The Things They Carried

I really enjoyed this story. I suppose it might partly be because I really like stories about the World Wars, but I think it was written pretty well too.

What is so good about this story, though, is that it gives you a REAL look into the minds of the soldiers. It doesnt show you all that crap on the military commercials of the guys doing all this crazy stuff like hang gliding out of a helicopter, pinpointing their target on a satellite, and giving hand signals to their squad, all while talking to their mom on the phone. No, it gives you a real look at the fear that the soldiers have that they have to cover up or risk embarrassment. It shows what goes on inside their heads and how that differs from their actions, all because of the pressure to be tough soldiers.

I really like how the story brings out the soldiers' emotions and backgrounds by focusing on the physical things they carried. You read about the physical things, and this causes you to think about why they carry those things. Then that leads you to think about the intangible things they carry, like missing a loved one back home or the fear of death. It's an interesting way to convey what each individual is thinking.

Tunnel of Oppression

Soooo this is a little late because I forgot to write it...but hey better late than never right?

I really thought the Tunnel of Oppression was interesting. Going into it I didnt have a very good attitude because I figured it would just be the normal, cliche stuff that you always see at those kinds of events. However, the way it was presented and the information given really was more interesting than I thought it would be.

One of the two rooms I liked the most was the first one about African oppression. It was just crazy to listen to those people's stories about how they themselves and their loved ones had been tortured, raped, and killed. Even their innocent children were hurt in unimaginable ways.

I also really enjoyed the schizophrenia room. I thought that room was really creative, because most of the time when you think of oppression you dont think about schizophrenics. But that's kind of what this whole Tunnel was about; yea, there is always the typical oppression like that of the Africans, but there is oppression in other ways too, like the way society treats schizophrenics.

Overall, I found the Tunnel of Oppression a very interesting and enlightening experience, and I am glad I visited it.

Where are You Going, Where Have You Been?

Well, I cant say I dont expect these stories to be weird now that we've read so many weird ones. This story was really pretty intense, the whole time I was wondering whether Connie would give in to Arnold Friend, or whether she'd figure out some way to escape. It really bugged me that he was able to get into her head like that, how just by talking to her he was able to basically control her. It really kind of made me sick to read.

One thing that I really couldnt figure out in the story was what the heck that Ellie guy was doing in it. He just sat there listening to the music the entire time, I'm not quite sure what he was supposed to represent.

I did find it interesting that music seemed to be a theme throughout the story. It was almost like the music was controlling just like Arnold Friend was, and they both seemed to mesh into the same thing at the end of the story when Connie went off the deep end.

I just dont really understand how Connie did go nuts like that though. I mean if I ran to call the cops and I knew he was coming in after me, I would be locking that door and running to the phone and gettin that done, because I knew he'd be coming in after me. The fact that she doesnt know what to do with the phone is just kind of weird, I feel like I'd be so focused on staying in that house, and hell, staying alive, that I'd be able to use the phone without even thinking. Maybe it's just because she's young and scared that she doesnt know what to do.

In the end, I thought this story was pretty creepy. The way she just gave up and went with him in a sort of daze was just messed up. To think that this kind of stuff happens in real life is pretty sickening.

The Red Convertible

I liked this story. It's depressing, but I enjoyed it more than some of the other ones we've read recently.

I've always found the whole post-war depression syndrome thing to be pretty interesting. Not interesting in a good way, but interesting in a bad way. If that makes sense. I have a connection to it through my cousin, who is on his second deployment to Iraq as a helicopter pilot. I talked to him when he was back from his first deployment, and he was having a little bit of trouble; not anything close to what Henry goes through in The Red Convertible, but he said it was a little hard to get used to every day life again. I just can't imagine it personally, being over at war and having to constantly be on edge and watching your back and then coming back home to safety and trying to relax. It would just be weird.

The story also reminded me a lot of the movie The Hurt Locker. In the movie the main character comes back to America after being in Iraq, and there is one scene that really sticks out to show the trouble he has. He is in a grocery store, and he can't decide what cereal to pick out. It sounds meaningless, but he's been so used to taking orders all the time while he was at war and so used to making life or death decisions in the blink of an eye, and then he comes back and can't even make the simple decision on what kind of cereal to buy, because it all seems so useless.

This story was interesting because it really showed the problems that people go through when they get back from war and try to lead a normal life. I enjoyed it.

The Hermit's Story

Yea so this story was boring. The fact that it was mostly description, while it was really good description, just kind of hurt it a little. I thought it was cool when they went under the ice and there was no water (if that happens in real life I definitely want to see it), and some of the stuff with the dogs was cool, but overall it was pretty boring. I found myself unconsciously skipping over sentences looking for the good stuff, but unfortunately not finding it. I dont really know what else to say. Good try though dude who wrote the Hermit's Story.

Sabateur

I thought this story was really interesting. The end was a weird and pretty sudden, but it wasn't bad compared to some of the other messed up stories we've read.

Throughout the whole story all I could think about was how much the Chinese government sucks. They do all this bad stuff to the citizens and then they blame it on the a-a-a-a-a-alco...i mean the citizens themselves, and then they put on a great face for the rest of the world, telling everyone that it's all ok. It makes me glad I live in the U.S., where we actually do have protection against our own government.

The end of the story I didnt really like. I would have liked it much better if he'd gotten revenge only on the men who'd imprisoned him, not on the whole town. It almost makes him no better than the Chinese government, he was innocent and was imprisoned unfairly, but most of the 800 people that he infected with hepatitis were innocent too.

The Not-So-Beneficial-Lottery

So...I thought The Cask of Amontillado was messed up...WHAT THE HELL SHIRLEY JACKSON?!

I've read this story before, but after reading it a second time the "messed up-ness" hit me even more. It's just so crazy that people would have a lottery to kill someone.

The first time I read it, I expected the lottery to be a good thing the entire time. I didnt pick up on any of the subtle hints that I did the second time through, such as the rocks the children were piling up or the slight nervousness here and there among the villagers. So, I naturally was completely surprised when they started stoning the lady. I guess that's part of what makes it such an interesting story, because Shirley Jackson uses the completely different notion of a lottery that we have today against us, so that we dont expect the ending at all, even though she did have some foreshadowing here and there throughout the story.

So I was reading through the questions in the back and one of them really struck me as interesting. Tessie, when she is getting stoned by the villagers, says "It isn't fair!" or something along those lines. But she wasn't talking about it being unfair that she was being KILLED, she was still complaining about her husband not getting enough time to choose the right paper. Yea, valid complaint LADY. If it was me, I definitely would have been mad that I was being stoned to death, not sure about everyone else though. It's weird that they have this lottery and the stoning so ingrained in their society that they really dont question it much. They do a little bit while they are drawing paper when they talk about other towns quitting it, but when it comes time to do the stoning nobody really cares about poor ol' Tessie.

I guess the lottery was originally started for the "legitimate" (the quotations marks around the word legitimate are meant to denote doubt and a hint of sarcasm, due to the fact that I still dont think this reason makes it legitimate) reason of keeping population down when they didnt have enough food to feed the whole village. Now, however, they just keep it around for tradition. (To find out what I think about this, please see the first sentence of this post.)

Anyway, The Lottery is a well written story that keeps you pretty oblivious as to what happens to the "winner" of the lottery, but other than that it kind of just depresses me.

The Cask of Amontillado

Well that story was messed up. When I finished reading it the first thing I thought was, "What could Fortunato have done to piss off Montresor so much that he buried him alive?" So I got to thinking about it, and I'm not sure what Montresor did was justified. Fortunato seems like a guy who's pretty full of himself and doesn't worry much about insulting others, so he probably insulted Montresor in a bunch of little ways until it finally all built up. But does that mean you have to KILL THE GUY?

I'll move past that point and look at some other things in the story. Montresor does do a good job of luring Fortunato in without even asking him to help him out. In fact, the entire time he's telling Fortunato not to help him out, but Fortunato's obsession with wine, and himself, refuses to let him quit and go back; he has to be the one to tell Montresor whether it is true Amontillado, not Luchresi. It's the perfect reverse psychology.

The story is riddled with symbols and parallels between Montresor's family and his inevitable revenge. His family's motto is "No one attacks me with impunity", which means no one attacks me and escapes punishment. The family symbol is a snake getting stepped on, but the snake's teeth are sinking into the man's heel at the same time, once again symbolizing that revenge that Montresor will get on Fortunato. Finally, the wine is called "De Grave", which is like the grave that Fortunato is heading to.

At the end, right before Montresor puts in his the last stone to Fortunato's tomb, his heart grew sick. Maybe he realized that he was about to take a man's life in cold blood? He shouts out his friend's name at the end, I'm not sure why, but it's almost like he felt a little bit of Fortunato's pain. What makes the story so disturbing in my opinion is that he feels that pang of regret at the end but still goes through with it anyway.

I gotta say this story bugged me a little. Edgar Allen Poe is one weird guy.

To Hell With Dying...Ha...it's funny because it's a play on words...

Well I have to say Mr. Sweet is one interesting guy. My first thought when I read the story was that Mr. Sweet was a creepy old man who had a bunch of problems, one of them being liking to play with little children. But as I read on I slowly realized that it was something else. This guy is interesting because he manages to have so many faults, yet he still is loved dearly by everyone else in the story. There was something about him that kept them loving him.

So I asked myself, what is it? Is it because he plays the guitar or plays with the kids well? Is it because they live in such a small neighborhood that they have known him all their lives and trust him? It seems weird that they would allow a "on the verge of being blind drunk" man to play with their kids. I got to thinking about it, and it seems like it's a combination of all these things. Maybe in that time period it wasnt as big of a deal to be an alcoholic as long as you weren't violent. They live in a small, mostly African American neighborhood, so maybe the narrator's parents grew up with Mr. Sweet and trusted him. And they probably liked the fact that he played guitar too.

An interesting thing about the way this story was written is the perspective for the reader. We read this through the eyes of the little girl who grows up playing with Mr. Sweet. Because of this, we look past Mr. Sweet's downfalls and grow to love him too. If the story had been told from an objective, third person perspective it would have been much different, and we probably would not have been so accepting of Mr. Sweet's actions.

Finally, I think there could be a symbolic connection between the girl's age and maturity and Mr. Sweet dying. When she is still young and doesn't believe death is permanent, Mr. Sweet is always revived by her actions. But when she is older, in college, and understands what death really is, she is unable to revive Mr. Sweet. It's like Mr. Sweet was kept alive while she was still innocent, but once that innocence was taken away she couldn't save him anymore. It may be a stretch, but I think there's a possible connection there. Then again, he could have just died because he was around 90 years old.

Overall, I thought it was a pretty good story, and I enjoyed reading it.

White Elephants...Like the Christmas Gifts?

Hills Like White Elephants is a very interesting story, and is one of my favorite works by Ernest Hemingway, an author whose stories I usually enjoy. One of the things that makes it so intriguing is it's structure; the story is stripped of all unnecessary description and wordiness (I hope that's a word, if not I'm pullin a Shakespeare on that one), and what is left is almost pure dialogue. In the first read through, one might think that it is just a story of two people talking about meaningless things. However, the key is to read between the lines to see the tension and problems between the couple. This kind of structure leaves much more analysis up to the readers, and I think it makes the story more interesting.

A prominent theme in the story is that of white elephants; it is in the title, and the girl mentions that the hills look like white elephants a few times. The term white elephant is often used to describe something that is unwanted, and in this story it refers to the girl's unborn baby. While this isn't said outright, it can be gathered by reading into the story. The man is trying to convince the girl to have a simple operation, which would only "let the air in", and the girl can't decide whether or not to do it. The indecision on whether or not to keep the baby is shown when she decides that maybe the hills don't look like white elephants after all, they are just colored the same.

Another theme in the story is that of communication. The man and the girl talk to each other the whole story, yet they don't really seem to listen to what the other person is saying. They try to avoid talking to each other by drinking, which the girl points out is all they seem to do. This belies the problems that the couple is having, and shows that, even if the girl does have an abortion, their relationship won't go back to normal like the man says.

The story is set in a train station in between two cities, which represents the fork in the couple's relationship. At the end of the story the man goes one way while the girl stays behind at the table, symbolizing the fact that their relationship is over and they both know it.

All in all, I think it's a great story. Kind of depressing, but a good read if you take the time to read it more than once and to think about it.

Thank you for joining us for "Scintillatingly Sanguine Short Story Stints" with Nick Neuman, and we hope you will be with us again next week when we discuss Judy Blume's "Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing."

In the Beginning...

In the beginning there was a man named Nick Neuman, and he was required to have a blog for one of his classes. He created that blog, and made it to his liking. He decided to use the blog to bring his wisdom to the unwashed proletariat of the world, so that they might aspire to one day be as wise and mature as he. And so, in his inaugural words, he said to them...

FIRST POST BABY!