Category: Schacht Fall 2018

One of the things I kept focusing on when reading Mrs. Dalloway was flowers. The first mention of flowers is in the first sentence. “Mrs Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself” (3). As we discussed in class this sentence is open to interpretation, but from the very beginning I started noticing mentions of flowers. In fact there are thirty-three mentions of flowers in the book! That is a lot!

There are several characters that flowers Clarissa Dalloway, Moll Pratt, Aunt Helena,  Richard Dalloway, and I mean there is a character named Daisy. So flowers are mentioned a lot in the book, and relate to several characters. I want to focus on flowers meaning for Richard and Clarissa Dalloway.

Traditionally flowers are a traditional symbol of love and femininity. Richard goes and buys Clarissa roses when he wants to say he loves her. To him flowers are his way of showing love. Yet for Clarissa flowers also represent the joy and beauty in everyday life. Clarissa loves looking out the window and seeing the flowers. She takes pleasure seeing all of nature. “Looking at the flowers, at the trees with the smoke winding… (3)”, she just enjoys seeing nature.

So when Richard gives Clarissa the roses, although he is too nervous to say that he loves her he feels that she understands that the roses symbol his love for her. Clarissa thinks that, “he stood for a moment as if he were about to say something; and she wondered what? Why? They were roses. (181)”. I do not think Clarissa understands that for him the roses symbol that he loves her, because to her they also represent beauty.

Clarissa hosting a party misinterprets Richard’s love gesture as a kind gesture to help beautify her party. Richard does not say he loves her so therefore Clarissa does not know, because she views flowers as more than just a symbol for love.

I find it so interesting when different people have different meanings for things. It happens all the time. People misinterpret what other people mean when they say things all the time, so therefore it only makes sense that Clarissa can not understand what Richard means by the flowers. Language both spoken and implied can be so difficult to understand because of how easily interpretations vary. This is part of the reason it is so interesting to me to try and understand.

As you know in English class we are reading Mrs. Dalloway. When we were discussing it in class we talked about how Mrs. Dalloway has a unique point of view where we get the perspective of multiple different characters in one book. Being completely honest, I got very confused at multiple points throughout the book because of this unique point of view.

Upon further consideration though, I decided to write a blog post on point of view. Each author chooses their point of view for a reason, and I wanted to research more about third person omniscient narrators (this is the point of view that Mrs. Dalloway has).

I found an interesting article on the three main points of view. The three main points of view are first person singular, third person limited, and third person omniscient. This article gives a great description of all three points of view, but for this blog post I am just going to focus on the third person omniscient point of view.

Third person omniscient point of view has an all-knowing narrator. “You have the storytelling powers of a god. You’re able to go anywhere and dip into anyone’s consciousness.” When you think about novels that these narrators are found in they tend to have a large cast of characters. I think that having a lot of characters makes it useful for a third person omniscient narrator. If you have an all knowing narrator you are able to know what is going on inside other people’s thoughts for the entire novel instead of focusing on one character.

I am surprised that this article says this is one of the most common types of point of view because I cannot recall reading a novel with this point of view until I read Mrs. Dalloway. I have read books that switch narrators, but this is such an interesting concept of knowing everything about all people all the time. Hearing it described as godlike in the article I found made me think about how godlike it is. I believe in a god that know everything about everyone just like an author ought to know everything about his work. This omniscient point of view is confusing to me because it is something I am unused to, and not something as a human I am able to do. I am not able to know everything about everyone, but when we consider the narrator as a godlike figure it makes since for the narrator to know everything about everyone.

Reading Mrs. Dalloway made me very curious about this third person omniscient point of view. An outsider that looks in and knows everything would have to be some sort of a god figure, and this is fascinating to think about. I hope to someday read more books with this point of view to learn more about this omniscient view.

Time is such an interesting concept to me. It is defined as “the indefinite continued progress of existence and events that occur in apparently irreversible succession from the past through the present to the future.” We use time as a measurement for our seconds, minutes, hours, days, months, years, and ultimately our lives. Einstein published his Theory of Relativity which states that time is an integral part of the fabric of our universe. St. Augustine in his Confessions, wrote that God made time and it therefore exists outside of human understanding. Some people argue that time is a social construct and doesn’t truly exist. However you choose to interpret time though, one thing is certain: you can’t go back in time.

One of my absolute favorite poems (one I encourage you all to read in full), “Ode to Broken Things” by Pablo Neruda, discusses the finitude of life and how the passage of time destroys all things. He says

And that clock
whose sound
was
the voice of our lives,
the secret
thread of our weeks,
which released
one by one, so many hours
for honey and silence
for so many births and jobs,
that clock also
fell
and its delicate blue guts
vibrated
among the broken glass
its wide heart
unsprung.

This passage really makes you think about how much time really rules one’s life. We wake up to a clock, go about our day on a scheduled time, and eventually die when our time is up. He goes on to say, “Life goes on grinding up glass…” to show that no matter what, life continues on. We cannot go back. The rest of the poem expresses the hope that all of the broken things mentioned in the poem (including our lives) can somehow fit back together.

This reminded me of Henry David Thoreau’s comparison of time to a stream in Walden, “Where I Lived and What I Lived For.” He says,”Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in. I drink at it; but while I drink I see the sandy bottom and detect how shallow it is. Its thin current slides away, but eternity remains. I would drink deeper; fish in the sky, whose bottom is pebbly with stars.”

The more you drink the water, the more you see how shallow the stream is. The more time passes, the more you see how little their really is. I feel as though Thoreau is telling us to make our lives as meaningful as possible because our time is limited.

Both Neruda and Thoreau really hit home with the advice to live while you can because time is short. We cannot live our lives focusing on what is ahead, and should focus on the now. This is what it means to be truly alive–time permitting of course.

 

 

In anthropology we were discussing how when people move to a different country they  eventually assimilate into the country. This process may take several generations but it will happen as time goes on. As we were talking in class, my anthropology professor commented on something that I found interesting. He said, “When people assimilate they lose a part of their identity”.

In light of this idea of losing your identity it made me think back to our English class and how we talked about what is our identity. I started questioning what defines our identity. Is our identity more than just how we feel?

I have pondered this question since Monday trying to figure out how to put my answer in words, and this is what I have come up with through thinking about my anthropology discussion and our English discussion.

Yes, our identity is more than just how we feel. Our identity is composed of at least these three things: who we are, where we come from, and our future goals. Allow me to illustrate these things with my example.

Who we are: My name is Alexandra Welker. I am eighteen years old. I am a college freshman at SUNY Geneseo majoring in elementary and special education. I graduated high school from Lima Christian School, and I have five younger brothers.

This is in fact the quickest way to define me.  If we were playing an icebreaker game this would be how I would introduce myself. Yes, it is who I am, but it doesn’t explain more than the basic things about me. I am simply stating facts. If I were to introduce myself to you this way you know of me, but I would not say you know me.

Where we come from: I live in Greece, New York, and attend Webster Bible Church. I was very involved in that church right up until I went to college. I constantly volunteered in the kids church (even when it wasn’t a Sunday), and I lead a small group of high school girls Bible study. I went to Webster Christian School until it closed. Then in my junior year I transferred to Lima Christian School where I graduated from. I played piano and sang when I was younger. I really enjoy acting and have been an actor in three school plays as well as a bunch of elementary school skits.

When I say where I come from I don’t just mean the basic “Oh I lived in Greece”. Though that is a part it goes further than that. When I am telling someone where I come from I tell them about some likes I have and important things that have shaped me. This is a part of my identity that is more complicated than my name. It is a part that will change throughout my life as I continue to grow older and have things change in my life.

My future goals: I am going to be an elementary teacher. I have wanted to be a teacher since I was young and can’t wait for that to happen. Due to the fact that I took several AP and dual enrollment courses I hope to possibly graduate college a semester early. I hope to work at Camp Bay View again this summer. As I am here at college I want to become actively involved in a church here and hope to remain involved in a church all my life.

Some people might not consider future goals as part of their identity, but I do if I didn’t have future goals where would my life be. I am not just a name, I am a unique individual with my own identity. My future goals help show that I am unique and not the same as everyone else

When you assimilate into a culture, as I learned about in anthropology you become just like everyone else. Although a part of you will always be different because of your history. You lose a part of your identity by following another people groups customs instead of your own, yet you gain a different part of your identity.  When you look at where you come from to where you are you gain more future goals because you have seen the challenges that came from entering a new country. That my friends could be worth why your identity is changing.

In class, we discussed the poem “The Jabberwocky” which appears in Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass and reads as follows:

     ‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
      Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
     All mimsy were the borogoves,
      And the mome raths outgrabe.

     ‘Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
      The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
     Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
      The frumious Bandersnatch!’

     He took his vorpal sword in hand:
      Long time the manxome foe he sought—
     So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
      And stood awhile in thought.

     And as in uffish thought he stood,
      The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
     Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
      And burbled as it came!

     One, two! One, two! And through and through
      The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
     He left it dead, and with its head
      He went galumphing back.

     ‘And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
      Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
     O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!’
      He chortled in his joy.

     ‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
      Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
     All mimsy were the borogoves,
      And the mome raths outgrabe.

Although this nonsense poem includes made up words describing a made up creature, we as readers can still understand the poem because it follows the syntax of English with all of it’s wonderful conventions.

Furthermore, some of the nonsense words like “chortle” and “galumph” were were made up by Carroll, yet have entered the English language. I find that unbelievably interesting. This got me to think about lots of other words coined by famous writers and I was reminded about a conversation I had in my high school English class about Shakespeare.

We read the play Hamlet where many new phrases like “the clothes make the man” and “cruel to be kind” come from. In order to fit a certain style of writing, Shakespeare played with words, often time inventing ones of his own. In this way, we have an extended vocabulary and cool phrases to use. It’s so weird to think about words and our everyday language–and where they come from. I love words!