Journal 31

My job shadowing experience was nothing like I would of thought it would be. I would always go with my dad to his work because he also does cardiology also and it was nothing like what I was shown on Wednesday. All I really did was watch a doctor do an echo scan on one patient and that is about it. After I watched that, they took me back to a room where we watched the film on the echo scan. All of this was basically all I did throughout the whole thing. What I would of liked is maybe me going to watch a person getting worked on by cardiologists. I remember because my dad had done a lot of things in the surgical room and I was there to watch a lot of the times and it was really cool. Instead, this time I sat in front of a computer and saw the kidneys and the heart which was pretty cool, but I would of liked to see something other than just a video on the computer. Other than that, the food was good. The guy I was working with was really nice and he taught me a lot on the echo scan. He knew my dad which probably helped him talk to me in a more "doctor" way. He was naming off all these things and I really did learn a lot from him. I would still like to go somewhere in the medical field and it is just not because of my dad. Doctors do make a lot of money and it is something that I would think I would be good at. I am good at the science classes and math classes that we have here and I am excited to see where I will end up in ten years. The job shadowing experience for me was not the best thing in the world, but it did show me a lot about the heart and the organs inside a persons body. It was not the best thing in the world, in terms of exciting, but it did teach me a lot.

Incident by Countee Cullen

Journal 30

Walt Whitman during his lifetime wrote a lot of poems. A lot of them and I mean a ton of them were published and looked at by millions of readers. He sends a great message through all of them, but there was one poem that I really enjoyed reading and I am going to tell you why. The poem that I have chosen that I have enjoyed the most is "O Captain, My Captain". I have chosen this poem because it has a great message with it and it was enjoyable to read. Everybody remembers president Lincoln. He was in my opinion one of the greatest presidents of all time and I am sure that everyone else almost feels the same way. The things he did during his presidency was incredible compared to what the other presidents did. In a time that would seem to be impossible to control, Lincoln took control and did the right things which made him how popular he is today. Anyway, Whitman did a great job with Lincoln in the poem "O Captain, My Captain". The captain in this poem is President Lincoln, hence where I said all the information about Lincoln. Walt Whitman is talking about when Lincoln got shot in the head in the theatre. He says, "But O heart! heart! heart! O the bleeding drops of red", so he is talking about when Lincoln got shot in the head and he is bleeding very badly. "Where on the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead", this part of the poem is talking about how Lincoln is dead on the floor. I do not really know why this poem has such a big impact on me. I really liked president Lincoln and the things he did. I never knew that Walt Whitman had written "O Captain, My Captain" for Lincoln or even related to Lincoln. Then we went over it in class and I finally realized that it did talk about Lincoln and it finally made sense to me. Everything Whitman did in this poem whether it was the description he used or just because he wrote about Lincoln, either way I enjoyed the poem.

http://whitmanarchive.org/published/LG/1891/poems/194

Chanting the Square Deific

This poem that Whitman wrote was very nice. It was calm and it had a nice background in it. Whitman did a good job with organizing this poem, which he is known not to do very well. Anyway, when you think of God sometimes people call him the Son, the Holy Spirit, or the Father. Well this story, which is called "Chanting the Square Deific" it introduces a fourth element that has to do with God.

The first stanza has to do with God taking the lives of people. Which in someone's view is probably not right because everybody sins in some way or another and God always gives them a second chance at life or whatever the deal is. Here is a quote from the story that might give you more of a background, "Not Time affects me-I am Time, old, modern as any, Unpersuadable, relentless, executing righteous judgements, As the Earth, the Father, the brown old Kronos, with laws, Aged beyond computation, yet ever new, ever with those mighty laws rolling, Relentless I forgive no man--whoever sins dies--I will have that man's life" (Whitman). This quote basically explains all of what I was talking about. About how God is relentless and whoever sin's, that he will take that man's life which is the part that I do not find true. God gives everybody a second chance.

In the second stanza, it was sort of inspiring. Whitman wrote, "From this side, lo! the Lord Christ gazes--lo! Hermes !--lo! mine is Hercules' face. All sorrow, labor, suffering, I, tallying it, absorb in myself, Many times have I been rejected, taunted, put in prison, and crucified, and many times shall be again" (Whitman). This is saying that God has been rejected by a lot of people, but he never goes away. He absorbs it and it makes him more strong than he already is. "He absorbs all sin in himself" (Oliver) so he becomes stronger.

The third stanza talks about Satan. Here is a quote from the poem, "Aloof dissatisfied, plotting revolt, Comrade of criminals, brother of slaves, Crafty, despised, a drudge, ignorant" (Whitman). This is just talking about Satan and what he is. He says "brother of slaves" (Whitman), which means he has a "soft heart for the downtrodden" (Oliver). Satan creates a balance between good and evil. There has to be something that makes everything balanced out, in this case it is Satan to balance out the Square Deific.

The final stanza just puts everything together. "Santa Spirita, breather, life, Beyond the light, lighter than light" (Whitman). This is saying that God will keep us together through the thick and the thin. It is our job to believe in him and and trust him. Whitman, throughout this poem, does a good job with organization by talking about each side of the Square Deific. Overall, this poem was very well put together and talked a lot about spirituality.

Bibliography

Whitman, Walt. "Chanting The Square Deific." The Walt Whitman Archive. Web. 03 Apr.

Oliver, Charles M. "'Chanting the Square Deific'." Critical Companion to Walt Whitman: A Literary Reference to His Life and Work, Critical Companion. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2005. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc.

Journal 29

For me this whole self analysis thing is getting me confused. I still do not really know how Walt Whitman saw self, but I sort of have an idea as to what I am supposed to talk about. My name is Justin Yakel. I was born in San Francisco California on May 27, 1995. Now that does not define the word self or how Whitman saw the definition of self, but in my eyes self means who are you. Now that is a tough question to answer because I know who I am, but I do not know how to define it. So first my personality is very important to me. My personality throughout my life that has been the thing that makes me who I am. I am a nice, caring guy which is what I am known for. Once in a while I do get a little cranky and go off on some people, but that is only rare occasions. Anyway, I find that your personality is big when it comes to Self because it defines who you are and how you act. Another thing that is important to me is the way I act around other people. You know you have a group that screws around all the time and they do not really pay attention. Well for me it is the other way around. I am a good student in school and I pay attention in class. I never disrespect anyone except if it's for my parents, but other than that if there is a coach telling me what to do or a teacher during class tells me to go do something I always do it. This is part of my personality. My parents raised me to be a good kid and to always respect your elders. I will always remember that I should respect anyone even though they might not be the nicest person in the world. The last thing that is important to me and defines the word Self is the way I see myself. I do not mean I look at myself everyday in the mirror and say I am pretty or not, I mean the way I see myself around other people per say or something else. This is the way I defined my Transcendental Self.

Nature the Gentlest Mother-Emily Dickinson

When I first read this poem, once again me and Benjamin got a little confused as to what the story was talking about. We read and analyzed this poem at least several times and yet we still could not get the grasp of it. What me and Benjamin finally got out of it was that everyone knows that a mother is caring and very loving. Me and Benjamin believe that a Emily Dickinson used Nature as a mother in this story.You think of a mother and a child and you immediately think of the bond that they share. They have such a great bond and when Dickinson says this it says that nature is like a mother. I guess that if you think about it like saying when the sun comes up, your mother gets you up and when the sun goes down, she puts you to bed. The little things in the middle of this poem may be the things that she does for you to reward you. Nature is doing the same things for us that a mother does. She treats us with love and care just like the warm summer day that the poem refers to, and when it is dark nature puts us in our beds and cools us down. Here is a quote from the story that shows how Emily Dickinson referred to a motherly sense in the story, "When all the children sleep She turns as long away As will suffice to light her lamps; Then, bending from the sky" (Dickinson). This is showing that you think of a mother putting her children away for the night, and the nature outside is calm and seemingly very caring. Dickinson also gives out a positive vibe towards by writing nature as a soothing and relaxing topic. She does this by saying things like "summer afternoon" (Dickinson). When one thinks about a summer afternoon, you think of a sunny day, not too hot, but with a perfect breeze, and being outside for this is like nothing other in the world. I love these kinds of days where it is a perfect day to play outside and chill out. Dickinson does a great job with explaining this and this is when me and Ben started to get ideas.

During a few classes we have looked at the literal meaning of the poem. After looking at the first stanza the literal meaning that we got out of this was that nature is gentle and patient to all children. Some of the words were hard to understand and we had to look them up, which made the literal meaning harder. The last part of the stanzas literal meaning comes out to be, she still gives advice to the weak and the improper. Overall, through the way me and Ben analyzing and looking at this poem, I think we did a good job with looking at how Dickinson wrote this poem and what she did to show us how she wrote all her stories.

Bibliography

Dickinson, Emily. "1. “Nature, the Gentlest Mother.” Part Two: Nature. Dickinson, Emily. 1924. Complete Poems." 1. “Nature, the Gentlest Mother.” Part Two: Nature. Dickinson, Emily. 1924. Complete Poems. Web. 28 Mar. 2012.

I heard a fly buzz when I died-Emily Dickinson

When I first read this poem, like every other poem we ever read, I did not understand it. It was tough trying to put my thoughts with this and try to put Emily Dickinson's thoughts into this poem. I do have to say that when I think about the title I think about a fly flying around a dead person and going inside the mouth of that person. I would though like to quote the last stanza of this story. "With blue, uncertain, stumbling buzz, Between the light and me; And then the windows failed, and then I could not see to see" (Dickinson). I did kind of understand the last part of this poem. I do not know why, but it helped me understand the story a little bit more. The quote was saying that the fly was buzzing around her dead body, between her and the light of heaven, and then her eyes closed, and she could not see the fly any longer. I think that the fly symbolizes life and when this girl is dying she sees this fly flying around her and it gives me the idea that the fly is life compared to what this girl is going through with death. Dickinson does use imagery in her poem, especially in this poem. Here is another quote from the story, "I heard a fly buzz when I died; The stillness round my form Was like the stillness in the air Between the heaves of storm" (Dickinson). This uses a lot of imagery because Dickinson is talking about what the room looked like while she was about to die. She said that there was stillness in the air which gives me the image that the room is empty and very quiet with just this person and the fly. In a way, I found this poem kind of creepy. Although it is creepy, I found it very good for imagery and symbolism and I thought Emily Dickinson did a great job.

Bibliography

Dickinson, Emily. "128. “I Heard a Fly Buzz When I Died. Part Four: Time and Eternity. Dickinson, Emily. 1924. Complete Poems." 128. I Heard a Fly Buzz When I Died.” Part Four: Time and Eternity. Dickinson, Emily. 1924. Complete Poems. Web.

Journal-Dickinson

I found it very cool to find out that most of Emily Dickinson's poems have a tune that is a tune that I enjoy to listen too. The tune that Emily Dickinson's poem goes to is Amazing Grace. Amazing Grace is a song that really gets to the heart. It is a very slow song and is very nice going. I think that that can reflect off of Emily Dickinson's poem because Emily Dickinson is a very calm person and she does a lot of things that has to do with nature. Whenever I read her poems her tone throughout the poem is sort of calm and nice to read. It seems like whenever I read the Edgar Allan Poe poems it seems like his tones were a little more assertive than Emily Dickinson's. Also another example of an assertive voice is the Devil and Tom Walker story that we read earlier in the year. When we put it on the speaker on the computer the narrator was very loud and was very scary sounding but that could be just from the story. I find that Emily Dickinson was more of a quiet writer. Her work is very calm and are very thought out well. I believe that I read that her poems were very organized and were very thought out well. She was much more organized than say Walt Whitman because Whitman did not have a set amount of words for each poem. On the other hand Dickinson did have a set amount of words for each poem and she seemed like she was much more organized from her work. Overall, I find that Dickinson's poems were fun to read because of the fact that it set the poems mood knowing that the poem could be read as the same as the song Amazing Grace. If you read a poem that does not have some calming tone to it you can read it as an assertive poem. I think that the way Dickinson's poems were written was one of the ways that she was set apart from other writers.

Reflection-Dickinson Writing Style

Emily Dickinson was a great poet of her time. She is one of the best known women writers of all time. She is also just like Whitman, a unique writer. She was also in between the Realism period and the Modernism period. She falls into the same category as Walt Whitman just because of he fact that they are known to people as the "tweeners". Emily Dickinson was different from Walt Whitman in a way because unlike Whitman Dickinson used rhymes in her poetry. She was a very organized lady who had new how much she was going to write and how long she was going to write it ("Whitman"). That is one way that these two writers were different but there were many other ways that they were different. I can not name them all, but that first difference is probably the most efficient. Here is a quote that I had found very interesting that has made Emily Dickinson the kind of poet that she is known for today, "Dickinson wrote poetry for nearly thirty years. In that span of time, she created approximately 2,000 poems, fewer than a dozen of which were published in her lifetime. Therefore, she had little feedback from either an appreciative or an uncomplimentary audience" (McChesney). I found this interesting because Emily had written so much in her lifetime and she was only able to publish a dozen in her lifetime. Now to this day, she is a very important poet and is known for the many good stories that she has written. I also found this sad because she was not recognized for her achievements that she has been known for to this day. Here is a quote that I found in that same criticism, "The themes of her poetry do not always leap immediately to the eye, and sometimes Dickinson packs layer upon layer, theme upon theme, into a few lines. Richard Sewall, a noted Dickinson biographer, describes this dilemma in his essay Teaching Dickinson: Testimony of a Veteran: the first editors in the 1890's divided the poems into four categories-Life, Love, Nature, Time and Eternity..." (McChesney). I found this quote interesting because it talked about Dickinson's themes that she put into her poetry. It seems like she kept packing each and every theme into each of her lines in her poetry. Here is an example, "A Wounded deer leaps highest, I've heard the hunter tell; 'T is but the ecstasy of death, And then the brake is still" (Dickinson). Here she packs so much information just in the first couple lines of her poem "A Wounded deer leaps Highest". It has so much that you can get from in the first couple lines. She does not really rhyme in the first couple lines but she still has gotten to packing in the themes like I had said earlier in the blog. Emily Dickinson was a great poet during her time even though people did not know it and she is still a great poet to this day. Emily Dickinson will always be a great poet just by her having her own unique writing style.

Bibliography

McChesney, Sandra. "A View from the Window: The Poetry of Emily Dickinson." In Harold Bloom, ed. Emily Dickinson, Bloom's BioCritiques. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishing, 2002. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc.

Dickinson, Emily. "8. “A Wounded Deer Leaps Highest.” Part One: Life. Dickinson, Emily. 1924. Complete Poems." 8. “A Wounded Deer Leaps Highest.” Part One: Life. Dickinson, Emily. 1924. Complete Poems. Web. 20 Mar. 2012.

"Whitman and Dickinson Poetry." Byzantine Communications. Web. 20 Mar. 2012.

Reflection-Whitman Writing Styles

Walt Whitman's writing style was one of a kind. Him and Emily Dickinson were both amazing poets who had one of a kind poetry. Walt Whitman had a unique writing style. Whitman's poem lacked the structure that a regular poem would have. Whitman's poems would run on and on and there was no set length for his poems ("Whitman"). Whitman really did not like being very organized. He would just keep writing until he could no longer think about anything to write about. He just kind of ended when he wanted to end. I respect this very much because I personally do not like having a set amount of length and I just like to get it done with and however long that I like it to be. Whitman did just that. Another structure of Whitman's poetry is that it has no rhyme with it. I like poems that have rhymes. I do not really know why. A reason could be that it just makes the poem go so much smoother and it really puts together the poem in the end. I also find it more creative in a way because I know from my past experiences in the past and especially this year, because I remember a certain journal that we did having to do with writing a poem, that it takes a lot of thought to get that rhyme down and I find it more beneficial to you and other people to make sure you have a rhyme scheme. Walt Whitman though had his ways with getting to people and he became one of the best poets in the history of poetry. Other people might have differences, but I think he did a nice job with writing poetry. Here is a quote from a criticism that I had found about the writing style of Walt Whitman, "Also, Whitman diffuses his identity into various poses or characters, creating both distancing perspectives on himself" (Baurelein). I found this quote interesting because it does make sense now as to what he writes about or how he writes. He creates different perspectives on himself. He uses those perspectives and puts them into characters and has them view him. Walt Whitman to some people including our teacher Mr. Langley is called a "tweener" because he doesn't fit in with the Realism period or Modernism period. Here is a quote from one of his most famous poems that he has ever written O Captain, My Captain, "But O heart! heart! heart! O the bleeding drops of red, Where on the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead" (Whitman). Now here in this quote you can see he rhymes a little bit but not a whole lot. He has a different kind of writing style that can not be taken out and put into a different period. He is a very unique writer and he will always be one of the most memorable poets because of his unique writing styles that were big back in his time.

Bibliography

"Whitman and Dickinson Poetry." Byzantine Communications. Web. 20 Mar. 2012.

Bauerlein, Mark. "Whitman's Language of the Self." American Imago 44, no. 2 (Summer 1987). Quoted as "Whitman's Language of the Self" in Bloom, Harold, ed. Song of Myself, Bloom's Modern Critical Interpretations. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishing, 2002. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts on File, Inc.

Whitman, Walt. "O Captain! My Captain!, by Walt Whitman." Poetry Archive. Web. 20 Mar. 2012.

Walt Whitman Poem

For my last blog I have once again read the biography on Walt Whitman. "Walt Whitman found poetry in the lives of everyday Americans. He took daily walks to absorb the sights and sounds of Brooklyn and its people, especially blue-collar workers" (Whitman 340). This was interesting to me because I realized that this poem that I was about to read would be more of Thoreau than of Emerson if anything because Thoreau was more into how people were acting and their behaviors. Another quote that I had found interesting was "Whitman used his experiences as a reporter, teacher, laborer, and Civil War nurse to create his poetry" (Whitman 340). It was interesting to read this because it was cool to see where he might have gotten his writing styles from. It was also cool to learn about what he did before he was a writer and what he did to become one.

I read the poem by Walt Whitman On the Beach at Night. I did like this poem because it had both of the characteristics of Emerson and Thoreau. Here is an example of how Whitman somewhat wrote like Thoreau, "Weep not, child, Weep not, my darling, With these kisses let me remove your tears" (Whitman). This is somewhat like Thoreau's writing because Thoreau had focused on the behavior of people and how people should stick up for themselves and be self-reliant. The other author that we are talking about Emerson, he focused on nature and the setting of this poem is on the beach. Here is a quote to show you that Whitman had put some nature into his writing, "Up through the darkness, While ravening clouds, the burial clouds, in black masses spreading, Lower sullen and fast athwart and down the sky" (Whitman). This quote shows the writings of Emerson also because it talks about the nature that was surrounding this child and her father. This story showed a great deal of both Emerson and Thoreau's writings.

Bibliography

Whitman, Walt. "On the Beach at Night, by Walt Whitman." Poetry Archive. 2002. Web. 11 Mar. 2012.

Whitman, Walt. "Before You Read." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 340. Print.

Emily Dickinson Poem

I have once again read the biography on Emily Dickinson and I have to say it was very interesting. Here is a quote from the first sentence in the paragraph, "While Whitman experienced America and its people, Emily Dickinson observed the life of Amherst, Massachusetts, from her bedroom window, composing poetry that could turn the ordinary into the deeply meaningful" (Dickinson 340). I know that this quote does not make any sense right now, but with the poem that I read in after reading this it makes a lot more sense as to what I meant by that. I found it hard to believe that Dickinson had wrote 1,775 poems in her lifetime, buy only less than a dozen were published in her lifetime (Dickinson 340). I would hate to have that happen to me because you spend your whole life dedicated to reading and writing poetry and you write one thousand poems which is a huge milestone to hit. Back then she was pretty popular, but nowadays she is one of poetries best author. It is a shame that she was not able to stay alive in order to see all the recognition she was able to get to this day.

I read the poem The Lightning is a yellow Fork and I have to say I was a little bit sketched out when I read it the first time. It usually takes me a while to read poetry because it is confusing towards me. Around the third or fourth time I finally realized that I was thinking about it too hard. What I had said in the beginning of the blog, Dickinson observed from her bedroom window and wrote things down (Dickinson 340). This poem seemed to have come from that. It talks about lightning and how it fills up the sky. Here is a quote from the poem, "Of mansions never quite disclosed And never quite concealed The Apparatus of the Dark To ignorance revealed" (Dickinson 341). This is a great quote to go along with the story because it talks about how lightning is so electrifying and how it lights up the sky. This is similar to Emerson's type of writing style because they both love nature and adore looking at the outdoors and writing about it. I would think that Emerson would approve of this poem and would have liked to read it.

Bibliography

Dickinson, Emily. "The Lightning is a yellow Fork." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 340-341. Print.

To Build a Fire

I have once again read the Before You read again. I read about Jack London and what he did and wrote about. Jack London before he became famous and was a child, he lived a very tough life. Here is a quote to help out what I just said, "Born in 1876 in San Francisco to an unstable mother an a father who refused to claim him, London was raised mainly by a family friend and a stepsister. From the age of eleven, he worked to earn money to help put food on his family's table" (London 601). When I read this I was astonished to see that an eleven year old boy had to help put food on the table for his family. When he was born his parents did not even want him which I could not imagine that happening. Even though he had to support for his family basically his whole life from the age of eleven, he was "the country's first millionaire author" (London 601). This is a big accomplishment for London because coming from a family that really had nothing, he became famous and made a lot of money for him and his family.

When I read "To Build a Fire" I felt this sadness that came within me. The story is about a man who is stuck out in a blizzard and it trying to make a fire, but sadly is not working out for him. He tries to go against this blizzard which is nature and as you know nature always wins. He ends up dying and losing the battle between him and nature (London 614). He has a companion throughout the story and it is a dog. The dog is okay with the fact of the blizzard and the man does not like the fact that the dog is not fazed. Thoreau and Emerson envied nature and loved living out in the wilderness while London just hated nature and wanted nothing to do with it. There is one part of this story that I would like to point out and it is actually highlighted in the story, "There was the fire, snapping and crackling and promising life with every dancing flame" (London 610). This quote was big to me because the man kept fighting against nature to stay alive and this quote shows that by the fire going in and out. Like London said "promising life" (London 610) and this man is just hoping to stay alive during this blizzard. Thoreau and Emerson loved nature but they new the boundaries of nature and new the limits they would go with nature.

Bibliography

London, Jack."To Build a Fire." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009.601-614. Print.

Richard Cory

I read the beginning paragraph about the author Edwin Arlington Robinson. I have to say that it is quite a background that he has with him. It said in the paragraph that he had begun writing at an early age, and as a high school student he practiced intricate verse forms under the guidance of a local poet (Robinson 573). When I read this I noticed that he was very into poetry at a young age especially for being a high school student. It is incredible to think that he practiced poetry at that young of an age. Then I read that "He continued to write during the two years he attended Harvard University until family financial problems forced him to leave and return to a troubled home" (Robinson 573). When I read this I felt bad for him because I can not imagine the stress he was going through during this time. To top it all off I read, "Robinson's father died in 1892, and his mother died of diphtheria in 1896. One of Robinson's brothers became a drug addict, and the other became an alcoholic; both died early" (Robinson 573). When I read this I was overwhelmed to think of all the stress that this kid had gone through and still made it to be a successful poet. I had a feeling that the story that I was going to read tonight was going to be about death or something that had to do with his life story.

Let me say at the beginning of this story I was reading it and was surprised at the fact that there was no killings or deaths. Richard Cory was a man who was "a gentleman from sole to crown, Clean favored, and imperially slim" (Robinson 575). He was obviously a nice gentleman who like to keep himself clean. He was a gentleman who was rich and had it all going for him. He was "richer than a King" (Robinson 575), he was liked in the town that he was in, but there was obviously something missing in his life because at the end of the story "he put a bullet through his head" (Robinson 575). He was missing something in his life because he had everything going for him. Emerson and Thoreau would have seen his death as a waste of a life because they never wanted somebody to take there own life. They wanted people to live out there lives and live it to the fullest. Richard Cory had everything going for him, but there was something in his life that either was too much or he just could not find the missing piece. Emerson and Thoreau would have not liked to see Richard Cory's death to go to waste.

Bibliography

Robinson, Edwin Arlington. "Richard Cory." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 573-576. Print.

The Darling

When I first read this story I was really puzzled to try and find a theme or a plot inside the story. Truth is I really found no plot at all. The only thing I found during this story is a girl who complained about her life and would only listen to her husband and what he had to say. She never socialized with anybody and would not do anything unless it was with her husband. The first difference I saw between Chekhov and Emerson and Thoreau was that Chekhov wrote about a woman who would rely on other people to do the work for her and she never relies on herself to do the things that she needs to get done. Here is a quote from the story to get you going on what it was like living with this lady, "Who will look after me now, my darling? she sobbed, after burying her husband. How can I possibly live without you? I'm so wretched and unhappy! Pity me, good people, I'm all alone now..." (Chekhov 562). I typed this quote because of the fact that it shows how much she relied on her husband and now that he is dead she does know what to do. She says that she is all alone (Chekhov 562) and she has no one else to talk to when there is a ton of other people out there to listen and be friends with her. This goes against with every belief that Thoreau and Emerson had because they believed that you needed to rely on yourself and do not rely on other people which is clearly not the case here. Here is another quote from the story where it shows another showing as to how much Olenka relied on other people, "She wore a black dress with weepers, having vowed never to wear a hat or gloves again, went out seldom and then only to church or to her husband's grave, and lived at home like a nun" (Chekhov 562). Now this quote shows that the only interaction that Olenka got with other people is when she went to church or she went to go and visit her husband's grave. I found it interesting when the story read "and lived at home like a nun" (Chekhov 562) because nun's aren't allowed to marry people and they do not really interact with people very much outside of the church which is what is happening to Olenka. Overall, this story goes against every belief that Emerson and Thoreau had.

Bibliography

Chekhov, Anton."The Darling." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009.557-565. Print.

I Will Fight No More Forever

Before I read the story I read about the author of this speech. His name was Chief Joseph. Chief Joseph was chosen to be chief of the Nez Perce after his father died in 1871 (Chief Joseph 531). "The Nez Perce were more warlike than neighboring tribes, especially after acquiring the horse from the Plains Indians in the early eighteenth century" (Chief Joseph 531). This had given me an idea as to how or what the story was going to be about. I figured from just looking at the title that the story was going to be about how Chief Joseph did not want to fight any more. Here is another quote that helped me figure that out. "However, they had maintained peace with the whites for decades, ever since the Lewis and Clark expedition in 1805, which was their first significant contact with the whites" (Chief Joseph 531). That is just another quote as to how that helped me out with the story I was going to read. Overall, I have realized that by reading the biography on the author before you read the story is very helpful by the time you actually read the story.

When I first read this speech I felt kind of sad for Chief Joseph and his men and tribe. As he described, "The little children are freezing to death. My people, some of them, have run away to the hills and have no blankets, no food; no one knows where they are -- perhaps freezing to death" (Chief Joseph 533). This is just a couple sentences as to when Chief Joseph was explaining to the scout or whoever he was talking to that his tribe was slowly dying from everything that was happening to them whether it was them freezing to death or just not having enough food. He also explained in the beginning part of the speech that all of these tribe leaders were dead and there was basically no part in him trying to fight anymore (Chief Joseph 533). He was just done with fighting and he did not want to fight any longer. Thoreau would have been very angry with what the government was able to do to these people. He was already against government and Indians were people who were "lovers" of nature. Thoreau even went out into the woods to be with nature for two whole years. Thoreau had told us, "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach" (Wayne). Thoreau would have been very upset with the government being the way they were with treating the Indians this way.

Bibliography

Chief Joseph. "I Will Fight No More Forever." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 531-533. Print.

Wayne, Tiffany K., ed. "Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson." Critical Companion to Ralph Waldo Emerson: A Literary Reference to His Life and Work, Critical Companion. New York: Chelsea House Publishing, 2010. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc.

Spoon River Anthology

I have read the author's biography before I read the book once again and I learned a lot of interesting things about this guy. I learned that he was born in Petersburg, Illinois where I was at a basketball game tonight. I also learned that he had wrote a lot of other poetry coming from where he was. He wrote a lot on people's attitudes and kind of like what Thoreau's writings were. The second paragraph in this biography said, "The realism and irony expressed in Spoon River Anthology were at odds with the romantic and sentimental poetry popular at the time" (Masters 514). I typed this quote out because it talked about the story that I had read and it gave a little thought as to how it was written.

I read an excerpt of Spoon River Anthology and it was called The Hill. Each character in this story had a different characteristic associated with them. Here is a quote from the story to give you more of an idea as to what I am talking about, "Where are Elmer, Herman, Bert, Tom and Charley, The weak of will, the strong of arm, the clown, the boozer, the fighter? All, all are sleeping on the hill (Masters). Each one of them had a different behavior and that is the point that Thoreau was trying to get across to people. People are obsessed with making ourselves feel good and we really need to look at the big picture that is in front of us. This goes with the concept of Masters in this story that he has wrote. Here is another quote, "Of the horse-races of long ago at Clary's Grove, Of what Abe Lincoln said One time at Springfield" (Masters). I typed in this quote because I found it interesting that he put in Abe Lincoln, which is obviously a huge icon in our society today. Especially in Springfield, because he lived here and was such a huge icon. This is what I was going with when I typed in the beginning of the blog when I said that he wrote stuff in his stories that contributed to his lifetime in Illinois.

Bibliography

"Excerpt from." EReader.com:. A Barnes & Noble. Web. 02 Mar. 2012.

Masters, Edgar Lee. "Before You Read." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 514. Print.

Two Views of the River

I have once again read the beginning of the story where they talk about Mark Twain and his type of writing and his life. I never really knew that the part that I read had that much information. I did not really know that Mark Twain had changed his name after his real name was Samuel Langhorne Clemens (Twain 496). Here is a little bit of information on Mark Twain and his lifetime. "Samuel Clemens spent his early life in Missouri, chiefly in Hannibal on the west bank of the Mississippi River. Life there was full of adventure, but the death of Clemens's father when the boy was just eleven forced him to curtail his childhood escapades and his schooling in order to work as a printer's apprentice" (Twain 496). I would really like to focus on when the death of his father came around. If my father died at that early of an age, I would not know what to do about it. Twain was forced to work in a printing company. This company that he worked at probably gave him ideas as to continue his career in writing. To this day, there are still people reading his books and I even enjoyed reading this story that he wrote.

I find that Thoreau and Twain would have fit in nicely with each other because they both loved to talk about nature and the things around it. They loved to talk about and describe the environment and all sorts of things around them. Like in Twain's story "Two Views of the River", Mark Twain describes the river very intensely in this story, describing it as it is turning to the color of "blood, gold and also black and conspicuous when a log had floated in his view (Twain 504). Mark Twain did a great job with the description of nature in this story and he would of fit nicely with Thoreau's writings because they both looked at the beauty of nature and all the things around it (Harding). Overall, both of the authors really went into descriptive detail on each of their stories about nature and how they saw it.

Bibliography

Harding, Walter. A Thoreau Handbook by Walter Harding: pp. 131-173 (New York University Press, 1959). © 1959 by New York University Press. Quoted as "Thoreau's Ideas" in Harold Bloom, ed. Henry David Thoreau, Bloom's BioCritiques. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishing, 2003. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. 26 Feb. 2012.

Twain, Mark. "Before You Read." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 496. Print.

Twain, Mark. "Two Views of the River." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 504-505. Print.

From The Red Badge of Courage

I once again read the first page of this story and read about what we are in now. Instead of doing the Realism period we are going to do Naturalism now. Here is a quote from the first paragraph of this page, "Toward the end of the 1800's, however, a group of writers known as Naturalists, who were strongly influenced by Charles Darwin's scientific theory of evolution by natural selection, adopted the view that people had little control over their own lives" (492). I typed this quote in because it tells the reader, or us, about Naturalism. Naturalism is about how people have little control over their own lives (492). This sort of relates back to Thoreau and his writings in his story "Civil Disobedience" and how people are shaped by the behaviors that they present (Thoreau). That is what I found when I started to read the story "From The Red Badge of Courage."

I did not really understand this story at first. When I read it a second time I started to put the Naturalism period and the story together. It was about a middle class soldier who went through war as a "colorful" way. Crane described how the soldier had filled up with anger and went on the battle field and went through all the soldiers and how using his hands would have been better to satisfy his blood lust (Crane 493). This is the same as Thoreau because they both believed "human destiny was shaped by powerful forces, including heredity, social and economic pressures, and the natural environment" (Crane 492). I typed this quote because I found it interesting as to what naturalist believed in and this helped me put together the story and everything else in between. The story "from the Red Badge of Courage" it had a lot of Naturalistic things involved in it and it made the story that much more interesting. Overall, this story had a lot to do with Thoreau's writings and they both were Naturalists.

Bibliography

Crane, Stephen. "from The Red Badge of Courage." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 492-493. Print.

Thoreau, Henry David. "Thoreau's Civil Disobedience - with Annotated Text." The Thoreau Reader. Web. 25 Jan. 2012.

From The Awakening

To start out this blog I would like to say that I was reading the beginning part of the story again. I read a page ahead to maybe learn more about Realism and I did learn a little bit as to what Realists believe. Here is a quote from the beginning pages, "Romanticism's glorification of the imagination became unappealing to Realists, who wanted to explore the motivations, behaviors, and actions of real people" ( "Realism" 490). I typed this quote in this blog because it is talking about what the Realists believed in in the Realism period. I found it very helpful to me to realize what Realism was all about. It also helped me with comparing with what Realists thought and what the story was all about.

Here is what the story was about. It is about a girl crying, and why she was crying. That is what I got out of this story. I do not know about other people or how they saw this, but I could see this as a Romanticism story also. I found that this girl had a lot of description within the story. Here is a quote to demonstrate what I meaning by description, "There was no sound abroad except the hooting of an old owl in the top of a water-oak, and the everlasting voice of the sea that was not uplifted at that soft hour" (Chopin 491). This story also relates to Emerson's Nature story. His Nature story talked about the behaviors of people and how they react to things and the way people should act. This is relative to "The Awakening" because it talks about the girls behavior and how she is crying over something that she does not even know why (Chopin 491). In the story, "It was strange and unfamiliar; it was a mood" (Chopin 491). This is just describing as to what I was saying earlier when I said she did not know why she was crying. Overall, the two author's have the same kind of relation toward human behavior.

Bibliography

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. "Nature." Ralph Waldo Emerson Texts. Web. 06 Feb. 2012.

Chopin, Kate. "from The Awakening." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 491. Print.

"Realism." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 490. Print.

A Wagner Matinee

I will start out this blog by saying that I was not ready to jump to the Realism period. I had not really heard of the author we are learning about now. I was not sure what to do because I did not know how I would figure out how to find out about this author. So, I looked in the beginning part of the story and read about Willa Cather. Here is a quote from the beginning sentence, "Readers best remember Willa Cather for her portrayal of the pioneer life and landscape" (Cather 519). I typed this quote down because it makes sense as to what Emerson had focused on. Emerson wrote a story on nature and how the mind works. (Emerson) and that is what Cather also wrote about in her stories. That is a key characteristic that each one of these authors shared in part of their stories.

Now for the second part of my blog I will talk about the story "A Wagner Matinee." In the beginning of the story, the author shares with the reader that she received a letter from her Aunt Georgiana (Cather 521). He is very excited at first and gives good description on how excited he is to have received this letter. Also coming with her excitement was a nervous feeling because he wanted to make sure that he showed his Aunt on how good of a person he will be (Cather 522). I have never had that problem because one, I do not live on my own, and two I really do not care on how much a person thinks of me. Here is a quote from the story, "I felt suddenly a stranger to all the present conditions of my existence, wholly ill at ease and out of place amid the familiar surroundings of my study" (Cather 521). This quote shows how nervous he was to think that his Aunt might not approve of where he is living. So since his Aunt is coming over, he decides to buy opera tickets because he knows she loves music and always will. Emerson and Cather are alike because Cather brought music as an element and brought it to a whole new meaning while on the other hand Emerson brought nature as an element and also brought that to a new meaning. Both of these writers were great writers of their time.

Bibliography

Willa, Cather. “A Wagner Matinée.” Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 521-526. Print.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. "Nature." Ralph Waldo Emerson Texts. Web. 06 Feb. 2012.

An Occurrence at Owl Creek

From reading the beginning of this story I was reading the biography page of Ambrose Bierce who was the author of this story. The first sentence says, "Ambrose Bierce did not trust people. Nor did he trust governments, businesses, or churches" (Bierce 387). This sentence is a lot different from the thoughts or beliefs of Thoreau. It is different from the writings of Thoreau because Thoreau did not like the government that they were having. He wanted to change it and not totally take it away and as you can see from Bierce he did not trust the governments. Also coming from the first sentence of this quote was that Bierce did not trust people (Bierce 387). This is also a lot different from the beliefs of Emerson. Emerson believed in people relying on each other and they form there own world. As you can tell, Bierce was not a fan of some people. Ambrose Bierce was also called "Bitter Bierce" (Bierce 387) which was probably why he was called this because from the first sentence of this paragraph it seems like Bierce did not like anything in the world which is why he was called "Bitter Bierce". I found it funny to read his biography because of just the way he seemed to act.

I found this story sad but interesting at the same time. This story had some slavery in it and it goes against Emerson and Thoreau's beliefs again because they did not like slavery and this story had to do with slavery in the South. Peyton Farquhar is a plantation owner in the South in this story. While sitting on a bench a soldier comes up to him and says that there is an attack coming and they need to do something about it. He comes up with the idea that they need to blow up the bridge in order to buy a little time for them. So he agrees with the soldier to help him out and when they are about to blow up the bridge they get caught. In the story it said "any civilian caught interfering with the railroad, its bridges, tunnels or trains will be summarily hanged" (Bierce 392). Peyton died at the end and I found this story interesting but sad.

Bibliography

Bierce, Ambrose. "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 387-396. Print.

A Letter to His Family

When I first started to read this story I noticed that it was a letter saying that he wished for the best. Here is a quote from the story, "I will not, however, permit myself to believe, until all ground of hope is gone, that the fruit of his noble deeds will be destroyed, and that his precious advice and virtuous example will so soon be forgotten by his countrymen" (Lee 385). This quote really started to get me thinking about this story. It got me thinking because Lee is saying he will not give up on his country. Even though Unions have left and more are about to, he will not give up until the battle is over (Lee 385). This quote I also found inspirational to me because it takes a lot of courage to stand up to what you believe and to stand up against your country like that is great. "Then, if the border states are brought into the gulf of revolution, one half of the country will be arrayed against the other" (Lee 385). This quote I also found inspirational because he is talking about how things will be bad if the Unions will not go his way. As you can see I really did enjoy reading this story. One last thing to mention about this story is that Lee talks about the government and how he wants to make it better which totally goes against Thoreau's beliefs.

Thoreau's beliefs were that he wanted know part of any government. Which is a difference in between the two stories. Lee wants to better the government and Thoreau does not want anything to do with the government (Thoreau). Here is a quote from a criticism I found on Thoreau, "Thoreau's principal achievement was not the creation of a system but the creation of himself, and his principal literary work was, therefore, the presentation of that self in the form of a self-portrait" (Harding). Here the quote is stating that Thoreau believed in the form of a self-portrait (Harding), so people shape themselves. Overall, I really enjoyed reading this story "A Letter to His Family."

Bibliography

Harding, Walter. A Thoreau Handbook by Walter Harding: pp. 131-173 (New York University Press, 1959). © 1959 by New York University Press. Quoted as "Thoreau's Ideas" in Harold Bloom, ed. Henry David Thoreau, Bloom's BioCritiques. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishing, 2003. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. 13 Feb. 2012.

Lee, Robert E. “Letter to His Son.” Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 385. Print.

Thoreau, Henry David. "Thoreau's Civil Disobedience - with Annotated Text." The Thoreau Reader. Web. 25 Jan. 2012.

Ain't I a Woman?

When I first read this story I was really pulled into it by all the description she was using. She was complaining how white women get all this stuff and "Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain't I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm" (Truth 370). This quote really brought me into this story because it talks about how she is standing up for herself. She will not let anyone roll over her like she is some sort of animal. She said that she had "borne thirteen children, and seen them most all off to slavery" and she was mad at how white girls are "better" than black girls. In my opinion there was no difference between white and black people and it never should of happened the way it happened. Overall the story that I read gave me inspiration to see a black woman speak out against slavery. Another point I would like to add is that she spoke of how low the women are back then. Here is a quote "Then that little man in black there, he says women can't have as much rights as men" (Truth 370). The black woman is stating that men thought they were better than everyone else back then. To this day still there are men out there who think they are better than women and I think it is wrong. Luckily though it is not as bad as it was back then, like the black woman stated.

I read a criticism that read that Ralph Waldo Emerson had given a women's rights lecture in Boston in 1855 (Wayne). This was a big thing for a Transcendentalist to do back in the old days. Anyway, this relates to Truth's story because they are both speaking out against slavery and how bad it is. This would still have an effect on society today as a whole because women's rights are still a problem in today's society. They are much better than they were back then though.

Bibliography

Wayne, Tiffany K. "'Address at the Woman's Rights Convention'." Encyclopedia of Transcendentalism. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2006. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. 12 Feb. 2012.

Truth, Sojourner. "And Ain‘t I a Woman?." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 368-370. Print.

Swing Low, Sweet Chariot, Go Down, Moses, Keep Your Hands on the Plow

First I would like to start out this blog by talking about each and every one of the three poems we had to read. The first one I read was "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot" and the first thing I remember about this song is that we had sung it in first grade. We would always sing it and it would be a very catchy song. The other thing I remember about this song or at least I interpreted from it is that it is about angels coming down to take these people to heaven ("Swing Low" 346). Now on to the next one, Go Down, Moses. This story is about "letting the people go" ("Go Down" 347) and helping the kinds of people they have. The last story is Keep Your Hands on the Plow which is a very repetitive song and all three of these poems have a song with them.

"Emerson called an individual to be a believer in him or herself" (Brugman). I typed this quote on this blog because I wanted the reader to realize what Emerson saw in a individual. This quote also ties into the poems that we are currently reading. In Swing Low, Sweet Chariot, everybody believes and everybody is just singing to the angels who are coming down and taking them up to heaven. Here is a quote that I found from a criticism about Thoreau and Transcendentalism, "a Transcendentalist is one who believes that one can (and should) go beyond Locke in believing that all knowledge is acquired through the senses" (Harding). This quote is a good one because it talks about how Thoreau saw an individual. In Go Down, Moses, it talks about how the Lord told Moses what to do and Moses did do it. This is like Emerson who believed that somebody's voice was given to them by God and that is like Go Down, Moses where God is telling Moses what to do. This belief is also relevant in "Keep Your Hand on the Plow" because when "Paul and Silas shouted the Jail Doors opened and they walked out" ("Keep" 348). Overall in these poems they all had somewhat the same beliefs of Thoreau and Emerson.

Bibliography

Brugman, Patricia. "Individual and Society in 'Self-Reliance'." McClinton-Temple, Jennifer ed.

Encyclopedia of Themes in Literature. New York: Infobase Publishing, 2011. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts
On File, Inc.

"Go Down, Moses." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 347. Print.

Harding, Walter. A Thoreau Handbook by Walter Harding: pp. 131-173 (New York University Press, 1959). © 1959 by New York University Press. Quoted as "Thoreau's Ideas" in Harold Bloom, ed. Henry David Thoreau, Bloom's BioCritiques. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishing, 2003. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. 10 Feb. 2012.

"Keep Your Hands on the Plow." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 348. Print.

"Swing Low, Sweet Chariot." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 6. Print.

Cavalry Crossing a Ford

When I first read this story I did not really comprehend it that well. I got the meaning of it and the meaning of the story was that the cavalry or soldiers were crossing the river. Walt Whitman did a great job describing throughout his story. He talked about "their arms flash in the sun-hark to the musical clank" (Whitman 341), this quote just shows the detail that he put into the story to make it more effective to the reader. This description for me made me more into the story.

I would say that when Whitman wrote this story he was focusing on the ordinary man. This is sort of similar to Thoreau's writings because Thoreau believed throughout his life that "the common man can reform themselves and in doing so, reform the surrounding and the government" (Harding). Both of these writers had their own opinion on individual's. Thoreau would believed that each person would shape the environment around them and he also believed that the individual shaped the government. Here is another quote from "Calvary Crossing a Ford", "Behold the brown-face men, each group, each person a picture, the negligent rest on the saddles" (Whitman 341). This quote just basically states that Whitman definitely focused on man and wrote about the individuals. Like I said before Thoreau believed that we, or the individual, shape the environment around us and the government that we serve.

Now on to Emerson. Emerson served as basically a role model for Walt Whitman. I looked at the page before reading the story to see if it had something on Emerson and I found that Walt Whitman was inspired by Emerson. Here is the quote I found, "The poet has a new thought; he has a whole new experience to unfold; he will tell us how it was with him, and all men will be the richer in his fortune" (Whitman 340). I found this quote interesting because Whitman really loved Emerson and tried to be like him. In the end, I found that Whitman did kind of end up like Emerson with his writing.

Bibliography

Harding, Walter. A Thoreau Handbook by Walter Harding: pp. 131-173 (New York University Press, 1959). © 1959 by New York University Press. Quoted as "Thoreau's Ideas" in Harold Bloom, ed. Henry David Thoreau, Bloom's BioCritiques. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishing, 2003. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc.

Whitman, Walt. "Calvary Crossing a Ford." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 340-341. Print.

The Gettysburg Address

The Gettysburg Address is one of the most famous speeches of all time. I can remember all the way back in I think it was seventh grade where we had to recite the Gettysburg Address for extra credit points. I could not recite it all the way, but I still got the points. Anyway, the Gettysburg Address is probably one of the most famous speeches. Abraham Lincoln did a great job with describing the government and coming together as one.

The Gettysburg Address stated "Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure" (Lincoln 402). This is a great quote because the Gettysburg Address happened right in between the Civil War. Lincoln knows this war is bad, but we have to stick with each other and keep the government right where it is. Now this is different from what Thoreau's Civil Disobedience in a way that I will describe. Thoreau's story consisted of him saying that he did not want a government or for that matter a better one if anything (Thoreau). This is different from Lincoln's Gettysburg Address because Lincoln was all about the government. He was our sixteenth president, while Thoreau and Emerson wanted nothing to do with the government. Lincoln basically said that we or the nation need to stick together and get through this. Emerson's story was about how we relied on ourselves or individual work (Brugman). Lincoln's Gettysburg Address said basically that we needed to rely on each other to get through this war. You also need to rely on yourself, but the focus that Lincoln was trying to get to is that the government should have some say in the decisions people make in their everyday life. Another quote from Lincoln is "and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth" (Lincoln 402). This quote is just dealing with Lincoln and him saying that the government that they have there will not disappear during this war.

Bibliography

Thoreau, Henry David. "Thoreau's Civil Disobedience - with Annotated Text." The Thoreau Reader. Web. 25 Jan. 2012.

Brugman, Patricia. "Individual and Society in 'Self-Reliance'." McClinton-Temple, Jennifer ed. Encyclopedia of Themes in Literature. New York: Infobase Publishing, 2011. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc.

Lincoln, Abraham. "The Gettysburg Address." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 402. Print.

The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro

Let me just start out with this blog and say that I found this story to be inspirational. I found it inspirational because Douglass, who was a Negro, was talking about how great the men who wrote the Declaration were (Douglass). He said they were great men and all but he was talking about slavery also. I found this inspirational because it was very hard back then for a black man to go up against a bunch of white people and talk about slavery and how it affects the world. I just found it great to see a man like Douglass to step it up like that.

To start out here is a quote from the story, "The signers of the Declaration of Independence were brave men. They were great men, too great enough to give frame to a great age" (Douglass). I found this great because a black man who was talking in front of all these white people was brave enough to stand out and talk about the men who made the Declaration. He has a lot of respect for the men who wrote the Declaration. I am sure that the white people who are out in the crowd are not very pleased to here him speak. It took a lot of courage for him to stand up there and speak. Thoreau and Emerson are comparable to Douglass because they all wanted slavery to end. "You must either get rid of slavery or get rid of freedom"(Emerson), that is a quote from Emerson which states that he wants slavery to end. He does not agree with slavery or anything that has to do with it. "If you put a chain around the neck of a slave, the other end fastens itself around your won" (Baym), this is just another quote and how it portrays slavery.

What is different between the writers is that even though Emerson and Thoreau cared about slavery, Douglass really put his thought into it. Emerson and Thoreau did talk about it, but Douglass was the one living through it everyday of his life and he felt the need to go out and fight for his freedom. Overall, this story I thought was good.

Bibliography

Douglass, Frederick. "Africans in America/Part 4/Frederick Douglass Speech." PBS: Public Broadcasting Service. Web. 08 Feb. 2012.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. "Nature." Ralph Waldo Emerson Texts. Web. 08 Feb. 2012.

Baym, Nina, Ronald Gottesman, Laurence Holland, Francis Murphy, Hershel Parker, William Pritchard, Norton Anthology of American Literature, Second Edition. W. W. Norton and Company, New York: 1986.