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Jesus Cow #1

I love the prologue for ‘The Jesus Cow’. The novel has a very unique tone, and the prologue completely exemplifies it in only 44 words. Harley only says three words, and already we can see what kind of character he is. “Well. That’s trouble.” He is not a dramatic man, but instead is a nonchalant one. He is also smart because the moment he sees the mark of Jesus on the calf, he knows that people are gonna cause some trouble around it. 

Another part of why the prologue is so interesting is the parody of tone it does. It uses very proper language that emulates that of speaking about divine and religious subjects. Only to turn to do the exact opposite with Harley’s appearance. Here we can prepare ourselves for a rather comedic book, and a rather easy-going protagonist. It is intriguing in the fact of introducing a laidback protagonist and a conflict at the same time. It intrigues me into how Harley will handle the conflicts in the story.

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Death of a Salesman

The core conflict of “Death of a Salesman” is Willy Loman dealing with the pain of having his sons forget about him. When the boys were growing up, Biff and Happy adored and idolized their father. Not only did they love him, but they also respected him. Throughout the play, Willy makes notes of if other characters are ‘well-liked’. In a monologue of Charley’s at the end of the play, Charley explains how the traveling salesman has a desire to be liked. “He’s a man way out there in the blue, riding on a smile and a shoeshine. And when they start not smiling back—that’s an earthquake.” At Willy’s grave when Happy says they would have helped Willy with finances, Charley explains that it was not the struggles of finances that lead to Willy’s demise, but the fact that he felt he was no longer ‘well-liked’. Neither of the brothers succeeded in providing him with this. They were going to take Willy out to dinner, but Biff angered Willy by informing him that he did not get the money from Bill Oliver, and Happy sets himself and Biff with two girls for them to leave with. Sure, Biff would have to break the news sometime, and the sooner might be better. But what the dinner was meant for was to have some quality time with their father, and forget about all of their troubles. Happy insisted that Biff not bring up the news, which he does for the sake of his father. But what kind of person leaves their ailing father with a woman they just met? In all of the ways Biff treats his father, he is trying to get him out of his fantasies and to accept life as it is. Which seems less humane than Happy’s attempts in keeping his father content in his fantasizes. But ultimately I would say Biff has better intentions. Biff wants his father to accept the world as it is so he can learn to live in it, while Happy just wants his father to be content. I personally think even though Biff’s intentions are harsher, had he gone about them differently, it could be healthier for Willy.

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The Office Space (1999) and Romanticism

The film Office Space (1999) is a mainstream Hollywood comedy movie. Just like many we like to spend our Saturday nights watching. Though it is a piece of mainstream entertainment, the film exemplifies the beliefs of Romanticism. Which sounds a little sophisticated for a comedy with Jennifer Aniston that you catch on TV. The film may seem very different from the literature we read in class, but the ideals presented in it are hardly different than those of William Wordsworth and Henry David Thoreau. 

Wordsworth and Thoreau are major writers of what is called Romanticism. Some of the major ideals of Romanticism are: appreciating the outdoors and nature, and that life is more about feelings than simple pragmatic thinking. The protagonist of the Office Space is Peter, who works in a cubicle day in and day out...and he hates it. Peter believes life is more than just work, and he hates his job with a passion. To solve this- he quits. Well, he does not actually resign, but he does stop showing up to work. And when he does show up to the office of Initech, he doesn’t do any work. This shows the free spirit of Romanticism, and the lack of practicality it has. 

Peter also likes nature. On one of the days he skips work he goes fishing. He often comments on the outdoors, and in the end, he finds that a job outside is where he is truly happy. This side of his character exemplifies the love of nature in Romanticism.

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Assignment Four

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s ‘The Birthmark’ is a rather progressive piece for its time. In a period when women were seen more for their beauty than for their personality, this story seems to challenge that notion. In the story, scientist Aylmer is married to a woman named Georgiana. In his eyes, she is the embodiment of physical perfection, the most beautiful woman in the world. Although, she has a hand-shaped birthmark on her cheek that Aylmer loathes. He feels it distracts from her beauty and is a sign that she is mortal and flawed like the rest of us, rather than the divine being he believes her to be. He believes that with his experience in alchemy he will be able to rid her of it, and he convinces her to allow him to do so. His assistant, Aminidab, strongly advises against it. Amnidab also comments that if Georgiana was his wife, he would never part with her birthmark. Aminadab is described to be a very unique specimen that is unlike the idea of what men look like, so it makes sense that he sees nothing wrong with this so-called flaw. It is almost as though he too perceives it as a sign of mortality, but finds beauty in the idea of her being human. At the end of the story, the treatment to rid her of the birthmark, though successful, kills Georgiana. There is a laugh heard from Amnidab, as if to have the literal last laugh. This is because Amnidab knew it was foolish for Aylmer to attempt to rid Georgiana of the birthmark. What makes this progressive is that in this time frame women were seen almost exclusively for their physical features, and this story openly mocks doing so.

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Assignment Three

Rather than being genuine characters, the women in Washington Irving’s ‘Legend of Sleepy Hollow’ and ‘Rip Van Winkle’ act more as plot devices. In ‘Sleepy Hollow’, Katrina Van Tassel is the apple of Ichabod Crane’s gluttonous eye, and the story follows him trying to win her heart and hand in marriage. However, Ichabod’s reasons for marriage are not as pristine as they should be. Though Ichabob does have feelings for Katrina, one of the main things that has convinced him to pursue marriage with her is gaining the farm that her wealthy father owns. He would love to use it for all the delicious food it can offer, or sell it so that he may move to Kentucky or Tennessee. Even when the story depicts the affections Ichabod has for Katrina, it is her physical appearance and child-birthing qualities that are addressed, rather than her beliefs and quarks. Unfortunately, Katrina Van Tassel never gets to fully develop as a character beyond her wealth and aesthetic that makes her appealing.

In ‘Rip Van Winkle’, Rip Van Winkle’s wife is never even given a name. She is only ever addressed as Dame Van Winkle, with Dame simply meaning woman. The only part of the story she plays it being nothing but a nuisance for Rip Van Winkle. 

Though Washington Irving is a highly respected author, when you look at the roles of the women in his stories, he does write them in a very flattering light. My guess for this reasoning to be that reading was a more male specific activity, as women were not often allowed the right to an education. Therefore, Irving most likely anticipated these stories to have an all male audience. I would hope to think that if this was not the case, he would have written the women in a more respectable manner, and would have believed them to be capable of being a character rather than a plot device.

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Is Prospero Really Shakespeare in Disguise?

With The Tempest being the last play by William Shakespeare, people have wondered if Prospero’s decision at the end of the play to end magic is supposed to be symbolic of Shakespeare putting an end to his writing. It is a beautiful metaphor that I would like to think is true.

Throughout the play of The Tempest, Prospero is shown to be a very controlling character. He even goes so far as to eavesdrop on his daughter while she is conversing with her lover. If you look back at the piece as a whole, it seems that all the events took place because of this manipulative behavior of his. It is almost as if he orchestrated the whole plot...much like the writer did. Like Shakespeare, Prospero causes the storm that starts the events of the story. He also points two people in the direction of falling in love with each other. Much like Shakespeare did as the writer.  

I can not say I know why Shakespeare ended his writing career. But after evaluating the character of Prospero, I believe he felt that he had become a very influential person in his writing. This is all a hypothetical situation that is most likely looking at the situation with more detail than needed, but perhaps the loss of Prospero’s dukedom symbolizes a loss of influence Shakespeare felt. Perhaps being stranded on the island alone with Miranda and Caliban symbolizes that as a writer, the characters in his plays live nowhere than with him, and that has full control over everything that they do. Again, this could be too deep of an analysis, but I think it is an interesting way to look at it.

So to put it simply, yes, I do believe Prospero’s resignation from magic is symbolic of Shakespeare retiring as a writer.

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Question: Based on their conversation in scene two, does either Caliban or Prospero have any more title to the island than the other? Is one more wronged than the other? How do the various grievances the two have for each other line up?:

I think Prospero and Caliban are competing to be the victim of one another. Prospero argues that he is a victim of Caliban because Caliban tried to rape his daughter Miranda. While Caliban argues that he is the victim because he was on the island first, and Prospero took it from him and turned him into a slave. Both are arguing to be the victim of the situation because being the one in the right does not entitle the island to them. If they make the other guy the bad guy, then surely they must deserve the island themself. 

Although they argue to whom the island truly belongs, I personally do not think it belongs to either of them. Yes, I know saying they should just share the island is asking far too much of these characters, but there is not one argument that rules out the other. Caliban was there before Prospero was, but when Prospero took the island and made Caliban a slave, Caliban did not put up a fight. And Prospero has no reason whatsoever to be entitled to the island. If anyone truly is entitled to the island, wouldn’t it be the people who sent Sycorax there?