To the Person Sitting in Darkness, The War Prayer by Mark Twain

In the essay "To the Person Sitting in Darkness", Mark Twain criticizes imperialism by naming two examples:
the "Boxer Uprising" and the "Philippine-American War". He also mentions historical figures, especially William Scott Ament as part of his criticism. He describes how the Americans who he speaks of in the "us" form, plan their overtaking of the Philippines in a very "screwed up" way- how cruel and barbarous and fiendish had been the warfare made by those whose avowed purpose was to carry the blessed light of civilization and Gospel “to the benighted native”. In his opinion it is very poor "how in very truth these priceless blessings had been handed on the point of a bayonet to the “Person Sitting in Darkness.”" His style of writing is very sarcasm and when it was finished he himself did not want to print it.


In the short story "The War Prayer", Mark Twain criticizes the patriotic and religious blindness as motivations for war.
He begins his story with an unknown nation that is about to go to war. Everyone attends a church service for soldiers who have been called up. The people pray to God to grant them victory and protect their troops. Soldiers and their families are proud of "protecting their country from the evil."
Suddenly a stranger enters the church and announces that he is God's messenger. He tells the people that they should not only pray for them and their soldiers but also for the suffering and destruction of their enemies.
The story has a bad ending since the messenger was ignored.

Emily Dickinson

In today's class we were talking about the American poet Emily Dickinson.
We collected different contents about her (for example family, movements, famous works,life stations, her style of writing, historical background etc.). Then we read some of her short poems and we are supposed to choose one and interpret it. My choice is the epigram "This is my letter".

This is my letter to the world,
   That never wrote to me,--
The simple news that Nature told,
   With tender majesty.

Her message is committed
   To hands I cannot see;
For love of her, sweet countrymen,
   Judge tenderly of me!

In the first two lines Emily Dickinson expresses the feelings she has towards the world. She claims that nobody gives her attention.(We know from her life that she lived really isolated in her house with nobody else). In the next to lines she describes that the nature tells her simple news from the world around her.

In the second paragraph, Dickinson says that the nature has a message which is not accessible for her.

In the last two lines of the epigram , she begins to talk to "sweet countrymen" she could refer to the lover she had in her life. She tells them to judge tenderly of her; for her (either the natures's or her love).

Rappaccini's Daughter- Nathaniel Hawthorne

In today's class, we watched the end of the short story "Rappaccini's Daughter" and discussed what Hawthorne wanted to tell us with this story. As he was a transcendentalist, he criticized  science as he shows the result of  Dr. Rappaccini's work and experiments which caused his own daughter's poisoning. Furthermore he says that everyone in the world can do what he/she wants? What he meant by saying this is not really clear for me...

Thesis

The thesis statement must be arguable and specific. You should avoid statements that are so broad as to be meaningless. Furthermore the readers must be able to agree or disagree with the statement. The author's job is to offer support.

The Scarlet Letter Chapter 13 Another view of Hester

In today's class we read Chapter 13 of The Scarlet Letter. This Chapter describes the change of Hester's position in the Puritan village over a long period of time. Hester is no longer beautiful as she used to be. She either cuts her hair or wears in under a hat so nobody can see it. As the time passes she gets more and more respected in the village and people forgive her for her sin. When strangers come to the village the people show them Hester and tell them how nice and kind she is. Since Hester lives outside the village she has a lot of time to think about her life and she realizes how she cares about Dimmesdale. She feels responsible for him and wants to help him. Since Chillingworth kind of terrorizes Dimmesdale, she decides to talk to him. The leaders of the village, however, still do not really forgive Hester for her sin. A reason therefore might be that they take their role as a leader very serious and do not want other people think they could do the same what Hester did and "only" get disrespected for a few years.

The Scarlet Letter Group Work

Today in class we were divided in groups. Each group got for the same amount of chapters of the Scarlett Letter we have covered so far. In my group I am responsible for the Chapter 15 (Hester and Pearl). We are supposed to put anything on a sheet of paper which makes the rest of the class remembering what the chapter was about. Therefore I drew a scene on the piece of paper we were given with a short dialog between Hester and Pearl which hopefully will make the rest of the class remembering what this chapter was about.

The Scarlet Letter Chapter 5

Why does Hester choose to stay in the town?


Hester Prynne did not leave the Puritan village, because "She could no longer borrow from the future, to help her through the present grief." That means she could not trust in the future, not be sure to get better.
Furthermore, "there is a fatality, a feeling so irresistible and inevitable that it has the force of doom, which almost invariably compels human beings to linger around and haunt, ghost-like, the spot where some great and marked event has given the color to their lifetime; and still the more irresistibly, the darker the tinge that saddens it. Her sin, her ignominy, were the roots which she had struck into the soil. It was as if a new birth, with stronger assimilations than the first, had converted the forest-land, still so uncongenial to every other pilgrim and wanderer, into Hester Prynne's wild and dreary, but life-long home." That means that she has a special feeling that she should stay here in her "new" home, no matter what has happened.
Another reason might be "All other scenes of earth--even that village of rural England, where happy infancy and stainless maidenhood seemed yet to be in her mother's keeping, like garments put off long ago--were foreign to her, in comparison. The chain that bound her here was of iron links, and galling to her inmost soul, but never could be broken." She says that the chains or the connections to the village where she was born and has lived for her whole childhood are broken, that she does not feel to have a real relation to her village in her home county.
Finally "she said to herself, had been the scene of her guilt, and here should be the scene of her earthly punishment; and so, perchance, the torture of her daily shame would at length purge her soul, and work out another purity than that which she had lost; more saint-like, because the result of martyrdom." That means that she feels guilty and wants to get her punishment at the place where she did her crime. And she knows that she will experience a lot of mortification.


How does the community treat her?


The community treats Hester very bad. She had to live in a very poor shelter away from other homes. She had no single friend. Later, the people of Boston tried to take her child away from her. She was treated as a victim with mortification,animosity and contempt. Having a child without marriage or from another man than her husband was a very bad crime for this time, especially for Puritans. Hester was excluded from her people.