New Ending

I fell forward, feeling the oppression and evil of the pit in front of me, overcome only by my dread of the closing walls, threatening to squeeze all remaining life out of my being. But as I began to make that dreaded tumble to impending death in the pit below, I suddenly found myself immovable in the air, suspended over my death by some unseen force. Suddenly, the three judges reappeared in front of me, as stern and unsmiling as before, though now they all carried a wicked gleam in their eyes, a gleam that drove fear deep into my heart. The judge in the middle pulled off the guise of the white body, underneath appearing a hideous, grotesque, ash-black face with red eyes glaring incessantly at me. I knew from the deep sense of fear that overcame, my shaking, the chills, that this was no judge, but instead and me Lucifer himself. He gave me an appraising smirk and nod. “You have defeated two deaths now, my pit of darkness and pendulum of death. You are too great to perish only by your hand into that pit. You will die, yes, but Satan wishes to give you a choice given to no other man. You may plead acquittal before my brothers [indicating the two flanking judges] and try your luck, (dieing later, of course,) or you may choose to fight the walls. The choice is yours” he leered. Looking from the unflinching faces of the two to the jagged walls of the dungeon, finding myself free to move about, declared “I make my own luck” and dove to my death in the pit, watching the disappointed yet satisfied faces of those above.

Iving over Poe

I am more inclined to side with Washington Irving over Edgar Allen Poe because of the sharp contrasts in writing style, because I think Irving writes a better story. Even though Poe has the name recognition and the more famous stories, I like Irving and how he writes. When neither one of them is really crisp and clear, I like how Irving uses action and values and subtle themes. Irving does a good job getting the gothic elements in, but it's not all gothic, there are deeper values and a good, positive ending. Wheras Poe is all dreary and helplessly stuck on punishing his characters and expressing his problems through his writing. Very little, if any, good happens with Poe, when Irving brought a little hope and promise of change, even if it is only a little.

The writing styles too, for me, favor Irving. Poe spends way too much time going through descriptions, which were often unpleasant, and the wording is cluttered and not precise. He has multiple pages of descriptions for very short periods of time. Irving wins on conciseness.

Reflection on A Psalm of Life

To listern to the music video corresponding to reflection copy and paste address:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTALLCna6gY">

After reflecting on “A psalm of life,” I realized just how similar that poem, written many years ago is similar to a current song we hear a lot of today that echoes many similar themes, “Live like we’re dying” by Kris Allen. You compare them side by side and it is amazing how Longfellow’s words and the values they represent are so timeless. “A psalm of life” is really a deep work that Longfellow obviously thought through deeply, and so is, in a different way, “Live like we’re dying.”

“Sometimes we fall down, can’t get back up/We’re hiding behind skin that’s too tough/How come we don’t say ‘I love you’ enough till its too late” opens Kris Allen, very similar to Longfellow’s beginning of “Tell me not, in mournful numbers,Life is but an empty dream? —For the soul is dead that slumbers,And things are not what they seem.” Both underline the ageless theme of despair and hopelessness that gets in the way of people using their lives to the fullest and focusing on the future and what they can achieve, not selfishly holding onto what they have.

“And we’re all staring down the barrel of a gun/ so with your life that’s before you/ what do you wish you would’ve done” Kris Allen continues, parallel to Longfellow’s verse “Art is long, and Time is fleeting, And our hearts, though stout and brave, Still, like muffled drums, are beating, Funeral marches to the grave.” Both hit on the limited amount of time we have-we are all indefinitely heading to the grave and staring down the barrel of gun, the only question is when.

However, the message is less about death than about using what time we have left. “We only have 86400 seconds in a day to turn it all around or you’ll throw it all away.” “Trust no Future, howe’er pleasant! Let the dead Past bury its dead! Act, --act in the living Present! Heart within, and God o’erhead!” Both of them talk about the sheer importance of action, putting the past behind us where it belongs and looking to the future knowing it is limited. Now is the time, and they know and encourage it.

“Gotta tell them that we love them while we got the chance to say/ Gotta live like we’re dying.” “Lives of great men all remind us, We can make our lives sublime, And, departing, leave behind us, Footprints on the sands of time.” It’s kind of subtle in a sense, but these are both definitely on leaving “footprints on the sands of time”—a legacy that lives after us for us when we no longer can. They both say we need to use our time to further those around us and after us—which is ultimately the focal point for both of these poems.

Both of these works read and listen well lightly, but go much deeper than the surface. Underneath the music and the poetry, there are huge themes. Defeat, death, action and legacy all come up, important things to each and every person. And, after reflecting on it, essential to making our life worth the living.

Voki

Voki

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            Reflection on nature- fall.      

Fall is really a time of transition. You are between the heat and sun of summer and the cold and snow and winter. You can have a fall day that is freezing or an Indian summer of the seventies or eighties, sometimes in the same day. The leaves turn colors but then they fall off and the trees are bare. You know it is going to be cold soon, but it isn’t yet, and you have a chance to reflect on your summer and look to the upcoming cold and new year. Fall is a time of transition.

Hollywood begins the Red Scare

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfKSykTPzA4&feature=player_embedded

This video is an interesting preface to the modern-day Salem--Hollywood during the Red Scare. When you just listen to this video it makes it sound like this is a tame search for a few Communists based on evidence, not the witch-hunt it became. And the bit from the producer too makes it seem like this will be peaceful. The producer makes it sound like Communism is not a problem and is not tolerated, which directly debates the amount of people that actually were charged, guilty or not. The website I checked said that about 350 people from Hollywood were punished, either jail time for contempt of Congress or told not to work for the entertainment industry. Whether they were actually Communists or not (a few probably were) that is a huge number for the amount of real evidence.
 I really get a kick out of how tame and well-meaning this video talks about or implies the search will be and that the guilds actually claimed also to be anti-Communist and willing to do their part. How quickly things changed.

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAhuac.htm

The Crucible, Act 1

This first act of The Crucible shows just how pent up with anger these people are, that when given the chance they will use the situation to settle personal grudges with other people they dislike. It really seems like these are the exact opposite of an ideal Puritan settlement, they are all running around wrongfully accusing each other just because they don't like something about the other, and have no problem seeing their neighbor tried or hung because they have an argument or different view. And in amongst all of this witch-calling are land disputes, money disputes, sect rivalries and affairs. When you think of an ideal Puritan village you would think they would have respect for one another and not be involved in all of these things, but I guess they had enough. They're not perfect, after all. There's only so much anyone, even the religious, can take.

King Philips War Account by Colonist

"We have fought the devil and is ways in flesh and blood form. We weare engaged in a deadly conflict with Metacom (King Philip) who was commanded by Satan to destroy us. It began when we, as responsible Christians, sought to bring religion to the natives and draw them away from their foolishness. We had established prayer towns and places where Natives could come and learn our religion and culture, hoping to bring Christ to them in that way. However the Devil through the errant beliefs of the natives caused Metacom to want to attack us. When we were warned of his intents, the messenger was murdured. After we sought justice for this death by hanging some of Metacom's followers they became even more violent. Over time they attacked many settlements and killed many of our number before Metacom was finally killed in hiding by our raiding party, for many of his allies had joined our side. Let this be noted by all: This was a message to us from God. We must stand up and fight the evil of this world, resist it, for it seeks to destroy us. We must fight through the difficulties we face for in the end we know God will help us defeat all of our enemies who resist the Lord and his message and will."                                        -Average Colonist of the day

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Philip's_War
 http://imagecache6.allposters.com/LRG/22/2246/3K2ZD00Z.jpg

William Brewster-week 3

William Brewster was born around 1566 in Doncaster, Yorkshire, England.  He went to Cambridge for a while, but never got a degree. He eventually worked under William Davison, the Secretary of State. He later took over his father’s position as local postmaster. He helped to start a Separatist church and after its move to Amsterdam and then Leiden (both Holland).  During his time in Holland he helped to publish anti-Anglican church literature, almost to the point of being arrested. When part of his congregation decided to travel to America, he was asked to go along with his family and serve as a religious advisor. When they arrived he became the senior elder of the colony and a close advisor to the governor, William Bradford. Being the only pilgrim university educated, he served as religious leader for several years until their official pastor arrived. For his service Brewster received some of the islands of Boston harbor, which still bear his name.

                William Brewster had several large contributions to the colony. During his tenure he served as religious leader he probably helped to remind the colonists why they were there and given them support. He was also an advisor to William Bradford and was part of the main decision-makers.  He bore responsibility for the religious life, which was quite a task during all of the hardships they faced. After his death in 1644, Bradford wrote of Brewster as being "sociable and pleasant amongst his friends, of a humble and modest mind, and tenderhearted and compassionate."

http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=5103

Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca after his voyage -week 2

After de Vaca returned from Spain, he wrote La Relación about his voyages as a report for King Carlos of Spain. De Vaca wanted to return to Florida and become the governor, but a sucessor had been chosen and he did not want to be 2nd in command. In 1540 he was appointed  Rio de Plata in South America. His mission was to re-establish the settlement of Buenos Aires in Argentina. As governor he was disliked by the elite settlers over his respectful treatment of the natives, and without their support he was arrested by the former governor for poor administration. He was exonerated after a trial in Spain, but never returned to the colony. He wrote a sequel to his previous book critical of the former governor. He eventually died poor about 1557.

I think it's interesting how despite of how good he sounds in his book he was not a good leader of a colony, and along with his criticisms of the governor who arrested him, we see he has a lot of pride and bias toward himself. He still died poor, it didn't really work out.

Native American symbolism similarities

Looking throuh the above website, (located on this weeks real post) I found several similarities between the site and our readings.
1- The sun-god "Life giver. Warmth, growth, and all that is good & well." is also in the way to Rainy Mountain as a type of god his grandmother danced to at one time
2-The twins "good and evil" are in The World on Turtle's back, how they are constant struggles but related
3-The coyote "trickster" is very similar in the description and in Coyote and the Buffalo, how he uses his cunning, but to his demise
It's been neat to see the stories we read tie in to their descriptions so well and so similarly. It's also kind of fun to be able to see the characteristics in their matter of fact descriptions but also in real stories.

Native American Symbolism

I was looking for some info for this week on Native American culturea and really liked this website ( http://buckagram.com/buck/symbols/ ) because of how in depth it goes with symbols. From the sheer amount it looks like th Native Americans used a lot of symbolism to express themselves and it appears to be a large amount of their culture. It also seems like this corresponds to some of their myths and stories and just their lives in general (nature, life, environment, etc.)

Getting Started

Just starting off my class blog for this year. I hope it ends up going well.