domingo, 26 de octubre de 2008

"A Great Female Thinker"


“A room of one’s own” by Virginia Woolf, is a piece of work that excellently depicts how women were seen during the 20th century. Nevertheless, we can still see some examples of women being looked down on by men and by society in general, including some women.
Regardless of the fact that women have not had enough room to express themselves, there are some powerful women that through politics, music, poetry, and so on, have made the world think about what’s going on with regards to women and life in general. This is what Virginia did in a marvellous way. It seems to be that she wrote everything she felt, and those thoughts, ideas, feelings, etc, have been passed on to us in a way that it has made us think about the role of men and women in society.
Luckily, the situation has changed in a rather violent way. In fact, we have two women who are president in Latin America, and I would definitely not be surprised if I see the same case in the States or in Europe. Nowadays, women are speaking up, they fulfill very important roles, they can study, work, be artists, and everything they want!
I truly believe that art can make a big change, and this is what Virginia helped to do in some way.

sábado, 18 de octubre de 2008

"Charles Dickens' great works"-corrected version.


I have realized that finding out more about the authors’ lives is really helpful. When we get to know different aspects of an author’s life experience, it becomes easier to understand his/her works. However, I must admit that I had to read “The Signalman” three times to get enough ideas out of it. In “The Signalman” the reader can see the trip that Charles Dickens went through during his life. Maybe he wanted to leave behind certain moments that affected him and that became ghosts in the end. I think that the train is all his psychological baggage. The train represents his story, memories, pains, and so on. Furthermore, when the train passed, some strange force wanted to challenge his mental strength, making him believe has was seeing a man. However, he fortunately realized it was a ghost. This story represents life. Life is evolving day by day, we are witnesses to new technological devices, but sometimes we do not go beyond the surface in order to think more critically and be more self-reflective. Thereby, the train may pass by us and we end up thinking why, but not even considering the fact that we probably did not pay close attention to what was happening in our worlds within, with our inborn life motivations, etc.On the other hand, we have “Oliver Twist”, a film that shows us how cruel life can be to a child who is deprived of the minimum conditions to survive. This story depicts Dicken’s own life. He wanted to take his past life experience into writing. He knew very well how sacrificed is to work from an early age. He could not have a family since they all went to jail, and so on. Dickens showed us how present individualism, abuse of power and social injustice were in the Victorian Age.

jueves, 16 de octubre de 2008

"Seeing without seeing"-Corrected version


Undoubtedly, “Frankenstein” is one of the most important literary works in the nineteenth century. Nonetheless, it still produces a lot of impact on the readers that are getting to know the story nowadays. “Frankenstein” was written by Mary Shelley, a brilliant English writer that had a very intense life, which apparently inspired her to create her works. With regards to “Frankenstein”, Shelley’s life experience seems to be absolutely present throughout the whole story.
I think that the creation of the monster was a way for Mary to say what she could not say when being through terrible moments like the loss of her baby. She felt devastated, wiped out by life, by her partner. Moreover, she “killed” her baby, so desperation, hopelessness, and any kind of guilt overwhelmed her. All those issues might have been the inspiration to create the story. Thereby, every detail I have mentioned helped to create the characteristics of the monster. Thus, we would be able to say that the monster is a kind of “dustbin” because all “bad feelings” like fears, guilt, frustration, were thrown away into it.
What comes into my head is the example of a person who feels lonely, singled out, with a low self-esteem, and eats everything he/she finds as a way to have some control over his/her actions. After eating, there comes some tiredness that makes forget. Perhaps Mary Shelley would feel relieved after messing around and behaving as a monster. However, in the monster’s inner self, there was a human, a human that maybe did not want to feel and needed some mask to speak up.
On the other hand, oddly enough, it was a man the one who gave birth to the baby (Victor creating the creature), so it is highly possible that due to the weakness the mother felt, she wanted to perform a man. A man was “for sure” going to be able to create a monster, but who was the monster then? Mary? or did she feel that she could only give birth to a monster? That is a question I do not have an answer to. Nevertheless, I imagine that by having a man giving birth to a baby, she could criticize a man not giving support to a woman who has just lost a baby.Despite everything I have mentioned, there is a theme that goes beyond the surface. I refer to the human capacity to create “monsters”. How far have we gone? Are our actions able to do harm to ourselves, to society? How powerful is the capacity of influence? Nowadays, we see on television terrible pieces of news. What shocks me the most, however, is that as time goes by, it seems that they are more and more.
What is happening inside our heads that we are so vulnerable? Where is the strenght that all of us are supposed to have? Stress, selfishness, “work slavery”, corruption, amongst other deplorable concepts, are taking control of human beings’ minds. The desire of success blinds humans, making them not realize the actions they make. It is really interesting to think about the possibility that humans are able to create their destinies, the possibility of being the ones to blame for their pains. The consequences of “blind actions” may cause a lot of damage. Ergo, as time goes by, the “train of life” may pass by us and without realizing how much we did not do. Some people end up being ill, embittered, lonesome, and then people say that the blind cannot see, but maybe they can see without seeing...

martes, 7 de octubre de 2008

"The power of colours"



After seeing the picture, I can have two different opinions about it, depending on the colour the picture is shown. First, I saw the picture in black&white and I perceived something completely different from what I saw in the second time, when I saw it in colours. In black&white, the image shows me desertion, abandonment, autumn, coldness, regardless of the fact that the two girls do not seem to be sad or cold. That place is full of leaves, or garbage (I cannot really see what there is there), but anyway, dry leaves is a synonym of death, decline, etc. Nevertheless, some time ago those leaves were blossoming, and it was probably spring, so I can directly relate this description to “The waste land” and its part “What the thunder said”.
This part of this masterpiece has directly to do with death and decline. The text talks about the decay of eastern Europe, amongst other themes. “What the thunder said” says “...He who was living is now dead, We who were living are now dying...” Nonetheless, if I see the picture in colours, I can see two girls looking for something in an abandoned place, full of newspapers, probably old books, etc.
Having different colours can change the whole view we have about something. Colours are so powerful that they can give life, death, or any feeling to anything! I agree with those people that say “Give colour to your life” (I’m not sure if I can say this in English, it’s probably translated, but I want to express what I’m thinking of right now) And having attached images to a piece of literary work, text of any type, etc..can help readers perceive different things, read different messages, etc. This is why the objective correlative is so important. It makes readers feel more, understand more, make more relations between different topics, texts, etc.