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Summer Reading: Antigone

Paragraph One:

• Determined
• She tries to bury him twice
• [Antigone]  Thy choice was to live; mine, to die
• She feels like her defiance of the law is justified 
• Antigone justifies her defiance by saying it is the law of the gods.
• Her Uncle (Creon) is the one who states that her brother and his army are the intruders and Polynices (Antigone's brother) should be left for the dogs to feast on.
• Antigone great
• Antigone greatly contrasts her sister Ismene
• Ismene is timid while Antigone is confident in her beliefs even unto death
• Stands by her beliefs in confidence
• [Sentinel] ...Burying that body, you forbade to bury.
  ...
  [Creon] Do you, I say--you, with that downcast brow  do or deny that you have done this deed?
  [Antigone] I say I did it; I deny it not. 
• (17)
• She acted out of love 
• "Love, unconquered in the fight, Love, who makest havoc of wealth, who keepest thy vigil on the soft cheek of a maiden; thou roamest over the sea, and among the homes of dwellers in the wilds; no immortal can escape thee, nor any among men whose life is for a day; and he to whom thou hast come is mad." (29-30) different translation. 

Paragraph 2

• Determined
• [Antigone] There is no shame in piety for a brother. 
• Justifies defiance
• [Antigone]  And yet, for glory-whence could I have won a nobler, than by giving burial to mine own brother? All here would own that they thought it well, were not their lips sealed by fear. 
• Love
• But now I also am carried beyond the bounds of loyalty, and can no more keep back the streaming tears, when I see Antigone thus passing to the bridal chamber where all are laid to rest.

She sees herself as a strong, confident woman and so she is not afraid to go against the secular or worldly law in order to honor her family and the gods laws. 

The Chosen: Reuvin

The Chosen:

• He looks into himself 
• Has a kind of has epiphany 
• sight and insight 
• Inside of himself
• Now he sees the error of his ways in being closed minded
• The way he sees the world is different
• It is a common motif in literature that when someone loses a physical aspect a spiritual one is gained. 
• While Siddhartha sees the world in a simple logical way, rubin sees the world in a complex way. 

First Paragraph 

• "When you are blind it makes no difference whether you open your eyes or not. I couldn't imagine what it was like to know that no matter whether my eyes were opened or closed it made no difference, everything was still dark." (53)
• He was blind to understanding the differences in the different faiths or sectors of his own faith.
• now he is more open and has allowed himself to accept Danny as a friend. 
• "Some how everything had changed, I had spent five days in a hospital and the world around seemed sharpened now and pulsing with life...I felt I had crossed into another world that little pieces of my old self had been left behind on the black asphalt floor of the school yard alongside the shattered lens of my glasses." (99) 
• 
  
• "I don't understand it...weeks and weeks go by. One Shabbat follows another, and I'm the same, nothing has changed, and suddenly one day something happens, and everything looks different." (111)

Second Paragraph

• His change isn't enough to get him ostracized in his community/congregation but it is recognized as different or unusual. This type of friendship between two  people would never happen between two different Jewish faiths. 
• Danny's father talks to Danny through Reuven, Danny's father ends upcoming to terms with the fact that Danny does not want to be a rabbi. He (Reuven) acts as an owl. 
• Reuven's father is a Zionist and wants an independent state in Israel. 
• Danny's community is more hesitant with their friendship and even when they go off to college Danny's community is more closed off. 
• "I spent Monday, Wednesday, and Friday Mornings playing ball with my yeshiva friends, none of whom seemed to be bothered by my friendship with Danny-- they accepted it and just didn't talk about it..." (175)
• "You will go one way Reuven, and my son Daniel, he will go another way'...'I have known for a long time..'he was talking to Danny through me." (282)
• "Reuven, I - I ask you to forgive me...my anger At your father's Zionism. I read his speach..I-I found my own meaning for my...brother's death...for the death of the six million. I found it in God's will...which i did not presume to understand...Forgive me." (288)

Summer Reading: Siddhartha: Quote Outline

Part One

• "to everyone he was a pleasure...did not delight himself...no pleasure to himself." (6) He looks down on himself. He is still searching for himself. 
• He is searching for his purpose and what fulfills him. Trying to find his connection to his spirituality. Searching for his spiritual fulfillment 
• "did not atman dwell inside him, did not the primal source flow within his own heart? it had to be found, the primal source of the individual I, one had to possess it oneself? Everytrhing else was searching, sidestepping, going astray...His thirst such his suffering."  (8)
• Everything but that spiritual pursuit was meaningless, nothing else would satisfy him. 
• "I do not wish to know how to walk on water...may old Shramanas content themselves with such wiles!"
• He is not satisfied with the level of fulfillment that the shramana's have reached. 
• "It has come to you out of your own seeking, on your own path, through thinking, through meditation, through knowledge, through enlightenment." (21)
• He respects the buddah because he is buddah for christ sake. He knows that he is not a follower of buddah, but he respects that buddah has reached personal enlightenment. But he (siddhartha ) knows that if it isn't his own way/path he won't be satisfied. 
• "Where he appeared as the sole star in the sky...more I than before..." (36)
• Really?
• Conceited

Part Two

• "...the world was transformed, and his heart was spellbound."
• "So lovely, so delightful to go through the world this way, so like a child, awake, open to what is near, without distrust." (39)
• He is seeing the beauty in everything, he is seeing everything in a positive light. He is taking in the sheer beauty of nature. He has awakened with a child-like view on life. 
• "Suddenly awakening from this dream, he felt himself surrounded by deep melancholy. Worthless, so it seemed to him, the conduct of his life had been worthless and senseless up to that point...Alone he stood and empty, like a shipwreck on the shore." (66)
• "he had taken pains and longed to become an ordinary human like all these many others, like these children, and in the process his life had become far more miserable and poorer than theirs, for neither their aims nor their troubles were this..." (67)
• After his revelation he  has new standards for himself, he is going in a repetative cycle
• unsatisfied, attempts to fix, leaves lifestyle, repeat
• Gotten so in tune with materialistic life he loses of his goals. He ignored his inner voice. 
• It's his innermost voice that is the thing that stays true to "his path". 
• He is never satisfied with his life. 
• "In this hour Siddhartha ceased struggling with his fate, ceased suffering. On his face blossomed the serenity of knowledge, which no will opposes any longer..." 
• Enlightened, he understands the perplexities of human nature. 

Summer Reading: Lord of the Flies: Ralph

Ralph
Paragraph One

• "'We nay stay here till we die." With that word, the heat seemed to increase till it became a threatening weight and the lagoon attacked them with a blinding effulgence."' (pg 14) This spurs  Ralph to action, he realizes that they must take action so that they don't stay there until they die. He has that child like hope of being rescued. 
• Although he is voted leader, he sort of takes the position before the election. 
• Focused on Rescue rather than surviving on the island. 
• Ralph has to be reminded that he is the leader; it appears that he is only in this position when something is going terribly  (when fire goes out, shelter isn't being built)
• Ralph keeps an innocent, hopeful outlook on life until Simon is murdered in chapter nine. 
• Ralph loses all hope of returning to civilization when the conch shatters in chapter 11. The conch shatters when Piggy is murdered. 
• Ralph acknowledges that Piggy is the brains of the operation but he does not want to admit it to himself or others. (He puts it out of his mind) "I can't think, at least not like Piggy can." (78) 
• When Piggy is murdered and the conch is shattered he loses his hope in HIS ability to get them civilized or to get them back to civilization. "The rock struck Piggy with a glancing blow from chin to knee, the conch exploded into a thousand white fragments and ceased to exist." (181) 
• After they murder Simon (which  Ralph participated in) Ralph talks to Piggy about the murder. He mentions how Piggy was never a part of it he was always outside of the circle. 
• equates adulthood with knowledge

Long car ride, short novels.

So tomorrow I leave for a twelve hour car ride. With my entire family. Five of us. In one car. For TWELVE hours.

Lord of the Flies: Chapters 4 and 5

Hey everyone, I found this amazing quote today from  E.L. Epstein on Lord of the Flies and though you would really enjoy it. "...the boys of the island are figures in a parable or fable which like all great parables or fables reveals to the reader an intimate, disquieting connection between the innocent, time-passing, story-telling aspect of its surface and the great, "dimly appreciated" depths of it's interior." 
This quote truly describes Lord of the Flies, William Golding holds up a mirror to humanity; and questions what we would do in this wretched situation.
 Now, let us  do a quick recap and then get started with today's reading!

• Ralph has the magic conch.
• Ralph is elected leader even though Jack was the obvious choice. This was because Ralph possesses the magic conch. 

• Ralph, Simon, and Jack go on an 'adventure' to the top of the mountain to confirm the island is actually an island.
• Ralph rules by giving people hope on being rescued. 
• The little boy with the birth mark goes missing, and some people begin to wonder if the creature he mentioned was real. 
• Ralph and Jack argue over each others jobs not getting done: Which is more important, food or shelter?