Dialectical Journal #22: Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows

Passages From The Text	Pg #	Comments & Questions
“’Perhaps roused by the sound of Fred and their father’s arrival, George stirred.            ‘How do you feel, Georgie?’ whispered Mrs. Weasley.            George’s fingers groped for the side of his head.            ‘Saint-like,’ he murmured.           ‘What’s wrong with him?’ croaked Fred, looking terrified. ‘Is his mind affected?’            ‘Saint-like,’ repeated George, opening his eyes and looking at his brother. ‘You see, I’m holy. Holey, Fred, geddit?’            Mrs. Weasley sobbed harder than ever. Color flooded Fred’s pale face.”	74	(R) I absolutely love the twins, Fred and George! They are always joking around and act like they don’t have a care in the world, but they care very deeply for one another! And even though George had just lost and ear he wasted no time feeling sorry for himself. Nope, he started joking around immediately. If I was him I would have cried myself a river and then attempt to drown myself in it. I think they are fantastic, those twins.

Dialectical Journal #21: Catching Fire

Passages From The Text	Pg #	Comments & Questions
·         “When I swim back into semiconsciousness, I can feel I’m lying on a padded table. There’s the pinching sensation of tubes in my left arm. They are trying to keep me alive because if I slide quietly, privately into death, it will be a victory. I’m still largely unable to move, open my eyelids, raise my head… yet I manage to swing my arm around until I rip the tubes out. A beeping goes off but I can’t stay awake to find out who it summons ·         The next time I surface, my hands are tied down to the table, the tubes back in my arm…. Directly across from me I see Beetee with about 10 different machines hooked up to him. Just let us die! I scream in my mind. I slam my head back hard on the table and go out again."	·         382	·         (R) 1) WHERE IS PEETA???? ·         2) Even though I know Katniss must be scared out of her mind, being picked up by a hovercraft that she believes is filled with capital witches and all, but I can’t help feel she’s taking things a bit too far. Slamming your head on a table? Really? Then again, on top of all the stuff that’s happening around her, PEETA IS MISSING! Suzanne Collins can never leave that boy alone! It’s not fair! I wish Katniss would stop being sick and crazy and go find him. I mean, where would this story be without the boy with the bread?

Dialectical Journal #20: Catching Fire

Passages From The Text	Pg #	Comments & Questions
·         “As we near the force field, Finnick suggests I take the lead. ‘Katniss can hear the force field,’ he explains to Beetee and Johanna. ·         ‘Hear it?’ asks Beetee ·         ‘Only with the ear the capital reconstructed,’ I say. Guess who I’m not fooling with that story? Beetee. Because surely he remembers that he showed me how to spot a force field, and probably it’s impossible to hear force fields anyway. But, for whatever reason, he doesn’t question my claim.”	·         362	·         (R) I’m curious to why Beetee didn’t question Katniss on the “super hearing” she seems to have. He seems like the type that would take any opportunity they had to learn something new. Perhaps he was smart enough to figure out that Katniss wanted to keep the ability to see force fields a secret. I’m not exactly sure why she wants to keep it a secret, anyway. Maybe just so she can have something on the Capital that they don’t know about, like how to make out force fields.

Dialectical Journal #19: Catching Fire

Passages From The Text	Pg #	Comments & Questions
·         “Finnick is trying to tell me something, but I can’t hear him. What I do finally hear is another bird starting up somewhere to my left. And this time, the voice is Gale’s. ·         Finnick catches my arm before I can run. ‘No. it’s not him.’ He starts pulling me downhill, toward the beach. But Gale’s voice is so full of pain I can’t help struggling to reach it. ‘It’s not him, Katniss! It’s a mutt!’ Finnick shouts at me. ‘Come on!’ He moves me along, half dragging, half carrying me, until I can process what he said."	·         342-3	·         (R) Katniss, at times, can be such deadweight! If I was Finnick, I would have left her to run around, or whatever it was that her little brain desired, and gotten myself out of there! That girl knows that Gale is not actually in the arena and chasing his voice would do more harm than good yet she still tries to chase it!!! She was the one who found out that the voices were coming from mutts anyway! I mean, come on Katniss! I know rationality is not one of your strong suits, but pull it together! For Peeta’s sake.

Dialectical Journal #18: Catching Fire

Passages From The Text	Pg #	Comments & Questions
·         “This seems to draw Wiress in her direction and she careens into Johanna, who harshly shoves her on the beach. ‘Just stay down, will you?’ ·         ‘Lay off her,’ I snap. ·         Johanna narrows her brown eyes at me in hatred. ‘Lay off her?’ she hisses. She steps forward before I can react and slaps me so hard I see stars. ‘Who do you think got them out of that bleeding jungle for you? You-‘ Finnick tosses her writhing body his shoulder and carries her out into the water and repeatedly dunks her while she screams a lot of really insulting things at me.’	·         320	·         (R) I feel kind of happy that Katniss got slapped. It didn’t happen at one of the more convenient parts, but it still happened! Johanna, though, seems to be a mad woman. I thought Katniss had trouble controlling her anger, and then Suzanne Collins brings in this girl. I’m a bit leery of  Peeta and Katniss forming an alliance with such an unstable person. But Johanna gets stuff done, which counts for something. Also, she seems like the kind of person who tells it like it is, no beating around the bush. Even if she’s a little crazy, hopefully she’ll help the group get farther in the competition.

Dialectical Journal #17: Catching Fire

Passages From The Text	Pg #	Comments & Questions
“Finnick’s back by my side, Peeta hanging over him. ‘It’s no use,’ I say. ‘Can you take them both? Go on ahead, I’ll catch up.’ A somewhat doubtful proposal, but I say it with as much surety as I can muster.            I can see Finnicks eyes, green in the moonlight. I can see them as clear as day. Almost like a cat’s, with a strange reflective quality. Maybe because they are shiny with tears. ‘No,’ he says… ‘I’m sorry, Mags. I can’t do it.’            What happens next is so fast, so senseless, I can’t even move to stop it. Mags hauls herself up, plants a kiss on Finnicks lips, and then hobbles straight into the fog. Immediately, her body is seized by wild contortions and she falls to the ground in a horrible dance.”	301	(R) I don’t know a lot about Mags, but I feel that if I did, I would finally have a favorite female character in this book. I think it’s incredible that she gave up her own life in order to save Peeta’s. But now Finnick is sad!!! These people rarely get to be happy. I don’t understand how the people of the Capitol can enjoy this. What is entertaining about watching 24 kids, or currently 24 victors, fight to the death? Or be killed off by malicious Gamemakers?

Dialectical Journal #16: Catching Fire

Passages From The Text	Pg #	Comments & Questions
“’ You were dead! Your heart stopped!’ I burst out, before really considering if this is a good idea. I clap my hand over my mouth because I’m starting to make those awful choking sounds that happen when I sob.            ‘Well, it seems to be working now,’ he says. ‘It’s all right Katniss.’ I nod my head but the sounds aren’t stopping…            ‘It’s okay, it’s just her hormones,’ says Finnick. ‘From the baby.’…            ‘No. It’s not-‘ I get out before I’m cut off by an even more hysterical round of sobbing that seems to only confirm what Finnick said about the baby. He meets my eyes and I glare at him through the tears…            I expect to see a smug or sarcastic expression on his face, but his look is strangely quizzical. He glances between Peeta and me, as if trying to figure something out, then gives his head a slight shake as if to clear it.”	281-2	(R) I really, really, want to jump into the book and give Katniss a good shake. SHE IS IN LOVE WITH THAT BOY. What needs to happen before she realizes this? He died and she still hasn’t come to grips with that little fact. Finnick, I gather, was informed of Peeta and Katniss’s “arrangement”. I think that was why he looked confused. He probably was not expecting Katniss to start bawling like that. Probably because he didn’t think she actually cared.

Dialectical Journal #15: Catching Fire

Passages From The Text	Pg #	Comments & Questions
“I look at Cinna, raising my eyebrows for an explanation. He just gives his head a slight shake, as perplexed as I am. Why are they delaying this?          Suddenly the door behind him bursts open and three Peacekeepers spring into the room. Two pin Cinna’s arms behind him and cuff him while the third hits him in the temple with such force he’s knocked to his knees. But they keep hitting him with metal-studded gloves, opening gashes on his face and body. I’m screaming my head off, banging on the unyielding glass, trying to reach him. The Peacekeepers ignore me completely as they drag Cinna’s limp body from the room. All that’s left are the smears on the floor.”	262-3	(R) NOOOOO! Not Cinna!!!! I don’t know who I dislike more, President Snow or Suzanne Collins! I feel like all my favorite characters are being maltreated. Not only is my precious Peeta being put back into the arena, Cinna has gotten beaten up and has practically no chance of coming out of that alive! This story is so much better because of Cinna! I don't want anything bad to happen to him, ever!         In the play Julius Cesear, the character Cinna gets murdered by the hands of a mob. Was this the fate of Cinna the whole time? To be mercilessly beaten? I hope not.

Dialectical Journal #14: Catching Fire (Hunger Games Sequel)

Passages From The Text	Pg #	Comments & Questions
“’ I’m so sorry,’ I whisper. I lean forward and kiss him.            His eyelashes flutter and he looks at me through a wave of opiates. ‘Hey, Catnip.’            ‘Hey, Gale,’ I say.            ‘Thought you’d be gone by now,’ he says.            My choices are simple. I can die like a quarry in the woods or I can die here beside Gale. ‘I’m not going anywhere. I’m going to stay right here and cause all kinds of trouble.’            ‘Me, too,’ Gale says. He just manages a smile before the drugs pull him back under."	118-9	(R) Before this part, I was actually feeling sort of sympathetic towards Katniss. I was thinking, maybe I’m too hard on this girl. She’s dealing with things the best that she can. Then she goes and kisses Gale, knowing full well that he will read so much into it and knowing it would break Peeta’s heart. She always acts like she has everyone’s best interest at mind but I think, at her very core, she’s just selfish. She wants what she wants, when she wants it. Then again, doesn’t everyone act that way at one point? Maybe I’m just bitter because she’s hurting Peeta. Again.

Dialectical Journal #13:Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows

Passages From The Text	Pg #	Comments & Questions
“’ Aunt Petunia, whose face had been buried in her handkerchief, looked up at the sound. She did not expect to find herself alone with Harry. Hastily stowing her wet handkerchief into her pocket, she said, ‘Well- good-bye,’ and marched toward the door... For a moment Harry had the strangest feeling she wanted to say something to him… but then, with a little jerk of her head, she bustled out the door of the room after her husband and son.”	42	(R) This quote makes me feel a bit sad. I think it’s horrible how this woman couldn’t find any other words to say to her only blood nephew-the flesh and blood of her only, sister who is now deceased- other than ‘good-bye’. Whenever I read a book in this series I wonder, how can family treat each other like that? If I was in Petunia’s situation, I would be the best Aunt I could possibly be! I would do anything to keep my nephew happy. I think, personally, that if you took away all the Death-eaters and such (Voldemorts Gang) Petunia would be the vilest creature.

Dialectical Journal#12: Where Angels Fear to Tread

Passages From The Text	Pg #	Comments & Questions
·         “’ My dear Laila, don’t let’s have a scene. Before I arrived I thought I might question you. It is unnecessary. I know everything…. He is probably a ruffian and certainly a cad.’… she was sharp enough to say, ‘ indeed Philip, you surprise me. I understood you went in for equality and so on… and for my own poor part, I think what people are is what matters, but I don’t suppose you’ll agree.”’	·         33-4	·         (R) I thought this book would be very interesting when I picked it up because of the name. Also, the author wrote a book that’s on the AP Lit reading list so I thought I would give it a try. So far, nothing angelic is going on. Lailas’ in-laws are trying to bully her into living the way they want her too and I applaud her for not giving in! Sure, I don’t agree with the way she does things, but she should have the right to do things however she wants! She needs to do something to those in-laws off her case.

Dialectical Journal #11: Candide

Passages From The Text	Pg #	Comments & Questions
“’ But you, my dear Pangloss,’ said Candide, ‘how is it that we meet again?’            ‘It is true that you did see me hanged,’ said Pangloss. “… The rope was wet and wouldn’t slip through properly, and it got caught. So I was still breathing…”	92	(R) I think that it is absolutely ridiculous that this guy is still alive!!! I thought he was dead then suddenly he’s back surviving against all odds- and logic. I also don’t even understand why Voltaire would bring this character into the story again, especially now when it is practically over. Perhaps he is going to use Pangloss the philosopher to make one final jab at Leibniz just in case the reader forgot that this whole story was a satire on his teachings.

Assignment 3:Edgar Allen Poe...try (Do you see what i did there?)

Edgar Allen Poe has many themes present in his poetry, but the three most prominent are death, love and nature.

Death is a theme that is not just apparent in Poes’ poems, but in his short stories also. In almost all his poems his characters have some kind of interaction with death.

THE CITY IN THE SEA

“Lo! Death has reared himself a throne

In a strange city lying alone

Far down within the dim West,

Where the good and the bad and the worst and the best

Have gone to their eternal rest.”

The death theme is quite apparent in that poem, but it also more subliminal in other poems.

The Haunted Place

                “But evil things, in robes of sorrow

                                Assailed the monarch’s high estate.

                (Ah let us mourn!-for never morrow

                                Shall dawn upon him, desolate!)

 Even in the few poems that Poe wrote that weren’t about death seemed to have a kind of deadly undertone to them.

The next biggest theme in Poe’s poetry is love. His characters all seem to be longing for somebody they can’t have, usually because they have been departed from them in this life.

[“Deep In Earth”]

                Deep in earth my love is lying

                                And I must weep alone.

His characters seem to always be separated from the ones they love. In the poem “The Raven” the narrator is depressed because the raven tells him that he will never again see the one he loves- in this life or the next.

The Raven

                “’Prophet!’ said I, ‘thing of evil!-prophet still, if bird or devil!

                By that Heaven that bends above us-by that God we both adore-

                Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,

                It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore-

                Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore.”

                                Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

Nature is the last most prominent theme. Poe is apparently a big fan of it. His characters seem to receive something (usually mental insight) from nature when they are surrounded by it and he also seems to slightly reprimand humans for what they are doing to nature with all their expansion.

Sonnet-To Science

                “Hast thou not torn the Naiad from her flood

            The Elfin from the green grass, and from me

             The summer dream from beneath the tamarind tree?”

                

The three most prominent themes in Edgar Allen Poe’s poetry were death, love and nature. Death and love were usually tied together, usually with the character of the poem being departed with the one he loved. Nature was often used to describe things and was usually connected a character to something in their life.

Dialectical Journal #10: Where Angels Fear to Tread

Passages From The Text	Pg #	Comments & Questions
·         “’The meaning is quite clear-Laila is to be engaged to be married… How dare she not tell me direct! How dare she write first to Yorkshire! Pray, am I to hear through Mrs. Theobald- a patronizing, insolent letter like this? Have I know claim at all? Bear witness, dear’- she choked with passion-‘bear witness that for this I’ll never forgive her!”’	·         15	·         (R) I’ve just started this book and I already don’t like most of the characters. I’m not sure where this story is set in yet or the time but I think it must be set in a time period long ago because this woman, named Laila, is being controlled by her deceased husband’s family! And the family believes that have to control her for fear that Laila will shame the family name. I think she is in an unfair situation, but don’t necessarily feel bad for her. She seems to have a lot of problems and she is apparently creating more already!

Assignment 1&2: 1984

In the first half of 1984, George Orwell introduces the reader to a middle aged man named Winston Smith who lives in the dystopian London in the year 1984 (he thinks) and works at the Ministry of Truth. At the very beginning of the book Winston committed thoughtcrime by opening a diary. His world is ruled by the Party and the head of the party is Big Brother. His pictures are posted all over the city, as well as the party’s slogan: War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength.  There are telescreens within every room that record everything. So people in the Republic of Oceania must always watch the faces they make, the words they say. If they don’t the Thought Police will come and take them away. They will essentially be erased from existence

This is the fate Winston resigned himself to as soon as he opened the diary. Winston was unhappy with his life. He spends his days altering newspaper articles, speeches, anything that could make the Party look bad. In essence he, and the other people within his branch, is “rewriting history.” He spends his nights drinking victory gin in his filthy apartment. That is until he meets Julia. She works in other branch of the Ministry of Truth. Winston begins to see her around and fears she maybe a member of the Thought Police tracking him. Then, after she sends him a secret message, he realizes that she’s in love with him and they start a forbidden affair. After meeting in odd places at infrequent times, Winston rents out the room above the thrift store from which he bought his diary, owned by a man named Mr. Charrington, who is a prole, which is basically a the lowest of the lows in the Republic. They are seen with such little humanism that they do not have to follow the rules that the people of the Party do and are rarely put under surveillance. This is why Winston decides that the thrift store is a great place to have a secret hideout.

“’Do you remember,’ he went on, ‘writing in your diary ‘Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two equals four?

‘Yes,’ said Winston

O’Brien held up his left hand, its back toward Winston, with the thumb hidden and the four fingers extended.

‘How many fingers am I holding up, Winston?’

‘Four.’

‘And if the Party says that it is not four but five-then how many?’

‘Four.’

The word ended in a gasp of pain. The needle of the dial had shot up to fifty-five….

‘How many finger Winston?’

‘Four.’

The needle went up to sixty…

‘You are a slow learner, Winston,’ said O’Brien gently.

‘How can I help it,’ he blubbered. ‘How can I help what I seeing what is in front of my eyes? Two and two are four.’

‘Sometimes, Winston. Sometimes they are five. Sometimes they are three. Sometimes they are all of them at once. You must try harder. It is not easy to become sane.’”

I think this passage is really profound. I mean, what stops two plus two from being five, really? The Party has the ability to control the past, which means they can make the future whatever they want it to be. If you know, with all your heart, that two plus two equals four, but you can’t prove it, then what good is that? What if everyone around you says it equals five, and they can give you “proof” that it has always been that way, then aren’t you the crazy one? Maybe sanity is whatever the majority says it is.

“Winston, sitting in a blissful dream, paid no attention as his glass was filled up. He was not running or cheering any longer. He was back in the Ministry of Love, with everything forgiven, his soul white as snow… The long hoped-for bullet was entering his brain. He gazed up at the enormous face. Forty years it had taken him to learn what kind of smile was hidden beneath the dark mustache! O cruel, needless misunderstanding. O stubborn, self willed exile from the loving breast! Two gin-scented tears trickled down the sides of his nose. But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother.”

This passage was poignant to me. I don’t know why, but I thought good would triumph over evil and somehow Winston and everyone else oppressed by the Party would rise together and rebel. Unfortunately, Winston was caught by the thoughtpolice and broken down, just like everyone else. It was sad, beginning this book with Winston writing “DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER” in his forbidden journal and ending it with him loving the very person he was willing to do anything to take down. I would’ve thought that the human spirit was stronger, more resilient than that. I was hoping that the experience would make Winston stronger. Instead, it broke him so completely that what was left was not really a person anymore. Just like the rest of the Party citizens.

Dialectical Journal #9: The Hunger Games

Passages From The Text	Pg #	Comments & Questions
“I want to tell him he’s not being fair. That we were strangers. That I did what it took to stay alive, to keep us both alive. That I can’t explain how things are with Gale because I don’t know myself. That it’s no good loving me because I’m never going to get married anyway and he’d just end up hating me later instead of sooner. That if I do have feelings for him, it doesn’t matter because I’ll never be able to afford the kind of love that leads to a family, to children. And how can he? How can we after what we’ve been through?                  I also want to tell him how much I already miss him. But that wouldn’t be fair on my part….                 Already the boy with the bread is slipping away from me.	373-74	(R) Dear Katniss, YOU DON”T DESERVE THE BOY WITH THE BREAD. You are rude and selfish and I have no idea how you can live with yourself for making Peeta sad!!! I feel so bad for Peeta! I know Katniss is supposed to be one of those tough heroines and she’s loyal and stuff, but she’s just so dumb! I understand that she’s confused and stuff, but seriously? I know Gale has been your illegal hunting buddy for so long, but Peeta is… Peeta! He’s “the boy with the bread”, the one who can connect with people so easily, the boy who sees the good and tries his best to work with the bad (like Haymitch!). He’s just so wonderful. Turning him down is like meeting the leprechaun at the end of the rainbow, but refusing to take his gold! It’s ludicrous.

Dialectical Journal #8: The Hunger Games

Passages From The Text	Pg #	Comments & Questions
·         “Rue, who when you ask her what she loves most in the world, replies, of all things, ‘Music.’ ·         ‘Music?’ I say. In our world, I rank music somewhere between hair ribbons and rainbows in terms of usefulness. At least a rainbow gives you tips about the weather. ‘You have a lot of time for that?’ ·         ‘We sing at home. At work, too. That’s why I love your pin,’ she says, pointing to the mockingjay that I’ve again forgotten about… ·         I unclasp the pin and hold it out to her. ‘Here, you take it. It has more meaning for you than for me.’ ·         ‘Oh, no,’ says Rue, closing my fingers back on the pin. ‘I like it on you. That’s how I decided I could trust you…’”	·         212	·         (R) This part made me start wondering- just when was it decided that Katniss would be the face of the rebellion? Ever since the beginning of the book, people have been making it hard for her to forget about it that mockingjay pin. When she forgot it on the train when she arrived at the capitol, Cinna made sure that she had it before she entered the arena. Coincidence? I think not. ·