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“You’re looking for a place where this oppression doesn’t occur. Basically, that’s up North. So, you start looking towards getting out of this system of oppression.”

This quote is by Clifford Boxely who wrote about his personal experience in school when he was younger.  This quote reminded me of Grant.  Grant went to college so he could get more out of life than working on a plantation like his aunt and Miss Emma had.  He planned on getting and education and becoming a teacher, that way he would have more respect, not only from his students, but from society.  He wanted to escape the social structure where whites were always superior to blacks.  When Grant’s aunt and Miss Emma ask him to talk to Henri Pichot and go to the jail to visit Jefferson, Grant is reminded “this system of oppression.”  He is inspected and talked down to.

I watched The Taming of the Shrew and I really liked it.  I had seen it a long time ago, but after finishing Macbeth and getting used to the language, it was much easier to follow.  What I liked about this version of The Taming of the Shrew, or perhaps what I like about the play,  is that it isn’t dark and depressing.  It’s about love but it has humor in it so it’s not boring.  My favorite character was katherine because she has so much fire in her.  She seems mean, hence Shrew, but the viewer expects there to be a change in her character, so I was just waiting for it to happen.  I like how Katherine and Bianca, who are sisters, are so opposite.  I thought the characters, in general, seemed much more realistic than those in macbeth.

First of all, we shouldn’t even be in Iraq.  Once the U.S. discovered that there were no wmd’s there, we should have left.  Now that we’ve been in there for so long, it’s hard to just pull out and risk loosing everything American soldiers have worked to establish.  In class we discussed how U.S. soldiers are stationed in areas to prevent fighting, but once they leave the fighting starts again.  It’s hard to say that we should put more troops in and risk loosing more lives, but it could be necessary if America really wants to help keep Iraqis from killing each other.  But putting more troops in brings up the question, is it even worth it? Will all their efforts be lost once soldiers are removed from their stations?  JJ said

Iif America leaves now, without having established a successful democracy, Iraq may end up with in a tyrannical state which we initially set out to destroy, or end up with the rule of one party. 

I think U.S. troops have been in Iraq long enough and it’s time to begin bringing them home.  Maybe it’s time for the U.S. to take a step back and let Iraq deal with their internal problems without added external pressure.

The different versions of The Scottish Play were interesting to read and watch, even though I am just about sick of the play. I think my favorite version is the original, probably because everything else is based off of it. Even though Shakespeare’s language can be difficult to read and understand on your own, discussing it in class made it easier to follow. After knowing what was supposed to happen, I could follow the other versions, but I wasn’t crazy about them. The Travesties was okay. I thought the rhyming was pretty cool…for a while. In the beginning the rhyming was funny and no one was really paying attention to what was happening because we were all giggling at the Dr. Sues/Shakespeare play. It’s hard to take this play seriously though when the plot is changed and the language is amusing. I’m not sure which was my least favorite though, because they all had something different. For Throne of Blood I thought it was interesting that Macduff was taken out of the play completely. We attempted to talk about why this was during class, but I’m still hesitant to take a firm position. It’s possible that the director wanted the play to be based more on the relationship between Macbeth and Banquo. But I’m still not sure. If we’re still going to be discussing The Scottish Play in class, this is one thing I’d like to keep discussing. I really didn’t like that we had to read the subtitles for the whole movie, but at the same time, it made everything much more dramatic. The last scene was my favorite because “Macbeth” finally got what he deserved. After committing treason himself, his soldiers followed suit and killed him. Going back to the original play, it’s ironic that Macbeth becomes Thane of Cawdor because the Thane committed treason, and then in the Japanese movie Macbeth is killed for this same reason.

As much as i didn’t care for Amir in parts of the book, he made definetly redeemed himself somewhat in the end by looking for Hassan’s son.  As i was reading, i thought that Amir should have told Farid why he was looking for that particular child.  If he was trying to atone for his sins, he should be honest to those that are trying to help him.  More important than this though, was that Amir stood his ground, somewhat, to Assef.  I was impressed that he took everything Assef gave him, and in the end, he laughed.  It was ironic that Amir was laughing at the pain he was enduring because that pain relieved him.  This makes sense to me, but at the same time, it doesn’t make up for when Amir let Assef rape Hassan without even trying to stop it.  I thought it was great though, how Sohrab, Hassan’s son, ended up saving Amir and taking him out of the room, just like his father always protected Amir when they were boys.  Like father, like son. 

I was happy that in the end, Sohrab and Amir end up together.  Amir felt so terrible about his past with Hassan, that he risked his life to find Hassan’s son and take him in.  Somehow, by Amir and Sohrab being together, is like Hassan forgiving Amir.  Sohrab, being Hassan’s son, symbolizes Hassan, so Sohrab and Amir represent Amir and Hassan.  In a way, the story made a full circle.

I just found out that The Kite Runner is being made into a movie in for 2007!!! I can’t wait to see it!