Badlands is one of those bands who almost made it. Durn good "big rock" band (That is David Lee Roth's term for Van Halen, & it fits here).
Voodoo Highway, the band's 2nd & pretty much last album, is deep in the blues,as you can tell by the title & the cover.
Speaking of covers, they include a really, really cool version of James Taylor's "Fire and Rain."
Oh, & for you Ozzy fans, the guitar player here is Jake E. Lee, one of the most underrated rock guitarists of my lifetime.
Juniors: discussed the differences between the 1818 original & the 1831 "edit." Same book, different details. Also, that whole "fate" thing might make you think differently about the themes. This is among the things I love about literature--there are no (or, at least "very few") correct answers--there are "better" & "worse" arguments.
Thinking rules.
Let's do a whole lot of it this year.
Also, you got a ton of info about the Socratic seminar that you will conduct next Wednesday & Thursday.
Sophomores: "Contents . . . " quiz. "Contents . . ." Do Now. "Contents . . ." OR 1.1.
You answered a question each from the "exposition," "rising action," "climax," "falling action," "resolution," "& "theme."
& yes, I know my way around some quotation marks.
A lot of "Contents . . . "
(& don't forget the ellipsis.)
Finish those 4 sentences (part III of the update) for tomorrow, as you will turn it in at the beginning of the period.
be cool
I think the 1831 version truly made the book's message less powerful; if, -as the 1831 version asserts-, it is Fate that propels Victor to make his decisions and pure fate/chance that causes the tragedy of this story, the novel's warnings of fatal flaws becomes significantly diluted. A key aspect of the 1818 version is that EVERYONE, despite upbringing and differences in personality and benevolence, has a fatal flaw, and if given the chance to do so, said flaw will ruin the person's life and those around his. For instance, Victor's fatal flaw is Hubris, his Creation's is envy, and Ernest... well,maybe he is just too much of a background character. As you said McBride, if the theme of the story is "Fate sucks" as opposed to "rationality is the last defense against a fatal flaw (here hubris)" then that is all you can get out of the book, Fate sucks. Well yes, it does, practically any Shakespearean play will assert this (poor Oedipus), but that is not all there is to a story; Antigone also tells of the value of sacrifice and, in true Greek fashion, the futility of fighting Fate, Romeo & Juliet warns of poisons, both literal and metaphysical, and that is why we remember them. As Thomas C. Foster says in How to Read Literature Like a Professor, "there is only one story", and quite a few of these stories involve Fate; what makes a story powerful/memorable is what ELSE the story tells, something readers of Shelley's 1831 edition may miss out on. Well, that got a bit off topic/"ranty", but I do not speak up in class too much so I had to vent somewhere... sorry for the wall o' text, I just had to let some of the crazy out...
ReplyDeleteMcBride, I have started reading "Brave New World".. and I need some sort of explanation. I'm in the part where they go to the Savage Reservation and find out all the background on Linda and her son, John. Everything before that however, is confusing to me. I have a little understanding of what they do and why they do it. But I feel like I need more of an explanation.
ReplyDeleteJamie Talebi
Oh, and in response to Noah's comment, I totally agree. Having now seen the difference between the two versions, 1818 makes it a lot more powerful and provides a better reason for why Victor acts they way he does. Sad to say, but I think Mary Shelley wrote like an old woman for the 1831 version, it is somewhat depressing... like she gave up on all the beliefs she had before. Her opinions were shinning through Elizabeth in the 1818 version. I do not see that in the lines I read today from the 1831 version.
ReplyDeleteNoah: you win today's internets (again)
ReplyDeleteJamie:I will search the memory banks for BNW info . . . but my mental rolodex is old & fragile
whoa--when I wrote that, Jamie's 2nd comment had not yet appeared
ReplyDeleteso . . . Jamie: "wrote like an old woman" made me laugh, I must admit