Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Journal #2: Animal Story

At one time there was a kind and gentle deer and a very rude snake. The deer was kind to everyone she encountered and was loved throughout the forest by all the smaller creatures like the squirrels, the chipmunks, and the birds. Even the grumpy old bear thought that the deer was nice. On the opposite end of the spectrum the snake was a very mean animal. He would often eat the smaller animals and treat everyone very badly. One day while out and about the snake encountered a large bird known as the eagle. The eagle was tired of the snake eating all of his smaller friends so he attacked him. After a fierce battle the eagle flew off and the snake was hurt very badly. He knew he would not last long but he tried to make it back to his home. At the same time the deer was out walking in the forest. She saw the wounded snake slithering back home and asked him what had happened. He told her to go away and mind her own business but she persisted and eventually ended up taking him back home to take care of him. It took him many days to recover but eventually he was back and stronger than ever. Because of how well the deer treated him he decided to change his ways and be nicer to everyone he encountered. He promised to never eat the smaller animals while he was roaming about and eat fruits and berries to survive from now on. The deer treated the snake kindly and did not care about his previous behavior only treating him as she treated everyone else, which not one of the other animals had ever done for him, and thusly being treated so well changed the snake from being such a mean and spiteful animal into another kind animal in the forest. The hospitality and courtesy of the deer had a massive and positive affect on the snake and changed him for the better.

Friday, August 27, 2010

Journal 1: Culture of the Native Americans

Native American culture is far from a specialty of mine but I do have a bit of knowledge in the area. My main knowledge is on the culture of the Aztecs, Incas, Mayans, and Olmec and those inhabited Central America and the Yucatan Peninsula. The Aztec culture was my favorite to learn about because of their ritualistic sacrifices. The Aztec priests were actually so specialized at ripping out a man's heart they could do it so quickly that the heart would still be beating after they ripped it out. It took 5 priests to sacrifice the person and it was usually a prisoner of war. Four of them would hold them down and the last would use an obsidian dagger to tear open the chest and tear out the victim's heart. They sacrificed them because they thought that the sun god and and serpent god Quezocaotal demanded sacrifices to keep the sun rising. If they did not sacrifice enough people then the gods would not allow the sun to rise and their crops would be destroyed. The Aztecs were a very violent group going to war to gain prisoners. When they fought they tried only to incapacitate their opponents so they could either use them as slave labor or sacrifice them to the gods. They had two pyramids in their capital city of Tenochtitlan that were dedicated to their sun god. The pyramids were the largest buildings in the city and they only usually used one to sacrifice their prisoners. Many of the commoners were farmers or fishers who lived in the city of Tenochtitlan fishing from the lake their city rests on. Holy men were the most revered people in their city and below them on the social ladder were their warriors who wore the pelts of jaguars or eagles that they killed. Depending on the skin they wore they were known either as Eagle or Jaguar warriors. The city of Tenochtitlan is now where the city of Mexico City stands.

Thursday, August 26, 2010

Symbolism Journal

Symbolism is a very powerful literary tool. Every single author who has written a story has in one way another included symbolism in their writing. It could be as basic a symbol as a lion representing courage, or in the case of Hemingway using several Christian themes and incidents to symbolize the events in his novel The Old Man and the Sea. I'm usually a fan of symbolism in most cases because authors can usually convey it in a clever and very original way. Most symbolism it seems to me is very original but after a while some religious symbolism can be overdone and cliched. For example when I was reading and analyzing Grapes of Wrath I was pretty sick of symbolism at that point and when I found something that to me looked like symbolism for something else, I simply found it old and uninteresting sometimes even annoying. That's a very bad quality to have however because most symbolism is veiled thinly and used so brilliantly in a novel to further help it's point across. Symbolism is not a thing to strain and agonize over analyzing, but something to enhance and enrich the journey of reading the book. In the case of a novel like Fahrenheit 451 the symbolism is so brilliantly crafted in the novel that some won't even recognize it until afterward reading of Bradbury's viewpoints on censorship and the media. Symbolism enriches novel's in many ways often adding more qualities to the protagonist or antagonist or relating the plot to well known events in history. It is a great and necessary tool that all authors must master to become successful.

Sunday, August 22, 2010

Grapes of Wrath: Socialism

At the time of the novel's release the socialist party of America was actually becoming pretty popular. The average worker was pretty enticed by the idea of socialism despite the fact that as we know a perfect socialist state is virtually impossible due to corruption and the inability of man to share power, at the time it struck them all as a pretty cool idea and one that they could easily get behind. The novel took a pretty sympathetic view on the poor man, and your average worker because of the main characters being a family down on their luck and forced to move out of their homestead and state in hopes of striking it back over in California. Due to this sympathetic and realistic portrayal of the poor and it's never before seen point of view critics and other people were pretty angry at Steinbeck. The book got publicly banned in a few places and some people even bought it just to burn it (yea that will show him let's increase his book sales.) Political correspondents attacked the book calling it rubbish and a simple tool of communist propoganda to indoctrinate the common citizen against the United States government so that the Socialists could take power and run America right into the ground. Evidently stupidity and ignorance have been in America much longer than just today which is a relief. The fact that they could interpret such things from such a boring and plain novel is just amazing to me. It's just a statement on how much people's lives sucked back then and he gets called a communist in that day and age? He should be lucky he didn't write and release the novel when McCarthism was going on or he would have been straight out of luck. Anyway the point is that if people try hard enough they can just pull out anything from a book and call it what they want or say that it represents something in even the most minuscule of fashion which just amazes me that people have the capability to be so stupid some times.

Grapes of Wrath: Rose of Sharon

Alright well aside from having a pretty awesome name and sharing it with one of my favorite songs albeit with different spelling, there is very little about Rose of Sharon that I actually liked. She was a dreamy teenage girl before the pregnancy and afterward she becomes reclusive and hardly ever talks. Due to this she really doesn't talk all too often but when she does it's usually a pretty important statement, or something along those eyes. She is Tom Joad's younger sister and the daughter of Ma and Pa Joad. I don't know why she escapes with such an awesome name when everybody else gets names like Tom, Ma, Pa, Noah, and John but hey whatever not like I named the characters. In the novel Rose of Sharon kind of plays a type of symbol for the Virgin Mary and the whole immaculate conception jazz because Steinbeck likes to put those oh so subtle religious symbols and themes into his novel. I really just didn't like Rose of Sharon because to me I couldn't really relate to her at all which I suppose is a good thing, but the whole being so reclusive aspect really made me kind of dislike her. And then the episode at the end of the novel where she feeds the stranger by breastfeeding him, while being all noble and a very thinly veiled symbol for the capability of mankind's regrowth and being able to treat it each other right despite all of our faults just struck me as pretty weird. I guess it's just a thing of living in the modern age but the image of this teenager suckling a grown man to keep him alive just seems a bit odd to me, but hey whatever. I guess the main reason for me not liking Rose of Sharon was that she was written to symbolize the Virgin Mary and stay there to give hope to the family that despite all the terrible events that happened the human capability and beautiful ability to give birth and sustain life was there to keep them going and stuff, but that just struck me as really cliched.

Grapes of Wrath: Symbolism

Oh boy another post on symbolism joy, oh happy happy joy. Alright I'll try and contain my happiness and excitement as I write this. The main symbol that I found in this novel was that of Rose of Sharon's pregnancy, oh and guess what it's ANOTHER religious symbol. God I'm getting tired of Christianity in every novel I read. What about the Hindus guys? Can they get some lovin here? Anyway Rose of Sharon's pregnancy is sort of like the immaculate conception in that we don't know who the father is and she herself represent hope, goodness and the ever present chance for redemption, or something along those lines. The way the baby is born and is discarded (it's a stillborn) is reminiscent of Moses being sent down the Nile. Not in the fact that Moses was stillborn (he wasn't) but the whole being sent down a river in a basket thing. That's the main relateability to the bible here. It has also just occurred to me that this event happened in the Old Testament so therefore we have a reference to both Judaism and Christianity, oh boy. I still don't get why nobody pays attention to the Hindus but whatever. The whole representing The Virgin Mother thing by having some holy woman who is representative for redemption has been so played out for me by this stage I don't even care. I hate religious symbols and undertones in novels and at this stage the abundance of references to the Holy Bible are just getting on my nerve. Oh my gosh Steinbeck you're trying to make a statement on the redeemability of mankind despite all the terrible and tragic things that we have done to each other and our capability for destruction that is just SO original and I have never read ANYTHING similar to that idea at all. I really just don't like religious undertones in my novel because I feel that they kind of distract from the thing I'm reading. Blegh. I hate this book.

Grapes of Wrath: Tom Joad

Tom Joad is the protagonist of the Grapes of Wrath and I didn't really like him whatsoever. Not once did I feel myself being concerned for Tom's well-being or if I even cared if he lived or died. He was not a relateable character whatever I felt. He starts the novel as just being released from prison for four years after he is paroled from homicide. He starts off by telling us that prison changed him into living for the moment and only being concerned with his survival for the day, which in my opinion is just a stupid philosophy to have. Eventually he changes his way of looking at life into one for bettering his life and having a more positive outlook on the future but seeing as how that was the only logical and seemingly sane version for the character to progress I wasn't impressed at all. Seriously the novel was just a straight forward ride the entire time with nothing surprising happening at all. It seems like half of the events in the plot and through character development could be pretty easily seen and predicted which gives the book too much of an air of predictability, which I don't enjoy in my novels. I like being surprised by happening in my novel or character progression happening do to important events in the book that not only affect the character, but they give me a feeling of having witnessed what just happened, or some jazz along those lines. I honestly didn't like any of the characters in this novel and Tom Joad was one of my least favorites due in fact to his massively obvious character development and the fact that I couldn't relate to him in any way shape or form. In fact I really don't think he was a good protagonist for this novel in any way shape or form that comes to mind. I really just didn't like this book at all as you can tell and most of these blogs are going to be me picking apart every little nuance that I can find that annoys me.

Grapes of Wrath: Opening Thoughts

Alright, I'm going to be completely honest here. The only novel I have ever disliked more than this novel was Wuthering Heights. I wouldn't go so far as to say I absolutely hated this book (only that trash by Bronte deserves that tag) but the list of things I enjoyed about this novel is so few it's not even funny. Honestly one of the only things I liked about the book was the character Rose of Sharon's name. And that's only because one of my favorite songs is called Rose of Sharyn which I thought could have been a reference to the character in this novel. It wasn't however and I was severely disappointed by this. The writing style of the novel was one of the main things that turned me off right away. Now I'm all for making the story atmospheric and really getting the reader into the world but good lord did Steinbeck take it over board. The amount of trivial and extremely boring stuff he added in was so unessential it wasn't even funny. I think the only good thing to ever come out of this novel being written was the South Park parody episode, other than that I really wish that he had never written this novel. Another thing I just hated was the character of Rose of Sharon. The whole saintly and Virgin Mary role she played in my opinion was just stupid, and I couldn't care less how her character developed from a non-talking recluse into suddenly this symbol for holiness and redemption and whatnot. Ugh I could just go on and on about the list of stupid stuff that I didn't like from this novel but I won't because that would probably go on forever and I could submit this as a college thesis paper at that rate. So as you can tell there will not be a lot of positive entries from this section of my blog so prepare yourself for the worst as I analyze the second worst novel I have ever read.

Fahrenheit 451: Final Thoughts

Well I've pretty much beaten the horse that is Fahrenheit 451 into submission so I figure I will write my final analysis of the book here and move on to The Grapes of Wrath. I don't think I'm going to enjoy doing that. Fahrenheit 451 has left me with quite a bit to think about. Really the thing the stuck with me the most in this novel was the timeless message it left the reader with. We live in an age where it is considered normal to not read books and to just prefer watching mindless television or listening to the next shallowly produced pop single from some slutty pop star. The ever-present threat of this novel's reality has not diminished over the years, no indeed it has become even stronger and more prevalent 60 years of being written. To me this idea is incredibly frightening. I don't think that Bradbury ever could have imagined how much of a lasting impression this novel would have on society, but due to his masterful writing skill and ability to portray such a bone-chillingly possible future he succeeded, and I don't think he would be very happy with that. The ever-present threat of literary insignificance is becoming more and more real. How many of the novels being written today will be analyzed as "classics" and have a lasting impression on the up and coming years? To me it seems that the downfall of literature and the increasing prevalence of computers, televisions, and the shallowly produced message of music that not much hope remains for books. I really enjoyed reading Fahrenheit 451 none the less and was amazed at how Orwellian the future that Bradbury painted was. The dystopic setting of the novel was really one of my favorite aspects of the novel as well as the seemingly hysteric demented genius of Captain Beatty, who in my book will go down as one of my favorite villains in literature.

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Fahrenheit 451: Clarisse Living or Dying

There are two versions of the book that Bradbury is cool with. One is the ending of the movie in which it is revealed that Clarisse never died but she ended up living with the hobos out in the middle of nowhere (an ending that Bradbury liked so much he ended up re-writing that as the ending to later versions of the novel.) The second and in this version of the novel canonical ending is one where the fate of Clarisse if ambiguous. It is never proven that Clarisse is killed in an auto-accident. This could just be information that Beatty uses to get inside Guy's head and mess with him as he always does. Or it could be that she really was killed by a traffic incident and it just sucks to be Guy. Personally I like thinking that she actually did die, because in this case it is best for his character development. She's more of an angel in this way in that she comes to help him and then departs very suddenly, or something along those lines. I'm not just being an evil little freak now either because it is seriously for the better if she dies for Guy. It's like his mentor the one who has caused him to open up his eyes to the world around him is killed by the very thing he has been helping to maintain all of these years and this event finally causes him to realize what is wrong with what he has been doing and to attempt to right all of his wrongs. It's got a much better sense of poetic irony in this sense and I think adds another layer of depth to the novel and the character of Guy. If she survives then sure it gives Guy some happiness but if she dies it really gives a sense to the actions that he takes against the firemen and adds a layer of justice and nobility to everything that he does.

Fahrenheit 451: Burning Bright

The title for this section is a reference to the burning that occur at several points throughout the section. The section begins as Guy Montag is called to his house by an alarm designating his house must be burnt. He sees Mildred leaving with a packed suitcase and deduces that she called the firemen to the house. Beatty leads him into the house and hands him a flamethrower telling him that he must burn down the house by himself and if he attempts to escape he will be killed. But then Guy comes up with the bright idea of roasting Beatty alive with his new found flamethrower. Beatty toasts up pretty good (Guy must like his human well-done. Ha joke.) After killing his boss (He was fed up with those lousy hours! Ok I'm done.) Guy escape into his yard and digs up the remaining books he has been hoarding which amounts to four. The mechanical hound injects his leg making it go numb but as he does with all his problems he burns it. He runs away as news choppers begin to track him as does another mechanical hound. He hides his books in a co-worker's house (that's what you get for stealing my lunch! Ok sorry I promise I'm done now) and calls an alert to his house to distract the firemen. Then he runs to Faber's house and learn to follow the railroad tracks out until he meets some hobos and Guy tells him how to get rid of his scent in the house. Guy runs to a river and jumps in to make the hound lose his scent. He floats down the river for a while until he washes onto shore and walks on until finding the group of hobos. The leader introduces himself as Granger and tells Montag they are memorizing books for when the world ends and they can rebuild society. Not long after this the bombs drop and the city is vaporized. The group then walks up river to start a new life and be reborn as a collective whole just like the phoenix.

Fahrenheit 451: The Sieve and the Sand

The second part of Fahrenheit 451 takes it's name from a memory of Guy's. He recalls being at a beach and attempting to fill a sieve with sand and crying because of the impossibility of the task. The section begins with Mildred and Guy still reading the books. Guy wonders about what made Clarisse such an interesting character and why she acted the way she did. Montag remembers an English professor he once met in a park who gave him his phone number and he tries to contact him with information about the bible, but he thinks he is being tricked so he hangs up on him. Mildred goes back to watching TV and Montag takes a subway over to Faber's house with the bible. On the train he is distracted by an ad and waves the bible around while yelling at the passengers. After this he quickly departs at the next stop. He reaches Faber's house and chats with him for a while attempting to convince him to make a copy of the bible. Faber is convinced and he helps Montag by giving him a two way radio piece for his ear. Guy returns home and talks with Mildred and her friends. He is enraged by their shallow and idiotic viewpoints and actions and reveals a book of poetry that he reads to them. This causes one of the women to break down and cry because of the emotions that the poetry brings up while the other yells about it's evil nature. After this the next day Montag returns to work and hands Beatty a copy of a book which he tosses in the street. As the two are talking an alarm goes off and they head to the source which is revealed to be none other than the house of Montag. At this point the second section of the novel ends and the third beings with Montag at his house and discovering the source of the alarm.

Fahrenheit 451: The Heath and the Salamander

The first section of this novel is called The Heath and the Salamander. A heath is commonly known as a fireplace, and in ancient mythology the salamander was thought to have been born and lived in flame. The first part of the novel is the section that causes Guy to question what he is doing and to realize the fallacy of his ways. Guy Montag is a fireman whose job is to burn any illegal books that they find. On his way home one day he meets a new neighbor Clarisse. She talks to him about why he is a fireman and whether or not he is truly happy which frightens him. He spends the next few days thinking about the answer and talks to her on his way home several times, until one day she disappears. He continues to work for a while until one day when the firemen encounter an elderly woman hoarding books. She self-immolates herself after the firemen douse the house in kerosene and this event shocks Montag who calls in sick the next day. Before the woman burned herself he found a copy of the Holy Bible which he takes and hides. Captain Beatty, Montag's captain arrives at his house the next day to talk to him. The conversation reveals Beatty's questionable sanity and after he leaves Montag reveals to his wife his stash of books that he has been taking in over the months. She is frightened by these and does not want them in the house. The book ends with another visitor coming to the door but neither of the two Montag's answer the door and it is later revealed to be the mechanical hound, a robot used to execute people who break the law. It is hinted at the dog was programmed to hunt down and kill Montag. The hound leaves without incident and both Guy and his wife go on reading, albeit she is very reluctant to be reading and would rather be watching the television.

Fahrenheit 451: Religion

Religion is a very important aspect in Fahrenheit 451. One of the books that is often by the firemen are copies of the Holy Bible. This demonstrates to the reader that religion is not an important thing in that society, and that due to the increasing ignorance and dumbing down of society religion has all but been forgotten. Due to the burning of all texts religion in America is non-existent. It would also seem that a larger reference in the novel to Christianity it the nuclear apocalypse that occurs. It seems to have a great similarity to the end of days mentioned in Revelations. Montag himself thinks of a quote from Revelations as they walk upriver to the decimated city to rebuild it. Bradbury probably had Revelations in mind when he was writing the end to this novel as the similarities between this nuclear holocaust and the apocalypse in the bible are clear. Fire is also a very prevalent symbol in the bible and Bradbury uses fire quite a bit as a very important symbol in Fahrenheit 451. Faber also talks about the creation of wine from himself, who he describes as water, and the mixing of Montag, who he describes as fire. This is a reference to the miracle of Canaa when Jesus makes water out of wine and makes enough food to feed a massive crowd. It also strikes me as odd that in this novel religion is completely discarded. The way I see it there are two types of dsytopias. One version with no focus on religion at all with the society either being atheist or worshiping some sort of government figure or head of state as a holy being. Fahrenheit 451 falls into the first category. The second category is that of which the dystopia is religious in nature. The idea of a state-run theocracy in which the people are brainwashed into obeying them seems to be the second version of a dystopia. I found the use of religion or in this case lack of it in the novel to be an interesting aspect, albeit one that does make sense in the context of the novel.

Fahrenheit 451: The Media

At the time of Fahrenheit 451 being written mass media was becoming massively popular and much more popular. The novel was written during the 1950s when television was becoming much more prevalent and more easily accessible to the common citizen. This along with radio was the start of the information age with information about the world becoming more and more readily available. Bradbury viewed this as being a sign that novels and books would become less popular due to people being able to get a quick short fix of information or entertainment and saw this as a coming sign that intellectualism would fall and society would become less and less focused on intelligence and more so on entertainment. Fahrenheit 451 could be interpreted as a statement against the popularity of mass media and the deminishing popularity of literature due to the coming information age. This aspect of the novel is one of the things that makes it's message so timeless and prevalent in today's modern age. Information had become even more available to us in the form of computers and laptops with the ability to access just about any kind of information in only a few clicks. The popularity of books is diminishing and the prevalence of computers seems to be dumbing down our society. I don't think that at the time Bradbury would have any idea that in 60 years the novels message would be more important or prevalent than at the time it was written, which to me is one of my favorite qualities about the books and it's message of the threat to intellectualism from the media. The fact that he could write something at the time that was so true along with 1984 by Orwell is amazing to me. The fact that both men could vividly imagine a message that would be so timeless or indeed become more important in the years to come than at the time they wrote the novels.

Fahrenheit 451: Mildred's "Friends"

In the novel just about all of the common people in the society are dull, mindless, and impressionable sheep who do nothing of value in their lives and spend their days watching television and listening to the radio while the news programs force-feed them lies which they are all too willing to accept. Two other common people introduced in the novel are friends of Guy Montag's wife Mildred. Their names are Mrs. Phelps and Mrs. Bowles. Both of them are friends of Mildred's who talk to Guy on one or two occasions. The one he has the most important discussion with is Mrs. Phelps to whom he shows a poem that affects her deeply and makes her feel a large variety of emotions that she has never felt before in her life. Mrs. Phelps has had three husbands and most recently the third has been sent off to fight in the front lines of the war that was mentioned several times throughout the novel. Despite this she cares almost nothing for his well being and is basically entirely unaffected by his departure. This just goes to show how entirely unattached to their lives and emotions the people of the society really are. Even worse it Mrs. Bowles who has gone through three husbands, one by divorce, one by suicide, and one by a traffic accident and she doesn't seem to care at all. Even better is the fact that she has two children who seem to despise her more than anything, and what does she do about it? She goes back to watching TV and playing with technology like a good, obedient, mindless sheep. The way Bradbury portrayed the apathetic and technology obsessed society in Fahrenheit 451 is a truly amazing testament to his writing ability. He so masterfully pulls off a dystopic view of the people in his society that it is truly believable how uncaring their society is. This is one of the reasons why his novel carries such weight.

Fahrenheit 451: Chekov's Gun

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that throughout the entire course of Fahrenheit 451 there's a war going on. It's mentioned pretty scarcely throughout the novel and the reader is led to believe that it's just there for a back story and not much if anything is going to happen off of it or if it's going to be build off of. Then, BAM the book ends in a shower off atomic bombs and the apocalypse is upon us. That's one of the qualities I really enjoyed about this book, the textbook perfect execution of Chekov's gun. Chekov's gun is a rule in plays that if a gun is on stage during the first act then it must at some time in the play go off. It's always a very inconspicuous dropping in of what will happen later in the book and then without warning the event occurs and it's usually incredibly important and alters the plot or one of the characters. It's one of my favorite literary devices and seeing it executed so well is really an enjoyable aspect of reading the novel. That's the brilliant thing about the execution of Chekov's gun is how the reader is fooled into thinking it's an insignificant aspect of the novel or film that will have no consequence for the rest of the novel but often times it is one of the most important happening in the story. At first I didn't think much of the war and I didn't expect that the book would end with the complete destruction of the city, but Bradbury very masterfully pulled it off and I was more than satisfied with the way that he ended such an excellent book. I cannot think of a better way that he could have ended the book using the war. Having killed Montag would have been a bad move in my opinion because after seeing such development out of him would have made the reader feel cheated as if they had just wasted all of their time reading the novel, but he could have ended it differently while retaining the use of the war as the main instrument of ending the book.

Fahrenheit 451: The Phoenix

The Phoenix is a popular mythical creature from Roman, Sumerian, Persian, Egyptian and many more ancient religions. It is commonly viewed as a very large fiery bird and represents life, fertility, rebirth, and hope. The symbol of the phoenix is mentioned on a few occasions in Fahrenheit 451 and in my opinions it is an excellent (albeit often times overused) symbol for the novel. The most relevant use of it is when Granger says that they will rebuild the city after the bombs drop and the city is wiped clean. They say that like the phoenix they will build a new city and society and be reborn as a whole much like after the Phoenix is killed. When a phoenix's life span of 500-1000 years is over it constructs a nest usually out of something flammable and then ignites itself dieing in the fire and reducing itself to ash. It is then reborn from the ashes to begin it's life cycle once again. To me all though the chance for redemption is there it seems like the cycle of the destruction of intellectualism and the demise of society due to media is an ever-present threat and I am not hopeful for the future of those in the book. Due to the repetitive nature of the Phoenix's life and it's continual birth and demise it seems that what Bradbury is saying is that in time the reason the society was founded will be forgotten and the same thing will be bound to happen again. As the old saying goes those who do not learn from history are bound to repeat it is very relevant here. And although the Phoenix is an excellent symbol in this novel for being a great fire bird that is known to be representative of flame and destruction the symbol of the phoenix is often times overused in novels and other other forms of entertainment, but in Bradbury's defense not many other things would work as well as the Phoenix.

Fahrenheit 451: Suicide

One of the most memorable and chilling events in the novel is when on the job Montag and the other firemen encounter an elderly woman who has been hoarding and attempting to protect novels. The firemen attempt to drag her away and send her to a mental hospital like all the others, and then afterward burn the books. The woman is so vehemently opposed to this that she conceals a match from the firemen and after they spray the house with kerosene she breaks free from them reveals the match and in an act of self-immolation martyrdom reminiscent of that of Thich Quang Du'C she burns herself and the house and books. Self-Immolation to me has always been a terrifying and bone chilling form of suicide that has always powerfully affected me. The picture of the Buddhist monk burning himself alive is always moving to me. I was greatly affected by the image that Bradbury painted so vividly when he wrote the section on the woman burning herself alive. Guy Montag was also heavily affected by this event and afterward asked for a sick leave from the job so he could recover from seeing such a jarring act. He is puzzled why for worthless books anyone would give their life in an act of rebellion or to attempt to protect them. The worth of books was never realized by Montag until this point, and it is at this time that he begins to hoard books. Before the woman burns herself Montag is looking through one of the books he finds and accidentally reads part of him which causes him to hide it for himself so that he may study and read it later. Witnessing this act along with the thoughts and and conversations he has with Clarisse cause him to being a large character progression which ends with him attempting to protect books along with the exiles outside of the city limits. This event is arguably one of the most important happenings of the novel along with Montag meeting Clarisse.

Fahrenheit 451: Captain Beatty

In my opinion Captain Beatty was an awesome antagonist to Montag. At first it seems like he is a real mentor and friend to Montag, but when he tries to convince Montag of the evils of books and he is roasted alive by him it was a fitting end to him. A man who once loved books, but after he was deluded into thinking they all contradicted each other he devoted his life to hunting down the books and those who hoarded and protected them. Captain Beatty seems to play the role of the voice in the back of Montag's head telling him to keep calm and that everything will be alright. He's like the little devil from cartoons telling the character to do the evil thing, with Clarisse on the other shoulder dressed like an angel. Beatty also seems to act as a foil to Faber. Another quality of Beatty is his seeming ability to be able to play off of Montag's thoughts so well. A truly devious and somewhat ironic quality is how Beatty uses his books to manipulate Montag so well. His devious and perceptive nature really make him just shine as a villain, and it would have been hard pressed for Bradbury to write a better villain then Beatty. In the end as well when he doesn't attempt at all to prevent his death at the hands of the fire that Montag started is a sign that he may be fed up with his life despite comments where he may state otherwise. It seems that he just like all the other citizens in Fahrenheit world are truly unhappy with their lives despite seeming to be happy and content with their dull and meaningless existence. These are some of the reason why I think that Beatty is an excellent and diabolical villain who in my opinion deserves a top spot in the list of best villains in literature. I'm surprised that he isn't given more credit as excellent as an antagonist he is.

Fahrenheit 451: Clarisse

Hello Clarisse. Alright now that the terrible and inevitable reference is out of the way I'll focus on this blog post. Clarisse McClellan is a naive, fun, outgoing, and curious seventeen year old girl who moves in next to Guy Montag early on in the novel. At first he regards her as an oddball and does not really like her, but after time she grows on him and when she disappears Guy Montag truly begins to miss her and takes her attitude and the lessons he learned from her to heart. Also when he talks to Captain Beatty about her he says that most people dislike her because of her tendency to ask why something occurs rather than how. In the novel it is assumed that she is killed by a car crash, or so it is said. In the film however when Montag finds the group of exiles she is among them and Bradbury is said to have liked this alternative ending much more than the original he wrote for the book. Essentially because of her nature she is a foil to Mildred. Mildred does nothing to help Montag and essentially causes him to stay the way that he is, not helping his character development at all. Clarisse however is a very positive influence on Montag setting in turn all of the events of the novel for the most part. It is arguable that had Montag never encountered her he would have remained for the most part the same throughout the entire course of the novel and not character development or progression would have occurred. In my opinion I like the ending where she is killed instead of hiding out with the exiles. The ending is good as well as it would make it seem like she is a potential romantic interest for Montag after the city is bombed, but I'm more for the bleak and dreary endings. I thought Clarisse was a very important and likable character in the novel.

Fahrenheit 451: Fire

Fire is a very prevalent theme in Fahrenheit 451. The primary means of destruction for the books that the firemen find is by gathering them up into great big piles and burning them all at once, a spectacle greatly enjoyed by many of the firemen seeing as how most of them have some sort of obsession with fire or pyromania. The fire could be interpreted as being a symbol for destruction and death, as it is used to destroy the only remaining hope of intellectualism left in the world, the books. Alternatively if one believes that the book was written as a statement against censorship then the fire could be viewed as those who advocate for the censorship in novels. Another example of the ironic use of fire in the novel is when it is used to kill Beatty. At first it acts as a destructive and terrible thing used to burn the books and keep Montag a machine, but after he begins to realize what he is doing he uses it to free himself from Beatty. It is also ironic in the sense that Beatty used fire as his main tool for the destruction of books and in the end it was the flames the consumed and killed him. Fire is an extremely diverse element in Fahrenheit 451 and is one of the central symbols and themes throughout the entire novel. Indeed by the end of the novel the flames along with Montag were somewhat redeemed when Granger compares the destroyed city to that of a phoenix who is consumed by flame only to be reborn once again. This idea is prevalent in the city's destruction because after being consumed by the fire the ones who preserved the books in their heads will rebuild the city like the phoenix being reborn. These are some of the reason why fire is such a prevalent and interesting symbol and theme used throughout the course of the novel very well and powerfully.

Fahrenheit 451 and Porcupine Tree

As I've been doing these blogs I've been listing to an album by the name of Fear of a Blank Planet by the band Porcupine Tree. The thing I've noticed about this album is that the themes are extremely similar to the themes presented by Fahrenheit 451. The theme of the album is that of dissociation and the worship of technology. It is written from the point of view of a teenager who wastes away his day playing video games, watching TV, and taking pills and different kinds of medicines. I never realized how similar the themes of the album were to that of the people in Fahrenheit 451. I thought it was really cool when I realized how much of an influence Fahrenheit 451 was on one of my favorite albums. The similarities between the character of Fear of a Blank Planet and those teenagers in Fahrenheit 451 are plentiful. The child in the album causes chaos and havoc only for the purpose of causing chaos and havoc, similar to those teenagers in the novel. The technology worship is prominent to in the line "My Xbox is a god to me." This and the child in the album saying how the TV is always on yet he never pays attention remind me of the anarchic and dissociative nature of the teenagers in the novel are very similar. Again another similarity between the child and a character in the novel, Mildred, are the medicine. The child in the album takes a numerous amount of pills and medicines, just like Mildred in the novel. The pills confuse the narrator of the album and make him lose intrest in the world around him similar to the way Mildred behaves in the novel. The connections between the novel and the album are very numerous and until really listening I never realized how many there were. The idea of Bradbury influencing such a masterful album is really a cool thought and makes me appreciate the book even more.

Fahrenheit 451: Books

The title of the novel is actually a reference to the temperature at which book fire combusts. Books in the novel are the key element of the plot. The protagonist is a fireman whose job is to hunt down any remaining paper texts and burn them, along with sending the hoarder of the books into a mental hospital where God knows what happens to them. The main reason books are being burned in this novel is because of the increasingly anarchic and apathetic nature of people in the world during the novel. People have become narrow-minded, unable to think for themselves, and do nothing but blindly follow orders. They have become an obedient and thoughtless group of sheep. Some people have said that Bradbury wrote the novel using books because it was a critical statement on censorship of an author's work (ironically Fahrenheit 451 was heavily censored in high schools at the time.) The books are central to the plot because their disappearance and society not allowing books has been a primary cause of the "dumbing down" of the culture. The small hope that remains for their conservation is any hoarders who collect them and are not caught or those men that Montag meets at the end of the novel who memorize entire novels and retain them to write them down again when the time is right. The books in the novel could be interpreted as a symbol for the dumbing down of American culture due to the massive influence of modern technology such as television and radio. People became less and less interested and delving into a novel and instead went to the television or the radio to get a quick fix on information. They became a culture of technological dependence, which could happen and may already happen to the society that we live in today. The use of books in the novel is what really makes it such a timeless novel and why the message it conveys is still relevant to this day.

Fahrenheit 451: Mildred

I've already written a bit about Mildred in my previous posts about Guy but now I've got an entire section devoted to this doll-like, character dead, excuse for a human being. Won't this be an interesting post? Mildred is mainly just a psychological drain on Montag. She does absolutely nothing but sit around all day listening to music on the radio, watching the TV and letting the media shove false information down her throat, and just obsessing over technology. She thinks she's happy but she really just hates life. She's the perfect example (along with her friend Mrs. Phelps) of the average citizen in this novel. She does not have a job and has a dependency on medicine which she makes Guy get. She is the perfect polar opposite of the cheery, lifelike, thoughtful, and somewhat naive Clarisse. She doesn't seem to really like Guy all that much, sleeping in different bed then him, and going so far as to turn him into the authorities when she discovers that he is hoarding books. She serves nothing to Montag except to irritate him and at one point he compares to either a mosquito or a wasp. Really the only purpose that she serves in the novel is to show the decrepit state of the citizens in that day and age and to move the plot along by turning in Montag. Other than that she is completely useless and serves no purpose, which I thing is a good quality. Bradbury masterfully writes this character as an empty shell who lives life just for the purpose of living. She takes no initiative and never does anything important (although at one point she does attempt to overdose on sleeping pills to kill herself.) All in all I think it was a good move for Bradbury to put this character in the novel because she just helps to make the reader realize how terrible the world that exists in the novel really is.

Fahrenheit 451: More on Guy

Guy Montag really is a pretty good protagonist. He also shows a very large amount of character development changing into a completely different character by the end of the novel. The main character who has the most effect on Montag is a girl by the name of Clarisse McClellan. She is essentially a foil to the character (if you can even call it that) of Mildred. Mildred has a draining effect on Montag and they have a terrible relationship, I mean they even sleep in separate beds! Clarisse however has a much more positive affect on Montag and setting in motion his massive character development. Another quality of Montag's is that while working as a fireman he shows traits of being a bit of a pyromaniac which I guess would kind of come with the job. He takes a great amount of pleasure to watching the books burn. By the end of the book Montag is living with other people who attempt to keep books safe by memorizing them and when the times comes they will be able to re-write them all down. During the course of the novel Montag becomes more and more interested in books and at one point begins to horde them. Eventually Montag is hunted down by the firemen for hording the books but he is able to escape. He ends up finding a large group of people hoping to conserve novels and he lives with them until the end of the novel with hopes that they will be able to at some time rebuild society and write down all of what they have memorized. Another character with a large influence on Guy is Captain Beatty. Beatty once loved books but over time grew to hate them and he became a fireman. Beatty attempts to convince Montag to come back to being a fireman but after he fails he dies in a fire started by Montag. All in all I think Montag is a very deep character he is very likable and has an awesome name.

Fahrenheit 451: That Guy

Ha I made a joke in my title. See the character's name is Guy and I made the title That Guy. Get it? OK you can boo me now. Well this post is about Guy Montag the protagonist of Fahrenheit 451. I liked Guy Montag because he was a pretty relate able and likable character and had the same name as the hero from V for Vendetta and the revolutionary Guy Fawkes so that makes him A-OK in my book. In the novel Guy Montag is a fireman, but not in the traditional sense of the word. Guy Montag burns books. In the futuristic society of Fahrenheit 451 books are illegal. The firemen go around searching "suspicious" peoples houses and gathering up any text they can find and burn it. They also collect of book hoarders and ship them off to mental hospitals because they think the book burners are the ones in need of help, which seems a bit off. Also an ironic note is that Montag is the name of a paper company. That's a pretty funny coincidence. In the novel Montag at first goes along with burning books and killing things just to watch them suffer. But a series of events occur that cause him to begin thinking for himself if what he is doing is truly right. He is also married to Mildred who just might be one of the most boring and plain characters I have ever seen. But the reasoning behind her lack of character is a good one as she attempts suicide early on which is one of the events that motivate Guy to question what he is doing and become a revolutionary. Mildred has absolutely no character what so ever. It's like she's just a puppet who does not think at all and just watches television. All she does is mess around with the technology of the age and irritate Montag by making him bring her medicine.

Fahrenheit 451: Opening Thoughts

Seeings as how I've analyzed the living snot out of Old Man and the Sea I figure now is a better time than any to start analyzing a new book that at first I will enjoy but slowly as I read more and more into it being to loathe with an unheard of passion. Anyway I liked Fahrenheit 451. The idea of dystopian future are always my favorite kinds. My favorite book to this day is 1984 so it makes sense that I like the idea. I would have liked the book much more had it had a bleaker more soul crushing ending but that's not up to me it's the author. For the most part I liked all of the characters and the setting and it seemed to roll along pretty smoothly keeping my attention for the better part of the novel. The one thing that I really enjoyed about the book was the idea of the mechanical hound. One of my favorite parts of the novel that really just set the tone for me was when the firemen just sat around and watched that thing just kill for the sole purpose of watching something get grotesquely massacred. That just set the tone for the novel and how bleak and anarchic the novel was. The thought that people could devolve into such terrible excuses for people is a very real and frightening threat. The idea that mass media and lack of education could turn humanity down such a dark and destructive path is an extremely real and ever-present threat which is really the sad part of the novel. The fact that more now than ever it's message is prominent is a scary thought indeed. In all actuality all a book has to do has to be dystopian in setting and will instantly have an approval rating for me. Anything having to do with such a bleak future will instantly win my approval and win my liking.

The Old Man and the Sea: Alternate Ending

The ever present question of the battle that Santiago had with this fish is who was going to win? Is Santiago going to come out on top and kill the fish during his battle? Or is the fish going to wear Santiago down and be able to escape from the hook? What I think would have been an excellent (and very depressing) ending for the book would be if both had died out there at sea. Santiago could kick the bucket first, either succumbing to his injuries or fatigue (perhaps his cut could have gotten infected) and he died out in the middle of the sea, perhaps never to be found. For the ending to work however he would have had to stab the fish with the harpoon first so that the fish would succumb to it's injuries and then be devoured by sharks. This just screams bleak to me because both the great creatures (man and fish) die at the hands of one another and meet their untimely end. Even more depressing is the thought of how Manolin would handle it. The idea that your mentor just goes out to sea one day and never returns is a classic one. Perhaps he would spiral into a depression and this event would haunt the rest of his adult life. Or maybe he could always hold onto that faint and optimistic point of view that Santiago would one day return. To me the idea of bleak and depressing ending where evil triumphs and good meets it's end has always been more appealing to me. Usually books where the outright evil protagonist is the subject, or if it is an anti-hero always speak more strongly to me. This is why I would have liked it if Hemingway would have ended the book on a more depressing note. I'm not a bad person by any stretch but the idea of good defeating evil has been so played out it's not very entertaining any more. When you get a case where the villain triumphs or the hero of the novel is evil are always more interesting.

The Old Man and the Sea: Interpretations of Symbolism

Last post I wrote about how some people analyzed that Santiago could be a symbol for Christ. First I'm going to start with a quote from Hemingway however, "No good book has ever been written that has in it symbols arrived at beforehand and stuck in. ... I tried to make a real old man, a real boy, a real sea and a real fish and real sharks. But if I made them good and true enough they would mean many things." I really like this quote. It shows that Hemingway didn't mean to write a novella so rich in symbolism and motifs that it would be analyzed for years and years to come. He meant to write a book about a man and a fish. That's about it, but because of his great writing talent he made a book that could be analyzed by so many for so long. The idea that the entire novel is a vaguely clothed re-telling of the story of Jesus Christ, or the idea that the lions in Santiago's dreams represent something is entirely up to the reader to decide. No one idea of symbolism is correct in this novel. Old Man and the Sea is more or less like an ambiguous movie ending. The viewer, or in this case reader, decides what everything in the novel means. Some could interpret the sharks to represent death, or some could take it the other way and interpret them as life. It all depends on what the reader thinks due to Hemingway's masterful style of simplistic writing. This quality is a very rare thing to find in a book, because most of the time the author has a simple idea in mind for symbolism and things can be interpreted in one of few ways. The quality that everybody who reads this book can take away something completely different is a one of my favorite things about this book, and one of the things that makes it such a timeless novel.

The Old Man and the Sea: Religion

Religion to some people is a very important aspect in their lives. In the novel The Old Man and the Sea it seems that Santiago really lives up to the saying of there are no atheists in foxholes. Santiago never explicitly states that he does not believe in a higher power only that he is not a religious man, yet several times in the novel when in a dangerous or bleak situation and he needs strength he will pray to the Virgin Mary. This strikes me as somewhat hypocritical. The fact that the only time he prays is when he is in trouble seems like he is just taking advantage of religion and not truly believing in it. Personally I like Santiago, he just seems like a pretty cool and chill guy. This one thing he does thought just irks me. The novel was not meant to be any sort of statement on religion or anything in the like, but some people like to analyze everything they can to get some sort of religious message out of it. Case in point is Star Wars. Yea, some people try to say Star Wars is promoting Christianity through it's use of the force and the light and dark sides of it. But enough about Star Wars the point is not everything has a religious aspect. Some say that Santiago is a metaphor for Christ, which I can't see but if people dig deep enough they can just relate any old thing to the Holy Bible. Santiago mentions the crucifixion of Jesus Christ in one moment with the sharks and people interpret this as Hemingway meaning that Santiago could be a Christ figure. In my opinion it's not at all. It's an old Cuban fisherman who is having a very rough time at sea and he looks to the crucifixion and how Christ stayed strong in his time of trouble. To me that just doesn't relate Santiago in being a savior type character at all but hey, whatever floats your boat I suppose.

Friday, August 20, 2010

The Old Man and the Sea: Setting

The setting of The Old Man and the Sea is in the 1950s in a poor village somewhere outside of Havana, Cuba. The time period and land are both incredibly important to the novel. The time period is important because it allows Santiago to relate to a baseball player of the period known as Joe DiMaggio. DiMaggio has an injury that slows him down but despite this he continues to play and be one of the best baseball players in the industry. This is a quality that Santiago greatly admires and it inspires and motivates him throughout his entire journey. The novel takes place mainly somewhere in the Gulf of Mexico in the ocean area around Cuba. The setting of the ocean is important because it is where the main conflict occurs and it is central to the plot often times saving the characters life by providing him with food and providing the main source of conflict for the novel. Despite the good it causes thought it also is the primary cause of the protagonist's defeat because it houses the sharks that devour Santiago's marlin. The sea provides Santiago with flying fish and dolphins to keep him alive when he is hungry and the store of tuna he brings with him rots in the sun. It's ability to provide and take away from the main character does make it a bit of a double-edged sword but that is the way the novel is written and how it has to be. The setting being at sea is really the main element of the sea (it's even in the title.) Without the sea the novel would not pack the same amount of punch that it does and it would be an entirely different novel altogether. The area where it takes m=place is much more important than the time period in my opinion. These are the reasons that the setting in this novel is so important and central to the events that transpire.

The Old Man and the Sea: The Sharks

The sharks in Old Man and the Sea are extremely important and symbolic in the novel. The sharks come about after Santiago has captured and killed the marlin. He stabbed it with his harpoon causing blood to pollute the water. The sharks smell the blood and come to the skiff to eat the marlin's corpse. They represent death and it's inevitability and how you cannot escape from death. Despite Santiago's greatest efforts the sharks devour the marlin's corpse and leave Santiago with nothing but a skeleton. They come into play while Santiago is extremely tired and pained from his battle with the fish. Despite his fatigue he fights off their attacks to the best ability but in the end it is to no avail. This represents how despite how hard you may try you can never escape death or something bad happening. The sharks are extremely important to the novel because in essence they negate everything that Santiago has worked for. They crush his spirit in the end and make him loose his ever-present optimism by the end. He worked as hard as he could to kill and take in that fish and even viewed him as a brother. The main damage done to him was because he felt he had disrespected his brother by letting the sharks devour the fish. They cause damage to both the fish in the form of eating him and to Santiago by destroying his spirit. He manages to kill and wound all of the sharks that come after the fish and at one point even goes so far as leaning over the side of the skiff and punching it in the nose. His determination is very strong and he does absolutely everything in his power to stop them. Due to the power of mother nature and her ability to take away the sharks are able to overwhelm and eat the fish however destroying Santiago's optimism. The sharks are very important to the novel.

The Old Man and the Sea: The Fish

The fish is one of the very few characters in Old Man and the Sea and he does not even have any spoken dialogue, but he is a fish after all so that does make sense. But his importance to the novel because he does not speak at all and his presence has such an adverse affect on Santiago and he is the driving force of the novel. The fish is the antagonist to Santiago but the conflict is viewed as a good thing by Santiago due to the fish bringing out so much in him. He views the fish as his equal and his brother and feels great remorse for having to kill such a noble and magnificent creature. The fish is a marlin and is the largest marlin that Santiago has ever seen. The fish has it's own struggle against Santiago and tries for three days to break free of the hook only to be killed by Santiago. I viewed that as a somewhat sad story because he put up the fight of his life (literally) for three days only to be stabbed by a harpoon, drug back to Havana, and on the way back be devoured by sharks. That does not really strike me as a very good end to such a noble creature. But I digress because it would either have been the old man or the fish who would make it out alive. The fish causes Santiago to bring out his all and realize how important the boy is in his life so I think that overall the fish helped Santiago become stronger and a better man. The conflict is not a physical one but mainly a psychological one. It is to see who will break first and become tired and it is the fish who loses the battle. Out of the three characters in the novel the fish is easily one of the most important, but all characters do have their rolls.

The Old Man and the Sea: Themes

I think that the main theme of Old Man and the Sea is struggle, determination, honor, and death. The struggle is obviously the fight between Santiago and the Marlin and how brutal is it for both combatants. By the end of their fight Santiago is wounded and extremely fatigued and he still has to continue a fight with the sharks. The books shows that even through the greatest battles determination is a must have in the face of great struggle. Even the fish has determination as he fought against Santiago but despite his greatest efforts Santiago finished him off and won the battle. Determination alone is not always the victor in a fight. Honor is another important theme in the novel. Despite Santiago killing the fish he never once loses his respect for the fish which is a very honorable quality. He views the fish as his brother and his equal throughout their battle. Death is another important theme in the novel. Death is mainly in the form of the fish but their is also the thought of the imminent death of Santiago due to his old age and failing health. The fish's death is a major event in the novel. One of the two's death is an unavoidable event in the novel because of their struggle. Santiago knows the entire time that either the fish or he will perish at the hands of the other. Death is a prevalent theme this entire time as the two struggle against one another. The novel has many themes but these four are the ones that I found to be the most prevalent throughout it's course. I think that death and honor are the two most important out of the four as well because of the importance they play in Santiago's character and his development. All of them are important in their own ways and I think the themes of the novel add much to it's entertainment value and lasting impression.

The Old Man and the Sea: Manolin

The boy in the novel Manolin is an extremely important character despite not being in the novel all to much. In the film for which Hemingway was a consultant, the boy was sixteen years old and he did not object to this portrayal so that is the age that I view Manolin as being. Manolin is a very sweet young man who cares deeply for Santiago. He helps to take care of him bringing him food and keeping him company in the evenings talking to him about baseball or discussing other things with him. During the novel Manolin works for another boat because his parents will not allow him to work with Santiago due to his long streak of bad luck. Santiago is also the one who taught the boy to fish so he has a very deep seeded respect for the old man. The old man also truly loves Manolin and during his journey thoughts of the boy keep him going and he often time wishes that the boy was with him to help him against the great fish. At the end of the novel Manolin is so distressed at the sight of the terrible condition Santiago is in that he makes Santiago promise him that he will not go out anymore without him. The relationship the two have in my opinion is that like that of a grandfather and a grandson. It is a mentor type of relationship between the two and they both love and respect one another. The boy is extremely important to Santiago and motivates him to battle the fish. Manolin also helps Santiago by bringing him food and drink and the newspaper so that he can read the stats for baseball. Like Santiago he has a great admiration for baseball but he does not seem to love Joe DiMaggio as much as Santiago. Due to all the help that he provides Santiago and his selflessness Manolin is an extremely important character in the novel.

The Old Man and the Sea: Summary Part 3

By the third day of the ordeal the marlin begins to circle the skiff. This signifies to Santiago that he is growing tired and will not last for much longer, but Santiago knows that he does not have much energy either. He knows that the only way to finish this is to give all of the strength he has left and finish the marlin off. He is not certain who will win but he knows that only one of them will be living alive. He pulls the marlin in using the line and with his harpoon he stabs him in the side and wounds him. He then proceeds to tie him up against the skiff so he can bring him home, but it dawns on him the sharks will pick up on the scent of blood when he notices the water around turning very red. He hopes he can make it home without much issue but he knows that will not be the case. He knows that if he can make it home however that he will get a very large sum of money for such a massive fish. He begins to make his way back home but as he predicted sharks begin attacking the fish. The first shark takes an extremely large chunk out of the fish and he slowly realize he will not make it home with the fish intact. Despite this he continues to fight the sharks killing and wounding as many as he can. When he finally returns to the village the fish is nothing more than skeletal remains. He gathers up his gear and goes home to fall into an extremely deep sleep. The next day the other fishermen gather around to view the great fish's skeleton and they are all amazed at it's size. One tourist even mistakes it for a shark. Manolin goes to see Santiago and when he sees him in his current state he weeps for him. He gets him coffee and food and wakes him telling him he will never fish without him from now on and Santiago agrees.

The Old Man and the Sea: Summary Part 2

When Santiago awakens he gets Manolin and they carry his gear down to the boat. He says goodbye and Santiago embarks on his journey out to deep sea in hopes that he will finally have a catch today. Little does he know he is about to embark on one of his greatest journeys. When he rows out so far that the shoreline is no longer visible he baits his hooks and drops them. He then continues to row talking to himself about the other fishermen. There is little activity with the hooks other then the occasional nibble. Finally one fish takes the bait. Santiago can tell it is very large but he is uncertain of it's exact size. He hopes the fish is very large and he pledges that this fish will die and he will finally break his streak of bad luck. Something distracts Santiago as he is holding the line and the Marlin tugs extremely hard. The sudden jolt causes Santiago to lose his balance and he cuts his hand very badly. He treats his hand and eats some Tuna that Manolin gave him. He then baits the other lines so that he may find some more food. To keep himself motivated he thinks about how Joe DiMaggio would fare in his situation. He cannot fall asleep that night and stays up with the fish for the entire night. For food Santiago catches a dolphin and some flying fish. He thanks the sea for it's plentiful bounty and utters a prayer to the Virgin Mary for strength. The struggle with the Marlin continues on for several days with Santiago coming to respect the admire the Marlin as his brother and a very worthy opponent who is bringing out the very best in him. He is sorrowful that he must bring about the demise of such a noble creature but he knows it is either him or the Marlin and he is dead set on catching this fish.

The Old Man and the Sea: Summary Part 1

In the first part of the novel Santiago returns home from another unsuccessful day at sea. This marks his 84th day without catching any fish. Despite his failure he remains optimistic and does not give up hope that today will be the day breaks his dry spell. He returns home where a boy, Manolin, appears to help him with ending the day. He gets him some food and drink and helps him put away his boating supplies. They talk about baseball with each other, with Santiago talking about his great admiration for Joe DiMaggio. Manolin then leaves and Santiago goes to bed. Manolin wants to go fishing with Santiago but he will not allow it because his parents forbid him from fishing with Santiago because of his unluckiness. The other fishermen in the village also give Santiago grief because of his optimism despite his great spell of failure. The older fishermen in the village are simply sad for him however because they know how it is sometimes and Santiago used to be a living legend. Manolin gets the food from the manager of the bar because Santiago does not have anything to use to purchase food for himself. The manager gives Manolin the food because he respects Santiago and feels sorry for him. Santiago tells Manolin to thank the manger and he is very appreciative. Santiago has a very deep seated respect for Joe DiMaggio because despite a terrible injury he is still one of the best baseball players out there. Santiago looks to him for inspiration several times throughout the novel and uses him as his motivation. After Manolin departs Santiago goes to sleep covering himself with newspapers because that is all he has at his disposal. The next day Santiago awakes and makes his plans to head out to sea. In hopes that he will break his dry spell he plans to go out very deep to the sea where no other fishermen go.

The Old Man and the Sea: Symbols

Symbolism is very prominent in The Old Man and the Sea. Several objects and even the character themselves represent other things or embody ideas or values.

The Sea: As I have previously written the sea represents a mother providing for humanity, but at the same time being dangerous in it's ability to destroy and take away.

The Lions: Several times in Santiago's dreams Santiago sees an image of several lions, some adults some cubs, playing in what seems to be the coast of Africa. This dream is a recurring theme throughout the novel and can represent many things. The cubs could represent Santiago's youthfulness or his lost youth. The adults most likely represent Santiago's courage, strong will, and pride in what he does.

The Skiff: The skiff Santiago uses is very small and barely suitable for just him, but Santiago uses it because it is the best he has and he's been using it for years. It is a reliable vessel and has served him well. The skiff represents home, it is a safe shelter that keeps him safe to it's best ability from the harsh sea and allows him to live the life of a fisherman.

The Virgin Mary: The immaculate mother is who Santiago prays to on a few occasions. The Virgin Mary is usually associated with being a great mother and a protector. In this novel she represents hope, safety, and perseverance. The prayers Santiago say give him strength in his struggle with the marlin and keep him going despite his injuries and fatigue.

The Sharks:
The sharks in the novel attack Santiago's haul and eat it almost entirely by the time he returns to the port. The sharks are merciless in their attacks and never cease until everything that Santiago has worked so hard for has been destroyed and mutilated beyond recognition. The sharks represent destruction and the unyielding fury of mother nature. They are the perfect example of how she can take away. After she provides Santiago with his great catch she quickly snatches it up from him and leaves him with nothing.

The Old Man and the Sea: An alternate Story

I've been thinking about the basic elements of The Old Man and the Sea and I think that the novel could work if it had been written on land. Bear with me as I explain myself. The novel itself is a story of a man who is trying to provide for himself while he hunts to make a living. This easily could have been switched to an early time and had Santiago as a hunter. I could envision Santiago in an early time, perhaps during the Dark Ages, as a hunter/gatherer. While out hunting he could stumble upon a very large wild boar, one that would feed him and his families for weeks. He hits the boar with an arrow and it flees. He spends the next few days tracking it and he finally finds the boar's dead body. Several days from home he must transport the boar back home to his family. While hauling the boar with him a variety of creatures, birds, foxes, wolves, and insects help themselves to his haul. By the time he reaches home the corpse is rotted and mostly devoured rendering his great quest null and void. Perhaps in place of Santiago's injured hands he could have a bad leg that would prevent him from tracking the boar to his full potential. In place of Joe DiMaggio too could be a legendary hunter whom he looks up to or perhaps the God of the Hunt in his culture. The message of the novel is truly timeless and this has made me realize that the novel could work without the sea and still bear the same effect and weight. We won't ever know obviously I believe that had the novel taken place in an earlier period and taken place on land instead of at the sea we would have much the same novel as we had today. This is my take on the novel and how it could be converted to an entirely different, yet same, story.

The Old Man and the Sea: The Sea

Seeing as how I have already taken down one aspect of the novel's title I figure it is time to include the other. The sea in the novel is the setting of the majority of the novel but it is so much more than that. The sea represents the vast journey of life that all people must embark upon. It encompasses struggle, joy, and disappointment. The great battle with the fish is struggle, when Santiago finally catches the fish it is joy, and after he makes it back home and the fish has been devoured it is disappointment. The sea is incredibly important to this novel due to it's importance to Santiago. To Santiago it is a second home. He is a fisherman and has been for most of his life so he is very comfortable at sea. He views the sea as a guardian who will keep him save and provide for him, but at times can come close to killing him. It is a double-edged sword and it gives him life and can at any time take it away (much like all mothers say.) In this way the sea is very much like a mother to Santiago. Mother Nature provides for him by giving him food, and a way to make a living. In it's tempests, squalls, and other storms it is deadly though and can destroy Santiago as quickly as it provides for him. The image of the sea being Mother Nature is a very popular notion and Santiago himself refers to the Sea as his provider. When Santiago prays to the Virgin Mary I also thought that the Sea could be interpreted as a symbol for the blessed mother. The notion of the sea being the immaculate provider and giving humanity such a vital source of life could be another representation of the sea symbolically. The sea is arguably the most important aspect of the novel and without it the novel would not have the same weight.

Wednesday, August 4, 2010

The Old Man and the Sea: My Reaction

I enjoyed reading The Old Man and the Sea. I thought it was a quick and easy read, with excellent characters and a good plot. Going into I did not expect to enjoy it because I generally don't enjoy reading the "classics" but I was surprised to find that I enjoyed this novel much more than I expected. I really enjoyed reading the novel and found that Santiago was a much deeper and likable character than I originally thought. Santiago was an interesting character because of his die-hard nature and how he would not admit defeat to the fish until one of them perished. Another admirable quality of his was the nature of his conflict with the fish. How he viewed him as a brother and an equal was a very noble quality of his that I found added another layer of depth to his character. His voyage back to Cuba was my favorite part of the novel. When Santiago had to fight off the waves of sharks I knew it was imminent that he would not make it back to shore with the fish intact and Santiago was aware of this as well. This knowledge did not stop him however and he tried his very best to keep his catch intact, despite the futility of the situation. I found this part of the novel to be extremely riveting and inspirational. I also enjoyed the nature of the friendship between Santiago and the young boy. I was impressed by how devoted the young boy was to Santiago and and despite the entire village laughing at the old man how he stuck with him through all of his toughest moments. All in all I think that The Old Man and the Sea is a very riveting tale of adventure and struggle of an old fisher man and is worth the read. I would highly recommend the novel to others because of it's short nature and how easy and enjoyable it is to read.

Tuesday, August 3, 2010

The Old Man and the Sea: Characters

There are only three main characters in the novel The Old Man and the Sea. Santiago, the Boy, and the Marlin. Other characters are mentioned but no only these three play a pivotal role in the novel.

Santiago: Santiago is the main character of the novel and the novel is centered around his encounter and ordeal with the fish. He is a quiet and reserved old fisherman from Havana, Cuba who has lived a very full life but has been going through a rough patch in his career after 45 days of not catching any fish. He is a very kind and hardworking man. He is good friends with the boy who usually helps him with his fishing related actives. He encounters the fish while out fishing and begins a struggle lasting for days attempting to catch the fish. He is finally successful, and kills the fish but before he can make it home sharks devour over 90% of his catch. Despite his loss he nevertheless remains optimistic about his endeavors. He is also a baseball fans and Joe DiMaggio is his favorite player.

The Boy: The boy is a young man who assists Santiago with his fishing. He is not allowed to work for him during the novel because his father believes he is bad luck due to Santiago's streak without fish. The boy is extremely devoted and loyal to Santiago helping him to get food and drink and always talking baseball with him.

The Fish: The fish is the largest marlin that Santiago has ever encountered. He is hooked by Santiago and for three days drags Santiago and his skiff out to the middle of the ocean. He is finally killed by Santiago and his corpse is completely devoured by sharks on Santiago's voyage home. The fish is a magnificent creature in Santiago's eyes and he views him as his equal and his brother. He is extremely saddened that he must kill him, but he appreciated the beauty and the nobility of the creature.

Sunday, August 1, 2010

The Old Man and the Sea: Conflict

The conflict of The Old Man and the Sea is primarily an external one, but several other minor conflicts are littered throughout the novel. The most obvious conflict of the novel is between Santiago and the Marlin, an external conflict obviously Man Vs. Nature but to find the heaviest conflicts of the novel one must dig deeper into it. There is also another Man Vs. Nature in the novel in the form of Santiago and the sharks, but this also includes Santiago against himself as he must gather up all of the strength within himself and overcome his doubts to prove that he can make it back home and that nature cannot stop him.

Another conflict that I think is important to the novel and the character of Santiago is Santiago's spirituality. Santiago does not consider himself to be a religious person but in times of great hardship he will pray to the Virgin Mary, which I find to be somewhat hypocritical. It has been so long since he previously prayed that he does not fully remember his prayers. This is a great example of Man Vs. Self because he is coming to terms with his own spirituality and his belief in a higher power.

One of the more important conflicts in the novel is between Santiago and the Marlin because of the realization it causes in Santiago. Santiago comes to view the marlin as his own brother and this strange friendship that forms between the two motivates Santiago for the rest of his journey. He treats the fish as his equal and he attempts to honor it in their battle and becomes stronger in his victory. He is saddened by the fact that such a noble creature should have to die but through it's death Santiago becomes much stronger as a person.

The Old Man and the Sea is a novel that is ripe with conflicts with many of them requiring serious analysis and digging deeper than the surface to find the most prevalent and important conflicts in the novel.