Welcome to blogging!!!
Welcome to blogging in World Literature! You are about to embark on a bold and wonderful enterprise. I hope you enjoy your blogging experience.OK, a real post. What do I want to say? No clue. We had a great discussion in the Thursday class today, I think. Shingirayi asked this really interesting question: "If the boys in the movie theater are watching glamorous movies, which blind them to the conditions of their own lives, then why are they full of rage?" (He was referring to the fifth paragraph of "Sonny's Blues.") Several people spoke up and talked about the discrepancy between the glamour shown in films and the reality of their lives -- so you sit in a theater, watch an illusion of wealth, go outside, and hit that "low ceiling of actual possibilities" -- thus the rage. Another student (I think Jessica?) had read that paragraph in a really interesting way. She said that the darkness of the movies showed violence and addiction, and the boys' lives were filled with violence and addiction, so there was no difference, and that's why the darkness of the movies blinded the boys to the darkness of their lives. I think. Then we talked about placing the literature in context and how Jessica's (I hope it was Jessica...I haven't learned names yet) reading would be perfect today but wouldn't necessarily fit the 1950s, when the subject of movies was quite different. I always think of Richard Wright's Native Son and his powerful portrayal of the disjuncture between the illusion in movies and the reality of living conditions outside the movie theater.
Oh, also a lot of folks like the vocabulary idea. So we're doing that this semester. I've got to figure out where to put that stuff on the website. Any ideas?
posted by Sandra @ 1:08 PM
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