Young Goodman Brown, Nathaniel Hawthorne

The story begins with the homey air of a village at sunset where a recently married couple says such heartbreaking goodbye that the only destination coming to mind for the man’s journey is of some purely religious origins. See an example: “ ‘My love and my Faith,’ replied young Goodman Brown, ‘of all nights in the year this one must I tarry from thee…’ ” But as soon as they part and the man gets out of her sight, the story takes up a theme of horror and evil using words such as  “wretch”, “evil purpose”,  and describing scenes like “He had taken a dreary road, darkened by all the gloomiest trees of the forest, which barely stood aside to let the narrow path creep through, and closed immediately behind.” , and the quoting Goodman Brown’s monologues in the forest where, for example, he says: “what if the devil himself should be at my very elbow!”. At the point where he meets his companion, the pious theme of the story is evaded completely at the ambiguous line by Goodman as the reason for his delay to his companion, he says: “Faith kept me back awhile.” as if this is a journey in which ‘faith’ has nothing to do. There comes magic to be added to the theme of the story as the reader is given a snakelike description of the old man’s staff and its ability to increase Goodman’s speed. At the same time, the young man cannot trust his companion and despises of him and their destination. Here on, the remains of the man’s faith shatter into pieces when first he sees the pious old lady who even had taught him his catechism in youth walking to the same destination and later as he had receded from his intention he hears the minister and Deacon Gookin going to the same gathering as well. He wishes to fight all the devil: “With Heaven above, and Faith below, I will stand firm against the devil.” but he sees a figure resembling his wife going to the same devil gathering and that is the last straw. Here magic comes to be the major part of the theme, then come horror and evil again. And the story adds to its horror at the devil baptism. When he goes back to the village, the overshadowing theme is bewilderment and misanthropy. Although he lives a long life, it is a gloomy life that he lives.

To wrap it up, this is a story of fear and religious bewilderment which is like a vortex. As soon as one is into it, no craft can get one out of it. The only destiny is to sink in more and more; just like the Young Goodman Brown’s.

I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud, William Wordsworth

“I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud, William Wordsworth”

The “Perrine’s-based” primary approach to thoroughly reading any poem is via asking questions among which the following four have the utmost importance; “who is the speaker?”, “what is the occasion?”, “what is the central purpose of the poem?”, and “by what means is that purpose achieved?” Thus, henceforth these questions are to be answered based on the poem “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” by William Wordsworth.

The narrator of this poem is obviously first person singular but to who and how old this narrator might be we shall later on refer. The poem starts with a simile, claiming a similarity between the narrator and a cloud on their both being lonely and wandering over lands of nature and freedom. Here, it is to the readers’ benefit to consider the difference between alone and lonely and see why the poet decided to choose one and not the other. “Lonely”, based on Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, 8^th edition, PC Version, means “unhappy because you have no friends or people to talk to” and “alone” means “without any other people”. There are two key points in the poet’s preferring lonely over alone: the first one is that naturally a cloud is a collection of inseparable tinier elements which visually are capable of forming many clouds if driven away from each other or just one if left undisturbed, so a cloud can never be a good example of being alone while it is possibly among the best similes for feeling lonely among a dozen many since a cloud is never out of society; the second point reveals the juvenile secret that the narrator tries to conceal from the audience. By calling himself lonely [l. 1] the narrator exhibits how sad and friendless he is while he pretends to be the free, happy character that has life and movement in his hands. Whereby in line 22, as he is mature and experienced both loneliness and being among friends, he calls the same situation “solitude” and is aware how ignorant he has been to the potential pleasure of years ago when he was much younger and in want of company of any nature [ll. 4, 7, 16] but mostly unsuccessful in getting into any and lonely. The poem looks like a coming-of-age narration of a man, starting at his teens and ending at his middle ages; presumably not a woman’s because beck Wordsworth’s time women could not be that free even in their imagination. The narrator is either relating to himself or some immature juvenile his life.

The narrator tells the story of how freely he wandered about valleys and hills like a lonely cloud when suddenly he notices a host of carefree daffodils by the lake under the trees, dancing and fluttering, continuous like shining and twinkling endless stars of the milky way. The daffodils surpassed the waves in the jollity of their dance and existence. He then says were he the poet that he is now by then he could not but be happy although being immature and mesmerized by the enchantments of nature back then let him gaze and only gaze vacantly at the jocund beauty. Afterwards, he tells something of his contemporary life in which he often has times of being lonely, thoughtless and mesmerized by his own memories of his pleasant passionate past resembling the dance of daffodils.

At this point the theme of the poem is still under a shady cloud itself, thus it is right to be pointed out here. The central purpose of this poem is that by age, bitter concepts of life such as loneliness change into sweet pleasant repose such as solitude.

Let the magnifier be used to further on elaborate on some of the literary devices the poet took advantage of in order for the poem to serve the purpose. [l. 4] The word “host” has been professionally used here to raise an ambiguity as whether the word refers to the number of the flowers or it refers to host in relation with guest so the daffodils as in the famous nursery rhyme and also “Daffodowndilly” by A. A. Milne are the first host of spring and its passion and joy. So there is also personification here if host is looked at as a host to the carefree nature of youth. There are many lines that benefit from imagery created by the precise description of the poet [ll. 2, 4-6, 7-13].This descriptive poem is structured in four rhymed sestets and the rhyming scheme is ABABCC, DEDEFF, GHGHII, JKJKLL.   

 

A Reading of “Hills Like White Elephants, Ernest Hemingway”

The story starts with the narrator describing the location where the story happens. The image given by the narrator is like an extensive white land which is too bare and unprotected against the Sun to enclose a romantic scene. The no-name, no-identity characters have only forty minutes to rescue the monarchy of desertedness before their saviour, the train, comes to take them to the promised land. There is supposedly just one refuge at the moment and it is the feeble support of a building near the station, thus they enter and a conversation starts which goes on for the whole rest of the story.

The interesting thing about Hemingway’s way of storytelling is that he relates the commonest daily conversations in a way that not only they don’t strain the brain but also they are not boring. The tone of this conversation can be described as unfriendly in general. The girl wants to romanticize the experience and make the scene memorable while the man’s appetite has nothing to do with romance so the girl feels insulted or ignored and takes up a satirical tone at some point when she comments: “Everything tastes of licorice. Especially all the things you’ve waited so long for, like absinthe.” At this point she also refers to “the thing” indirectly for the first time in the story. And “the thing” is mainly there to let them have more fun as the man says here.

Again, at line 35 the girl tries to romanticize but the man ignores her. But suddenly a few lines further he comments on the beer in a nice manner which is welcomed by the girl’s positive reply. The man, though, is only after “the thing” which he calls operation and not even an operation. Their conversation goes on and on around the same topic of “the thing” without really directly clarifying the nature of it to the reader. Between line 60 to 65 the man says that he is worried then he says that he is not worried, the expression of which shows how seriously anxious he is.  

The girl leaves the table and at this point the surroundings are no more frightening and unprotected, but there are trees, grains, mountains and a river in her prospect. Some hopes apparently arose in her and she knows that she is the one who by doing “the thing” kills them all. The man pretends to be hopeful for a wonderful future but he is trying to be persuasive.

When they return to the table, the girl’s prospect gets back to the hopeless side of the valley, and the man gets more and more practical, looking at her and trying to coax her to do “the thing”, indirectly. At this point in the story, the nearest inference that comes to mind is that the two has slept with each other more than once and unexpectedly the girl got pregnant so now the man who is probably much older than her wants to get rid of the bothersome child via abortion.  The girl asks the man to stop talking in a very childish manner by repeating “please” seven times in a row, and by saying that she’ll scream if keeps on talking. She is so lost in her thoughts that she doesn’t hear the woman who tells them about the train’s arrival. The man probably has another family elsewhere or a kind of secret life which he aims to save and hide at the same time. Both feel better after a few minutes of being away from each other which seems to have helped them make their mind. The story is open-ended so the author doesn’t say what their final decision is.

 

Letter of Apology _ Page 24

BMI Hospital,   

Ferdowsi St.,     

October 6^th, 2018

Dear Edward,

Meeting you after this long torturing blue moon this weekend has been my dream every single moment whenever I could close my eyes intending to sleep, for excitement kept me high and up since I heard your angelic voice uttering compassionately we could meet this Thursday in your beach cottage.

How horrible a flood collapsed the rainbow bridge of my hopes just an hour before my flight and what horrendous consequences followed afterwards I simply cannot express within the limitation of ink and paper. Shall a sparrow’s blood be shed to serve the expression of this shock as ink and many a white rose petals be spread to duly substitute the paper; a sophisticated hand is to be hired for the task, for my passionate heart should shatter into the sharpest pieces of sorrow were I to write the trials and tribulations of these terrible past hours.

Instead of me, you will see this letter and I know how deep it hurts you not to see me there on the front porch. Thinking how sad you may feel makes my heart cringe and my bosom quiver. I offer this broken heart along with the most sincere apologies ever offered.

 Your beloved hazel green eyes long for a last glance at your gleaming brown eyes before this forthcoming surgery. I am so lonely and fragile within these cold white walls; desperately wishing for your warm deep embrace.

Looking forward to seeing you as soon as possible.

 

Love,

Ensieh

 

A Dog Was Crying Tonight in Wicklow Also, By Seamus Heaney

A Dog Was Crying Tonight in Wicklow (church of the toothless one, the county town of County Wicklow in Ireland) Also

Seamus Heaney

 

In memory of Donatus Nwoga

When human beings found out about death

They sent the dog to Chukwu (Chukwu is the source of all other Igbo deities, and is responsible for assigning them their different tasks. The Igbo people believe that all things come from Chukwu, who brings the rains necessary for plants to grow and controls everything on Earth and the spiritual world.) with a message:

They wanted to be let back to the house of life.

They didn’t want to end up lost forever

Like burnt wood disappearing into smoke

Or ashes that get blown away to nothing.

Instead they saw their souls in a flock at twilight

Cawing (the harsh cry of a rook, crow, or similar bird) and headed back to the same old roosts (nest, where birds rest)

And the same bright airs and wing-stretchings

Each morning.

Death would be like a night spent in the wood:

At first light they’d be back in the house of life.

(The dog was meant to tell all this to Chukwu.)

 

But death and human beings took second place

When he trotted off the path and started barking

At another dog in broad daylight just barking

Back at him from the far bank of a river.

 

And that is how the toad (وزغ) reached Chukwu first,

The toad who’d overheard in the beginning

What the dog was meant to tell.

‘Human beings,’ he said

(And here the toad was trusted absolutely),

‘Human beings want death to last forever.’

 

Then Chukwu saw the people’s souls in birds

Coming towards him like black spots off the sunset

To a place where there would be neither roosts 

Not trees

Nor any way back to the house of life.

And his mind reddened and darkened (abashed!! & angry) all at once

And nothing that the dog would tell him later

Could change that vision. Great chiefs (leader or ruler of a clan) and great loves

In obliterated (When something is obliterated, it disappears or is so damaged, you can barely recognize it.) light, the toad in mud,

The dog crying out all night behind the corpse house.

 

Discussing the poem above, four questions are required to be answered based on Perrine, 673_676. The first one is who is the speaker? This poem is relating the story of Wicklow people and their reaction towards the knowledge of the nature of death from the point of view of a third person observer/ narrator. The second question is concerned with what the occasion is? So Wicklow people learn about death and they don’t find it pleasant to be lost forever, they feel the urge to ask Chukwu for an amelioration of death. They send a dog as the messenger, it gets distracted from its aim; thus a toad conveys the important message but turns everything upside down. The dog can’t undo what the toad did. Then everyone dies, including the toad and the dog. Afterwards comes what is the central purpose of the poem? The purpose of this poem is to tell the story of how by accident, death became so common though unpleasant part of life, although of course it is dramatized. The last question requires us to say by what means is that purpose achieved? The poem wants to say two things one is the unpleasant nature of death and the other is the unreliability of the messengers; to achieve these ends a scene is created where people get the unpleasant information and a messenger is assigned to convey the request to god, then an accidental natural distraction keeps the messenger from accomplishing its goal and the ending goes the opposite way of what people desired.

The image that comes to mind while reading this poem is simply like a village and ordinary folks all worried about death, and a dog running to the god stopping by a river to bark back at another dog, and a toad seeing the scene looking visions.   

The Dream #1

"The Dream #1"

This is as if the dragonfly is asleep inside the light bulb. The light is off. It is very early in the morning. A rattling, and then the key turns clockwise; the handle goes down smoothly, then up; then sharply down and a knee hits the door. It opens and the dust flies up into the airless threshold in confusion. The dragonfly stirs in the bulb, but it’s still asleep; as if in a sweet long desired dream of the sordid swamp. The black velveteen heels patter towards the pre-dawn majesty of evil inside. The dark green satin skirt wakes every single dust on its way with a caress and a gentle kiss on the forehead. The snow-white wall touches a damp cold softness all around its waist, then a weak pulse goes through the whole body. The dragonfly is still, smiling in a deep timeless dream. The pulse goes stronger, the door creaks; the dust freeze afloat, and stronger. A pulse comes to hit the dragonfly but dies at the glass guardian. The dawn is awaited long now. The wall feels five glossy fingers approaching its sensitive organs, it becomes one for a single moment; the tiny dust siblings stop breathing. The dragonfly remains astonishingly calm. The wall restlessly keeps on the gentle touch. Then, the moment comes. Two fingertips around, the dust screech; Click! It’s done. The evil majesty escapes away. An amber glow shines weakly over the dark velveteen heels moving to and fro in haste. The dragonfly is smiling, in its deepest dream ever; looking after a broken azure green wing in the sordid swamp of desire.

suicide letter #1

بغض ... بغض میکنم و جوابگو نیست. گریه، اشک؛ سیلاب حتی ... چاره ساز نیست.

من نباید اینجا فارسی بنویسم ... نشاید ... من عاشقم ... اما گاهی لازمه حتی من هم از مرزهای زبانِ عشقم فراتر برم... برم؛ پرواز کنم و فارسی بنویسم ... اشکال، ایراد، عیب... باکی نیست؛ مثلا.

یکجایی از من درد میکنه ... ندونم کجاست بهتره و نمیدونم ... اما بدون جایی از من دردِ اسم نبردنیِ درمان نشدنی گرفته

تو خوبی اما. باور کن ایمانِ من به این دو کلمه رو. بخند؛ خوبِ من. تو خوبی.

سر شب بدحال شدم...گمونم باز یکی از همون حمله ها بود ... نگفتم به تو، میدونم...رفتم دویدم...همون مسیر همیشگی خودمو...خوب دویدم...بغض کردم...اشک ریختم...فکرم پرواز کرد تا تو...جیغ کشیدم حتی...برگشتم، دوش گرفتم، چای دارچین با خرما خوردم، به مامان اینا زنگ زدم، حالم خوب نشد...دراز کشیدم...بلند شدم...باز دراز کشیدم...برای مینا نگران شدم...بلند شدم، شام خوردم، شروع کردم به فیلم دیدن...حالم خوب نیست هنوز...

میگم...یه چیزی...ترس بده؟ من می ترسم.

تو این فیلمه میگفت:( منتظر معجزه ای؟ معجزه اتفاق نمیافته. پاشو خودت یه کاری برای زندگیت بکن.) _چیکار کنم اخه؟ می ترسم...میدونی...میترسم._

(رهاش کن بره رئیس!) کجاشو؟ کجای این دردِ نمیدونم چیِ نمیدونم کجا رو رها کنم؟ اصلا من کی دردم گرفت؟ تو یادته؟ تو بودی اون موقع که شروع شد؟ چی شد که اینجوری شد منم؟

اینجا بدون من بهار میشه...یخ دستِ منه...یخ خودِ منم...من که برم زمستون تموم میشه حتما. بهار میاد. خورشید میاد. ماه میاد. یخ رو باید بشکنم. کم کم بشکنمش یا یدفه؟ تو چی میگی؟ بزنم پودرش کنم یهو راحت شن همه...منتظر بهارن همه.

میگن قراره زلزله بیاد...میاد؟ میگن صد و چهل و هفت روز دیگه بهار میاد...میاد؟ یه کار کنم زودتر بهار بیاد، زلزله نیاد؟

دستم به نوشتن نرفت...اون وسطا برنامم این بود که بنویسم...ماجرای شعر و اینا رو که یادته؟ همون. ولی نشد. شاید هیچ وقت نشه. اگه نشد ببخش منو.

میگم...یه چیز دیگه... "چیزهایی هست که نمیدونی"

مواظب خودت باش... و اگه منو یادت موند...یادت نره...چیزهایی هست که نمیدونی حتی اگه من نباشم.

"Full Fathom Five"

Analysis of 'Loot' by Nadine Gordimer

 

"I’m Nobody! Who are you?

Are you – Nobody – too?"

Superiority or inferiority in personality reveals no difference when it comes to the case of retaining _or regaining_ who one has strived to become his/her whole lifetime.

Natural events, mostly catastrophic, play the leading role in this short story. A different consequence caused by the powerful earthquake, emerged a hidden side of human beings' character; converting them into looters.

These people hushed their exploitative hoarder souls for years, but as the past detritus treasures glistened on the sea-bed; the wild nature of soul freed itself. People wanted to have more and more; no matter what. When they were given the chance, people rushed to take; take, take.

Everyone becomes a looter in this short story, so they are all the same, most probably in searching for the glorious past they lost, or were rubbed off by Time, over the sea-bed where it is given that time does not, never did, exist down there where the materiality of the past and the present as they lie has no chronological order, all is one, all is nothing – or all is possible at once.

No name and no specific character is referred to in 'Loot', even the most selective looter is not introduced properly personally since he lost his politically well-known name to Time and even hoarding the past didn't help him retain _or regain_ his fame. Who recognized them, that day, where they lie?

The story is related from two points of view; one is the defective report presented by the media which knows nothing but what's vivid, the other is by the writer who believes to know more though does not relate it all in detail.

The climax of the story is where nature, the most powerful being, shows people how exploitatively uncivilized they can be; then draws them all back for itself, since it is the most exploitative of all.

The treasures down the sea-bed are professionally described in a way that cheap and expensive, important and unimportant pieces of stuff are gathered together down there and people take them regardless of the value.

But the human version of the sea, the retired long-divorced man, who is not, cannot be as exploitative as his natural lad; is a hundred percent similarly hoarding. In the final battle, seeking for his long lost self, he is defeated by the sea. Besides, it is indicated that somehow he believed his journey will end as soon as he finds the most important _thing. Because he kept 'The Great Wave' over his bed and did not care about it. All that mattered to him was to retain who he was, but innocently unlucky he was; he didn't know at the end; no carnation or rose floats.

The End!

The Tell_tale Heart by Edgar Allan Poe; a Re_view

The Case of the Silent Devil

Troubled, in no rush, ne'er blushed; HuSH

Hushh Insanity! No Pity.

Ears of his given to city

Tense whose wires, beware! Fly back! ShuSHH

Excitedly still, talks his crush:

Lacks fire the hellish dim sky eye

Lulls reckless passion, on the sly

_Shush, HUSH, NO ruSh_ fakes pale blue crush

Tick-Tock tiptoes, hands in No ruSh

Asleep, sniffs deep, creeps he; not eyes

Label not him but he who sighs

Eager to face his cruSh, No ruSh

Hush the creak, do NOt b_Reathe; Shh

Eine, duex, three, hush; seven nights

Alas, veils wrinkled wave the sights

Re_fake_ationship, by morn RuShh!

Tick-Tock; every cell a clock HUShh

Bursts into chuckles, still quiet

Yearns dead night to join the riot

Escapes no devil this dark bluShh

Dauntless the nervous boy to fluSh

God damn it; his thumb click clinked slipped

ah! "Who's there?" he; not a bit whipped

Repose his hands; run the clock's, hush

Around was quietus; men's ruSh

Lifeblood froze, mortal terror groaned

light, by soul the sea was disowned

Asks his heart disregards his crush

'Nay, it's the wind with his dark brush,

poor mouse on the floor to find flour'

Overlooked death, the sea this hour.

Even more stealthily peeped, hush!

He peeped, saw vulture's eye; the crush

Dull blue hideous motionless

Chilled his bone the emotionless

'I'm no mad, bloody hands must waSh'

Tick-Tock Lub Dub Tick Dub Tock Hush

rat-a-tat 'Full Steam Ahead' BoM

Bom! He breathed not, to keep it calM

Hellish Lub Dub of such a thrush

LUB DUB as if blood was to gush

As soon his acute strings were cut

Silenced hush, Shh ,Silenced hush; but

Dead dreadful dumb hour of night_ HUSH

_Lub Tock excited terror; Shh

Lub Dub Ba Boom Lub Dub DUb DUB

Sea's turn to dance in the nightclub

Was announced by his yell, No hush

Waves shrieked once, died the sky, all hushh

He smiled, though heard the muffled Dub

Stone dead was universe, no Lub

'I'm no mad, bloody hands must waSh'

Scattered he the dead sky, all hush

Hid then sea from water itself

Nothing was wrong but wrong itself

Ha-ha! He-hE! Drenched sea to wash

Yet dark, riiing, knock knock, police calls

'Some white crow reported a shriek'

Smiled, 'I had a dream' a hard week

'The dear is by some waterfalls'

All to see; seen, some sound enthralls

Chit-chat with his detective lads

Strange ring in his ears, volume adds

A low dull quick sound, tick- tock calls

Tick dub Lub Dub, the sound not falls

'Villains! Here! Here! Fake it no more!

Tear up the planks! Under the floor,

beats his hideous heart' Mad calls

The Cave of the Two Robots

Dare to play the GAME!

To play a game, let it be so

Then thou have no fear of failure

One door through, back home you can go

Behind other, thou poor player

Monsters await, let it be so

Iron companions you've got two

Honest and liar both in row

To live on, your best thou shalt do

Query once then let it be so

But since it's just a game, don't blame

The way back home you need not know

Must remain brave and win the fame

Past is all gone, let it be so

Rearrange thine hard-hearted lads

Devise a new time machine, bro

Adventure to thine wisdom adds

To play a game, let it be so

Create joy; make it a poem

Way to heaven, Iron won't show

Play Game, pick the jeroboam