Hagar Character Sketch

This is a character sketch of Hagar from the book Song of Solomon. A character sketch is the thoughts and feelings followed by actions of a character. 

Death Essay

Reflection: 

            Death is a topic that can arise any time in anyone’s life, everyone has so many people that they interact with that the chances of facing death is as common as someone having a child. Each person will deal with death in different ways. Some people even deal with death in different people different ways, I know I certainly do.  Death for me is a touchy subject because I have lost many who were close to me. These two poems give different views of death that I had never really though about, I thought they were interesting and I was glad that I could understand and interoperate the poems.

 

Prompt: In "Suicide's Note" by Langston Hughes and "The Man He Killed" by Thomas Hardy, the poets reveal their attitude twords death. In a well-organized essay discuss their similarties OR their differences. Consider their poetic style, tone, devices, structure and imangery used to explore the theme of death.

Essay:

Everyone views death differently; one may think it’s a release while another may think that of death as the end to something great. Everybody thinks about death in different ways and no way is right or wrong.  Death is also a common thought in everybody’s mind. In the poems “Suicide Note” by Langston Hughes and  “The Man He Killed” by Thomas Hardy are both addressing death but with different views and feelings; these authors use tone, diction and imagery to describe the different views of death; not being afraid of death or dying and death isn’t in ones hands but comes when it comes.

 There are different tones in each poem and both addressing opinions about death.  “Suicide Note” by Langston Hughes has a relaxing or inviting tone; this is shown when in the poem says, “Asked me” and “a kiss.” Both of those two quotes show the tone of being comforted or an inviting feeling of the thought of death and not being afraid to die because once you die you can be rid of all your problems and pain.  While in “The Man He Killed” by Thomas Hardy has a tone of anger or upset and regret. “But ranged as infantry, And staring face to face, I shot at him as he at me, And killed him in his place,” This quote shows the anger and upset feelings in the poem as he has to shoot this man, just because he is his enemy not because he has anything against him. “ I shot him dead because—Because he was my foe, Just so: my foe of course he was.”  This is where the tone turns into regret because he didn’t know man nor did he know his life. These two quote from “The Man He Killed” by Thomas Hardy show that the author uses these tones to show that his view of death is that life shouldn’t end that way, not because of a feud, not by someone else, and that everyone deserves a life even if you don’t know him. Diction in these poems helps understand the tones.

Diction is also used in each poem to address the viewpoints of death. In “Suicide Note” by Langston Hughes diction is used to show how death is inviting and will relive a person of all pain. Using the words “calm”, “Cool face” and “a kiss” in the poem shows those themes. Calm and cool face have a reliving and relaxing thought and a kiss shows that the pain and problems in life will all go away once they have gone into the river/ died. “The Man He Killed” by Thomas Hardy used diction to show the viewpoint that death isn’t something someone can choose nor can you take someone’s life away. This is shown in the poem by using the words “my foe”, “no other reason” and “shoot a fellow down.”  My foe and no other reason give off a feeling of not wanting to, or not having a compelling reason to kill the other man, and shoot a fellow down shows that there was no connection to the other man who was shot; shooting him was a distant feeling. He shot the man because he has to not because he wanted to. Tone and diction helps provide imagery in each poem.

Imagery is also a big part of understanding the attitudes towards death in each of the poems. In the “Suicide Note” by Langston Hughes it says “Cool face of the river” and that paints a great image, which is welcoming and inviting this is because it is a cool face, with no worries in the river. This further backs up that the river is inviting and your troubles will go away once you have gone in the river.   While in “The Man He Killed” by Thomas Hardy they also use imagery to depict a different feeling of death. “Staring face to face” and “shot him dead” paints the picture of how they were staring face to face and didn’t want to kill one or the other, but he had to because it was his enemy even if he didn’t want to take his life. Shot him dead also shows that taking this mans life didn’t make him feel good, it made him feel bad, something he shouldn’t have done. Tone, diction and imagery all help reveal the authors attitudes towards death in each of the poems.    

These authors have different views on death and portray them in different ways. But they both use tone, diction, and imagery to portray their different views on death. Hughes uses a comforting tone and inviting theme in his poem to show that death is something that will rid you of pain and problems. Hardy thinks differently, his poem portrays a view that nobody should have to die until it’s his or her own time, you can’t play game maker for someone else.  

Power Essay

Reflection: 

             I thought that this essay topic was a good topic because you could relate to it easily as a teen.  Growing up under your parent’s rules, you don’t really have a say in what you can and cannot do sometimes. Also writing this topic as a girl was an interesting view because me, my family supports anything and everything I do, and if I didn’t have that support system I don’t think I would be as good at things that I am good at today. This essay was an advantage to me to see how privileged I am.

Prompt: How  and when were both women (Mariam & Laila) able to regain power over their own lives and who was essentail for them to gain their personal power?

Essay: 

 Everyone has the power and strength within themselves to have control over their own lives. To some people it is a little harder to find, they have to search to find their inner power. But once they find it, they know they can do anything, anything they would like to do with their lives. In the book “A Thousand Splendid Suns” By Khaled Hosseini both Mariam and Laila are striving to gain power over their lives. Mariam finds her strength and power through Laila’s youth and her strength, she gives her courage to stand up for herself.  Laila always had her power she lost sight of it for a while but Mariam helps her find it again.

            Mariam never really had ay kind of control over her life until she finally stood up to Rasheed and killed him. First it was her mother telling her what to do and how to act, then when she dies her father just marries her off to Rasheed, she can’t say no she has to marry him. Then Rasheed becomes the puppeteer of her life, he tells her how to act, what to wear, when she can and cannot speak or leave the house and even how to cook. Mariam is powerless, she doesn’t even know she could have power over her own life; it has never been introduced to her until Laila comes along. When Mariam befriends Laila, Laila shows her that she can stand up for herself through her own actions. Laila was an essential part in Mariam finding her inner strength, because when she does she stands up to Rasheed and doesn’t take no for an answer, Mariam ends up killing Rasheed and thus freeing herself. From that point on Mariam knows she can make decisions for herself but since Laila could get punished, so she make s life changing decision and turns herself in so Laila can have a happy life with Tariq.

Laila always has done what she wanted to do, her dad told her that she could do or be anything she wanted to be. She continued to play with Tariq when they were younger even when people started to talk about them, she didn’t care as long as she was doing what made her happy and playing with Tariq did.  When she lost her family and then thought she lost Tariq is when she looses sight of her power, she thinks that she has nothing left and the only way she can survive is by marrying Rasheed.  Now Rasheed has control over Laila too, for the most part anyway.  Once Mariam and Laila become friends Laila starts standing up to Rasheed more and when Mariam kills Rasheed Laila can gain full control over her life again. Mariam gives her a life with Tariq who wasn’t dead like she thought. She is able to have a life with Tariq and when they move back to Kabul, that is when Laila’s power is finally full and she can have a happy life with her family. Mariam was essential in Laila’s process of finding her power because if Mariam hadn’t acted like a mother figure and protected Laila by killing Rasheed, Laila might be dead. 

Through out the book “A Thousand Splendid Suns” By Khaled Hosseini both Mariam and Laila strive to gain power over their own lives. Mariam and Laila are important and essential roles in each other’s journey of finding ones inner power. They both help each other find that power and realize that they always have had it. 

Parchman Farm Presentation

The Parchman Farms were a big part of the south in the 1930's. They were jails for people but not just a jail, but it was a learning expirence for crinimals.

Reflection: When I doing this presentation I learned about a new type of jail system, the parchman farm. This is where the inmates are not only punished and locked away but they work together like a community. They help each other out, one section cooks while the other makes bed and the other folds laundry, and one more grows food and other things in the fields.