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Oryx and Crake: Writing the Work 2

This whole process has been an experience. Reading all of these different things about Atwood and her writing just opens up so many new lenses to look at her pieces. All of the work that we’ve done in class has helped me to look back at and incorporate it into my writing pieces too. Its still really hard to find time to work on the work, but I feel like I am working at a really nice consistent pace and everything can be done on time. The hardest part was getting through the Criticisms because they were so time consuming and basically just hard to read. 

Im on my way to graduating guys. I can taste the victory and I can see the light. 

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Okay so i just came back to read your comment and as ive been reading, there have been like themes about love in my book. They talk about how you cant buy love and stuff and like you you cant replace love with other things. They talk about the false perception of love and how you shouldn’t mix it up with real love. 

I just find it cool because like in the beginning, Jimmy wasnt being shown love, and now moving on into the story, there have been so many different “versions” of love each of the characters have experienced  

Oryx and Crake: Reading the Work 2

What a suprise, the book has not started to pick up. I see a lot of resemblance from handmaids tale to this book. Atwood loves to use flashbacks to give the reader insight on the situation. Every other chapter so far, it has gone from present dystopian, to past world. The main character, it seems, was going through a lot of things with his parents and honestly he was put in a tough position. 

I have family members whose parents have gotten a divorce and its not easy on the child or the family. Jimmy, the main character in the past (he changes his name) has parents who are just arguing all the time. Atwood really shows what kind of character Jimmy is through their arguing though. As a reader, i picked up that Jimmy feels guilty for everything that happens between his parents and after doing a little research, (typing in what do you call a person who feels guilty for everything on Google) I found out that this is one of the main signs of Depression. TBH i dont blame Jimmy at all for being depressed after the stuff that hes been through and this is only the first few chapters of this book. 

I just left off on the chapter before they introduce Crake. HOPEFULLY, this is where the story will pick up and things will start to get more interesting. Please Atwood, PLEASE. 

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Oryx and Crake: Reading the Work 6

My first thought when i first read that this was a love story was confusing. If Snowman was the last human, how could he fall in love? But I have fallen in love with the characters. There is a love story, under all of the pain and all of the different emotions that goes through Snowman and Jimmy’s head, there is a love story. In any other novel, Crake would have been the antagonist. He was an intelligent teenage guy who went mad in his work. He biologically enhanced humans and animals and he even killed. But Atwood portrays him as someone to feel sorry for. Not even that, but just someone to love. 

As a reader, i have fallen in love with the characters the way i think Snowman has. I love Crake because he is such a realist. He sees things for what they are and he adds humor to the story at points. He is not afraid to say or do what he is thinking. Jimmy is such a pessimist. He only looks at the negatives, but where the love story begins to happen is when Oryx, the optimist, comes in. These three combined just compliment each other and it makes reading this book a whole lot better. 

Atwood splits up her chapters and sections perfectly. She goes between story lines, past and present, relationships, and she ties them all in together. to make one beautifully put together story. You learn so much about each character, you feel like you know them personally. You feel sorry for them or you feel happy for them at times. Its a love story between the reader and the characters and the characters between the characters. 

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Oryx and Crake: Reading the Work 5

Margret Atwood’s writing, at times dry and hard to get through, is very smart. Throughout the book, i was very confused because the narration was in 3rd person. They weren't trust worthy, they didn't know specific details about the main character, they were just there narrating the story. 

from what I've read, Atwood uses three main key language techniques to indicate whose speaking. Regular text indicates that its the narrator speaking and telling the story. Quotation marks show that someone specific is speaking. One thing that really confused me was why are there italicized phrases? After reading and rereading so many times, it literally hit me that the italicized phrases are the thoughts happening inside of Snowman’s mind. 

After coming to this conclusion, things just started making sense. Atwood shows an internal conflict between Snowman and himself and a metaphorical conflict between Snowman and Jimmy (present day Snowman and past Jimmy). Snowman is always thinking to himself and sometimes his thoughts make him very upset and depressed (which i talked about in my other blog and turns out i was right about his whole depression state). Jimmy, in the past, was always blaming himself for the issues between his mom and dad, which is a sign of depression, and now looking at present day Snowman, he is still in that depressive state. The internal conflict that is presented with Atwood’s language shows the struggles that are happening inside of Snowman, that were happening inside of Jimmy, and how it has continued to happen. 

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Oryx and Crake: Reading the Work 4

OK WELL, 

this book took a 180 degree turn just like I predicted. Way to go Atwood, way to go. Honestly, I think Crake is crazy, but its totally justified.  Crake (or Glenn) and Jimmy play these games that are violent and very explicit all the time, this progresses them into watching executions, assisted suicides, pornography, and basically everything else that is twisted for these teenage boys. The only thing while reading this is the fact that none of the stuff seems real to them because they are safe and secure from it all. Little do they know that all of this is happening OUTSIDE OF THE WALLS. The most fricked up part about this is that Crake is smiling and enjoying everything about these videos. He sees the women and the executions as “staged” and “virtual clones”. 

Bruce Lee said, “Those who are unaware that they are walking in the darkness will never seek the light” 

The people inside of the Compound are so oblivious to the harm that they are doing. The torture of animals for the growth of an already corrupt society is just awful. And to relate this to modern day society, the people who don’t see the BLATANT racism, sexism, and bigotry of our American Supreme Ruler Donald Trump will never be searching for a way to fix it all. People, we are living in a “Happiness Dystopia” where people who see that there is no problem will never be looking for the answers to the real and obvious problems that are happening. 

Atwood is awakening my third eye.  

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Oryx and Crake: Reading and Writing the work 3 & 1

As I continue to read my book along with my literary criticism, I see so many things and ideas that are being presented in both. In Reasonably Insane by Ariel Kroon, she discusses the reasons why Crake may or may not be insane. In all honesty, while reading this book, I feel like everyone is insane. 

The main characters in this book are sectioned off from the rest of society. They stay in Compounds, where the top and best scientists (and their kids) are protected and safe from the outside world to test, experiment, and basically do whatever they want to do. After reading some of this criticism, I started reading my book now and I started to see how Atwood creates this “happiness dystopia” as Kroon would describe it. Atwood focuses on all of the positive things that are happening INSIDE the walls of the Compounds and not what was going on on the outside which was poverty, starvation, racism etc. All the people inside the Compounds are like-minded people; scientists who do not care about the consequences for advancing science (an example given was Dr. Frankenstein). Because these people who are living inside of the Compounds are basically all the same people who don’t care about the wellbeing of creatures or people, the things of the real world outside the walls are entertainment to them. The “real dystopian setting” is still taking place through the book, but through the readers lens, the life of Jimmy and Crake seem pretty good. They’re living a pretty nice life away from the actual catastrophe that is happening right outside, but it all seems like a joke or entertainment to them because they don’t have to experience it. 

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There are some aspects to your book that definitely relate to mine. im reading Oryx and Crake by Margret Atwood and her style of writing of going back and forth between timelines. In Atwoods case, she uses this to move the story forward too. Going back in time adds more layers to the character, gives the reader a backstory of why the character is the way they are, and helps give more of a setting point of why things are the way they are (in my books case at least). She did this in Handmaid’s tale by giving the reader more information about Offred’s past life and connected it to the Gilead future.

Why does your author use back and forth timeline? what do you think the purpose in your book is? i know you said you didnt know, but i feel like maybe, deep down inside, you have some sort of idea.

Relating to the chapters of your books, in Oryx and Crake, the title of each chapter is like an object or something to describe the chapter. for example, one of the chapters names was Flotsam and i looked up the definition; People/things that are/have been rejected and regarded as worthless. in this chapter the main character talks about how alone he feels and how he feels like he doesnt belong.

When you were talking about how the chapters of your book show and define the characters of the book, it kind of just opened up a new perspective to me. I havent looked at the ending chapters of my book yet, but i will definitely be looking out to see my book does the same thing.  

Catch-22: Chapter Structure

I think that structure is really important, and the chapter structure of Catch-22 is really purposeful, but I haven’t fully determined it’s importance/effect. Basically, every chapter is given a name of a character, and that character is usually the focus of that chapter. 

There are only like 4 or 5 chapters in the entire book that aren’t named after characters, and they are named after important events, and most of them come at the end. A lot of the book seems almost like exposition. It establishes the roles in the military of these characters, their backgrounds, and usually their relationship or interactions with Yossarian. These “exposition” chapters also help to move the story forward a little. The story moves through each of these characters, and the reader understands it all as the story moves on. The only chapters that aren’t named after characters all come near the end of the book, so we are almost assuming that all the characters and their roles have been “defined”, so now it’s purely about moving the story forward because we already know as much as we need to know about specific characters. 

The story also does this thing where the timeline goes a bit back and forth around the beginning, but it all straightens out throughout the book. Some of the chapters go back in time, but others continue to move the story forward. It’s a really interesting structure, and I honestly don’t fully understand the magnitude of how it works, but if I figure out more I’ll reblog or make another blog. 

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The librarian didn’t like us I guess. Oh well we tried.

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Oryx and Crake: Reading the Work 2

What a suprise, the book has not started to pick up. I see a lot of resemblance from handmaids tale to this book. Atwood loves to use flashbacks to give the reader insight on the situation. Every other chapter so far, it has gone from present dystopian, to past world. The main character, it seems, was going through a lot of things with his parents and honestly he was put in a tough position. 

I have family members whose parents have gotten a divorce and its not easy on the child or the family. Jimmy, the main character in the past (he changes his name) has parents who are just arguing all the time. Atwood really shows what kind of character Jimmy is through their arguing though. As a reader, i picked up that Jimmy feels guilty for everything that happens between his parents and after doing a little research, (typing in what do you call a person who feels guilty for everything on Google) I found out that this is one of the main signs of Depression. TBH i dont blame Jimmy at all for being depressed after the stuff that hes been through and this is only the first few chapters of this book. 

I just left off on the chapter before they introduce Crake. HOPEFULLY, this is where the story will pick up and things will start to get more interesting. Please Atwood, PLEASE. 

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Oryx and Crake: Reading the Work 1

Ive started reading Oryx and Crake by Margret Atwood a few weeks ago on my way to LA. The first few pages are just so hard to get through tbh. The style Atwood uses just seems really dry to me. It really resembles the first few chapters of Handmaids Tale. I think that its just the way Atwood choses to write. I know towards the end of Handmaids tale, the story picked up a lot and it go very interesting so i know that somewhere along in this book, it will get interesting.

Trying to continue to read it while its dull is just really hard. It makes it really hard to pick it up and read and read when i keep zoning out or not thinking about what im reading. Theres some chapters that i just couldnt finish because it was just so uninteresting. I literally wrote in the book, “This chapter was so boring. I did not finish it. Finna sparknote it.” 

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Oryx and Crake: Picking the Work

The book that I have chosen is Oryx and Crake by Margret Atwood. I wanted to read a dystopian book because I feel like sad, depressing, horrible future books are the books that im the most interested to. Personally, I dont like reading. In 5th grade, they used to force us to read and i think thats where i lost interest in picking up a book for fun, so finding a book that looked or sounded “Interesting” to me was hard. At first, i wanted to read 1984 by Orwell, but it was already taken. My second pick was Fahrenheit 451 by Bradbury, but apparently it was “too middle school” for me. 

In class, we had just finished reading Handmaid’s Tale and it was pretty interesting. The whole dystopian concept had me intrigued, so i decided to read another book by Margret Atwood. Oryx and Crake has a dystopian futuristic trilogy. I am NOT reading all three books unless i am totally in love with this book. Apparently, the world the main character lives in was affected by a plague and him and everyone is trying to survive. Theres some sort of love story going on and what not, but anything with a bad future that sounds relatively close to what mine will look like after failing this class sounds pretty interesting to me so, time to give this book a shot!

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Mentor Poet 2

my second thought for a mentor poet would have to be Tracy K Smith. She writes about various things. The book that I would choose if I chose her would be Life on Mars. This book is her most recent book or poems which, “takes readers into the universe and moves them to an authentic mix of joy and pain.”-Pulitzer Prize judges’ citation

Being a person who personally loves the mixture of joy and pain (not like beat me with a stick pain, but the listening to sad music to hypothetically help myself cry pain), I think that Tracy K Smith not only provides things that I like, but also great poetry. 

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Mentor Poet 1

for my first mentor poet, i was thinking about doing Denice Frohman. Shes a poet who publishes a lot of poetry on YouTube and she speaks about a lot of real world problems. The only problem with this is i don’t think she has published any books or hard copies of poetry. Although her poetry is really good and i encourage everyone to listen to at least something by her, i don’t know if i would be able to use her because i wouldn’t be able to get a hard copy of any of her work. 

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Permission

this year, I want to give myself permission to say no. It sounds kind of ironic to tell myself, “say yes to saying no”, but with everything im doing this year, I dont have time to be filling myself up with extra things. I have to learn how to say no when i know i cant do things others want me to do. 

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being jalen's white person

Before, I only knew of the stereotypes that were put upon me, or the ones that I grew up hearing my family talk about. My extended family was notorious for talking negatively about other races and groups. In my mind, stereotypes were just a way to make someone else seem small, so others could feel better about themselves. I was always relieved when the stereotypes that were brought upon me didn’t seem nearly as negative as the ones that my uncle mentioned when talking about other races. I have been effected by stereotypes when people look at me and claim that I must hate men because I’m a feminist, or that I must only care about Starbucks and my parents money. However, the reality is that my parents don’t pay for anything of mine. I’ve been working since the summer after my freshman year and buy just about everything for myself. My parents have taught me that I should earn my money, not be dependent on theirs. Talking to Jalen, I learned that minorities are most commonly stereotyped because they can’t hide the color of their skin. It’s the first thing that people see. It’s disheartening to think that people would go around and judge a whole, large group of people based on their skin color and the negative actions of a minority of the race. Stereotypes are never accurate and can hurt others self esteem, depending on how negative the stereotype is. Now, I believe that stereotypes are counterproductive to society. My reason for saying this is because we want to put labels on everyone and see things black and white, it doesn’t take into account that most things are often gray. It’s unfair to say that “all white girls like Starbucks” just like it’s unfair to say that “all African Americans are violent”. I already knew this from my own experience as a white girl, but now I know more on how people like Jalen are effected by stereotypes on a daily basis.

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Stereotyped

I used to think that only people of color would be harshly stereotyped. I am an African American and Filipino male who looks black on the outside but you wouldn't be able to tell if I was Asian just by looking at me. I'm always stereotyped as "average" because "my black side is dumb but my Asian side is smart, therefore I am average". What really angers me is not that fact that I'm "average" (which I don't think I am), but the fact that negative connotative words are always correlated with being black. Words like: ratchet, ghetto, stupid, and dumb. These stereotypes are always being associated with African Americans and it just gets worse for other people of color like Muslims or Hispanics. What I learned was that white people have been harshly stereotyped too and it's not just colored people. All around social media, you'll see pictures of "dad shoes" or "white girls" correlating them to Starbucks, uggs, iPhones etc. The person I talked to yesterday about her personal experience of being stereotyped said that, appose to popular belief, she isn't shallow like the stereotypes make her out to be. She isn't obsessed with Starbucks and uggs. She is a human being who is just trying to get by just like the rest of us. What I think now is we should stop trying to see people by their stereotypes and start looking at people by who they are as a person. I tired of going into a store by myself having to wear a cowbell to warn people "hey guys, a black person is coming in the store, make sure you keep an eye out for him because he could steal something". I'm tired of the judgy side looks and side glares that people give me. Yeah, it may not be because my skin is black, but it's just a constant reminder that people are looking, people are judging, and people are constantly making judgments based on the color of my skin but not the content of my character. I think that if we put all stereotypes aside, we will be able to see people for who they really are at first, and not what society makes them out to be.

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Once I found the strength to be myself, I had no need to act myself ” ~Andrew Sullivan

Automatically by looking at this quote I see the words ‘be’ and ‘act’. It’s hard to be yourself in a world like today’s. People, and teens especially, live in this constant fear of not being able to fit in, acceptance, worthiness, self-acceptance, (etc.), but what they don’t know is that life is so much easier on the other side. Why waste your time–waste your life ACTING like a person you’re not? Why would you want to go through constant pain and unhappiness pretending to fit into a crowd or a group of people you know deep down inside your heart you will never fit into? The amount of the tears you cried on your pillow because of the constant stress of trying to fit in will eventually equal the amount of money you’ve spent trying to be like one of them. You are not one of them. You do not need to keep acting and pretending to fit in. Because you have enough strength to BE yourself. After you find the strength to be yourself, you won’t need to act like your “old-self” anymore.