The Namesake

Blog about one of questions for discussion.  Include quotations with page numbers. 


Well, I don't know what or where i get the questions for discussion from, so I am going to write about how I felt about the reading.  I actually enjoying the novel very much.  This story is about a Bengali couple who moves to America and is trying to find their identity.  The mother, Ashima is struggling to find her self identity in America.  She wants to go back to her home country because she doesn't know the American culture. She is also is pregnant, so she wants to be back home, where her family can help take care of the child.  She is "terrified to raise a child in a country where she is related to no one" (6). Even after she gave birth to her child, Gogol, and three years after she gave birth, she feels like she is trying to find her self identity.  She doesn't like the idea that her child is adapting to the American culture instead of raising her child as a Bengali.  The reason why she wants to hold on to her Bengali because she wasn't planning to live in America and raise a family.  Her husband, Ashoke was in Cambridge to finish up his education and leave the states after he got his education. But Ashoke got a job in America and did not want to leave his job or his income.  If Ashima did not meet Ashoke, she would of have a career of her own.  "Before she was married, she was working toward a college degree. ...She was nineteen, in the middle of her studies, in no rush to be a bride" (7).  But her parents and Asoke's parents had an arrange marriage for their children and that is the end of Ashima's dream.  This really robbed her dreams because within two weeks of meeting Asoke, she is already married to him.

"Faint"

Blog about your favorite song. Type out the lyrics and explain how the sounds and rhythm of the song work to enhance the meaning.  Explain why the song is important to you. 

Choosing a song for this blog took me awhile because I was debating in between five songs of my favorite songs.  I finally choose the song "Faint" by Linking Park. This song is featured in the album Meteora, which was released back in 2003.

Even though I do not listening to rap, Linkin Park does a good job incorporating rap with rock, which I like.  The rap is important because it states the theme.  The theme of the could be interpret in many different ways.  How I interpret the song can go for how a love or friendship relationship went wrong.  This song is important to me because I feel like a lot of my friendship ended poorly because a lot of these people went behind back, resulting them losing my trust. But a lot of theses 'friends' ended up of wanting to be friends again because they realize that they are needy and realize that I am a good friend.  But before I wanted to be their friends again, I tell them that they lost my trust and a lot of these people does not want to hear what I have to say.  They do turn their backs on me because they know what ever I say is true and is afraid of facing the truth.  I am a very straight forward person and a lot of people does not like that personality trait of mine.

The main chorus is when the 'rock' section of the song is played. I think that the group decided to use more of a rock influence on the main chorus because this shows how the group feels frustrated when certain people goes behind their backs.

"Faint"-Linkin Park 
I am a little bit of loneliness, a little bit of disregard
Handful of complaints but I can't help the fact
That everyone can see these scars

I am what I want you to want, what I want you to feel
But it's like no matter what I do
I can't convince you to just believe this is real

So, I let go watchin' you, turn your back
Like you always do, face away and pretend that I'm not
But I'll be here 'cause you are all that I've got

I can't feel the way I did before, don't turn your back on me
I won't be ignored, time won't heal this damage anymore
Don't turn your back on me, I won't be ignored

I am a little bit insecure, a little unconfident
'Cause you don't understand, I do what I can
But sometimes I don't make sense

I am what you never want to say but I've never
Had a doubt, it's like no matter what I do
I can't convince you for once just to hear me out

So, I let go watchin' you, turn your back
Like you always do, face away and pretend that I'm not
But  I'll be here 'cause you are all that I've got

I can't feel the way I did before, don't turn your back on me
I won't be ignored, time won't heal this damage anymore
Don't turn your back on me, I won't be ignored

No, hear me out now, you're gonna listen to me
Like it or not, right now, hear me out now,
You're gonna listen to me like or not, right now

I can't feel the way i did before
Don't turn your back on me, I won't be ignored

I can't feel the way I did before, don't turn your back on me
I won't be ignored, time won't heal this damage anymore
Don't turn your back on me, I wont be ignored

I can't feel, I won't be ignored, time won't heal
Don't turn your back on me, I won't be ignored

Elizabeth Bishop's "The Fish"

Blog about one poem that you read for today.  Explain its denotative and connotative meaning.  Discuss its use of imagery and/or figures of speech.  Use the checklists to help you think of what to analyze about the poem you selected.  Make sure you include specific quotes form the poem. 

"The Fish", written by Elizabeth Bishop, is about a fisher man who caught a fish.  Just by reading the title, the readers can concluded how the poem is about a fish and how the fish can represent many themes.  With this poem, the fish represented the life. When the fisherman caught the fish, the man so fascinated by the fish of how it appeared and behaved.  As the fish was hanging on the line in the beginning of the poem, the fish "didn't fight./ He hadn't fought at all./  He hung a grunting weight,/ battered and venerable/ and homely" (454).  By this description, this is quite amazing how the fish did not resist to be taken out of its natural environment.  Naturally, fishes will squirm around due to the fact that fish cannot breathe oxygen and will fight in every way to get into the water.  But, this fish was different because this fish already knew that he lost the fight and will shortly die.  This action can represent how the fish knows how there are always going to be a greater force that has the power to change one's course in life.  But, at the end of the poem, the fisher man let the fish go because man was so in the moment of observing the beauty of the fish and could not bear the fact that he could indeed end this beauty. 


Through the poem, Bishop describes the fish in great details from the "brown skin hung in strips/ like ancient wallpaper,/ and its pattern of darker brown/ was like wallpaper" and "the mechanism of his jaw," (455).  Bishop wanted to go in full details about describing this fish because she wanted the readers to have the visual image of how this fish looked like. When I was reading this poem, I felt as if the fish was in front of me. I was drawn into the detail of the fish because I imagined this fish to be a large fish while listening to "his gills were breathing in/ the terrible oxygen/-the frightening gills" (455). With this kind of effect on the readers, I wonder how the man's thought of about the details of the fish. I believe the affect on the man was more intensified because he was holding the fish in front of him, instead of reading the details. That is why he released the fish. 


Even though that the meaning the of the poem is depressing, this theme is balanced out about the value of life through the colors and body movements.  Bishop also went into great details of how the fish anatomy.  The man said how he "thought of the coarse white flesh/ packed in like feathers,/ the big bones and the little bones,/ the dramatic reds and blacks/ of his shiny entrails,/ and the pink swim-bladder" (455).  A part of life includes having a body.  With the fish, the man was fascinated by the fish because of the different anatomy.  The man probably have never seen a fish in this kind of manner or never considered the fact that he was in controlled of a destiny of a living object.  This ties into the colors of the poem.  Color in this poem is important because color help change the mood of the poem.  The mood of the poem is depressing. When Bishop wrote "rainbow, rainbow, rainbow", people automatically think of the typical colors that is found in a rainbow, like red, yellow, and green (456).  These colors are usually associated with good feelings, instead of depressing feelings.  So the readers can finish the poem on a happy note, instead of a sad note. 

"The Student Life"

“The Student Life”

Written by Nichole Kimbell

Ring ring goes the alarm clock

Wiping my face free of drool

Then it is off to school

Backpack is heavy like a rock

Studying in the library

I forgot to bring my paper

It could be with the draper

It could be in the pantry

Running to the parking lot

Drove back to my home

The paper was on the comb

Came back to school on the dot

For all this, class got cancelled.

What a day. Such a hassle. 

Poetry Blog

Write a blog entry about the person you sent your poem and how they reacted to it. 


I decided to sent a poem about a dangerous vampire who is on a hunt to my 14 year old sister, Allison.  She is currently in the cultural phase where vampires is consider 'cool'; and how vampires are not evil like the traditional image of the past. Her first obsession came from the Twilight series when she was about 11 years old. Since then, the only novels that she reads is about 'nice' vampires who comes to the recuse of saving innocent mortals humans.

The poem, "The Vampire" written by Conrad Aiken, is about a group of people who is running away from vampire who is trying to kill them. The people describe this vampire who as "basilisk eyes so ominous,/ With mouth so sweet, so poisonous."With this description, these people were afraid for their lives, but did not survive.  Aiken wrote how the "innocent souls turned carrion birds/ To perch upon the dead./ Sweet daisy fields were drenched with death,/ The air became a charnel breath,/ Pale stones were splashed with red".  This poem really portrays how vampires were first portrayed as when Dracula first came out, compared to vampires today, where  vampires shines in the sunlight.

Allison really enjoyed this poem because not only the poem incorporated her favorite themes, vampires, into a style of writing that she does not like to read. She told me how she thinks how the theme of the poem is about how people is constantly fighting with one another and how in the end, the result usually ends in violent.  But on the other hand, she liked how the poem flowed. There is a lot of rhyme that made the flow of the poem really fluid.  This poem reminded her how these fictional characters were like when they first came out.

The Glass Menagerie

How do you feel about these characters? You may focus on one character or discuss more than one. Include quotations from the play to illustrate your points. 

Through the play, I felt that the characters: Tom's, Laura's, and Jim's character revolved around Father.  In this play, one of the main themes was the lack of family structure and the lack of having the fatherly and husband figure in the family. With this lack, the family members have to fill in the missing traditional roles that the father/ husband have to fulfill or are in need of the fatherly figure.  That is why the family fell apart by the end of the story.  But with Amanda, she is living with her dream of being able to go back in time and chose a different future for herself.  She is trying so hard for Laura not making the same mistake as she chose when she was younger.

In many ways, Tom is the head of the family. He is the one who has a job and a steady income.  But he hates living at his home because he feels the pressure to bring the money home to support the family. Amanda pressures him not to spend his own hard worked money on movies every single night.  She does not want him to “jeopardize the security of [the family]” (1006). But he told Amanda that he does not want to “spend fifty-five years down there in that-celotex interior! with- fluorescent-tubes! Look! [He] rather somebody picked up a crowbar and battered out [his] brains- than go back mornings” (1007).  He even said that he is like his father in many ways because he is “the bastard son of a bastard (1029).  Even Amanda told him that Tom reminds her of her ex husbands.  She told him that “more and more [he] remind [her] of [his] father! He was out all hours without explanation-Then left! Goodbye” (1013). Tom even is planning to run away like his father because he wants adventures in his life.  That is why he goes to the movies every single night because “adventure is something that [he] don’t have much of at work, so [he] goes to the movie” (1012). Amanda desire of wanting a husband like figure in the story really drives Tom away from the family because Amanda does not allow him of doing what he wants to do with his life.  Amanda’s expectation of him pushes Tom to be like his father because there is a good possibility that Amanda put the same expectation on her ex husband.  That is probably the reason why both characters ran away from the house because both characters could not stand living with Amanda. 

Laura has insecurities problems because she is crippled and needs the reassurance from a fatherly figure who tells her that she is beautiful despite her disabilities.  She put her disabilities as an excuse for not being more outgoing, more motivated to receive an education, or achieving any personal goals.  When Tom and Amanda were talking about Laura, Tom told Amanda how “in the eyes of others-strangers-she’s terribly shy and lives in the world of her own and those things make her seem a little peculiar to people outside of the house…She lives in a world of her own-a world of-little glass ornaments, Mother… She plays old phonograph records-and that’s about all” (1021).  But when Jim came over, he told her “somebody needs to build [her] confidence up and make [her] proud instead of shy and turning away…” (1043). That is why Tom was such a significant role in this play because Laura needed a character like Tom.

Jim does represent Father and the fatherly figure in many ways.  He represents the fatherly figure because he is the one who told her how everyone has problems, including himself.  Jim told her how “everyone has problem, not just you [Laura], but practically everybody has got some problems. …For instance, [Jim] hoped when [he] was going to high school that [he] would be further along at time, six years later, ...” (1037).  On the other hand, he is very similar to Father.  He took an interest in Laura by telling her that she is very pretty and actually kissed her.  But he did not lead her on because he told the entire family that he was engaged with another woman, Betty.  Jim did not want Laura to have the same faith as her mother did because that is what happened with the Wingfield family, where the husband leaves the mother with the children.  

Tim O'Brien

Blog about "The Things They Carried".  What is the story saying about the theme of war? Include specific quotes to backup your points.  


By reading the title, "The Things They Carried", can give the readers a prediction of what the story is going to be about.  In this story, it is about Lieutenant Jimmy Cross who is serving in the Vietnam War. The theme of this story is the how war takes an emotional toll on these young soldiers and how being away from their love ones carries either a toll or a transformation of their personalities for the better.   The protagonist, Lieutenant Cross,  said that he was 24 years old.  Being this young and having to serve the army carries a lot of responsibilities.  One of the responsibilities to act more mature beyond what is expected of a 24 year old, instead of doing what most college graduates are doing at the same time.  But his oblivious love relationship between Cross and a young female, Martha, help keep him get rid of the responsibilities to act more mature.  By the age of 24 years old, most people are thinking about marriage and sharing a life with someone.  So this relationship is important because Cross thinks that Martha is a glimpse of hope and motivation to stay alive.  He thought that she is waiting for her knight in shining armor to come back from war.  This relationship helps Cross to act more like his age instead of acting twice his age because when he thinks about Martha, he thinks that he can be in a better place instead of having to worry about the risk of dying every single day. Through the story, she sends Cross letters and a good luck charm and how "she ha found the pebble on the Jersey shoreline, precisely where the land touched water at high tide, where things came together but also separated" (345).  So through the war, Cross is carrying letters and a good luck pebble to help get his mind off the situation that he is in.  This relationship helped keep his mind off what the situation is like in Vietnam.  He rather be "walking barefoot along the Jersey shore, with Martha" (345), instead of "[carrying] lice and ringworm and leeches and paddy algae and various rots and molds" (348).  He "loved her more than anything, more than his men, and now Ted Lavender was dead because he loved her so much and could not stop thinking about her" (344). This friendship is important because he feels that he is loved and he thought that a person is waiting for him.  Also, this shows that Cross is mentally strong because even though that he thinks there is someone who is in love with him; he is still more willing to give up his life for the sake of the country.

But near the end of the story, he realize that he Martha does not love him.  This emotional transformation made Cross a stronger person.  I felt that Cross transformed into an adult because before, I felt that Cross needed a lot of affection like a child and he took the letters from Martha as love letters where he can be emotionally attached to someone. I felt that he needed someone to talk to and he felt that Martha would understand his  emotional needs.  In a way, Martha also represented this idea that she represented home because in her letters, she will write about how her life is like in college.  So Cross did not lose the connection to home. Also, his position in the military had a large impact on his emotional development. I feel that having the title of lieutenant by the age of 24 is overwhelming because he is such a young guy with so many responsibilities. But he realize that he can not blame Martha for the lost of Ted Lavender.  She took such a large part of his mental stage during the war that he could never focus on what his job responsibilities are.  He realize that she would never understand because she "had never mentioned the war, except to say, Jimmy, take care of yourself.  She wasn't involved.  she signed the letters Love, but it wasn't love, and all the fine lines and technicalities did not matter" (354).  Cross soon realize that he could not relay on someone else who does not understand the emotional pain of losing a person during war.  Cross realized that he has to rely on personal strength to be able to make it to the end of the story.  He knew that he forgot that he has duties to fulfill and "was now determined to perform his duties firmly and without negligence.  It wouldn't help Lavender, he knew that, but from this point on he would comport himself as an officer... He would accept the blame for what had happened to Ted Lavender.  He would be a man about" (354-55). This shows that he transformed into an adult and is taking responsibilities for his stupidity.