Dear Mr. and Mrs. Caulfield,

     Upon further examination your son Holden seems to show symptoms of a personality disorder. In order to be diagnosed with a personality disorder, a patient must demonstrate five or more of a number of  different criteria. Holden meets exactly five to some extent, suggesting he has a borderline personality disorder. He has volotile relationships with other people, engages in impulsive and self-destructing actities such as smoking and drinking, and regularly experiences feelings of emptiness. He displays intense anger at inappropriate times and is terrified of being abandoned, going to extreme lengths to prevent it.

     I advise giving therapy a try. Make sure to choose a therapist Holden can be comfortable with if possible- someone he doesn't consider a "phony." Minimal medication is advised as people with this kind of disorder often don't take well to it. Above all, don't try to force him into anything. He is sure to resist if you do.

Impressionist Art

Today, my class has to select our favorite abstract expressionist and talk about them. I can't pretend to like or understand that kind of art, but one guy I thought was pretty good was Wassily Kandinsky. Here are some of his paintings:

    
Kandinsky was a big believer in what he called inner necessity- the true hidden beauty of everyday life. This influenced a lot of his earlier paintings. He was also an expert in music and philosophy and frequently compared the two to art. Though he was very smart and school came easy to him, he was known for having a very hard time relaxing, and he felt overwhelmed by the world, channeling these feelings into his paintings. That feeling of being overwhelmed was the primary emotion he put into his art as he shows in the seemingly random jumbles of shapes and objects in some of his paintings. He also frequently used The Bible for inspiration, particularly Revalation, as many of his paintings dealt  with the end of the world.

     Some of his paintings give a positive "Oh, that's nice" reaction like the one of the street and the horse one. Others are violent and random-seeming and give a more negative feel. Abstract expressionalism was fueled by a desire for change and to establish American art. Those may not have been what motivated Wassily, but it's what his work inspired for many other artists nontheless.

Understanding Poetry

Some people find poetry easy to understand while others think it is impossible. I tend to fall somewhere between those two categories, though unfortunately probably more toward the second one. Here's some poetry that I think is too easy, too hard and just right for my current comprehension level.

Too easy: "Every Day" by Rich Acetta-Adams

     Not a bad poem, but there isn't much to misinterpret here. It is just talking about the daily routine of the author's family. No hidden messages as far as I'm aware- though if I'm wrong, I bet I look like an idiot for putting it up here as the "easy" poem.

Too hard:  "Elegy in a Spider's Web" by Laura Jackson

     This poem is insane. It makes no sense whatsoever. The title sheds a pinprick of light on what it means, but I can't make any kind of sense of it. You really have to read the poem to see what I mean here; look it up.

Just right: "The Road Not Taken" By Robert Frost

     Okay, I'll admit it, I don't fully understand all the possible meanings of this poem. But that's what I like about it; it seems simple to interpret, yet there's always a deeper meaning. It seems to be a happy poem at first, but there's an element of wistfulness to it, as if he knows he will never get a chance to take the other road. I'm not a poetry person, but this one is actually really good. Here's a link: http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-road-not-taken/

No Fear Shakespeare

     My English class is reading Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet this quarter. I know a lot of people in modern times have trouble understanding Shakespeare's works, so I'm posting some links for anyone who needs help.

http://www.nosweatshakespeare.com/

This handy site has plenty of information about both Shakespeare himself and all his works. If you're having trouble understanding anything, this is as good a place as any to start.

http://shakespeare.about.com/od/teachingshakespeare/a/shakespeare_words.htm

It has nowhere near the amount of total  info of the above site, but it's a nice list of all the Shakespeare terms and what they mean.

http://www.shakespearehigh.com/classroom/guide/page1.shtml

As the name suggests, this site is practically an online classroom for learning about Shakespeare that should be a lot of help.

http://www.shakespeare-online.com/plays/howtostudybard.html

A guide devoted specifically to help students be able to better understand how to deal with Shakespeare in general.

http://www.enotes.com/romeo-and-juliet-text/strategies-for-understanding

Here's one focusing on Romeo and Juliet specifically.

My class has to read Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet  this quarter. I know a lot of people in today's world have trouble understanding Shakespeare's works (I know I do), so here's a few links to sites that can help these people out.

http://www.nosweatshakespeare.com

This handy site has tons of information about Shakespeare's plays as well as the man himself. If you're trying to learn about or understand anything Shakespeare-related, this is the first place you should go.

http://shakespeare.about.com/od/teachingshakespeare/a/shakespeare_words.htm

A list of all the hard-to-understand words and phrases in Shakespeare's works and what they mean exactly.

http://www.shakespearehigh.com/

Essentially an online classroom for learnign about Shakespeare, this site should be helpfull to any student.

http://www.shakespeare-online.com/plays/howtostudybard.html

Provides all kinds of information, strategies and tips to help you deal with any Shakespearian literature you come across.

http://www.enotes.com/romeo-and-juliet-text/strategies-for-understanding

This one is devoted specifically to Romeo and Juliet, but the tips it contains actually apply to any of his works.

"Nice description, Eric, I also liked Divergent.
Somehow, though, I was never really a fan of Tris; I just never thought she was a very interesting character for some reason."

Ender's Game

         We had our picks of several dystopian books for English this year. Unfortunately, by the time I came to pick up a book only Ender's Game and The Host were left-one of which I've already read and one of which I don't want to read. I'd rather read Ender's game again than read The Host, so that's the one I picked. I'm actually pretty happy with this arrangement; I really liked Ender's Game the first time around. I don't really know how it made it onto a dystopian list, though- there is not much about it that is actually dystopic, at least nothing I can remember.

          The only thing that I would consider to be dystopic in the book is the way the government lies to everyone about why battle school exists, and I'm not even supposed to know about that yet... I guess the population control law might count, though. The people certainly live in fear, but the living conditions are pretty good and the government is pretty much the same as it is now. Here's a picture of the book, and a link to buy it :http://www.amazon.com/Enders-Game-Ender-Book-1/dp/0812550706/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1360262693&sr=8-1&keywords=ender%27s+game

Huckleberry Finn and the N-word debate

          I recently read an article about the N-word in the book Huckleberry Finn talking about how the new, censored version-which is rapidly taking over on school reading lists. This new version replaces the the word "nigger" with the word "slave". It is hotly debated whether or not the original version should be read to kids or not. Some say kids should not be exposed to the word; others say the word is more hurtful if you don't use it.I am inclined to believe the latter group; I believe that profanity is more meaningful the less you use it. 

          Another issue with censoring the word is that it takes away from the meaning of the book. During the  time period that the book was set in , it was the word everybody used. And it's not like it goes unsaid today, either- most black people call themselves and each other that. It also changes the meaning of the word itself- "slave" is a condition while "nigger" refers to the entire race.

          

Drive-Thru workers

There are many things that can annoy me, it's true,
but my biggest pet peeve is the workers at the drive-thru.
I might order a chicken sandwich and fries
but over the years I have come to realize  
if I say "no mayonnaise" they'll give me plenty
and if it's three dollars they'll charge me a twenty.
They get everyone else's orders right with consistency
but mine they mess up with incredible frequency.
What is it about me that makes them mess up?
Makes them forgest the pickles and the ketchup?
It's not only the drive-thru but restaurants too;
I'll get pork instead of the cow that says moo.
If I ask for a lemon they'll give me a lime
ninety-nine point nine percent of the time.
My fries are all curly instead of straight
And the rest of the food sitting on my plate
is probably something that I don't really like
like saurkraut, brussel sprouts and English tripe.
But at the end of the day it doesn't bother me
'cause they make up for it by letting me eat free.

Satire in Shrek

          For my first post of the new year, I'm going to talk about examples of satire in the movie Shrek. There are four types of satire: exaggeration, reversal, parody, and incongruity. There are many exaggerations in the movie, such as Lord Faarquad's height, Shrek's hygiene  and  Fiona's fighting abilities. The main character, Shrek, is an example of reversal satire, since he is an ogre, but he is the hero of the story instead of the villain. The fairy tale creatures are an incongruity since they are so out of place with the otherwise realistic world. However, the type of satire that was used the most was parody.

          The entire movie was essentially a parody of fairy tales in general, particularly princess rescue stories like Sleeping Beauty. Numerous other individual stories were parodied as well, such as Snow White (Faarquad's mirror). Fairy tales aren't the only things parodied in the movie: many other things are poked fun at as well. The movie parodies pro wrestling in the tournement scene, king fu movies in the forest scene and celebrity marriages in the wedding scene. Throughout the entire movie, the goal of the satire was to make a movie that could appeal to a younger audience with exaggeration and slapstick as well as an older one with the movie's various parodies.