For this assignment, I chose topic number 2 because all stories that we discussed in weeks 9 to 11 have affected my willing suspension of disbelief. Those stories have primary fantasy setting. As a result, the places used in all stories were easy to imagine. However, each story expressed Rosemary Jackson’s concept in different ways. In the story of “26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss”, the bathtub trick was unknown at the beginning, and this unknown created a sense of longing for an absolute meaning. Then, the mystery was revealed at the end, “Aimee and Geof are really just houseguests in the monkeys’ world: they are there for a while and then they leave” (Johnson 352). The revelation at the end satisfied me because the mystery is now known, and …show more content…
His character showed a longing for an absolute meaning of love and happiness. In order to find the absolute meaning, the creature experienced sufferings. I think that he was able to realize what is true love, and what is real happiness because of Karloff’s advice: “Underwater, my friend. Water is your natural milieu” (Bailey). Because the Creature is similar to a human, I can understand his feelings which made me feel that I am part of the story. In “The Rememberer”, I immersed myself in the story because I got curious about the topic of reverse evolution. Moreover, the main message of the story caught my attention, and I think that the theme shows Jackson’s concept of longing for an absolute meaning. “We're all getting too smart. Our brains are just getting bigger and bigger, and the world dries up and dies when there's too much thought and not enough heart” (Bender). In general, I have learned that every fantasy story affects a reader’s suspension of disbelief in different ways, and it depends on the fantasy setting and on Rosemary Jackson’s concept of ‘known’, ‘unknown’ and the ‘longing for an absolute
Joshua Foer’s “The End of Remembering” and Kathryn Schulz’s “Evidence” are two essays that have more in common than one might think. Although on two totally different topics, they revolve around the central point of the complexities of the human mind. However, there are some key elements both writers have contemplated on in differing ways.
Theim, Jon. "The Textualization of the Reader in Magical Realist Fiction." Magical Realism: Theory, History, Community. Ed. Lois Parkinson Zamora and Wendy B. Faris. Durham; N.C.: Duke UP, 1995. 235-247.
Throughout the story, the reader comes across several things that he or she will question. In the beginning of the story, a young boy goes to the aquarium to see the axolotls. He soon becomes obsessed with them and goes everyday to watch them. At the
American Literature. 6th Edition. Vol. A. Ed. Nina Baym. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. 2003. 783-791
The soft island breeze blows across the sound and the smell of the sea fills the air in Willow Springs. Meanwhile, a thousand miles away in Lower Manhattan the smell of garbage and street vendors’ hotdogs hangs in the air. These two settings are key to Gloria Naylor’s 1988 novel Mama Day where the freedom and consistency of the Sea Islands is poised against the confinement of the ever-changing city, two settings that not only changes characters’ personalities but also their perceptions. On the surface the two places seem to share no similarities and represent different aspects. There are, however, some similarities, among which is the effect of the setting on the characters. Naylor demonstrates through the characters Cocoa Day and George Andrews that a person’s surroundings affect the way they behave and either allows or permits them to believe in certain aspects of life, especially in respect to believing in magic or logic.
Literature. Vol. A. Ed. Nina Baym and Julia Reidhead. 17 ed. New York: W.W. Norton &
Douglas Light said that our imagination is better than any answer to a question. Light distinguishes between two genres: fantasy and fiction. He described how fantasy stimulates one’s imagination, which is more appealing, but fiction can just be a relatable story. In the same way, books and movies are very different entities. In the short parable Doubt, the readers are lured in to the possibility of a scandalous relationship between a pastor and an alter boy.
...ment of himself as a man, as a provider of his family and most important of what he wants to be, which draws him to a completely discomfort of who he is and lost his mind in a parallel world where he is not afraid of the men in the portrait anymore and let himself been through his transformation and finally release in his death.
“If the human race didn’t remember anything it would be perfectly happy" (44). Thus runs one of the early musings of Jack Burden, the protagonist of Robert Penn Warren’s All the King’s Men. Throughout the story, however, as Jack gradually opens his eyes to the realities of his own nature and his world, he realizes that the human race cannot forget the past and survive. Man must not only remember, but also embrace the past, because it teaches him the truth about himself and enables him to face the future.
It is easy for the reader who enters the enchanted realm of Tolkien's own work to be lost in the magic of the Middle-Earth and to forbear to ask questions. Surrounded by elves, hobbits, dragons and orcs, wandering the pristine fields and woods, described with such loving care they seem almost real, it is easy to forget there is another world outside, the world in which John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, an Oxford don, lived and wrote his monumental series of fantasy novels. It is, after all, natural to want to escape humdrum reality. Literature that offers a simple pleasure of a different time, a different place has nothing to be ashamed of. Tolkien in the same essay describes "escape and consolation" as one of the chief functions of the fairy-tale by which term he understands also what we would call "literary fantasy" today. "Escape and consolation" seem to be self-evident terms. What is there to discuss? Perhaps all that I have to do today is to praise Tolkien's fertile imagination and to step modestly aside.
of how John Steinbeck uses extraordinary circumstances to create appeal and realism to the reader.
Faris, Wendy B. Ordinary Enchantments: Magical Realism and the Remystification of Narrative. Nashville: Vanderbilt UP, 2004. 24 Sept. 2012. Web. 15 Mar. 2014. 21
Character Development in Edward Abbey's The Monkey Wrench Gang. Search and Rescue, Utah State Police, and Bishops of the Church of Latter-Day Saints chase a group of bridge destroying, billboard burning, bulldozer mutilating eco-terrorists through the desert of the Southwest. The group known as the Monkey Wrench Gang consists of four very different characters: Seldom Seen Smith, also known as Joseph Smith, George Washington Hayduke, Doctor A. K. Sarvis, and Bonnie Abbzug. Each character has his own opinion of why nature needs to be saved. The group decides to make their mark on nature by "taking care" of the different machines, roads and bridges that are destroying it.
In order to see how Magical Realism is found in this treatment, one must first consider at least one of the identifying marks of Magical Realism. Among the characteristics that identify Magical Realism is the feeling of transcendence that the reader has while reading a Magical Realist text (Simpkins 150). During transcendence, a reader senses something that is beyond the real world. At the same time, however, the reader still feels as if he or she were rooted in the world (Sandner 52). After the reader undergoes transcendence, then he or she should have a different outlook on life.
Zipes, Jack. Why Fairy Tales Stick: The Evolution and Relevance of a Genre. New York: Routledge, 2006. Print.