zaaaAP Lit SuperBlog

A Favorite Book

Maurice Sendak's "Where the Wild Things Are" is the ultimate book of adventure. As a child, I remember reading it with my parents, and feeling myself drift to that far away island filled with frightening beasts looking to befriend a child.

The story begins with the Protagonist Max running around completing childish maneuvers. Max is the essential kid; disobeying the mother, and acting like the typical animal. He feels that, like most kids feel, his parents treat him with disrespect and wish no fun upon him. As he is sent to his room to sulk, he eventually falls into a dreamscape, in which he enters the land of the Wild Things.

By looking into the yellow eyes of the beast, without blinking, he soon conquers the Wild Things. At first he is joyous and has taken his role as King to heart. However towards the end of the story, he begins to realize that he is alone, and that what he thought would be an adventure was nothing without the love and close ties of his family. 

As children we see life as an adventure waiting for us. Yet sometimes we want to grow up too fast. As I am about to leave high school for good now, I feel just like Max. I feel alone and I am worried that life has flown by like a jet leaving for battle. I wish that there was a way to turn back time, to allow me to experience childhood once again. Max feels lonely at the end of his stay with the Wild Things, and returns home where his loving mother is waiting for him with a hot bowl of soup. Life is empty without the love of others. I wish I didn't have to say goodbye next week.

I will never forget High School. I will forever look back on my experience as life changing, and something that I would love to repeat. 

Goodbye OPRF. I will miss you.

Murray Ringold

I first came to the blog to be read a thought provoking post, eventually leading to my own post. Instead  for the first time I took notice of the quote at the top of our blog.  I started to critically think about critically thinking.

Anyway I noticed the tilde and ellipsis and wanted to read the whole quote, so I did some quick Internet research and traced it to the book I Married a Communist (I think were reading it eventually -- I should have probably saved this post for when we do). The quote is from a fictional English teacher obviously about the importance of critical thinking.

(Mr. Heidkamp) The teachers name is Murray Ringold, Not Ringhold.

With this post I subvert. Murray is right, just because a quote (in this instance) comes from an authority doesn't mean we should just take it at face value, because sometimes it is misspelled.

Blinded by the Light of the Whited Sepulcher

So I tried to read and understand this article. I really did. In fact, I even re-read it. But for some reason the point Brady was trying to make never really made itself clear to me. Sure, I got the whole denial, hypocrisy, deception part of it. I could follow his individual passages on the symbolism of the whited sepulcher. In the end, however, it just didn't seem to connect for me. Even in class today, we discovered that the thesis may not even be until the end of the article. So I guess I would appreciate knowing how others would summarize the article, just to help me understand it more.

Welcome!

Welcome to the weblog for our AP College English class. Here's the place we will be continuing conversations from class and starting new ones. We'll be discussing and debating literary conundrums and so much more. We might even see a little poetry.

So, what's a blog? And how will we be using it class?

For information on blogging and how to join and post to our blog, see "All About Blogging."

Make sure you check your e-mail for your invitation to join the blog. Also – and this is very important – when entering in your “First Name” and “Last Name” enter your entire first name and just the initial to your last name (for example, “Bernie” would be my “First Name” and “H” would be my last name). Having just the initial to your last name keeps a little bit of anonymity with the outside world.

We're looking forward to a great year.

Apocalypse Now relating to Alice in Wonderland

If it has not been established yet, Apocalypse Now took many, many aspects of Heart of Darkness and incorporated it into this movie, making the whole experience better. Besides the fact it takes place in the Vietnam period and not in the late 19th century, this movie is a major masterpiece.

If I noticed one thing from seeing this movie about four? times...it reminds me of Alice in Wonderland. While some may question me and say that that is a very bold statement to make, I feel that it relates very well. The other worldly effects, and the absurdity of the mission to capture Kurtz by Captain Willard, only to become more and more like him as time progresses, reminded me so well of the tone and feel of the eerie situations that Alice got herself into.

Even though Apocalypse Now, and Alice in Wonderland both connect with drug use, (the writer of Alice in Wonderland & the drug use by the soldiers) I think that by each passing obstacle on the Nung river, the soldiers become even more warped and sucked in to the madness that is the Vietnam War. They lose themselves and every time they reach an outpost, one of them dies, or get attacked, it always has a melancholy feel to it. Pretty much, Willard finally reaching the outpost that Kurtz has claimed as his kingdom set me back to the coming of age story that Alice felt throughout that movie, but this time Willard experiences the horror of war and it's toll on the mental health of himself and others, while on his mission.

Truly Becoming a Captain in the End

I had my doubts about the captain in The Secret Sharer, I cannot deny this. Ever since he gets into the role of managing a ship, it just does not seem like he is put out to lead men into the unknown, and sail through the ravaging storms and blistering hot days that nature has to offer. Reinforced by the gap that is continually widening between the captain and his crew members, is when he decides to take watch and let them sleep, all the way up to not trusting them and keeping Leggatt a secret to all. I think that towards the end of the book, when Leggatt is ready to jump ship and make for the island, the captain truly evolves into something more. Before the epiphany he has, the captain would have surely let the ship crash into the rocks and become stranded, or even worse, die along with all his crew members. I think that since he sees the white hat that Leggatt has, and that it symbolizes their relationship in a sense falling apart and losing meaning, he is able to snap out of his state of confusion as to what to do. The captain quickly regains his better judgment and turns the ship and saves it from sure destruction. The move he makes to save the ship and his one true love, sailing, really does show that he can now call himself the captain of his ship.

Welcome!

Welcome to the weblog for our AP College English class. Here's the place we will be continuing conversations from class and starting new ones. We'll be discussing and debating literary conundrums and so much more. We might even see a little poetry.

So, what's a blog? And how will we be using it class?

For information on blogging and how to join and post to our blog, see "All About Blogging."

Make sure you check your e-mail for your invitation to join the blog. Also – and this is very important – when entering in your “First Name” and “Last Name” enter your entire first name and just the initial to your last name (for example, “Bernie” would be my “First Name” and “H” would be my last name). Having just the initial to your last name keeps a little bit of anonymity with the outside world.

For information on your responsibilities as one of the authors of our blog, check out "Responsibilities of Authors."

We'll be talking about these responsibilities during the first week of class.

We're looking forward to a great year.