Honors English Project Part 3!

 

Negro Spirituals

 

Negro spirituals were songs that were sung while slaves worked for hours on end in the fields of labor. Usually the songs were directed at the owners but were also directed towards God helping them in their time of need. These spirituals were also used as a way of communicating with each other and some songs were sung by one person while a group of other people would reply back with either the same verse or a different verse. The songs were also used to express personal emotions and also for cheering each other up. Lyrics to the spirituals were tightly linked to the authors of the songs themselves: the slaves.

 

 

Call and Response

 

Call and Response was created by African Americans. These songs would include one person who would sing out one line of the song and then other people around him/her would sing the next line which was a response to the first line. Call and Response is important because it helped the slaves communicate with each other through a song and not get attacked by any slaveholders.

 

Motif

 

A motif is a recurring subject in a book or piece of writing. They help shape the book and create the story. Motifs are very noticeable and they are mostly a recurring object or person that symbolizes something in the book. They play a significant role in the events of a story.

 

Genre



 

Genre is an artistic category. They categorize a story as fiction, non fiction, horror, romance etc. They help out with categorizing because it helps the reader know what kind of book they're wanting to read. Books can also have multiple genres like a action-romance book where the book is all about, well action and romance. Genres are helpful in ways because without them in the literary world, every book that was picked up would be classified as the same book right next to it.

 



Irony

 

Irony is something that either the reader can pick up pretty quick or a character in the book already notices something that one character doesn't notice. Irony has three categories: Verbal Irony, Dramatic Irony, and Situational Irony. Irony can be humorous because a character in a book doesn't pick up on what is about to happen and then when the event does happen it usually is pretty humorous. Irony is important in books because it helps ease tension in the book and create a sense of humor in an author. Irony is also when a writer writes something that can mean something completely different. 

 

 

Verbal Irony

 

Verbal irony is used in everyday conversations as one of the worlds oldest form: Sarcasm. Verbal irony examples: Clear as mud, soft as concrete. Verbal irony is when someone says one thing and then uses the complete opposite of what it really is. Mud isn't really clear at all and concrete is hard as a rock. Keep in mind that verbal irony isn't always sarcasm. It can also be considered offensive if it is used too late or too early in a conversation. Verbal irony in a book is important (even if the author doesn't use it) because they can help bring humor into a story or a strict conversation that helps as an ice breaker. 



Situational Irony

 

Situational irony is when the final outcome is completely different than what the people expected. Examples of this are: A man avoids being hit by going into another lane only to be hit by a truck or a woman has saved enough money to by a watch for herself when her daughter comes home and has the same watch for her as a gift. Sometimes Situational Irony can be considered as a coincidence rather than irony itself.

 

Dramatic Irony

 

Dramatic Irony is defined when the audience reading the book knows what will happen and the characters in the book do not have any idea what is going to happen. Dramatic irony in a book is important because the audience automatically already knows what is going to happen while the characters do not. If the audience knows what will happen then it prepares them for the future events about to unfold. 

Honors English Project 2 Authors!

 

Edgar Allen Poe

 

Edgar was born in 1809 and he died in 1849. Poe was the first person in American literature to make the bad guys and the madmen the main characters and he also popularized the scary stories genre. Poe wrote sci-fi, mystery, poetry, and horror stories. His most notable works are "The Black Cat", "The Cask of Amontillado", and "The Masque of the Red Death". He contributed to the Romanticism era because he mostly worked through the Gothic Romanticism era. His stories contained notable features in them such as The All Seeing and Knowing Eye; crazy characters or a crazy narrator ("The Cask of Amontillado" features a crazy narrator who carefully kills one of his friends in his wine cellar which is extremely crazy), a premature burial of animals and kids ("The Black Cat" is an example because the owner of the house buries the black cat in the walls); illusions,  ghosts, voices etc.; and a big gloomy house or mansion.

 

 

Washington Irving

 

Washington was born in 1783 and died in 1859. He was considered one of America's first true literary artist and earliest "classic". He wrote "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow", a famous Halloween tale that tells us how Halloween was celebrated back in the day. His works set up a monument for humorous and romantic writing. which became important in American literature. His notable short stories are "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Rip Van Winkle". Irving's story "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" has elements of Romanticism because it deals with emotional values (Ichabod chases after the hand of Katrina) and material values (Ichabod wants to marry Katrina just for her fathers farm and wealth).

 

 

Nathaniel Hawthorne

 

Nathaniel was born in 1804 and died in 1864. Hawthorne is a puritan and his works were mostly dealing with the puritans view of the world. His most notable work is the book "The Scarlet Letter", which deals with a lady named Hester Prynne who is forced to wear a scarlet "A" on herself for committing adultery. Hawthorne's other notable works are "The Minister's Black Veil" and "The House of Seven Gables". Hawthorne's books dealt with trying to find acceptance in the world (just like Hester Prynne) and trying to accept yourself in a world of people who judge others. His stories included someone who was trying to find a sense of place, darkness, mysterious and exotic people and places, as well as dark and gloomy settings.

 

 

Charles Baudelaire

 

Baudelaire was born in Paris, France in 1821 and he died in Paris, France in 1867. His early works were art criticisms, essays and reviews for various journals. His most famous work was "Les Fleurs du mal" (The Flowers of Evil). "Les Fleurs du mal" contained elements of sexual content and only helped contribute to him being seen as a "cursed poet" throughout France. Despite the content, "Les Fleurs du mal" dealt with themes of eroticism and decadence. The poem was criticized for depicting women who were lesbian and not many people could accept that. Baudelaire's stories were criticizing the human race and were showing the disgusting and disturbing sides. 

Honors English Project 1 Romanticism!

 

Romanticism

 

Romanticism is a genre used in Europe and later in America but categorized as Southern Gothic Romanticism. Romanticism itself has one sub-genre and that sub-genre is Gothic Romanticism. Romanticism on its own focuses on two types of values: Material values and Emotional values. Both of these values are essential to Romanticism otherwise the stories that are under this genre would not have made any sense. What makes Romanticism unique is that it deals with Human nature, Nature, and the past rather than the future. This genre deals with almost everything you can think of from being in love to politics and music to literature/art work. Romanticism is used by Washington Irving in the Legend of Sleepy Hollow and is also shown in "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot"

 

 

 

Gothic Romanticism

 

Gothic Romanticism is the sub-genre to Romanticism. Gothic Romanticism has a genre that branches off of it and it is known as Southern Gothic Romanticism. Gothic Romanticism is different from Romanticism because it deals with the supernatural, it is dark and gloomy, and mysterious and deep. The genre itself contains conventions of medieval literature (damsels in distress); grotesque (meaning a character has to show sympathy and disgust at the same time. If the character only shows one of those emotions, then the character is not considered grotesque); mysterious and desolation, as well as tensions between the scientific and the supernatural. Gothic Romanticism may also include: Dreamstates or nightmares, Family secrets, Dark Towers or hidden rooms, or Ancestral Curses. Three authors are known for using Gothic Romanticism: Edgar Allen Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Charles Baudelaire.

 

Southern Gothic Romanticism

 

Southern Gothic Romanticism is the sub-genre to Gothic Romanticism. What is different about this genre is that it deals with the American South. Supernatural, ironic and unusual events guide the plot lines of this genre. Southern Gothic Romanticism takes a European Romanticism creature (knights or dragons) and turns them into American Southerners (a drunk who is uneducated, a quiet but wise lawyer, or someone who was just released from prison). The most notable feature of the Southern Gothic is the grotesque characterization and something in the town, the house, or the farm is bizarre and often falling apart. Southern can also include freakishness, violence, imprisonment and/or a sense of place. Southern Gothic is used in the stories "A Rose for Emily" and "The Life You Save May Be Your Own". In "A Rose for Emily", the grotesque character would be the entire town because Emily doesn't really do much besides sit in her house and do nothing. The whole town has sympathy for her and will show their disgust when they need to behind her back. In "The Life You Save May Be Your Own", the grotesque character is Mr. Shiftlet because he shows sympathy for Lucynell after he left alone in the café and he shows disgust (a small amount) towards the grandmother because he doesn't like her in the beginning but decides to take her word and marry Lucynell.



Unit Essential Questions!

1.) Optimism and individuality is reflected in the stories read because they all have at least one character that stands out in the crowd and that one character has a different personality, has some type of mysterious flair or a different type of style emitting from them (Ichabod was different than the other boys in the town because he was taller and had a soft side for women. Emily was different because she was always locking herself in her house, returning tax payments, and sending her slave to go shopping for her. Shiftlet was different because he was a person who was wanting something special like Lucynell, who was also different because she couldn't talk or do much. Usher was different because he had a mental issue that made him go nuts at the end of the story, claiming he saw his dead sister at the door which was true and scared the narrator out of the house.). If individuality was not present in these stories then nothing would be eye catching or interesting. Everything would be very bland and boring to read. Nothing interesting would happen and wouldn't seem right in a Gothic or Southern Gothic Romanticism story.

2.) Romanticism deals with almost everything under the sun from nature to music, arts and literature to politics. It has 4 pillars: Love, Truth, Beauty, and Freedom. Romanticism also has different values ranging from emotional to material values. Gothic Romanticism is a counterpart for Romanticism. Gothic Romanticism is more of a mysterious, supernatural, dark and gloomy as opposed to nature, past and human nature romanticism. Gothic is more interesting rather than Romanticism, but both can be interesting. Gothic is more towards the weird and creepy, and it includes damsels in distress, grotesque characters, and tensions between the scientific and supernatural. Southern Gothic Romanticism is a sub-genre to Gothic. It has supernatural elements to it and focuses on the deep south in America. It has a notable feature and it is grotesque characterization. Grotesque characters are those who have sympathy and disgust at the same time. Southern also takes a Gothic creature (such as a monster or a knight) and twists it to become an American Southerner. Southern Gothic also has Freakishness, Imprisonment, Violence and a sense of place. All three are similar to each other because they all can deal with nature and music, arts to politics. They are also the same because they can also have dark sides to them (despite the fact that Romanticism on it's own deals with nature and emotional and material values).

3.) Southern Gothic Romanticism has taken the elements from Gothic and Romanticism and combined the two to become a more modernized version for Romanticism. It's a different genre of Romanticism but a sub-genre to Gothic. Just like Gothic Romanticism, it has supernatural events that lead the plot and also uses grotesque characters. Southern Gothic Romanticism has been manipulative in literary conventions because it uses either formal or informal ways of writing. The authors have used both ways of writing and using formal or informal ways of writing has helped put emphasis on many topics that were being offered in each of the stories.

4.) American culture has helped form the Southern Gothic and Gothic sides of Romanticism because Europe lacked the creativity the Americans had. (American Romantics tend to venerate Nature as a sanctum of non-artificiality, where the Self can fulfill its potential (the earlier Puritans tended to see nature as the fallen "wilderness," full of "savage" Indians)  Europe also lacked a new frontier while the Americans had a lot to write about (Frontier promised opportunity for expansion, growth, freedom; Europe lacked this element.
Spirit of optimism invoked by the promise of an uncharted frontier.
Immigration brought new cultures and perspectives
Growth of industry in the north that further polarized the north and the agrarian south.
Search for new spiritual roots.)
Europe already had their expansions and their freedom, while America was still trying to grow during this time period. Southern Gothic was formed because many European ideas were taken onto American soil and turned into Americanized versions (A monster or a heroic knight would be turned into an uneducated drunk or a quiet, wise lawyer).

5.) The writings of that time period has been reflected in many of today's writings ("The Deceleration of Independence"). If this time period did not have a unique way of writing, then books today would have been bland and boring. Without any of the Gothic genres, no creativity would be seen and if Gothic was created in today's times, many people would be recognized mostly for their intelligence on creating a new type of genre rather than for its deep meaning or how it criticizes many aspects of human nature. The Gothic genre helps many authors create different plots for their books and create a sense of place in a person. If the Gothic genre had not been around, we wouldn't be able to see the dirty, disgusting sides of human beings. We would only see the positive side and not the dark side that everyone tries to hide.

"The Fall of the House of Usher" "The Masque of the Red Death" and "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment"

"The Fall of the House of Usher"

1.) Roderick Usher's nervousness and weakness is caused by his now dead twin sister, Madeline Usher who is thought to be a vampire.Madeline is indeed a vampire, but not one that turns into a bat and flies off sucking blood in the middle of the night. She is a vampire because Roderick's attitude and appearance has altered since the narrator had last seen him. Madeline's death had sucked the life and joy out of Roderick. According to the narrator, "Surely, man had never before so terribly altered, in so a brief period, as had Roderick Usher!"  he has never seen a man changed drastically over a death to the point where he couldn't tell who is sitting in front of him. Throughout the period that the narrator is staying with Roderick the two read books and Roderick tells the narrator that he has a particular interest in one book "His chief delight, however, was found in the perusal of an exceedingly rare and curious book in quarto Gothic—the manual of a forgotten church—the Vigilae Mortuorum secundum Chorum Ecclesiae Maguntinae."  A few days after that, Roderick asks the narrator to help him with burying his sister and the narrator agrees, even though he doesn't want to. Nights after the preservation of the body, the narrator starts to feel terrified, just like Roderick, "It was no wonder that his condition terrified—that it infected me. I felt creeping upon
me, by slow yet certain degrees, the wild influences of his own fantastic yet impressive superstitions." The narrator had also observed changes in his friend after the preservation, "And now, some days of bitter grief having elapsed, an observable change came over the features of the mental
disorder of my friend. His ordinary manner had vanished. His ordinary occupations were neglected or
forgotten. He roamed from chamber to chamber with hurried, unequal, and objectless step. The pallor of his
countenance had assumed, if possible, a more ghastly hue—but the luminousness of his eye had utterly gone
out. The once occasional huskiness of his tone was heard no more; and a tremulous quaver, as if of extreme
terror, habitually characterized his utterance. There were times, indeed, when I thought his unceasingly
agitated mind was labouring with some oppressive secret, to divulge which he struggled for the necessary
courage. At times, again, I was obliged to resolve all into the mere inexplicable vagaries of madness, for I
beheld him gazing upon vacancy for long hours, in an attitude of the profoundest attention, as if listening to
some imaginary sound." One night as Usher is having problems sleeping (or roaming around the mansion) the narrator decides to read him a book. Shortly after reading a certain passage in the book, Usher goes mad saying, "“Not hear it?—yes, I hear it, and have heard it. Long—long—long—many minutes, many hours, many days, have I heard it—yet I dared not—oh, pity me, miserable wretch that I am!—I dared not—I dared not speak! We have put her living in the tomb! Said I not that my senses were acute? I now tell you that I heard her first feeble movements in the hollow coffin. I heard them—many, many days ago—yet I dared not—I dared not speak! And now—to-night—Ethelred—ha! ha!—the breaking of the hermit's door, and the death-cry of the dragon, and the clangour of the shield!—say, rather, the rending of her coffin, and the grating of the iron hinges of her prison, and her struggles within the coppered archway of the vault! Oh whither shall I fly? Will she not be here anon? Is she not hurrying to upbraid me for my haste? Have I not heard her footstep on the stair? Do I not distinguish that heavy and horrible beating of her heart? Madman!” here he sprang furiously to his feet, and shrieked out his syllables, as if in the effort he were giving up his soul—“Madman! I tell you that she now stands without the door!”After the terrible shrieking from Usher, the sister appears and she evidently kills Roderick, causing the narrator to flee in horror. In conclusion, since the sister had died from a weird disease that nobody knew how to cure, she had sapped the once happy man that the narrator knew as a boy and his sorrow eventually found its way towards the narrator, which had creeped him out. That is how Madeline Usher is considered a vampire in "The Fall of the House of Usher".

2.)  The authors of the books "The Masque of the Red Death" and "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment" criticize human nature indirectly. "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment" criticizes the impatience humans have towards things that give a promise of a new start, a different life, or some other miraculous idea (The doctor's four venerable friends made him no answer, except by a feeble and tremulous laugh; so very ridiculous was the idea that, knowing how closely repentance treads behind the steps of error, they should ever go astray again.). "The Masque of the Red Death" criticizes the ego that humans have for themselves (When his dominions were half depopulated, he summoned to his presence a thousand hale and light-hearted friends from among the knights and dames of his court, and with these retired to the deep seclusion of one of his castellated abbeys.)  Both stories show us those types of criticism through the King (The Masque of the Red Death) and the four eager friends who didn't give a reply back to Dr. Heidegger and were begging for more of the water (Dr. Heidegger's Experiment). The writers have a similar attitudes towards the human nature because both stories focus on a self centered person/ a group of self centered people who were wanting nothing else to do with others' well being.  Both stories have people who wanted nothing to do with the outside world or the well being of each other after the experiment. The King in "The Masque of the Red Death" didn't want the Red Death to come into his castle and had summoned all the healthy and light hearted friends before taking them all to his isolated abbey. The group of friends in "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment" were already very old, and when Heidegger mentioned the Fountain of Youth water, all of them were very eager to drink the water, they didn't even bother to answer the question that Heidegger had presented to them, ""Before you drink, my respectable old friends," said he, "it would be well that, with the experience of a lifetime to direct you, you should draw up a few general rules for your guidance, in passing a second time through the perils of youth. Think what a sin and shame it would be, if, with your peculiar advantages, you should not become patterns of virtue and wisdom to all the young people of the age!" At the end of both stories the main character/s get what they were trying to keep away from them (the Red Death appears and kills the King and the four friends end up returning old but they venture out towards Florida after the experiment  in search of the Fountain of Youth for themselves. 

"The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot"

1.) "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow": The story captures the imagination of the reader by using plenty of descriptive words and has them guessing what happened to Ichabod Crane. The story also captures the reader's imagination by setting the story in a place where anything could basically happen from the ordinary to the supernatural. Plus it shows the reader how Halloween was celebrated back then and how it differes from today's way of celebrating the spooky holiday. What could of happened to Ichabod toward the end, when he looked back to see if the Headless Horseman vanished, since he's extremely tall he could of hit his head on a low hanging board so hard to where he fell down and the creek had carried him away before anyone could have found his body the next day or he was extremely panicked about all of what was going on and it just happened to kill him.

2.) "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot": The song talks about escaping the physical conditions of slavery when the song says "If you get there before I do, coming for to carry me home, tell all my friends I'm coming too, coming for to carry me home." which is talking about arriving to a different place and that the friend should go find all the other friends and tell them that one more slave is about to come soon. The song is about religious faith and hope by talking about "The brightest day that I ever saw, coming for to carry me home, When Jesus washed my sins away, coming for to carry me home"; "... But still my soul feels heavenly bound, coming for to carry me home" The song is saying about the day that the songwriter was saved and that his soul feels heaven bound instead of the earthly freedom from slavery. He wants to go home, meaning back into Heaven. The song is reflective of it's time period because it was composed while Willis was in slavery and he would perform songs he made while working in the evening time for the children.Most songs back then were spiritual in nature but were also meaning freedom from slavery. The song relates to today because many people are waiting for heavenly freedom instead of earthly freedom. Earthly freedom means something, but it's only temporary while heavenly freedom lasts forever.

Southern Gothic Romanticism: "A Rose for Emily" and "The Life You Save May Be Your Own"

Southern Gothic Romanticism

1.) Southern Gothic Romanticism is a subgenre to Gothic Romanticism.. It focuses on the southern part of the United States.

2.)  "A Rose for Emily" and "The Life You Save May Be Your Own" exhibit Gothic traits because the have one character that is grotesque,("A Rose For Emily" is Emily herself and in "The Life You Save May Be Your Own" is Mr. Shiftlet)  having sympathy for others and having disgust for them at the same time; they also have a run down home that they live in ("A Rose for Emily" It was a big, squarish frame house that had once been white, decorated with
cupolas and spires and scrolled balconies in the heavily lightsome style of the
seventies, set on what had once been our most select street. But garages and
cotton gins had encroached and obliterated even the august names of that
neighborhood; only Miss Emily's house was left, lifting its stubborn and
coquettish decay above the cotton wagons and the gasoline pumps--an eyesore
among eyesores.") or they live in isolation ("The Life You Save May Be Your Own" Although the old woman lived in this desolate spot with only her daughter..."). The stories and their literature compare to Romanticism by having a character that exhibits emotional value toward another character.

3.) In "A Rose for Emily" Emily's crime goes undetected because she was seen as someone who couldn't love others or receive love. This is evident because throughout the story the elderly people are having sympathy for Emily by saying, "Poor Emily" nearly every time the town people see her outside of her house. Everyone also thought that she would have married H.B. but when she didn't, the people continued to say "Poor Emily." Nobody assumed she had killed him even though they never saw H.B. out of the house again.  "(And, as we had expected all
along, within three days Homer Barron was back in town. A neighbor saw the
Negro man admit him at the kitchen door at dusk one evening.
And that was the last we saw of Homer Barron.") Emily was also someone who didn't accept change because she had never updated her house. She was afraid of losing the past, so she never changed anything about her house ("We did not say she was crazy then. We believed she had to do that. We
remembered all the young men her father had driven away, and we knew that
with nothing left, she would have to cling to that which had robbed her, as people
will.").

4.) The episode when Mr. Shiftlet picks up the hitchhiker is essential to the story because if Shiftlet hadn't picked him up, the reader wouldn't have known how Shiftlet felt after he left Lucynell at the cafe. The hitchhiker is important because without him in the end, we wouldn't have also known what would happen to Shiftlet, which he feels guilty because the boy had compared his mother to Shiftlet's mother (a fleabag to a stinking polecat). "The boy turned angrily in the seat. "You go to the devil!" he cried. "My old woman is a flea bag and yours is a stinking pole cat!" and with that he flung the door open and jumped out with his suitcase into the ditch.". Shiftlet has feelings for Lucynell so without the hitchhiker we wouldn't have known about his feelings.