World lit exam 3

An unwritten novel compare to other texts

*A thousand and one nights: stories of commoners told and created by a woman/commoner, common girl more significant than the king, story created through imagination focus on every day versus world war or king killings Montaigne: take innocent and acts and make them dark - perspective, Gilgamesh: collective memory and history of town v Woolf story is individualistic, high stakes story of leader v story of commoner

Things fall apart relate to other texts

*Montaigne: missionaries/Europe misguided view of barbarian foreigners, laugh at Stick gods but have statues, want to change them to fit own culture, lost in translation missionaries use interpreter Gilgamesh: Ok need to prove self, mistreat women, power as fulfillment, *Hamlet: daddy issues, motivates actions, cause downfall, mistreat women *A thousand and one nights: treatment of women, story telling of women to kids to teach them something and entertain like teach king, women seen as less superior yet healing/motherly despite main males view and disgust by them (rep weakness) in Ok when things are tough seek mom/motherland for support

The Garden of Forking Paths relate to other texts

*Montaigne: preface novel as his own writing written for himself and fiends, very honest and humble gives credibility, Borges preface that it is testimony, he is honest, lack credibility plus main character acknowledge self weakness Gilgamesh or Faust - need to prove self as justification for doing bad things, lead to danger, almost like he has to do it like Faust willingly pairing w devil, coward Chuang Chou - perspective, butterfly example, paths in garden, fate, everything connected, looping

"There was a pattern to his circus. As he spoke his aides threw clusters of paper birds into the air and the artificial creatures took on life, flew about the platform of planks, and went out to sea."

- Death Constant Beyond Love by Marquez - What happens during Sanchez's speech - This is getting bizarre, yet the situation is shockingly familiar... although paper birds coming to life is unrealistic, elections are all about decor - Magic realism Speak on circus politics have become

Without seeing her, I knew what she was doing. I knew that she was sitting in front of the mirror again, seeing my back, which had had time to reach the depths of the mirror and be caught by her look, which had also had just enough time to reach the depths and return- before the hand had time to start the second turn- until her lips were anointed now with crimson, from the first turn of her hand in front of the mirror."

- Eyes of a Blue Dog by Marquez - Describing how he sees the woman - Creating an impossible image of seeing things out the back of his head... yet his description is very concrete - There's nothing particularly magical, but we know he isn't actually seeing things out of the back of his head This image is very normal and concrete yet is seems bizarre because it is so focused on perspective This is how he sees this mysterious woman This is a very male perspective as well as he is watching this woman - parallels the influence he had in his life (reality from his grandfather but daily interactions with this grandmother)

"'Sometimes I think I'm made of Metal' "Sometimes, in other dreams, I've thought you were only a little bronze statue in the corner of some museum. Maybe that's why you're cold."

- Eyes of a Blue Dog by Marquez - The woman says this while she is standing undressed in front of the man - We now realize it's a dream and he has transformed her into something else - She's saying that she is nothing more than what he sees in the mirror - He can imagine her a something artistic and beautiful as in a museum but physically cold and even emotionally cold - playing with possible realities

"'You're the only many who doesn't remember anything of what he's dreamed after he wakes up."

- Last line in Eyes of a Blue Dog by Marquez - Woman talking to the man in his dream - The story has a hallucinatory feel Characters in dreams must stay in dreams - their rules to the magical world

"Dazed with fear, ____ drew his machete and cut him down. He was afraid of being weak."

- Okonkwo does nothing to protect his son, and the killing violates his responsibility as a father - At this moment, Okonkwo does something out of fear and will pay for it later - Fear of looking weak drives all of Okonkwo's actions

"On page 22 of Liddell Hart's "History of World War I" you will read that an attack against Serre-Montaiban line by thirteen British divisions (supported by 1,400 artillery pieces), planned for the 24th of July, 2916, had to be postponed until the morning of the 29th. The torrential rains, Captain Liddell Hart comments, caused this delay, an insignificant one, to be sure."

- Opening of The Garden of Forking Paths by Borges - Borges is referring to a real book that recounts the war.... but it says nothing about who died, just gives the # of guns - Reducing people to the role they played in war & Borges believes this is an insufficient way to recount history - How do we remember events? Strategic or human level? Most books recount events strategically, but Borges takes a different perspective

"My sole consolation when I went upstairs for the night was that Mamma would come in and kiss me after I was in bed."

- Proust, Remembrance of Things Past - Exemplifies how desire functions... we want what we cannot have Mom leaving after kiss is painful (desperate and dependent) Desire what we do not have Internalize it and the memory

"Someone had indeed had the happy idea of giving me, to distract me on evening when I seemed abnormally wretched, a magic lantern

- Proust, Remembrance of Things Past - Marcel talking about the magical lantern he would play with as a child - The machine is used to make cuts between different worlds... imagines his own mind functioning as a magic lantern - He struggles to separate his memories in the past Deep how imagination and memory work together

"But when from a long-distant past nothing subsists, after the people are dead, after the things are broken and scattered, taste and smell alone, more fragile but more enduring, more substantial, more persistent, more faithful, remain poised a long time, like souls, remembering, waiting, hoping, amid the ruins of all the rest; and bear unflinchingly, in the tiny and almost impalpable drop of their essence, the vast structure of recollection."

- Remembrance of Things Past (Proust) - Marcel after eating the Madeline and remembering Combray - Memories are like souls waiting to cross the river into death - When he tries to remember, he utterly fails - Memory is strongly connected to what we taste and smell - Something unexpected gave him a taste of his past Marcel is talking about the effect the Madeleine has for him Sense of smell and taste can bring back some of the strongest memories even though they seem extremely insignificant Memory is fleeting

"And so it was that, for a long time afterwards, when I lay awake at night and revived old memories of Combray, I saw no more of it than this sort of luminous panel, sharply defined against a vague and shadowy background..."

- Remembrance of Things Past (Proust) - Marcel reflecting about his inability to remember his past at Combray at the end of the story - Fleeting nature of memories More you try to remember (voluntary) more you can't Did he create the memories?

Here, then, is the explanation of the novel's contradictions. Fang, let us say, has a secret; a stranger calls at his door; Fang resolves to kill him. Naturally, there are several possible outcomes: Fang can kill the intruder, the intruder can kill Fang, they both can escape, they both can die, and so forth.

- The Garden of Forking Paths (Borges) - Albert explaining the garden of forking paths to Yu Tsun - Only when you step in the future does it become concrete, otherwise in the moment it is abstract and there are infinite potential outcomes

"Before unearthing this letter, I had questioned myself about the ways in which a book can be infinite. I could think of nothing other than a cyclic volume, a circular one. A book whose last page was identical with the first, a book which had the possibility of continuing indefinitely."

- The Garden of Forking Paths (Borges) - Albert to Yu Tsun - The book forks itself- can read it again and again (Ts'ui Pen created a book that combined a book and a labyrinth) - All locations have the potential to continue forever

"I am a cowardly man. I say it now, now that I have carried to its end a plan whose perilous nature no one can deny."

- The Garden of Forking Paths (Borges) - At the beginning of the deposition, Yu Tsun discusses why he carried out the mission - He really has no reason other than he is a coward - He was so focused on succeeding and proving his worth to his boss that he ignores the value of human life - There is no room for heroism in this global conflict - Sense of being lost

"From this broken state I passed into an almost abject felicity. I told myself that the duel had already begun and that I had won the first encounter by frustrating, even if for forty minutes, even if by a stroke of fare, the attack of my adversary. I argued (no less fallaciously) that my cowardly felicity proved that I was a man capable of carrying out the adventure successfully."

- The Garden of Forking Paths (Borges) - Yu Tsun is being tailed, but was able to get rid of him - Sign of luck... maybe he'll be able to succeed - Sudden intense miserable joy... he becomes more confident in himself - Trying to gather enough courage to continue his mission (self-doubt of his worth) nature of character

"The future already exists," I replied, "but I am your friend. Could I see the letter again?"

- The Garden of Forking Paths (Borges) - Yu Tsun right before he kills Albert - Tsun justifies that the future already exists so his decision has been made for him - Does he make a decision to shoot him or did the future already decide for him? Theme of fate

"That was many years ago, 20 years of more, and during this time _____'s fame had grown like a bush-fire in the harmattan."

- Things Fall Apart (Achebe) - Achebe transforms the english style... puts his own twist - Okonkwo is a born leader - Foreshadowing... a figurative fire is about to take over Nigeria

"At first Ikemefuna was very much afraid. Once or twice he tried to run away, but he did not know where to begin. He thought of his mother and his three-year-old sister and wept bitterly. Nwoye's mother was very kind to him and treated him as one of her own children."

- Things Fall Apart (Achebe) - Ikemefuna is still a child and does not understand why he is being forced to live here - Painful image of a young boy stripped away from his family - Despite trying to run away, Ikemeuna eventually grows part of Okonkwo's family (even calls Okonkwo his father), thus demonstrating the adaptability of people - The women in this story are nurturing... although they do not have social or economic power they are the emotional backbone of households Boy used as human treaty to make peace through a human connection - taking in the enemy

"Although he felt uneasy at first, he was not afraid now... He could hardly imagine that _____ was not his real father."

- Things Fall Apart (Achebe) - Ikemefuna thinks to himself that he is not scared as he is on his way to be killed - Feeling the support of a father can make you confident and fearless this is support that Ok never had which is ironic because Ok will let down IK just like his dad ... breaks to stream of conscious bc emotfion and almost perspective of boy No way of getting the past back

"In a flash ____ drew his machete. The messenger crouched to avoid the blow. It was useless. Okonkwo's machete descended twice and the man's head lay besides his uniformed body."

- Things Fall Apart (Achebe) - Okonkwo kills the messenger when the messenger tries to stop a meeting the villagers are having about the British - This is a crime which is out of the hands of the clan because this man belongs to the British - Okonkwo knows he is not supposed to harm the messenger, but he doesn't care - The "uniformed body" represents the British colonizing author... Okonkwo has killed something that will have a big impact - Huge mistake that will put the rest of the community at risk Parallels IK's death - rash and need to prove self

"Okonkwo was well known throughout the nine villages and even beyond. His fame rested on solid personal achievements. As a young man of eighteen he had brought honor to his village by throwing Amalinze the Cat."

- Things Fall Apart (Achebe) - Opening of the story... normal and clear english journalistic style Speak on culture that honor equals success Success based on merit Compare people to animals style

"The only course open to ______ was to flee from the clan. It was crime against the earth goddess to kill a clansman, and a man who committed it must flee from the land. The crime was of two kids, male and female. He had committed the female, because it had been inadvertent. He could return to the clan after 7 years."

- Things Fall Apart (Achebe) - The narrator discussing Okonkwo's options after his gun explodes and kills the 16-year-old boy - Intentional crime= male - Accidental= female - The lesser crime is considered female... AKA women's actions are considered as lesser Female viewed as more innocent plus punished less harshly

"She had suffered a good deal in her life. She had borne ten children and nine of them had died in infancy, usually before the age of three...The naming ceremony after seven market weeks became an empty ritual. Her deepening despair found expression in the names she gave her children...

- Things Fall Apart (Achebe) - The narrator telling the story of Ewkefi's 9 miscarriages after we learn that her only daughter is sick and she is worried she might die - Ekwefi used language as a way of resisting the death of her children because she knows she is powerless in this situation and cannot prevent the deaths - Women know how to imagine things and use words and language - Names in this story mean something - Women are extremely strong and defiant despite their struggles

"When Unoka died he had taken no title at all and he was heavily in debt. Any wonder then that his son Okonkwo was ashamed of him? Fortunately, among these people was a man judged according to his worth and not according to the worth of his father."

- Things Fall Apart (Achebe) - The villages are superior to the Europeans... it doesn't matter who your father is - Perhaps Nigerian culture is superior to the English Society based on merit Explain masculinity issues shame as source of behavior

It was one of those gay and rollicking tunes of evangelism which had the power of plucking at silent and dusty chords in the heart of an Ibo man."

- Things Fall Apart (Achebe) - This is said after the missionaries arrived - At first, the missionaries are not convincing at all, however, the music has an effect that other means do not - Song and music is a universal language Change as threatening and real - foreshadow

"Okonkwo ruled his household with a heavy hand. His wives, especially the youngest, lived in perpetual fear of his fiery temper, and so did his little children. Perhaps down in his heart Okonkwo was not a cruel man. But his whole life was dominated by fear of failure and of weakness."

- Things Fall Apart (Achebe) - Troubling portrait of Okonkwo because his own family fears him - Why does Okonkwo do bad things? Fear of failure or being weak - He is terrified of being unsuccessful

"And so the neighboring clans who naturally knew of these things feared Umuofia, and would not go to war against it without first trying to be peaceful."

- Things Fall Apart (Achebe) - When 2 villages have conflict, they don't immediately jump into war - The villages understand and respect one another (less barbaric than Europeans)

"The enomous stability of the fabric; the spine tough as whalebone, straight as oaktree; the ribs radiating branches; the flesh taut tarpaulin; the red hollows; the suck and regurgitation of the heart; while from alive meat falls in brown cubes and beer gushes to be churned to blood again- and so we reach the eyes."

- Woolf, An Unwritten Novel - Bizzarre description of a human body - The narrator describes a human body split open on the battle field - The war was so gory that you didn't need x-ray vision to see inside someone Gory is common decencitized

"Such an expression of unhappiness was enough by itself to make one's eyes slide above the paper'd edge to the poor woman's face

- Woolf, An Unwritten Novel - The narrator at the opening of the story - People are avoiding making eye contact with one another on the train - We spend so much time commuting that we don't really know the people around us... no sense of neighborhood ... show stream of sconscious style, we don't actually finish full thoughts Author fascinated by ordinary things

She rubbed as if she would rub something out for ever- some stain, some indelible contamination."

- Woolf, An Unwritten Novel - The narrator describing the woman sitting near her on the train that is obsessively trying to clean the window (towards the beginning of the story) - While most would assume it's just some unusual quirk the woman has, the narrator concludes she's cleaning the window because just hearing the word sister-in-law irritates her - Important because she uses her imagination to take the ordinary and uninteresting and make it grand - The narrator assumes this is the woman's reaction to the word "sister-in-law" Take innocent and make it something dark

"I have my choice of crimes. In woods flit and fly- in summer there are bluebells; in the opening there, when spring comes, primroses. A parting, was it, twenty years ago? Vows broken?"

- Woolf, An Unwritten Novel - The narrator is picking what happens to these imaginary people - The thought of this woman cheating seems unimaginable - It shows how invested she is in this story and how real it feels to her

"She runs, she rushes, home she reaches, but too late. Neighbors- the doctor- baby bother- the kettle- scalded- hospital- dead- or only the shock of it, the blame?"

- Woolf, An Unwritten Novel - This is the crime the narrator makes up for this woman to have committed: she stayed out too late when she should have been home minding the family and because of this one of the children has hurt himself - The narrator can't decide if the child died or if it is just the guilt over it - The horrors of the 20th century are much more mundane, meanwhile people are out fighting in war Focus on horrors of this woman not horrors of the war

Forking paths characters

Albert Yu Tsun Captain Richard madden

Woolf, Virginia

An unwritten novel

Remembrance of things compare other texts

Chuang Chou - perception, butterfly dreams, memories are sometimes imagined and create by ourselves - our perception of them also like rose colored glasses Basho: life is fleeting and fragile like fleeting ness of memories, mansion example and trying to remember Combray memories

The Garden of Forking Paths themes

Destruction of human life, loyalty/betrayal, credibility, perspective, choices, time, reality, subjectivity, good v evil in human

Flowers of evil themes

Evil stems from boredom, loneliness, common people, hopes, dreams, death, failures, despair, women, regrets, disease, murder, escape from reality, alienation

"Queen of Spades" Themes

Games of chance, romantic fiction elements, societal rules, hierarchy, greed, freedom, guilt, manipulation

Queen of spades compare to other texts

Hamlet - obsessed man, ghost real or not real and how that drives his obsession and ultimately leads to downfall, ofelia and Lisavete as pawns in men's plans (isolated and seek connection), women not quite free bound to social rules, men are rude to women to get what they want Gilgamesh - main characters are anti heroes, fairytale like, QoS appear as hero at first and then villain v G is villain then hero A thousand and one nights: lisavete perpetuates the cold society because of social norms even though society was unkind to her. King was cheated on (lost love) so he kills women and takes love away from others. Both perpetuate wrong doings

Queen of Spades Characters

Hermann: the Russianized-German: very stereotypically Germany: very strict and borning Lisavete: The Countess' ward; she does not have a lot of control over her actions and is being brought up to find the right husband The Countess: the most powerful character of the story; she is compared to a witch however like the famous Baba Yaga St. Petersburg: a mystical and somewhat malicious city that should not exist; very strange things occur here that add to the fairy tale aspect Pushkin: the writer who did not fit in with society due to his background but became incredibly famous. He asks the question of belonging in a place

The Flowers of Evil by Charles Baudelaire comparison

Montaigne - does opener (to the reader) to preface almost like a warning, makes him more credible and it feel more intimate, auto adresses audience directly (sense of unity), shows hypocracy of society. Montaigne only travels through books like narrator travels through mind but still comment on society Woolf - authors write about the everyday common people. Woolf imagines life for person while Buadelaire turns bad into something beautiful use imagination to craft their own narratives 'an imagined state" Basho - cycles of life and death and how energy moves ex, carcass gives way to life, Basho, mansion only lasted three generations but nature lasts eternally cycles plus human v eternal cycles. Give way to new life

Remembrance of Things Past Themes

Perception, memories, imagination, love, insomnia, connection, involuntary v voluntary memory, rose colored glasses, is memory accurate or a reflection of who we are today

"These shifting and confusing gusts of memory never lasted for more than a few seconds"

Proust remembrance of things past, is memory reliable or flickering idea of voluntary or not

Proust

Remembrance of Things Past

"For a long time I used to go to bed early. Sometimes, when I had put out my candle, my eyes would close so quickly that I had not even time to say to myself: 'I'm falling asleep.' And half an hour later the thought that it was time to go to sleep would awaken me; I would make as if to put away the book which I imagined was still in my hands, and to blow out the light; I had gone on thinking, while I was asleep, about what I had just been reading, but these thoughts had taken a rather peculiar turn."

Remembrance of Things Past, Proust, opening of text, describing liminal moment of not knowing if you're asleep or awake, relatable, nothing special, how to connect with people, nothing distinctive, stuff he used to do

"Perhaps the immobility of the things that surround us is forced upon them by our conviction that they are themselves and not anything else, by the immobility of our conception of them."

Remembrance of Things Past, Proust, world is dull, static because we see it that way, mind not agile, discussion of perception aligns with Chuang Chou

An Unwritten Novel Themes

Sorrow, mystery, nature of human existence, imagination, write about common people, questions who gets to tell stories and who should stories be told about, stream of conscious, we never know the world completely

Queen of Spades (Pushkin) location

St. Petersburg. Cold individualistic society, but also a city of dreams magic and wealth where outsiders must take risks to advance and fit in. People also perpetuate the cold nature ex. Lisavete getting her own ward

Baudelaire

The Flowers of Evil

"The flies buzzed and droned on these bowels of filth Where an army of maggots arose, Which flowed like a liquid and thickening stream On the animate rags of her clothes."

The Flowers of Evil, Charles Baudelaire, "A Carcass," dead carcass in forest, decaying thing gives rise to other life, cycle between living and dead (cycles also play role in Basho), makes something tragic to be beautiful (style)

"And then, oh my beauty, explain to the worms Who cherish your body so fine, That I am the keeper for corpses of love Of the form, and the essence divine!"

The Flowers of Evil, Charles Baudelaire, "A Carcass," poem preserves dead moments, your body will produce new life in nature and in poetry, death is rejuvenation, body full of memory

"There, there is nothing else but grace and measure, Richness, quietness, and pleasure."

The Flowers of Evil, Charles Baudelaire, "Invitation to the Voyage," Paris offends them, travel through the mind (like Montaigne through books)

"My child, my sister, dream How sweet all things would seem Were we in that kind land to live together...

The Flowers of Evil, Charles Baudelaire, "Invitation to the Voyage," armchair tourism, Travel used to escape reality, dreams as a sort of vice and temporary happiness, travel mentally

"Life is a hospital where every patient is obsessed by the desire of changing beds."

The Flowers of Evil, Charles Baudelaire, "Paris Spleen," prose that works like poetry, new form, conversation with soul, all you get to do is pick a gross bed and a disease, change beds like changing country's, fresh start and escape

"If poison, arson, sex, narcotics, knives have not yet ruined us and stitched their quick, loud patterns on the canvas of our lives, it is because our souls are still too sick."

The Flowers of Evil, Charles Baudelaire, "To the Reader," idea of honesty and "us," we're not hypocrites, vices as a form of escape but also self destruction, an imagined state of happiness but not lasting and will eventually kill us

"Infatuation, sadism, lust, avarice posses our souls and drain the body's force; we spoonfeed our adorable remorse, like whores or beggars nourishing their lice."

The Flowers of Evil, Charles Baudelaire, "To the Reader," we're all terrible, France in real trouble, uses "our," not hypocritical, I vs. we, like Dante, address collective society (style) so reader becomes a character, we're all in this together and all have evil - unity

Borges

The Garden of Forking Paths

Can one really believe it...? No! Economy, moderation, and industry; these are my three winning cards, these will treble my capital, increase it sevenfold, and earn for me ease and independence!"

The Queen of Spades, Alexander Pushkin, Hermann after hearing the story of the three cards, obsessed, agitated, broken thoughts (also shown in Hamlet/Faust), numbers 3 and 7 reappear at the end when the countess appears to Hermann, trying to repress the urge to gamble, Hermann has just enough money to make him want more. 3 and 7 are winning numbers from countess

"In his heart there echoed something like the voice of conscience, but it grew silent, and his heart once more turned to stone

The Queen of Spades, Alexander Pushkin, Hermann after seeing Lisaveta when going into the countess's house, he has no conscience, he has chance to do something right but he doesn't, society is cold

"I entreat you by the feelings of a wife, a lover, a mother, by everything that is sacred in life, not to deny my request

The Queen of Spades, Alexander Pushkin, Hermann begging the countess to tell him the cards, repulsive begging, shows how desperate he is, possibly bc society

"'The ace wins,' said Hermann and showed his card. 'Your queen has lost,' Chekalinsky said kindly. Hermann started: indeed, instead of an ace, before him lay the queen of spades. He could not believe his eyes, could not understand how he could have slipped up. At that moment it seemed to him that the queen of spades winked at him and smiled. He was struck by an unusual likeness..."

The Queen of Spades, Alexander Pushkin, after Hermann loses the card game, fairy tale style w the card wink, reveals countess as sort of witch trickster, story passes into magical

"But the Countess heard the news, previously unknown to her, with the greatest indifference"

The Queen of Spades, Alexander Pushkin, after the countess is told that her friend died, no feeling for death of best friend, critique of emotionally callous environment of St. Petersburg

"And indeed Lisaveta Ivanovna was a most unfortunate creature. As Dante says: 'You shall learn the salt taste of another's bread, and the hard path up and down his stairs,' and who better to know the bitterness of dependence than the poor ward of a well-born old lady?

The Queen of Spades, Alexander Pushkin, after the countess scolds Lisaveta for nothing, Pushkin preoccupied with people who don't have freedom, she's miserable bc of her dependence

"Hermann was the son of a Russianised German, from whom he had inherited a small amount of money."

The Queen of Spades, Alexander Pushkin, introducing Hermann, Hermann sounds like German, only works in English, parallel puzzle of wining gamble. Key word small amount of $ - he doesn't fit in

Pushkin title

The queen of spades

Things Fall Apart Themes

The struggle between tradition and change; varying interpre-tations of masculinity; language as a sign of cultural difference, honor, ancestry, societal pressures, hierarchy, oppression of women

Achebe

Things Fall Apart

"Seven years was a long time to be away from one's clan... The clan was like a lizard; if it lost its tail it soon grew another."

Things Fall Apart (Achebe) - Narrator describing how things have changed since Okonkwo and his family left in exile - Sheer power of time - At first, the missionaries were unsuccessful, but people are not longer hostile towards them like OKonkwo is - Okonkwo is determined to regain the "wasted years" Style - nature metaphors Ok is replaceable not so glorious return