Summary of Assignments (Fourth Marking Period)

Please be sure that you have completed the following written commentaries for the 4th marking period. All of these should be posted to your personal blogspots. (If I've missed anything, please let me know.)

1. F. Scott Fitzgerald: A Selection of Quotes (The Great Gatsby)
   
2. Third Quarter Reflection
3. Death of a Salesman*
   
4. The Catcher in the Rye*
   
5. The Soloist (Part 1, Chapters 1-6)*
6. The Soloist (Part 1, Chapters 7-12)*
7. The Soloist (Part 2, Chapters 13-22)*
8. The Soloist (Part 2, Chapters 13-31)*

For the assignments listed with an asterisk, don't forget to write a sentence or two at the end of your post about how you would like your readers to respond to your post. For example, you might ask them to focus on a particular idea/argument you've put forth or to critique specific rhetorical/grammatical/stylistic aspects of your writing. Or, you might ask a specific question of your reader about what you have written. There are a number of possibilities for this, feel free to experiment with the kind of feedback you request.

Class Notes: The Soloist (Steve Lopez)

I'm using this blog posting as a way to track some the questions, ideas, and arguments that have developed in response to our reading of Lopez's writing. You might consider some of these as you post your own blog entries in response to your reading. On a separate entry I will post links to the various supplemental articles, videos, and sound bytes that I bring into our class sessions dedicated to Lopez's work.

My initial questions for discussion:

• How does Lopez tell these stories?
• How does The Soloist compare to other texts we have read this year?
• What do the interviews/news bytes/articles we've read, listened to and viewed add to our reading of this book?
• What genre does The Soloist belong to?
• What social/political issues does Lopez seem interested in addressing in his book and other writings?
• Who does he write to? Who does he write for?
• Are there aspects of Lopez's writing that make it readily attributable to him?

Ongoing questions/ideas students posed:

Topic: Why does Lopez write (in general)? Who does her write for?

• Lopez seems interested in people with “hidden talents” and whether or not they are successful in these.
• He seems ‘obsessed’ with people who strive to do better. He seems to feel connected to people as they take steps to move higher and higher with their talents. How does this connect to Lopez’s own story/career moves?
• Does he see something inside of people that we don’t see that helps him to select what he will write about?
• He seems to write about people who have overcome hardships.
• Lopez seems to write about people who overcome obstacles through their own power. Ayers seems to be content with his surroundings, regardless of whether or not he planned to end up where he is. Is this comfort a symptom of his mental illness, or something else?
• He seems to try to play an active role in Ayer’s life.
• He writes to America as whole to spread awareness. He writes for Ayers and for people like him (to spread this awareness). (His works might become models for ways of overcoming these obstacles.)
• What makes him so interested in the lives of strangers? How do journalists (Lopez) decide how deeply to pry into the lives of those they write about? How do they choose their subjects?
• When Lopez sees someone with talent who is struggling it seems to ‘set him off’ and he wants to help these individuals as much as possible.

Topic: What social/political issues does Lopez seem interested in addressing in his book and other writings?

• Lopez might write to show how the community ‘acts’ towards the homeless, psychological disorders, and other aspects tangential to the actual storyline of Nathaniel Ayers. He doesn’t just write for himself.
• He might write for his own fulfillment/happiness.
• He also writes for people who are at a disadvantage—people with disabilities or economic challenges. He wants people to rise above their individual problems to accomplish their goals.
• He writes for society, for awareness. He writes not for the government or for any larger institution, but for all of us so that we are aware of what goes on around us.
• He wants to express to his readers that poverty is more than just ‘being poor’. He wants to show all of the issues that affect the poor and have led to their current situation.
• He likes writing about the ‘underdog’ to inspire others and to challenge [essentializing] notions about the poor.
• Writers (like Lopez) take on the role of social workers in their writing, by describing the complexities and particulars of their identities.
• Lopez’s own parents were immigrants (from Italy and Spain) and may have experienced varied levels of discrimination. So when he writes about those who are discriminated against, he may connect in some way to their experiences. This may be why he has been successful as a writer who writes about these issues.
• Maybe Lopez realizes that there are less fortunate people out there than himself; maybe he was one of those people. He writes very inspirational stories about people from ‘the hood’ or the slums who attempt to better their lives. Maybe he’s starting a movement. Maybe there is something autobiographical here.

Topic: What genre does The Soloist occupy?

• This book might be both a biography and an autobiography. Lopez writes a great deal about his own experiences along with the story that he tells about Ayers.

Topic: How does Lopez write his stories (issues of style, voice, etc.)?

• He writes in the first person and analyzes characters more than events.
• He writes in a ‘modern, plain, uncomplicated’ way. His writing is very easy to read.

Topic: How does The Soloist compare to other texts we have read this year?

• Similar to The Great Gatsby, where the narrator, Nick, meets others who he sees as new, different, strange and wants to know more, Lopez also seems to want to know more about the people he meets and this might drive him to write about them.
• This might connect to Lopez’s interest in the underdog.
• In The Great Gatsby Nick is unable (or unwilling) to affect change in the lives of the people he meets. In fact, the book ends in tragedy for the most interesting of these people (Gatsby). Will Lopez be able to change Nathaniel’s life in anyway, or will this story end in tragedy as well?

Questions Lopez has posed in his writings:

Topic: Social/political/medical concerns related to Ayers’ life and condition

• "I'd like to know how a black kid growing up in the sixties—when the civil rights movement and Vietnam War divided the country and cities like Cleveland were on fire—beat the odds and ended up in Julliard's classical music program." (2008, p. 17)
• "Does the madness come up in a person randomly and without warning?" (2008, p. 17)
• "Who am I…to make his story mine?" (2008, p. 17)
• He has some big questions about Nathaniel’s symptoms and about the notes he jotted down about his initial awareness of his illness. (p. 80)
• He seems to be asking why he, as a writer, has to take on the role of agency to support Ayers. (Especially when in The Soloist he calls the workers at LAMP and enlists their help.)
• He seems to ask ‘Is Nathaniel getting better?’ every few chapters. He checks in to ask are his (Lopez’s) efforts or the efforts of others doing anything to help Ayers?

Topic: Personal and professional exploration through writing

• “Everything I’ve written about Nathaniel is extremely personal, and yet I’ve shared it with thousands of readers. Have I exploited him? Is it possible for me to me to keep writing about him without doing so? I’ve asked myself the question before, and the answer remains the same. I’m telling the story of his courage, his challenge and his humanity, and I believe there’s a benefit to him, to me and to the public” (pp. 231-232).
• He seems to ask, ‘Do I need Nathaniel as much as he needs me?’ when he writes, “I’m frustrated by my own limitations, and because I don’t know whether, in the end, I’ll have had as big an impact on Nathaniel’s life as he will have had on mine.” (p. 232)
• Lopez seems to be continually redefining himself through this work and thinking about how he has changed through his relationship with Nathaniel and in telling Ayers’ story. For instance he writes, “Life is all about the next phase, about feeding the monster, about finding a definition of himself that makes sense for at least one day. We’re like each other in many respects. Do you think about writers the way I think about musicians? he asked when I spent that night with him. Yes, I do. But I don’t have time to do enough of it” (pp. 210-211).

How many still die 'the death of a salesman'? (Post for the week of 3/30/09)

I'm thinking about how Miller's play connects to our reading of The Great Gatsby, especially since I've never taught these two texts back to back before. It's been an interesting experience for me, I must admit. I'm reminded of Ric Burns' film and the emphasis he places on New York during the 1920s as the place where advertising was born. The billboard image of the the eyes of Dr. T. J. Eckleberg in Fitzgerald's novel is, I think, symbolic of the increasingly capitalist and consumerist culture of that decade. I'm thinking of a specific line from The Great Gatsby: "Over the ashheaps the giant eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleberg kept their vigil" (p. 124). For me, this description represents the god-like and restless nature of advertisement and consumerism that looms over the poor of the valley of ashes. The billboard is both enticing and frightening. Eckleberg's stare holds the power to draw the masses to it with the promise of financial and professional success that this new America holds, but it simultaneously rejects those who fall short of the mark. It is both inviting and cold.

In my mind Willy Loman is the archetypal fallen salesman, a man who thinks he has found his own version of the American dream in the life of buying and selling (a dream he and Nick Caraway shared). But rather than see the business of sales for the material reality of what it involves, his romantic vision of being 'well liked' crashes when he can no longer keep up with the changing times. Willy recalls in Act II the image of success he had as a young man that formed, in part, when he met the salesman Dave Singleman and saw the apparent notoriety he had achieved. As he says to Howard: "And old Dave, he'd go up to his room, y'understand, put on his green velvet slippers--I'll never forget--and pick up his phone and call buyers, and without ever leaving his room, at the age of eighty-four, he made his living. And when I saw that, I realized that selling was the greatest career a man could want. 'Cause what could be more satisfying than to be able to go, at the age of eighty-four, into twenty or thirty different cities, and pick up a phone, and be remembered and loved and helped by so many different people" (p. 81)? This encapsulates what I see as the 'get rich quick with as little work as possible' American dream of the '20s, one that persists even in our time. But as Charlie points out, the business world cares little for the salesman who Willy describes as being able to create "personal interest" (p. 33). At the end of the day it's a about "what you can sell" (Charlie, p. 97).

So what does all of this mean for us as an audience for Miller's play? As for me, I wonder how many Americans are still stuck in the same system that breaks Willy Loman. This leads to a number of questions for me: How do we define our dreams of success? Is Charlie right, are we only worth what we can sell? If so, how does that limit our hopes, dreams, and visions of a better life? What about Willy's hopes and dreams? Where did he go wrong? Can we blame him for wanting to be respected? What stood in his way? How do we explain why Willy cheats on Linda and his approach to raising his sons? Who has power in the play and in what ways do Miller's characters navigate the worlds they live in? What does it mean to die the death of a salesman?

A shift in my approach...

For the rest of this year (and leading into next year) rather than ask you to respond to a question of my creation or to write about a particularly narrow section of the texts we read, I'd like you to write approximately one page a week on a topic of your choice.

I'm trying to shift my own position in the class away from that of leader/writer/teacher to that of reader/writer/teacher. Each week I will post my own blog in response to the readings. My blog entries will be based on my own thoughts, ideas, questions, and critiques about the readings, and you are welcome to continue the conversation I begin or to go off in your own direction.

If you have difficulty getting started, you might read some of what others have written to see what has interested them about a particular text. Another blogger might ask a question, raise an issue, or make a comment that inspires you to write. You might consider commenting on that person's writing to let them (and us) know that they inspired you to write. That way, we can keep track of the conversations we're having about our readings.

(See above for this week's post.)

Third Quarter Reflection (Due: Monday, March 30, 2009)

First, I'd like to thank all of you for the writing you've done over the past seven weeks. For me, one of the most rewarding aspects of teaching is the opportunity to read your words, to listen to your ideas, and to add my own voice to those that you bring to the classroom.

For this week's blog I'd like you reflect on how blogging has been going for you. I have many questions about what this kind of work has meant for you, and I've listed some of these below. Feel free to respond to as many or as few of these as you like and to express any other perspectives, concerns, or ideas you might have about this approach of reading, writing, and response.

My questions:

Has blogging been valuable to you as a student, thinker, reader, and writer?
What have you taken away from taking this approach to submitting writing for a class?
How do you feel about doing and continuing to do this kind of work?
Is this work different from other experiences that you have had in English classes?
What suggestions do you have for me as a teacher who uses blogging in his English classes?
Looking forward, do you have suggestions for how you want to be graded on this writing?
Has doing this work changed the community within your own class or between classes (11-1 and 11-2) in any way?

F. Scott Fitzgerald - A Selection of Quotes (Due: Monday, March 23, 2009)

For this week's blog I've provided you with a small sampling of F. Scott Fitzgerald's private writings. Below are several quotes taken from letters he wrote to his daughter and to Ernest Hemingway, among others. In these, he comments on his life, his work, his observations on society and humanity. You might use one or more of these as a way to reflect on your reading the novel.

I'm going to resist providing you with a question or prompt for this week's blog assignment. Write about what you want to write about with regard to The Great Gatsby.
______________________________________

“Life is essentially a cheat and its conditions are those of defeat...the redeeming things are not 'happiness and pleasure' but the deeper satisfactions that come out of struggle.”

–Letter, October 5, 1940, to his daughter, Frances

“Often I think writing is a sheer paring away of oneself leaving always something thinner, barer, more meager.”

–Letter, April 27, 1940, to his daughter, Frances

“Riches have never fascinated me, unless combined with the greatest charm or distinction.”

–Letter, Aug. 1936, to Ernest Hemingway

“A great social success is a pretty girl who plays her cards as carefully as if she were plain.”

–Letter (undated) to his daughter, Frances

“All good writing is swimming under water and holding your breath.”

–Letter (undated) to his daughter, Frances

“Sometimes I think that idlers seem to be a special class for whom nothing can be planned, plead as one will with them—their only contribution to the human family is to warm a seat at the common table.”

–Letter, July 7, 1938, to his daughter, Frances

“In a few days I’ll have lived one score and three days in this vale of tears. On I plod—always bored, often drunk, doing no penance for my faults—rather do I become more tolerant of myself from day to day, hardening my crystal heart with blasphemous humor and shunning only toothpicks, pathos, and poverty as being the three unforgivable things in life.”

–Letter, September 22, 1919

“The purpose of a work of fiction is to appeal to the lingering after-effects in the reader’s mind as differing from, say, the purpose of oratory or philosophy which respectively leave people in a fighting or thoughtful mood.”

–Letter, June 1, 1934, to Ernest Hemingway

“My idea is always to reach my generation. The wise writer...writes for the youth of his own generation, the critics of the next, and the schoolmasters of ever afterward.”

“Self-interview,” New York Tribune (May 7, 1920).

"That was always my experience—a poor boy in a rich town; a poor boy in a rich boy's school; a poor boy in a rich man's club at Princeton…I have never been able to forgive the rich for being rich, and it has colored my entire life and works."

–F. Scott Fitzgerald: A Life in Letters

Source: The Columbia World of Quotations. New York: Columbia University Press, 1996. www.bartleby.com/66/. [Accessed March 20, 2009].

Gatsby Journal Page: Chapters 1-3 (Due: Monday, March 16, 2009)

This week I'd like you to post a page from The Great Gatsby reader's journal I've asked you to keep. How you organize this journal entry is up to you. (See the handout I provided earlier this week if you want some suggestions for how to approach this assignment.)

In addition to your journal posting, I'd like you to create a Wordle "word cloud" from the text that you post to your blog. This can only be done once you have completed your blog post. Once you have done so, visit the Wordle site, cut and paste the text from your blog into the Wordle engine, and play around with the various layout, font, and color choices in order to customize the look of your word cloud.

In order to insert your Wordle creation into your blog you will first have to take a screen shot of your "word cloud". Visit the following screen shot instruction webpage to view directions on how to take and save a picture of what you create. Once you have done so, you should then click on the 'Add Image' icon located on the top menu of your blog's create post window to insert the image into your blog.

Your finished product should look something like this:

American Poetry Supermarket (Due: Monday, March 9, 2009)

Once you have your poem, perform a web search and find an online version of the poem. Publish a link to that poem somewhere towards the beginning of your post. (I will review how to do this during our lab period.) Then respond to the following:

1) Research some biographical information about the poet and some historical background about the period in which he/she wrote. How does this information connect to the work you have read by this poet? (You might also incorporate words that either the poet has said or others have said about their motivation for writing this and other poems.)

2) Perform a close reading of the poem you have chosen and write a bit about rhetorical aspects (such as figurative language, structure, theme, tone, meter, etc.) that you feel have contributed in some way to your experience of reading it.

3) Perform a web search and find at least one other work by the poet you have chosen. (You will have no problem locating these works online, as each of these poet's works have been widely disseminated.) Provide a link to the poem(s) so that your readers can access it/them. Write briefly about your experience as a reader of one or more of these.

4) Finally, respond to the question, “Is there anything about the works of this poet that makes them distinctly American?” (Other than the fact that they were composed by an American poet.)

How you arrange this information is up to you, but your post should be approximately a page in length when typed. You may include a small image of the poet if you are able to find one. . Remember, if you quote a source from the Internet to cite it!