Odysseus is a Suitor

     Something that struck me while reading book nine of the Odyssey was how horrible of a person Odysseus could be. There were multiple occasions in the one book where Odysseus did things that most heroes wouldn't have done. For example, when he ends up at the lands of the Cicones he sacks their city, kills their men, and enslaves the women as concubines. The book doesn't suggest that there is any military significance to this so it is just straight up piracy. However, what really seemed weird to me was that they were blown to that land by Zeus and since Odysseus himself said Zeus is on the side of guests, it would suggest that Zeus was trying to make Odysseus's crew guests there. This explains why Zeus was mad at them and why he gave them bad luck in their fight.
     But beyond that, I think it shows something a little more important. It draws a connection between Odysseus, the hero of the story, and the suitors, some of the antagonists of the story. For one, both show up where they don't belong. Odysseus is trying to get to his home but instead ends up at the Cicones and the suitors should probably be at their houses but instead, they are all at Odysseus's house. For two, both commit acts of piracy or similar to piracy. Odysseus raids the town and takes all their wealth while the suitors are at his house taking all of his wealth. And lastly, both try to take the wives of the men who are gone. In Odysseus's case he succeeds and enslaves the women and we see the suitors still trying to convince Penelope to marry them and forget Odysseus. I think it is interesting that so many parallels are drawn especially considering the Telemachus has grown up hating the suitors while wondering who his dad is and it seems like he's going to find out his dad acts basically like the suitors. 

Personal Reflection

     One hero narrative that really has had an impact on me is The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss. The Name of the Wind follows the hero of the story Kvothe, but in a way that is slightly different from most hero narratives. Instead of simply following the hero from the beginning of their journey, The Name of the Wind starts with the Hero's journey already over for Kvothe. He is known as a hero by many people and yet he chooses to hide his identity and live his life as the owner of a tavern. Eventually, a scribe comes to town and convinces Kvothe to tell his story. This results in a dual story where Kvothe is both telling the story of his past while dealing with new problems arising in the present. Something that struck me about that part of the story was that the scribe really had to work hard to convince Kvothe to tell his story. That mixed with the fact that Kvothe was living under the radar despite his hero status was revealing. It showed me that he didn't want to look back because there was some aspect of his journey to becoming a hero that he was ashamed of. And while I certainly am not on some heroic quest it still made me think that whatever I ended up doing I never wanted to look back and hate the choices I made to that degree. 
     Another thing that stood out to me about The Name of the Wind was the fact that Kvothe is seems to be given the chance at redemption. I say seems because the series isn't concluded yet but the build-up suggests that Kvothe will have to once again become some sort of hero. I liked this because it made me think about a sort of comeback story. Like if I dindn't do something right the first time I could always try harder to do better the next time.
     The last thing that really made me think was actually a sort of character in the book. It was basically a demon tree that showed anyone who got close to it a horrible vision of the future. That person would then try with all their might to prevent that future but in the end that would just end up being the cause of the horrible future they saw. I feel like this has really had an impact on what I do, becuase I also don't like to go too far because I often feel like it actually make the problem worse.

Cult

     Something that immediately struck me about Sorry to Bother You was how much WorryFree resembled a cult to me. And yet despite this and the ever increasing backlash against it, ads for it continued to be run on television and billboards stayed up, albeit often with a little touch of graffiti. Not only that but congresspeople are shown celebrating after it is revealed that WorryFree is turning people into horse people. I think the director, Boots Riley, definitely trying to make a point by doing this.
     But first I want to start with what about WorryFree seemed like a cult to me. First of all, their message is extremely suspicious. They claim that they will solve all of your problems if you just join them and sign a lifelong contract that prevents you from leaving. And if that doesn't sound like a cult I don't know what does. Second of all, it is undoubtedly exploiting people. This made me think of a flowchart I saw about whether something is a cult. One of the questions leading up to the answer, "definitely a cult!!", was do people get exploited. And if the answer was "yes but no stuff" then it was a cult. And this is what is happening in the case of WorryFree. Everybody who is signing up is being exploited for their labor and receiving almost nothing in return. Another sequence in that flowchart was the question "is it a cult" and one of the answers was "it's a movement". While nobody every calls WorryFree a movement, the creator, Steve Lift, calls it the future which is eerily similar. The final thing is about Steve Lift. He just looked like a cult leader to me. I don't know what it was but while watching the movie, the first time I saw him, the first thought that popped into my head was, "he looks like the leader of a cult". 
     That brings me to how despite the obvious signs that WorryFree is a cult, the ads continue to be run and people still continue to support it. I think the most revealing scene in that regard is when the congresspeople are shown celebrating with WorryFree when their stocks increase after it comes out they are turning their workers into equisapiens. My best guess is that Boots Riley is trying to criticize how people are willing to do anything for enough money. This also matches pretty well with how Cassius Green is willing to be a power caller despite how horrible it is simply because it pays enough. 

Unreliable Narrator

     Something that I've been thinking about a lot is how trustworthy of a narrator Gunnar Kaufman is.  The main reason I've been asking myself this question is that the narrative voice is Gunnar from the present when he is the messiah and renowned poet. This means that he isn't telling his story as it happens but what he remembers it as. As such it is vulnerable to him altering memories of the past of even interpreting his experience differently than he did at the time. We had a similar discussion about the Narrator in Invisible Man and how we weren't sure whether we could trust him for similar reasons.
     The other reason I have trouble trusting the narrator is it seems like he is embellishing the story to at least some degree. Take for example the scene when he is recounting how he told his story of his entire family tree when he was in elementary school. For one, I find it hard to believe he can remember what happened in elementary school clearly, because I, for one, know that I can hardly remember anything from them. But putting that aside it is still strange. For one he is surprisingly eloquent for his age. I'm pretty sure there was no one at my elementary school who could speak that well and I'm pretty sure I couldn't even now. The other thing about that story is when Gunnar is telling it he uses words most elementary schoolers would use. Just a few examples are quintessential, daguerreotype, and honeysuckle. One other example of something that seems embellished is his introduction to the sport of basketball. However, at the same time, Gunnar in the present has sold 126 million copies of a book of poetry so maybe his childhood isn't as embellished as it seems.

Confusion

     I'll admit the first thing I thought when I read the first page was, "What?" That confusion lasted until class and we had a chance to talk about what happened and clarified who the characters were. While the readings have started making more and more sense to me as we go on there are still some things that trip me up or have tripped me up. So I thought I'd write about what I found to be most confusing about Beloved.
     The part that was the most confusing was definitely the beginning. I think the main reason that it was so confusing is that the book expects the reader to instantly understand the rules of the world within the book. That would be okay if the rules were the same as the real world. But they're not. So you're entered into a world where it is accepted that ghosts are a real thing. Reading a ghost story that you don't know is a ghost story is confusing because you look for a logical explanation for things even if there isn't one. Combine that sense of not knowing what's going on with the confusing names Toni Morrison uses and that makes for a really confusing first chapter.
     After learning that ghosts were real within the context of the novel everything started to make more sense. However, there are still some things that confuse me while I'm reading. The two things that still get me every now and then are whose perspective the book is being told from and what time is the story taking place. The way Morrison writes it, the transition between both the points of view and between the past and the present is hard to notice. This has caused me to have to reread on multiple occasions because I wasn't sure who was talking or when what was going on was going on. A perfect example of this is when Sethe is heading to the place where Baby Suggs used to preach and it keeps switching back and forth between the past and the present. 

Authentic Voice

      While reading Their Eyes Were Watching God something that really stood out to me was the use of African-American vernacular throughout the novel. The characters used in when they were talking and the narrator even slipped into at times. I found this to be one of my favorite aspects of the book and felt as though it added another layer to the book as well.  However, to be honest, I also found it to be one of the most challenging things about the book. I would often have to reread sections of dialogue to make sure I understood what was being said. I would also sometimes read the words as they were written but try to connect them to the "proper words". I felt like that took away from the novel.
      As a result, I was thinking about ways to deal with that problem. The first thing that jumped into my head was an audiobook. I thought it would be awesome to actually hear the dialogue as opposed to just hearing it in your head. So I went and found an audiobook version of Their Eyes Were Watching God and listened to the part of the book where Janie is in the store listening to people on the porch. I must say that I really liked it. The dialogue just seemed so much more natural when I was just listening to it as opposed to reading it. The only problem I had with it was that all of the characters had a similar voice. Even though the reader was changing her voice a little it was just a little off and I thought that having each character have their own unique voice would be even better.
      That made me remember listening to a radio play a few years ago and how each character had their own voice actor. I think that that would be the best way to listen to Their Eyes Were Watching God. Imagine how awesome it would be for each character to have their own recognizable voice. Because of that, I think that a radio play would be one of the best mediums to experience the story through.

Invisible Man Movie

      After watching the movie about Ellison's life and seeing how they adapted some of the scenes from the book into a short movie scene. This raised the question in my mind of what would stand in the way of making a good Invisible Man movie. We have talked about how there isn't one yet and how difficult it would be but not why, so I thought I would try to write down all the reasons I think it would be extremely difficult to do a good job with an Invisible Man movie.
      The most obvious challenge would be dealing with the narrator's thoughts. Something that a book can do that a movie can't is deal with thoughts. This is something I've noticed when watching movies based off of books I like. None of the movies could accomplish the same sense of understanding a character as the book could. The only movie I can think of that did an okay job was The Martian, but that was accomplished because Mark Watney was alone on Mars. The same thing wouldn't work for Invisible Man. The one thing I can think of that seemed to successfully provided a character's thoughts  is The End of the F***ing World. It lets the watcher understand what the main character is thinking by having him narrate over video that doesn't necessarily match with what he is talking about. However, this also wouldn't work for Invisible Man because The End of the F***ing World is a comedy and the narration aspect is designed to add to that and Invisible Man is not a comedy by any means.
      The other big challenge in creating an Invisible Man movie would be dealing with the fact that the narrator is never described and we never learn his name. For one, not having a description means that it would be hard to pick an actor to play him because nobody looks like him. Giving him a face also takes away from the sense of mystery that surrounds him which would make the movie worse. The other problem is that the reader never learns the name of the narrator but there are several times when Ellison writes someone saying his name. For example, "The boy read my name off a card." While it would be possible to simply omit those scenes it would change some aspects of the book.
      I think that along with how difficult it would be to correctly depict the dreamlike portions of this book, these challenges would make it impossible to make an Invisible Man movie that is the same quality as the book.