Author Archives: laura cvikevich

Because the story did have a threatening tone, and a suspenseful plot, it got my attention from the opening paragraph.  The story opens up with the husband and wife conversing about the infamous blind man, Robert coming for a visit. The blind man was a friend of the wives and as much as she was looking forward to seeing her friend after 10 years, it is clear that her husband isn’t to pleased about Robert’s visit. He even says, “A blind man in my house was not something I looked forward too.”  He had no hesitation when it came down to bashing the blind, and basically just showing no pity for the disabled what so ever.

Raymond Carver does a phenomenal job at keeping the reader interested. In fact, after reading the short story, all I wanted to do was read more.  For the most part the narrator sounds irritated, and sometimes hostile.   Knowing how bothered the narrator is by Robert’s blindness I made an immediate connection to Aylmer in “The Birth-mark”.  It was interesting to see that the things that bothered these two men the most, were things that were uncontrollable.  You can’t control whether or not you will be born with a birthmark despite the size and shape.  Similarly, it is fair to say that people who are born blind, do not chose that fate.  In fact they are born with a disability that should never be questioned or ridiculed.  Another similarity between Aylmer and the husband or narrator is although they seem relaxed as the stories progress; they both still challenge the imperfections of others.  When the husband asks Robert to turn on the TV, clearly he is looking to test him.

I had no hope for the narrator until he allowed the blind man to help him draw the cathedral on a paper bag.  This experience helped him learn about not only himself, but communicating with someone who earlier believed, was incapable of anything.

Out of all the short stories we have read this semester, this one seemed to intrigue me the most.  I liked the fact that at the end of the story, he learned something from someone who he believed was inferior to him.   That interested me the most.  There are too many people out there who believe they are better than everyone, and capitalize on others flaws, instead of reaching out and in the end, ultimately bettering themselves.   

Team Irony

Laura Cvikevich, Elizabeth Kim, Olivia Caban, Danny Shimhayiv

*SCENE STARTS W/ GEORGINA SLEEPING*

*Aylmer walks in*

He says, it is gone!  The birthmark has disappeared! “Success, success!”

*Liz Laughing in the background.

*I wake up, and I look in the mirror, and I am happy that it is gone, but I am worried that Aylmer is still not happy.

Aylmer tries to make me feel better by saying I am perfect, and I’m looking good.

I say, “To everyone else, I am perfect, but to you, I was never enough.  Now look what you’ve done, I’m dying.”

EHRENREICH GIVES MONOLOGUE

“Hawthorne is allowing the overly appeasing Georgiana to take the typical 19^th century feminine role as the naive, eager to please woman. Because Georgiana is so naïve, she’s allowing this “dominant male” to persuade her into believing he had the anecdote to rid her of her ghastly birthmark. Alymer successfully does something that Americans have been doing for centuries, fooling this poor woman into believing that there is nothing to fear… then what do you know? His fair maiden is perfect…perfectly dead. Great job Dr. A, you achieved in creating the perfect woman…by typical male standards at least; she can’t complain, she can’t argue – why, she’s freakishly perfect.”

The movie, “Best in Show” was a hilarious one.  From the first scene with the couple and their dog in a therapy session, it caught my attention.  In most comedy’s, a structured plot, or even a deep insight is not common.  It just so happened in this film, there was one.  All of these competing couples and their dogs were fighting for the same thing.  The champion dog.  This accomplishment would have made any one of the competitors, ‘happy’.  It was interesting to see, a various number of couples competing with each other, even one couple, sleeping in a janitors closet, just to have the opportunity to having trained, the champion dog.

Throughout the entire movie, all of these people are fighting and competing with each other to win the competition, and ultimately, be happy.  The things they put themselves through in their pursuits of happiness is ridiculous.

But does winning something necessarily make you happy?  I think not.  I would argue, winning something brings you temporary happiness, but not life long.   Quite obviously, the owners of the champion dog were ecstatic to have owned and trained the winning pooch.  As for the dog, I’m sure they weren’t even aware of their great accomplishment.

This was a movie that not only portrayed the pursuit of happiness, but the struggle and hardships one has to go through in order to ultimately attain happiness, or in this case, the champion dog.  It wasn’t until I discovered the deep insight of this movie that I began to understand the overall theme.  Happiness comes from within you, not from your wins or losses.  Winning something brings you a temporary happiness, which is a stepping-stone to developing and attaining life long happiness.