My Final Blog *brushes away a single tear*

      Last year I walked into the AP Lang exam with shaking hands.  The fact that I had only read about 2 novels and done a few multiple choice exercises all year proved to me that I was not ready.  Unfortunately, the exam was just what I thought it would be.  I did not finish the multiple choice and wrote three terrible essays (one of them I even alluded to Forrest Gump).  My lack of preparation turned me into a complete mess that mirrored my exam.  However, this year was completely different.  I entered the test taking area as nervous as can be based on my previous exam, but felt much better coming out of the test than last year.  I finished my multiple choice with enough time to go back and look through my answers.  The essays were much better than last year, too.  I knew immediately which novel to write about for question three and immediately knew what I wanted to talk about for questions one and two after reading he passages.  All in all, the exam was alright.  I cannot really complain.  I am not completely sure what score I will recieve but I am hopeful for around a four.

Ms. Clinch, I truly feel that I have improved more than I ever thought I would as an AP Literature student.  This year has been tough, exhausting and strenuous but I would not have changed it for the world.  I have grown so much through AP Literature and though I do feel the absolute need to analyze just about everything that I see, watch or hear, I still feel great that I have come through the other side of this class.  I feel as though I now wear a badge of honor for surviving this class and I can wear that figurative badge with honor and pride.  Thank you for everything.  From the never-ending novel readings to the monotonous poetry notebook, I feel as though they were all worth it to come out of the class victorious.  Though I was stressed before, I feel so relieved; it is almost as if a huge wait has been lifted off of my shoulders.  I am glad to say that I took the class, but I am also glad to say that I am finished with the class!  I am proud of myself and the class for sticking with the class until the very end and continuing on with the hard work; everyone who stayed knew it would be worth it in the end and it truly was.  I know I will be able to walk into literature freshman year of college knowing that I am prepared and ready to take the class!

Homosexuality--Making Hypocrites of Society

After the discussion in class today, I now realize just how sexual the play The Importance of Being Earnest actually is.  I am shocked.  The cucumber sandwiches may seem to be harmless, but in reality they are a major sexual reference that is almost completely vulgar since the play is intended to be seen by all people of all ages.  The cucumbers are sliced, but when thought of as an unsliced vegetable they can also represent a quite blatant phallic symbol.  The act of the men eating these cucumber sandwiches is also a reference to a vulgar sexual act.

Another sexual reference in the play is the fake character named Bunbury.  No, he is not real, but he is mentioned quite a lot.  The name “bunbury” has two key words that make up the whole: bun and bury.  “Bun” is described by dictionary.com as slang for “the buttocks.”  “Bury” is described by dictionary.com as a way “to plunge in deeply” or “to immerse (oneself).”  When these two words are put together, it is quite clear to understand the point that Oscar Wilde is trying to get across to the audience.

Besides Wilde’s quite blatant sexual references, there are more discrete (and less vulgar) ones to suggest his homosexual code throughout the play.  He uses Lady Bracknel as a key character in this code.  She is the one who flips the sexist stereotypes by being loud and boisterous and pushing men around, while the social norms are that women stay quiet and away and are pushed around by men.  The flip in gender stereotypes shows that women can be masculine and men can be feminine, just as gay people are viewed to be.

I am honestly quite shocked that The Picture of Dorian Gray is the novel that suggested Wilde’s homosexuality, especially since I feel that this play is much more sexual than his other work.  Then again, I read that novel many months ago and did not know of Wilde being gay, so I did not look for any gay hints in the novel as I did in this play.  Wilde’s forceful emphasis on everything homosexual seems almost as if he was trying to be caught and he was trying to push boundaries just so that he can proved that homosexuality may be condemned by all social classes, but the same people who are against his ways and beliefs are entertained by his works of literature.  In other words, these people say that being gay is a sin while they pay money to go see plays all about being gay, though they do not know it yet.  It is actually quite genius of Wilde to do this since the play is about mocking society and society knows this, but he is also mocking society in a different way and proving they are all hypocrites while they have absolutely no idea of this.  I now understand why Wilde is widely studied today, since he was such a mastermind in his days.

My Apprehension

To be honest, I absolutely adore The Importance of Being Earnest!  The humour in it seems to be quite close to that of the Monty Python movies, which I have grown up watching.  The trivial matters taken seriously and the serious matters taken trivially, however, seem to confuse me quite a bit.  I understand that Oscar Wilde intended this to be a way to poke fun at the higher class and show how messed up their troubles actually are, but I feel like there is something else that is intended by this.  To be honest, I feel as though I may just be grasping at straws since I honestly do not know what else the switch of serious and trivial could be used for besides the obvious of making fun of the upper class.  I just feel as if Wilde is intending something else that I have not yet discovered.

Another point I have to make about this play is that I understand it now, but I feel as though the plot will become quite twisted with the second identities (such as Jack in the city and Earnest in the countryside) and the question of who is Earnest, since many people claim to his name, but just as false identities.  I know that the plot, though it will become quite humorous, will also become more confusing and since it is so close to the end of the year, I feel as if my brain will not want to handle more confusing literature with hidden meanings.  I am trying to keep it going until the end of the novel, but honestly the amount of analyzing we have done on the other novels seems to have add up throughout time and now I need an easy read.  This could possibly be an easier read than all of the others and I may simply be overreacting, since I realize now that the play is certainly not like Hamlet in need of some strong analysis and confusing roles between protagonist and antagonist.

All in all, I feel as though my apprehension is getting the better of me since I am not in the right mindset to do another major analyzation.  To me, I cannot just read the play and enjoy it, I do have to analyze it but the analyzation mixed with the fear of confusion is what is truly holding me back.  Maybe it is a good thing that we are reading this in class and therefore we can learn together, which will decrease the confusion of the class as a whole.  I know I am probably overreacting, but I am worried about this play since the last one was Hamlet, which is truly an amazing play, do not get me wrong, but is also confusing and does not seem to have an answer to any of the questions created because of it.  There has got to be some middle ground between super easy and Hamlet-hard, and maybe that middle ground is The Importance of Being Earnest.

Emma: The Setting Makes The Novel

In Jane Austen’s Emma, the setting has a major bearing on the novel as a whole.  A tiny little town with nothing to do in it seems as if it would not affect the novel, however, I believe that is the point.  Austen is trying to tell the reader that even the most simplistic settings can change the novel completely.  I have been thinking about this lately and it is true that this novel would not be anything like it is now without having this setting.  Emma would not be bored enough to want to entertain herself with matchmaking, which would halt the rest of the novel from happening.  It is interesting when I think about it because if the same exact characters from the novel were dropped into some big hustling and bustling city such as New York City, there is almost a guarantee that none of the events of the novel would have taken place.  Emma would have most likely found some other people whose lives were in need of Emma meddling into, Mr. Woodhouse would certainly not have the fears that he holds in the novel since he would not be able to leave his apartment building if he had them in NYC, and Mr. Knightley would have found someone who truly belongs with him rather than ending with Emma who believes she is in love due to pure jealousy.  There would be no Harriet, no tea parties, and certainly no literary merit for the novel.  On that note, there is no telling whether we would be reading this novel in class today if the setting was any different.  Austen needed the dull setting in order to prove Emma’s boredom then turn Emma into a matchmaker through that boredom.  Emma could have found something else. Maybe something that is actually useful, to do with her life rather than matchmaking if she had been dropped into any other setting than this.  But maybe that is just it, Austen had to make the townspeople’s lives so unbelievably boring that a marriage between two random people could absolutely rock their world.  I know that if I had read this novel with the setting being in New York City, a wedding would not have even made it to the list of exciting things happening in the novel, yet when the setting is so mind-numbingly boring, something like a wedding is quite exciting; I know I was elated to read about the union between a ditsy, egotistic girl and a self-righteous man.  And the fact that I was actually rooting for them and cheering them on all the way to the aisle makes me realize that even though they are absolutely angrily annoying, I still feel happiness since we have followed them this far.  Maybe it is the fact that I was excited for them since this moment could be one of the happiest they will ever experience, or maybe I was simply excited that I had finally reached the end of such a long novel, but regardless, I was pleased when I reached the last chapter and everything came to a close.

My Experience With The Regency Era

After experiencing the life of a 2nd class citizen of England during the Regency Era, I now understand what a tough time these people have even when they look like they are happy.  Being Lady Crowley, I had to make sure to spend time with the Duchess since she is my good friend, then I have to spend the appropriate time with my husband Sir Andrew Crowley, I also have to make sure to keep an eye on Mr. Darcy and Miss DeBergh since I suspect they are up to something and on top of all of that I have to remember my etiquette.  Yes, it seems like fun and games (mainly because we are playing cards and dancing) but it is also very hard to keep up with everything that I am supposed to do.  It also pains me to know that women are not aloud to show how smart they are since that is apparently the men’s job.  All I can say is I am glad that I was born when I was because if I lived in a time like this I guarantee I would go insane since I would be stuck cooking, cleaning and looking pretty for my husband.  I mean, is it really too much to ask for a bit of recognition of the women’s side?  We are just as strong as men and although they treat women right by protecting them whether it be from a saving a women’s dress from dragging through a puddle or protecting her honor, they still suppress the women.  Luckily now, women have almost-equal rights as men, but this suppression that went on during the Regency Era is not one to overlook.  In fact, the only woman that seemed to have even an ounce of power in her relationship was the Duchess and that was simply for the fact that she is the Duchess.  However, something that strikes me as odd is the fact that women are not really supposed to be showing how smart they are or having the upper hand in most cases, but Emma seems to defy these rules.  Emma is cunning and sly even to men, and wants to show her power to people such as Mr. Knightley.  Oh faith, she is such a rebel!  However, I would not describe Emma as having bad form since she has proved herself to many of the men and although she attempts to outsmart them, she does it in such a way that they do not even notice.  Emma can be a symbol to all of us women that although she may live in a suppressed era, that does not mean that we have to be suppressed ourselves.  We can break out of the social barrier just as Emma did.  Women will learn from Emma for years to come and maybe one day, possibly around the 21st century, we will live a lifestyle of equality where we do not have to prove ourselves to the men.  Zooks! this is our England, too!

The Motif of Eyes

I am going to be honest; I do like Emma much more now that I have a deeper understanding of the novel.  Now that I have a firmer grasp on who the characters truly are, I feel as if they are much more relatable.  However, I do not understand Emma’s pull toward Harriet.  In fact, Harriet’s eye seem to be the main focal point of her character.  The narrator says, “those soft blue eyes and all those natural graces, should not be wasted on the inferior society of Highbury, and its connections” (20).  After this mention of Harriet’s eyes, I began circling every time I saw the word “eyes.”  I noticed this word does come up many times after Harriet has entered the novel.  “‘The expression of the eye is most correct’” (41), “‘If I had set my heart on Mr. Elton’s marrying Harriet, it would have been very kind to open my eyes’” (58), “she cast her eye over it” (64), “May its approval beam in that soft eye” (64), “soft is the very word for her eye” (64), and “You soft eyes shall choose their own time for beaming” (68) are but a few examples of this word used everywhere.  It seems almost as if every time Harriet is mentioned, her eyes are described first.  The word “soft” often accompanies the eye.  Since the eyes are the windows to the soul, this could mean that Harriet’s soul is in fact soft.  Soft can also be described as moldable.  As we have seen throughout the novel so far Harriet follows everything Emma tells her and lets Emma manipulate her as a sculptor manipulates moldable clay.  She is young and impressionable so that could be the reason why her eyes, and therefore her soul, is soft.  The irony of the line, “those soft blue eyes and all those natural graces” is the fact that the softness of Harriet’s eyes are what have led her to be almost completely unnatural.  Harriet without the influence of Emma could be described as her pure and natural form, but now that Emma has changed her and manipulated her into being the person Emma wants to see, Harriet could now be described as unnatural since she is technically no longer herself.  I might be crazy for following the descriptions of eyes that seem to be everywhere, or I might still be in Hamlet-mode since we only just finished the play, but I believe there is something very significant about Harriet’s eyes that we have not found yet.  I feel as though maybe with closer analyzation I will find some deeper meaning that the softness referring to her easily-change soul and personality, but for now I have sadly found nothing other than that.  There is a possibility that Part II will continue with this motif until I finally complete this puzzle or crack this code, at least I hope so since this word is will be playing on my mind until I figure out why it is everywhere in the novel.

My Rant About Emma

The beginning of Jane Austen’s novel Emma honestly does not seem too gripping to me.  My honest truth is that I love Hamlet since he was such a verbal contortionist that we can analyze all of his plays in infinite ways and there are no true answers as to what the true intention of the play was originally.  However, Emma so far seems very different from any typical Shakespeare play.  Yes, they both tend to have slow parts, but this novel has more slow than interesting parts.  This may simply be due to the fact that I have never read a Jane Austen novel before and maybe I am trying to understand her writing style but have not yet fully grasped it, but to me it seems quite slow.  I may just be completely wrong since we have not yet begun to analyze or discuss Emma yet, but this form of writing does not quite seem as if Shakespeare would come close to it.  He linked so many words together to form separate meanings which then lead to completely different meanings and so on and so forth, but all Jane Austen seems to do is put me to sleep.  I understand that I must read this novel knowing that is was written in the 1800s and it will seem almost nothing like the movie “Clueless,” which is loosely based on this novel, even though I completely adore it.  I believe my major problem with this novel is that fact that we have switched gears from an action-packed, fast-paced play written by a writer that I respect completely to a slow-moving, (I hate to say it but) dull novel written by a writer that I have heard of but have never read any of her works.  Do I feel bad for bad-mouthing this book even though we have only just begun with Jane Austen?  Yes.  Do I feel as if Austen is possibly rolling over in her grave (or twisting around as dust particles; sorry, I felt the need for a Hamlet reference there) at my anger over a book she intended for people of the 1800s?  Yes.  However, do I want to read another page of this?  I can’t say I do.  I might just be acting over dramatic right now since I have never dealt with her writing style before, but this is how I honestly feel.  I do believe, however, that once we start analyzing and discussing it in class I will feel much more comfortable and happy with this novel.  I do believe I will grow to like Jane Austen, since the same thing happened with Grendel since I hated it initially but now it is one of my favorite novels that we have read not only throughout the school year, but also throughout my entire high school career.  I need to give this novel a chance of discussion in class and then, and only then, do I feel as if I will appreciate it more than I do now.