The Giver

 In middle school we read a book called The Giver, which is about a society where everyone is the same. People's partners are picked for the, their jobs are picked for them when they reach a certain age, and their kids are given to them. In middle school it was difficult to fully understand all the nuances and implications of this text, but not I can see that it can be labeled as a postmodern work.

The Giver brings to question the trustworthiness of government and those in charge. Going more specific, it can be said that the book questions the merits of communism. Its main postmodern technique used is absurdism. Many parts of this story are absurd. First of all, most people in this society only see in black, white, and shades of grey. Memories and information of the past are contained in a person; it is that person's job to keep that information, and access to that information allows them to see color (somehow). The rigid structure of the society is also absurd. People are watched and judged from the moment they are children, and this is what determines their jobs in the future (which they receive when they're still kids). The age someone is given a bike is recorded, and taking an extra apple to eat is also recorded. The absurdity of all the regulations satirizes over powerful leaders/governments, showing them in a tyrannical light.

Paranoia is also used in The Giver. Once the main character (and we, the audience) start learning more about the society and how it really functions, darker sides of it begin to emerge. People who get problematic are killed. A baby born when they shouldn't be is killed. Up to and when the main character escapes this community, paranoia builds on if they will be discovered and reach the same fate. The unsettling feeling that comes with this paranoia serves the postmodern aspect of the novel because it puts over powered governments in an evil light, calling to question methods used to stay in power.

Annabel Lee

Annabel Lee by Edgar Allen Poe 

It was many and many a year ago,
   In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
   By the name of ANNABEL LEE;--
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
   Than to love and be loved by me.
She was a child and I was a child,
   In this kingdom by the sea,
But we loved with a love that was more than love--
   I and my Annabel Lee--
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
   Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,
   In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud by night
   Chilling my Annabel Lee;
So that her high-born kinsman came
   And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
   In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in Heaven,
   Went envying her and me:--
Yes! that was the reason (as all men know,
   In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of a cloud, chilling
   And killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love
   Of those who were older than we--
   Of many far wiser than we-
And neither the angels in Heaven above,
   Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
   Of the beautiful Annabel Lee:--

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
   Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise but I see the bright eyes
   Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling, my darling, my life and my bride,
   In her sepulchre there by the sea--
   In her tomb by the side of the sea.

 In Annabel Lee, the speaker reminisces his departed love. They paint this love as something grand, something fantastical-- too good to be true for many. One way the fantastical nature of this love is portrayed is through the repetition of the fact that it happened "in this kingdom by the sea." Kingdoms draw the image of a fictional and possible magical world. This takes the speaker and Annabel out of the ordinary human world and places them in a much more exciting setting, which adds to the mystic of their love.

However magical the love in the poem may be, it is ultimately about loss. The grief is shown through the length of the stanzas. The first stanza is the longest, at 12 lines long. The length reflects the happiness and lively flow of the love the speaker and Annabel Lee share. However, then the stanzas get shorter as their story becomes more tragic. The next stanza is only 8 lines. The third stanza is  the shortest in the poem, at 6 lines. This is the stanza where Annabel Lee is killed, and the shortness of the stanza reflects both the shortness of their love story, and the emptiness/lack of thoughts that consumes one after experiencing the loss of someone dear to them. The fourth stanza is 7 lines and the last is 8. The stanzas slowly get longer as the spear begins coping with and accepting his loss. However, the stanzas are never as long as the first one, where Annabel was still alive and their love was still blossoming. So while the speaker slowly starts recovering, it seems they never fully returned to the fullness of thoughts they had while their love was alive.

Furthermore, Annabel Lee does not follow any set pattern for how many lines its stanzas contain. This is befitting the content of the poem, which discusses how the love between the speaker and Annabel Lee went against the expectations and desires of everyone, from "her high-born kinsman" to even "the angels in Haven above" and "the demons down under the sea." Both the stanzas and the love story refuse to adhere to guidelines.

Above is an image of Edgar Allen Poe, and below is a depiction of Annabel and the sea from the poem.

Ferris Bueller

 Even though it released in the late 1980s, Ferris Bueller's Day Off is still an iconic comedy movie, and a large part of the credit for that goes to the hilarious main character, Ferris Bueller.

Firstly, the metatheater nature of the movie is striking. Not many shows and movies at the time broke the fourth wall, but Ferris constantly turned to the camera to talk to the audience, like this when he tricks his parents into thinking he's sick so he can skip school. It makes us feel like we're in on his schemes, which makes the movie funnier. Additionally, Ferris changes his language level depending on who he's talking to. When he's lying to his parents, his level drops considerably as he starts talking like a child to win them over. With his friends he's at his regular level, and then when he talks to other adults he tries elevating his level to seem sophisticated. The exaggerated changes in his speech make him a funnier character.

One of my personal favorite aspects of Ferris is his wit. His ability to come up with schemes to get what he wants, like getting his girlfriend out of school or him and his friends into places they're too young for, is really funny. In addition to that, so is his ability to create good responses to things said to him. The repartee between Ferris and his best friend Cameron is fast paced and humorous to watch. Finally, Ferris uses a lot of sarcasm when he talks. It isn't overdone, or very malicious, and what result are light and funny moments.

The World Was Silent

1. The characters often say how Biafra would be further with foreign aid-- support, supplies, or even just recognition. How do you think the Nigerian civil war would have played out differently if it happened in the 2010s?

2. Ugwu's personality changes depending on his situation. With the same mentality, how do you think Ugwu would act different if he was white? If he was rich? And what about if he was Hausa or Yoruba?

3. Kainene was introduced as the ruder, rasher twin, while Olanna was introduced as the gentle and "perfect" one. How has this first impression been developed-- and possible even challenged-- through the story?

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The World Was Silent

The world was judging us when we cried

When the North began firing

on its own brothers and sisters.

When our accents became a maker,

and being Igbo became a death sentence.

When the people we dined with

became the ones that sold us out.

When we watched pregnant women lying

on the ground, their bellies cut open like melons.

When we saw the bodies, bodies of family, friends, strangers, filling the streets

the world judged our tears.

The world was criticizing when we suffered

"Savages," they called us,

sitting from their perch of colonizing moral superiority.

"Uncivilized," the papers and radios yelled,

ignoring the destruction of our civilization Europe had brought.

"What more could you expect from Africa?" The white man asked,

rejecting journal articles that didn't fit the narrative they wanted.

"Will Biafra succeed?" the West questioned

as their government sent guns to shoot us, supplies to bomb us.

As we died of their oppression, pleaded for recognition, watched each other fall,

the world criticized our pain.

The world was watching when we fought

We didn't have many supplies

but we had heart, we had hope.

We didn't have any support

but we couldn't give up, because that meant death.

We got used to the shrill alarms piecing our quiet

and then running from bunkers as they rained fire on us.

We tore down social borders, opened our hearts

and helped everyone around us, because we knew no one else would.

We saw mothers cry over their sons' bodies, boys ripped off streets, forced into war.

The world watched our fight.

The world was silent when we died

Eventually, they closed us off from the world,

leaving us supply-less and starving

Eventually, the fires in us began to dim,

seeping out of the wounds we didn't have supplies to treat.

Eventually, we got used to the wailing of families

as another member fell to the weakness, to the hunger.

Eventually, we stopped fighting at the supply buildings

because there wasn't much left to fight over.

Children died, the elderly cried, and we lost our pride, and then eventually,

the world ignored our death.

Postcolonialism

 What does the text reveal about the operations of cultural difference - the ways in which race, religion, class, gender, sexual orientation, cultural beliefs, and customs combine to form individual identity - in shaping our perceptions of ourselves, others, and the world in which we live?

What I really like about my book, Half a Yellow Sun, is how different the three perspectives it provides are. Ugwu shows the world through the eyes of someone who grew up poor and is observing the wealthy. Olanna shows the inner life of the wealthy, and Richard shows the perspective of a white man. Each of these three offer unique views on the same plot.

Ugwu's part, for me, is so far the least insightful in terms of postcolonial influence (at the same time, it is also my favorite part because I love seeing how he sees the world after coming from a rural background). Ugwu's parts focus a lot on his master's parties, which reveal a lot about politics in regards to Nigeria and the Europeans. The one point constantly emphasized is how many people are unhappy with the Europeans and believe Nigeria needs to govern and advance itself, because the Europeans aren't doing a satisfactory job helping them. From reading the book's summary I know the book is about the Nigerian struggle for independence, and Ugwu's parts do the best job of painting the simmering tensions in the country.

Olanna's parts reveal class and gender in 1960s Nigeria. Ugwu found straight wigs distasteful, but when Olanna goes to visit her ex, he tells her how she looks better with wigs on, and that her naturally styled hair makes her look like a poor person. This shows that while the Nigerian upper class may dislike European colonialism, their definitions of class and beauty have still been molded by them. Looking like a white woman is considered more beautiful (in terms of features-- I don't remember colorism being mentioned). The upper class drive sports car models that are luxurious in Europe, even if-- as Olanna's ex admits-- they aren't built to work well on African roads. 

Richard's part is the one that has stood out to me the most; I found it really interesting to see how the White people regard the Africans, and the fact that Richard was just as uncomfortable as me made it easier to read. Richard's parts challenge some of Derrida's binary opposites. The man is White, while the woman (Kainene) is Black. However, Kainene is the richer of the two; Richard lives with her. Furthermore, the "colonizer" Richard is more child-like than Kainene: he is much shyer, doesn't smoke like she does, and struggles more with their intercourse. Both of them are shown to be just as rational and industrious. This sets up a nice juxtaposition where we see the White people in the book say certain things while the Black people are quite the opposite, which, once again, helps show the reasons behind the building tensions in the country.

The Creature's Poem (Frankenstein)

 The first sight I saw when I opened my eyes

was the face of my creator.

Excited to greet him, I began to rise

but upon seeing his face, I froze.

He screamed and ran away

and foolishly thinking it was a mistake, I followed.

But when I caught up, his horror-filled face kept me at bay;

upon realizing I was the cause, my heart hollowed.

Grabbing some clothing, I ran from the house in shame.

I found beauty in the world that surrounded me,

but the loneliness in my heart even the Nightingale's chirp could not tame.

 So I set in search for a place I would not have to flee.

Pity me though, because my misfortune I could not seem to rid.

I came upon a village and thought I'd found my salvation,

but they threw stones at me until I ran and hid

at a cottage that for the next year was my station.

Next to me was a family of three:

a son, a daughter, and a blind old man.

Over the next year it is from them that I was able to see

the complex range human emotions span.

I secretly learned the meaning of the things they spoke.

More importantly though,

I learned how much different I am from these folk;

It was following this realization that my loneliness once again began to grow.

Alas! I still tried to be worthy of their love.

For their friendship I tried to plea,

but what would they understand? Their creator watched them from above

while mine sickened at the sight of me.

It was then that I made up my mind.

I will too have a companion with whom I can enjoy my day!

I am a monster of your design

and until you atone for this, you and your loved ones will pay.

A Single Story's Impact

 

{Excerpt from page 237}

Easily one of the best books I've read in 2020, Sisters of Sword and Song follows two sisters with two very different- but interwoven- stories who, for a majority of the book, are on different corners of the kingdom. The author, Rebecca Ross, does a wonderful job juggling their two journeys, and she does this by using a 3rd person limited point of view narration that switches between the sisters.

The limited narration creates suspense. This book has many characters- just within this scene there's one of the protagonists, Halcyon, and the two villains Selene and Macarius. If we had insight into Macarius's mind, we would know what he's looking for as he "sweep[s] through [Halcyon's] mind." However, we're only privy to Halcyon's thoughts, and as she is doing her best to avoid thinking about the "details of the [at this point unspecified] mission," we readers still do not know what about this mission is so important that the kingdom's highest officials are obsessed with it. And then when Macarius finally finds "one particular moment" that he can take to use "against [Halcyon] and her sister," we are again left in the dark to what the moment is. If the narration gave insight to Macarius's (currently satisfied and victorious) mind, we would no doubt know what this important memory is. Since this book is a bit over 450 pages, it is necessary to not fully reveal developments every time they happen, because doing so would take the suspense out of the plot and leave readers feeling like this book is dragging out. A 3rd person limited narration helps accomplish that.

Additionally, the characters in this book are too out of it too often for 1st POV narration to give a cohesive story. Take this scene for example. Halcyon is practically getting tortured as she has her mind forcibly swept. She has "coughed blood," and is "screaming" and bruising "herself on the chains." All in all, her mental state is not very put together right now. Throughout the story, Halcyon and Evadne are constantly fuzzy-minded either because of literal torture like this, or because of hunger, exhaustion, and fatigue. If the story was in 1st person, then we would not (realistically) have half the details that we do. A 3rd person limited narration creates the intimacy with the protagonists that 1st person would, but it also provides us with details and descriptions that the characters alone would miss.