I thought the story, Oedipus Rex (left top), was really interesting and highlighted the idea of tragedy. It made me see that there are many different qualities and aspects of the theme of tragedy. What we've already talked about was how tragedy can be seen as pathetic or comical, but I think with Oedipus we can also see the true sadness and misfortune that comes along with tragedy. I also think that not only is tragedy sad, but there can also be something good that comes from tragedy. For example, though Oedipus finds out the truth and gauges out his eyes, he can now see the truth and no longer will live in fear of Apollo's prophecy. So, in a way, even though it was tragic how everything turned out, at least Oedipus knows the truth now and can move forward. We also read a new poem this week called, "To the Virgins to Make Much of Time" by Robert Herrick (left middle). I found this poem very interesting because the message and meaning behind it is one that is frequently stressed. The idea of "carpe diem" and that life is too short are often talked about in life today. I thought his comparison between gathering rosebuds and taking advantage of our opportunities was a really clear and well-chosen metaphor. There is a prime time to gather flowers and it doesn't last very long just as the sun is only high in the sky for a temporary amount of time just like our opportunities in life. We may not have the chance to experience something we pass up for a second time; that is why it is always important to take advantage of our opportunities in life. We also learned how to take Cornell Notes (left bottom). It was somewhat hard for me to get used to at first because I think everyone kind of takes notes in a particular way that is specially helpful to them personally, but once I got the hang of it, it was pretty helpful taking these types of notes. I like how your notes gradually narrow down into a small and effective summary. Also, by the time you finish off your Cornell Notes, you have repeated the important points at least three times and it becomes a lot easier to commit these important points to memory. |
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This week was the first week that we began working in room 216 in preparation for Mr. Schoenborn's paternity leave! We really started to delve into the new tragedy unit. We began watching videos, writing our tragedy blogs, and reading some of the webpages necessary to learn about tragedy.
The number one thing I remember from this week was the TED Talk video we watched comparing tragedy to success and failure. It was one of the best TED Talk videos I think I have ever seen honestly, and it truly resonated with me. After we finished watching it I had so many ideas rattling around in my head that I had recorded in my tragedy blog, and I had this sudden urge to just write which I found rather odd. I guess the message in the video just really got to me and inspired me. It actually inspired me to incorporate some of the points the speaker made about success and failure into some of my college application essays later that day. I liked the point he made about how success and failure is not a set thing. Each individual has their own personal idea of success and failure, and no one individual can be solely successful or solely unsuccessful. There are trade-offs that come along with excelling at something. No one can accomplish everything perfectly, and there for we all experience failure. I also enjoyed when the speaker brought up our society and our unrealistic idea of a complete "meritocracy". When we believe in a world like this, that implies that we believe that the people who do certain great things will be on the successful end and those who do certain bad things or don't do anything at all will be on the unsuccessful end. But, this is not true at all. Too often in our society, do we associate the word "failure" to the word "loser". To fail at something does not equate to being a loser. Similar to how being prosperous does not equate to being successful. Like the speaker says, there are too many random factors that influence a person's ability to end up at the top or the bottom. There are too many uncontrollable factors such as, heritage, religion, disabilities both physical and mental, and family finances, for us to truly believe that each and every person has the same opportunities as another. There are many people in this world who have tried to do great things and long to do them, but just don't have the resources or the money to take hold of these opportunities. Take into consideration this scenario: Say a man is born into a family living in poverty, and he can't afford to get an education. Without an education he does not have nearly the same opportunities and chances that those with an education do. Let's say the only family he has die and he is left alone to fend for himself. Unable to pay for a home he becomes homeless and scraps for food. He searches desperately for a job, but always falls short. He never gets hired or is prepared to go into the work force. What resources does this man have to reach out for a job? How will he write a cover letter? How will he know the proper format without an education? How will he create a resume with nothing to put on it? How can he dress professionally for a job interview? Who is going to hire a man that came off the streets and has seemingly nothing to offer? How does he stand a chance in our cutthroat society? Now consider this scenario: A boy is born into an extremely wealthy family that owns a multi-million dollar business. After coasting through high school doing the bare minimum of work and achieving no honors or awards, he does not attend college because he becomes a higher-up in his family's company. He is making five times what people his age make with no college education and no degree. Is he considered successful? Did he work hard at all to earn his position? This just reinforces that failure and success cannot be determined by how "hard" one works. There are simply too many uncontrollable factors. All in all, I found the whole week to be extremely interesting and enlightening. This week in AP Lit. we discussed the poem, "Pathedy of Manners" by Ellen Kay. I find it interesting how creating words like "pathedy", a combination between pathetic and comedy or even tragedy, is encouraged in poetry and literature. The poem we looked at this week was quite different than the poems we've been looking at. It kind of led us into our new unit on tragedy. This poem really highlighted the ideas that the two main aspects of drama are comedy and tragedy, and they are both somewhat connected. The woman described in the poem essentially has given up her life and ideals in order to live a lifestyle of luxury. This lead me to believe that she is more concerned with what people thought of her than her own self-worth. Towards the end of the poem the tone shifts from talking about her lavish lifestyle to talking about her new lifestyle of sadness. This really emphasized the use of the created word "pathedy" in the title of the poem because readers and the speaker view this woman as pathetic yet find it comedic since, ultimately, the fault of her misfortune is purely her own. Tragedy came into play when I really considered her lifestyle. Though she is now lonely and pathetic, I came to the realization that her situation is quite sad. The fact that she has to pretend like she still lives in her world of luxury and forever be encircled by fake friends is actually extremely tragic. Realizing this kind of opened my eyes to the connections between tragedy and comedy. When bad things happen to people, we tend to compare ourselves to them and find comedic pleasure in the misfortune of others because we're glad it's not us. Sometimes, we even decide that a person deserves whatever horrible thing is happening to them. But, at the end of the day when you really sit back and look at someone's tragic circumstances, they really are not funny at all. They are actually very sad. Not only did this poem teach me about tragedy in literature, but it also made me realize the lack of empathy we have as a society. I also found the Poem of the Week Essay this week to be a lot easier to write than previous essays, probably due to practice. But, I think there were so many things I got from this poem that it was so easy to just flow while I was writing. Creating a thesis was easier for me than it usually is and the support for my main points was super clear in the poem that, with the use of direct and indirect quotes, I was easily able to write a very nice paper! This week I learned a lot about working in a group. I obviously have experienced working in a group before, but I had never necessarily experienced it quite the same as I did this week. We have been working on our projects for a few weeks now, but bringing both essays and the presentation together this week really tested my group's communication and cooperation.
In past group projects, they usually occurred in classes that did not contain all higher-level and more advanced students. Typically, we were assigned groups and the more motivated students did all the work. And, although it is extremely stressful to be the person doing all of the work and allowing others to take credit for it, I now realize that it is also much simpler than taking every single group member's ideas and opinions into consideration. My group struggled greatly with numerous and frequent creative differences. We all brought to the table a different way of looking at things and valuable ideas, we just struggled to combine them initially, and still manage to write a cohesive paper. We all have very different writing styles as well which I could tell really bothered some people. But, I personally think that the whole point of the project was so that we could see those different writing styles and personalities shine through throughout different parts of the paper. Some of us have a more conversational tone while others tend to write more formally. It doesn't mean either way is "wrong" or has to be changed, it just means each has to be incorporated into the writing in non-confusing way. I think that initially members of my group didn't necessarily handle the creative differences very well. Some tended to just not contribute because they found working in a group too frustrating, while others tended to just ignore the differences and pretend like they weren't important. I think this week once we started to realize that we actually are capable of producing good work as an outcome of using all of our perspectives, we began to work a lot better together. Basically, what I learned is that I personally much rather prefer working individually simply because I enjoy putting forth work that I am proud of because it really feels like "me" work, and I don't like having to be responsible for other people's grades as well. I would feel horrible if I were to interpret something differently and subsequently make our essay contradictory costing my group-mates a grade on it. However, I also learned that social and cooperative skills are insanely important to have! At some point or another, you will HAVE to work with people; it's inevitable and completely unavoidable. Also, we are supposed to be the most advanced writers and students, which means we can all learn something from fellow classmates. Not one student is smarter or better than the other, and we all have something positive to offer to our classmates to improve their literary abilities. I found the poem of the week for Week 5, "Bright Star" by John Keats, to be incredibly interesting. Out of all the poems we have read so far, this was the only poem that I really had to analyze and read multiple times to even come up with one idea as to what it was about. I feel as though it may be a little harder to analyze as the other poems because the language is slightly more eloquent. I find that the analysis of sonnets seems to be a little more perplexing than the analysis of other poems. I also found "Bright Star" intriguing because of its use of imagery and rhetoric.Throughout the poem, the author uses words with relatively good connotations that painted vivid images in my mind due to his descriptiveness. Then, as the poem proceeded, he started pairing words like "sweet" with "unrest" which are very contradicting seeing as "sweet" has a positive connotation while "unrest" tends to have a negative connotation. This sentence then guides the reader into the very last line, "And so live ever--or else swoon to death." which romanticizes the idea of death and ever-lasting life which are both usually viewed in a negative way. It also interested me how the author seems to refuse acceptance of anything changing. He uses words that represent things staying the same for a long period of time. He uses words like "eternal", "steadfast", "unchangeable", and phrases like "to feel for ever...", "awake forever...", "live ever..." to emphasize his desire for an unchanging and restless world in which he is able to admire and love eternally this woman. I also feel as if I am slowly understanding how to write my essays in a more concise yet eloquent way. I still feel somewhat rushed with only forty minutes to write the Poem of the Week essays, however, I feel like I am getting a lot better at them! I feel like I have a better grasp on what my audience will be looking for especially after we revised our "Cross" essays. Even though there is still not a set-in-stone structure to writing our essays like we used to follow, it has been getting incredibly easier to write under the stressful time limit. And, if we continue to do these times of essays throughout the year, I am sure that I will feel confident enough to "knock-out" the essay portion of the AP test especially since I feel like I am already getting a lot better at writing. |
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February 2015
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