Dripping English

 Good projects are wasted on you teenagers (who don't even read this).

I've already picked out two or three songs for the CD I would do; but then I know all the scenes in the book.  I can listen to a song and ask myself whether it would fit anywhere in the book.  It's amazing how a little channel surfing on the radio or setting the iPod on shuffle can help with such a project.

But then I start imagining things like designing the book jacket, etc.  

Instead, I have a ton of Latin tests and quizzes to grade, and if I somehow get through those I can go to school to get the essays you wrote a couple of weeks ago.

I wish I could show you how to see what I see in the books.  I wish I knew how. I wish I had that magic.  These books, these works of literature, which may bore you at your tender age are indeed the stuff that our culture is built upon.  Take _Merchant of Venice_, our next literary pick.  Do you know how many quotes from Merchant are in "Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory"?  Or even in _F451_?  They are part of the fabric of our common humanity.

So is music.  Picking songs isn't a frivolous and fun activity. Ok, it is fun and it might seem frivolous, but understanding a song--both lyrics and music--and understanding a scene in a book, and how the two might interact is a sophistocated process.  The kind of analysis you'd use in this you might find in an advertising or marketing firm.  There may be times that your client base might be highly educated and pulling stright from literary sources could be advantageous.

But I'm falling asleep here so I'm signing off.  

I'd sure like a comment or two.   Don't be shy.

MrsL

 So you might think this has nothing to do with English.  Well, lyrics are poetry.  And one line in this song always makes me think of _Fahrenheit 451_.

If you don't know the song I'm talking about, it's on the Grey's Anatomy 3 soundtrack and by a band named Gomez.  Take a listen:

 http://www.stereogum.com/archives/new-gomez-moon-and-sun.html

I'm really in love with this song. Lyrics and tune. Here's my attempt at the lyrics:

When you look to the future
Don't forget to write to me
When you last felt wonder
Don't regret I broke down the scene
'cause the night was so serene
Just add kerosene....<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

We always felt so good together
The days just rolled on by
Moon and sun
We all move on

The nights and the sand dunes
Café days and summer sounds
It's the way they built you
That house just won't come down
By the false and feeble ways
My better days

We tried to hide from filthy weather
We said we'd never fight
Moon and sun
What's done is done
Moon and sun
We all move on

Did you say someday?
Did you say try?
Did you say love me?
Don't ask why

'cause we always felt so good together
But the days just rolled on by
Moon and sun
We all move on

We all move on
We all move on
We all move on
****

Some of the words might be wrong.

But that line, "just add kerosene"... wow, that has me thinking.  What does he mean?  Was there a passion to their relationship?  Did their passion add the kerosene?   Was he the kerosene?  Is he the false and feeble ways?  Was she the strong one--the house that won't come down?   What about the "someday"?  (Someday I'll marry you?)  What about "try"?  (Try to be what I need you to be?)  What about the rest???

The chemistry was there, to light the world on fire, but it just didn't work and they moved on....  Is that it?

Sometimes I get hooked on the words of a song and spend forever trying to pull meaning out of them.  Other days I can just sing along and not think.  

Anyway...not exactly _Fahrenheit 451_, but I was looking at the Totally 10 project sheet this afternoon and thinking about the one project that is making a CD of music to accompany scenes in F451.  This song wouldn't work; there's another Gomez song I've got on their "How We Operate" CD that would.  But you can explore that for yourself.

Anyone who does that particular project will really need to think about music and truly analyze what they are doing.  Sometimes listening to the songs TV shows, like Grey's Anatomy, use for a particular scene is useful.  But I'm a lyrics and music sort of person; perhaps I overanalyze.  

Do you have a favorite song because of the words?

I have to admit I've been deeply disappointed in our class discussions or lack thereof.  On the other hand, I'm beginning to wonder if teenagers are really up to reading a book and having a deep discussion on something like _F451_.    I'm enjoying reading it and experiencing it more than even last year.  Is it because I'm older?  I wonder.   In fany event,  I just got back from Barnes & Noble where I bought another of Bradbury's classic novels and a thick anthology of his short stories.  And today I found one of his early short stories, "The Homecoming," in an old book of horror stories that I had as a kid.  It's really a neat story about an extended family reunion on Halloween of all these vampires and werewolves and such, and this one kid whose 14 who is "abnormal" (normal to us) and doesn't fit in and fears he never will.  Maybe I'll save it for Halloween to read in class or something....

My point is that whether YOU are enjoying Bradbury, I've discovered that I like him a lot.

All the imagery and such in _F451_ that we discuss, that we have talked about and will talk about in greater detail, is the icing on the cake.  It is the icing on a delicious, rich, moist cake and some days I feel like we never get to cut into the cake.  Something's wrong here if this is what teaching literature is like.  And perhaps this is my fault.

Or is it partly your fault? But must a grade be attached to every darn thing in order to make students accountable?  How sad.  I don't want to forcefeed this book.

Bradbury isn't too far off the mark in this book.  He wrote it over 50 years ago, saying that kids aren't interested in books, but race their cars and shoot each other.  I read about one school shooting this week and either one or two planned school shootings.  Too many kids have died in car wrecks.  And everyone is more interested in their phones and iPods and halo games than in anything of substance.

But the thing is, Bradbury wasn't trying to say that we need to give up our big screen TVs or iPods or whatever because they can be means of communicating things of quality. (God knows I couldn't live without my iPod or being able to record my favorite shows on the DVR!)   I want to talk next week about Faber, about the three things he said we needed:  1) quality of material, 2) leisure to read and absorb it, & 3) the right to act upon it--whatever acting upon it may be. 

Wow.  #2 is my big problem.  I have no leisure.  I haven't written in this blog in a long time because a) no one was replying and b) I hadn't had the time.   Prepping for school and grading and family are all time consuming.   I like blogs because they feel to me like I have a legitimate excuse to stop and make time to consider what I've read/what we've read.  What's the big picture, what's the big meaning.

And I can't help but wonder in the 1950s when this book was being written did Bradbury have a sense already about how books are hated when forcefed?   In "Burning Bright" (the last section of _F451_)  all of those men Montag meets by the railroad tracks have books in their heads.  Granger doesn't say that they are going to print and distribute them first and foremost.  No.  He said they will be there WHEN THEY ARE NEEDED.  Not to force them on people.  Just to be like a library of books to be checked out when needed.

And yet here we are, forcing this book on you.  We force it on you and you swallow bits and pieces but you never taste it really.  You don't enjoy it.  It's like wolfing down a fast food meal on your way to the football game.   I wish I knew how to get you to truly taste this book....

I'm hoping that next week we can talking meaningfully about _F451_, about overall messages, and if need be about themes, symbolism, and imagery.  And I also want you to hear the interview with Bradbury that I've been listening to.  He's just an average Joe; he sounds like someone's grandfather--sweet and cuddly and passionate.  He's definitely passionate about writing and the art of writing, which he says just pours out of you without all this intellectualizing.  

But what do we do with the book in school?  Intellectualize it.  Dissect it.  Overanalyze it.  He didn't sit there thinking about the imagery; it just poured out of him.  And we as students try to squeeze out meaning from every pore--but should we?  Can't we just enjoy the overall book--just like we enjoy a friend--without having to list all of the reasons why we like that friend or approve of that friend?  I wonder.

Read it in bed with a flashlight.  Forget that it's assigned for school.  Think about the chase, the near escapes, the mechanical hound, the bombers and the war.  Think about if any part of it can speak to you...any part of it at all.  Or just enjoy the ride to the end.

And if you don't like the book now, pick it up again in 20 years. 

Ok, so I finished my Stephen King novel (I enjoyed it a lot, but I think you may need to be my age to do so...I could be wrong), and was debating what to read next.

Then I remembered someone (was it Darriane?)  was reading ECLIPSE and told me that I needed to start at the beginning of the series.  So I thought, ok and bought TWILIGHT.  And while I haven't thought yet that it's as good as Harry Potter, it's got me turning pages.  If I'm not already 100 pages into it, I will be by class tomorrow.  I'm hooked.  Thanks for the recommendation.

Girls, it's really a chick book.  It's a school romance so far, without being too corny or romantic.  Guys, well, I dunno.  You might like it.  I'm thinking now that mainly I've seen girls holding copies of ECLIPSE.  Am I wrong?  And if so, guys, why do you like it?  For that matter, girls, why do you like it?

Add a comment.  It's time to get a discussion going here.

Mrs Lindzey

 

 I was so pleased to discover that Saki's "The Open Window" is taught freshman year, because that is one story that for WHATEVER reason has always stayed with me.  As an adult teaching Englsh literature, I can see much artistic value in "The Open Window"--BUT THAT'S NOT WHY I REMEMBERED IT!

I always thought it was so cool that the menfolk came strolling in and freaked out the guy.  In fact, admittedly for a long time I didn't understand that last line of "Romance at short notice was her specialty."   Of course, understanding that last line and really thinking about it makes that story all the more clever.

"Fish Cheeks" in so many ways seems ordinary--not extraordinary.  But it hits so solidly and quickly the issues of being ashamed of who you are and learning to accept who you are and to embrace it.  

I guess one of the things I like about short stories is that they are SHORT and you can REREAD them.  You can, so to speak, go over the evidence with a fine tooth comb, if you like.

And if you're reading this and thinking, "man, I'd never want to do that!  I'd never reread something to get more out of it!"  Yes?  What about songs?  Have you never listened to a song over and over until you knew it by heart?  Sometimes you like music because it has a good beat and you can dance to it (the old "American Bandstand" joke), but sometimes the chorus will hook you with a phrase or two so they you listen more closely to the verses.  And then those verses--wow, some of them are really powerful.  And it's no longer a song with a good beat to dance to (or mellow enough to get romantic to), it becomes something that speaks to you, to your very soul.

I never really pondered much last year about what Amy Tan could have done differently, not like I've done this year--that she could have thought about how ROBERT felt, and helped him get through the meal instead of making it worse for him.  AND CAN'T WE LEARN FROM THIS?  How many times do we make our own lives WORSE by our own sorry attitudes?  

She didn't know my motto, did she?  AD ASTRA PER APSERA--to the stars through difficulties.  You have to go THROUGH them, you can't waddle in them.  You can't soak in them until they are absorbed into your very soul and ruin everything around you.  SHOOT FOR THE STARS, guys.  And while you're at it, don't be afraid to crack open that literature book at home and reread that story.

You know, if we....  I was going to write that if we didn't have to do this narrative that's coming up that I would challenge you instead to try to write a similar short story.  Think about her progression: a tight first paragraph introducing her; next one the mom and her kitchen; the next one relatives arriving (thus ever expanding outward from herself through her family to all the guests); then the dinner at the top with "fish cheeks" as the climax, followed by the burping and departure of guests, then her mother and the gift, and finally her own changed opinion at the end.  (Thus expanding inward on the way down.)  That is, the story doesn't read like it's well-shaped, but boy is it!

So I was going to write, too bad we can't write a story in imitation of what she did.  Or can we?  

We're going to be writing a narrative.  It will have 5 paragraphs--Intro, 3 body, and conclusion.  Each body paragraph needs three concrete details & two commentaries.  I wonder....  I wonder, does it have to look a certain way?

After all, Amy Tan has an intro--introducing us to her in the first paragraph--and boy does she!  Those sentences are loaded and revealing.  We get a good idea about her.  She has a concluding paragraph, which is just her again (like the 1st paragraph) but this time she's reflecting on the events and coming to different conclusions about what happened.

So that leaves the body.  How is the body different from what we'll be doing?  (Other than she's a professional writer!)   Do her paragraphs have topic sentences, concrete details & commentaries?  Maybe they do.  After all, if the "concrete detail" or fact of one of the situations is that her father offered her the fish cheeks, surely the commentary is that she wanted to disappear, isn't it?  Am I stretching it?

You know what?  Read it again.   Instead of thinking about this as a tedious writing assignment, let's challenge it.  Let's make it something more.  Let's make it like writing a short story.

AND YOU KNOW WHAT?  Go ahead and make something up if you want.  But can you provide the details?  Can you say what's the concrete details and what's the fact?  Can you put the climax in the third paragraph?  What will it be?

WOW... this has me thinking now.    I can think of an embarrassing situation or two, but it would take "shaping it" and perhaps adding to it to make it INTERESTING and noteworthy like a good, tight short story.  Otherwise it's just a chapter from "my pitiful life as a middle school student."  I'd RATHER it be, "I was pitiful but look what I learned and learn from it" -- if that doesn't also sound to pathetic.

ha.

WHAT DO YOU THINK?    Comment on anything in this.  Don't be shy.

SOWISA -- Strap On When It Seems Appropriate.

This phrase came out of Stephen King's _Lisey's Story_, which I am still reading and it has to do with facing situations.  That is, when a situation in life requires you to dig in deep, find some bravery or confidence or whatever, that you dig in and strap it on, so to speak.

Yeah, I found myself saying this loudly last week while running up the stairs in the A wing.  We had SO many meetings during in-service we could hardly get our rooms ready or prepare first day handouts.  It was overwhelming at one point, and I found myself yelling SOWISA. 

And this is what good reading should do.  It should touch us in a way that effects our lives.  We should connect with it.  If we don't, why the heck are we reading it?  Ok, maybe it's something funny like a good Terry Pratchett novel, something that we read just to ESCAPE REALITY.  There's nothing better than a book for that.  When you feel your life is a mess and you just need a break, a good book can do the trick.  It can buy you time to recover and face whatever you need to face.  And it doesn't require batteries either.

I read other books this summer--Steven Saylor's _Rome_ (yes, Mr Saylor's brother--and he's also a friend of mine) as well as _Rubicon: The Last Years of the Republic_ by Tom Holland.  A student gave me the latter and I read it first, I admit.  And I enjoyed it far more than I thought I would.  (Isn't that always a nice surprise?)  Plus it covered the same years as _Rome_ so they complemented each other. 

But you know what I read and enjoyed the most, don't you?  And in fact I read it TWICE to get the Latin spells: _Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows_.  It was even better the second time through.  I could really see how Rowling developed the theme of remorse from the very beginning.  And what an important theme that is, especially how she explained it.  Wow.  I mean, think of all the bad choices you can make when you're a teen (or, heck, when you're an adult) and how you can feel like you've screwed up so big time that there's no coming back (like Voldemort's divided soul).  And what was the only way a person could come back from having his soul so divided?  It was said to be very painful....an extremely painful process: remorse.  That is, there's no easy way to start over. There's no easy way to say you're sorry to friends. There's no easy way to fix things (and we adults know this all too well!).  Remorse is painful--sometimes very painful--but it makes you stronger; it's worth the pain to get back to where you want and need to be, like Ron.

And who else loved that breakout from Gringott's bank?!  Or Ron being clever enough to just repeat what he remembered and speak Parseltongue when he needed to?!!  

I read _Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone_ to my youngest son this summer and enjoyed seeing how it all began again.  So I guess I better count that book too.  (I often have several books going at once...)

I hope you get what I'm saying: I enjoy reading.  I really enjoy reading out loud, which you will see soon enough.  But most of all I try to find the enjoyment in anything I read.  But I want to let you in on something: I didn't begin to truly ENJOY reading until AFTER COLLEGE.  I read for school like a good girl and made good grades, but it took until after college before I found an author that *I* really liked.  I didn't know the fun and joy of reading until late in the night until after college.  (I was a late bloomer, for sure, in so many ways....)  I hope you guys can discover an author you really ENJOY sooner than I did. 

One reason why I like Stephen King is because he brings so many other things into his books--other books, movies, music.  His book _On Writing_ (which is a really good read even if you have no interest in writing) mentioned how many books he reads and how many books he listens to.  He had, it seems to me, a list of books in the back of recommended reading that included all genres and books old and new.  Harry Potter was there.

In _Lisey's Story_ he mentions _Fahrenheit 451_ by Ray Bradbury which we'll be reading this semester.  In _Hearts in Atlantis_ he mentions _Lord of the Flies_ which we'll be reading next semester.  Books--like movies and some tv shows--become part of our lives.  They are part of our cultural heritage, high quality or not.  They are the little references that enrich other parts of our lives.  If I'm watching a sci-fi show with my husband and the leading man is falling for some alien chick, I'll start saying, "She's GREEN, Jim!"  which is a reference to Star Trek.  My generation gets it.  It almost doesn't matter if you do.  And most of us understand if someone is called a muggle these days....

Stories becomes part of our lives, for better or worse, because of how we connect to them.

So, the year is beginning, whether you like it or not.  We're reading some literature, whether you think you want to or not.  SOWISA!  SOWISA guys!  Brace yourselves:  this year may be a real rollercoaster ride!  You never know!

AND I WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU!  What did you read this summer?  Do you have any comments on what I wrote above?  Comment on this thread.  Yes, I will be screening them for inappropriate things (because this is a school related thread), but I won't be screening them because you disagree with me.  You may hate Stephen King.  I'm ok with that--though I may ask you why.  I really WANT to hear from you.  So now it's your turn....