Thoreau

After reading "WHere I lived and WHat i Lived for" written by Thoreau, i found some connections between him and CHris McCandless from Into the WIld. Thoreau gave the reason for going into the woods, as he wished "to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if i could no learen what it had to teach." CHris also went into the wild for the same reason. He wanted 'live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life.' Both CHris and Thoreau wanted to have a purpose in life. Both of these men also wanted to have a very simplistic life. Chris only bought what he thought was neccessary to survive. He even gave all of his money to some charity before heading out. Thoreau said 'let your affairs be as two or three, and not a hundred or a thousand'. I agree with Thoreau; however, in today's society that we live in, it is hard to live like that. I mean it is possible, but it would be very difficult. I kinda relate this to cell phones. Today, almost everyone has a cell phone. And they probably are texting each other a hundred times a day. But what did people do when cell phones weren't owned by everyone and texting wasn't popular? Well they didn't do these kinds of things. I mean with cell phones, our lives have just gotten more away from being simplistic.

Personal Philosophy

WHat is my personal philosophy? Well i don't really know. I guess i could say that it is the phrase, Live, Laugh and love. Because i really like this phrase. I believe that in life, in order to live, one has to laught a lot and love a lot. THis is one thing that you have to do in order to live a happy life in my opinion. I personally belive taht laughter is the best medicine in life. If a person is mentally happy, then phisically they'll be happy as well. It is just like if a person is always in a bad negative mood in thier head, if they continue to be like this for their whole life, then the physical appearance on their face will also be that of unhappy and they;ll start having wrinkles on their face. Just like Emerson speaks of his personal philosophies in both Nature and in Self REliance, my personal philosophy is live, laugth and love.

Poetry

THere are four fireside poets that we read poems from. THey are Henry Longfellow, Oliver Wendell Holmes, James Russel Lowell, and John Greenleaf Whittier. They are all considered fireside poets because their poems were read by families by the fireside in the evenings as a social hour. All four of these poets lived and wrote their poems during the 19th century. One theme that is found in common in their poems is the use of Romantic elements. All four of the poems read by these men include some aspect of relation towards nature. In "A Psalm of Life", Longfellow refers to nature by saying "Footprints on the sands..." In THe First Snowfalll, thre is a lot of references made to the nature, especially the snow. In the poem by Holmes, entitled, "the CHambered Nautilus", he makes a comparison to the nautilus, an animal found in nature, to a ship on the sea. In the final poem, "the worship of nature", uses a lot of romanticism in it. In tshis poem, Whittier compares how nature worships itself and that man doesn't have any care for mother nature.

Irving

Irving was a Romantic, yet he was also a satirist. One element in his story that he is satrical is women. He is very satirical and against women. In both The Devil and TOm Walker and in Rip Van Winkle, Irving shows that he is against women. In The Devil and TOm Walker, Irving describes Tom's wife as termagant. SHe is constatntly nagging at Tom. Tom want's to get away from her; and he doesn't even care about her death. Instead, he cares more about the silverware and the money he can get. In Rip Van Winkle, Rip's wife is also termagant. Rip doesn't like being near her. Instead, he is seen more with other children and helping other people. In both the tales, there is a wish fulfillment. Both Tom and Rip are able to have theire wives go away and they are free from them. Tom and Rip are similar in both stories, as they both have termagant wives. And in the end, both their wives end up dying. Irving probably had something against women during his life. That's probably why he made both women in his stories termagant.

Poe

Poe's stories include a lot of gothic stuff in it. So far from what we've read, both the Raven and the fall of the house of usher both include gothic concepts in it. Both these stories include mystery, ghosts, haunted houses, and darkness. Another factor included in gothic are doubles. In the Fall of the House of Usher, one can see the use of doubles. I think that Madeline and Roderick are used as doubles here. Becuase they are twins, is why i think that they can be seen as being doubles. Maybe cause they're twins, Roderick thinks that Madeline is just a ghost and not a real person. That's why when he goes to bury her, he's lost his mind, and he thinks that she's dead. But i know that the fact that they are twins has to be important. Maybe since they're twins, they have telepathic communications. Thus, after Roderick has burried Madeline, he starts feeling different and wired taht following week. Maybe Madeline was communicating to Roderick and getting mad at him for burying him in the tomb while she was really alive.
I also think that Madeline and Roderick represent both Poe and his cousin? that he married. The description of Roderick that is given in the novel, describes Poe in my opinion. And Poe was an ill man as well. I don't know if he had any kids or not, which i don't think he did. It would mean that he was the last person of his family as well becuase he was adopted by another family. So this is also another similarity between him and Roderick.

Romanticism

Romanticism was an artistic movement that was popular in Europe and American in the 19th century. I think that a lot of people may think that romanticism is about Romantic love, but it's not. Romanticism deals with emotions and imagination. These two things are stuff that can rule a person. Romanticists thought that reason isn't the right way towards truth. Another factor of romanticism is imagination. The romanticists thought taht imagination was the key towards their inner world. This goes and relates back to reason, and it not being the right way to truth. To the romanticists, they thought the best way to interpret things was through their immagination. I think that when comparing romanticism to the age of reason era, romanticism had more individual freedom. I mean people were allowed to use their imagination. It is just like when mrs. clinch gave us the M&Ms, we were allowed to use our imagination as to what we would create with them. Everyone had a different idea as to what they would create with them.

Ending of SL

The ending of Scarlet Letter includes a third and final scaffold scene of the novel. This scaffold is similar in many ways to the previous two. In the third scaffold scene, it is election day, and thus there are many people there, including all the townspeople and the native americans. In the first scaffold scene, all these people were there too, to see Hester face her guilt. The conflict in the final scaffold scene is man vs. self and man vs. man. In here, Dimmesdale is the the one who is pertaining to the conflict. He is facing himself becuase he is going on the scaffold and has the guts to let out his sin, finally. He has tolerated his pain that he has on his chest for nearly 7 years now. He is also man vs. society, becuase he is in front of the whole village when he lets out his sin. Thus he has to face the reactions of the crowd when he shows then what is on his chest. The symbol of this scaffold is shame, sin, and unity. It shows unity because this is when Hester, DImmesdale and Pearl are unitying together for the first time on the scaffold. Dimmesdale calls Pearl onto the scaffold to come with him. "He turned towards the scaffold, and stretched forth his arms." (p.277). The scaffold scene also shows shame and sin because Dimmeadale is revealing his sin, and has to go through shame upon revealing his sin, which is probably why he dies right there and then.

Scarlet Letter

Now that the book is finished, i have seen the result of why Dimmesdale keeps putting his hand over his heart. Even though we exacctly don't know why he does this, because there was more than one account from the people in the crowd, I believe that there was a letter A that he himself carved on his chest. Why else would he keep putting his hand over it? ALso, he was sick before Chillingworth actually came to aid him. So Dimmesdale must have engraved the letter A on his chest.
I also wonder what happened to Pearl. We know that she left her Puritan town in New England. SHe has now become a women and i believe she has a husband. She probably lives a good life far away somewhere in Europe. Even Chillingworth gave all of his land to her when he died. WHen Pearl kissed her father on the scaffold it was like the spell was all broken. Everything was all settled and all the guilt that DImmeadale has was out.
As for Hester, when Chillingworth died, Pearl and her left. But she came back later to her cottage and returned doing her needlework. I think that now she doesn't feel bad about wearing the scarlet letter on her bosom. Everyone knows the truth now and so she dones't have anything to hide.

Scarlet Letter

Chillingworth is definately turned into the devil. In reality, I believe that instead of helping Dimmesdale get better with his herbal medicines, I think that he is actually poisoning him with plants that aren't good for you. I mean he's lived with the Native Americans when he was captured and he probably learned from them which plants are good and which are not. And from the way taht he talks with Dimmesdale, he is trying to convince him to let out his sin, and telling him that it's okay for the minister to talk with him. THe devil is someone who comes betweeen a person and god. IN this case, Chillingworth is clearly seen as interfearing the Dimmesdale's relationship with GOd. The minister wants to reveal his sin to god, but Chillingworth keeps interfearing with him and trying to make Dimmesdale tell him what his sin was. This is really having a huge effect on the minister. He is seen more often with his hand over his heart. And even Hester doesn't like the fact that CHillingwroth is really getting his revenge on Dimmesdale. Hester is ready to actually tell Dimmesdale who Chillingworth really is.
Pearl is also getting to an age where she is starting to ask more questions. Sooner or later she's going to find out who Dimmesdale really is and who Chillingworth really is. Pearl keeps questioning her mother as to why the Minister keeps putting his hand over his heart and she connects this to the scarlet letter on Hesters bosom. I wonder what Pearl's reaction will be when she finds out the truth. She might get mad in a way and not talk anymore. I think this only beucase when you think about a real pearl, they shut their clam when the pearl has been taken away. And thus, Pearl might do this when she finds out the truth about her father.

Thoughts of SL

So far, Scarlet Letter is an interesting novel. There is some mystery in the novel which makes it good. I have a feeling that Hester's husband, Chillingsworth is definately going to seek revenge on Hester. That's probably why he make her make a promise to not reveal who he is. Chillingsworth's name also seems to foreshadow what's going to happen. It gives you the chills to think about what he's going to do to her. I think taht whatever he does to Hester, it will affect the Scarlet letter that she has. Right now it stands for adultry, but i think that maybe after her husband has his revenge on Hester that the meaning of the "A" will change. Ms. Clinch mentioned that the meaning of the scarlet letter changes through the novel, so i think that it will change after hester's husband will have his revenge. I have noticed a lot of irony in this novel as well. Some include the fact tthat hester does needlework and sewing. The clothes that she makes as well for the people is ironic, especially to the people that she does it to becuase they all relate to the crime that she has done in one way or another.
Right now Pearl, hester's daughter, is a few years old. I think that when she gets older, she's going to question Hester as to who her father is, and something bad might happen to her. Yet then again, thinking back to the rose bush mentioned in the beginning of the novel, something good might happen to Hester & Pearl and maybe Chillingsworth attempt at his revenge will fgail.

Impression on Paine

Thomas Paine was an incredible man and a writer. When reading his work in the textbook, I noticed that he expressed his emotions a lot. With him being a nationalist and wanting freedom for the American colonists, he really expressed a lot. It seemed as he expressed more rather than actually giving actual factual detail over things. I noticed that he exaggurated a lot. Like when he mentions that the king being a murderer, a highway man and something else. Even though the king isn't any of this, Paine is just saying this for exagguration. But he's just trying to show his point. He's trying to show people, especially Loyalists, that they should show some nationalism and be wanting to be free from Great Britain. When Paine writes his Common Sense, thousands of copies are sold throughout the colonies. This book inspired manyn people about independence and becoming free from Great Britain.

Bradstreet

Anne Bradstreet is considered the first American poet. That kinda surprised me. WHen you read her poem one way, she seems to be an ideal Puritan wife. But in another way she seems as though she isn't confident. In line 3 of the poem, we see that she really loves her husband. She is grateful & happy with their marriage. When she says "Thy love is such I can no way repay" she's saying that he loves her so much that there's no way that she can repay him, but heaven will. In the poem we see a contrast between spiritual and material. WHen she uses the words: prize, mines or gold, riches, recompense, and repay, she uses material metaphore to describe her love. In the last line however, we see a use of spiritual love.

NA Mythology

Native American mythology focuses a lot on nature and the enviornment. Throughout the myths and legends of Native Americans that we read, there was a lot of references to the nature. Some examples, would be in "SOng of Sky Loom," there is references to the Earth, SKy, rain green grass, and rainbow. THe NA society has respect towards nature and other people, and even towards animals. In our society today, we think that we dominate animals, however, in the NA society, animals and humans were equal. THe Native AMericans didn't look down on the animals. The animals in the legends and myths were very close to the humans, and had humanlike qualitites. THe animals also displayed self sacrifice. For example, in the Raven myths, the owl carries the burning stick in his beak. In response to this, his own beak gets burned and becomes smaller. This shows the sacrifice that he made for the raven. Land was also important for the Native Americans. They believed that Earth was their mother. Since according to them, God created them and their land, God was very wise. He made sure that the humans and the animals were well suited for their enviormnent that they were in. This is seen in "The Blackfoot Legend." The Old Man puts the mountain goat who has one horn on the mountains and the deer on the plains. At first he made a mistake, but he went back to fix what he had done wrong, so the animals were well suited for their enviornment.

American Dream

My definition of American Dream is being given the oppurtunity to have freedom and to work your way to achieve your goals. Every American has their dreams. The majority of the people in this country probably have an American dream of being wealthy, having a family, and being rich. All people care about these days is money, but that is not what life if all about. A person can be very happy with what they have even if they only have very little. In this country, we are given freedom. Not all citizens in other countries have freedom. In this country we do. With this freedom, we make goals out of them. And that is my definition of American Dream.