M2504’s Weblog

Suppose you’re a creator. Among architecture, sculpture, music, and literature, which do you think offers the most promise of an enduring monument? Explain your answer.
Architecture, sculputre, and literature are the most likely to endure I think. Architecture will be conseved through many years and studied as well as a sculputre, but with literature you can really explain the reasons and give much more detail of the time. I dont think that music endures because we can se the many changes in music taste through the years and it is not likely that many people will appreciate it.

Irony is the discrepancy between expectations and reality. Explain the fundamental irony in the sonnet.
The fundamental irony in the sonnet might be that the legs in the desert where a sculpture from a great king and that is what he wanted when someone passing by saw that the sculpture was from the king of ozymandias, but now after many years the sculpture was left as a ruin and nothing else. 

Discuss what you think is the speaker’s message about pride -and whether it also applies to artists.
In some way he expresses that feeling pride is useless because it won’t leave you anything at all in the end. It can be applied to artists because they think that what they do is so awesome that it will never be forgotten and it is not that way at all.

Could this poem apply to any contemporary figures who wield political power? Explain.
Politics are not interesting for me in any way, but I guess I can say that in some way it applies. Politicians expect to rule over everyone and over a very long period of time, which is not true and the power they reach at some point won’t last for more than a few years. 

In the poem She Walks in Beauty, by Lord Byron, what in the woman’s appearance does the speaker praise? what conclusions does he draw about her character and personality?
she appears to be a beautiful woman which he compares to night clouds because of her beauty, and he wishes her beautiful expressions and her beautiful face. He states that she is a woman who has a lot to live for because of her beauty and that she has a innocent soul.

This poem has been criticized as sentimental and dependent on clichés. Tell me whether or not you agree and why.

In my opinion, this poem is sentimental. He expresses his feelings for her openly, stating that she is very beautiful and gives details about her and her beaty. We can tell from this poem that his feelings towards her are strong.

Do you think that inward nature can be revealed by outward appearances? Explain.
Inward nature is nowhere near of being revealed by the physical appearances. As the saying “do not judge a book by its cover”. Many people may seem nice, beautiful, and kind at first sight, but once you get to know them better you discover the real them, which may be mean, liar, and ugly inward.

There was a time in American History (or Unitedstatesian, as you say) when almost every schoolchild could recite parts of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Find four stanzas that strike you as particularly quotable. What situations in contemporary life would you apply the lines to?

The sun came up upon the left,
Out of the sea came he!
And he shone bright, and on the right
Went down into the sea.
This stanza can be used by someone at the sea who presenced the drowning of someone else.

The ice was here, the ice was there,
The ice was allaround;
It cracked and growled, and roared and howled,
Like noises in a swoind!
This can be used by people living in very cold places like in alaska. Maybe used by some men dedicated to transport things in big trucks over the ice.

Alone, alone, all, all alone,
Alone on a wide, wide sea!
And never a saint took pity on
My soul in agony.
This stanza can be used in contemporary life by anyone feeling alone and depressed. It also shows some who is holding a grudge because no one really helped him or her.
To thee, thou Wedding-Guest !
He prayeth well, who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast.
This can be used as a farewell to someone that is dying.

Coleridge once said that he would have preferred to write The Rime of the Ancient Mariner as a work of “pure imagination”. He believed that it had “too much” of a moral, and that the moral was stated too openly. Do you agree or disagree with Coleridge about the message in this poem? Why?
An ancient Mariner meets three Gallants bidden to a wedding-feast, and detained one. The Wedding-Guest is spell-bound by the eye of the old seafaring man, and constrained to hear his tale. The Mariner tells how the ship sailed southward with a good wind and fair weather, till it reached the Line. The Wedding-Guest heareth the bridal music ; but the Mariner continueth his tale.  The ship driven by a storm toward the south pole. The land of ice, and of fearful sounds where no living thing was to be seen. Till a great sea-bird, called the Albatross, came through the snow-fog, and was received with great joy and hospitality. The ancient Mariner inhospitably killeth the pious bird of good omen. At the end of the tale the mariner is cursed to tell the story everyday for the rest of his life. The message of this tale was really hard to understand for me because I didn’t read the poem in class, but with what I undertood I may say that I agree with the message because it teaches a lesson and shows how actions are always followed by reactions, these could be good or bad, in this case bad.

This ballad is famous for its use of vivid figurative language and memorable sound devices. Find examples of especially effective examples of simile, metaphor, personification, alliteration, assonance and internal rhyme (one of each).

Simile
The bride hath paced into the hall,
Red as a rose is she

Metaphor
The Sun came up upon the left,
Out of the sea came he ! 
And he shone bright, and on the right 
Went down into the sea.

Personification
Almost upon the western wave 
Rested the broad bright Sun

Alliteration
Water, water, every where,
And all the boards did shrink ; 
Water, water, every where, 
Nor any drop to drink.

Assonance
The repeating ‘a’ vowel sound in ‘Alone, alone, all, all alone’.

Internal Rhyme
In the four-line stanzas, the second and fourth lines usually rhyme.
In the five- and six-line stanzas, the second or third line usually rhymes with the final line.
The meter alternates between iambic tetrameter and iambic trimeter.

Have you ever felt fear, joy, wonder, or grief because of an animal? To remember incidents, create a list of family pets since you were young. To recall other animal encounters, create associations from the words circus, outdoors and camping. And don’t forget “lowly” animals like bugs and mice: any experience that raises lingering feelings or questions is a good topic.

Write a poem to another creature, -fly, cockroach, spider, moth. Imitate Burns. 8 lines

Penguin, I think it must be very nice
To stroll about upon the ice,
Night and day, day and night,
Wearing only black and white,
Always in your Sunday best
Black tailcoat and pearl, white vest.
To stroll about so pleasantly
Beside the cold and silent sea
Would really suit me to a T!
I think it must be very nice
To stroll with penguins on the ice.

Why do human beings do evil? Why do evil people sometimes prosper? Why does God allow innocent children to suffer?

If you could cry out against an evil of our day -and get people to listen-, which social problem would you choose? Why would you choose it?

 In The Poison Tree, by William Blake, the speaker describes what happens when anger is left unresolved. What happens to anger that is allowed to grow and fester, anger that is nurtured with our own deceit?

Think of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. What does confession mean to you? What purpose does confession have for the teller and listener? Is a listener even necessary? Why do you think the act of confession plays such an important part in law and religion?

Today is almost the only day of the week that I am able to sleep whatever I want, but that is never possible. It was almost 10 am ( i know it was already kind of late ) and I started hearing voices. My mom was talking almost screaming to my brother, while my brother was answering her back. The discussion was as usual about my brother and his undone homeworks and his failed tests. So I wake up and star walking towards my mom’s room. And beacuse of my pacience and tact talking when I am pissed off, the first thing I did was scream “could you please shut up! I am trying to sleep and all you ever do is argue! at least close the door!” and went back to my bed. Obviously I couldn’t sleep anymore. I got up and went to the computer and checked out the school’s blog. While the web page was loading I was hoping and praying not to have any homework, but of course it was impossible. I realized that it was the last day of the journal writing and I had only writen one day. Yes, only monday! trying to remember what I did during the whole week wasn`t so hard though. At least I could remember clearly that thursday I went out, Friday I went to dinner with my boyfriend, and Saturday I went out too. The fact of thinking that I had so much to write about gave me headaches so I decided to start with another homework. Ok, essays. Yay my favorite thing to do….NOT! There were two essays, one formal and the other one from, my favorite book, words. I did the formal first and then turned off the computer.
Sundays are dad’s official days. Every Sunday I have to go out with my dad. Well, a couple of years ago was a must, now I have to admit that I really like Sundays. He called and said he was picking us at 1pm sharp. i turned to the clock and realized it was 12:30, with my boyfriend on the phone, and still a messy room, which my mom naturally hates. So, I thought “ok, its Sunday, I had a bath yesterday and besides I did not had a party nor anything that could get me dirty. I am not taking a bath today” and I did not. hehehe. I got dressed and washed my face and brushed my teeth, cleaned my room, and at that time my dad called, he was already there.
We went to Cemaco because he needed new things for his house. Boooooring, but he bought me something so it wasnt that boring at the end. Then my dad’s cell almost exploded so we went to telefonica in search for other and one for myself too because mine is almost dying too. We had reservations for luch at 2:30 so we rushed to the restaurant and met with my cousins and aunts and everyone. Last week was my cousin’s birhtday so her dad called and told us to meet and go bowling with everyone. We went to metrobowl and after playing for a whole hour I wen to play at the machines with my dad…

Today I woke up at 3:00 am as usual.  I guess I am starting toget used to the idea that I will not get any sleep from now on. I dont know what the reason is, but I am getting sick and tired of waking up at the same our for the last 4 days. At some point is almost kind of creepy, is like the movie of that girl named Emily Rose. I dont remember exactly who was the one that always woke up at 3 am, ad at the end of the movie they said it was because it was the hour contrary to the hour at which Jesus died. To be honest, I did not even remembered that movie until, my loving boyfriend told me “Do you remember the movie about Emily Rose? The one who had devils inside?” and thanks to this stupid question I am starting to freak out every time I wake up at 3am. I just hope it stops because now it really scares me. Yeah I know, it is stupid, but I tend to be really nervous and freak out about almost everything.
After waking up at 3 am, I went back to sleep. It was almost 4 am when I did that. Five minutes later my alarm starts ringing and it was 6 in the morning and I had to get up to get a bath. In fact, I was already 15 minutes late beacuse I always wake up at 5:45. As usually, I pressed the snooze button and went to sleep again. By the time my alarm went on again it was 6:20 am and I wasn’t even ready. As nasty as it sounds I woke up and put on my uniform, mhm without getting a bath, I ran to the bathroom and washed my face and brushed my teeth. I looked towards the mirror and daaaaamn, I have a bad hair day. So I went to my room and got the straighter and spent the next 15 minutes trying to fix it. The next thing I know, my mom is screaming at me “It is late! You have to go to school now or your brother will get a demerit”. If my brother gets a demerit it means that I get it too, but my mom does not care much about me getting a demerit, she says that my brother can not go around getting demerits for stupid thing like getting late or not wearing a belt because at the end of the week he always accumulates more than five and guess who has to stay at school and wait for him to get out? Me! We got at school on time, well in fact I got on time. I dont know why but he did not make it on time and I did, of course it was my foult so at night my mom talked to me about it.
Monday was another boring day at school, we did not work much nor talked about interesting things that happenden during the weekend. In fact, I do not even remember of anything important at school. I got out at 2pm and went with my brother to my grandparents’t home. We had lunch there with them and talked about almost nothing. We finished eating and I drove back home with him. We did what we usually do, park the car, open the door, and let my dog in from the garden. He is a chihuahua named takito, pakito, pako, tako, manzanita, etc. He has too many names and the interesting thing is that he actually comes with whichever you say. I changed clothes and went to the gym with my boyfriend. When I came back I had dinner with my mom, took a bath, and went to sleep.

She made passion a living. Known because of her ability to express herself with a simple brush and a full palette, FARO FARO, exhibit what is known so far as her best art exposition so far.

Born in Guatemala on April 25th of 1990, FARO FARO became the best artist Guatemala could have ever had. Her participation in national expositions began when she was aproximately 16 years old. She grabbed her first brush when she was 2 years old and began art classes at 8. For a while she felt that painting was not really was she was born to do, she doubted of her abilities, but decided not to leave what she was doing since she was a kid. When she was 15 years old, she contacted a famous painter of the time and decided it was a good idea to

Usually at 10 in the morning, you can see me walking down the street. It is always Saturday, and days are sunny and cool. I reach the house with a balcony and a beautiful palm tree. Up the stairs, a room as bright as the day, contains a whole lot of imagination, colors, feelings and dreams. Entering that room is entering a whole new world. I sit, right beside to the balcony’s door, where I see outsiode

1.       In “An Essay on Man”, Alexander Pope makes generalizations about people’s negative and positive characteristics. Describe his generalizations about positive characteristics in one paragraph and describe his broad comments about negative traits in another paragraph.

Pride is a positive characteristic shown in “An Essay on Man”, he gives the idea of refusing to human limitations, to feel no difference between pain an pleasure.  Intelligence, knowledge, he emphasizes on humans having knowledge of everything, reasoning just to err, and saying the truth out in every aspect of life are some of the positive characterizations Alexander Pope shows about human beings when he wrote “An Essay on Man”.

At the same time he doubted that human beings could gain knowledge o anything and also made some emphasize on the limitations of human beings. He shows that men were born just to die, and when they reason, they reasoned just to make mistakes. Passion is used as negative generalization in this essay, shows that it tends to create confusion and chaos.

2.       Do you think that Pope has a positive or negative opinion of human beings and why?

In my opinion Alexander Pope has a negative opinion on human beings because he emphasizes a lot on how humans err, how passion brings them to destruction and how humans use their knowledge in ways that are not positive and because of this lack of knowledge they make mistakes.

3.       Do you agree with Pope’s characterization of man kind? In one paragraph.

In some ways I have to admit that I agree with Pope’s characterization of human beings. I think that men are basically searching for wrong doings instead of making things right. It is much easier for people to do wrong than to do right, and when they act right they usually feel like if they have to be rewarded for following the right path instead of thinking that that is what they should have done from the beginning and has no reason for being rewarded.

Quotable Wisdom

In his heroic couplets, Alexander Pope, offers what he thought were nuggets of wisdom. Write 4 of your favorite couplets below. Underneath each couplet, state whether you think Pope’s advice is wise or foolish, and support your opinions with examples from your life or someone you know.

Which of the above couplets do you think gives more useful advice? Why? One paragraph.

Think of advice that you would give to someone, confused or in trouble, and write your advice in a couplet form. (Iambic pentameter and AA rime)