1984 / Afterword (Reflection)

"... can human nature be changed in such a way that man will forget his longing for freedom, for dignity, for integrity, for love-that is to say, can man forget that he is human?" (Page 260) The human mind is fragile... it is weak. People are broken all of the time. Hearts are thrashed and minds are scattered. 1984 shows that horrible experiences can alter a persons mind. If someone knows your weakness then they can hurt you inside and out. The human mind is easy to fool and just as easy to contort. "Doublethink" is something ever single one of us has to deal with everyday. If we are constantly questioning what we think we know then it is just as easy to be tricked into believing something that we didn't believe before.

I feel, just like the afterword has said, that 1984 can still be a warning to our future. The more our society develops and the further we go into the future, the scarier that it becomes. Everything that Orwell has written in his book can very well happen. Similar things like that have happened in the past and who is to say that we are safe now? Who is to say that there isn't someone who is greedy for power that is plotting to cease us now?

Ayn Rand

Happiness

Her true feelings about happiness aren't present in her book Anthem. I feel as though that book contradicts her real feelings. In her Lexicon it states, "Happiness is that state of consciousness which proceeds from the achievement of one's values." In Anthem, happiness wasn't allowed to be 'one's value' but every ones shared value. It was to be every ones united emotion.

Another thing that completely threw me off was when she sad, "Just as I do not consider the pleasure of others as the goal of my life, so I do not consider my pleasure as the goal of the lives of others." This is completely different from her book because no one was allowed to think for themselves. No one could have their own success.

Reaction to In My Hands

After reading this book I was extremely surprised about how it ended. So much horribly depressing stuff was going on and yet it ended on a happy note. I'm really glad I read this book because it really changed my outlook on the Holocaust altogether. I would recomend anyone to read it. Everything that happend in the book is something people can learn from and all about Irene's heroic duties.

In My Hands by Irene Gut Opdyke

Usually I wouldn't chose to read something about the Holocaust because of all the sad feelings it overwhelms me with. When I heard that this was about a rescuer I decided that I really wanted to get into this book. I wanted to know how it was done and I was happy that this wasn't all about death and destruction. As I began reading I was very surprised at how different it was from so many other Holocaust stories. It made me feel so many different emotions and I became close with Irene as I read on. She did so many amazing things. I really like this book a lot and I am glad that I decided to read it.

Reaction to Tim O' Brien's Lecture

Note: Yet again, I wasn't quite sure how to go about doing this assignment, but I did the best I could.

I love how honestly he speaks, especially at the very beginning of his lecture. He says, "In any case, after, I don't know, twenty aborted attempts to compose a lecture for tonight, I finally gave it up, and decided to spend my time with you doing what I do best, which is to tell stories." This lets everyone else know how outspoken he is and how outright he is with himself. Another thing I really liked about his lecture was his few short things he had to say about writing. They were very informative yet he kept it simply said. As I continued to read his lecture I noticed he always kept a steady pace and always kept things simple and witty. He always had his own little commentaries about everything he talked about and I just find that to be a good way of drawing people in to what he was saying. For example he said, "The town, for reasons unknown, took pride, and to this day still takes pride, in calling itself "The Turkey Capital of the World." Uh, why they took pride in this I'm not quite sure." I feel, after reading his lecture that he is not only a great author but a very good speaker as well.

Analyzing The Things They Carried by Tim O' Brien

Chapter: Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong

Note: I'm not great at this whole 'analyzing' thing so just work with me here.

This chapter really captured my interest. In the beginning, I felt the intense bond Mark Fossie and Marry Anne Bell had. "They were very much in love, full of dreams, and in the ordinary flow of their lives the whole scenario might well have come true." (pg 94) They were "high school sweethearts" as Rat Kiley said. I kept having that single thought in my mind that they were in love and that they wouldn't separate. It intrigued me that Mary Ann was curious about what they had to do and eventually learned a real lot while she was there. As time passed though she 'disappeared.' I didn't expect her to leave. The story was a complete turn-around and it was quite shocking.