The End of the World as We Know It

If we don’t ever take the time to be quiet and take in what’s going on around us, we’re bound to miss a lot. In the film “Children of Men” it is often in the quiet moments that the most powerful things are happening.  The suicide kits that were distributed to the people of London, the Quietus kits definitely had a lot of meaning behind the name.  The “quiet-us” kits would be a more appropriate name for them because thats what they did to the people of the society.  When Jasper gives the Quietus to both his wife and his dog and then refuses to give any information to Luke, there is a lot of powerful meaning in that silence.  Another scene that demonstrates this is when the soldiers hear the baby crying for the first time and stop their fighting for Theo and Kee to pass by. This scene is especially powerful because of the sheer amazement in the eyes of the soldiers when they stop their fighting.  They watch quietly as this one beacon of hope passes them by right before their eyes.  There’s really no surprise that many of the powerful moments of this movie happen when there is a quiet moment because there is so much going on and those are the times where you can absorb what you have seen and really take in what’s going on.

Please take a few minutes to read a New York Times book review of Zadie Smith’s White Teeth, by clicking the link.

We’ll be discussing it in class tomorrow.

Quick announcement: I’m postponing the response paper supposedly due on Tuesday.  It will be due on Thursday instead.  I’ll post a question early next week.