How To Read Literature Like a Professor (Chapters 25-27)
Chapter 25
One of my favorite authors, Edgar Allen Poe, wrote The Black Cat in 1843. Though it is not my favorite short story from Poe it gives an easy answer to the question. The Black Cat is about a man who loves his animals yet he murders his wife and maims his beloved cat, Pluto. Towards the begining of the story Poe informs us that the man is an alcoholic. People in today's society who read this would assume that the man is acting this way because of the drinking problem; but if we were to read this when it was first published we would not focus on the drinking problem. We would say part of him was lost in the wrong he was doing and he turned evil. In the story the man abused the his wife and the animals. Reader's today would consider this type of violence unacceptable, but that was the norm before the twentith century.
Chapter 26
Irony can be found in almost any work of literature; however, a lot of irony can be seen in one of the worst movies of all time, The Village. The Village is seemingly set in the 1800s in a town where people are forced to never leave due to the terrifying creatures that dwell inthesurrounding forest. The protagonists are a young blind girl named Ivy and her husband Luscious. Shortly after their marriage Luscious iss stabbed by a man with mental problems and needs out of town medicine to survive. After the elders ease Ivy's fears by revealing that the creatures are only townspeople in costume, she heads on her quest.This is ironic because the monsters were supposed to be the enemy and dangerous, when in reality they were just ordinary people in costumes. When the blind Ivy miraculously makes it to the new town you discover that the movie is actually set in modern times and the village was formed by luddite elders. Which is ironic because throughout the entire movie one is lead to believe that they reside in an underdevloped world.
Chapter 27
Just to be clear the directions were followed 100%.
Mansfield is using this story, The Garden Party, to allow the reader see the gap between social classes and how they percieve each other. Mansfield, in many different ways signifies this; one example being that she describes vividly how the upper class Sheridan's feel about the lower class town which ironically lies below them. Laura, who in the story is a child, is curious about the lower class and wants to interract with them, unlike her uptight mother who wants nothing to do with them and isolates herself within the house, leaving Laura and her siblings to plan the party. Then you have the hat. The hat signifies Laura and her mother's relationship. Like I stated before Laura and her mother have different views towards the poverty striken people below them. As Laura warms up to the hat she becomes more like her mother, feeling less sympathetic towards the lower class. When Laura brings her gift to the grief striken wife and see the dead body lying before her she even apologizes for the hat showing she was wrong for feeling better than them.
My observations we not as well thought out as those of Diane, but I got the gist of it. I wasn't as thorough as the author, but I'm also notas expiriences either. Using only my exprience with this book I believe I did a top-notch job describing the story, which was a magnificant way to describe social classes.
The essay the followed the story adds a more understanding view of the story. The tale of Persephone is on of my favorite Greek tales I've heard about in my high school years. I would have never thought to relate the two stories together as Foster did. Foster has a way of making the most difficult concepts to understandable. I enjoyed Mansfield's story much before I read Foster's interpetation, but after reading I appreciate it so much more, and understand it better.