Hello! For my new post, I am continuing to read “The Sun Also Rises.” The author, Ernest Hemingway, is who I am studying for my author study for the semester. In the last post, I praised him highly for his character sketch. After continuing to read further, I noticed the sexism in his characters, or maybe through his own thoughts. Either he was sexist or he created his own characters to have sexists thoughts, particularly the narrator. I know that sexism was very normal in the time period it was written during as well as the time period it portrays in the book. However, I cannot help but notice that maybe Hemingway is expressing his thoughts through the narrator.

Excerpt (pg 14) to show subtle sexism within the text:

“She went by once more and I caught her eye, and she came over and sat down at the table. The waiter came up.

‘Well, what will you drink?’ I asked.

‘Pernod.’

‘That’s not good for little girls.’

‘Little girl yourself. Dites garcon, un pernod.’

‘A pernod for me, too.’ ”

While the narrator is gender stereotyping, I do appreciate Hemingway creating this fiesty confident young woman who doesn’t back down when told that specific drink is not for her, because she is a “her.” This will be something I will watch for during my author study to find out more about him because even though he is considered a genius for literature, he may not be a genius in gender stereotypes and how to avoid sounding sexist.

In the same part of the book, Hemingway demonstrated his magnificent powers of sensory detail. I had no idea what Pernod was and this simple description was so useful and I felt like I could smell it and see it while reading.

Excerpt (pg: 15) to show sensory detail:

“Pernod is greenish imitation absinthe. When you add water it turns milky. It tastes like licorice and it has a good uplift, but it drops you just as far.”

I also loved how he incorporated the “uplift” in contrast with the “drop(ping)” of spirits. While seriously describing a drink, it is hilarious that he was able to get a little sarcastic bit in there. I will also be watching for more sarcasm as I continue to read.

The Sun Also Rises (1)

The Sun Also Rises (1)

I recently started The Sun Also Rises (TSAR). The author is Ernest Hemingway, the author I am researching for my author study. Since I have already researched the author a bit, I was interested to see if this book would live up to the hefty praise Hemingway has received. I only read the first chapter and was very impressed. In the past month, I have not read a book of substance. I have been reading teen fiction by authors who have not even graduated college yet. Delving into this book was a huge change for me.

This first chapter is basically a character sketch of Robert Cohn. This sketch is given by a close friend of his whom Cohn knows from tennis. The sketch begins with declaring that Cohn was “middleweight boxing champion of Princeton.” In the style of Hemingway, that declaration did not impress me. But what did impress me was that the author knew that describing Cohn in the same manner that he himself would, reveals a lot about his character. The fact that Cohn would tell people about this title shows that this means something to him. It shows it means that he can stand up for himself and that no one will mess with him because of his Jewish background. Since this means so much to him, we can assume there is some history of being picked on or hurt because of his religion. The narrator continues to describe Cohn as coming from a combination of the richest and oldest families in New York. The way the distinction is made in the book reminds me of a comparison between old money and new money in “The Great Gatsby.”

Hemingway surprised me on the second page. His narrator had talked all about Cohn being a middleweight boxing champion for two pages and then all the sudden he writes, “He… was married by the first girl who was nice to him.” He then goes on to talk a little bit about the marriage but the story isn’t nearly as detailed as the boxing story. This is surprising because I would have thought Hemingway would have dragged out the details of the wedding and how they met. Maybe Hemingway was trying to show that the marriage did not mean as much to Cohn as being the middleweight boxing champion meant to him. Since the narrator only seems to know what Cohn has told him, I am sure he has heard many more stories about the boxing than the marriage so it is proportionately represented in the narrator’s character sketch of him.

The DUFF

The book I will be writing about is called “The DUFF.” It is written by Kody Keplinger, who is very young (in her 20’s). She actually wrote this book in her senior year of high school. Now this book is a movie that is coming out tonight (2/19). This book is not great literature, it is an easy read targeted towards young adults. This is a book I would classify as a “beach read,” something easy and quick with a lot of drama. The title itself stands for “Designated Ugly Fat Friend.” While I initially thought that was quite possibly one of the most ridiculous titles I have ever heard about, the book was super dramatic and caught my attention. I started reading it this morning and finished about an hour ago.

The plot moves very quickly and jumps around in terms of timing. The book’s plot is about a girl named Bianca who is told she is a DUFF by a boy in her class, Wesley. Bianca is a super relatable self conscious teenage girl, which is why I think Keplinger chose her as the protagonist. She takes this label very seriously and begins to question herself and her status amongst her friends. The label of being a “DUFF” means you are the one least likely to be noticed in your friend group and it means you make your friends look better when they are with you. This is a very rude term, in my opinion, and she is very hurt by it but keeps all of her anger within herself and starts to push her friends away.

Towards the end of the book, of course there is a love triangle (there is one in almost every YA book ever!). Bianca starts to fall in love with Wesley, the boy who is all wrong for her. On the other hand, there is another “perfect” boy, Toby, who likes her. While this sounds so silly and not worthy of writing about, this is the part of the book where Keplinger shows signs of literary genius. Kody Keplinger decided to create a parallel between the characters in Wuthering Heights and her own fictitious characters. She compares Catherine’s choice between Heathcliff (Wesley) and Edgar (Toby). In the end, unlike Catherine, Bianca chooses Heathcliff.

In this entire book, this parallel of characters was the only part I think that stood out in terms of great writing. However simple and cliche the book seemed, it kept me entertained throughout and I enjoyed it.

Funny In Farsi (Part 2)

I have been continuing my book, Funny in Farsi, by Firoozeh Dumas. It is just so funny and humorous that I find myself laughing out loud while reading. The narrator of the book is the author and so she is very believable and realistic, because she actually exists. She is so relatable and recounts her adolescent years perfectly. I completely understand her because of the beautiful way she has portrayed herself inside this book. She uses her previous interactions with others to help us understand more about her as a person. Many people say you can tell so much about a person by how they talk and act around different people. I completely agree with this statement, especially using this book as an example. Instead of telling us the characteristic of her in the book, she shows us through the way she handles different situations.

I love this book also because it is made of tons and tons of flashbacks of some of her most memorable moments. These flashbacks also tell a lot about Iranian and Middle Eastern culture which is what I hope to study next year. Below is an excerpt showing culture:

“For my American friends, “a visiting relative” meant a three-night stay. In my family, relatives’ stays were marked by seasons, not nights. No one bothered coming halfway around the world for just the month of December. Might as well stay to stay to experience spring in California, the children’s graduation ceremonies in June, and Halloween. It didn't matter that our house was barely big enough for us. My father’s motto has always been “Room in the heart, room in the house.”” (pg 24)

As you can see demonstrated in the excerpt, Ms. Dumas educates about Iranian culture while at the same time using humor. This is why I was so drawn to the book after just a few pages. This paragraph made me think of a time when I was studying abroad in the Middle East and my friends and I received an invitation to stay at a random family’s house whom we had just met that day. It was a bit strange for us to receive that invitation because that was not common in any of our cultures. However, this welcoming attitude is a large part of Middle Eastern culture and so I can relate to the book in that way.

I would highly recommend this book, even though I am not finished yet. I hope to finish by next week.

Funny in Farsi

     I started this book a few weeks ago and I love it so much! It so informational and educational but makes me laugh out loud. I started reading it because I am very interested in Middle Eastern culture and it was recommended to me. This real life story about a young iranian girl's transition in American. Her name is Firoozeh Dumas and she wrote this comedic novel about her childhood. She came to America when she was 7, with her parents. Her mother did not know any English upon arriving and her father spoke "a version of English not yet shared with the rest of America" (8) than other people did so they did not always understand him. Firoozeh learned English quickly and soon her mother was taking her everywhere to be the translator.

funny excerpt:

     "Asking my father to ask the waitress the definition of "sloppy Joe" or "Tater Tots" was no problem. His translations, however, were highly suspect. Waitresses would spend several minutes responding to my father's questions, and these responses, in turn, would be translated as "She doesn't know." (9)

     I think the entire book is a message. She moved to the United States before 9/11 and she watched as her situation began to change and acceptance of her background and heritage changed. I think she wrote this book as a funny read to lighten up the mood because there are many underlying meanings. She laughs about it now but moving when you are very young is incredibly scary and all of our traditions seemed very strange. The adjustment must have also took some time. This book was written in 2003, just two years after 9/11. I think she was desperately trying to send the message that she and her family are normal humans and are not terrorists because after 9/11, people were very paranoid and scared and took those emotions out on people of Middle Eastern background, including Iranians. In the book there is also much to learn about culture. For example, she explains in an amusing manner to an amusement park worker that not all Middle Eastern people speak the same language and they are not all alike. She breaks down many stereotypes that are not as obvious as the fact I just mentioned. 

     Throughout her book I think her purpose is to spread knowledge and humor on her situation and humanize and Americanize herself, her family, and immigrants in general. 

I finished Kite Runner this week and highly recommend it!
I have recently started a new book. It is called "the Memory Keeper's Daughter" by Kim Edwards. I chose this book off the shelf partially because of the creative cover (yes I judged a book by its cover...)

I am only on the first chapter but already I can tell a lot about the author. Edwards uses a very descriptive style. She puts you right in the room when the babies are born and describes the emotions and the atmosphere perfectly. The first 3 paragraphs establishes the setting and a little bit of background about the characters in this novel. Below are the first few lines which give insight into her descriptive style:

"Th snow started to fall several hours before her labor began. A few flakes first, in the dull gray late-afternoon sky, and then wind-driven swirls and eddies around the edges of their wide front porch. He stood by her side at the window, watching sharp gusts of snow billow, then swirl and drift to the ground. All around the neighborhood, lights came on, and the naked branches of the trees turned white."

I love this introduction because I could picture this happening, vividly, in my imagination. I also love how she makes everything seem calm and perfect, just before the stressful labor, without a doctor, begins. I also love how the author is "all-knowing" about the characters. The fact that she knows so much about the characters helps us understand them and gives them a realness that would not be as clear otherwise.
In this first chapter, I start off very impressed at how well everything is going, despite the hectic surroundings of the babies being born. Everything is going perfectly and then the father of the two children realizes that his daughter has down syndrome. He sends her off with the nurse who helped deliver her and tells her to put his daughter in an institution. He then lies to his wife and tells her that the second child died as she was born. This part made me very upset and also made me more interested in the book. I'm looking forward to reading!

     For my short story group, we read victory lap. This was one of the coolest pieces of writing i have read in a while. There is no dialogue in quotations, or in the story anywhere. I think there might be some implied dialogue but in this story, telling reality from the imaginations of the three people from the story is difficult. One aspect of this story that makes it difficult to completely follow is that the entire story exists in the minds of three different people. Not only are the perspectives of the three in the form of a "stream of consciousness," they each have their own distinct styles and word choices. George Saunders really put in time in thinking about the different people. 

     In Alison's head, Saunders uses "Pas de chat," "changement," "pas de bourree." These are all words that a dancer would use as they are thinking about an upcoming dance performance or dance class and trying to remember their dance. She is a dancer and so Saunders recognized that putting in these words enhances the uniqueness of Alison. 

     The next character that we are inside the mind of is Kyle. Saunders again uses word choice to let us know more and more about this character. Kyle thinks faster and and he asks himself lots of rhetorical questions. "What is?" Why? Who?" Kyle also hears his parents reprimanding voices in his head. His parents are overbearing and so now when he knows he is doing something wrong, he hears his mom or dads voice in his head. This is shown in the excerpt below.

     EXCERPT:

     "Swearing in your head? Dad said in his head. Step up, Scout, be a man. If you want to swear, swear    

      aloud. 

      I don't want to swear aloud.

     Then don't swear in your head"

     The third person we are in the mind of is the abductor of Alison and the victim of Kyle. He uses obscenity obsessively and he has a much angrier tone. He even considers suicide to avoid jail. He has a morbid and scary stream of consciousness. Saunders developed his characters thoroughly and I hope to bring the depth of character that George Saunders uses through these three perspectives to my own short story in enhancing Betty and Earl. 

     I also read Nine Lives by Ursula K. Le Gumn. This story was the first of its kind that talked about cloning. The many many themes inside this story are crazy and mesh together so well. She really went outside the box and in my story I think I stay way to far inside my comfort zone. I want to try to create depth and write about things I do not fully understand.