Great job on your presentation! One of the biggest things I liked was how you incorporated the themes of your book into your presentation design, the black being symbolic of the pessimistic attitude McCarthy had and the yellow highlights of the words symbolic of the inklings of hope in his works (and the literal connection to the word “light” in your title!). Also, I enjoyed the witty connection with the nian gao and the backstory behind why its eaten on New Year’s—something I definitely didn’t see coming. You also did a good job in explaining McCarthy’s writing styles, ranging from his southern gothic early works to his post-apocalyptic The Road. It’s helpful to see how his writing progressed over time.
In regards to your poetry essay, the argument in the thesis was well-thought out and complex, though I’m not quite sure if the connector “instead” fits in the context. You may want to look into that since it seems a bit choppy and disjointed to me. You did a good job incorporating the literary devices found in your poem to support your thesis, and I liked how your topic sentences didn’t simply list the devices used. Rather, you explained a thematic topic sentence with devices in the body paragraph. Also, a nice job changing up the paragraph numbers; I’ve seen so many five body paragraph essays and am ashamedly guilty of that myself. Overall, awesome job!
Derek, I enjoyed watching your presentation of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road. Your presentation stood out from the rest, for you identified not only the literary devices used to create McCarthy’s unique narrative style, you also showed how they created meaning. I see many similarities between McCarthy’s narration and the second poem you picked, Emily Dickinson’s “Because I Could Not Stop for Death”. Although her poems do not contain any dialogue, they use fragmentation to create that same sense of alienation and isolation that McCarthy so often expresses. Emily Dickinson uses dashes to insert many caesuras in her poems, almost as if she is so depressed that she must drag herself to finish the poem. These dashes create fragments like “I heard a fly buzz—when I died” and “seems shorter than the day I first surmised/the horses’ heads were toward eternity—”. Her poems end unresolved, to reflect her uncertainty of what still lies ahead. You talk about how the road is story of survival. Emily Dickinson seems to hold an opposite view, that life isn’t worth living. I think you were correct in saying that Dickinson views death as a friend, not something to be feared. The line “Because I could not stop for death/he kindly stopped for me” implies that Dickinson does not want to live life, but she feels forced to keep living, to move on, to move on, to which death is a release.
Great job on your presentation! One of the biggest things I liked was how you incorporated the themes of your book into your presentation design, the black being symbolic of the pessimistic attitude McCarthy had and the yellow highlights of the words symbolic of the inklings of hope in his works (and the literal connection to the word “light” in your title!). Also, I enjoyed the witty connection with the nian gao and the backstory behind why its eaten on New Year’s—something I definitely didn’t see coming. You also did a good job in explaining McCarthy’s writing styles, ranging from his southern gothic early works to his post-apocalyptic The Road. It’s helpful to see how his writing progressed over time.
ReplyDeleteIn regards to your poetry essay, the argument in the thesis was well-thought out and complex, though I’m not quite sure if the connector “instead” fits in the context. You may want to look into that since it seems a bit choppy and disjointed to me. You did a good job incorporating the literary devices found in your poem to support your thesis, and I liked how your topic sentences didn’t simply list the devices used. Rather, you explained a thematic topic sentence with devices in the body paragraph. Also, a nice job changing up the paragraph numbers; I’ve seen so many five body paragraph essays and am ashamedly guilty of that myself. Overall, awesome job!
Derek, I enjoyed watching your presentation of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road. Your presentation stood out from the rest, for you identified not only the literary devices used to create McCarthy’s unique narrative style, you also showed how they created meaning. I see many similarities between McCarthy’s narration and the second poem you picked, Emily Dickinson’s “Because I Could Not Stop for Death”. Although her poems do not contain any dialogue, they use fragmentation to create that same sense of alienation and isolation that McCarthy so often expresses. Emily Dickinson uses dashes to insert many caesuras in her poems, almost as if she is so depressed that she must drag herself to finish the poem. These dashes create fragments like “I heard a fly buzz—when I died” and “seems shorter than the day I first surmised/the horses’ heads were toward eternity—”. Her poems end unresolved, to reflect her uncertainty of what still lies ahead.
ReplyDeleteYou talk about how the road is story of survival. Emily Dickinson seems to hold an opposite view, that life isn’t worth living. I think you were correct in saying that Dickinson views death as a friend, not something to be feared. The line “Because I could not stop for death/he kindly stopped for me” implies that Dickinson does not want to live life, but she feels forced to keep living, to move on, to move on, to which death is a release.