Dover Beach

     I'm really glad that we went over this poem in class! I had little to no idea on what this poem meant and why Ray Bradbury chose to include it in Fahrenheit 451.  I have 2 ideas why Bradbury chose to include the poem and why it made Mrs. Phelps cry.

     My first idea is, because it compares the reader's and his new bride's commitment to each other to Mrs. Phelps's marriage. This is why Mrs. Phelps cried. Although she wasn't able to completely understand what the poem was about, I think that she understood this key point and it made her break apart inside. I think she wanted that kind of relationship with her husband or at least one of her husbands.

     And another idea is because the reader in the poem, pretty much says to his wife 'no matter what happens, we will always be together'. And this part stung. Mrs. Phelps has gone through 2 marriages previously and is now in the third one. But a part that builds on top of this is her third husband; who is serving in a war said to her, 'If I die, you go on marry someone else.' This means that there is no commitment in their marriage. It's almost like a marriage is a joke in their society.

     This is, at least in my opinion, why Bradbury chose to include Dover Beach in his novel and why Mrs. Phelps cried after hearing the poem.

I'll Give You The Sun Pt. 2

     I haven't read too much of this book lately because I had my attention diverted towards Fahrenheit 451. But I did get to read enough to blog about.

     

     Where I last left off, Noah was a socially awkward kid with no friends, and Jude was quickly becoming a diva. But over the course of the 70 pages I've read, an enormous change has taken place. Noah is not a popular kid who has a girlfriend and is hanging out at a late night party (we'll get into that in just a minute), and Jude is now a girl who pretends to be a diva; but in reality, she has lost her popularity. 

     This galactic change in Noah's personality and social life has occurred due to  a guy who moved next door. He made a new friend who has just moved in to the house adjacent from his. And now they both hang out. Noah really takes pride in their friendship because he believes that the new kid is his only friend. Later it is revealed that the new kids name is Brian, and it turns out that he is the star of his baseball team at his boarding school. Where the students often call him "The Ax." This turns in favor for Noah as Brian's throwing skills are beneficial in scaring bullies. 

     As the days go on, the popular group of girls find out about Brian and they immediately find him interesting and attractive. They take Brian into their group and also take Noah along because they think they are a 'package deal'. Later as the summer goes on, Noah slowly opens up and starts dating the least knuckle-head of the girls. While this is happening, Jude is rejected and abandoned. According to her, Noah has stolen her friends.

     Now it is the day before Brian goes to his boarding school, and they are throwing him a party. At this party, some 'interesting'... events occur (which I can't say). And they keep playing some 'dumb' party games; you'd expect to see at a college party. 

     Right now the story has picked up in pace and I really like how the author has given each of the characters a special identity, through their clothing, description and especially their dialogue. I definitely think you should read this book. But if you already have, leave a comment on what you think of the book so far and if you like it :)

I'll Give You The Sun By Jandy Nelson
 

                                         

     Honestly, the only reason I got this book was because the cover looked unique... yeah. I judged a book by it's cover. This is a dichotomous book because it is told through the perspectives of  two twins; Noah and Jude. They used to be best friends and would tell each other everything. But somewhere along the way, they lost each other. (I know what happened but, I wont reveal it) The book jumps between their perspectives and time periods too, which is a bit confusing at first. It's like a puzzle, you are constantly piecing together a bigger picture. They have their half of the story but what they don't realize is that if they could somehow just tell each other their story, they can fix their dispute. Even when they are mad at each other, they secretly make sure the other one is okay. 

      This book has a lot of inappropriate words at the beginning around pages 1-20 or maybe 25, but then the strong language dials down. This book is extremely detailed about the surrounding, what the characters are doing, and the dialogue is well fitting to the characters. Besides these great qualities this book has, the only complaint I would have is the chapters are incredibly long. Maybe 25- 30 pages each. And I personally like books with smaller chapters because it gives me a sense of accomplishment and it's a nice place to put the book down. In this book I have to stop in the middle of the chapter which I don't like. But overall this book is a great read for both girls and guys and should be an intriguing journey for the reader. 

     This time, I thought that I'd try something different and try to reflect on a poem. So when I was watching TV, I came across a guy reciting poem and I decided to reflect off that poem. The poem is called, Dont Go Gentle Into That Good Night. At first I could really think of what Dylam Thomas, the writer, was trying to communicate. But after reading it a couple times, I think I was able to narrow down on a few main points.  The complete poem is attached to a hyperlink with the picture up at the top; so if you would like to read the entire poem you can find it there. 

     I thought that the writer was trying to say that you shouldn't die and leave this world without a fight. The old men/ women shouldn't simply accept death but rather they should resist it. I got to this conclusion from the first two stanzas. 

"Do not go gentle into that good night,

Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night."

     Here in the first line, the writer suggests that you shouldn't just give in to the concept of dying. Just to clarify, by 'resisting death,' I mean living life to the fullest and not leaving this world without leaving some sort of mark; because what good of living here if you don't leave something people can remember you by.

     And in the final stanza, the poem gets deeply personal for the writer as he connects this theme to his father who is going blind. Which, I, think is the inspiration for the writer to include "Rage, Rage against the dying of the light." The dying of the light could by symbolism for his father going blind and he can slowly, no longer see light. 

     I think I'm somewhere in the ballpark with my reflection, but if you have another interpretation of this poem, feel free to leave it down in the comments. :)

     

MockingJay Part 1 Vs. MockingJay (Book) 

In my last blog I wrote about the book MockingJay and if you read it, the review wasn't good. But I felt that the movie was good. So I decided to make a little list of what was different between the movie and the book.

1) In the movie, you see Katniss start out in District 13, and eventually she visits her 'home' District 12.  But in the book, all of this wasn't included, the book simply started off in District 12 with Katniss shocked about the leftovers. I personally liked the movie version of this better because this was a build up to her decision in becoming the MockinJay. 

2) In the book I think Katniss interact a little less than they do in the movie. And they also don't trust each other as much in the book as they do in the movie. Additionally, in the movie, Katniss's demands were a little different than in the book. 

3) In the book, the rescue mission feels a bit choppy and you dont get to 'see' or feel what happens completely. But in the movie they did a good job on showing the mission. I liked how the movie included this scene because it adds a lot of suspense and is one of the major conflicts. 

These were just some of the things I noticed when reading the book and watching the movie. I just listed a couple differences obviously because the second part of the movie hasn't hit the theaters yet.

P. S.  Is it just me or do you like the song Jennifer Lawrence sung in the movie called 'The Hanging Tree"?

"The Odds Are Never In our Favor" 

I recently saw the movie MockingJay Part 1 and i thought it was a piece of art. So i thought to myself, Why not read the book? I've read Hunger Games and Catching Fire, but i decided that i wasn't going to read the third. This was because of the responses i heard about the book from my friends. They said "Don't read the book" and " It's sooo boring". But I read it anyway.

I regret it...

The book (in my opinion) just drags on, and has very minimal dialogue. There are pages and pages of description which gets tiring very fast. Now I'm not saying the book is a bad one, all I'm saying is that the book is tiring to read. I feel like the series has gone downhill. Hunger Games was exciting and grew curiosity. Then Catching Fire came out. It seemed a bit repetitive with another game. And i felt that it moved a bit slower. And MockingJay had a pace that I didn't enjoy. But if we were to put that aside and just focus on the story, then this book is great. The story has a lot of unexpected parts, and the ending was a shocker!

"There Will Be Blood"

"There Will Be Blood"

     I am going to do another post about the Blood of Olympus because I just wanted to share some other info regarding this book.

     I started reading this book on Saturday last week and finished it on Friday.  I'd say this was the fastest I've ever read a 500 page book. There were 2 main reasons for this:
1) This book was a fantastic read and it a bit poignant during the last 100 pages because...

 * SPOILER ALERT* Leo dies. He was one of my favorite characters during the course of book and I just didn't want him to die. But I guess it was alright because he didn't actually die.*

2) My Friend got this book on the Wednesday before the Saturday I got it and he said that we are going to have a race. A race on who can finish the book before the other. It wasn't really fair because by the time I got the book, he was already on 250. I started to read for an hour or an an hour and a half, everyday. Just sitting on the couch, with all electronics away, so I don't get distracted. By Wednesday, the both of us were on 300! I couldn't believe I caught up. He thought I was lying so he asked he around 10 questions, and after I got them all right, I thought Now... It's WAR!

BLAH BLAH, I'll jump to the part I WON! On Friday, I finished the book at exactly 7:02 pm. And I texted him that. He replies, "We never shook on it." And a couple of other excuses like, "My dad made me do SAT practice everyday so I didn't get time to read." Buuuttttt, I don't care, because I WON!