Saturday, February 28, 2009

Paralyzing Love

Eveline, the main character in James Joyce's Eveline experiences moments of paralysis followed by an epiphany similar to those experienced by the young boy in Joyce's Araby. Eveline is a nineteen year old girl who lives at home with her father, two young brothers, and sometimes her older brother. Since Eveline's mother died she has taken care of her younger siblings and the house while trying to avoid "her father's violence". (38) She lived a challenging life, but when she contemplated leaving she realized that she actually liked her lifestyle. The idea of leaving came about when Eveline met Frank. Frank was a sailor who wanted to take her to Buenos Aires to marry her and live happily in his house there. For Eveline Frank represented an escape. She said, "Frank would save her. He would give her life, perhaps love, too." (40) Eveline idealized Frank as the antithesis of her father. The life she lived with her father made her unhappy and afraid while the life with Frank would allow her to be cared for and content.

She thought that Frank would be the perfect man to make her happy, so she decided to set sail with him. She made it to the docks with Frank where she saw lots of other soldiers and the ship. At this point, she experienced paralysis as "she felt her cheek pale and cold, and out of a maze of distress, she prayed to G-d to direct her, to show her what was her duty." (40) Eveline was unable to respond to Frank, she just stood there frozen in time and thought of the consequences of setting foot on the ship. She looked to religion for an answer. She was still caught up in indecision when "she felt him seize her hand". (41) He was leading her into a realm of uncertainty and she was trapped by her own inability to decide. Eveline, finally able to think, had a moment of epiphany. She knew that "he would drown her". (41) She had idealized what her life would be like with him, but it could have just as easily been as bad or worse than life with her father so she "clutched the iron [rails] in [a] frenzy." (41) She stayed on the dock and looked at him without compassion or guilt and watched him yell to her to follow him onto the boat. In her moment of epiphany, Eveline was terrified of the consequences of turning into her mother and leaving her family just as her mother had. She was paralyzed by the guilt of not fulfilling her obligation to her mother as well as the fear of how her father would treat her siblings. Eveline did not want to leave the place she grew up in as well as her family because the town had already lost many of its residents since she was a child and she did not want to leave the community that had provided so much for her. She felt an obligation to give the community what it had given her. Eveline's paralytic indecision led her to an epiphany where she chose family over impulsive love.

The young boy in Joyce's Araby was also paralyzed by a decision caused by love. He was in love with one of his friend's older sisters and he mustered up enough courage to ask her if she was going to the bazaar. She was not, but he decided to go anyway. The young boy got to the bazaar and went to the stall with the pottery that the girl loved. He wandered around the stall and pondered a purchase. Just as he was about to walk away from the stall without buying a vase for the girl, the lights went out and the boy's eyes filled with tears. His eyes burned because he took too long and the bazaar closed early. He was paralyzed while he was standing at the stall deciding whether or not to buy a vase for a girl. When the lights went out he had an epiphany as he had missed his chance and he had to go home empty-handed.

Just as Eveline went home without achieving her goal at the dock, the young boy went home without the vase for his crush. Both of them were paralyzed with their love of someone else and both idealized what would come of their relationships with the other had they taken the step after what had paralyzed them. For Eveline, it was a matter of leaving her family behind for the unknown and for the young boy it was not being confident enough or having enough money to buy something for the girl he thought he loved. They both felt sick by their indecisiveness. The young boy cried so much that his tears burned his eyes when the bazaar closed and Eveline had knots in her stomach that caused her to feel nauseous about going with Frank. Eveline and the young boy in Araby experienced similar bouts of love that caused them to be paralyzed and then reach an epiphany.

Friday, February 27, 2009

A Metamorphological Nightmare

In The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, the author frequently straddles the line between fantasy and reality. The main character Gregor starts the story off as a bug with human qualities. Gregor has a family, a job, an apartment, and concerns about being late for his job as opposed to those of a bug which would more likely include when it would find its next food. He is worried about being fired when his boss comes to the apartment because he has missed work, which is a real concern that most humans would have. He is worried that he will not be able to provide for his family and he has become more of a burden and a shame than a help as most humans would. Gregor is able to hear and understand the conversations his family has, although he cannot respond. He hides when his sister and mother come into his room more out of compassion than fear unlike most bugs. His life basically revolves around his family which is the case for most humans. Gregor has the thoughts of a human, but the lacks the physical characteristics making him seem real.

At the same time as Gregor has human-like thoughts he looks like a bug making the story appear more fantastical than realistic. He just happened to wake up one morning with a "domelike brown belly divided into stiff arched segments".(89) It seems quite unlikely that someone would go to bed a human and wake up a large insect. He scares away people because of his appearance and although humans have the capability to scare others with their appearance it does not usually occur without effort (ex. a clown). Gregor only has an appetite for moldy cheese and other things that would seem unpalatable to a human. It is challenging to imagine a human family hiding a large bug in a bedroom for months, most families would kill it and dispose of it right away because bugs are disgusting. The idea that the family ignored convention by aiding an odd creature in their home shows how fantastical the story is.

Because it is so improbable that a human would turn into a bug, the story is about the metaphorical transformation of a human. Gregor kept himself very distanced from life and the people around him that he almost acted like a bug. Bugs from a human perspective are dirty and disgusting, which is how Gregor was viewed. He felt for his family, but his family did not feel for him. He worried about their well being, but was unable to express this, so it was like he was non-existent with respect to them. Through his metamorphosis, Gregor was able to clearly view other people's perspectives of him. His new view of life from other's perceptions came shortly before death. Gregor died both before his transformation and after as he was of no use to his family after his metamorphosis and he literally physically died at the end.

An Angel Comes to Town...

In Gabriel Garcia Marquez's A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings, religion is something of the imagination that may or may not help people and has nothing to prove its existence. In the beginning of the story, the angel arrived and Pelayo placed him in the chicken coop showing that the angel was no more important than the dirty animals that would later get eaten. He did not care enough about religion as symbolized by the angel so he did not treat the angel as if it were important. He chose to treat it as a burden to his everyday life. Even after his child's fever went away and he was quickly cured, Pelayo ignored the angel (religion) and decided that his child was better because of to the care he and his wife provided. In this case, religion provided no help to Pelayo. Pelayo and his wife went on to charge people five cents to view the crazy specimen of religion that they possessed. They did not care that he could have been divine, but used him to improve their financial well being and class. Although the church has religious foundations, for Marquez these religious foundations were something that was made up and used as a way to collect money and make a living for the people who worked for the church.

Pelayo showed his disinterest in religion when the angel arrived, but it took the town a little bit longer to decide that the imaginary angel was not as important as reality. The town's disinterest in the angel came when a human spider arrived. The spider became more relevant and real to the townspeople because she had been a human at one time, so it was possible that something as horrific as this could happen to them too. The people essentially left religion by no longer taking interest in the angel and moved toward the human. They moved from the imaginary or unproved (religion) to the real, even though it is hard to believe that a human could be turned in a spider for coming home late. Religion proved to be more of a burden at the end of the story than a help even as Pelayo and Elisenda made a lot of money by showing off the imagined creature that was representative of religion. As the angel left at the end of the story, "[Elisenda] kept on watching until it was no longer possible for her to see him, because then he was no longer an annoyance in her life but an imaginary dot on the horizon of the sea". (455) She watched something that had been real for a short period of time (the angel) leave just as easily as it had come. Religion enters and exits people's lives, but it relies on faith and just as the angel left, there was no way to prove that he had been there in the first place. The whole idea of religion was just a dream. Religion or the presence of the angel had just been an "annoyance" and Elisenda was glad that it was gone. It went from being a burden to being a figment of her imagination.

Thursday, February 26, 2009

Miss Emily is hiding.

Miss Emily's blog would epitomize her private, secretive attitude towards the world. She would utilize all of the privacy settings available to make sure that no one except her "friends" would be able to see. She would only be friends with Tobe, Colonel Sartoris, Homer Barron and her relatives from Alabama. There might be a few photos of her silhouette or shadow through the window that had been taken and tagged by other people, but no photos of Emily taken by herself or those close to her. Emily would have applications for photos (that others have posted), a calendar (to measure time slowly passing by without external human contact), groups (to join an art group because of the classes she taught), and the likeness application (to show how well she matched up with Homer). Miss Emily would probably not have conversations on her wall because that is too public, but she might have conversations via messaging.

Colonel Sartoris: Dear Miss Emily, I would like you to know that you are and will always be exempt from your taxes due to the great service provided to our town by your father. Regards, Colonel Sartoris
Emily: (20 years later) Dear Colonel Sartoris, I have been receiving inquiries regarding tax collection from the town and have sent them back to the post office immediately because you said that I am exempt from taxes. Please verify this information. Thank you. Regards, Emily

Emily: I am having a lovely time with my significant other, Homer. Everything is swell. I hope everything is wonderful in Alabama. Love, Emily
Grierson cousins: Emily we are coming to see you and meet Homer. The mayor of your town has contacted us and we just want to make sure everything is going well. We cannot wait to see you. Love, cousins
Emily: It is absolutely unnecessary to come see us. I am sure you will get to meet Homer in the near future anyways. PLEASE do not come to town. Love, Emily

Miss Emily is clearly a private person judging by the fact that she never leaves the house after her father's death. She also neglects to have visitors over other than Homer who ends up living with her and Tobe who is her servant and lives with her anyways. Because she is so reserved I doubt she would have a facebook page in the first place as facebook was intended to be a networking tool and she clearly does not want to connect to anyone that she does not have to. If she did happen to have a facebook page it would be completely private because she was such a hidden woman. She would not have very many friends to respect her need for privacy and prevent town gossip. The calendar feature of her facebook page would record the day she poisoned Homer and her slow aging process, leaving her daily reminders. It is hard to create a definite description of Miss Emily because she was so secretive and William Faulkner tries to retain that discreteness in his description of her. We know little about her because the story was told from the perspective of an outsider who clearly did not know her very well, but knew her primarily from stories told by others. The image painted of her is fairly vague and prevents her from having a more exciting or elaborate facebook page.