12.09.11. The Last Journal! Holy moley, the semester has flown by! Seems like it was only yesterday that we were just starting out. Anyway, I wanted to first talk about some of the reading about the Koran. I knew very little about it before reading this, so the informational introduction was the most interesting part of the reading for me. I found it interesting that the Koran is merely arranged in order from the shortest sura to the longest sura, even though this isn't necessarily the chronological order of the writings. The Koran therefore has no real flow and jumps from subject to subject as it jumps from sura to sura. The suras may be a few words or they may be three hundred verses, and the style varies among them as well. I prefer writing about the Koran rather than writing about our readings from the New Testament because, as I’ve expressed before, I’m really not into reading and discussing and examining the Bible. I do my best to view it as simply a piece of literature and nothing more, but this doesn’t exactly work too well when I’m sitting in a classroom with people who worship it. While I don’t believe in the Koran, learning a bit about it still intrigues me because it is a foreign religion that I have had little education about in all of my schooling (probably because American schooling is so egotistical, but I won’t go there for now). What I’m really saying is that from this week’s readings, I didn’t like being assigned the selections from the New Testament, but I did enjoy reading some background about the Koran to broaden my horizons a bit.
12.02.11. Paper Revisions
I ended up with Jack's paper to read over and make suggestions for. I liked the topic because I didn't know very much about it before reading this paper. I felt like the paper did a good job of explaining things clearly. It put the concepts of Hinduism into simple terms that anyone could understand and made things very basic. I also liked that the paper took a path less traveled, so to speak, by comparing reincarnation not to the Bhagavad-gita, but to Plato's writings instead. I would not have thought of this comparison immediately on my own, so I feel that the paper brings a new kind of perspective to things by making his unlikely comparison. I realize that we aren’t supposed to focus on grammar in this journal, but there are a lot of grammatical/structural issues and typos that need to be addressed between this draft and the final copy. Beyond that, I felt that the paper was perhaps a little too informal. I felt like I was reading a journal, like this, or something informal hiding behind a formal structure. It felt too much like a story outlining the process of how the research paper was created and less like a paper telling me about how Hindu reincarnation relates to Plato’s writings and ideas. I’m pretty sure Dr. Hartman said that some first person was allowed as long as it wasn’t too informal, but this felt like too much to me. If this were my paper, I’d take out the parts that trace the process of creating the paper; I deem them unnecessary. I also felt that the final paragraph focused more on why researching Hinduism was significant and not so much on why relating Hinduism to Plato’s writings is significant or why the relationship matters. Beyond these things, I felt that the paper still had a good topic and left me feeling like I had certainly learned something.
11.18.11. The Art Museum
It was actually my feeling that the outside of the art museum seemed foreboding. It looks old and is quite large, and it gives me the feeling that I'm breaking some kind of rule by going inside. I didn't feel like it said anything nice to the visitor, but I did find it to be an attractive building nonetheless. For lack of a better word, I guess I'd call the architecture and style of the building's exterior grand. The sculpture court, however, did seem a bit more inviting. The way it looked was intriguing to me, and it made me want to look around and see what I'd find. I'm not sure exactly what it was about the room that intrigued me other than the fact that the design of the room is beautiful. I also felt that the white walls and floors made me think of a clean slate, a blank canvas. It was kinda like I was coming into the museum with a blank canvas, not knowing what to expect, but beyond this, I would find only canvases that were not blank. The lighting around the museum was beautiful. It seemed to shine softly on the artwork, but only on the artwork. The immediate area around the artwork was lit, but beyond that, there were shadows. It was evident on the floor where the range of the spotlights would end by the shadows. It was a very nice effect and made me feel like the only thing that I should be focusing on was the artwork, which I'm sure was partly what they were going for. It was also done to portray the art in the most flattering type of light possible. Huge florescent lights would not flatter the art; it would make everything seem too cold. The spotlights add an element of warmth that I really appreciated. I think my favorite collection of art to look at was the modern art because I find it easier to relate to than any of the older art. Overall, the art museum is a beautiful place and I'm looking forward to going again.
11.11.11. The Aeneid
Okay, now I understand that Dido is shot by Cupid and that this is the reason that she falls in love with Aeneas. I really get that, and I've taken that into consideration as best as I can. With that being said, I must also say that she is ridiculous. It's actually to the point of humor. She's like the most hilarious type of stereotypical girl. She and Aeneas have sex and so then she goes around acting like they're married. Then, when she finds out that Aeneas is leaving and going to Italy, she suddenly becomes the crazy girl that bashes her ex and calls him all kinds of names and wishes bad things upon him. Then she's all sad when she talks to Aeneas, who hides his feelings and tries to just be unfeeling as he tells her he must leave. Then she becomes all crazy again and curses him again. Then she tells her sister that she wants to burn all the stuff that Aeneas left behind. Let's face it, what girl doesn't want to get rid of her mean exboyfriend's stuff? Anna, Dido's sister, was probably all for this sisterly man-hating bonding. But then Dido just has to go and be all melodramatic and talk about how much her life sucks like an emo girl. Then she just goes way over the top and kills herself. To me, her suicide was just a kind of thing where she wanted to be like, "Aeneas won't stay with me? Well fine! I'll show him! I'll kill myself! Then he'll be sorry he left me!" She got too caught up in the moment, and I feel like if she had just waited a little while and calmed down, she could have found a better way to handle the situation. She could have stepped down as ruler and appointed someone else who was worthy to rule the kingdom. Then she would have been free to go to Aeneas! She's just a big drama queen.
As for my paper, I was thinking of looking into the Trojan War. A lot of what we've read is about the war, and I'd like to look into the history of it and maybe relate/compare that to the events given in the texts we've read.
11.04.11. Chuang Tzu Basic Writings I found the Chuang Tzu writings very entertaining compared to some of the other things we read. They often contained an element of humor, which kept my attention focused on what was happening instead of allowing it to wander. My favorite stories in particular were the one about the butterfly and the one about the minnows. As I said, I liked the one about the minnows because I have lived a similar situation several times with my mom and our frogs. In my situation, I'm the Confucian and my mom is the Daoist. This was my first time reading the story about the butterfly, so it took me by surprise, and I really liked it. I was not expecting the twist in logic where the character was unsure of whether he was a man who dreamed he was a butterfly or a butterfly who was dreaming he was a man. I definitely would never have considered that from the butterfly's perspective. It may be because I'm not sure if butterflies have dreams or it may just be the self-centered nature of the human race coming out in me. Either way, I was just impressed by the new perspective that this writing offered to me. In addition, the story about the wasted gourd also made me laugh a little. I just found it humorous that the guy doesn’t know what to do with this huge gourd and can’t dip water with it so he just decides to smash it, only to essentially be told “Hey, moron, why didn’t you find another use for it, like using it as a boat?” On the most basic level, it was hilarious. I also appreciate the message to be resourceful, though. I mean, let’s face it, we all have to do the best with what we’ve got. Right?
10.28.11. The Good Life
Reading that article reinforced my belief that popular culture puts too much emphasis on the fact that celebrities supposedly have "the good life" just because they have fame, money, and/or talent. Before reading that article and a few others about Steve Jobs, I knew nothing about him except that he's the genius behind my beloved iPod touch and that he had been battling pancreatic cancer. To others like me, it appeared that Jobs was living some perfect life. It's obvious that he has tons of money and is clearly insanely intelligent. To many, this would constitute a good life, and most people would simply stop here and fail to consider the other things going on in the life of this insanely rich genius. Most people would never consider that Jobs was emotionally all over the place or that he had a bad childhood and then failed to provide an ideal one for his own children in some ways. I certainly had no knowledge of these things until very recently. However, despite this knowledge, from what I've read, I've gotten the impression that Jobs was content with where he was in his life in many ways, especially near the end. This is important. To be living "the good life" does not mean to me that your entire time of existence has to be ideal. In fact, it may start out to be really crumby. I believe, though, that if a person comes from an awful beginning and turns it into something that they are comfortable and happy with, they are indeed living "the good life". In my eyes, all it takes to be living "the good life" is to have created a life that is comfortable for the person living it and to sustain that comfortable life until death. Not every second of any life, good or otherwise, will be the greatest second ever, but it's the overall quality that matters here. For me, living "the good life" would probably entail, among other things, possessing wisdom, loyal and supportive friends and family, enough money that I can take care of myself and my family sufficiently, and a fairly objective insight regarding the world and the people in it. I value these things (along with other things that would take probably forever to think of and list) and feel that combining all of them would be my ultimate fantasy good life.
10.21.11. Midterm Journal
While this course may not be my cup of tea, it's going pretty well. Let's face it, I'm a math major, so this is no calculus class for me, but it's still most likely going to rank higher on my enjoyment scale than History 150 or Comm 210 will when I take those. I always do the reading and get my journals done on time and stuff like that, so I feel like I'm putting plenty of effort into the class. Sometimes I feel like my participation in class discussion is a little lacking, but it's because I often find that I'm not sure what to say about the things we read. I deal better with more modern literature (so things will get better when we have 202 together, I'm sure), and for some reason when I read things like the stuff we've been reading, I just tend to find that I'm not sure what to say about it. I've read it and soaked in the concept of whatever happens in the reading, but that's just that to me. That's the end. It may be my lack of interest taking over. Actually, that's probably it. And I would like to take this opportunity to apologize for that (even though it probably doesn't hurt your feelings too much). Regardless of my participation, I feel that I have certainly learned things about the readings that we've encountered. I've never seen the vast majority of the stuff we've looked at, so it's all been a chance for me to look into the thoughts/creations of a new person, so that's interesting. I feel like this course has a certain type of structure to it that appeals to my need for structure and routine (I'm big on routines - I have to have a routine for the things I do in my life), so I feel like that is going well in the class (at least for me). So, just to let you know, I appreciate that. The bottom line, I think, is that I feel like this class is going pretty well because while the subject matter might not be my cup of tea, it's very structured and I feel like I'm learning from the texts and the ideas thrown out by them, you, and my classmates.
10.14.11. Antigone
After reading Antigone, it is very clear to me that I prefer Agamemnon. While I felt like both plays dragged out an event that didn’t need to be that lengthy, I felt that Antigone was far whinier than Agamemnon. Much of the play was spent with Antigone going on about how she wanted to die because she felt that she had to bury her brother even though it was forbidden, and it was a little annoying at times. I did feel that she was right in wanting to bury her brother though. Familial relationships were important in that time period, and she probably would have been punished by the gods had she not done the right thing for her brother since he was her flesh and blood. I felt that it was wrong of Creon to refuse burial rites to Polynices just because he didn’t fight on the side that Creon supported. He was still a member of Creon’s family and a member of their kingdom, so he should have been afforded some burial rites even if they weren’t as magnificent as those of his brother’s. It was cruel to leave him for the buzzards. Creon is just a generally frustrating character in the play, though, because he is quite inconsiderate of others and their feelings and act like he is always right and everyone who opposes him is wrong. He finds out just how foolish he is, though, when his wife and son are both dead at the end of the play because of his actions. I did not feel, however, that he had changed by the end of the play. I feel that he was just feeling sorry for himself. He did not actually realize that he was mistaken in any way, which, to me, made him all the more easy to dislike.
Parody: (this is the approximate script for my parody...I don't think I can post the actual video) This is Odysseus’s adventure in ninety seconds! Odysseus travels to Troy to fight in the Trojan war and kicks lots of butt and his side wins! YAY! He leaves Troy with his twelve ships and comes to a village, which he ransacks, and then an island, where the men decide to get high. Next comes the Cyclops's cave, where Odysseus tries to act like a baller, but really he just ends up getting some men killed and has to poke out the Cyclops's eye to escape, but in the process he tells the Cyclops his name like an idiot. The Cyclops gets Poseidon to curse Odysseus. This means that fun times are ahead for Odysseus and his crew! When they leave, Odysseus meets a king who gives him a bag of winds to get home, but his stupid men unleash the winds too soon and they're blown back to the king, who is ticked off and refuses to give them any more winds. The next island they go to is inhabited by cannibals, who chow down on all of Odysseus's men except those on his own ship. Apparently life is short when you decide to sail with Odysseus. Odysseus escapes and finds Circe, who turns the crew into pigs, but Odysseus convinces her to change them back and they end up staying there for a whole year and partying while Odysseus gets his bom-chicka-wow-wow with her. She then sends him to hell to talk to a dead guy, who tells Odysseus that when he gets home, he won't have any men left. WHAT A SURPRISE! They go back to sea and pass some sirens who try to tempt passersby to their doom, and a sea monster, who eats some MORE of Odysseus's men, but in the process they avoid a whirlpool that would have destroyed their ship and killed them all. Next they come to an island with some sacred cattle, which his men stupidly kill, OF COURSE, thereby causing them to die anyway, leaving Odysseus alone just like the dead guy said! He then finds his way to Kalypso's island and gets his bom-chicka-wow-wow with her for seven years and cries about it before Athena finally arranges for him to leave. He sails away on a raft and washes up on another island, where a king grants him passage back home to Ithaka. Odysseus sails home, puts on a disguise, kills all the suitors who've been harassing his wife, and ends his adventure! And this was Odysseus's adventure in ninety seconds!
10.07.11. Heroes
I've enjoyed reading the hero stories more than much of the other things we've been reading lately. Specifically, I liked the story about Rama and the excerpt from The Iliad that we read. I have a certain fascination with hero stories like these, so whenever I read them for classes, I usually enjoy them. I've always liked looking at the Trojan War and even did a paper about it in high school after reading The Odyssey. I liked researching it and finding out about what really happened and how much of the movie Troy was actually real truth and how much was just Hollywood junk. I think The Iliad interested me more than The Odyssey because it was about the Trojan War and included things that are seen in the movie Troy. I've always just been more interested in the actual war itself than what people like Odysseus did afterward. The story about Rama was interesting to me because it was similar to mythological stories, which I've also always liked. It was very similar to Greek and Roman hero stories. When I read the little introductory thing about heroes in the book, it bothered me a little because it made it sound like calling someone who is strong and fights off monsters a hero wasn't a good thing or wasn't right. That was the impression I got, anyway, and I completely disagree with that. I don't see anything wrong with that definition of a hero; it's classic. There are certainly heroes who do not fit this mold, and that is perfectly okay too, but this does not mean that we should shun the classic definition. It may seem random or off topic, but this was what I thought when I was reading it. I found that I didn't really like the story about David and Goliath because it wasn't the type of hero story I enjoy. It was far more of a biblical story and far less of a classic hero vs. monster type of story.
09.30.11. Creation Myths
All this stuff on creation myths has been not fun for me, to say the least. I didn't mind reading the myths from Greece or wherever because to me, they're like reading stories about Medusa or whatever. It wasn't until we got to reading the Hebrew scriptures that I started having a problem. I separate myself from anything that has to do with the bible or going to church. Reading parts of the bible like this just irks me, and not in the way that Dr. Berg tries to irk us by having us read excerpts that discuss why we should be donating to charity. Those things may simply make me feel guilty about how I'm living my life, but that's the extent of it. Being instructed to read parts of the bible makes me just plain angry. (This is not at all saying that I'm mad at you, Dr. Hartman, so please don't take it that way) Neither class discussion nor this 300 page journal entry are the place to discuss what I think about the contents of the bible, so I'm not going to get into it at all. I've been doing my best to view it as simply another myth, but this gets difficult come discussion time. I've also obviously not been at all inclined to take part in discussion on this matter, so I therefore wanted to take this journal to explain why. I am not putting down the Christian religion or the bible here. I'm just saying that I don't agree with it and that I have a problem with reading parts of the bible because of my own beliefs. I do understand, though, that it is a piece of ancient literature of the type that we've been covering, so I'm just trying to basically wait it out until we can move on to another topic.
09.23.11. Sappho and Her Poems
I'd have to say that Sappho was definitely an admirable woman. It is not often that you see a woman writing poetry, much less anything else, from times like 600 B.C.E.. I feel that this means that there was a reason for this, and whether it be the oppression of women or something else, Sappho rose above it and wrote, so kudos to her for that one. Beyond that, from what we read, some of her poems are definitely a little odd in my opinion. But before I get into that, as a side note, are her poems untitled? I know that for untitled poems such as some of those written by Shakespeare or Emily Dickinson often have the poem's first line listed as the title, and that's what appears to be the case with Sappho's poems. I wonder if she has any that are titled. Anyway, the poem "Don't ask me what to wear" is what I think of as a typical poem that I'd read in an anthology. Such a poem is one where the author just picks something random and ordinary and puts it into poem form to make me read it in classes like this (I promise, that's their motivation!). The poem "Lament for a Maidenhead" was, I felt, the weirdest of all the poems we read. It seems unfinished, so perhaps if we had the full poem it would not seem as strange, but based on what we have now, it is basically a random, half-finished thought that leaves me wondering why it's even included in this book. I know my "analysis" or whatever of Sappho seems a little harsh in some places, but I've never been a fan of poetry. If it makes you feel any better, I went on rants like that in high school to my senior AP lit teacher as well.
09.16.11. The Odyssey
Reading about how Odysseus can be in his own home next to his wife and take abuse from the suitors and still manage to not reveal himself and go crazy has kind of impressed me. I know that if I were in a situation where I had to stay in disguise while some insolent suitors were trying to humiliate me, I'd have a very hard time keeping from just going crazy on them right then and there. I think these parts of the story are meant to work up emotion in the reader and make the audience eager for Odysseus to get his revenge on the suitors for all they've done to him, his wife, his son, and his home. When Odysseus finally does kill all of the suitors, it will be that much more satisfying for the readers because of all the frustration that was built up. I had also forgotten since the first time I read this that some of the maids go off and sleep with the suitors, which made me mad. I know that the suitors have no commitment to Penelope, but they spend their time in her house eating her food and trying to win her over whenever they see her, so I'm pretty sure they should have a little more respect for her than that. Plus, beyond that, her maids are supposed to be there to serve their mistress and be loyal to her, and sleeping with the suitors that their mistress hates is not loyalty in my book. It especially irked me that the maid that Penelope raised and cared for since she was a child was sleeping with the suitors. If Penelope raised this girl, this girl needs to have respect for Penelope and not do disgusting things like that. Just my opinion.
09.09.11. The Odyssey
I read The Odyssey as a freshman in high school, so I do remember some of it, and one of the things I remember is what my favorite parts were. They're two parts that we've just read. One of them is the story of Odysseus and Polyphemos. I thought it was pretty stupid of Odysseus to insist on venturing into the cave despite knowing that it belonged to Polyphemos. I think maybe there was a bit of a need to be a manly man behind this action. This may have been stupid, but the way Odysseus escapes from the cave is quite clever, and that is probably what I like most about this story. Telling Polyphemos that his name is Nohbdy and riding out of the cave under the flock of sheep was just sheer genius on the part of Odysseus. The thing that was not genius, however, was taunting Polyphemos as Odysseus sailed away and telling the cyclops his real name. Really, if Odysseus had just kept his big, fat mouth shut, he wouldn't have gotten cursed by Poseidon and then he could have gone straight home! If that had happened, we could just skip straight from the story of Polyphemos to Odysseus pulling up on the shores of Ithaka and fighting off the suitors to take back his throne. Anyway, my other favorite part of the story is when Odysseus is travelling and must pass by the Sirens and then must choose to either go through the place where the sea is really rough and the ship may be splintered or go by the sea monster and the whirl pool and either lose six men or have the ship torn apart. I've read about Sirens in other books and stories and thought that they were interesting. I also remember talking about the sea monster and the whirl pool in other classes. In that situation, Odysseus was definitely caught between a rock and a hard place, because on one hand he was compassionate for his men and didn't want to lose them in such a brutal, gory way, but on the other hand the entire ship could be lost, himself included. While The Odyssey is not the most exciting of stories altogether, these parts were the parts that really caught my attention and imagination both the first and second time reading them.
09.02.11. The Odyssey
Reading The Odyssey is a lot easier for me than reading the Epic of Gilgamesh. Odysseus seems more like the classic hero than Gilgamesh did, and I like that about him. I think the most interesting thing for me about The Odyssey is the interaction of the gods with humans. I find it interesting to see the different personalities of the gods and see how they favor certain humans or hold grudges against other ones. I find myself tending to like Athena since she wants to help Odysseus and disliking Poseidon for impeding Odysseus, even though Poseidon's reason for doing so may be a good one. I, for one, would be angry if someone blinded my cyclops too. I think that my favorite character of the story besides Odysseus is a tie between Athena and Telemachus. I like Telemachus because he is standing up to the suitors in his home and is becoming a man and showing traits of his father. I like Athena because she is kind and does all within her power to aid Odysseus and Telemachus. I also appreciate when Odysseus is on the island with Kalypso and the story introduces him for the first time with him sitting by the ocean crying. Although he is a hero, I feel that he shouldn't be built up to something that he is not. Everyone, even the greatest of people, has moments of weakness. This small detail shows that Odysseus is no different. He sees that the situation of his return is out of his control and he mourns for his kingdom and his wife because of it. I prefer this over having the story open with Odysseus enjoying himself with the nymph and not missing his home at all. This would portray him as arrogant and uncaring about his wife or home. If that were the opening, there wouldn't need to be a story at all, actually, because he would probably just prefer to stay on the island for the rest of time, as the nymph wishes for him to do.
08.26.11. Gilgamesh Response
When I read the Epic of Gilgamesh, I kept thinking about Beowulf. It may be the fact that I just lump the two together in my mind as ancient forms of literature. It may also be the fact that Gilgamesh and Beowulf are both hero characters in their stories and they are both looking to fulfill their destinies. Either way, I can say for both stories that I read them and tried to take out of them anything I could, but neither story was really my cup of tea. It's not that Gilgamesh wasn't a good story. Based solely on the plot line, the story was quite interesting. My main trouble, as silly as it sounds, is the fact that it is so old and is definitely translated in an older language. I have never been a big fan of ancient literature and things like that, so I've always had a hard time getting into stories like that and enjoying these topics. The movie Troy is basically as good as it gets for me. Regardless, as I stated, Gilgamesh's story is still a good one. He starts out as a terrible person, sleeping with brides-to-be and just being a pig. Then, when he meets Enkidu, he changes and becomes a much better king and person. He and Enkidu are like brothers and refer to each other as such, and I found it very sweet. The gods created Enkidu to challenge the wrongs Gilgamesh was committing, and their plan worked perfectly. In many ways, the story was reminiscent of stories found in the Bible. I picked up on the similarities even with my limited knowledge of the Bible. I suppose it can be attributed to the fact that they are two of the oldest writings we know. Their stories probably came from similar or shared sources. To me, though, the stories of Gilgamesh were much more interesting and entertaining than the stories of the Bible. I am still astounded that I didn't remember ever hearing of Gilgamesh until he was brought up in class. I know that I will definitely remember him now, though.
Taylor Aynes
12.09.11. The Last Journal!
Holy moley, the semester has flown by! Seems like it was only yesterday that we were just starting out. Anyway, I wanted to first talk about some of the reading about the Koran. I knew very little about it before reading this, so the informational introduction was the most interesting part of the reading for me. I found it interesting that the Koran is merely arranged in order from the shortest sura to the longest sura, even though this isn't necessarily the chronological order of the writings. The Koran therefore has no real flow and jumps from subject to subject as it jumps from sura to sura. The suras may be a few words or they may be three hundred verses, and the style varies among them as well. I prefer writing about the Koran rather than writing about our readings from the New Testament because, as I’ve expressed before, I’m really not into reading and discussing and examining the Bible. I do my best to view it as simply a piece of literature and nothing more, but this doesn’t exactly work too well when I’m sitting in a classroom with people who worship it. While I don’t believe in the Koran, learning a bit about it still intrigues me because it is a foreign religion that I have had little education about in all of my schooling (probably because American schooling is so egotistical, but I won’t go there for now). What I’m really saying is that from this week’s readings, I didn’t like being assigned the selections from the New Testament, but I did enjoy reading some background about the Koran to broaden my horizons a bit.
12.02.11. Paper Revisions
I ended up with Jack's paper to read over and make suggestions for. I liked the topic because I didn't know very much about it before reading this paper. I felt like the paper did a good job of explaining things clearly. It put the concepts of Hinduism into simple terms that anyone could understand and made things very basic. I also liked that the paper took a path less traveled, so to speak, by comparing reincarnation not to the Bhagavad-gita, but to Plato's writings instead. I would not have thought of this comparison immediately on my own, so I feel that the paper brings a new kind of perspective to things by making his unlikely comparison. I realize that we aren’t supposed to focus on grammar in this journal, but there are a lot of grammatical/structural issues and typos that need to be addressed between this draft and the final copy. Beyond that, I felt that the paper was perhaps a little too informal. I felt like I was reading a journal, like this, or something informal hiding behind a formal structure. It felt too much like a story outlining the process of how the research paper was created and less like a paper telling me about how Hindu reincarnation relates to Plato’s writings and ideas. I’m pretty sure Dr. Hartman said that some first person was allowed as long as it wasn’t too informal, but this felt like too much to me. If this were my paper, I’d take out the parts that trace the process of creating the paper; I deem them unnecessary. I also felt that the final paragraph focused more on why researching Hinduism was significant and not so much on why relating Hinduism to Plato’s writings is significant or why the relationship matters. Beyond these things, I felt that the paper still had a good topic and left me feeling like I had certainly learned something.
11.18.11. The Art Museum
It was actually my feeling that the outside of the art museum seemed foreboding. It looks old and is quite large, and it gives me the feeling that I'm breaking some kind of rule by going inside. I didn't feel like it said anything nice to the visitor, but I did find it to be an attractive building nonetheless. For lack of a better word, I guess I'd call the architecture and style of the building's exterior grand. The sculpture court, however, did seem a bit more inviting. The way it looked was intriguing to me, and it made me want to look around and see what I'd find. I'm not sure exactly what it was about the room that intrigued me other than the fact that the design of the room is beautiful. I also felt that the white walls and floors made me think of a clean slate, a blank canvas. It was kinda like I was coming into the museum with a blank canvas, not knowing what to expect, but beyond this, I would find only canvases that were not blank. The lighting around the museum was beautiful. It seemed to shine softly on the artwork, but only on the artwork. The immediate area around the artwork was lit, but beyond that, there were shadows. It was evident on the floor where the range of the spotlights would end by the shadows. It was a very nice effect and made me feel like the only thing that I should be focusing on was the artwork, which I'm sure was partly what they were going for. It was also done to portray the art in the most flattering type of light possible. Huge florescent lights would not flatter the art; it would make everything seem too cold. The spotlights add an element of warmth that I really appreciated. I think my favorite collection of art to look at was the modern art because I find it easier to relate to than any of the older art. Overall, the art museum is a beautiful place and I'm looking forward to going again.
11.11.11. The Aeneid
Okay, now I understand that Dido is shot by Cupid and that this is the reason that she falls in love with Aeneas. I really get that, and I've taken that into consideration as best as I can. With that being said, I must also say that she is ridiculous. It's actually to the point of humor. She's like the most hilarious type of stereotypical girl. She and Aeneas have sex and so then she goes around acting like they're married. Then, when she finds out that Aeneas is leaving and going to Italy, she suddenly becomes the crazy girl that bashes her ex and calls him all kinds of names and wishes bad things upon him. Then she's all sad when she talks to Aeneas, who hides his feelings and tries to just be unfeeling as he tells her he must leave. Then she becomes all crazy again and curses him again. Then she tells her sister that she wants to burn all the stuff that Aeneas left behind. Let's face it, what girl doesn't want to get rid of her mean exboyfriend's stuff? Anna, Dido's sister, was probably all for this sisterly man-hating bonding. But then Dido just has to go and be all melodramatic and talk about how much her life sucks like an emo girl. Then she just goes way over the top and kills herself. To me, her suicide was just a kind of thing where she wanted to be like, "Aeneas won't stay with me? Well fine! I'll show him! I'll kill myself! Then he'll be sorry he left me!" She got too caught up in the moment, and I feel like if she had just waited a little while and calmed down, she could have found a better way to handle the situation. She could have stepped down as ruler and appointed someone else who was worthy to rule the kingdom. Then she would have been free to go to Aeneas! She's just a big drama queen.
As for my paper, I was thinking of looking into the Trojan War. A lot of what we've read is about the war, and I'd like to look into the history of it and maybe relate/compare that to the events given in the texts we've read.
11.04.11. Chuang Tzu Basic Writings
I found the Chuang Tzu writings very entertaining compared to some of the other things we read. They often contained an element of humor, which kept my attention focused on what was happening instead of allowing it to wander. My favorite stories in particular were the one about the butterfly and the one about the minnows. As I said, I liked the one about the minnows because I have lived a similar situation several times with my mom and our frogs. In my situation, I'm the Confucian and my mom is the Daoist. This was my first time reading the story about the butterfly, so it took me by surprise, and I really liked it. I was not expecting the twist in logic where the character was unsure of whether he was a man who dreamed he was a butterfly or a butterfly who was dreaming he was a man. I definitely would never have considered that from the butterfly's perspective. It may be because I'm not sure if butterflies have dreams or it may just be the self-centered nature of the human race coming out in me. Either way, I was just impressed by the new perspective that this writing offered to me. In addition, the story about the wasted gourd also made me laugh a little. I just found it humorous that the guy doesn’t know what to do with this huge gourd and can’t dip water with it so he just decides to smash it, only to essentially be told “Hey, moron, why didn’t you find another use for it, like using it as a boat?” On the most basic level, it was hilarious. I also appreciate the message to be resourceful, though. I mean, let’s face it, we all have to do the best with what we’ve got. Right?
10.28.11. The Good Life
Reading that article reinforced my belief that popular culture puts too much emphasis on the fact that celebrities supposedly have "the good life" just because they have fame, money, and/or talent. Before reading that article and a few others about Steve Jobs, I knew nothing about him except that he's the genius behind my beloved iPod touch and that he had been battling pancreatic cancer. To others like me, it appeared that Jobs was living some perfect life. It's obvious that he has tons of money and is clearly insanely intelligent. To many, this would constitute a good life, and most people would simply stop here and fail to consider the other things going on in the life of this insanely rich genius. Most people would never consider that Jobs was emotionally all over the place or that he had a bad childhood and then failed to provide an ideal one for his own children in some ways. I certainly had no knowledge of these things until very recently. However, despite this knowledge, from what I've read, I've gotten the impression that Jobs was content with where he was in his life in many ways, especially near the end. This is important. To be living "the good life" does not mean to me that your entire time of existence has to be ideal. In fact, it may start out to be really crumby. I believe, though, that if a person comes from an awful beginning and turns it into something that they are comfortable and happy with, they are indeed living "the good life". In my eyes, all it takes to be living "the good life" is to have created a life that is comfortable for the person living it and to sustain that comfortable life until death. Not every second of any life, good or otherwise, will be the greatest second ever, but it's the overall quality that matters here. For me, living "the good life" would probably entail, among other things, possessing wisdom, loyal and supportive friends and family, enough money that I can take care of myself and my family sufficiently, and a fairly objective insight regarding the world and the people in it. I value these things (along with other things that would take probably forever to think of and list) and feel that combining all of them would be my ultimate fantasy good life.
10.21.11. Midterm Journal
While this course may not be my cup of tea, it's going pretty well. Let's face it, I'm a math major, so this is no calculus class for me, but it's still most likely going to rank higher on my enjoyment scale than History 150 or Comm 210 will when I take those. I always do the reading and get my journals done on time and stuff like that, so I feel like I'm putting plenty of effort into the class. Sometimes I feel like my participation in class discussion is a little lacking, but it's because I often find that I'm not sure what to say about the things we read. I deal better with more modern literature (so things will get better when we have 202 together, I'm sure), and for some reason when I read things like the stuff we've been reading, I just tend to find that I'm not sure what to say about it. I've read it and soaked in the concept of whatever happens in the reading, but that's just that to me. That's the end. It may be my lack of interest taking over. Actually, that's probably it. And I would like to take this opportunity to apologize for that (even though it probably doesn't hurt your feelings too much). Regardless of my participation, I feel that I have certainly learned things about the readings that we've encountered. I've never seen the vast majority of the stuff we've looked at, so it's all been a chance for me to look into the thoughts/creations of a new person, so that's interesting. I feel like this course has a certain type of structure to it that appeals to my need for structure and routine (I'm big on routines - I have to have a routine for the things I do in my life), so I feel like that is going well in the class (at least for me). So, just to let you know, I appreciate that. The bottom line, I think, is that I feel like this class is going pretty well because while the subject matter might not be my cup of tea, it's very structured and I feel like I'm learning from the texts and the ideas thrown out by them, you, and my classmates.
10.14.11. Antigone
After reading Antigone, it is very clear to me that I prefer Agamemnon. While I felt like both plays dragged out an event that didn’t need to be that lengthy, I felt that Antigone was far whinier than Agamemnon. Much of the play was spent with Antigone going on about how she wanted to die because she felt that she had to bury her brother even though it was forbidden, and it was a little annoying at times. I did feel that she was right in wanting to bury her brother though. Familial relationships were important in that time period, and she probably would have been punished by the gods had she not done the right thing for her brother since he was her flesh and blood. I felt that it was wrong of Creon to refuse burial rites to Polynices just because he didn’t fight on the side that Creon supported. He was still a member of Creon’s family and a member of their kingdom, so he should have been afforded some burial rites even if they weren’t as magnificent as those of his brother’s. It was cruel to leave him for the buzzards. Creon is just a generally frustrating character in the play, though, because he is quite inconsiderate of others and their feelings and act like he is always right and everyone who opposes him is wrong. He finds out just how foolish he is, though, when his wife and son are both dead at the end of the play because of his actions. I did not feel, however, that he had changed by the end of the play. I feel that he was just feeling sorry for himself. He did not actually realize that he was mistaken in any way, which, to me, made him all the more easy to dislike.
Parody: (this is the approximate script for my parody...I don't think I can post the actual video)
This is Odysseus’s adventure in ninety seconds! Odysseus travels to Troy to fight in the Trojan war and kicks lots of butt and his side wins! YAY! He leaves Troy with his twelve ships and comes to a village, which he ransacks, and then an island, where the men decide to get high. Next comes the Cyclops's cave, where Odysseus tries to act like a baller, but really he just ends up getting some men killed and has to poke out the Cyclops's eye to escape, but in the process he tells the Cyclops his name like an idiot. The Cyclops gets Poseidon to curse Odysseus. This means that fun times are ahead for Odysseus and his crew! When they leave, Odysseus meets a king who gives him a bag of winds to get home, but his stupid men unleash the winds too soon and they're blown back to the king, who is ticked off and refuses to give them any more winds. The next island they go to is inhabited by cannibals, who chow down on all of Odysseus's men except those on his own ship. Apparently life is short when you decide to sail with Odysseus. Odysseus escapes and finds Circe, who turns the crew into pigs, but Odysseus convinces her to change them back and they end up staying there for a whole year and partying while Odysseus gets his bom-chicka-wow-wow with her. She then sends him to hell to talk to a dead guy, who tells Odysseus that when he gets home, he won't have any men left. WHAT A SURPRISE! They go back to sea and pass some sirens who try to tempt passersby to their doom, and a sea monster, who eats some MORE of Odysseus's men, but in the process they avoid a whirlpool that would have destroyed their ship and killed them all. Next they come to an island with some sacred cattle, which his men stupidly kill, OF COURSE, thereby causing them to die anyway, leaving Odysseus alone just like the dead guy said! He then finds his way to Kalypso's island and gets his bom-chicka-wow-wow with her for seven years and cries about it before Athena finally arranges for him to leave. He sails away on a raft and washes up on another island, where a king grants him passage back home to Ithaka. Odysseus sails home, puts on a disguise, kills all the suitors who've been harassing his wife, and ends his adventure! And this was Odysseus's adventure in ninety seconds!
10.07.11. Heroes
I've enjoyed reading the hero stories more than much of the other things we've been reading lately. Specifically, I liked the story about Rama and the excerpt from The Iliad that we read. I have a certain fascination with hero stories like these, so whenever I read them for classes, I usually enjoy them. I've always liked looking at the Trojan War and even did a paper about it in high school after reading The Odyssey. I liked researching it and finding out about what really happened and how much of the movie Troy was actually real truth and how much was just Hollywood junk. I think The Iliad interested me more than The Odyssey because it was about the Trojan War and included things that are seen in the movie Troy. I've always just been more interested in the actual war itself than what people like Odysseus did afterward. The story about Rama was interesting to me because it was similar to mythological stories, which I've also always liked. It was very similar to Greek and Roman hero stories. When I read the little introductory thing about heroes in the book, it bothered me a little because it made it sound like calling someone who is strong and fights off monsters a hero wasn't a good thing or wasn't right. That was the impression I got, anyway, and I completely disagree with that. I don't see anything wrong with that definition of a hero; it's classic. There are certainly heroes who do not fit this mold, and that is perfectly okay too, but this does not mean that we should shun the classic definition. It may seem random or off topic, but this was what I thought when I was reading it. I found that I didn't really like the story about David and Goliath because it wasn't the type of hero story I enjoy. It was far more of a biblical story and far less of a classic hero vs. monster type of story.
09.30.11. Creation Myths
All this stuff on creation myths has been not fun for me, to say the least. I didn't mind reading the myths from Greece or wherever because to me, they're like reading stories about Medusa or whatever. It wasn't until we got to reading the Hebrew scriptures that I started having a problem. I separate myself from anything that has to do with the bible or going to church. Reading parts of the bible like this just irks me, and not in the way that Dr. Berg tries to irk us by having us read excerpts that discuss why we should be donating to charity. Those things may simply make me feel guilty about how I'm living my life, but that's the extent of it. Being instructed to read parts of the bible makes me just plain angry. (This is not at all saying that I'm mad at you, Dr. Hartman, so please don't take it that way) Neither class discussion nor this 300 page journal entry are the place to discuss what I think about the contents of the bible, so I'm not going to get into it at all. I've been doing my best to view it as simply another myth, but this gets difficult come discussion time. I've also obviously not been at all inclined to take part in discussion on this matter, so I therefore wanted to take this journal to explain why. I am not putting down the Christian religion or the bible here. I'm just saying that I don't agree with it and that I have a problem with reading parts of the bible because of my own beliefs. I do understand, though, that it is a piece of ancient literature of the type that we've been covering, so I'm just trying to basically wait it out until we can move on to another topic.
09.23.11. Sappho and Her Poems
I'd have to say that Sappho was definitely an admirable woman. It is not often that you see a woman writing poetry, much less anything else, from times like 600 B.C.E.. I feel that this means that there was a reason for this, and whether it be the oppression of women or something else, Sappho rose above it and wrote, so kudos to her for that one. Beyond that, from what we read, some of her poems are definitely a little odd in my opinion. But before I get into that, as a side note, are her poems untitled? I know that for untitled poems such as some of those written by Shakespeare or Emily Dickinson often have the poem's first line listed as the title, and that's what appears to be the case with Sappho's poems. I wonder if she has any that are titled. Anyway, the poem "Don't ask me what to wear" is what I think of as a typical poem that I'd read in an anthology. Such a poem is one where the author just picks something random and ordinary and puts it into poem form to make me read it in classes like this (I promise, that's their motivation!). The poem "Lament for a Maidenhead" was, I felt, the weirdest of all the poems we read. It seems unfinished, so perhaps if we had the full poem it would not seem as strange, but based on what we have now, it is basically a random, half-finished thought that leaves me wondering why it's even included in this book. I know my "analysis" or whatever of Sappho seems a little harsh in some places, but I've never been a fan of poetry. If it makes you feel any better, I went on rants like that in high school to my senior AP lit teacher as well.
09.16.11. The Odyssey
Reading about how Odysseus can be in his own home next to his wife and take abuse from the suitors and still manage to not reveal himself and go crazy has kind of impressed me. I know that if I were in a situation where I had to stay in disguise while some insolent suitors were trying to humiliate me, I'd have a very hard time keeping from just going crazy on them right then and there. I think these parts of the story are meant to work up emotion in the reader and make the audience eager for Odysseus to get his revenge on the suitors for all they've done to him, his wife, his son, and his home. When Odysseus finally does kill all of the suitors, it will be that much more satisfying for the readers because of all the frustration that was built up. I had also forgotten since the first time I read this that some of the maids go off and sleep with the suitors, which made me mad. I know that the suitors have no commitment to Penelope, but they spend their time in her house eating her food and trying to win her over whenever they see her, so I'm pretty sure they should have a little more respect for her than that. Plus, beyond that, her maids are supposed to be there to serve their mistress and be loyal to her, and sleeping with the suitors that their mistress hates is not loyalty in my book. It especially irked me that the maid that Penelope raised and cared for since she was a child was sleeping with the suitors. If Penelope raised this girl, this girl needs to have respect for Penelope and not do disgusting things like that. Just my opinion.
09.09.11. The Odyssey
I read The Odyssey as a freshman in high school, so I do remember some of it, and one of the things I remember is what my favorite parts were. They're two parts that we've just read. One of them is the story of Odysseus and Polyphemos. I thought it was pretty stupid of Odysseus to insist on venturing into the cave despite knowing that it belonged to Polyphemos. I think maybe there was a bit of a need to be a manly man behind this action. This may have been stupid, but the way Odysseus escapes from the cave is quite clever, and that is probably what I like most about this story. Telling Polyphemos that his name is Nohbdy and riding out of the cave under the flock of sheep was just sheer genius on the part of Odysseus. The thing that was not genius, however, was taunting Polyphemos as Odysseus sailed away and telling the cyclops his real name. Really, if Odysseus had just kept his big, fat mouth shut, he wouldn't have gotten cursed by Poseidon and then he could have gone straight home! If that had happened, we could just skip straight from the story of Polyphemos to Odysseus pulling up on the shores of Ithaka and fighting off the suitors to take back his throne. Anyway, my other favorite part of the story is when Odysseus is travelling and must pass by the Sirens and then must choose to either go through the place where the sea is really rough and the ship may be splintered or go by the sea monster and the whirl pool and either lose six men or have the ship torn apart. I've read about Sirens in other books and stories and thought that they were interesting. I also remember talking about the sea monster and the whirl pool in other classes. In that situation, Odysseus was definitely caught between a rock and a hard place, because on one hand he was compassionate for his men and didn't want to lose them in such a brutal, gory way, but on the other hand the entire ship could be lost, himself included. While The Odyssey is not the most exciting of stories altogether, these parts were the parts that really caught my attention and imagination both the first and second time reading them.
09.02.11. The Odyssey
Reading The Odyssey is a lot easier for me than reading the Epic of Gilgamesh. Odysseus seems more like the classic hero than Gilgamesh did, and I like that about him. I think the most interesting thing for me about The Odyssey is the interaction of the gods with humans. I find it interesting to see the different personalities of the gods and see how they favor certain humans or hold grudges against other ones. I find myself tending to like Athena since she wants to help Odysseus and disliking Poseidon for impeding Odysseus, even though Poseidon's reason for doing so may be a good one. I, for one, would be angry if someone blinded my cyclops too. I think that my favorite character of the story besides Odysseus is a tie between Athena and Telemachus. I like Telemachus because he is standing up to the suitors in his home and is becoming a man and showing traits of his father. I like Athena because she is kind and does all within her power to aid Odysseus and Telemachus. I also appreciate when Odysseus is on the island with Kalypso and the story introduces him for the first time with him sitting by the ocean crying. Although he is a hero, I feel that he shouldn't be built up to something that he is not. Everyone, even the greatest of people, has moments of weakness. This small detail shows that Odysseus is no different. He sees that the situation of his return is out of his control and he mourns for his kingdom and his wife because of it. I prefer this over having the story open with Odysseus enjoying himself with the nymph and not missing his home at all. This would portray him as arrogant and uncaring about his wife or home. If that were the opening, there wouldn't need to be a story at all, actually, because he would probably just prefer to stay on the island for the rest of time, as the nymph wishes for him to do.
08.26.11. Gilgamesh Response
When I read the Epic of Gilgamesh, I kept thinking about Beowulf. It may be the fact that I just lump the two together in my mind as ancient forms of literature. It may also be the fact that Gilgamesh and Beowulf are both hero characters in their stories and they are both looking to fulfill their destinies. Either way, I can say for both stories that I read them and tried to take out of them anything I could, but neither story was really my cup of tea. It's not that Gilgamesh wasn't a good story. Based solely on the plot line, the story was quite interesting. My main trouble, as silly as it sounds, is the fact that it is so old and is definitely translated in an older language. I have never been a big fan of ancient literature and things like that, so I've always had a hard time getting into stories like that and enjoying these topics. The movie Troy is basically as good as it gets for me. Regardless, as I stated, Gilgamesh's story is still a good one. He starts out as a terrible person, sleeping with brides-to-be and just being a pig. Then, when he meets Enkidu, he changes and becomes a much better king and person. He and Enkidu are like brothers and refer to each other as such, and I found it very sweet. The gods created Enkidu to challenge the wrongs Gilgamesh was committing, and their plan worked perfectly. In many ways, the story was reminiscent of stories found in the Bible. I picked up on the similarities even with my limited knowledge of the Bible. I suppose it can be attributed to the fact that they are two of the oldest writings we know. Their stories probably came from similar or shared sources. To me, though, the stories of Gilgamesh were much more interesting and entertaining than the stories of the Bible. I am still astounded that I didn't remember ever hearing of Gilgamesh until he was brought up in class. I know that I will definitely remember him now, though.