Extra Credit: "Drown"

“Drown” by Junot Diaz has a rather interesting take on life as an immigrant and how becoming an American doesn’t change the perspective. The main character of the story seems to embody both typical stereotypes as well as ones that contrast with said stereotypes. It seems to me that the character, and narrator, seems to struggle with his identity when it comes to how an immigrant is “suppose” to act and conform to the stereotype that is given to them.

In the beginning, his mother enters the room to tell him that Beto is home. This doesn’t seem to have much of an effect on him because he says he continues to watch the television. I thought it was interesting that in the first few lines, he mentions, “He’s a pato now. . .” (Diaz 1666), pato being Dominican slang for a gay man. He goes on to say that they had been friends, yet, that’s the first tidbit of information we get about Bato. I think the fact the narrator repeats that his friend is gay, and that he’s in college, proves that he’s jealous. Bato has broken out of the norms by being gay and educated and has become who he wants -- not what society wants.

Before Bato left, we get a sense that the narrator seems to be fighting between his punk-kid life and one that is more than that. Bato didn’t know what the word “expectorating” meant, and when the narrator explained it to him, he said that even though Bato was going off to college, “He hated when I knew something he didn’t. . . Even then I didn’t tell him; he thought I didn’t read, not even dictionaries” (Diaz 1667). This quote gives us some insight one of the stereotypes of immigrants, which is that they don’t know, or won’t learn, how to read or write and become successful.

On the top of page, a teacher compared the immigrants in school to shuttles, “A few of you are going to make it. Those are the orbiters. But the majority of you are just going to burn out. Going nowhere” (1673). This kind of stereotype, in my opinion, hurts people who it applies to because they believe they need to stick to it. If immigrants are known for being illiterate, many other immigrants -- some who may even enjoy learning -- may not take part in learning how to read and write due to the stereotype. I feel that this applies to the narrator due to the fact he sells “shitty dope” (1667) and hides from the Army recruiter when the recruiter is circling around his neighborhood. I think he’s afraid to break out of his stereotype, which is a drug dealer, and become something more, which perhaps could be a member of the Army. This story highlights the fact that being an immigrant in America is challenging. The past has elevated particular stereotypes immigrants feel they need to live up to and it makes it hard for them (and people from all races, including white people) to break out and become nonconformists and be who they want to be.

Critical Commentary for Beloved

I read “To Be Loved: Amy Denver and Human Need -- Bridges to Understanding in Toni Morrison’s Beloved” by Nicole M. Coonradt. This article title immediately grabbed my attention due to the fact that Beloved only dedicated “. . . about fifteen pages of the novel’s 275. . .” (Coonradt 169) to Amy. I thought her character provided an important perspective that we didn’t see in Uncle Tom’s Cabin and wondered why Beloved, or anyone else, didn’t explore her character more. To say the least, she was a pivotal character in the story, since without her, Sethe and Denver would never have survived. Coonradt discusses Amy Denver’s importance and significance in the novel by expressing her similarities to the slaves.

Coonradt discusses how Amy is “the often-ignored young white woman marginalized by society” (Coonradt 169). Yet, had Amy not escaped her own indentured servitude, Sethe never would have survived long enough to birth her baby. Since Amy was a white indentured slave, this “. . . introduced another subtext about slavery which had often been ignored. . . “ (Coonradt 175). Since indentured servitude was much like slavery, it comes to no surprise that Amy may have dealt with another horror that affected many enslaved women.The article touched on the fact that “. . . old slave narratives exercised a willed omission of trauma as a defensive armour against humiliating or embarrassing memories, Morrison. . . seeks to disrupt” (Coonradt 171). We saw the lack of shock value while reading Uncle Tom’s Cabin; Beloved took slavery and exposed the taboo that came along with it, especially sexual enslavement.

Sethe was not the only character in the novel that was sexually assaulted as a slave. Amy makes subtle allusions to the fact that she may have been assaulted during her time as an indentured slave even though she was white; it seems that race wasn’t a eliminating factor. “Sexual enslavement of women at the hands of sadistic masters, the most extreme subjugation of women in a white patriarchal culture that historically touched women irrespective of their ethnicity” (Coonradt 172). Morrison hints at the fact that Amy may have been sexually assaulted when she mentions her master locking her in the root cellar. It’s also implied when Amy says, “Joe Nathan said Mr. Buddy is my daddy but I don’t believe that. . . All I know is it ain’t him” (Morrison 91). This statement could mean Amy knew her mother was raped, which highlights the sexual enslavement that went on during indentured slave trading as well. Tie that into Sethe’s story about being raped at Sweet Home, and the two seem to be the same side of one coin.

Another point Coonradt brings up several times is the difference between races and love. “The fulfilment of this promise [of acceptance and healing] lies in bridging the gulf of racism that still exists between blacks and whites. Perhaps only then can all people, regardless of race, be loved and healed” (169). Although Amy was white, she still brings an important piece of information to the table when it comes to the history of slavery. “Morrison presents Amy Denver as evidence of white exploitation of white, class repression, and the marginalization of women within the white patriarchal culture” (Coonradt 182). Although Amy has very few pages, her character provides another aspect of slavery that isn’t always exposed to people; Morrison provides us with a different aspect of slavery and another story. It also represents white people who were not racist and treating African Americans as people. “Her [Amy] all too human desire to love and be loved supersedes both her concern for safety and her desire for freedom” (Coonradt 174). Instead of running off, she helps Sethe. Her warm heartedness and willingness to risk her freedom to help a stranger shows that color doesn’t define people, their hardships do.

One part of this article that seemed to tie it together for me was when Coonradt discussed the use of Morrison’s biblical references. I never quite understood the importance of Sethe’s back, and this tied the knot for me:

Interrupting her [Amy’s] own flight to help another human being in need, Amy identifies the horrible wounds on Sethe’s back as ‘a chokecherry tree’, saying, “It’s a tree. . . See, here’s the trunk. . . and this here’s the parting for the branches. You got a mighty lot of branches. Leaves, too, look like, and dern if these ain’t blossoms. . .” (Morrison 79). It seems hard to ignore the allusion to the Biblical Tree of Life that In Revelations 22:2 overshadows death, especially as Sethe herself blooms with life in the midst of the ravages of slavery as she faces her own death. (Coonradt 178)

This particular passage of Coonradt’s article made it clear to me what the chokecherry tree on the back of Sethe’s back could represent. Looking at it from a religious aspect and comparing it to the Tree of Life raised several thoughts for me, the main one being that it seems contradictory. In the Bible, the Tree of Life is a tree whose fruit bears the gift of eternal life. Amy mentions that the tree is in bloom and wonders what God has in store for her. The fact that a life symbol would be on the back of a near-dying woman seems symbolic of her strength. Since reading this article, I have a new view of the biblical symbols throughout, such as viewing Baby Suggs as a prophet. I would also include Amy as a biblical figure since she washed Sethe’s feet, which was one of the acts done by Jesus during The Last Supper in the Bible. I concur with Coonradt that Amy should be discussed more often when dealing with the novel since she’s such an integral part of the main character’s survival and her role in introducing a new subcategory of slavery and religious context.

Works Cited

Coonradt, Nicole M. "To Be Loved: Amy Denver and Human Need      -- Bridges to Understanding in Toni Morrison's Beloved.
     College Literature 32.4 (2005):168-87. JSTOR [JSTOR]. Web.
     11 May 2015.

Morrison, Toni. Beloved: A Novel. New York: Knopf, 1987. Print.

(Biblical facts due to 14 years in Catholic school)

Contemporary Connections for Beloved

Unfortunately, in today’s world. racism is not dead. The article titled “Town Leaders Sorry for Handling of 1944 Rape Case” by Bob Johnson raised some points that were relevant to Beloved. The case involved a then-24 year old African American woman named Recey Taylor and a gang of white men. According to the article, “the married woman was walking home from church when she was abducted, assaulted and left on the side of the road in an isolated area.” When she tried to bring the case to court, the two all white male juries declined her wishes to move the charges forward. Since then, her case has been tried -- and won -- and has received the deepest apologies from the court, the city, and community.

With all of the riots going on dealing with young, black men being shot by cops for what seems like -- due to intense media coverage -- no reason whatsoever, race is a topic that has been elevated once again. Black Lives Matter protests have sprouted all over the nation and have raised the awareness of the injustices that African Americans are still suffering from today. Seeking justice for all is one of the main goals our courts have been working towards, and this case proves to be an example as the justice system continues to work out the kinks in their flawed system.

When reading about cases like this, it frequently makes people wonder how a case like this would have been handled today; certainly much different, but how much? Race still has an impact on today’s society due to all the recent murders. And present murders make people dig up past murders, assaults, etcetera that may have been unjustly sentenced. Yet, Taylor was quoted from the article saying, "I can pray that things would be handled differently now than in the past” -- and it was. Although she believed all her rapists were dead, the justice she finally received from the courts and an apology that was received from the city, courts, and community justified herself -- although it doesn’t undo the action and unprofessional way the court handled her case in the past.

This article relates to Sethe and her attack from Beloved. As she was about to escape Sweet Home, she was gang raped by the schoolteacher’s nephews -- also a gang of white men -- and unlike Recey, never saw justice for her assault. Her husband, Halle, had witnessed this unjust act and didn’t do anything about it. “I can’t go back and add more. Add my husband to it, watching, above me in the loft -- hiding close by. . . looking down on what I couldn’t look at at all. And not stopping them -- looking and letting it happen “ (Morrison 83). It was hard for Sethe to imagine someone standing by while this heinous act was taking place. Instead of taking action and stopping the rape, he chose not to be a hero. From what we heard from Paul D, it sounded like Halle was rather mortified at what he saw. In my opinion, it was still not a good enough reason to stand by and let that happen to her.

In a way, he acted as her judge and jury, dismissing her instead of helping her. He watched her attack and never made an effort to stop the rape from occurring. Halle made it about himself instead of about Sethe by shutting down and slathering butter all over his face (whatever that was all about), which would inevitably divide their family since he was too depressed or ashamed to run away with his family. This part of the book made me think about Taylor’s case and wonder if there were any bystanders who walked by her, either during or after the attack, and looked at her and kept walking. It makes me wonder how long she laid there until she finally scraped herself up and went home, how much courage it took to report the rape, and how empty she felt when justice wasn’t served. Beloved has inserted more questions and sympathy to my train of thought when it comes to reading news that deals with race today.

Work Cited

Johnson, Bob. "Town Leaders Sorry for Handling of 1944 Rape
     Case."Msnbc.com. Associated Press, 21 Mar. 2011. Web. 11
     May 2015.

Reader Response for Beloved

I’ve never taken the time to read book reviews, and let me just say this is probably more entertaining than social media. I spent a good hour just on Goodreads before I realized I still had not visited the other two sites. I digress, Beloved has a rather wide range of reviews from people both young and old. It varies from this novel is an abomination to this is the best novel in the entire existence of the universe. I was immediately drawn to the reviews that were negative since I think this novel was one of the most complex and intriguing thing I’ve read in a while, I like to see why people didn’t like it. This one star review jumped off the screen from Goodreads:

I know the book is supposed to give you a view on the cruel treatment of slaves but after I finished I actually less sympathetic for them. How exactly am I supposed to feel sympathetic to people who screw cows -that is just disturbing on so many levels- and kill their own babies. Paul D even admitted that the male slaves usually rape the girls. Beloved (the charater (sp)) is supposed to give the book more depth but she was just confusing and quite annoying, so is the mom by the way.

This view to me was interesting because I thought the opposite of this reviewer. Sure, beastiality is disgusting and wrong, but had the people not been African American, would it have made a difference? What about all the white men who locked up and raped the African American women brutally for years? And what about the many years of mistreatment of slaves, both physically and mentally? The schoolteacher in the book even referred his students to “. . . put her human characteristics on the left; her animal ones on the right” (Morrison 228). White people saw African Americans as animals; so technically, if they saw them as animals and raped them, they also assaulted animals. In the mindset of a white man, how is that any different?

Some of the other negative reviews were about the book’s structure and how it was too confusing to follow, which I would slightly agree with. It’s very poetic in places and sometimes it gets a little wonky, but I believe that this style adds elements to the story that we wouldn’t get if it were a linear story. Some of the positive reviews from Barnes and Noble were raving about Morrison’s lyrical writing and described Beloved as “indescribable” and “a story not to pass on” and something that you cannot get out of your head once it’s read. Since reading this, I find myself comparing it to things we read in class (such as The Woman Warrior and how “The Unnamed Woman’s” community abandoned her just like Sethe’s did), amongst other things.

One three star review from Amazon that I agree with is:

But while I can appreciate the story, the structure, and the way it was written, I found it extremely tedious to read. It hangs on the thinnest of narrative thread, and whenever a plot threatens to develop, the scene ends and we find out what happened later as an aside. Most of the 275 pages are dense interior monologues, frequently repetitious, that sometimes degenerates into what seemed like random text.

I felt a lot of the novel repeated itself; maybe that was artistic choice, but it was unnerving at times when it seemed like a story was about to take off, then bam, we’re eighteen years in the past. Sethe would repeat her stories, sometimes it seemed without prompt, which made me view her as narcissistic. I think some stories that were repeated did have some positive qualities for the novel; the story about Sethe being raped and losing her milk came up for what seemed every other paragraph, which made the reader never forget it. In a way, we became Sethe, never forgetting what happened. It was interesting to read some of the reviews and seeing how broadly they ranged. Since the reviews were so diverse, I would have to say Morrison achieved her goal of whatever she was trying to write and hopefully, this novel will be talked about for many years to come.

Synthesis for Beloved

Throughout the course of this class, it’s rather apparent that race plays an important role throughout literary history, and history itself of course. The purpose of the Race in American Literature project has vastly opened my perspective to things I had not previously learned in history classes. Today, teachers focus on the historical impacts such as the laws that occurred because of the African Americans and hardly about their treatment. They discus the lynchings, but not how or why they are in that position. It’s moments like this where reading Claude McKay’s “The Lynching” would be a great source for history teachers to use to add a contextual background to the material. For example, from Maddie’s blog: “‘And little lads, lynchers that were to be, Danced round the dreadful thing in fiendish glee’ (McKay 927) is especially unsettling. The idea that young children would dance around a dead body as if it gave them amusement is difficult to think about” (Braun The Lynching).

In my opinion, the imagery from McKay gave me a better understanding of how terrible the lynchings were instead of listening to a lecture about the hangings. Novels like Uncle Tom’s Cabin and Beloved make statements that are relevant today. The novels also make main connections, including the differences between the way the slave’s experiences were represented, how male slaves were treated versus female slaves, as well as different religious symbols throughout the novels.

Referring to Uncle Tom’s Cabin, A Slave Auction Described by a Slave, written by Solomon Northup was a rather brief writing, explaining what slaves endured before and during an auction. They were taught to act like someone who wanted to be purchased, “exhorted us to appear smart and lively...he exercised us in the art of ‘looking smart,’ and of moving to our places with exact precision” (Northup 435). This piece continues to shock me because these people were treated like animals for sale, and Northup goes on to tell us how “Buyers would, ‘feel of our hands and arms and bodies, turn us about, ask us what we could do, make us open our mouths and show our teeth, precisely as a jockey examines a horse which is about to barter for or purchase’” (Northup 436). As if this wasn’t already nauseating to hear, that’s just the tip of the iceberg; women faced a different kind of hell.

Sexual abuse of the African American women was something that Stowe didn’t talk about as blatantly as Morrison did. Uncle Tom’s Cabin was supposed to be a political statement, but in my opinion, it wasn’t as strong as Beloved. Stowe’s novel had a variety of characters and stories, but it lacked the factual representation of what was actually going on. One author named Sophia Cantave wrote an article titled "Who Gets to Create the Lasting Images?” relating to the fluffiness of slavery and race in Uncle Tom’s Cabin.

The writer acknowledges that the book is a very inadequate representation of slavery [because] slavery, in some of its working, is too dreadful for the purposes of art. A work which should represent it strictly as it is would be a work which could not be read; and all works which ever mean to give pleasure must draw a veil somewhere, or they cannot succeed”. In fiction, therefore, one can “find refuge from the hard and the terrible, by inventing scenes and characters of a more pleasing nature.” (Cantave)

If Stowe’s purpose was to persuade, she should have worried less about the art and more about the content. Make people feel uncomfortable. Make them change their minds about the past; by fluffing the story, it makes it seem like slavery wasn’t really all that bad if you could get masters as nice as the Shelby’s or the St. Clare’s. Beloved exploits the intolerable by opening up the grisly rape culture that was going on during the slave trades. Many times throughout Beloved, the reader is told Sethe’s rape story and about how the young men held her down and “took my milk” (Morrison 20)! Not only that, but her husband, Halle, witnessed the entire assault and didn’t help her. Beloved didn’t stop there -- it also included indentured servitude.

Amy Denver’s character provided a new view that I haven’t read anywhere else. Like the African American slaves, indentured servants were under the reign of a master. And also similar to the slaves, she was subject to the same punishments -- including rape. Nicole Coonradt states in her article “To Be Loved” that the “Sexual enslavement of women at the hands of sadistic masters, the most extreme subjugation of women in a white patriarchal culture that historically touched women irrespective of their ethnicity” (Coonradt 172). Since these people were treated so poorly, it would only make sense for them to have a belief system -- something to keep them moving through the trying times. That belief was religion.

Religion plays an important role in both of these novels. Uncle Tom’s Cabin’s main prophet is Tom himself. He represents many of the aspects from “The Cult of Domesticity”, especially piety, submissiveness, and domesticity. No matter how poorly he’s treated, he puts his master before himself. Tom says to St. Clare that he will not leave him, “Not while Mas’r is in trouble. . . I’ll stay with Mas’r as long as he wants me, --so as I can be any use” (Stowe, 279). In Beloved, the main prophet is Baby Suggs. Much like Tom, she was an “unchurched preacher” who “‘’busted her legs, back, head, eyes, hands, kidneys, womb and tongue,’ she had nothing left to make a living with but her heart -- which she put to work at once” (Morrison 102). These two characters both served as biblical figures, both haunted by something, yet are two individually strong characters who die. Why those figures must die is a question for another post.

When reading novels like this, you can’t help but compare it to present day news. When reading about Recey Taylor’s rape case from 1944 and about the injustice she received is mindblowing. Taylor said, "I can pray that things would be handled differently now than in the past” (Johnson). I think of all the women who were raped and received no justice because of their color and just prayed for a better future, and here we are, 2015. This project has helped me to include all races, all social and economic standings of all women who have suffered. Reading stories like The Woman Warrior by Kingston adds the Chinese aspect, Uncle Tom’s Cabin African American suffrage, and Beloved with indentured servitude as well as African American enslaved women. These novels and stories provide a different story for everyone which establishes a better understanding for humankind and its struggles throughout history.

Works Cited

Braun, Maddie. “The Lynching”. Blogger. Wed. 12 May 2015.

Cantave, Sophia, and Elizabeth Ammons. "Who Gets to Create the
     Lasting Images?

Coonradt, Nicole M. "To Be Loved: Amy Denver and Human Need
     -- Bridges to Understanding in Toni Morrison's Beloved."
     College Literature 32.4 (2005):168-87. JSTOR [JSTOR]. Web.
     11 May 2015.

Johnson, Bob. "Town Leaders Sorry for Handling of 1944 Rape
     Case."Msnbc.com. Associated Press, 21 Mar. 2011. Web. 11
     May 2015.

McKay, Claude. "The Lynching." The Norton Anthology of 
     American Literature. By Nina Baym and Robert S. Levine. 8th
     ed. Vol. 2. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2013. 927. Print.

Morrison, Toni. Beloved: A Novel. New York: Knopf, 1987. Print.

Northup, Solomon, and Elizabeth Ammons. Uncle Tom's Cabin:
     Authoritative Text, Backgrounds and Contexts, Criticism. New
     York: W.W. Norton, 2010. Print.

Stowe, Harriet Beecher, and Elizabeth Ammons. Uncle Tom's
     Cabin: Authoritative Text, Backgrounds and Contexts,
     Criticism. New York: W.W. Norton, 2010. Print.

The Problem of Black Representation in Uncle Tom's Cabin."
     Uncle Tom's Cabin: Authoritative Text, Backgrounds and
     Contexts, Criticism. New York: W.W. Norton, 2010. 582-95. 
     Print.

The Woman Warrior

The Woman Warrior by Maxine Hong Kingston was a rather interesting excerpt. The narrator was being told a story by her mother about her father’s sister who had disgraced their family by having another man’s baby -- and then committed suicide due to the harshness from her family. I thought the story was rather bizarre; it was a little extreme for a talk about the birds and the bees. Specifically, I thought it was interesting how the narrator had certain views about American-Chinese culture and said some interesting things.

One thing is her view on relationships later in life. “I use to add ‘brother’ silently to boys’ names. It hexed the boys, who would or would not ask me to dance. . . I hexed myself also--no dates. I should have stood up, both arms waving, and shouted across libraries, ‘Hey, you! Love me back’” (1512-1513). It seemed that the story had resonated in her; she would have rather been sisterly than something more like a girlfriend. She was also concerned about the way she held herself and spoke, “Walking erect (knees straight, toes pointed forward, not pigeon-toed, which is Chinese-feminine) and speaking in an inaudible voice, I have tried to turn myself American-feminine” (1512). She seemed more concerned with visually being American and ignoring her inner-Chinese heritage.

The patriarchal society then was much more harsh than it is today. The narrator made several references to women giving up things for marriage, “All the married women blunt-cut their hair in flaps about their ears or pulled it back in tight buns. . . And at their weddings they displayed themselves in their long hair for the last time” (1511). Not only did they sacrifice their long, flowing hair, but succumbed to the pain of hair removal and other things to maintain their beauty. “Once my aunt found a freckle on her chin. . . She dug it out with a hot needle and washed the wound with peroxide” (1511). The women were concerned about their appearances, even then. It seems not much in society changes.

Society today tends to give boys the benefit of the doubt by referring to the “boys will be boys” phrase, and the narrator here refers to something very similar to this: “It was probably a girl; there is some hope of forgiveness for boys” (1515). This quote was referring to her aunt and the baby she gave birth to. When she gave birth, she nursed it, and then took it into well with her where she committed suicide. The narrator says that her aunt also killed the baby because it was a girl and it would eventually suffered great shame, whereas if it were a boy it would have had a better chance of receiving forgiveness for his mother’s “atrocities”. Even though this was published in 1976, I think most of the things she said are relatable. The culture has obviously changed in a way where having children out of wedlock isn’t a dishonorable event anymore, but the rituals women go through (appearance wise) and “boys will be boys” is still relevant.

Lady Lazarus

For my blog post about confessional poetry, I lightly talked about the theme of control by men and overcoming that dominance in Sylvia Plath’s “Lady Lazarus”. I wanted to explore this poem a little more, especially the parts which show control and the character’s prevail over control, than I got to in that post. If you haven’t read my post about confessional poetry, the most important things to know about Plath is that she was depressed, her father was a strict, authoritative parent, and her husband left her for another woman. 

“Lady Lazarus” is the title of the poem, and the footnote in our Anthology book tells us that Lazarus, a biblical figure, was raised from the dead by Jesus; this will come into play at the end of the poem. Right off the bat the poem begins with “I have done it again” (Plath 1). To me, this sound like a phrase victims say. I watch a lot of Law and Order: SVU and the victims on the show are constantly saying, “it was my fault”, which is rather similar to Plath’s opening line. She continues on later in the poem by describing her helplessness as, “A paperweight,/My face a featureless, fine/Jew linen” (7-9).

She uses several allusions to Jews, Nazis, and the Holocaust throughout this poem. She talks about being “bright as a Nazi lampshade” (4) and “A cake of soap,” (76); our Anthology gives us a footnote about the lampshade and soap--Nazi’s would sometimes use the victims’ skins to make lampshades and the ashes from the remained charred victims to make soap. Plath also uses such words as annihilate, grave, vanish, and dying which emit a feeling of helplessness and despair much like the Jews (and herself) felt at the time. She also expresses her hatred toward men with these lines: “So, so, Herr Doktor./So, Herr Enemy” (65-66), Herr God, Herr Lucifer” (79). The footnote says “Herr” means “Mr.” in German, so we get an understanding that she feels doctors (who were primarily men in those times) were controlling her (perhaps with her suicidal issues) and how they may think they have a god complex but she sees who they really are--Lucifer. However, there is a shift in the attitude of this poem.

Plath references Lazarus in the title of the poem, and here is where it comes to play. In lines 46-47, she tells us why she attempts suicide; “I do it so it feels like hell./I do it so it feels real”. Her actual, physical life is the one thing she has total control of. No one can prevent her from ending her life, which is why she feels it “Is an art, like everything else./I do it exceptionally well” (44-45). At the end, we get the symbol of a phoenix, which is a mythical bird which is incinerated and reborn from its own ashes; “Out of the ash/I rise with my red hair/And I eat men like air” (82-84). Unlike Lazarus, she states that she will rise on her own and without the help of anyone or any man. I read “eat men” like “fare men” in the way where she just copes with men like she does air; it’s difficult to be alive with depression as well as deal with men, but she gets by. I feel that for a Plath poem, this one is more hopeful than most turn out to be.

Literary Context: Confessional Poetry

Confessional poetry emerged in America during the late 1950s and early 1960s. This specific type of poetry dealt with subject matter that previously was not openly discussed in American poetry. It talked about private experiences such as death, trauma, depression, and relationships written often in an autobiographical manner. The poetry isn’t completely based on emotions; “The confessional poets were not merely recording their emotions on paper; craft and construction were extremely important to their work” (A Brief Guide to Confessional Poetry).

Some authors that were involved with this movement were Robert Lowell, Sylvia Plath, Anne Sexton, and W.D. Snodgrass. Not all the authors were fans of the term “confessional poetry”, specifically, W.D. Snodgrass. He felt that as a poet, he wasn’t writing about anything other poets weren’t already writing about. Writing confessional poetry made him feel like he needed to confess something or write about something religious, which he didn’t do on purpose if he did, because of the term.

Two authors who wrote confessional poetry that we read as a class are Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton. Both poets seemed to have tough lives. Both lived with depression but were hard working writers who changed the face of poetry. Plath was born in Massachusetts where she lived with her mother and father. When Plath was only 8, her father died due to health complications. Plath’s father was rather strict and authoritative and his death launched a confusing definition for Plath and her relationships with men and poetry; if you’ve ever read anything by her, you know what I mean.

Plath was always a strong writer and was published fresh out of high school. She attended Smith College where she struggled with depression and even attempted suicide. Despite that, she graduated and went on writing. She married Ted Hughes, moved to England, and worked with Lowell for a while. But then, her husband left her. This inspired Ariel to be written. She wrote several books and poems, such as The Bell Jar, The Colossus, and Letters Home. At the age of 31, she wrote her neighbor telling him to call a doctor. Shortly after she committed suicide by using her gas oven (Academy of American Poets).

Anne Sexton was also born in Massachusetts. She moved and grew up in Weston with her mother and father where she was materially well off. Her relationship with her parents was not the healthiest; it was described as difficult and perhaps even contained abuse. After the birth of her first daughter, she suffered from postpartum depression and was institutionalized several times. Her therapist recommended writing as a type of therapy. When her therapist saw she was talented, he urged her to keep writing. “My analyst told me to write between our sessions about what I was feeling and thinking and dreaming” (The Poetry Foundation). She was influenced specifically by Snodgrass saying that people told her she couldn’t write like him because his writing was to confessional. Anyway, she took his writings as permission to write her own. She committed suicide at age 46 (Poetry Foundation).

Plath wrote dark poetry. She was depressed throughout college and the remainder of her life. The poem “Lady Lazarus” has several dark symbols and imagery throughout. She uses the Nazi’s and the Holocaust several times as references to express how she feels; defeated, like the Jews felt at the time. “Bright as a Nazi lampshade” (5) and “A cake of soap” (76) to me provided the most gruesome imagery by far. During that time, Nazi’s would sometimes use the skin and the ashes of the Jews to create lampshades or soap. There’s also dark words such as grave, annihilate, and the talk of incineration and suicide/death.

Another aspect throughout the poem I found was oppression and overcoming it. The fact that her husband left her for another woman made the connection more clear why she felt under the weight of men. Plath writes: “A paperweight,/My face featureless,” (7-8), “I do it [suicide attempts] so it feels like hell./I do it so it feels real” (46-47), “So, so, Herr Doktor. So, Herr Enemy” 64-65), which are all lines that show the powerlessness Plath feels under men. She talks about suicide and death as a way of taking control of her own life instead of someone else doing so; she also rises from her own “death” on her own when she says, “I rise with my red hair/And I eat men like air” (83-84). Although she felt oppressed, she found ways to take control of her life without men guiding her decisions.

Anne Sexton and Sylvia Plath were friends. In Sexton’s “Sylvia’s Death” we get some insight into how Sexton felt about the suicide of her friend. Both of the authors suffered from depression throughout their lives, and suicide was a topic discussed often by the two. One of the memories being “the one we talked of so often each time/ we downed three extra dry martinis in Boston” (21-22). Sexton also refers to Plath as sort of a cheater; “Thief--/how did you crawl into,/crawl down alone/into a death I wanted so badly and for so long,/the death we said we both outgrew,/” (15-19). Sexton and Plath seemed to have discussed their suicidal thoughts together in the past, and swore it off; she seems upset that Plath would go back on their vow. Sexton personifies death, referring to it as “our boy” and “the sleepy drummer” which makes the aspect of Plath’s suicide all the more real.

Learning about the background of the confessional poetry and the specific poets within add information and depth to the poetry. I found it interesting how their lives tied into their works in a significant way. Had I read “Sylvia’s Death” before learning about Plath’s depression and suicide along with Sexton’s own depressive state it would have made the poem’s context of discussing death together confusing--it helped to know they were friends. Also knowing that Plath’s husband left her made the powerless feeling of “Lady Lazarus” more apparent; I probably would have missed the feeling of oppression under men without the author history.

Works Cited

"Anne Sexton." Poetry Foundation. Poetry Foundation, n.d. Web.
     16 Apr. 2015.

"A Brief Guide to Confessional Poetry." Poets.org. Academy of                   American Poets, 2014. Web.16 Apr. 2015.

Baym, Nina, ed. The Norton Anthology of American Literature.               Eighth ed. Vol. 2. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2013. Print.

"Sylvia Plath." Poets.org. Academy of American Poets, n.d. Web.  16          Apr. 2015.

A Streetcar Named Desire

Blanche is a character who tries to be someone she’s not. Appearance and reputation seems to be all she cares about, which seems to be more than ironic when we discover why she ran away from home. When she gets to Stella and Stanley’s home, she puts on airs for everyone. And one thing she’s self conscious of is her age and appearance; when she tells Stella “But don’t you look at me, Stella, no, no, no, not till later, not till I’ve bathed and rested! And turn that over-light off! Turn that off! I won’t be looked at in this merciles (sp) glare” (1119)! at the beginning it’s apparent she’s slightly vain. She’s constantly blotting her face with makeup and taking baths to refresh her appearance. It seemed most of the story unraveled when Blanche was in the tub, actually.

There’s also a point near the end where Mitch confronts her about never seeing her in decent light or during the daytime. Blanche feels she needs to hide herself from everyone due to her age and being older and unmarried.  An example of how she hides herself is the use of the lamp shade she puts over the bulb in the house. Near the end when she’s being taken away, Stanley asks if she wants her paper lantern and tears it off. The stage note says “She cries out as if the lantern was herself” (1175). The lampshade represents the cover she puts over herself; the fancy clothes and makeup, keeping herself in dimmed settings, talking about refined things and acting high class, they are all ways she hides who she is, which is apparently crazy.  
Her reputation is something else she constantly worries about. She isn’t upfront with Stella about why she left her job, or even Belle Reve for that matter, and averts Stanley’s accusations when it comes to staying at the Flamingo. She kisses the young man who comes to receive donation for the paper but refused to do anything with Mitch because “I guess it is just I have -- old fashioned ideals” (1152)! Blanche later tells Stanley that Mitch came over and apologized and brought her flowers after she received a call from a rich man who asked her to take a cruise with him. Of course, Stanley calls malarkey and she immediately clams up.

It is also revealed that Blanche was locked out from her teaching job for hooking up with a seventeen year old male student. This can be related to her acts of kissing the young man who comes for collections. She thinks that a young man will make her feel young, too. I think her mental insanity has something to do with the first boy she fell in love with; I think she felt happy then, like she didn’t have to try as hard as she does now, and she tries to usher in the sense of youth. All in all, Blanche is an untrustworthy character. She may play the sympathetic sister, but she’s unstable from the get, and her obsession with her vanity is the proof.

September, 1918

Have you ever been going through the roughest time of your life and you wonder when it’ll lighten up? And in the midst of whatever may be going wrong, something good happens. You see a squirrel holding one to many nuts in its mouth, an old couple on a date, something good that lightens your day just a little. The peaceful bliss in the time of dark war was the emotion I received from Amy Lowell’s September. The poem was written in 1918, which is nearing the end of World War I. 

Lowell starts her poem light and airy, almost like one could imagine themselves outside on a nice day. The opening paragraph has the essence of a warm fall, with, “This afternoon was the colour of water falling through sunlight” and “The sidewalks shone...And the houses ran along them laughing…” This seems like a comparison to children running around the neighborhood playing. 

And then she says, “Two little boys, lying flat on their faces/Were carefully gathering red berries/To put in a pasteboard box.” so there are actually children, out and about, enjoying the weather.
After all the blissful descriptions, her second stanza begins with, “Some day there will be no war.” This line was surprising to me at first because the first stanza had been so relaxing and beautiful that I never would have thought a war was going on. After her statement about war one day being over, she says, “Then I shall take out this afternoon/And turn it in my fingers...And note the crisp variety of its flights of leaves.” She then goes on, in summary, to say that she will pack up this day and save it for a better day, perhaps a day without war, and reminisce on the happiness she tried to feel.
She ends the poem by saying, “For I have time for nothing/But the endeavour to balance myself/Upon a broken world.” This summary clarifies the fact that she did feel joy in that moment, but she couldn't enjoy it knowing what was going on in the world elsewhere. This poem is relatable to everyone, whether we be going through war or not, because we can all think of a time where we felt sad or depressed and yet something made us feel a little less blue. Even for a moment.

Uncle Tom's Cabin: Personal Synthesis

Personal Synthesis: Domesticity in Uncle Tom’s Cabin

“The Cult of True Womanhood/Cult of Domesticity” seems to reappear in multiple places throughout Uncle Tom’s Cabin. The four different parts of it contain piety, purity, submissiveness, and domesticity. When referring to those four terms they are usually meant to be traits that are desirable and necessary in women. Male and female slaves have these qualities as well as the few white female characters seen throughout the book. Three of the four terms are prominently found in most of the book: piety, submissiveness, and domesticity.

Piety is shown through women and their spiritual center of home; they are expected to be religious and teach their family about said religion. Most, if not all, the slaves had religion. They used it to tell themselves that suffering hell on earth would be worth a lifetime in paradise. On page fifteen, George is telling Eliza that he’s not a Christian like her and questions how someone (God) could let atrocities like slavery continue. She replies with, “O, George, we must have faith. Mistress says that when all things go wrong to us, we must believe that God is doing the very best” (Stowe). Mrs. Shelby has passed on her duties as a woman to spread the word of God to Eliza, who then spreads it to her family. Tom is also a strong character that is pious. His sermons make even the heaviest non-believer have faith, if only for a moment, and his songs bring joy to all.

Submissiveness was demonstrated by the passivity of women; they were told to stay out of the way and to respect men and God. One character who is the epitome of submissiveness is Tom. He seems to be oblivious to how terrible he’s being treated, whether it’s because his faith is so strong or because he’s a mellow kind of guy, he rarely gets fired up about anything. He’d sooner throw himself on the line to protect another slave or person with little regard to his own life. His loyalty not only to his slave brethren, but his white masters, is generally disturbing. After St. Claire gives Tom freedom, Tom says, “Not while Mas’r is in trouble. . . I’ll stay with Mas’r as long as he wants me, --so as I can be any use” (Stowe, 279).

After St. Clare dies and is sold to Legree, Tom’ doesn’t falter there, either. His loyalty to Legree is perplexing when Legree has treated him worse than any owner Tom’s been with. Yet, when Legree is ready to kill Tom, he’s only concerned for his masters soul. Tom says:

Mas’r, if you was sick, or in trouble, or dying, and I could save ye, I’d give ye my heart’s blood; and, if taking every drop of blood in this poor old body would save your precious soul, I’d give ‘em freely, as the Lord gave his for me. O, Mas’r, don’t bring this great sin on your soul! It will hurt you more that ‘t will me! Do the worst you can, my troubles’ll be over soon; but if ye don’t repent, yours won’t never end! (Stowe)

Legree has treated Tom as if he were less than human, yet Tom holds him to the same caliber he did with Shelby and LeClaire. He isn't pleading for his life, he's trying to save Legree's soul by telling him not to commit murder. Tom seems to care more about Legree's life rather than his own since Tom seems to know his "troubles'll be over soon". At this point, I recall Cantave's point of leaving out the horrors and reality of slavery. This scene was off to a "good" start when it came to Legree nearly beating Tom to death, but at this point I don't think any person could lie there and preach about their abuser's soul. As Northup described, being poked, prodded, inspected, separated from their family, doing laborious tasks, treated like animals rather than people, and being whipped and tortured would surely bring out the worst of even the best religious person.

Lastly, domesticity. Women were expected to keep their place inside the home by keeping up its maintenance and appearance. It’s in a different way that the women of Uncle Tom’s Cabin take control of their home. Mrs. Bird convinces her husband that it’s his moral obligation to put religion before law when it came to helping Eliza and her baby. St. Claire shares the affects his mother’s domesticity had on him by saying, "She was divine! ... She probably was of mortal birth; but as far as ever I could observe, there was no trace of any human weakness or error about her ...She was a direct embodiment of the New Testament" (Stowe, 205).

Women, and Tom, play an important role is this book. They are confined to their homes and students of religion, but they are not completely naive to their surroundings. There are female characters that show strength, courage, and intelligence when it comes to knowing what to do and exactly how to keep the men in line. Tom’s religious beliefs helped many slaves make it through the gruesome times They use what they know, specifically religion, as manipulation to achieve goals that are usually morally justifiable. Their submissiveness, piety, and domesticity contributed to how other characters formed; perhaps St. Claire would have been more like Legree had his mother not been so domestic.

Uncle Tom's Cabin: Critical Commentary

Critical Commentary: Who Gets to Create the Lasting Images? The problem of Black Representation in Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Sophia Cantave (p.582)

Sophia Cantave wrote Who Gets to Create the Lasting Images? The problem of Black Representation in Uncle Tom’s Cabin which talks about Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin in a critical manner. She raises several points about slavery and how books about slavery during that time period never fully expressed the absolute horrors of slavery. Specifically, Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin and Harriet Wilson’s Our Nig were criticized heavily for their romanticized version of slavery. Harriet Wilson mentioned in her preface, “I have purposefully omitted what would most provoke shame in our good anti-slavery friends at home” (Cantave). I haven’t read Harriet Wilson’s book, but I can attest to the fact that Uncle Tom’s Cabin was too fluffy when it came to the slavey accounts. Stowe surely had a wide variety of characters and shared a good number of views that could have been held by slaves, but it didn’t cover the true atrocities slaves suffered.

The writer acknowledges that the book is a very inadequate representation of slavery [because] slavery, in some of its working, is too dreadful for the purposes of art. A work which should represent it strictly as it is would be a work which could not be read; and all works which ever mean to give pleasure must draw a veil somewhere, or they cannot succeed”. In fiction, therefore, one can “find refuge from the hard and the terrible, by inventing scenes and characters of a more pleasing nature.” (Cantave)

Cantave makes a good point, here. In class, we've discussed how Stowe was more romantic when it came to slavery. This explains why; authors felt slavery was too horrible, so horrible that people wouldn't read it. So by making it lighter, it would then be readable. The only scene that may have shed some light on what slaves endured is at the end when Tom is tortured to death, but even that scene was romanticized with the dialogue between him and George at the end. Cantave claims many of Stowe’s characters were unrelatable; African Americans especially had a problem with Topsy. “Many middle-class African Americans want to forget, or get past, the images of Topsy ‘just growing’ of Sambo and Quimbo, of Sam and Andy, of Chloe and Uncle Tom himself” (Cantave).

Although Stowe’s account of slavery isn’t told as brutally as it actually was, I don’t know if she could’ve written it any other way. In today’s society, it’s more acceptable to be blunt when it comes to real life events, but I can imagine then it was already risque to be writing about slaves abandoning their owners. Another reason, perhaps, slavery wasn't told as gruesomely as it was in the books Cantave mentions is because they were fiction books; maybe people wouldn't have processed the reality of slavery in the same manner had it been based on true accounts. I agree with Cantave when it comes to slave stories being to light when it came to details about slavery. I don't think it was as common to find people who were compassionate towards there slaves, and in Uncle Tom's Cabin, we get four families who either treat their slaves kindly and/or help slaves escape (Shelby, Bird, the Quakers, LeClaire) and only one evil business man (Haley) and one cruel owner (Legree). Cantave helps point out these odds by showing stating how unrealistic the slave stories were due to the lack of cruelty experienced.

Uncle Tom's Cabin: Textual Background

Textual Background: A Slave Auction Described by a Slave, 1841 by Solomon Northup (p. 435)

A Slave Auction Described by a Slave was written by Solomon Northup in 1841. He begins the rather brief piece by explaining what the slaves endured before and during a slave auction. The men often wearing a new, cheap suit and cleanly shaven and women also finely dressed with frocks. Slaves were then arranged from tallest to shortest and separated by gender; men on one half of the room and the women on the other. They were taught to act like someone who wanted to be purchased, “exhorted us to appear smart and lively...he exercised us in the art of ‘looking smart,’ and of moving to our places with exact precision” (435).

Not only were the slaves examined on how they worked, but their physical conditions were also inspected. Buyers would, “feel of our hands and arms and bodies, turn us about, ask us what we could do, make us open our mouths and show our teeth, precisely as a jockey examines a horse which is about to barter for or purchase” (436). And if that wasn’t degrading enough, they were also taken and stripped for further examination; if scars upon a slave’s back were numerous it was considered proof of an unruly slave which in turn hurt the slave’s chances of being bought. (436)

This specific writing intertwines with the part of Uncle Tom’s Cabin when Eliza, among many other slaves, is being sold. Solomon spoke about families being separated and about Eliza’s separation from Randall. This piece added more emotion to the already heart-breaking scene when he describes her reactions, “Eliza was crying aloud, and wringing her hands. She besought the man not to buy him, unless he also bought herself and Emily” (436). Not only did she fight for her son against a white man, but she bargained with him. When her master tried to put her in her place, “Eliza shrunk before him, and tried to wipe away her tears, but it was all in vain. All the frowns and threats of Freeman, could not wholly silence the afflicted mother” (436).

Northup also wrote this piece in a way that makes the reader feel compassion, anger, and sadness with them. He writes with such precise sentiments that it feels like one could be there at the auction watching the events take place. Within the scene of it all, he describes the moments when Randall is separated from Eliza, which he describes as, “It was a mournful scene indeed. I would have cried myself if I had dared” (437).

Reading accounts like this makes my mind reel. It’s unreal how poorly slaves were treated at that time in history because I was raised to treat everyone with equality. My grandpa use to tell me to greet and treat a janitor the same way I would a CEO of a successful company -- with respect. To read about how white men inspected black men like they were an animal to be purchased was disgusting, and so was the separation of families. I cannot imagine being torn from my family because the slave owner did not have enough money or because they were not good enough. Scratch that, I cannot imagine even being a slave. Slavery was a disgusting part of history and I hope that’s where it stays, in the past. Northup's account of the slave trade helped me to put myself in that situation. From Stowe's account, it's more romanticized that how Northup describes it. When he describes the way they were touched and prodded, I tried to put myself in that state of mind. Reading it made me angry, which wasn't completely done when comparing it to Stowe's account of the auctions.

The Yellow Wallpaper

There are things in that paper which nobody knows but me, or ever will. Behind that outside pattern the dim shapes get clearer every day. It is always the same shape, only very numerous. And it is like a woman stooping down and creeping about behind that pattern. I don’t like it a bit. I wonder—I begin to think—I wish John would take me away from here! (Gilman) 

This part from The Yellow Wallpaper was one that I found interesting. The reader is introduced to the story through the eyes of a narrator, whom we know is ill with something called temporary nervous depression. Her husband, and doctor, has prescribed her with a resting cure where she is not to do anything physically or mentally strenuous. The quote above, to me, proves that she goes bananas (which are also yellow and horrible) from the wallpaper because she saw herself in it.

At the beginning of the story, she describes the room by saying, "I should judge; for the windows are barred for little children, and there are rings and things in the walls" (Gilman). Now, when I hear barred windows, I'm not thinking child safety -- I'm thinking preventing dangerous people from escaping, like a prison. Also the "rings" made me think of the barbed wire that curls along the tops of fences in protective areas, also like prison. Her husband, John, could play the warden. He shuts her up in a house to help her get better but prevents her from doing anything to physically or mentally grueling. John treats her more as a case than his wife and doesn't seem to notice that his "treatment" isn't working, The narrator describes John as, ". . .practical in the extreme. He has no patience with faith, an intense horror of superstition, and he scoffs openly at any talk of things not to be felt and seen and put down in figures" (Gilman). Perhaps this is why he cannot actively help his wife with her depression; depression is something he cannot physically grasps and therefore struggles with processing the reality of the disease.

When she says, "There are things in that paper which nobody knows but me, or ever will", I think she's talking about herself. She mentions early in the poem around where she describes her husband as practical, but also says that, "John is a physician, and perhaps--(I would not say it to a living soul, of course, but this is dead paper and a great relief to my mind)--perhaps that is one reason I do not get well faster. You see he does not believe I am sick" (Gilman)! This goes hand in hand with the idea of her husband not being able to grasp her disease, but also leaving her feeling even more isolated by battling depression alone.

The line, "And it is like a woman stooping down and creeping about behind that pattern" brought the whole picture together for me. She's isolated in a house, which is more like her prison, where she sees herself growing old in the background of life. John's sister, Jennie, is serving as a housekeeper and nurse, but also reminding the narrator of everything her husband won't allow her to do. She'll grow old blending in, much like the patterns of the wallpaper. Had John let her write and express her feelings instead of insisting he knew how to cure her, she probably would have seen the wallpaper in a different perspective.

Racism Less Learned

One of the most apparent things thus far in Uncle Tom's Cabin is that this book has an agenda towards the differences between races. It's set in a time where slaves were still acceptable to own, misuse, and treat like animals instead of people. And throughout the story, it's apparent that there are at least two types of people: those who own slaves and treat them as people, and those who are in the slave trade business to sell other people as if they were objects. One character in this book who makes it apparent that racism is being taught less is Eva.

Eva is a young, white girl who is on the ship with Tom. She runs around the ship, curious, as many young children are. "Tom had often caught glimpses of this little girl,--for she was one of those busy, tripping creatures, that can be no more contained in one place than a sunbeam or a summer breeze,--nor was she one that, once seen, could be easily forgotten" (p 132). This little girl was on a boat with many slaves, and not once did she treat them any differently; she treated them with respect and kindness without any pretense of how or why these people were locked up and different.

Often she walked mournfully round the place...She would glide in among them, and look at them with an air of perplexed and sorrowful earnestness; and sometimes she would lift their chains with her slender hands, and then sigh wofully (sp)...several times she appeared suddenly among them, with her hands full of candy, nuts, and oranges, which she would distribute joyfully to them... (p 133)

Eva treats the slaves as people, where as men like Mr. Haley treat them as goods. Haley is a cold hearted man who has no problem looking out for his own being. He buys slaves that will only gain him profit, never mind ripping families apart. He buys a young, fit slave named Albert without buying his mother as well, saying, "…she's an old rack o' bones,--not worth her salt" (p 107). And later on the ship, he sells one of his slaves ten and a half month old baby, then plans a heist in which to separate her and the baby without her causing a scene, "Now's your time...Don't wake him, and set him to crying, now; it would make a devil of a fuss with the gal" (p 117).

There are people like Mrs. Shelby and Eva who detest slavery, people like Mr. Shelby and Mr. St. Clare who hypocritically are against slavery but still own them and treat them kindly, and then there's men like Mr. Haley who use slavery as a way of making capital. Racism is learned in these characters, or not learned, by the different areas they are from and perhaps how they were raised. Religion, primarily Catholicism, also has a large impact on why women in particular are against slavery. Those different reasons are why racism is being learned less and could also be a reason to why slavery ends eventually.