great works ii – 2850 jta 12:25-2:05: love letters from the world

It is now the end of the semester and compared to the midterm is see an interesting change. I felt that as the stories we were ask to read got more abstract and were more open to many interpretation, I found that I would get more invested to the story being that I had come up with the endings myself due to their abstractness. Emphasis of the course turned more too comprehensive as opposed to writing which I enjoyed for I already had a grasp on writing and wanted a better understanding on how to interpret a text and its meaning, and I did.

Bartleby- allegory of the cave
In Plato’s allegory of the cave, there are four prisoner one in which escapes. This prisoner now enlightened with new found knowledge early tries to teach it to the other, but to no avail, for they are stuck in their ways. Plato used this allegory to explain why his friend and teach Socrates was sentenced to death and also why he would not preach his ideals more aggressively. Bartleby does too (like the prisoner) to a realization. Did he not retaliate because of fear of prosecution or did he feel those around him will not “get it”?

Sensuous woman- 5 stages of grief
The five stages of grievance is denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. The sensuous woman’s desire has led her to many hardships and as she told her stories to the two men is was clear she was grieving. When and how the narrator did experience denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance?

Franz Kafka’s The Judgement describes the struggle of a father-son relationships. This story explores Georg and ever-present conflict that Georg has been dealing with his father. The narrator states, “Perhaps during his mother’s lifetime his father’s insistence on having everything his own way in the business had hindered him from developing any real activity of his own”. This can very well be the reason why Georg’s father considers Georg a lonely, sad, and submissive person. Hence, it can be implied that the father is to be responsible for Georg’s action at the end. At the end of this story Georg uses the cover of the train to kill himself “At this moment, an almost endless traffic rolled across the bridge” could it be even through death Georg didn’t want to make a splash-so to speak? Many people have found this ending as somehow unrealistic and this may be in fact because of the many uses of “dreams” in this story but I tend to find this ending unrealistic because of its promptness, Georg, is about to get married, and his business is beginning to make progress yet a scolding by his father that can very well be because of jealousy for outshining him; is the push he needs to commit suicide.

Jorge G

I always enjoyed writing. With this Great Works class, I was able to not only practice on a skill I always enjoyed but also been introduced to many different concepts in literature? From Campbell’s heroes journey present in the Journey to the West to the classification of the types of heroes in Bartleby the Scrivener. Due to the writing intensity of this course, I found it detrimental to finally learn correct grammar and punctuation- all something I knew was a weakness but never worked on due to lack of incentive. I preferably enjoy presenting, though a bit nerve wrecking always to start I, find with the participation of the crowd and or confidence in the material I’m presenting I tend to warm up and feel at ease after a while.
-Jorge G.

In Bartleby the Scrivener, Wall Street lawyer in need of copyists hires the quiet, reserved, and mysterious Bartleby. After a few days of doing great work, Bartleby is asked to do a task, to which he replies, “I would prefer not to.” The narrator puzzled but strangely fascinated by Bartleby’s odd behavior tries his best to understand and accommodate to Bartleby. Underneath the comic actions of Bartleby, one can say he is shedding light to the limitations of our lives and the futility of our being. A key component of a traditional hero is or any hero is the realization of something that is eluding others- as Bartleby did. “Ah, Bartleby! Ah, humanity!” said by the lawyer after receiving a letter for Bartleby after his death, is there to only highlight that Bartleby’s actions at last made sense to him; there is futility in our existence. Bartleby’s hero’s journey was complete, as according to Campbells’ diagram the return of the hero with knowledge that influence other is the last stage of a journey.

Looking back at her life as a prostitute to two young men in need of guidance, a now aged woman tells her life story in relation to love and what she learned throughout. Each section of the story features a new man, and her different approaches toward love as she grows older. Her first love affair was with the samurai. “For four or five days-I couldn’t tell whether I was asleep or awake”, this was the purest she believed is ever been; eluding to herself as “bud of a lotus” and “purity of water”. The story progresses where she is now was a teacher and grew to love a man who was one of her customers. She “made love with the man day and night. When he lost his desire, she would strengthen him with food and continued.” This “love” resembled more like lust than the affection she had for the samurai. Case in point, her ability to love seemed to a have depreciated and become more twisted (Monk temple)as her relations progress with many man, each receiving less.

A major theme that seems to be emerging in the poem “Ten” is dichotomy. Dichotomy is a contrast between two things that are represented as entirely unalike; it can be good and be bad at the same time. By Tao’s use dichotomies one can understand that viewing life in clear cut options with no grey area can be the cause of problems. The poem then ends with “This is primal virtue” I immediately think as this as the middle ground or the grey area that talks about in every line.  For example, “Attending fully and becoming supple, can you be as a newborn babe ?”, when someone attends fully they are being  there or in the moment. Whereas when being supple you are simply letting go. Tao then describes the grey area or primal virtue as a baby. A baby is a perfect analogy because a baby is able to pay a great amount of attention but is so pure and unburden that it’s easy for it to detach.