Proses:
Nathan Hawthorne: The Scarlet Letter-Chapter 2
Hawthorne: sin
-Why are women especially the elder ones so harsh and intolerant to Hester?
1. Startled or astonished by the beauty, elegant and dignity of Hester.
2. The patriarchal society let women have eternalized patriarchal ideas, unfavorable for women adulterers.
-How does the author portray Hester Prynne?
1. Core impressive image: the artistically and fantastically made letter A.
2. Appearance
-What does the scarlet letter with gold thread and elaborate embroidery() suggests?
1. C lue of Hester’s attitude: she makes a mockery of her punishment by making this plain symbol of adultery into a
gorgeous decoration.
2. To negate the awful meaning of the letter.
3. as punishment, A human nature ,lush, devilish Hester wants to change
her human reality, to make it prettier than it really is.
-W hat does “A” stand for?
Adultery/Angel (appearing in the sky when governor dies)/Able (Hester gains influence)
-What kind of person is Chillingworth?
1. Devil or devil’s emissary or Satan: cold intellect and old age, without hominine feelings from heart and soul.
2. In Hester’s recalling, he is “…pale.”
Hester Chillingworth
Young, beautiful, perfect in figure Old(in his decaying age), ugly, deformed, cold and
indifferent
Herman Melville: Moby Dick-Chapter 41
Character Captain Ahab
Image of American: an idealist and an egonist.
Willa Cather: Miss Jewett
Sarah Orne Jewett’s poetic principles
Jewett both as a writer and a person
Cather’s poetic principles
As a writer, Jewett has her own writing style.
She focuses on the places where she lives and loves, and makes them subject-matters of her stories. (Wherever she might be, She carried the Maine shore-country with her. She loved it by instinct, and in the light of wide experience, from near and from afar. Every day, in every season of the year, she enjoyed the beautiful country in which she had the good fortune to be born. Her love of the Maine country was the supreme happiness of her life. Her stories were but reflections, quite incidental, of that peculiar and intensely personal pleasure. Take ,for instance, that dear, daybreak paragraph which begins “By the Morning Boat”:
“On the coast of Maine…”P127 paragraph 3)
She writes with delightful humor that comes from her delicate and tactful handling of her native language.(Her personal opinions she voiced lightly, half-humorously; any expression was spontaneous, the outgrowth of the immediate conversation.)
And, the distinctive thing about Miss Jewett is that she has her own individual voice.(her comment on the story of a mule)
Sherwood Anderson: The Triumph of the Egg
F. Scott Fitzgerald: The Great Gatsby
Ernest Hemingway: A Clean, Well-Lighted Place
Exist entialism and the “Lost Generation”: Although Hemingway was writing years before existentialism became a prominent culture idea, his questioning of life and his experiences as a searching member of the lost generation gave his work existentialist overtones.
Nothingness: (nada) an existential angst about his place in the universe and an uncertainty about the meaning of life. The struggle to deal with despair: the older waiter cannot actually stave off despair: ineffective methods including: money (bar)/mocking prayers (religion)
The Older Waiter Lonely, recognizes himself in the old man and sees his own future.
The Younger Waiter: naïve and insensitive, immature, demonstrates a dismissive attitude toward human life in general. Symbols: The café- the opposite of nothingness
Cleanliness and good lighting Order and clarity
Nothingness Chaotic, confusing and dark
Style: minimalist/”icebe rg principle”
Deceptive pacing: Conveys only the most essential information in the scene. Saul Bellow: Looking for Mr. Green
Character analysis: Raynor and Field
Poets:
19th Century:
Walt Whitman: One’s Self I Sing
Emily Dickinson: I’m Nobody!/ Success Is Counted Sweetest
20th Century:
Wallace Stevens: Anecdote of the Jar
William Carlos Williams: The Red Wheelbarrow
William Carlos Williams: Spring and All
Robert Frost: The Road Not Taken
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Robert Lowell: Skunk Hour
Allen Ginsberg: A Supermarket in California。