this mindset, I believe, is directly related to the communal backing, expectations and dependence. Even if the opportunity is gone, the men still feel a responsibility to carry on. Do we not feel a sense of obligation to fulfill an opportunity even if it is no longer possible?


Further, we described Chase and Pollard in class. Chase is democratic, sloppy, weak, emotional and absent. Pollard is daring, legal, fishy, bragging and flexible. In what ways to these characteristics helpful in the struggle to survive? how are they harmful? Both have personalities that drive them to continue their quest (democratic, emotional, daring, flexible), and both have characters that would discourage them (sloppy, weak, absent, legal, fishy, bragging). Who is more hopeful? Who is more hopeless?




Fight Club: Jack, Tyler and hopelessness

What does Jack mean when he says: "losing all hope is freedom"? Like mentioned in class, I think losing all hope means accepting a reality or the conditions you live under in order to completely liberate yourself. I'll say now, that I believe in hope and the power of being hopeful and the possibilities that it lends itself to. I think a new kind of reality is possible when one is hopeful. But, obvious a new reality is also possible when one is hopeless. When Hester Prynne lost hope, she became free of her constraints and limits and began to have power over her life and situation. Jack, too, when he gave up his his need and desire and hope to achieve an unrealistic life, he began to be exactly what he wanted to be. Tyler was a version of Jack that was both hopeless and realistic. And Tyler's hopelessness made it more possible for him to be free in his own world--both literally and figuratively. He literally lived free, not paying for a place to sleep; he escaped through Fight Club.

Like I said, I'm a hopeful person and believe definitely in the power and possibility of hope. I mean, I even have it tattooed on my wrist. I also see hope as a way to liberate and free the mine, while aiming to achieve a higher, more certain sense of personal reality. And, honestly, until reading Philbrick's In the Heart of the Sea and watching Fight Club, I have never seen hopelessness in such a positive way before. I definitely think that both can be liberating and freeing. But which one more so?


What is it like to want to sleep? what is the experience like? what causes insomnia? relationship between body/mind, consciousness/unconsciousness? 
In class we described insomnia with some key characteristics: dissatisfaction, hopelessness, unsteadiness, no dreams. In terms of Jack's restlessness: sleep is too risky; he doesn't want to sleep because he doesn't want to wake; he is avoiding the suppressed. Vianca mentioned a really awesome point-- that we are never "more ourselves then when we are asleep". I think there is a lot of truth in what Vianca brought up in class. I believe that our subconscious has a lot to do with who we are or who are "true" self is. I think a lot of our fears, thoughts, beliefs and realities are held in our subconscious, and therefore in our sleep or dream states.


In class we were asked to write about insomnia and answer those questions I bolded above. For me, insomnia has always been about an absents of a present. What I mean by that is-- an urgen feeling and a need to have something that is no longer there. Even when I was little, if someone or something left my life it made me so anxious that I just could not sleep. There were times when I night terrors every night for weeks, always being afraid of losing something I've already lost. Also, insomnia is caused by an anxiety about sleeping and a belief that being awake is more important than sleeping. Somehow, if I sleep, I'll miss something.

#4 emerson & melville: obsession and motivation.

Emerson's "Self-Reliance" one week; 7 days of motivation

Sunday: "My life should be unique; it should be an alms, a battle a conquest, a medicine."
unique. worth. journey.

Monday: "Let a man then know his worth, and keep things under his feet.
ownership. validation. self-interest. 

Tuesday: "Insist on yourself, never imitate. Your own gift you can present every moment with the cumulative force of a whole life's cultivation; but of the adopted talent of another, you have only an extemporaneous, half possession."
insist. conviction. virtues.

Wednesday: "Man is timid and apologetic. He is no longer upright. He dares not say 'I think', 'I am,' but quotes some saint or sage."
independent. creative. thoughtful.

Thursday: "Travelling is a fool's paradise. We owe to our first journeys the discovery that place is nothing."
freedom. self-knowledge. detachment. 

Friday: "Life only avails, not the having lived. Power ceases in the instant of repose; it resides in the moment of transition from a past to a new state; in the shooting of the gulf; in the darting to an aim."
control. power. instinct.

Saturday: "There is a time in every man's education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernal of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till. The power which resides in him is new in nature, and non but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried."
individuality. claim. self-reliance.


Is self-reliance possible?
There's no doubt that Emerson really believed that self-reliance was possible. He first argues that we most accept the world we live in: "Accept the place the divine Providence has found for you; the society of your contemporaries, the connexion of events." and then control it, "Great men have always done so and confided themselves childlike to the genius of their age, betraying their perception that the Eternal was stirring at their heart, working through their hands, predominating in all their being." I think, too, that Emerson felt that the self-reliance thought could definitely be a reality, but to behave self-reliantly would be challenging and take great strength.


Emerson writes, "What I must do, is all that concerns me, not what the people think. This rule, equally arduous in actual and in intellectual life, may serve for the whole distinction between greatness and meanness. It is the harder, because you will always find those who think they know what is your duty better than you know it. It is easy in the world to live after the world's opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude." We must not bother ourselves with the criticisms and pressures of our peers and must lean on our own understanding. Further, a man, according to Emerson, must learn to trust and respect and live with solitude to fully understand what self-reliance is. When men embrace the "independence of solitude" in the midst of society, that is when he has reached the Emersonian definition of self-reliance.


Melville's Moby Dick: who/what is your whale, your obsession?
In class we talked a lot about how Ishmael and Ahab, along with the other members of the crew and how they became totally mesmerized and captivated by this whale. Melville writes of Ahab: "Death to Moby Dick! God hunt us all, if we do not hunt Moby Duck to his death!" It was *all* about Moby Dick and capturing him. Nothing else mattered.


So, what is my Moby Dick? I have thought about this for a while now, and I'm still not sure. But, I do know one thing for sure. I am constantly seeking positive reinforcement for everything that I do. In a way, I am stuck. I do good things and want to do good things, but I also love the reinforcement that comes along with doing good things. I seek out those pat on the backs and "good jobs" like no one's business. It's a huge motivator for me. Like I said, I also do things with integrity and because I personally am driven to do them. However, I think a lot people love the encouragement and feedback they get when they do good things. I am no different.


History: "Melville reacted so hostilely to the optimistic side of Emerson's thoughts" A comparison of perspective. 

I thought it would be interesting to compare the two writers biographically, since they seem to be in different places ideologically. For starters, they come from two different backgrounds--Melville comes from a well established Boston family while Emerson comes from an Utilitarian modest family. When I was researching the two, I came across an essay where Melville actually criticizes Emerson and his buddy, Thoreau. Also, one source said: "In Moby-Dick, Melville challenges Emerson's optimistic idea that humans can understand nature. Moby-Dick, the great white whale, is an inscrutable, cosmic existence that dominates the novel, just as he obsesses Ahab." Also, in Melville's letter to Evert Duyckinck on March 3, 1849, he wrote, "And, frankly, for the sake of the argument, let us call him a fool; — then had I rather be a fool than a wise man. — I love all men who dive. Any fish can swim near the surface, but it takes a great whale to go down stairs five miles or more; & if he don’t attain the bottom, why, all the lead in Galena can’t fashion the plumet that will. I’m not talking of Mr Emerson now — but of the whole corps of thought-divers, that have been diving & coming up again with bloodshot eyes since the world began." Woah. Those are so pretty powerful words. To me, it seems that Melville feels like Emerson is a man of talk and philosophy but one of very little true integrity and endurance. And for Melville-- it's all about the chase.