Semester

This week we have to talk about things we liked in class. We can also talk about things that we have learned in class. We can also talk about thing that we improved on or benefitted from in the class. There are not a lot of things that I really liked about class. One of the things that I like about the class was the movie that we watched. Another is the videos that we watched that had to do with satire. One of the things that I learned was how to write a better essay. I think that I improved in writing essays in a set amount of time. I also improve on my reading skills. I benefitted from having to read all the things that we did read. I did not like having to write a blog every week. I also did not like the vocabulary quizzes that we had. I also did not like having to read all the things that we read in the class. I hope that I do better in the next semester then I did in this semester. I also hope that I don’t have to read as many things or do as many blogs next semester.

Movie & Play

This week we have been watching a movie. The movie that we are watching is called The Importance of Being Earnest. We are watching this movie because we are learning about satire. I at the beginning did not think that I would enjoy the movie because we were watching it in English class. But as we got further into the movie I started to enjoy it more and more. The things that I enjoy most about the movie are the parts that are funny. I enjoy these parts of the movie because when the actors say funny thinks they appear to be very serious about it. This week we also went to watch a play that the drama students have been working on for some time. I don’t really remember what the play was called but I enjoyed it. It was a little hard for me to understand some of the thing that they were talking about because of the language that they used. The parts of the play that I enjoyed the most were the sword fighting scenes. I liked these parts because the actors did a very good job in pretending to fight. I also liked how all the characters did a very good job in the play.

Finished Hamlet

This week we finished reading Hamlet. I think that overall it was a good play. It was a little difficult to understand at times but in the end I understood the main parts of the plot. I did not enjoy having to write an essay on Hamlet the first day back from our break. I did not know what to write about in the essay. I am also not good when it comes to writing essays especially when there is a set amount of time to do them in. We also had a vocabulary quiz this week. I was a little worried about the quiz because I had not looked at the words in a very long time. But the day before the quiz I studied the list of words for about half an hour. I think that I did ok on the quiz but when it came time for the quiz I got a little nervous and forgot a few of the definitions. I also got one of the words meanings mixed up with another word. We also started learning about satire by reading a speech. I did not find as many satire devices in the speech as some of my classmates so I think that I don’t completely understand it. But with a little more practice I think that I will get it.

Books

This week we read act three of Hamlet. I think that Hamlet should just tell someone that his father was poisoned. He should also tell them that it was the new king the kill him. After they find out the truth they should have the new king executed. I also think that Hamlet should not try to appear to be too crazy. I think that Hamlet’s mother should have been more scared when Hamlet killed the man hiding behind the cabinet. My second independent reading book was The Pesthouse. I think that this was a pretty good book. It was about people going east and trying to get out of the now ruined America. It talked about the problems that they faced on their journey. But in the end they decided to go back and make a life for themselves in this ruined America. Although I enjoyed this book there were some question that I don’t think got answered by the end of the book. My third book for independent reading is A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess. Some of my friends have told me that it is a little weird and can be difficult to understand at times. But I think that it sounds interesting so I will try to read it.

Play & Book

This week we started reading Hamlet by William Shakespeare. When I first started to read it I did not really understand anything that was going on. But as I got further into the play I started to understand some parts of it. The foot notes really helped me to understand some of the words that did not make sense the first time I read it. And they also really helped me to understand some of what was happening in the play. But there were times that the foot notes made things a little harder to understand. I thought that I was getting better at understanding how Shakespeare wrote but then I got to the second act.  I understood some of the beginning but as I got to the end of scene two I did not understand any of it. And most of the foot notes really did not help to make things clearer. The book I chose for my outside reading was The Pesthouse by Jim Crace. Although I have not really read a lot of it so far I think that it is a good book. I am sort of worried that I may not have the book finished by the day that it is due.

Oedipus and a play

This week we finished reading Oedipus Rex by Sophocles. At the end his wife kills herself because Oedipus finds out the truth of his past. I think that she could have found a way to deal with the problem that did not involve her taking her own life. Then after finding his wife dead Oedipus ripped out his eyes with her golden brooches. I think that he could have found a less painful way of punishing himself for killing his father and marring his mother. I thought that this was a pretty good tragedy over all. This week we also went to see a play that the drama kids worked on. I thought that it had some parts that were a little funny in it and they made me laughs a little. At the beginning I did not understand it and found it boring. But as it went on I started to understand it. There were some parts that made other kids around me laugh but I did not find them that funny at all. I think that over all the drama kids did a very good job in the play. Also I enjoyed watching the play even when it did not make me laugh.

Tragedies

This week we had to turn in our drafts for our papers. I had a hard time thinking of what to put in the paper. It did not help that I waited till the day that it was due to write it. I think that I did an ok job on the paper but there is a lot of work that can be done to improve it. This week we also had to start reading Oedipus Rex by Sophocles. I found some parts a little confusing because I don’t know a lot about Greek mythology but I think that I understood the most important parts. We had to think of question to ask our peers about what we read. One of the questions I came up with was why did the queen not want Oedipus to continue his search for the truth. One answer we came up with was that she suspected that Oedipus was her son and that he killed his father. She did not want Oedipus to know the truth so that she would not have to deal with the problems that came after. Another was if Oedipus would carry out the punishment that he said would be for the killer of the king. We said that he would punish himself so that the people would not get angry at him.

Book 2 and Assignment

This week we started on a writing assignment for the short story unit. At the beginning I did not know which prompt to pick but in the end I ended up choosing the first one. Then it was sort of hard to remember all of the short stories that we read and then pick one that could be used with the prompt. I decided to quickly scan some of the short stories that we read. And I think that I ended up picking one that fit the prompt I chose. What was a little more difficult for me was coming up with a good thesis statement that went with the prompt and the short story I chose. This week we also had to choose another book for our independent reading. For my independent reading I chose to read The Pesthouse by Jim Crace. I ended up choosing this book after going through the list of books we could pick from. I first picked out the books that had titles that sounded interesting to me. Then I looked up a short summery for those books and pick out the ones that were interesting. Finally I looked at how long the books were and chose from one of the shorter ones.

O'Connor and Camus

This week we had to read “The Guest” by Albert Camus. I found this story a bit odd because all Daru wanted was to stay in the building on the hill. He decided to let the prisoner make the decision of going to prison or escaping and he decided to go to prison. This was shocking to me because I did not think that someone would willingly go to prison when they could have escaped. We also read two stories by Flannery O’Connor. The first story was “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” and the other story was “Good Country People”. The first story was sad because the whole family was killed. I feel it was kind of the grandmothers fault for taking the cat without telling the others. One thing that I don’t understand is why the man shot the grandmother three times. The second story was a little stranger. I did not understand why the boy pretended to like the girl just so that he could steal her fake leg. What was stranger was that he does the same thing to other girls. This week we also learned about Existentialism. I am still having a hard time understanding it but I think that in time I will get it.

Irony and Drunkard

This week we had to read a section about humor and irony. This section helped to refresh my memory on the three different types of irony. We also had to read a few more short stories. One of them was The Rocking Horse Winner by D.H. Lawrence. I thought that the boy was trying so hard to get his mother’s love but all she cared about was the money. I was sad at the end when the boy died. Another story was Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? by Joyce Carol Oates. I found this story a little strange at the end. It was strange because of the way that they acted at the end. I thought that the boy was just an older man that liked to trick girls into going with him. The third story was The Drunkard by Frank O’Connor. I found it sad at the beginning because it started off with the death of an old man. But later in the story I found it funny. I thought it was funny when they were going back to their house and the boy got mad at the old ladies. This week we also got our new vocabulary list. This time I will try to study since we have more time.

Views and Elephants

This week we had to read a section about point of view. In this section I learned about a fourth point of view and it is the objective or dramatic point of view. In this point of view the narrator only tells you what the characters see and what they hear. It is not used very often so that is why I think that we don’t really talk about it as much as the other three. We also had to read the short story Hills Like White Elephants by Ernest Hemingway. When I read it for the first time I did not understand what it was talking about at all. Then in class the teacher told us that it was about abortion but I still did not see how the story was about that. But when we were doing some group work over the story, I reread some parts of the story and started to understand how it talked about abortion. I was sort of relived when the teacher told us that we would have vocabulary lists less frequently. I don’t have good study habits so I kept on doing badly on the vocabulary quizzes. Now I will have some more time to study the words and get a better grade on the quizzes.

Lesson and She Went

This week we read How Far She Went by Mary Hood and we also read The Lesson by Toni Cade Bambara. When I was reading How Far She Went I got a little sad when I read the part where the grandmother had to kill the dog so that they would not be found. I think that the granddaughter should have thought more about what she was doing when she decided to get involved with the bikers. In The Lesson I think that the way that Miss Moore taught the kids a lesson about life was unique.  I found the things that some of the kids said to be interesting. One of the things that the kids said that was interesting was when they were talking about the sailboat. They talked about how it cost one thousand one hundred ninety-five dollars and then they talked about the sailboats that they had. We also read a section about characterization and a section about theme. I can usually only get the generic theme of the story. I cannot find the deeper meaning in the story, so I have trouble when I am asked to explain the theme. We also got a new vocabulary list that I need to study.

Plot and The Destructors

This week we read the short story The Destructors by Graham Greene. We also had to read a section about plot and structure and then take some notes on it. I am not a very good note taker so I was starting to get a little worried over not getting the important information out of the section. Thankfully we were given a sheet of paper that helped me organize and overall take good notes. In The Destructors I did not really like the gang of boys because they made Old Misery’s house fall. Old Misery did not really do anything bad to the boys for them to have a reason to take down his house. Trevor was the one that came up with the plan to make Old Misery’s house fall so I liked him even less than the boys that followed his orders. Another thing that we did this week was we got our second vocabulary list. Our quiz is next week and since I did not do so well on the first one I think that I should try to actually study the words this time. I am going to study because I want to get a good grade this time. This vocabulary list seems a little harder than the first one so I might need to study the words a little each day.

Second Week

This week in class we talked about the two short stories that we read. The first was The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell and the second was The Child by Tiger by Thomas Wolfe. I thought that the first short story was interesting and I enjoyed reading it. I liked how it used suspense to keep you wanting to read more. I also liked the ending because it implies that Rainsford beat General Zaroff without telling you the exact details of the fight. It is a story that makes you think that if hunting animals for fun is right since to General Zaroff hunting humans was the best kind of sport. I thought that the second short story was a little weird and kind of disturbing.  One part when it was weird was when Dick Prosser was running away from the police and he was shooting the people that he passed by. The disturbing part was when the people caught up to him and filled his body with bullets. After they did that they hung his body up for everyone to see. I did not really enjoy this short story very much. I am nervous about the vocabulary quiz that we have because I am not a very good speller.

Week One

This week I read about commercial fiction and literary fiction. I learned that commercial fiction is mainly used to make money and to help people relieve some of their stress. Commercial fiction helps people to forget about their problems for a while. Commercial fiction is written so that the reader can enjoy it. Literary fiction is used so that the writer makes the reader more aware of the world around them. Literary fiction is written so that the reader enjoys it and also so that the reader takes away an understanding of what it talks about in the book. I personally like to read books that lean more to the commercial side but sometimes I read books that lean more to the literary side. This summer I had to read two books for my English class and I read The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay and I also read American Gods. I think that both of these books lean more to the literary side but I still enjoyed reading them. This week we were to read The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell. I think that this short story is more of a literary fiction than a commercial fiction.