Martha’s Class Blog

Would be Freckles. So I was shocked to find that a sequel was written many years later. This book, entitled Freckles Comes Home was written, not by Gene Stratton Porter, the author of Freckles, but by her daughter Jeanette (a creepy name, considering it is a version of her mothers name, just littler sounding). This sequel was first published in 1929; twenty-five years after the origional, and five years after her mothers death.

There were many things that I found that actually helped me to hate this book a little bit less; many things from it actually stemmed from Gene’s own life. Gene was around a lot of death when she was young; her mother died of causes not found my myself, and her brother downed. She herself fractured her skull sometime in her early adulthood. I think that this may be where the character of Freckles came from; beaten down with a tragic past. Gene was very interested in the outdoors and the wild; her father was a farmer, and she spent a great deal of time outdoors. When she got married and settled doen, she lived on the edge of the Limberlost swamp; the location of Freckles.  She was very interested in birds in particular, which is the strongest and most prominent characteristic of Freckles.

I think that Freckles is based on Gene herself. They have many of the same charaeristics, and interests. They are both strong-willed, and strong-minded despite past horrors.  They also happen to both live in the exact same place, and share a love of “chickens”, or swamp birds. I also think that the Bird Woman was based a little bit on Gene; she took pictures of the birds and wildernss of the Limberlost, just as the Bird Woman does in Freckles.

A Mystery of Heroism

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By Stephen Crane Over this past weekend, I read the 4th in Crane’s collection of stories, A Mystery of Heroism. As the title implies, the story raises the question - “What is a hero? What is heroism?” It begins with the factual description of a nameless war, one that by the equipment used – “On the top of the hill a battery was arguing in tremendous roars with some other guns, and to the eye of the infantry the artillerymen, the guns, the caissons, the horses, were distinctly outlined upon the blue sky.” – would definitely imply that this story was set during the Civil War.

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In said story, a union soldier called Fred Collins, of A Company, is shouting about wanting water. All the while, amidst his shouting, the regiment pauses to watch their comrades die on the field. “Our” side is strategically placed on a hill, while the opposing force is in the forest, and there is what used to be a quaint meadow between them. To the side of this meadow is a now-ruined gray house, that has been savaged by bullets and soldiers seeking firewood. The carnage continues around him, injuring specific nameless people, and scarring the meadow, as Collins natters on about needing water. His relative indifference to the dying around him leads me to believe he was either separating himself and fixating on the water as a means of clinging to the mundane in a dangerous circumstance – or, he was actually slightly delirious from dehydration.

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Fred Collins is a simple man, with simple thoughts and desires. He is a proud man, a foolish man, and when teased by his comrades about how he would be afraid to fetch water from across the meadow, he is rapidly driven to breaking point. He rashly goes to his captain, who is talking to the colonel of the regiment, and states his desire to go fetch water. The Captain recognizes the seriousness and absurd nature of such a request, and asks “ ‘Well – ah,’ said the captain. After a moment, he asked. ‘Can’t you wait?’” After a resounding no, the captain allows him to go.

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His companions badgering him with questions, advice, warnings, and excited talk, Collins is relatively indifferent. He takes five or six canteens to fill, and strides off into the field. No where in this is there any indication that he actually wants to go. It is almost as if he feels he must, as a matter of pride.

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Collins begins to ponder what he is doing, and finds himself so far unafraid. He felt dazed and a little out of control, and begins to understand that what he is doing might be called “dramatically great.” He then ponders that all men who do not feel this human fear “were phenomena – heroes.” He considers himself a hero – and then almost instantly dismisses it on basis of not paying back a friend 15 dollars, and not writing to his mother before she died. He then calls himself “an intruder in the land of fine deeds.”

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The battle continues, and he hurries toward the wrecked house, canteens empty and swinging. As soon as he reaches the well, he lets a canteen fill itself painfully slowly, and feels a sudden burst of terror. He gets more and more frantic, hearing the explosions and bullets around him, and eventually gives up on the canteens, opting for a fast-filling bucket.

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There is a wonderful quote that represents how Collins himself feels about his own heroism. “So, through this terrible field over which screamed practical angels of death, Collins ran in the manner of a farmer chased out of a dairy by a bull.” This metaphor, using death angels and farm animals, shows the extreme contrast between Collins and the ideal hero. But still, Collins is a hero.

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This is still questionable at this point, but as he runs frenziedly back to his regiment, he is very aware of his own mortality. He reaches an artillery officier who had fallen to the ground, horse and all, a few pages back. He is utterly alone, his suffering heard by only bullet after bullet. He is tormented by pain, yet calls out – “Say, young man, give me a drink of water, will you?”

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Collins shrieks out, “I can’t!” and runs on, wild. The man, trapped under his horse and doomed, sinks back down to die.

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But Collins turns. He is full of fear, consumed by it, but he runs back, and tries to give the officer his last drink. The man droops, falls, but Collins urges him. “Here’s your drink. Turn over. Turn over, man, for God’s sake!” The officer has the faintest smile on his lips as he looks at Collins, and he sighs, a small breath like that of a child. Wild with terror, Collins splashes the face of the dying man and runs on.

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The regiment welcomes him back with laughter. Two young lieutenants gained possession of the bucket, and they rough-housed a little. “Don’t, Billie! You’ll make me spill it!” and they laughed. Suddenly, there is a thud on the ground, a gasp amidst the ranks, and the two glare at each other. The bucket is on the ground, empty.

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The first thing about this story that strikes me as I read it over is how few characters have names, aside from our focal point, Fred Collins. At the very end, one of the lieutenants is called Billie by the other, and there is a Jim in there somewhere, but the no one is directly indicated to by name aside from Collins. This seems to reinforce Crane’s technique of not using names unless necessary for distinction, or for very specific reasons.

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The dictionary defines a hero as:

1. In mythology and legend, a man, often of divine ancestry, who is endowed with great courage and strength, celebrated for his bold exploits, and favored by the gods.
2. A person noted for feats of courage or nobility of purpose, especially one who has risked or sacrificed his or her life: soldiers and nurses who were heroes in an unpopular war.
3. A person noted for special achievement in a particular field: the heroes of medicine.
4. The principal male character in a novel, poem, or dramatic presentation

Fred Collins risked his life for a silly, arrogant need to prove himself. That is not heroic. But his second risk of his life – not for himself, or the recognition from his comrades, but to grant a dying man his last wish – that is heroic. Even after realizing the terrible danger that he is in, he continues to proactively help someone. Collins has never before considered himself a hero, and in the end, may not. After all, what difference did his risk make? A spilt bucket of water?

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Questions: Do you think Collins is a hero? That his risk was worth it? Do you think that the bucket was spilt even matters? 

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Thanks all,Emma

Hi guys. This is my first post. It’s sort of late at night, so i’m sorry if i babble.  Righto, so sometime within the past week we read a W.E.B. Dubois excerpt and talked about what role slaves played in their own liberation/how freedom is reletive/what it means to free oneself. So I thought that had the potential to turn into an excellent discussion, if it weren’t for the fact that we were all hungry at the point in time in which said initial discussion was taking place. So yeah, here it is, except on the internet this time.

I would like to believe that the slaves played a major role in the gaining of their own freedom, but it’s just not true. I think they played  a reletively minor part as a matter of fact.

Most of the reasons for the opposition of slavery were not moral, but economy-based. Slave labor, plantations and planter aristocracies made a select few people very wealthy but a lot of other [white] people quite poor. These white people were represented in congress and had the right to vote. Slaves did not have this right, so the political controversy aspect was solely among the rich and poor white people. I guess i’ll talk about this in class tommorow in the seminar, but i looked at the sheet we were given yesterday for causes of the civil war and i immediately wrote off slaves escaping through the underground railroad as being unimportant; yes thousands of slaves had esaped via the underground railroad, but that wasn’t enough to influence anyone’s place in any sort of political controversy. There were still millions enslaved.

That having been said, i’m not sure i fully agree with the quote dubois was referencing that the slaves had no role in obtaining their freedom. i think the building up of an african american identity was fairly important. it made it, i would think, less easy for slave owners to see their people more as people and less as cows. From there, i think, the verdict of the dred scott case stemmed. they were like SHIT THEY’RE BECOMMING PEOPLE, BETTER KNOCK THAT DOWN OFFICIALLY.

Also in terms of the general question whether one can single-handedly free oneself, i think it’s possible, but only in a situation where you got yourself into whatever you need to be freed from. a sort of illegitimate example that i’m sure people will get angry at me for using: you’re really the only person who can “free” yourself from something like an eating disorder. Yes there are therapists and nutritionists and friends and things like that, but ultimately, you free yourself because you know all of the loopholes etc.

i don’t know. what do you guys think?

Okay so i just really want to follow up on my original post about role models. So while we were talking in class and a lot of ideas just came into my head. Alright on pgs.48-49 we have three articles talking about how this role model, Mr.Brooks of South Carolina, was supported by the proslavery people. Now looking at the the role models for the North, we have people like Nat Turner who started a slave revolt. Then they’re people like William Lloyd Garrison who publishes the Liberator which then gets many supporters. So I see a pattern here that everyone has probably already heard of, people follow the leader(s). Now I’m sure that isn’t a new phrase to anyone but here is proof of it and how bad it can get. When the leader we identify with is violent, his/her followers are violent. And have seen this in history with people such as Nelson Mandela and South Africa, Gandhi and India, MLK jr. and the US. Point being that the Civil War started really, in my opinion, because of the people who piggybacked on these leaders.

For those who read this, 1.) thanks for baring with me and 2.) you guys are probably gonna have to hear this again tommorow sorry.

alrighty, so i wanted to comment about a couple things that i noticed in the reading over the weekend. I learned a lot of new information about how Mexico actually owned a lot of the land that is part of the U.S. today. That being so, we really pushed a lot of people out of their homes, not only the Native Americans but also the Mexicans. I also noticed a key fact that all of the southern plantation owners seemed to believe, and that was that in order for slavery to survive, they needed to be able to spread westward and expand. But the slave owners weren’t the only whites living in the south, and they didn’t want the poorer whites to start agreeing with the North. so they told them lies and said that they could have more control and have a better life if they moved west. But i was wondering what actually happened to those whites. Did they become more prosperous or did things just get worse? I alos really liked how the reading described the fugitive slave law, saying that “no territory could interfere with the right of his slave-master to own slaves” It was a shocking but completely true statement. I was also really shocked at the extreme that the senators went to in their disagreement, i mean they were physically fighting. And they both were high class and had a big position in the government, and they resolved to physical fighting. I guess it shows how intense the opinions of each side were at the time, and how big of a barrier stood between the slavery supporters and the abolitionists.

Alright so first real post, yay? So one thing that came up in my head over and over again is how do these people make good role models for the country and for the public. It confuzzled me how this country could publicly abuse white and black people, leaders, and the poor. If you guys look at the cartoon on page 38 then I think you guys can see what’s going on in my head and the heads of the british.

The role models back then were the northern capitalist, the pioneers, and the southern slaveholders. I don’t know about the pioneers but the other two were violent and manipulative. In the North you had proslavery activists kidnapping and catching slaves while at the same time you had the abolitionists using violence to push the kidnappers away. This all being viewed by the public eye. And in the end I want to know what the hell were the bystanders thinking.

So I’m gonna lay some questions that maybe you guys could answer to cause I know that helps me.

1. What would go through your mind if you saw this kind of violence today?

2. What do you think the British thought of all of this?

P.S. Great Job Emma you were hilarious and the play was great.

Over the past week we read about 50 or so more pages and a looooooottttt happened! here it is:

At first Edna had a conversation with Mademoiselle Reisz about how Robertt had been writting to her. The letters were mainly about Edna and what was going on with her. So from this you can see that he is still interested. Edna was so happy to hear that he had not forgotten about her, but she also told Mademoiselle how she was going to become a painter again. Mademoiselle didn’t know whether to say if that was  good thing or not because she didn’t know Edna’s painting skills. After everything that has happened Edna had already began changing from being quiet to out-spoken and not caring about how she acted towards people. Her husband became aware of the change and went to this doctor named, Docter Mandelet. Mr. Pontellier was convinced that something was terribly wrong with Edna, and wanted the doctor to fix it. The Doctor’s repsonse to all of the complaints was to just leave her alone and in time she may come around. Mr. Pontellier at the end of their session told him that he was going on a trip to New York and wondered if he should tell Edna to go along. The Doctor said let her decide and go along with it or she may become more mad if you try to tell her what to do. Edna’s father then came to town for her aunt’s wedding. Their seemed to be some tension between the two of them (father and Edna) so it was a hard visit. Edna ended up not going to her aunt’s wedding and so the father became upset with her. Her father then left and Mr. Pontellier soon went to on his way. Edna became sad and remembered all the times where her husband had been nice and caring towards her. But now that she was by herself she was able to think clearly and figure out what she needed to do with herself and life. This man Alcee Arobin, who she had met at a race before, started to become very found of her. In my opinion he seemed to be very forward in his actions toward Edna. One day when she was at the race course she made a bet and won. This money was very valuable and later on becomes important to her life as well (i will tell later). Alcee dinned with Edna and loved to be in her company. He was so fond of her that he would ask her may questions of wanting to see her. Many times she said no, and didnt want to be around him. The whole time she was thinking of what Robertt would think, not even her own husband! Alcee the next day apologized for his actions, but it didnt change much quite yet. On a rainy day Edna went to see Mademoiselle Reisz to tell her some big news. The news was that she was moving away. She was moving apart from her husband! She was not moving far, but just the fact that a woman was taking charge in her life was crazy. Edna decides to have a going-away dinner with many people. Mademoiselle goes on to tell her that Robert has continued to send letters and that she has news as well. Robert will soon be returning. He didnt give an exact date, just said soon. Edna was extremely happy. She admitted to being inlove with him. Edna also later on that night wrote a letter to her husband that she was moving. Alcee kissed Edna the next day the were together. She didnt stop it either. But the after affect was not good. She started thinking about her husband and Robert. Edna begun to work on her house with help from others and also continued to plan her grand dinner. Nine people showed up to her dinner, 10 including her, but she had expected more. Everyone enjoyed themselves, laughing, conversing, singing and joking around. After people left, Alcee stayed to talk with Edna. He didnt leave until, “she had become supple to his gentle, seductive entreaties.”(pg154).  When her husband heard about the move, he immediatly covered it up by doing contruction on the house. He wanted to make it seem as though she wasnt moving, but that he was re-doing the house, so she had to move stuff out. He was scared about his reputation. Edna didnt care though she still moved and also went to visit her kids. She cried when she saw them. She was actually happy to see them! Once she left she realized she was alone.

-hope this was good

After the first 50 or so pages, where in Dorothy meats up with the scare crow, tin man, and the lion, the story starts to depart from the movie. While traveling towards the the city of OZ, or cast faces many trials. All of them can be generalized into the following formula {some sort of problem appears, the tin mans kind disposition earns the teem a friend to help, the scarecrow comes up with an idea of how to solve it, the lion bravely uses his strength to solve the problem} it becomes all to apparent that they already posses what they are searching for. then they arrive at the city of OZ where they are forced to ware goggles so the brightness of the city does not blind them. Inside they individually meat up with the wizard of OZ, who tells them that they must kill the wicked which before he will help them. So they set out, the which dispatches a bunch of useless minions in classic power rangers style. but they all fail, so she uses her magic hat to summon the winged monkeys which kill the scarecrow and the tin man, and take Dorothy and the lion to her castle where they are forced to work as slaves. the witch tries to steal Dorothy’s shoes so Dorothy throws water making her melt. Then Dorothy revives the tin man and the scare crow. They go back To OZ, where they learn that OZ is actually a “humbug” and a ventriloquist from Omaha. He gives them all placebo fixes except Dororthy who he will help later.

The city of OZ was clearly a thinly layered metaphor for capitalism. The city is all green(money), and when they first see OZ he says that he will only do things if they give him something in return. later on the trio learns that every thing the city and the wizard seem is a lie, but they choose to believe it anyways so it still works. The city was not actually green, but instead the glasses that they wore made it apear so. the forms that the wizard originally appeared in were all fake and he was really just an old silly man.

In this story, there is a man named Stimson who owns “Stimson’s Mammoth Merry-Go-Round”. Little children go on the merry-go-round and try to grab metal hoops as they go round. There is a young man named Frank who collects the hoops from the children when the ride finishes. He is always smiling at a girl who sells tickets. This girl is named Lizzie, and she is Stimson’s daughter. Stimson is annoyed that Frank is always smiling at his daughter. Frank and Lizzie have a complicated relationship consisting only of smiling at eachother. They have nevr spoken, and yet they seem to be in love. One day Stimson gets so annoyed, he tells Lizzie to stop staring at Frank, and he tells Frank that if he keeps staring at Lizzie, he will be fired. But this does not stop Frank. When Lizzie goes down the the beach with her friend, Frank follows. At first he doesn’t know what to say, but then Lizzie’s friend leaves him and Lizzie alone, and they begin to talk, and they were very happy with eachother. Then one day, Stimson arrives at his merry-go-round to see that both Lizzie and Frank are not there. He runs home, and his wife is there, hysterical. She says that Frank and Lizzie drove by, and before the wife could ask where they were going, they drove away. So Stimson runs down the street after them. He gets a “hack” (i think it’s like a taxi) and tells the driver to chase after the buggy that Frank and Lizzie are in. Stimson is furious, and caught up in the chase. But the buggy is going too fast, and Stimson begins to feel old. He realizes that the fast buggy infront of him is the pace of youth, “…swift-flying with the hope of dreams.”

I liked this story the most out of the three we have read. I actually liked some of the descriptions, because they were very vivid, like “the summer sunlight sprinkled its gold upon the garnet canopies…”

I think that Stephan Crane was incorporating yet another moral into this story. I think he was saying something like, you can’t chase after youth, that youth is not forever, and at some point you will age, and just have to accept that.

idk…i could just be randomly reading into it. What do you guys think?

Throughout the whole reading, th thing that struck me the most was the little snippet entitled “Paper Trail” It was one of the yellow boxes, on page 29. It said that a newspaper called the Hartford Courant had run a long apology piece about its involvement in slavery, saying that they had wrongly been “slave brokers”. My first reaction to this was wow, it’s nice that at least some people took responsibilities for their actions, did not excusing their actions in any way. They apologized sincerely, and regretted their decisions. At second glance however, I noticed the date on the article; July 4, 2000. 2000!! That is not even eight years ago, a little late for an apology, dontchya think? While maybe a nice gesture, it was one that should have been made a long, long time ago. The people who partook in the advertising of slave trade are now long gone; both from the magazine, and the world altogether. The people who wrote this article did not have anything to do with what happened back then. Not to say that it was wrong to apologize, but it came way too late; I would be more impressed by an apology made from someone who actually had a pert in all of this. What do you guys think? Do you think that this apology was indeed an appropriate amount of apology? Do you agree with the statement “it’s never too late to apologize”?