The Ministers Black veil

The Ministers Black Veil was a story written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Nathaniel Hawthorne was an American author who lived during the Romanticism period. Most of Hawthorne's stories, like The Minister's black Veil, are in the Dark romanticism subcategory of Romanticism. Dark Romanticism is a retaliation against the picture of perfection that Romanticism tries to portray. Dark romanticism does its absolute best to focus on all things bad about humans. Often in Dark Romanticism books the main character has large character flaws that are detrimental to himself in some way or the story serves to display an inherent human flaw.

The Minister's Black Veil had quite a few Dark Romanticism characteristics. Several of them being; a scary undertone, something frightening and strange, a man with large character flaws, and lastly a human sin that was exposed. To start the story off people are happy and ready for church until the minister shows up wearing a black veil. Everyone is frightened and afraid of what it means. That day the minister talks about how we all have hidden sins but it doesn't matter because no matter how well we hide them God can still see our sins. Many people in the crowd begin to feel uncomfortable about this sermon, feeling as if they are speaking directly to him. "Each member of the congregation, the innocent girl and the man or hardened breast felt as if the preacher had crept upon them..." (Hawthorne) The preacher by himself is a man with many character flaws. Something we don't normally see in romanticism. The minister ruins a wedding later in the story by showing up in his black veil. The mood becomes very sour. As the story progresses I at least began to feel the veil was concealing more than just his face but it was his own personal shield against his own doubts. In the very end the climax of the story happens as it is ending. While on his death bed the minister, who is still wearing the veil, becomes angry not for his own death but angry at the towns people who are feeling bad for him. " Have men avoided me and women showed no pity and children screamed and fled, only for my black veil?" (Hawthorne) This is the ending of the story and the part where the reader is supposed to begin thinking about it. Dark romanticism often talks of human flaws. The minister was referring tot he fact that everyone of the towns people avoided and pitied him for the simple veil he wore. Nto for him as a person or as a minister but simply for the veil. This was what the story was trying to get across. The idea that people can be so simple minded at times with prejudices against the unknow. Even something as small and insignificant as a piece of cloth. This story was really cool and ahd a nice ending. I thought it was alll presented nice and cleanly and it also had a pretty cool message in the end.

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. "The Minister's Black Veil." Glencoe Literature. 283-93. Web. 30 Nov. 2010.

Dark Romanticism in the pit and the pendulum

Dark Romanticism was a period in literature and a type of writing. This type of wirting was known to commonly be very morbid, and well, dark. Often the author who was writing a dark romanticism novel would include things like death and human nature. Things like greed, anger, sin and things liek that. Stuff that romanticism tried to forget and not focus on. Dark romantiicism was really in it's simplest form a rebellion agaisnt the perfect world of romanticism as well as a result of transcendentalism. Whcich is a literary period that focused on your inner self. Some people felt that their inner self was bad and evil sot hat is what they wrote about.

The story the Pit and the Pendulum was very much a dark romantic story. The basic summary of the story is that a man finds himself in a jail, being accused of heresy by the Spanish inquisition. Just from that much information we can begin to imagine all of the different things that could be evil and dark in this setting. The man begins to wonder around, believing he has fooled his captors. It is only till later in the story the man realizes he was being played the whole time. In reality his captors were doing they're best to make the man crazy. The most interesting and morbid part of the story was most likely when the unknown man was strapped down and a pendulum begin to swing overhead now normally this would not be a bad thing but this particular pendulum had the head of an ax strapped to it. The pendulum was slowly getting lower and lower always moving closer to cutting the man. This torture is not so much physical as it is mental. Something like this would have never been seen in a romanticism period story. Things like these were far to gruesome for the authors of the time to write about. In the end of the story the ax is slowly descending and lightly cutting the man swing by swing. Dark romanticism is obviously about the darker aspects of human life. Things that are on exhibit in this story. Ideas like torture being gruesome. Death being long and drawn out. That is something really different form romanticism. If someone did die they would quickly and honorable. There was never ever a mention of a long drawn out death or a painful and dishonorable one. The idea of a man forsaking his principles and pleading for mercy would never have been popular in romanticism times. Mean were supposed to be storng and iron willed. Without flaws. Stuff like that is pretty strong characteristics and really show how ingrained the idea of dark romanticism was in the writng of this story. Dark romanticism is pretty interesting and a cool off shoot of romanticism it is always good to get so many different views on these literary periods, so thigns like this are really coola nd show how people differ even when writing.

Criticism on the Criticism of The Raven

This was probably the best criticism I have read on any literature this year. Seeing as we have done quite a few of them that is a pretty heavy comment. There were a lot of things I positively loved about this criticism. The first and foremost was how plain and upfront the author presented all of the viewpoints of critics or fans. For instance the author wrote: "Literary critics focused attention, instead, on technical concerns of verse, such as parallelism, internal rhyme, and what were termed inconsistencies or absurdities in Poe's imagery, including his reference to angelic creatures whose “foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.”(" Rather than talking about a bunch of nonsense only professors will understand the author lays on the viewpoint in a simple way and straight up. No beating around the bush with him. Another thing I loved about the author was he FINALLY talked about ALL of the viewpoints and talked about their pros and cons. So many of the criticisms I have read this year are so biased it is painful. They so completely forgo any possibility of another viewpoint that you finish the article wondering what else there is. With this article the author talks about both view points, those for the poem and those against it. You do not get the idea he is trying to persuade you to think of something this way or the "right" way. For example: " Critics of his day also speculated somewhat unkindly on the inspiration and genesis of the poem, focusing their attention on the works of others from whom Poe was accused of lifting ideas and images...“The Raven” is generally accepted as one of Poe's most characteristic works in theme, tone, and execution, and Poe is highly regarded for his inspired, original imagination and deft command of language." From that quote it is obvious that the author attempted his best to give both view points in a scholarly way. I would have to say I really preferred this criticism over any other I have read this year. I found it a much much easier overall read than any other criticism this year. I would gladly read another article by this author. Several of the criticisms that I have read this year did things all wrong when compared to this criticism. Some of them tend to be bias and focus on one topic or view point. Some tend to over analyze the literature and ruin a simple thing with over thinking. Some even tend to alienate the reader b using literature jargon that is lost on many readers. This author did a beautiful job of not doing any of these. Granted there was a part where he talked about how the raven could represent black people and the angelic woman could represent white people. Though it was more of acknowledgement of the idea rather than a championing of it. I positively loved this criticism and it was actually a good and interesting read.


Works Cited

"Edgar Allan Poe The Raven Criticism." ENotes - Literature Study Guides, Lesson Plans, and More. Web. 23 Nov. 2010. .

Analysis of The Raven

I know were supposed to do a literal analysis for every sentence but thats just to many. I'm going to analyze the whole poem. In the Poem The Raven, Edgar Allan Poe wrote about a young man trying to forget about a lost love when a raven comes to his house. The Raven only says the one word Nevermore. THe young man claims the Raven will leave him like everyone else. The Rave says Nevermore. Finally he succumbs and asks when he will be reunited with his love in heaven and the Raven says Nevermore. He goes nuts and the poem sort of ends. Poe used a ton of literary devices for the poem. Some oft he imagery was absolutely fantastic, his rhyming scheme was complex and rhythmic. He also had some allusion in his work. At the beginning the man in the poem is reading a book by another author to help him get over his lost love. So it was sort of a shout out from one author to another. The Raven seemed to be a symbol for a broken heart. When he says that it will never leave him it means he is going to be reminded for it the rest of his life when he thinks about the lost love. The figurative meaning has to do with heartbreak. Heartbreak happens to everyone, we will never completely forget it and ti will always be there. Sometimes it will drive us mad.

Analyzing the Critcism

The criticism that I read of Thoreau was exceedingly long in length. To be fair it was mostly about Thoreau rather than about Walden. But you cant know anuything about the paper without knowing about the man. This piece from Bloom Literary Reference talked about Thoreads Life. One of the first things visited is how he was not as stoic as a man as some people may believe. The author of the criticism claims the Ralph Waldo Emerson is largely to blame for giving people the idea that Thoreau was such a stoic man. He even claims that Emerson edited certain facts about Thoreau's life to fit his image of the man. "To Emerson, Thoreau was a stoic. When he composed Thoreau's funeral address, he overemphasized the negative elements in Thoreau's personality. When he edited Thoreau's Letters to Various Persons, he purposely omitted all homely, personal remarks because they did not conform to his preconception" (Harding). I thought this was pretty fascinating. Everyone rationalizes things to fit their own impressions but to go so far as to change the public perception of a man in taking it to far. These were some of the things I did like about the criticism. Some of the things that I did not like was how the author tried to interpret certain actions. It seemed like the author felt EVERYTHING Thoreau did had a meaning and something deeper behind it. For instance while talking about Walden the author says: "Thoreau went to Walden not to escape from civilization but to discover the true civilization that would permit and foster the greatest development of man's spiritual nature."(Harding) He clearly has no basis for this assumption but his own ideas about who and what Thoreau stood for. There are several more examples where he gives his own interpretation of things that in all honesty were just simple actions. For me at least this was the largest reason in why I personally did not care for the criticism. Maybe his assumptions gave an air of arrogance or self importance that I did not like. I am not very sure I just found myself to dislike nearly everything the author said. I tried to keep an open mind about the criticism as I read it but it just got harder and harder especially when I read things like "But I am not convinced that Thoreau ever more than wavered from his original principles. To the very end he held to his belief that reform must come from within." (Harding). That quote is absolutely rediculous. The man admits the thought he is using as a fact to be one conjured form his own head. Not since the fourth grade have I been allowed to use my own facts that I decided in a paper. How this man felt it would be ok for someone to put their own thoughts so blatantly into such a prestigous paper is befuddling. Though there was some maddening parts to it overall the criticism did keep my attention through most of the reading

Works Cited

Harding, Walter. A Thoreau Handbook by Walter Harding: pp. 131-173 (New York University Press, 1959). © 1959 by New York University Press. Quoted as "Thoreau's Ideas" in Harold Bloom, ed. Henry David Thoreau, Bloom's BioCritiques. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishing, 2003. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=1&iPin=BCHDT05&SingleRecord=True (accessed November 15, 2010).

Tales from a man wwho aint ever scurred

In my life there are only two things that scare. One is nuclear war. Want to know what the other thing that scares me is? Carnies, strange people, smeel funny, small hands. Haha get it? Like from the movie with Austin Powers. Its a quote. In all honesty the last time I started playing tricks on myself and got anxious was maybe the first football game of the season. I was really nervous and it felt like I had to peee every five seconds, all i could think of was that i was going to mess up or do something worng. I just kept working myself up and by the time the game came i was really nervous and i was scared out of my mind. This actually sort of helped me with doing well in the game because it kept me so hoenst during the game. i was cared i was going to get beat by someone on a play so instead of cheating on a play asnd thinking it was goiing to be a pass or a run and getting ready early i jsut did nmy best to do my responsibility every play. Even though there were some plays i didnt do great on this really did help. sometimes being scared can be really helpful during sports because another good things about it is that it helps to clear your mind overall and the number one reason people screw up in athletics is that they tend to over think it all to much. being nervous helps you slow everything down. I dont get very scared or nervous very often for the most part im really of the opinion if it will happen let it happen. Some things you really can not control and there is no use to worrry about things like that. I try my best to take things slow and easy so that i can think through them

Unplugging

In such a plugged in age where everyone is always texting, chatting or facebooking. Or even when you are working out or trying to relax you are listening to something on your ipod or whatever music player has. Most people would find it pretty hard to unplug as you put it. They simply can npot imagine a day without their precious electronics. Me personally I actually have and pretty often i do go without electronics. Well maybe not commonly but i have done it. We go on a yearly canoe trip for a few days. For the last two years it has been pretty out of the way. Like last year for instance I didn't even have phone service for like a week. It was actually kind of nice, aside fromt he fact that i was sick during the trip and didnt have the best time. But back on topic the whole idea of unplugging was kind of novel and interesting it was really peaceful. I mean it was kind of annoying when i came back and did not really know whar had been going on for the last week in the world and i had to catch up with my friends. overall it is not something that i would do like weekly or something i think it something you need to sparingly so that it really has the full effect of calming you down and all of that good stuff. Some people probably could not handle it. I know several people who would have despised the experience i had because it took them away from their perfect little world with elctronics.