Final Blog

I feel that my writing has improved a lot since the beginning of the semester. I feel my writing has become more academic and that I sound a lot more educated now. There has been a lot of elements that I have worked on to do this improvement. One inparticular would be choosing a strong argument. At the beginning of the year, I would choose arguments that were very observational or ones that were very hard to support. Now I can see the difference in a strong argument and the opposite. Another thing that has changed for the better has been my word choice. I have learned which words sound more academic. This also helps with writing college level papers. For the argument aspect, the questions you gave us helped a lot. I found myself writing out the answers to those questions to find my argument. Freewriting these questions let me organize my ideas better. For the word choice aspect, the grammar guides were very helpful. I actually caught myself using one of the words in just everyday conversation. I really surprised myself. I felt like the Dr. Faustus paper was the easiet for me to complete because of feedback on previous papers. I know from the Zamyatin paper and the short story paper what exactly I needed to improve on. I took your comments from these and applied them to this paper. It helped make my paper of better quality. For the most beneficial lesson, I feel like the open discussions were most helpful. They presented new ideas to all of us to help us form a thesis statement. I do feel like I am better prepared to write college level papers now. This class really showed me what seemed like little mistakes but really affected my whole paper. Before I thought that having a thesis statement that I believed in was enough but if there is no support behind it, your paper will not be of high quality. That backup is very important.

Poetry Packet

I think the poetry packet shows that poetry can be written for all ages and all people. The children's poem showed that kids can be involved in poetry. The Sexism poem showed how both men and women can be invovled in poetry. The songs described different styles of people in involved in poetry. "If I Were a Boy" reminded me more of the city type of people for some reason. "Sold" reminds me more of country or cowboys. Packet really shows the diversity in poetry.

The Flea

I feel that "The Flea" is about a couple that had sex outside of marriage and now they are pregnant. The flea would be the child from the line "And in this flea our two bloods mingled be;". Another line that states the flea may be a child would be "This flea is you and I,". Then when it goes on to say "Thou know'st that this cannot be said A sin, or shame, or loss of maidenhead," means that it can not be told that the child is from them because it is outside of marriage. Another line about the child being outside of marriage may be "Though parents grudge, and you, we are met, And cloistered in these living walls of jet.". At the end of the poem it seems like the couple is scared for the baby's life and their own lives.

Expectations of Poetry

I have not had much experience with poetry. I know we did a little but not much in high school. I am kind of excited to learn more about poetry just because I really have not had much to do with it. I do have a feeling that, just like some of the stories, the wording of some of them may make them hard to understand. I will just have to take the poems line by line to figure them out.

My definition of poetry would be: lines of words that have meaning and have a rhythm to them. (They can not just be sentence thrown together in a paragraph. They need to be in stanzas.)

03/25/11

When Faustus and the scholars are talking about Helen of Greece really stuck out to me. I am wondering why Helen of Greece? What was so special about her and why not some other lady? I am not sure how I can turn this idea into a literary analysis instead of just a research historical paper. I know at the beginning of the play Faustus talked about how he had not found love yet and wondered if I can work this two incidents together to form an idea. Nothing has come to me yet but hopefully as I keep looking into it, I find something.

03/23/11

I really like our class discussions. They are really helpful for understanding the story. It shows me that there is more than one way to see each interaction. I really like hearing other people's opinions.

I have been having a hard time trying to think of a paper topic. I can't really find a concrete argument that I feel strong about. I plan on re-reading to see if I can find any part that really sticks out to me. Hopefully this will help.

Scene V

Scene V is when Faustus officially gives his soul to the devil. Mephistophilis tries to warn him about hell but he refuses because he wants to do black magic so bad. I feel the suspense already built up in the story. It makes you just want to yell at Faustus. Being an outsider we can see all the mistakes that are going to happen. I feel that the Good and Evil Angels really add to this effect too. You want Faustus to pick the Good Angel but over and over again he keeps picking the Evil Angel.