Form and Genre in Knulp

While reading Knulp by Hermann Hesse and trying to discover what was physically wrong with the main character Knulp, I began to project, which means to assume how a specific circumstance will result by analyzing the text’s form, genre, and any other aspects that give me clues to how the story will end.

I’m going to focus on the book’s qualitative progressive form, which demonstrates how every event in a story either essentially opens or closes an opportunity for another event (the next one) to take place.

The narration in Knulp isn’t in chronological order; however, we still see glimpses of some significant events that took place in Knulp’s life throughout his adolescence until his adulthood, and eventually to his death. If we arrange the events by how they actually happened in Knulp’s life, we will see the qualitative progression in Knulp’s character.

On pages 68-71 Knulp tells Dr. Machold the story of how he got expelled from Latin school as an adolescent, which is our first instance of qualitative progression. Knulp falls in love with a girl who attended a public school, and in Knulp’s neighborhood, it was socially wrong to associate with anyone from Latin school if you attended a public school, and vise versa. The girl, Franziska, told Knulp that he must attend the public school in order to be her boyfriend. So Knulp does everything in his power to get kicked out of his Latin school, and he was eventually successful. Once Knulp starts attending the public school, Franziska decided to change her mind about Knulp because he was spending too much time with her brother. So, Knulp never ended up dating Franziska.

After Knulp is finished telling Dr. Machold his story about how he got expelled from Latin school, Knulp says on page 71, “Since then, I’ve had good friends and casual friends, and even girl friends; but I’ve never relied on anyone’s word and I’ve never given my own. Never again.” This is the first instance of qualitative progression in Knulp’s character because the door to Knulp’s trust closed both for himself and for other people after Franziska went back on her word. This could be a huge reason why Knulp never got married in his life, and why he doesn’t try to see his child; it’s because he’s afraid that he will disappoint them if he would ever deceive them, and because he’s afraid of being deceived by them. Many doors closed for Knulp after he decided to give up on trust all together. He decided to be alone—to travel—to make friends, but to only contact them when he needs something like a razor to shave, a place to stay in the winter, and someone to talk to when he needs it.

Knulp traveled with a friend for some time as well, the narrator of the second chapter was Knulp’s companion. On page 56-59, the friend tells about how one day he was out late drinking, but Knulp wanted to go to sleep early. So the friend stays at the bar for hours after Knulp had already left. The friend finds Knulp later that night, asleep, so he went to sleep as well. The next morning, the friend wakes up and finds the Knulp had left him. Knulp was nowhere to be found. This shows the next instance of qualitative progression in Knulp’s character because he completely closes the door on his companion. We see why Knulp does not make promises—because he does not know when he will feel like dropping the current situation he’s in, and moving on to the next one.

The qualitative progression continues with Knulp’s adventure back to his hometown for the last time before he dies. Knulp reconnected with a few old friends once he got there, but he didn’t find much satisfaction by doing this. On page 87 the narrator says, “he knew that the town was no longer his place.” This instance of qualitative progression shows how Knulp completely lost all confidence in himself. Knulp dies without any real significant relationships to care about in the end. He had friends, and he used his friends to get the things that he needed. In the end when Knulp dies, he essentially dies as the same lonely man he turned out to be throughout his entire life.

Bowing Out!

Grandpa Simpson at his finest.

Upon entering Professor Kopp’s How Writer’s Read course this semester, I was predominantly a submissive reader (even thought I hadn’t realized it yet). Thinking back to my experiences in the second module of Intro to Writing Arts last semester, I have to admit that I had my worries. Since it was Kopp who was teaching the course, I made two assumptions about what the class would involve: the use of WordPress and a classroom filled with Apple machines.

I was right.

(No offense to Apple fans.)

Anyway, I was willing to deal with more use of WordPress and warm up to the Mac lab we were trapp-I mean holding our classes in. But my initial worries came in the form of the Personal Inventory. When Kopp asked us to put together an inventory of all the books we’ve read, I started thinking very negatively. For some reason I had fallen under the notion that I haven’t actually read a lot of real, literary novels that weren’t comic books or manga. It wasn’t until I had actually begun to put the whole list together that I realized that the amount of books I have read is much greater than I thought; and that doesn’t even count all the Batman-related content I wrote about. After I finally finished listing everything I could remember, I legitimately said out loud “Damn! That’s actually a lot of books! The hell was I complaining for?” And the only reason it took so long was I couldn’t remember some of the authors’ names, so I ended up using Google to find them.

To be completely honest, when it came to the course itself, I found myself to be resistant to the content that our professor put in front of us. Thus, I found it difficult at times to properly some of my blog posts for the five books we had to read this semester. I figure I am this way because I’m such a submissive reader, and I like to read specifically for recreation, unless the book I’m reading just doesn’t appeal to me (*cough* Bell Jar *cough* Oscar Wao *cough*). Therefore, when it came to “close-reading” a text or defining the various forms and intertextual codes within the stories we’ve read, I just didn’t personally like the idea of having to do doing so. Most of the time, I just reacted defiantly to it all. But that doesn’t mean I’m coming out of this without learning anything.

I had no idea what I was in for when we began reading our first book, Demian. All I was aware of was that it was the story of a young boy who made a very, very unique friend. The book’s synopsis and preface were what had me interested as it seemed to imply that Demian, the character, was a sort of mentor to to our protagonist/narrator, Emil Sinclair; he seemed to look up to Demian and enjoy his company. I couldn’t help but compare that connection between the two boys to how I feel about this guy (down below).

You’re probably wondering who the hell this is, but unfortunately…

To be honest, he’d probably just tell you that his name’s not important. (If you’re that curious, the title is right there in white. Look it up. Seriously. It’s that long of a story.) Just know that what Emil feels for Demian as a friend is sort of an equivalent to how I feel about this dangerous-looking individual above this text.

Anyway, as I sit here in front of this keyboard, mouse and screen, I must admit that Demian was unlike anything I’ve ever read before. Although I never quite get the value graphs right, I was at least able to get through the other posts as best as I could. Eventually, the more posts I was writing, the more I felt comfortable with the texts I was writing about. On top of that, I even started adding pictures, quotes, and links to other blog posts. I was making progress.

I must agree with Nicole about the intertextual codes being what I personally found most interesting. In most of my posts that deal with intertextual codes, I usually referred to the hermeneutic code because it involved some kind of mystery within the text that the reader may or may not be aware of. It was heavily present in the book we chose from my proposal list, Every Day by Levithan. I go over this in more detail in the book’s section of the annotated bibliography, but the biggest elephant in the room was a question that would have readers baffled for the entire book: What is our protagonist?

After finishing the first two books, I immediately began to lose steam. The next book we began was The Bell Jar, chosen from Nicole’s proposal list and our final book was The Brief Wonderous Life of Oscar Wao. I stated before that I become resistant to a text if it just doesn’t appeal to me, and that is exactly what happened with these two. The stories themselves aren’t bad; what got to me was this: on one hand, you had a seemingly mundane story filled with exposition and in-between-segments about a woman whose sanity slowly spirals out of control. On the other, you had a story about  a violently dysfunctional Dominican family with a heavy use of a certain word I won’t type out, and absolutely no quotation marks around dialogue. It caused me to not get my blogs out as frequently as needed as I would purposely not reading them. Bell Jar didn’t aggravate me as much, but by my fourth and final blog post for Wao, I was sick of it.

Before this course, I only read books just to read them. Read them for fun. I never read a book to analyze the text or apply some forms to it. It wasn’t until recently that I started questioning the logic behind some of the things I read, but I didn’t know what exactly I was trying to explain to myself. So, I guess my one personal achievement would be that I now have a “reading for” when I go to read my next book (most likely Eleanor and Park). Another aspect I’m making sure to take with me is the intertextual codes. In the past, I’ve tried to apply some of these codes without actually knowing it, but now I know, and it’ll make it easier and more enjoyable for me.

Core Values

The third core value of writing arts reads:

“Writing Arts students will demonstrate the ability to critically read complex and sophisticated texts in a variety of subjects.”

Essentially, WA students should understand most parts of a text and find some kind of relation between them and it. It allows for an alteration which leads to the reader having a new P.O.V. after everything is understood. Once we as readers identify as authentic submissive readers, then we come at the text new in a new manner. Remaining submissive will allow us to always accept what an author wants us to read. Now that I have a better idea of how I can dig deeper into a story, I can now go into any novel and enjoy it even more than I used to.

Comments

https://thegoldendemians.wordpress.com/2015/10/07/blog-1-eleanor-and-park/comment-page-1/#comment-58

https://thegoldendemians.wordpress.com/2015/12/15/1-in-the-beginning-all-the-light-we-cannot-see/#comments

https://thegoldendemians.wordpress.com/2015/12/15/2-the-kite-runner-form-and-genre/#comments

https://thegoldendemians.wordpress.com/2015/10/07/eleanor-and-park/comment-page-1/#comment-59

https://thegoldendemians.wordpress.com/2015/10/28/blog-3-music-in-eleanor-and-park/comment-page-1/#comment-60

https://thegoldendemians.wordpress.com/2015/11/03/3-eleanor-park-intertextual-codes/comment-page-1/#comment-61

https://thegoldendemians.wordpress.com/2015/10/12/blog-2-taking-a-closer-look-at-eleanor-and-park/comment-page-1/#comment-62

https://thegoldendemians.wordpress.com/2015/10/13/364/comment-page-1/#comment-63

 

Joe’s Final Reflection: Implementing What I Have Learned

(note: this was previously posted within my inventory, but after seeing Nicole’s blog post, I decided to also post it autonomously as a blog)

It was probably around late October, perhaps even early November, when it happened. I probably hadn’t slept much the night before, per the usual Thursday morning before my 8 am, and I was nodding off in class right next to the professor. I’m talking about a flurry of hypnotic jerks, until she handed us copies of a satirical article on YA literature and began reading to us—(these types of things normally gain my attention). The article, while funny, more importantly highlighted all of stereotypes a reader would attribute to a YA novel, distressing over the unoriginality of plot progression and the predictability of characterization. I kept this in mind as we began our discussion.

This Seminar 1 class went on as predicted: a few dominant voices engaging in a lively conversation/debate, while the timid students simply bowed their heads until the professor was forced to call on them to contribute. I was often on either end of the spectrum depending on how I felt that day. Today, I was tired. Today, I didn’t quite feel like talking. This was a slow end-of-the-week morning for me, and I was quite content with keeping it that way, until the class became quite during a normal early morning lull. My professor began surveying the room as was her penchant when none were brave enough to break the silence, and her eyes, guarded by thick-rimmed glasses, landed on me.

“Joe, you’re noticeably quite this morning. What do you think?”

I sat up and paused for a moment, turning over Grasshopper Jungle by Andrew Smith in my hand. “May I take the conversation in a new direction?”

She nodded.

“I wanted to ask the class a question.” I paused again—my brain was on default and the neurons sluggishly fired to find something suitable to throw out there. Then I remembered the article. I remembered the class that I had after my 8 am. I knew the direction I wanted to steer the conversation in. “I wanted to know, are you a submissive reader or a resistant reader? How are you engaging with the text?”

“Oh,” trilled my professor, “that’s a great question. Well class, how do you respond?”

The few dominant voices rose up again—they gave good answers. But I was surprised when even the most timid figures began to perk their heads up like spring flowers after the frost melts away for the first time. Their lips trembled precariously as petals do in the brisk morning wind. And they began to chime in too—resistant or submissive, submissive or resistant—the conversation rumbled on, not at all feeling as if it would delicately break down like most mornings.

As was special on these rare occasions, the class suddenly came to an end, with only a minute or two left.

“Ok, we have time for maybe one more comment.”

I raised my hand quickly.

She nodded.

“I wrote on the board earlier,”—I motioned to where all of the jotted down points and quotes were strew across the whiteboard, “‘beware of syllogistic progression,’ and I wanted to clarify what I meant by that. Since we read this article,” I picked up the heap of paper and waved it around lazily, and let it flutter back down on the table, “I thought it’s a good time to mention that our stereotypes can make us complacent when we are reading. Syllogistic progression, for those of you who don’t know, is when one action happens after another until they become predictable, and the conclusion becomes almost undeniably certain. But don’t be fooled by your stereotypes—because I’m sure we read this book,” I gestured to Grasshopper Jungle laying by my left elbow “and we take inferential walks based off of what we think we know will happen. We’re confident and we begin to assume. But the syllogistic progression also contains what’s called a peripety,” I paused as one of the dominant voices hummed and “oh’d” in sudden understanding, “and that’s basically a twist in the plot that occurs right when you think you know what’s going to happen. And everything changes.”

Notebooks began to rustle, appendages whirled around, bodies and heads dipped up and down under the desk, and a chorus of zippers sharply cut my words off.

“Ok class, next time we’re starting Glory Obrien’s History of the Future. Come prepared for an interesting discussion. It’s very bizarre. See you Tuesday!”

I was already halfway out the door as those words were being hurled after me. I wasn’t thinking about how I didn’t get any recognition for my input. I wasn’t thinking about how no one even listened to what I had just said. My mind was moving a million seconds per minute and—quite frankly—I thought something was wrong with me. My brain was overheating, probably. But all I could focus on was how I was going to recreate what had just happened for Professor Kopp. I half-jogged over to Bozorth to proudly tell him that I had orchestrated a class discussion—and English class discussion—around the concepts I was learning and blogging about in class. “Orchestrated” was probably too strong of a word, but I didn’t care. For the first time all semester, I felt a brief surge of mastery over my readership. Indeed, it was a feeling I wouldn’t soon forget.

—

Below are the links to my blog responses:

https://thebackrightgroup.wordpress.com/2015/10/13/intertextual-codes-within-knulp/comment-page-1/#comment-37

https://thebackrightgroup.wordpress.com/2015/12/19/nicoles-final-reflection/comment-page-1/#comment-48

https://thegoldendemians.wordpress.com/2015/12/18/final-reflection-ef/comment-page-1/#comment-50

https://thegoldendemians.wordpress.com/2015/12/15/final-slanted-reflection/comment-page-1/#comment-51

https://thegoldendemians.wordpress.com/2015/12/18/final-reflection-md/comment-page-1/#comment-52

https://fourtheloveofreading.wordpress.com/2015/11/23/wrapping-up-the-witness/comment-page-1/#comment-59

https://fourtheloveofreading.wordpress.com/2015/10/28/alexis-intertexual-codes-in-station-eleven-by-emily-st-john-mandel/comment-page-1/#comment-60

https://fourtheloveofreading.wordpress.com/2015/11/19/brittany-hermeneutic-code/comment-page-1/#comment-61

Nicole’s Final Reflection

I started out Professor Kopp’s How Writers Read course as a stubborn resistant reader. While writing out my reading inventory for my first assignment, it (for some reason) took me THREE HOURS to complete. Three. Hours. It wasn’t even because I was logging a bunch of books–It was the fact that I felt as though I needed to complete this reflection perfectly. I remember looking at my group mate Joe’s inventory of 100 or so books and feeling embarrassed by not going into the class as an avid bookworm. As I progressed in the class, I noticed that I was being used as an example and that people were looking to me. It felt incredibly rewarding at first, but it came with a price. After a while, I no longer wanted to be the superstar. All that I was doing was the required work for the course, and I was completing everything on time. I never truly thought that I was smart until I was told that I was. There was a severe lack of confidence in the beginning of the semester.

At times, I was aggravated. Frustrated. Lacking motivation. Tired. So tired. I also learned what it was like to be triggered. I picked The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath for our group which taught me a lot more than what was on the page. I couldn’t continue with the book because of how real it became and how much I resonated with it. As I started reading this book, I had finally received the help that I needed for years and pushed certain thoughts away. As I read deeper into the text, the words became too powerful. Thoughts were reappearing and taunting me, poisoning my mind as I was trying to cleanse it. I don’t regret the book that I chose, because it taught me that I am stronger than words on a page. It also taught me that I can live in harmony with the poisonous thoughts surrounding me while simultaneously filling up the cracks in the road I’ve been traveling with fresh asphalt. The fact that I felt so strongly because of a novel is a grand improvement on my own professional reading life, and I’m so fortunate that I can see it that way now instead of letting it crush me.

As I was learning completely new terms in class, I struggled to understand them at first, especially while trying to read as quickly and thoroughly as possible while applying terms I’ve never heard of. Starting off with the very first text, Demian, I was surprisingly pleased with how much I was enjoying the book. I had no idea what was in store as we discussed the book in class, but I apparently got the hang of things pretty quickly. I still struggled a bit with value graphs even with the last book of the class, but I did grasp the concept a little bit better as the weeks went along. It’s not easy to get the value graphs exactly right, and Professor Kopp even said that we won’t, but grappling with value graphs was a rewarding learning experience. I believe that that was probably one of the most challenging things about the course even though it was such a small part of it.

I feel as though my second Oscar Wao blog is the best representation of my progress in the course. I put my all into every word and really enjoyed the text which make blogging a smooth process. I made sure to connect my blogs to my own previous posts and also the posts of my group members at the end of the course. This was a significant improvement for me as opposed to just spitting out ideas and not connecting them. Once I started linking other blog posts, I started to reflect on myself as a writer and a close reader and I started to really see those improvements, which was very exciting!

I found that intertextual codes were the most interesting and fun aspect of the course. Of course, as I was introduced to these foreign terms, I struggled to apply them to the books. I remember with our first book, Knulp, I was anxiously taking notes as I read because I was afraid that I would miss something if I didn’t read EXTREMELY close. I’m thankful that we were introduced with the terms after the class read Demian so that everything was a lot less stressful. The class would have been chaotic if we hadn’t done so. I was having a lot of fun with this blog connecting Knulp to Demian as both were written by Herman Hesse. I focused on the cultural code for this blog in particular, and it was very interesting to see how Hesse uses the same character traits in different books. The cultural and  proairetic codes were always the easiest to find in the books that I was reading, but once our group read Every Day, I noticed that the book was plentiful with codes and that one character was embodying multiple codes.

I went on multiple tangents when finishing up Knulp, trying to get all of my thoughts out there at once, afraid that I was going to miss something. Looking back at the final blog discussing the narrator and addressee of Knulp, I realized that I could have been even more specific with half as many words. I finally grasped the concept of narrator and addressee in my final blog on Oscar Wao. Everything in the class led up to this interesting text which ultimately dealt with the mystery of the narrator and whether or not he was reliable. I go into more detail in section four of my annotated bibliography.

One of my biggest achievements in the course is finding out what I read for when I grapple with any text. With every single text that I have read thus far in my life time, I have always read for the sake of getting it right, whether “it” meant the overarching message of the text, the plot, the symbolism, etc. I learned that reading for “getting it” ironically doesn’t make you get it. Working with the methods of the text made reading to “get it” disappear. I’ve learned to to put so much pressure on myself when reading and to let the text speak for itself instead of fogging up my own mind with my doubts and insecurities. I will now be reading for learning; opening up my mind to further my knowledge of the terms used in this class and what I am capable of as both a reader and a writer.

Core Values:

1. Writing Arts students will demonstrate understanding of a variety of genre conventions and exhibit rhetorical adaptability in applying those conventions.

2. Writing Arts students will understand theories of writing and reading and be able to apply them to their own writing.

3. Writing Arts students will demonstrate the ability to critically read complex and sophisticated texts in a variety of subjects.

The first writing arts core value states that students will demonstrate their knowledge on a variety of genres. In terms of our blogging in the course, this dealt with part 2 of each of our blogs dealing with both form and genre. Other than fiction, young adult, nonfiction, fantasy, horror, and other common genres, I had no idea that there were more obscure sub-genres that some texts could fit into. One example of a sub-genre I found was magical realism in Oscar Wao, which I discussed in part 2 of my annotated bibliography. The second writing arts core value deals with understanding theories of both writing and reading and the application of those theories. I can say with confidence that I have meticulously applied everything that I have learned in every single one of my blogs while also becoming familiar and acquainted with the terms I was using as the class moved along. In the beginning of the class, I thought the terms were far beyond my comprehension, but practice most certainly made perfect when blogging about them.

Most importantly, the third writing art’s core value deals with understanding complex and sophisticated texts. In other words, it is required that students understand the various parts of a text, and they must be able to relate to those parts. This mode of thinking involves a shift from critical thinking to becoming authentically submissive with a new point of view on a reading after everything is understood. Critical thinking is the first step, and once we identify as authentically submissive, we are able to enter the text on a new and deeper dimension without completely giving up our own selves as readers. We see the text for what it is, and we have a choice as to whether or not it impacts us on a certain level. I believe that I have improved dramatically on the third core writing arts value in both my reading and writing because of this course. Being authentically submissive has a degree of control while also accepting what’s on the page in front of us, hence the submissive aspect. I have transcended what I thought I was capable of as a writer, and now I have a new found love of reading that I never thought I would reach. I am looking forward to applying the methods of How Writer’s Read throughout the rest of my undergraduate and post graduate adventures.

PEACE!

Comments I have made: #1, #2, #3, #4, #5, #6, #7, #8

Image Credit: #1, #2, #3, #4, #5

 

¡Terminé!

I’m finally…officially…DONE with Oscar Wao.

I’m just gonna go straight through this without sugar-coating anything since Nicole already pointed out the one part of the entire book that I was not only waiting for, but the one part I truly enjoyed:

The revelation of the identity of the narrator, Yunior. Which is basically a variation on the word/nickname “Junior.” Because of course it is…

…

Twenty years a Hispanic is what I am. When I was younger I would rock my Puerto Rican flag every chance I had. I was proud. I had pride in being Caribbean and in the fact that my entire family and bloodline hails from “La Isla.” Hell, my old PSN name was “cayey929,” after my parents’ hometown in Cayey, Puerto Rico. I honestly don’t know where it all went wrong, but nowadays I am just f#@$ing sick of it; and the fact that I can relate to most of this book about Dominicans only reminds me of why I grew to hate it so much.

So simply put, because of that mini-rant, I personally found the book hard to enjoy. It is not a bad book. Once you get over the fact that there are no quotation marks around dialogue and that the story itself isn’t completely about Oscar, it can be a fine read. Just not for me.

On the positive, I will say that I was relieved to finally know whose words I had been reading when I got to chapter 4. Given this revelation, I finally felt like I had some proper perspective on the text. It reminded me of just recently when I tried for so long to figure out how I wanted one of latest short creative pieces for Writing Children’s stories to be narrated. I had a hard time just tossing in some third-person voice before realizing who my narrator should be and have it make the most sense.

Anyway, that’s about all I have to say about this final novel, so until next time, this is it…for now.

– D.F. Rodriguez

 

Image Credit

Conflics, Conflicts Everywhere

…The next day my mother threw a wig at me. You’re going to wear this. You’re going to wear it everyday. And if I see you without it on I will kill you!

I didn’t say a word. I held the wig over the burner. Don’t do it, she swore as the burner clicked…That was when she slapped at me, when I struck her hand and she snatched it back, like I was fire.

page 59

The relationship between Lola and her mother is probably the most intense and violent mother-daughter relationship I’ve ever seen or read. I mean look at these lines!

When you grow up you’ll meet me in a dark alley when you least expect it and I will kill you and nobody will no I did it! Literally gloating as she said this.

You’re crazy, I told her.

page 61

These days I don’t blame her for smacking me across my face, but right then it was all I needed. We jumped on each other and the table fell and the sancocho fell spilled all over the floor and Oscar just stood in the corner bellowing, Stop it, Stop it, stop it!

Hija de tu maldita madre, she shrieked. And I said: This time I hope you die from it.

page 63

This chapter was very heavily driven by Lola and her mom’s hatred for each other, and it reminds me of the Symbolic code. This mutual hatred is essentially an “unresolvable opposition” between the two characters that remains strong and present throughout the chapter.

Although, it was somehow hidden from us in the first few chapters but that’s besides the point.

 

Image Credit 1

Image Credit 2

Concluding Oscar Wao

I am so glad that our group saved reading and blogging about The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao for last, because I feel as though all of our group as a whole can really come together and incorporate everything that we’ve learned into this text, especially since there is so much to talk about.

One of the most interesting (and somewhat frustrating) parts of the text is that we don’t figure out who the narrator is until about halfway through the book (specifically on page 169)! Our narrator’s name is Yunior, an ex boyfriend of Lola and ex roommate of Oscar.

Chapter 4 was all about Yunior and Oscar’s relationship and their college days at Rutgers New Brunswick. I found that this section of the text was the most fun and interesting to read. The reason why I found it so captivating was because of Yunior’s voice and the fact that I finally knew who the narrator was. At the same time that I discovered the narrator, I was also getting a clear picture of him which made the journey even more exciting. Kopp talks about the voice of the narrator in his blog and really getting into how Yunior talks.

The entire book is being told by Yunior after recounting the stories of the de Leon family. I never questioned for a second whether or not Yunior would be reliable because of the fact that he was such a huge part of both Lola and Oscar’s lives, but Yunior himself made me question his reliability. The quote that I questioned the most was on page 285,

I know I’ve thrown a lot of fantasy and sci-fi in the mix but this is supposed to be a true account of the Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. Can’t we believe that an Ybón can exist and that a brother like Oscar might be due a little luck after twenty-three years?

This is your chance. If blue pill, continue. If red pill, return to the matrix.

Image credit

Oh, look! A Matrix reference! How ironic that The Matrix was one of the first pieces that we looked at in this class and Oscar Wao is the last. Here, Yunior is asking us to believe him by admitting that he may or may not have slipped in some false information here and there. But does this really make him reliable? As the book continued, I felt as though I had to be more cautious of the story that Yunior was telling. I thought to myself, what if Oscar was alive to read his story in the end? Would he have been satisfied by a correct re-telling?

The Division of Author and Narrator

The chapter name of the text that I provided is called A Note From Your Author. Hmmm… There’s a real split here between Junot Díaz and Yunior. We know that Yunior is both the narrator AND the author of this story, because we are reading it as a sort of interview format between Yunior and the de Leon family. Because of this, Junot Díaz basically becomes the guy who published the book. Yunior has truly taken over in this aspect. In my second blog, I discussed how Junot Díaz uses his experiences to tell the story of a fictional character he has created. This means that he could be any of the characters; Oscar, Yunior, or maybe even the gangster. With this type of story, Díaz has interestingly become obsolete.

Yunior tells us himself that it’s up to him whether we believe him or not, but I think that he’s a reliable enough source throughout the story. Yunior wants us to believe what he’s telling him, but because of his attitude he probably couldn’t care less whether we believe him or not. This story is ultimately Yunior’s way of recounting a huge aspect of his past; being close with both Oscar and Lola.

THE END!

Image credit

 

Some Things I find Off-Putting in Wao

I’ll just leave this here…case you haven’t read it yet. Because you should look at it before looking at this one.

Also be sure to look at this one

As a recreational reader, I see realistically fictional stories like Oscar Wao as a form of escape, much like I do every time I turn my PlayStation on. Or open up a graphic novel related to Batman.

But I have to skip to how the form throws me off as a writer. Mind you, I am, in no way, criticizing or trying to put a negative review on the book, because I do like it.

First, let’s address this elephant:

Oscar, Lola warned repeatedly, you’re going to die a virgin if you don’t start changing.

Don’t you think I know that? Another five years of this and I’ll bet you somebody tries to name a church after me.

Cut your hair, lose the glasses, exercise. And get rid of those porn magazines. They’re disgusting, they bother Mami, and they’ll never get you a date.

Page 25

That is the exact excerpt as it appears in the book. In case you were wondering, yes there is dialogue here. But what’s wrong with this picture?

Again, I am not trying to down-talk the author’s choice of structure and lack of punctuation. I just feel that seeing dialogue without quotation marks just throws me off, and there are NO quotation marks around any piece of dialogue. I’m told it was done on purpose, as if for some bigger reasoning I will soon fond out as I read. I hope so.

And now for the obvious stereotypes mentioned in other posts including my previous one. It’s clear that the author is of Dominican decent and he shows it well via the stereotypical gender roles that Dominican men and women are supposed to have. I mentioned my friend, Jose, in my last post. Jose is pretty much Oscar’s family would deem a “real” Dominican young man by their standards. On the flip side, I also have a story about my best friend’s girlfriend, Alyssa. She is actually half Dominican and Half Puerto Rican, but had never been showed the “proper” Dominican life style of a female up until she and her ex-fiance went to the D.R. during Christmas vacation one year. On Christmas day, he proposed and she said “yes.” Shortly after, the women in his family had begun to bombard her with their standards, predominantly in cooking various dishes as if preparing her to be the “proper” wife to a Dominican man. I did not end well.

Anyway, the author purposely creates this environment for his story given his experiences as a Dominican, but inserted two “rebels” into the equation: Oscar himself, the overweight, geeky kid who by his family’s standards should be the opposite of what he is; and his big sister, Lola, who is constantly at odds with her mother in what is probably the most intense mother-daughter relationship I’ve ever seen anywhere.

– D.F.

Jumping Into the Next Book

I was really hoping this one is actually readable. Thankfully, so far it has been…with some exceptions. Anyway, I also realized that our protagonist, Oscar, is Dominican, which meant that 80% of the other characters are also Dominican. Thus, I had a feeling I’d run into the standards that Dominican males seem to live by. I was right. Here’s the very first half of the very first page:

“Our hero was not one of those Dominican cats everybody’s always going on about-he wasn’t no home-run hitter or a fly bachatero, not a playboy with a million hots on his jock. And except for one period in his life, dude never had much luck with the females (how very un-Dominican of him).”

page 11

You probably thought this was the only quote I was using…

“Anywhere else his triple-zero batting average with the ladies might have passed without comment, this is a Dominican kid we’re talking about, in a Dominican family: dude was supposed to Atomic Level G, was supposed to be pulling in the bitches with both hands. Everybody noticed his lack of game and because they were Dominican everybody talked about it.”

page 24

From what I’ve seen so far in the first 30 pages, it would seem that the Dominican lifestyle is very primitive, and as a Puerto Rican with a few Dominican friends, I can confirm that it still stands today. Take my friend Jose for instance. Earlier in the semester, we were talking about DBZ and other anime I was suggesting that he watch and some video games I’ve been playing that I thought he should check out. His response? “I can’t sit around and do that anymore. I’m a grown man, I need to be out of the house, in my own car, going to work and talking to girls.”

…okay then…? I’ll get into all that again in my next post, but for now I’ll just summarize what I’ve read so far now.

So this one is exactly what the title implies. We join the protagonist, Oscar, on his journey through life as a Dominican male. The story begins when he is seven and going through the period in time in which he actually had luck with girls. Eventually, that stops after he gets dumped by a girl named Maritza and he continues to grow in a an over-weight “loser.” He’s tried to exercise and change his look, but becomes depressed when he looks around and sees that every other guy around him has a girlfriend and he ends up just running back and crying. When I left off, he has become a full-on geek who loves pretty much anything science-fiction and even went to write his own science-fiction while vacationing with his grandmother in Santo Domingo.

In some ways, he reminds me of…me.

When I started, I really wanted to read for the aesthetic and be submissive to the text as it takes me away, but as I continue reading, there are already quite a few parts of the book that I can’t help but feel defensive against, and this one more thing I will refer to in my next post. Until then, this is it…for now.

– Doel Rodriguez Jr.

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Welp, I’m Done!

Before I begin, I’m just gonna leave this link to Joe’s final post on The Bell Jar here. In this post, I’ll arrive at a similar conclusion.

Looking back, I tried ever so vigorously to be a submissive reader so that I could enjoy the story in the way that I always do when I read. Unfortunately, the win/loss record of books I enjoyed versus books I didn’t enjoy and couldn’t finish or take seriously now has a second blemish on it (the first one was this book right here). Given the pace and tone the author chose for the story, I just couldn’t get through it all without wondering how long a particular sequence was going to last until something actually happened to make things interesting. But, much like The Omen Machine, nothing would happen. Either that, or the scene that Esther continued to describe would just go on and on and on all the way to me just closing the damn book.

Because of that, I ended up going from submissive reader to being an inauthentic resistant reader. Thus, I ended up questioning most of what Esther was narrating. This happened especially in the first few pages in chapter ten when Esther actually says she will willingly read Finnegans Wake. Although I personally found that part amusing at the very least, it’s probably the only piece of the story that I have anything positive to say about.

I know I’m kinda trashing the book at this point, and I apologize. But there’s one thing you have to understand as a reader if you’ve never read this book. It’s an extremely sad story that involves personal failure and misery which lands the protagonist in a very bad place; and one that is purposely written and narrated to sound and feel exactly as it is meant to be, and for that, I respect Plath for keeping it that way throughout most of the book.

– Doel Rodriguez Jr.

 

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