Ceremony Summary and Analysis

Characters:

Tayo: Tayo is a young man of mixed heritage - half white, half Laguna Pueblo. He has just returned home from war, and is sick with something the white doctors call "battle fatigue" (PTSD in modern times) and Tayo's Laguna Pueblo family and surrounding community members believe is something entirely different, related to nature, the earth, spirits, etc. Tayo, caught in between the two worlds of the white man and the native American tribes is referred to throughout his life as a "half-breed", learning from a young age to be ashamed of his light skin and hazel eyes, and the grave mistake his late mother Laura made by sleeping with a white man.

Auntie: Tayo's aunt, Laura's sister. Laura's pride and joy was with her son Rocky, who was killed in battle while Tayo returned. Auntie is the main source of Tayo feeling ashamed of his half-breed status, as she took taking Tayo in as a large burden and thought herself a poor saint for doing so when no one else wanted him, while Laura dropped Tayo off as she dropped further into alcoholism and prostitution and could no longer care for him. Throughout Tayo's childhood, Auntie makes sure he knows that he and Rocky aren't really "brothers".

Josiah: Tayo's uncle. Acts as a father, teacher, and friend figure to Tayo. Teaches Tayo the importance of balance in nature and the universe.

Emo: Emo is the face of Evil in the novel. Represents hatred as he constantly taunts Tayo about his mixed heritage, and is obsessed with killing, as in the novel it's stated that the higher the rank of the man Emo killed (in the war) the better he felt.

Harley: Tayo's friend, betrays Tayo by handing him over to Leroy, Pinkie and Emo. Eventually dies for Tayo.

Betonie: The medicine man. Only doctor able to help Tayo, teaches Tayo how to perform the "ceremony".

Rocky: Tayo's cousin, dies in battle. Growing up, Rocky became everything that represented the white man. He was involved in school sports, everything he was told by his Laguna Pueblo community and by his ancestors he brushed off saying that it didn't match up with his textbook definitions of things, and telling everyone what his teachers told him. Auntie is proud of her son for doing this and getting accepted to schools, even though all of these things are things the white man wants from Rocky, and Auntie makes Tayo feel bad for being half white.

Night Swan & Ts'eh: Yellow woman. Reincarnations of each other

Plot: Tayo is constantly torn between the world of the white man, his estranged father's side, and the Laguna Pueblo community, his mother's side. Coming back from war with something today known as PTSD, Tayo is confused on whether or not he needs to listen to the white doctors or the medicine man.

Themes/Motifs:

-Colors
-Rain
-Wind
-Direction
-Feminism
-Separation of cultures
-Storytelling
-Oneness with nature

Important quotes:

-“I will tell you something about stories . . . They aren't just entertainment. Don't be fooled. They are all we have, you see, all we have to fight off illness and death.”
- "It took only one person to tear away the delicate strands of the web, spilling the rays of sun into the sand, and the fragile world would be injured."
-"Josiah said that only humans had to endure anything, because only humans resisted what they saw outside themselves."
-"It was a world alive, always changing and moving; and if you knew where to look, you could see it, sometimes almost imperceptible, like the motion of the stars across the sky.
-"The feelings of shame, at her own people and at the white people, grew inside her, side by side like monstrous twins that would have to be left in the hills to die"

Open Prompt Revision

 
  1972. In retrospect, the reader often discovers that the first chapter of a novel or the opening scene of a drama introduces some of the major themes of the work. Write an essay about the opening scene of a drama or the first chapter of a novel in which you explain how it functions in this way.

     "I have to leave the curtains in the lounge and in the dining room, by the balcony, open to exactly the right width every day or I can't come back in the flat again. There are sixteen panes in each of the patio doors; the curtains have to be open so that I can see just eight panes of each door...If I can see a sliver of the dining room through the other panes...then I'll have to go back up to the flat and start again" (Haynes, 13).
     Elizabeth Haynes' novel, Into the Darkest Corner, depicts the horrifying memories of a woman named Cathy, who was in two separate abusive relationships in her life. The book, however, opens with descriptions that describe her meticulous checking of her apartment before she leaves for work. This OCD introduces a major theme of the book: that the damage done by her abusive relationships is still with her now, and affecting her greatly.
     The format of the book isn't exactly in chapters, but in sections. Within the sections, each short narration of the small things in her life day to day are written underneath the dates in which they happened (ex. Thursday 1 November 2007). All of the sudden, a few pages later, the date will switch from 2007 to 2003, and there will be a different man in that passage. This brings home the detail of Cathy's OCD, with the switching back and forth between the years. You aren't starting the book after she's been abused or while it's happening, but you begin with her regular life, with her working and going out to bars with friends at night. The first section of Into the Darkest Corner introduces the reader to the deeper personal problems Cathy is dealing with, while foreshadowing what is to come.

Response to Course Materials 4/14/13

Ceremony is definitely the most difficult book I've read so far in my life. So much imagery! I feel like while annotating, I can't just pick out some parts of the book to to highlight and call it imagery or tone or anything...it's the entire book. Which is kind of annoying while annotating, but the book as a whole is awesome. I think this is one I'm going to read on my own time during the summer or something. I don't understand everything I want to, and I need time to get through this one and dissect.
Fifth Business is up next, and so far it's pretty good. The tone of the narrator reminds me a lot of Holden in Catcher in the Rye. While the story line is kind of weird with the entire book being a letter to the main character's boss explaining every detail in his life, I still think it's interesting. The only thing I'm confused about is the definition of "fifth business", Ms. Holmes started to explain it to us in class, but I'm still lost. Seems to happen to me a lot.
We've been doing more practice writing open and closed prompts in preparation for the AP test coming up, and I'm really grateful to get the practice, but I'm getting scared because I've been consistently getting 4-3's on mine. Hopefully I can pull it together on the exam...

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Summary and Analysis

Plot:
      Rosencrantz and Guildenstern (Ros and Guil), two characters from Hamlet's Shakespeare, are looked at in a behind-the-scenes sort of way in the play that has a basic point: Shakespeare is everything. Shakespeare is literature, all other pieces of writing are influenced in some way by Shakespeare. Ros and Guil start out on a journey to the palace to help Hamlet, because they were sent for by a messenger. Along the way, they meet a crew of characters entitled in the play as "player and the tragedians". The play is filled with comical exchanges between Rosencrantz and Guildenstern as they contemplate their life with in a "box".

Characters:

Rosencrantz - The more whimsical and comical of the two, Rosencrantz relies on Guildenstern for companionship, but though the two have fast-pace conversation throughout the play, neither of them are really listening to the other one. Rosencrantz listents more to Guildenstern than Guildenstern does Rosencrantz.

Guildenstern - The serious and logical one. Throughout the play, Guildenstern is the one questioning the laws of physics and the fact that the two are stuck within this play, where Shakespeare is controlling everything.

Player and Tragedians - Represent actors in their most basic form, compared to prostitutes in the play (tumblers) because both actors and prostitutes will "perform" anything for money.

Main Themes/Motifs:

-Probability - seen in the coin toss exchange between Ros and Guil...representative of the probability that when a reader or a viewer comes back to the same point in the play, the same thing will be happening at that moment, time doesn't really matter in a play or novel.

-Hamlet -  Stoppard uses Hamlet to say that no one can escape Shakespeare. All literature is in some way, shape or form influenced by Shakespeare, and in Ros and Guil, no matter what the two cannot do anything outside of Hamlet, they're stuck.

POV:
-Ros and Guil is told from their own point of view, being stuck in Hamlet.


Significant Quotes:

"We're actors! We're the opposite of people"
"Words, words. They're all we have to go on."
"Life in a box is better than no life at all."

Response to Course Materials

This week ended with a poetry assignment from chapter 7 in our texts, which I actually kind of enjoyed doing. The poems were interesting to try to dissect (the questions definitely help give me a start on which parts of the poem I should be seeing as sticking out from the others, and which parts I should be commenting on) and I really liked the Lord Byron poem. Earlier we did 2 poetry forum posts, one for The Importance of Being Earnest and one for Woman Hollering Creek. I felt better about these poems when it came to the forum posts. I felt like finally these two pieces were ones I understood and could dissect by myself, and it's helpful with the forum posts to see the posts of my peers, and to see how they see the works and what they've responded to in comparison to my posts. We started on Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony, which I have to say is a book for school I actually don't mind at all, and in fact look forward to getting to read (and even to annotate!!) Coming off of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, I thought the play was an extremely dense piece of work. I was wrong - Ceremony is definitely the more dense work. It's very culturally diverse to everything else we've read in the class, and Ms. Holmes told us to pay attention to things like direction, wind, rain, and colors.

Response to Course Materials

Well, we just finished reading Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, and it's definitely my favorite out of all the plays we've read in class this year. The only thing with R&G is that I feel like it's a really dense piece of work, so things like the "life in a box" part of the play I didn't really catch onto until Ms. Holmes explained it to us. We're getting ready for the AP as well with more closed prompt practices, as well as poetry forums and reading from our texts and answering analytical questions after each poem. I'm really glad we're doing this practice, because I'm getting kind of nervous about the exam, but I'm just a little worried because I feel like I don't pick up on all the deeper meanings and symbols, metaphors, etc. without the help of Ms. Holmes, and obviously she won't be next to me during the test to guide me through a tough work. I hope to have more multiple choice practices, as well as help with essays. I've always struggled with thesis statements and developing a good opening paragraph, which is something that could really work against me on the exam.

Hamlet Summary & Analysis

Hamlet Summary and Analysis:

Characters:

Hamlet – Obviously, the play is based around Hamlet himself. He is the son of Old Hamlet, the late king of Denmark. When his father died, his brother (Hamlet’s uncle) Claudius took the throne as well as Hamlet’s mother as his wife. The play centers around the question of Hamlet’s sanity, after he sees (supposedly) his father’s ghost and hears that Claudius killed his father, and was told to avenge his father’s death by the ghost. Another theme with Hamlet is the relationship between him and his mother, Gertrude (the queen) as Hamlet feels betrayed by his mother after so quickly marrying his uncle after his father’s death.

Horatio – Hamlet’s best friend (assumed to be through textual evidence) and adviser to the king. His role is important because he is the only character we see that Hamlet continues to show affection for and trust throughout the play no matter the events.

Gertrude – The queen of Denmark, mother of Hamlet, widow of Old Hamlet, and wife to Claudius. Being the loving mother of Hamlet, Gertrude is at many times put in between the throne and Hamlet’s ally. As Hamlet appears to go mad and yells at the queen for her quick re-marriage to Hamlet’s uncle, and after an attempt to kill Claudius goes awry and Hamlet ends up killing Polonius instead, Gertrude has to sort of pick a side, to agree with Claudius that Hamlet is mad and needs for the safety of others to go away, or to believe Hamlet.

Claudius – Brother of Old Hamlet and uncle of Hamlet, Claudius murders his brother, taking the throne and the widow of Old Hamlet and mother of Hamlet, Gertrude.

Polonius – Adviser to the king and father of Laertes and Ophelia. Polonius believes the reason Hamlet goes mad is because he told his daughter to stay away from Hamlet, who became upset with his love for her. He tries to convince the king and queen of this theory, setting up Ophelia to lie to Hamlet while he and Claudius listen in to their conversation. Polonius also goes to listen in when Hamlet is in his mother’s bedroom yelling at his mother and accusing her of being a whore and betraying his father, Old Hamlet. It is then that Polonius is killed by Hamlet, who believes from behind a tapestry is Claudius listening in instead.

Ophelia – Daughter of Polonius, sister of Laertes and supposed lover of Hamlet. Ophelia is set up by Polonius to lie to Hamlet and sort of stick to a script and get Hamlet to say something that implies that the reason Hamlet is going mad is because Ophelia isn’t returning his love (while Polonius and Claudius are listening in to their conversation behind a wall. Ophelia eventually goes mad after the death of her father (Hamlet kills him) and witnessing Hamlet yelling at her, going in front of Laertes, Gertrude and Claudius and singing and handing them flowers. In this scene there is evidence within the text that suggests Ophelia and Hamlet had sex, and that Ophelia was pregnant. Ophelia ends up killing herself (drowning) in despair.

Laertes – Brother of Ophelia and son of Polonius. Laertes is Hamlet’s foil. Laertes goes off to college for a long time during the play, and returns upon hearing about the death of his father, and later the death of his sister. At the end of the play Laertes is told by Claudius to kill Hamlet during a fencing match by hitting him with a foil that is poisoned at the end.

Rosencrantz & Guildenstern – Rosencrantz and Guildenstern were childhood friends of Hamlet. Both are called upon to return to the kingdom to spy on Hamlet and get him to tell them what was going on with him that made him go mad. The two are eventually killed, with Hamlet forging a letter to say the two should be executed. The theme of betrayal is big with the interactions between Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, and Hamlet.

Plot:

Hamlet is the son of the late king of Denmark, Old Hamlet, who was recently killed. Upon his death, Hamlet’s uncle and Old Hamlet’s brother Claudius takes the throne and marries Old Hamlet’s widow, Gertrude, queen of Denmark. Hamlet feels betrayed and disgusted by his mother for re-marrying so quickly after the death of his father, and is soon firm in those feelings when he encounters his father’s ghost one night after Horatio and some guards tell him they saw the ghost. The ghost tells Hamlet that his father was murdered by Claudius, and that Hamlet must avenge his father’s death. Hamlet pretends to go mad, a plan to help him do things such as perform a play in front of the king and queen that suggests Claudius murdered Old Hamlet, so that Hamlet and Horatio can see if he was guilty, and Hamlet can just have the excuse of being mad so that no one tries to harm him. Throughout the course of the play, the question of whether or not Hamlet is actually mad becomes evident, and whether or not Hamlet is actually still seeing his father’s ghost, or if his madness and paranoia is taking over him and making him hallucinate. Hamlet kills Polonius, father of Hamlet’s love Ophelia, while he is confronting his mother in her bedroom about her betrayal and incestuous behavior and hears someone listening in behind a tapestry, thinking instead of Polonius that it was Claudius. Ophelia ends up committing suicide, and Laertes is after the death of Hamlet. In the end, Claudius’s plan to kill Hamlet by poisoning him goes awry, and he himself, Laertes, Gertrude, and Hamlet end up killed by the poison.

Central Themes:

-       Betrayal

-       Sanity vs. Insanity

-       Incest