rleung1′s Blog

At first i thought the poem read as they feed thy lion, so i thought something is being fed to the lions maybe some sort of animals? thats why this the line “They Lion grow” didnt make sense to me. After the class discussion i feel i understand the poem a little more. It is about the clash of middle and lower class. The lower class is where Levine use to be, but after leaving Detroit she returns as a middle class person and she is now the sheep that is being eaten in the poem. The lions are these lower class people and they are the people eating the middle class.

"madness, starving hysterical naked"

"crazy & publishing obscene odes on the windows of the skull"

"facts and memories and anecdotes and eyeball kicks and shocks
of hospitals and jails and wars,"

"  suffering Eastern sweats and Tangerian bone-grind-ings and migraines"

"who wandered around and around at midnight in the
              railroad yard wondering where to go, and went,
              leaving no broken hearts"
" who thought they were only mad when Baltimore
              gleamed in supernatural ecstasy,
       who jumped in limousines with the Chinaman of Okla-
              homa on the impulse of winter midnight street
              light smalltown rain,"
who howled on their knees in the subway and were
              dragged off the roof waving genitals and manu-
              scripts,
who walked all night with their shoes full of blood on
              the snowbank docks waiting for a door in the
              East River to open to a room full of steamheat
              and opium,
who cut their wrists three times successively unsuccess-
              fully, gave up and were forced to open antique
              stores where they thought they were growing
              old and cried,
   who sang out of their windows in despair, fell out of
              the subway window, jumped in the filthy Pas-
              saic, leaped on negroes, cried all over the street,
              danced on broken wineglasses barefoot smashed
              phonograph records of nostalgic European
              1930s German jazz finished the whiskey and
              threw up groaning into the bloody toilet, moans
              in their ears and the blast of colossal steam
              whistles,
who drove crosscountry seventytwo hours to find out
              if I had a vision or you had a vision or he had
              a vision to find out Eternity,
who demanded sanity trials accusing the radio of hyp
              notism & were left with their insanity & their
              hands & a hung jury,
Visions! omens! hallucinations! miracles! ecstasies!
              gone down the American river!
       Dreams! adorations! illuminations! religions! the whole
              boatload of sensitive bullshit!
       Breakthroughs! over the river! flips and crucifixions!
              gone down the flood! Highs! Epiphanies! De-
              spairs! Ten years' animal screams and suicides!
              Minds! New loves! Mad generation! down on
              the rocks of Time! 

The poem starts off talking about madness is acting crazy in away then as the poem
progress this madness gets more graphical in sense people are doing strange things
and hurting themselves and do all sort of irrational actions. All of this truly represent
madness as actually being mad and showing how the world is distorted and crazy.
At first i saw it as madness as crazy madness, but as i read it a few more times
it seems that this madness is almost like a release and breaking the social norm.
People who are refine and educated would never yell and run around, so they are
restricted and would never experience the same emotions as these so called mad
people. The reason these people act crazy is because they want to achieve a greater
understanding of the world, a understanding that is beyond books and research.
The understanding they are trying to achieve is a understanding about life.Ultimately
these mad people are the ones that have true experiences and they are the ones
that have to greatest mind because they understand these experience by actually
putting themselves out their to experience it while those who are refine would never
get this knowledge because they would never act like these mad people.

 

Loyalty  is the key to trust because if one cannot stay loyal to their own words then there cannot be trust. The reason loyalty is so important in this is community because its the only thing that keep them from trust each other as an community. This area is known for having illegal immigrants, so if someone in the community would report this information then it would harm others. During this time period immigrants weren’t completely accepted by the American public because it is these immigrants that is willing to work for cheap wages and taking the jobs from American people. That is why the community has to stay strong as a whole because they only have each other.

Eddie is suppose to be the big man who takes in immigrants, but when there is a person taking his spot light and taking what belongs to him then his pride is hurt. This book is mainly about Eddie’s pride thats what this book should be called because everything he does is trying to get back what he has lost to this new young man that arrive to take his Cathrine.

Obviously Eddie’s loyalty was tested because he no longer could do anything about Cathrine and he knows he will lose her. So, the only thing he can do call the immigrant police to get rid of his problem. I’ve experienced the same thing when i was in middle school. A friend pushed me in the halls and i hit someone. It was meant to be a joke of some sort, but we were caught be the yard duty who was hanging around the hall. She said no fooling in the halls and to teach us a lessen she wanted us to write lines. The guy i bummed into knew i was pushed so he told me to tell the yard duty who pushed me. I was really reluctant because the person who pushed me was my friend. I mean if i told her, that guy and i don’t have to write lines instead the friend who pushed me had to write 500 long sentences as a punishment. Both of them told me to tell who did and finally i cracked under the pressure. The yard duty told me that she would make sure it was anonymous but i felt really low. To make a long story short not that this is short, my friend found out i snitched and it is quite obvious and gave me a wtf look. This is one of those face palm/f my life situation. Everyone was like omg and wtf and u get the picture, at me because i snitched on a friend. I lost some friends that day, but to my surprise i didnt lose that friend who i snitched on, we did one of those bro hugs and thats was that.

“Come on back in the shade,” he said. “You mustn’t

feel that way.”

“I don’t feel any way,” the girl said. “I just know things.”

“I don’t want you to do anything that you don’t want to do –”

He went out through the bead curtain. She was sitting at the table and smiled at him.

“Do you feel better?” he asked.

“I feel fine,” she said. “There’s nothing wrong with me. I feel fine.”

This story is rather ambiguous because at first the girl was unsure of what she wants and reluctant to agree that the American’s way is right because of the knowledge she possess, but leaving her awhile it seem that everything clicked for her. The whole story is this couple being indecisive yet after leaving her awhile she comes up with an answer. I am really curious about what she decided because that is open to interpretation. Repetition is constantly being used which almost brings about the though of double consciousness. On one hand, the girl can mean one thing, but there are meaning behind her words. The whole i don’t care about myself then i’m fine is rather contradicting. Ultimately, I am confused because nothing seem to be solved in the end i mean did she decided to keep the baby or have an abortion, i just don’t know.

Modern art seems is an expression of the self. The meaning behind art is influenced by your surrounding for artist like Robert Chanler to the many artist out there. It is their surrounding that creates their point of view and it is through this point of view that creates the art that they create. Every artist has their own unique style due to this difference in up bringing that is why art is so diverse and constantly expands. People back in the old days may not experience the same influence as we do today therefore their expression of art is different.

Also the types of paint used in a painting further expands upon this idea of self expression. Part of this idea of consciousness or how they feel inside like the different paints. Water color, drawing, pastel and many more all influence the perception the artist is trying to portrait. In a way their is a type of double consciousness because their is a painter who is creating art and the person who experience and becomes influence by art. When they two entity meres it creates art because with influence and painter come together there is the perception that is created to form art.

Whether it is painting or sculpture, they both forms  of  art that seeks to  show  the artists perception of how they see the world. All their art will be based on how they see the world. So art almost allows people to place themselves in another person’s shoe. The whole purpose of art is the expression of the self, showing others how one perceive the world. With the creation of this art the consciousness or feeling will remain forever because one people look upon that work then they might comprehend this feeling that the artist put out.

All in all, what is modern art? it is a way people express themselves, creating a consciousness to allow people to perceive the world in their eyes. Everything about the piece of art they create is a way the artist is expressing their feelings. The paint, the clay, and so on is part of their way of expression.

Oh Carrie, a innocent country girl who uses other to move up the social later. You came to the city to live with your sister, but what you’ve experience is something so much more. Meeting Drouet was the first step you took to take control of your life and change the image of yourself forever. It is through Drouet, you begin to meet people of importance. Instead of losing simply lose your purity to Drouet, you used him to meet other people of importance. One in particular is Hurstwood, a man who you considered more dashing than Drouet due to status. Your heart drifted to him because of the material and what he can offer you. No your not a fallen women in the least. You climbed up the social ladder by being resourceful. There is two course of event that would happen to a woman like you as I mention before. Either you go up in ranks or you are a fallen woman. And its is obvious that you went up in ranks.

Although it may be true that the narrator is free from her husband john. she states she walks over him and that in away may represent how she is above him now. But at the same time she feels disappointed that her husband is like that and in away she lost someone close to him. there must have been a reason for their marriage and she must love him alittle to have gone through the marriage. Now the man she love is there and she might feel sad that it turned out the way it did. So she is happy she got her freedom, but at the same time she lost something that was once valuable to her.

Tell all the Truth but tell it slant –

Success in Circuit lies

Too bright for our infirm Delight

The Truth’s superb surprise

As Lightning to the Children eased

With explanation kind

The Truth must dazzle gradually

Or every man be blind –

Success in Circuit lies

Circuit is a process of going around or moving in a sense. Dickinson might be suggesting that one has to be constantly moving in order to achieve success. Going around in a circle requires to starting point and returning to the same starting point. This might show how one much experience the world before they can understand success.

Too bright for our infirm Delight

This again refers back to the motifs that Dickinson uses in her poems. This issue of light maybe representing the truth. And the fact that the light is too bright could mean and individual is unable to handle the truth.

The Truth’s superb surprise

superb means excellent, so the truth is an excellent surprise? The truth is so shocking that it is a pure shocking moment.

As Lightning to the Children eased

This example of lighting again refers back to the motif, but Dickinson uses children being started by lightning as an example of how shocking the truth can be.

With explanation kind

This might be referring to the children being scared as reason to prove that people will be just as surprised by the truth

The Truth must dazzle gradually

The truth must be revealed gradually, at a certain pace where  individuals slowly take in the information that is presented to them

Or every man be blind –

Only then will people begin to understand the truth. If people are exposed to the truth all at once it might be too overwhelming.

Observation:

Dickinson uses a lot of light motifs probably trying to show a type of relationship with light and truth. How they both are hard to see.

The success she describes in her poem could mean understand the truth and grasping the bigger picture in life.

She makes it sound like the truth is overwhelming.

The I vesus crowd is Whitman’s way of posing the problem between man vesus man. He does not know these people that he is seeing because he calls them the crowd. In Whitman’s previous work he has stated in a way that he wants to know all the people around him. In this situation whitman does not know these people which is  a problem. As for the I vesus tide, it represents a conflict between man vesus nature. There is a type of challenge that man must face much like the problem Whitman is facing with the crowd. All these problems are ultimately solved in the end because Whitman way states that no matter what happens or who these people are they all have somethings in common. We share the same sky ground, and bascially all of nature. So no matter what we are all connected.

The one thing i liked the most about this assignment is it allowed me to relate to the text. By looking for the picture i was trying to make sense of a phrase and convey the way i feel about the text. I can’t really think of anything that i dont like about the assignment. I learned that there are many interpretation about the whitman’s essay and I for one feel like i understand that phrase alittle more than i would have if i did not do the assignment. I dont feel like there is a need to change the assignment because its goal is to allow readers to relate to the text and i think it complete that job.