“The Judgment,” by Franz Kafka

Group Members: Myra Khan, Chi Zhang, Diana Rodriguez

Many people see this ending as somehow unrealistic. Do you agree? Why or why not?

I think that the story becomes unrealistic midway so I sort of understand why the ending is like this. The reason I feel the story had already taken an unrealistic turn is because of what the father was saying to Georg. As Chi pointed out; Georg’s father was probably waiting for the right moment before he told his son his wrong doings over the years and accused him of those things. After his father started to tell Georg about his real self the father kept referring to the devil. As in Georg is the devil. The father starts with how Georg’s friend “crumbles up your letter with his left hand while he holds up my letters to read them with the right!” Religiously speaking it is said the devil is represented usually on the left side. Another reason the story becomes unrealistic and bends more towards religion is when the father calls Georg a “devilish human” and “Condemns him to death by drowning.” This leads Georg to run away because he felt like he was being ‘chased away’ after his father said those words. Ironically before Georg runs to his death the charwoman yelled “Jesus!” This is what lead Georg to do suicide, because of the prior events that occurred. So the ending is fairly realistic because it goes hand in hand with the events that had occurred before. It’s an unrealistic ending for an unrealistic story. So the ending makes a lot of sense to me.

     -Myra K.

 

Who is responsible for Georg’s decision at the end of the story?

I believe Georg and his father are both responsible for his suicidal decision at the end of the story by means of self-realization and condemnation.  It can be inferred that Georg knows the wrong things he has done yet he finds excuses for himself throughout the story; such as how he ponders whether or not to tell his friend to come back in the beginning of the story and when he considers moving his father into a brighter room.  If he had really cared about the ways he treated his father, he would not have neglected him for so long especially when they lived in the same house.  This can be seen from their routines, “they would sit together a while in their common living room, each reading his own newspaper, unless, and this happened quite often, Georg went out with his friends or visited his bride”.  Certainly, he spends some time with his father each day yet from the fact that he did not know what his father was reading meant it was very seldom and even rare that he exchanged conversations with his father.  As for his father, it is likely that he was waiting for the right moment for him to pour out all his thoughts and observations of his son’s wrong doings over the years and accuse him of those things and finally condemns Georg to drowning.   At the end of the story as Myra have mentioned to be a bit unrealistic, although there wasn’t anything tangible to the human body pulling Georg, he still drowned.  This could be the result of how his self-realization coming into play making him feel his guilty or it could be his father’s command that has overpowered him since childhood.  

-Chi Z.

 

What is the significance of the very last line of the story: “At this moment, almost endless traffic rolled across the bridge”?  I slightly agree with what Chi and Myra pointed out. Myra describes a battle between good and evil and Chi explains how Georg and his father are both equally at fault of the ending, resulting in Georg to committing suicide. I however, believe that there was something more, I felt that Georg and his father might be dealing with a lot of suppressed emotions that possibly caused trauma, maybe even a disturbed mind. I think that after their mother figure passed away they both felt lost. Georg began to write about “a friend” and his father began to live in darkness. I also agree with Chi, when she mentions how he began to pour all his thoughts about Georg’s wrong doings. This encounter that happened at the end where the father started to expose the true Georg, I think it was the last straw for both of them. I felt that Georg was going through a lot and his father was not in the right state of mind which caused him to wish death upon his son. Now, regarding the last line. It can signify, that no one noticed, and life still went on for others around, which is why the traffic continued endlessly. Also it was on a bridge, Georg might have died not only of drowning but of falling off a high bridge. And finally, the line that really struck me most, was when Georg says “But dear parents, I have always loved you”, this alone proved to my point that I think Georg went through a lot of pain, maybe even while his mother was alive as well, and that maybe he was never really appreciated the way he truly wished.

-Diana R.

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The Judgement- Rosshelle

1) Who is responsible for Georg’s decision at the end of the story?

The theory of someone else being responsible for the decision of Georg at the end of the story is very ambiguous.  I believe that Georg’s decision at the end of the story is solely the fault of himself. Since the beginning of the story Georg begins to show evidence of depression and escaping reality: “After enclosing the envelope in playful slowness, he rested on his ebows on the desk and gazed through the window onto the river” and “he said he no longer understood the circumstances at home and he might remain abroad in any case, embittered by advise and more alienated from his friends than ever”. These quotes depict how Georg writes letters to a friend who might not exist, which describes the circumstances he is living himself; he is escaping from reality through a letter to an inexistent friend, which seems more like a personal journal. Therefore, Georg’s decision in the end of the story is a decision he made to permanently escape from the world he no longer wants to be  a part of.

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Your Mid-Point Reflections on March 24th

Many of you offered some good tips, for everyone to improve his or her performance, and you pointed to some viable areas to work on. Also, from your responses, I learned that I, too, can help with things I need to work on, so this was productive, I think, for all of us!

Helpful suggestions: Frequent writing (a nice part of the hybrid course); exchange of ideas with group members; annotating sources (thanks, Radia!); using the quizzes as starting points for the discussion.

Things you can work on: using college preparation as a way of working out how to balance your school work and your personal life (thanks, Chi!); speaking up in class (and as Mel suggests, one can “practice” a response in a blog, to help prepare you to respond in class) and trying to get yourself to speak up more will actually help to improve your confidence level when speaking in front of others; looking more deeply into the text; focusing more on specific pieces of text, as this will help you grasp more deeply; writing with more intent and more concisely; if you’re confused, think about how you feel, and note an emotional response (thanks, Mel!); relaxing during free-writing (it’s free, after all). Also, free-writing can also be looked at as brainstorming, so I think you’re doing the right thing, Chi, and as Myra says, don’t think too much about what you’re writing, just go with your ideas; working on pre-writing exercises (take the essay in steps); being more open to group work; working on the structure of the paragraph (it is, after all, the bones of the essay).

Things I need to work on: Giving everyone more time for free-writing. Perhaps I’ll try giving you some time for writing, then giving you time for reflecting, then for writing again? We can talk about this. . Something I’d like to try with you is called a “silent dialogue.” Also, I want to start devoting more time to our circle (we always seem to be running out of time, so that’s something I need to work on).

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Brian Baigorria, Sabera Qazi, William Dayan

As someone who has never been the best at writing I’d say I have learned a few things from this class and have continued to improve my past writing skills. I find that the weekly assignments we have has forced me to remember all that I’ve learned week after week. Not just when there is an essay due and I have to summon all my past writing skills to appear just for it. I’d say that personally I still have a lot to overcome when it comes to talking openly during class and raising my hand as I never do this willingly. Furthermore although I have gotten better at free writing because of the in class exercises I still think I can get better at learning to think quicker about a topic and being able to put my thoughts into words at a faster pace as well.
When it comes to my groupmates I think they are both well developed writers who know what to put what they’re thinking into words. A concern I would present to my groupmates would be that Bill could add more details to his paragraphs at times. A way to do this would be to use more examples from texts to get a more narrow focus of the topic. A concern for Sabera would be to be more specific in her paragraphs at times. A way to do this would be to keep to a certain topic consistently.
-Brian Baigorria

So far in this course, I have definitely found a lot of growth as both a student and writer. Reading works that challenge me to learn about genres or time periods I am usually not interested in has brought a new intellectual experience into my life. In addition, the weekly online writing assignments push me to examine the text more closely, often causing me to inquire about the historical relations or underlying theme of a text. I find usually I do not read too much into stories, but looking at a deeper meaning of the writing as we do in this class gives me insight on what the author may be going towards. The class discussions we have also give me reason to think as others in my class bring up great point of views that I would have never imagined. I believe I can get better at centering my ideas to have a main topic as I feel like I’m often conflicted in my ideas.
I believe both of my group members always supply great points in the weekly writing assignments. However, if I were to have to choose something to critique I would suggest for Brian to sometimes word his sentences to be more clear and succinct, and for Bill to explain his supporting details more. Otherwise, I do believe that being in a group where I am often working with others’ opinions have been more of a help to me.
-Sabera Qazi

The writing of this course this semester has shifted the way I think about writing. I found a quote that appropriately summarizes how my thinking towards writing has changed: “I write because I don’t know what I think until I read what I say.” Throughout my writings in this class, I saw writing as a way of expressing what I thought. I would think of something, and then write it down. That led me to summarize, and not analyze. But as I continued to see your comments on my papers telling me to “analyze and not summarize,” I noticed that writing should itself be my way of thinking, not just a means for expressing my thought. To improve my future writings, I feel that I need to actually, physically write my outlines on papers because that will allow me to divulge into my thoughts deeper. Another part that I felt was helpful was reading my peer papers. I feel that peer writings are designed to help the people whose paper is being written, but it didn’t turn out to be that way for me. It turned out to be that I learned a lot from reading other papers: I saw new ideas and a different perspective on the writings. I also found that writing an essay in as many sittings as possible is the best way to do it. I found that taking breaks and detaching myself from the essay for a while allows me to be flexible-making sure my mind isn’t stuck on just one idea.
-William Dayan

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Midterm Assessment: Radia and Mel

Comment #1 – Radia

 

I’ve learned how to manage my timing for this class and make the readings a priority. The quizzes and blog posts have helped create a deeper analysis on the texts for me. Of course, the quizzes force students to read, but it’s also helped process my thoughts. However, for the essay I still need to break my ideas down more and avoid being too general. I need to develop my ideas more and add quotes. I haven’t presented yet for the oral communication, but watching the two groups have helped a lot. Their presentations gave me ideas and advice on how to present mine.

       Mel, I used to have a difficult time finding evidence in other sources as well. Sometimes it’s hit and miss. My suggestion is just to annotate the article you may be reading. Although this is a skill that we have been drilled to do, this simple task helps. Instead of reading for just evidence, reading the article as a whole may help.

 

Coment #2 – Mel

 

Throughout the semester, we’ve had some deep analysis and discussions about life and society. It made me strengthen my analytical abilities as well as being detail-oriented. I like how the blogs give all of us an opportunity to express what we want to say that we didn’t have a chance to in class. This provides a good opportunity for all of us to speak up for our own thoughts and become more confident. One thing I need to work on is finding sufficient evidence in other sources to back up my claims. Although I’d like to think writing in a logical order will provide a clear basis of what I’m trying to say, but it would only strengthen my claim much more.

Radia, for quotes, one thing that I like to do is: as I’m reading, if a certain event in the plot causes any emotion (shocked, surprised, happy, sad, etc.), I put like a little note next to it, or I remember where it is. That way, it’s easy to reference back to the text and know where certain quotes are or be able to find a useful quote. I hope this helps!

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Midpoint Refelction

At the beginning of this semester, I thought Eng2850 would be another writing class, another stake of essays, and another bunch of not carefully read books. But it turns out that it is not like what I expect. One thing helped me most is the questions our professor gave in class and online, or in other words, various ways of interpreting one single text. Moreover, I think she also leaves us proper time for reading assignment, thus I am given time to read carefully, and digest the text. Now I enjoy my reading so much and become more interested in reading. About the strengths and weakness, I know for sure that I still need to work on my essay. Grammar, logic, vocabulary, structure are all supposed to be improved. Now I learned how to write the paragraph and hopefully I’ll keep practicing expressing my idea in a proper way. Besides, I always write slower than my classmates, and I’m always the last one to hand in the quiz. From my point of view, this is because I spend longer time composing my thoughts, and usually only after others have finished writing that I finally begin to write. Right now I haven’t seen any strengths. Maybe it is because the weaknesses are so apparent that I can spare no effort thinking of others. I believe things will become better through practicing.

 

—-Zeyu Kang

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Midpoint Reflections

One of the areas in which I feel I have improved throughout the course of this semester is in class participation. I greatly appreciate our group discussions and our circular seating arrangement which encourages this larger conversation. It is beneficial to not only voice your thoughts/concerns about a piece of work, but to also listen to and consider other people’s opinions at the same time. You have to be open to new ideas. I also believe my writing is developing. Now, I am able to write and think in a more promptly manner. In the past, I had trouble with timing as I would tend to second guess myself. However, the short quizzes, weekly posts, and the midterm have all helped me progress as an author. I feel a little more confident in my abilities. Something I still need  to work on is my free-writing. I often hesitate before I get anything down on paper and I never end up writing much by the time our time is up. I hope I can learn to let my thoughts flow without allowing my worries to hinder the process. Free-writing is an important exercise and I could surely benefit from more practice with it.

 

  • Emily Weiss

 

Emily, i could understand where you’re coming from with the timing problem. Whenever one is writing, time goes by at an exponential rate and we don’t even realize it. One way you could tackle this problem is by just having a watch right next to you in order to time yourself and make sure you’re not spending too much time on on any aspect of the writing process. In addition, the hesitation you face when you’re planning out what you’re writing is a similar problem many of us face. In my opinion i feel like it’s better to just put anything anything down on paper and then fix it once you’re finished instead of rushing at the end to put everything down.

 

  • Borys’ response to Emily

 

One area that i have been developing in this class is free-writing and in-class writing overall. I haven’t hand-written any work in over four years so it was a pretty big shock to discover that the midterm was going to be done in class. Although i never really enjoyed writing things out on paper, i have adjusted in this class and worked on improving this skill. Some things that i still need to work on my ability to think faster and come with responses to the free writes in a shorter period of time. At the current moment the five minutes we get is never enough for me to come up with a coherent argument that i could actually put down on paper. So i will work on this by answering more practice freewrites. Overall though i feel like all of the in-class writing activities has significantly helped me improve as a writer.

  • Borys Shturman

 

Borys, it’s great to hear how much the free writing has helped you develop your skills. This is something I’m looking to improve myself, so I’m happy to hear your feedback. I understand your concern about wanting to work on answering the free-writes faster because i sometimes also struggle with the same problem. One thing I would also encourage you to do would be to just put your thoughts down on paper right after you have heard the prompt. Even if you have nothing to say, just write anything down; this should help you think quicker and overcome the writers block that you seem to have at times.

 

  • Emily’s response to Borys
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Midpoint Reflections (Vyonna Etheleau)

English has always been a subject I’ve struggled with during my time in school due to writing. I’ve always been great at reading and analyzing texts but the flow of writing an essay is a battle for me that I know I need to overcome. Because of this class I am much more comfortable with free writing in class and I think its because some the texts chosen this semester tend to leave the readers with a lot of questions or thoughts to evaluate.  I also need to work on my spelling, grammar as well as my use of punctuation when writing. I’ve always considered group work to be annoying from past experiences of being left to do most of the work or being given the most challenging portion but during my time in Baruch, I’ve come to understand that group work is unavoidable and will also be that way with most jobs. Communicating with my group members has not been challenging which I am thankful for and helping each other isn’t difficult either.

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Jonathan Kerstein-March 24th Assignment

(Belong to group with Roshelle Munoz, posted earlier)

During the semester, one aspect of the course that has definitely helped me was learning and then working on the paragraph structure. The analysis of a work (in spite of Roshelle’s comment on her own post addressed to me – I’m not exactly sure what the basis for her assertion was) has always been something I’ve been able to do, however the ability to refine that analysis into a paragraph that flowed naturally had long eluded me. Further, reading and then writing about Life of a Sensuous Woman allowed me to consider the ubiquity of the social injustices experienced by women of that time, and how those injustices helped shape the “floating world” of Kyoto. Without having read that work, in addition to not being able to refine my thoughts into a more structured paragraph, I feel I would not be able to do a critical analysis of a work nearly as well, nor would I possess the ability to use a work in order to sympathize with a group of people.

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Midpoint Reflection March 24th Assignment

Throughout my education, I have known myself to be a below average writer. I mess up with punctuations, spelling, etc.  Despite this, I still enjoy this class very much. I enjoy to stories that we read and the deep analysis that we talk about during class. Most would say that I am wrong, but I enjoy the quizzes. They make sure that I read and understand the text, instead of just reading it and not interpreting any of it. For my strengths and weakness, I can know for a fact that my oral work is weaker than my written ones. The problem with oral for me is you have to speak it and that is a hard thing for me because I’m shy. When I get shy, I get flustered and I lose my train of thought. I have however believed that I have improved a bit this semester by participating in the large class discussions. As for my written communication, I have a lot of things to still work on, for example, my grammar.

-Denny Huang

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