Author Archives: a.wheeler

“Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets/ And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes/ Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows?…” (Eliot, lines 70-73)

In the literal sense, these three lines are quite basic. They describe Prufrock walking through the streets of some unknown city and regarding numerous men he sees leaning out of their respective windows alone. The only term I was unsure of was “shirt-sleeves”; after looking it up I found it means to be informally dressed. 

I chose this passage, not because it was difficult to understand, but the imagery of these few lines was a poignant representation of the theme of loneliness in the modern age this poem explores. Through the time of modernity, urbanization was at the forefront. As we spoke about in class, although the technological advancements of the age brought people closer together whether, in proximity or means of communication, it also brought devastation at much higher rates. In a city where millions of people live together, the world Prufrock sees is full of lonely men. 

Eliot, T.S. “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.” 1922. The Norton Anthology of World Literature: Volume F, W.W. Norton & Company, 2012, p. 543.

To think of our world in terms of abstraction is extremely valuable in furthering our understanding of what it means to be a human being. While I can understand that philosophical texts such as this one are somewhat difficult to get through, I believe that’s what makes it a “Great Work”; a text with this distinction should challenge us. In the act of expanding our views, boundaries of thought must be tested and that which fails against the strain is replaced with something better. Profound works are those that inspire us. The search for purpose is in everything we do as human beings: the art we create, the music we listen to, the books we decide to read. I truly believe that the world is bigger than we know and pieces like Alexander Pope’s, Essay on Man, unveil a little more of it. 

When I first got through the text, after much misunderstanding and re-reading, I thought of the type of person who would write a text like this. Is this sphere of thought, exclusive to the highly educated? Do only the upper strata of our society’s class have the time and resources to determine philosophical musings? Can a part of humanity truly contain the whole of it? I believe to be human is to search for more. Texts like Essay on Man, are important to our understanding of the evolution of philosophical thought throughout history and sociological advancement but it is a very narrow scope. Reality varies over identities in our society. The life of a Black teenage college student from a middle-class background in an urban setting will inherently be different from the life of a white middle-aged construction worker from a small town. “Great Works”, especially those in the philosophy genre, need to be broadened exponentially to truly begin an understanding of the whole of humanity. How else will we know more?

Hi everyone! My name is Audre Wheeler and I am a sophomore here at Baruch. Currently, my major is Management in Musical Enterprises through the Weissman School but I am interested in expanding and possibly double majoring in this and Film. I’ve been at Baruch since I started college so if you ever need a hand around campus just let me know! I am a New York native, I have lived in Brooklyn all of my life and most of my family is from here as well. My grandfather on my mother’s side is originally from Barbados and some of my family still live there. Unfortunately, I only speak English but I plan to minor in French. I’ve always wanted to learn another language and since I was only able to take French in 10th grade, I thought that I’d continue now. I’ve been involved with music my entire life. In 7th and 8th grade, I was apart of my middle school’s choir and had the opportunity to tour around New York state. Ever since then music has become embedded in my goals and it’s something I have always wanted to pursue. I worked at a recording studio in my senior year and attended New York University for a summer to take a class in music business. I’ve always been a very ambitious person and I’ve tried to do as much as I possibly can to get to where I want to be. I attended 3 different high schools before graduating, including an all-girls Catholic school and all-girls public school. Though difficult at times, I think the amount of transition I went through allowed me to better develop my adaptability to different situations. During most of my high school career summers, I attended an academic camp called the John Hopkins Center for Talented Youth. Through this experience, I was able to attend many different college-level classes and come into contact with a lot of different environments. I believe that this had helped me adapt more easily to the college lifestyle. I don’t have much of a professional writing background aside from school assignments. Personally, though, I write constantly. I write an array of things from songs to screenplays to poetry to personal essays. I’ve always been better at writing than any of my other subjects. I was never great at math or science or any technical areas but I always seemed to succeed in more creative areas. After college, whether I work in music or film, I know that writing is going to be an essential part of my job. I would like to develop my writing skills throughout college and definitely in this class.