Mark Twain exibit

hey you guys,
ok so it's not for sure yet but magui and i were planning to go to the exibit this saturday so i was wandering who else wanted to come with us so that we can meet up and go together and make it fun (not that the exibit itself won't be fun).
so yeah it was just to say that and i guess just answer on the blog and we can maybe all get lunch together before or something like that

ok well see you guys tomorow then!

Mark Twain exhibit...through January 2nd. Try to see it!

http://www.themorgan.org/exhibitions/online/MarkTwain/default.asp

A red wheel.....barrow

So much depends upon....

The Red Wheelbarrow
by William Carlos Williams
so much depends upon a red wheel barrow glazed with rain water beside the white chickens.

Stories...

Dear learning- community, 
So as we break for Thanksgiving, I find myself thrilled to see that you are discovering the power of stories, and that you go home thinking about them. Rose and Chloe's posts gave me chills. We love movies because they can tell beautiful stories with image and sound, but the stories we discover in the pages of a book or that are meant for us to pull up a bench in the mead hall to listen call to us in a different way.  A great story is the one that invites you to hear and to see with your mind.  You are immersed, and you can see it so clearly--the glorious, bejeweled mead hall with the warmth of the fire and the brotherhood of noble men.  The shaper invites you to be one of them and to imagine the evil that lurks, the monster, the one that preys on them all, night after night when the stories are done.  Is he a real monster or is he any evil that can undermine this brotherhood?  How strong is the brotherhood?  If the questions are too clearly answered, the mystery disappears and the story becomes something else.  As it is, you are invited to give it shape once it leaves the shaper's mouth and enters into your world, to have it speak to your own sense of community and what monsters can make things fall apart...These stories are universal, as you can see, so they are wonderful to read together.  At the same time, they are so distinctive, each and every one.  I find the sad beauty of this one particularly compelling--the ring-giver on his whorl-prowed ship sailing out for the last time onto the whale-road, this place of great mystery, loneliness and unknown.  A community both so strong, so beloved and so fragile...and a story that almost did not make it into our hands.
Hwaet!  We heed the call!
Have a great Thanksgiving!
yours,
knowledge-sharer

Beowulf on my mind...

Hi!

I was in the subway going to rehearse today and all I thought about was Beowulf! I kept imagining a story-teller in the mead-hall reciting the prologue from the book and it seemed really interesting to me. Then I pictured this modern day comedian tell the Seamus Version. And, of course, whenever I don't find something normal, my face does not hide it well. So I find myself on the train with people staring at me with my weird expressions and I was quite embarrassed... :P To cover my humiliation I whipped out my Beowulf and read the prologue again, switching the narrators in my head. And either way I figured that the book's prologue is so much more interesting, to me, because of it's authenticity.

So that's it, that's what marked me in English today...

Catharsis anyone? What do we think of the end of TFA?

English class on a typical Friday morning...

When you say yes, your chi says yes. But what does it take to say yes to your chi?

Hooray for you, audience!

Fate is so overrated--agreed or no?

Outcome of tragedy: Is Oedipus more noble in the end than he was in the beginning?

Dear oib class,
This is the week we wrap up Oedipus!  All of our snickering will be coming to an end soon and we'll be asking ourselves whether pulling a Jocasta (to quote Chloe) is the right thing to do or not!
We'll begin tomorrow by slowing down a little and looking at the odes.
Then, for Tuesday, I'd like you to think about the following questions:
1.  What is the moment of ANAGNORISIS and why didn't happen before?
2.  Why does so much of the final action/catastrophe happen offstage?  Do you agree with that decision?
3.  Are we satisfied?  Does Oedipus, as Adrien says, earn our respect points?

Welcome!

Dear oib class,
Welcome to your blog!  Its uses elude me somewhat still, but I hope this is a place we can meet and discuss and where you'll find some valuable resources.  Follow me down the rabbit hole into your hero's journey...hopefully you and the fish will grow well here. There will be dragons to fight, but you will have your eureka moment and emerge victorious!

Sheet of the Week

Dear oib class,

Congratulations, you've got the summer reading test behind you, phew!  Now, we concentrate on Oedipus for the next two weeks.  We'll be having a test on the play on October 1st.  This test will have 2 parts: passage identifications and an essay, which you'll be able to outline before the test day.

This week, we'll do the following:
For Monday, please re-read lines 380-403 on pages 16-17.  This is Oedipus' speech to Tiresias.  I'd like you to comment (in writing) on what we learn about Oedipus here, and I'd like to know what it is in the word choice and sentence structure that leads us to these conclusions.  If you see any irony, mark it.  If there's a motif at work, note it.

For Tuesday, forge ahead and read to page 36.  I'll probably give you a thinking question.
We'll chew on the reading on Tuesday and Thursday.

For Friday, please read to page 51.

Finish your reading for the following Monday.

We'll be tracking the growing tension and asking ourselves what the nature of Oedipus' tragedy is.  And we'll be learning how to close read!  Watch the snicker meter go!!

When you get the chance, some time in the next few days, email me a little something about yourself.  I'd like to know how you have felt up until now as a student of English, and I'd like to know something about what you enjoy reading.  And if you'd like to tell me something else just so I get to know you, I'd like that too.  Attach a photo, if you like.  I'll write you back :)