59 Matching Annotations
  1. May 2018
    1. swollen eye was still the black and purple color of an overripe avocado, she had rearranged them after she polished them.

      The black and purple color is the result of domestic violence. I feel that her figurines were the only thing that kept her distracted from her reality

    1. At night, on the edge of sleep, I can see the shore of Dublin Bay. Its rocky sweep and its granite pier

      Its like she's thinking about the good ol' days. I feel she's reminiscing on more than just her homeland, but on a time where she felt her best.

    1. madrigals

      noun

      1. a secular part song without instrumental accompaniment, usually for four to six voices, making abundant use of contrapuntal imitation, popular especially in the 16th and 17th centuries.
      2. a lyric poem suitable for being set to music, usually short and often of amatory character, especially fashionable in the 16th century and later, in Italy, France, England, etc.
      3. any part song.
    1. All  the  powers  of  old  Europe  have  entered  into  a  holy  alliance  to  exorcise  this  spectre:  Pope  and  Tsar,  Metternich  and  Guizot,  French Radicals and German police-spies

      I like how Marx was making his manifesto sound like a supernatural story.

    1. Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating On a pond at the edge of the wood: They never forgot That even the dreadful martyrdom must run its course

      Audun is saying that children seem to be more hopeful than adults, possibly due to their innocence. But also that suffering will eventually end.

    1. My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings; Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair! Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare The lone and level sands stretch far away.”

      SInce there was nothing left behind including the statue itself, I feel like this means that the Ozymandias lived up to the words sculpted on his statue. The despair that he placed on his kingdom was his eventual downfall.

    1. A man with funny shape Head and body all mixed up?

      He only likes things that makes sense to him. That is expressed here and also his taste of music as well. Romance is what makes sense to him which is why he gravitates towards that

    1. When my rooms have been decked out and the flutes sound and the laughter there is loud, let me ever feel that I have not invited thee to my house

      I think it's beautiful that he feels that even when life is happy and everyone around him is having a good time at his home, it's not enough for him since his future wife hasn't been to his home.

    2. As my days pass in the crowded market of this world and my hands grow full with the daily profits, let me ever feel that I have gained nothing

      Even though the narrator is making a living for himself, he feels it means nothing without the love of his life

    1. Step-Dad spits liquor back into glass, Mum’s body rolls back up the stairs, the bone pops back into place, maybe she keeps the baby.

      Here she talks how she would have changed her step-father's drinking habits and her mother's fall and a possible abortion or adoption of her sibling

    2. The poem can start with him walking backwards into a room. He takes off his jacket and sits down for the rest of his life;

      I really like this beginning. It's like shes about to start discussing all the things she would have changed

  2. Apr 2018
    1. However, this bottle was not marked ‘poison,’ so Alice ventured to taste it, and finding it very nice, (it had, in fact, a sort of mixed flavour of cherry-tart, custard, pine-apple, roast turkey, toffee, and hot buttered toast,) she very soon finished it off.

      It seems like Alice is being guided by her own sense of adventure and curiosity. Like she isn't afraid to try or do anything.

    2. Alice started to her feet, for it flashed across her mind that she had never before seen a rabbit with either a waistcoat-pocket, or a watch to take out of it, and burning with curiosity, she ran across the field after it, and fortunately was just in time to see it pop down a large rabbit-hole under the hedge.

      Alice's overwhelming sense of curiosity was growing to the point she had to follow the rabbit. this is evidence of her fearlessness as well since she didn't hesitate to follow the rabbit.

    3. once or twice she had peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, ‘and what is the use of a book,’ thought Alice ‘without pictures or conversations?’

      This depicts the naivety of Alice by her questioning the usefulness of the book since it is without picture.

  3. Mar 2018
    1. “Lizzie, Lizzie, have you tasted For my sake the fruit forbidden? Must your light like mine be hidden, Your young life like mine be wasted, Undone in mine undoing, And ruin’d in my ruin,

      Here i feel like Laura is blaming herself for the bad things done to her sister Lizzie

    2. Though the goblins cuff’d and caught her, Coax’d and fought her, Bullied and besought her, Scratch’d her, pinch’d her black as ink, Kick’d and knock’d her, Maul’d and mock’d her, Lizzie utter’d not a word; Would not open lip from lip

      The goblins were trying to force her to eat the fruit but she stands her ground and keeps her mouth closed. I feel here represents the ignoring of the urge of sexual desire trying to be pushed on her

    1. When I have fears that I may cease to be    Before my pen has gleaned my teeming brain, Before high-pilèd books, in charactery,    Hold like rich garners the full ripened grain;

      I think he is saying that he's afraid to die before he's able to show his full potential

    1. Sow seed—but let no tyrant reap: Find wealth—let no imposter heap: Weave robes—let not the idle wear: Forge arms—in your defence to bear.

      I feel like Shelley is saying that the solution to standing up against injustice lies within ourselves and our actions.

    1. Remember that I am thy creature; I ought to be thy Adam, but I am rather the fallen angel

      The way the monster was saying how he wanted to be treated the way Adam was and feel a sense of happiness from his creator. Versus being casted out by the very person that gave him life.

    2. How dare you sport thus with life? Do your duty towards me, and I will do mine towards you and the rest of mankind. If you will comply with my conditions, I will leave them and you at peace; but if you refuse, I will glut the maw of death, until it be satiated with the blood of your remaining friends.”

      The monster threatens the doctor stating as long as no one tries to kill him things are fine but if things change he will kill the doctor.

    3. I expected this reception,” said the dæmon. “All men hate the wretched; how, then, must I be hated, who am miserable beyond all living things! Yet you, my creator, detest and spurn me, thy creature, to whom thou art bound by ties only dissoluble by the annihilation of one of us. You purpose to kill me. How dare you sport thus with life? Do your duty towards me, and I will do mine towards you and the rest of mankind. If you will comply with my conditions, I will leave them and you at peace; but if you refuse, I will glut the maw of death, until it be satiated with the blood of your remaining friends.

      I feel the monster was saying that man has a habit of casting out what they fear or don't understand. But, Man is the one to create the very thing they want to destroy due to reasons that are out of the creations' control.

    1. I saw the dull yellow eye of the creature open

      I feel Frankenstein was frighten at the first sight of the creatures eyes. Like the famous saying stated, "The eyes are the window to the soul", he didn't feel the warmth or life that a person has in there eyes within the creature.

    2. but these luxuriances only formed a more horrid contrast with his watery eyes, that seemed almost of the same colour as the dun-white sockets in which they were set, his shrivelled complexion and straight black lips.

      Frankenstein was admiring the parts that he thought to be beautiful. However, it was like he realized that him creating this creature wasn't what he thought it would be

    3. A new species would bless me as its creator and source; many happy and excellent natures would owe their being to me. No father could claim the gratitude of his child so completely as I should deserve theirs.

      I felt like this sounded a tad egotistical with a splash of insanity. It seemed like Frankenstein really only wanted to be worshipped/appreciated by something, so he created something to do so.

  4. Feb 2018
    1. Confined then in cages, like the feathered race, they have nothing to do but to plume themselves, and stalk with mock-majesty from perch to perch.

      The language here is comparing women to caged birds. Beautiful but stuck to a singular thought of what they should do and be by the opposite sex

    2. Ah! why do women, I write with affectionate solicitude, condescend to receive a degree of attention and respect from strangers, different from that reciprocation of civility which the dictates of humanity, and the politeness of civilization authorise between man and man? And why do they not discover, when “in the noon of beauty’s power,” that they are treated like queens only to be deluded by hollow respect, till they are led to resign, or not assume, their natural prerogatives? Confined then in cages, like the feathered race, they have nothing to do but to plume themselves, and stalk with mock-majesty from perch to perch.

      I feel that she was saying how men only treated women at the time with respect and like queens so that they can basically trap them with false expectations and beliefs of how things are. Then once the female is with the male everything changes for the negative.

    3. Pleasure is the business of a woman’s life

      I feel she meant a broader meaning of pleasure. So instead of sexual work, it can be cooking and keeping the home kept. Keeping other individuals (i.e. children, husband) happy was the business she could possibly be referring to.

    4. That woman is naturally weak, or degraded by a concurrence of circumstances is, I think, clear. But this position I shall simply contrast with a conclusion, which I have frequently heard fall from sensible men in favour of an aristocracy: that the mass of mankind cannot be any thing, or the obsequious slaves, who patiently allow themselves to be penned up, would feel their own consequence, and spurn their chains. Men, they further observe, submit every where to oppression, when they have only to lift up their heads to throw off the yoke; yet, instead of asserting their birthright, they quietly lick the dust, and say, let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die. Women, I argue from analogy, are degraded by the same propensity to enjoy the present moment; and, at last, despise the freedom which they have not sufficient virtue to struggle to attain.

      I believe Wollstonecraft was saying that even though there were people fighting for the freedom of slaves, they weren't really focused on the basic human rights of all women

    1. the Angel told Tom, if he’d be a good boy, He’d have God for his father & never want joy. And so Tom awoke; and we rose in the dark And got with our bags & our brushes to work. Though the morning was cold, Tom was happy & warm; So if all do their duty, they need not fear harm.

      Both religion and faith is being processed and understood by the boy without him realizing or knowing what they mean.

    2. He is called by thy name, For he calls himself a Lamb: He is meek & he is mild, He became a little child: I a child & thou a lamb, We are called by his name.

      Narrator is now describing the boy and uses the word "lamb" once again describing the boy.

    3. ittle Lamb who made thee           Dost thou know who made thee Gave thee life & bid thee feed. By the stream & o’er the mead; Gave thee clothing of delight, Softest clothing wooly bright; Gave thee such a tender voice, Making all the vales rejoice!

      Narrator is describing the lamb and contemplating where it came from.

    1. This single story of Africa ultimately comes, I think, from Western literature. Now, here is a quote from the writing of a London merchant called John Lok, who sailed to west Africa in 1561 and kept a fascinating account of his voyage. After referring to the black Africans as “beasts who have no houses,”he writes, “They are also people without heads, having their mouth and eyes in their breasts.”

      Literature that causes a misinterpretation of different people

    2. And so, I began to realize that my American roommate must have throughout her life seen and heard different versions of this single story, as had a professor, who once told me that my novel was not “authentically African.” Now, I was quite willing to contend that there were a number of things wrong with the novel, that it had failed in a number of places, but I had not quite imagined that it had failed at achieving something called African authenticity. In fact, I did not know what African authenticity was.The professor told me that my characters were too much like him, an educated and middle-class man.My characters drove cars. They were not starving. Therefore they were not authentically African.

      She was unconsciously exposed to single story profiling due to being in a new environment where literature is used as a manipulative/judgmental tool against people or culture.