Hey y’all! Long time, no blog.
Actually, I think this is the shortest time span from this blog to the previous
one. Sweet! New record! But in all seriousness, it’s time to talk literature.
Yeah, I know, it sounds boring, but I hope to make it as enjoyable as possible.
Every term, our teacher has us choose an
independent reading book for us to read based on what we are learning in class.
Last term, I chose Euripides by Medea
(personally, I don’t remember what we were studying, but I think she had us
choose any book we wanted). This term, I chose 1984 by George Orwell because we are about to begin studying
satirical writing. I know, it is a famous book, but I was really interested in
reading it because I read his other great satire in eighth grade, Animal Farm. I read the first half of
the book and all I can say is: wow.
I know this may come off as very narrow-minded
since the first half of the book was filled with information, but I really want
to focus on the impact of the first few pages. First, we have to talk about the
structure of the satire. Orwell arranged his novel into three parts: One, Two
and Three (so original), or Books One, Two and Three. Within these books are
sub-chapters titled with roman numerals. Anyways, back to the story. The
opening line of the novel goes, “It was a bright cold day in April, and the
clocks were striking thirteen” (1). Immediately, you notice that something is
off: Why did Orwell use thirteen instead
of one o’clock? That was my question anyways. I also immediately went to
military time, because the military uses a 24-hour clock instead of a 12-hour
clock, like most do. Red flags went up because I knew that this had to be about
war of some sort, because what else does the military do?
I continued reading and noticed the
first word of the second sentence was the first name of a Winston Smith. Now I don’t know why, but it immediately made me
think of Winston Churchill. And just as I typed in George Orwell into the
handy-dandy Google search engine, I learned that he was born and raised in London.
Coincidence? I think not! (shout
out to my sophomore Honors Chemistry teacher Mrs. Derocher for that). Anyways,
I made the connections! Winston Churchill led England during World War II and
guess what? 1984 was written in 1949,
only four years after World War II.
Another coincidence? You can finish that phrase!
I know this post probably wasn’t
very insightful, but I really just wanted to focus on these connections
(whether true or not) that I made within the first 15(!!!!!!!) words of the novel. Wow. I’m actually surprised that I
made these connections because usually just blow right past them until another
classmate mentions the allusion or indirect connection, and then I feel really
dumb. But now, I see myself making progress, even if this connection was small.
Either way, I’m growing. And that’s the most important part of schooling.
Until next time,
EG
Great post!! I had never read Animal Farm so I decided to read that as my Satire and absolutely loved it. As always I find your blogs so interesting and fun to read. I thought George Orwell defiantly had a different way of writing. I had looked at 1984 and thought about reading it but had not loved the summary’s I had read. However, your intake of the novel has changed my mind. You are not afraid to be outgoing or funny in these posts and unlike mine it makes them interesting! Next time I would work on not showing that you researched about the book a lot but use more analysis of what you learned while reading!
ReplyDeleteWhat a coincidence! I'm also reading one of Orwell's book, Animal Farm and I'm soooo glad you did not spoil a thing :) Although this is the first time I'm reading one of Orwel's work, I find him very intriguing as a writer. Believe me I could not let go of the book (well I only did when I reached half way O.o) Back to you! I always enjoy reading your blog, there is always something different and interesting to learn without even noticing. The way you analyzed those first 15 words is just amazing, I'm pretty sure if I had read the first page, I would have not caught that. This proves that you are making great progress as a writer, so keep it up :) Looking forward to your next post!
ReplyDeleteI absolutely love reading your blogs, they are hilarious, and extremely insightful. I love how quirky you are, it makes the blog so much more interesting. This blog was different because you did not just give a summary of the first half of the book, you focused more on analyzing. The way you told us about how you analyzed the first 15 words was extremely impressive (I could never do that in a million years). I admired this post it was going off book, in a good way.
ReplyDelete