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Fahrenheit 451: Literary style

sehrash tanveer — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 23:42:28 +0000

The passage that i found really interesting was, the one when Montage, kills Beatty and becomes a fugitive. That whole scene of him running and the search for him goes on, is described in such a way that you can practically picture it in your mind, his description are very vivid. And Bradbury way of phrasing the text, his continue use of number (counting), and repetition of words, rises tension and makes the whole scene very dramatic…

“The fugitive cannot escape if everyone in the next minute looks from his house…”At the count of ten now!One!Two!” He felt the city rise. “Three!” He felt the city turn to its thousands of doors. Faster!Leg up, leg down! “Four” The people sleepwalking in their hallways. “Five” He felt their hands on the doorknobs!…”

I really enjoyed reading that part, it made the scene really tense, and you are wondering what’s going to happen, if he is able to escape or will he get caught. Bradbury style of writing is definitely different, it captures the reader’s attention and you really get into reading and want to know what would happen next.

This is another passage that i liked, Montag’s realization, why he doesn’t want to burn anymore and how he phrases it…He is stating that everything burns eventually naturally , then why should human beings do it, or burn it before its time…

“After a long time of floating on the land and a short time of floating in the river he knew why he must never burn again in his life. The sun burnt every day. It burnt Time. The world rushed in a circle and turned on its axis and time was busy burning the years and the people anyways, without any help from him. So if he burnt things with the firemen and the sun burnt Time, that meant that everything burnt!, One of them had to stop burning. The sun wouldn’, certainly. So it looked as if it had to be Montag and the people he had worked with until a few short hours ago.”

Fahrenheit 451

sehrash tanveer — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 23:01:59 +0000

It was somewhat interesting, some parts better than the other, but over all it was bearable to read. Reading this book reminded me this book, 1984 by George Orwell, it had a similar concept, i don’t remember it very well, so had to google it…In George Orwell’s 1984, Winston Smith wrestles with oppression in Oceania, a place where the Party scrutinizes human actions with ever-watchful Big Brother. Defying a ban on individuality, Winston dares to express his thoughts in a diary and pursues a relationship with Julia. These criminal deeds bring Winston into the eye of the opposition, who then must reform the nonconformist. George Orwell’s 1984 introduced the watchwords for life without freedom: BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU.

Its interesting how there are so many books and movies, related to this idea, of the future and how people would be brainwashed and won’t be allowed to think and what not. Human beings are portrayed as Robots, and there is always one person who snaps out of it and tries to get rid of that system, like Montag in Fahrenheit, john Preston(christian bale) in Equilibrium, and winston in 1984….

The Prestige

sehrash tanveer — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 20:22:35 +0000

I loved the movie, it has an amazing twist to it, I would want to watch it again . I must confess that when I watched the first 2 times in class, i wasn’t really into it, I think it was because it was too early to watch a movie couldn’t really focus. But when I read about it (the site had great details and I really wanted to know what happened at the end, it was taking to long) it made so much sense and I loved the story. So when we watched the ending in class i was more into it cause i knew what was going to happen but didn’t know how(reading is not the same as watching something) and everything was so clear. The twist was astonishing, how would have thought that Borden had a twin brother! Sara’s statement that she knew when her husband loved her and when he didn’t made sense, one was in love with her and one was in love with magic and she was able to tell apart the difference between the two though she didn’t figure out much later. Poor girl committed suicide, probably was too disgusted, with the fact that the brothers were “sharing” everything even her. There is a limit to everything and Borden and Fallon crossed that limit in order to become great magicians that’s really sad. I liked the theme the movie had, mystery, rivalry, obsession and all, we should read books like these, it would be more interesting. I could honestly say that the movie had a lot better story then any of the text we read…

Finishing up “The Captains Doll”

sehrash tanveer — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 20:01:06 +0000

Over all I did not like the book, but there were some parts that I liked reading, such as the dialogues. Even the story consisted mostly description, i preferred the dialogues, because dialogues shows interaction between two people and you get a strong sense of the characters emotions and such. I personally don’t like too much details about any thing and the story as a lot of description especially towards the end, which to me seemed really pointless. The way the author was just going on and on with describing the scene, was like its a novel and the story would go on but it was the last pages, he didn’t even describe anything else it such details in the beginning of the story. The ending was so annoying, the way he ended was like there is more to the story and it would have a second part or something (which it doesn’t), it was a very unclear ending, we can assume anything. Both of the characters just argue and than at the end, destroying the picture meant that he is free, Hannel won’t make a doll out of the captain like his wife did…

Close reading of “The Captain’s Doll”

sehrash tanveer — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 03:49:07 +0000

Page 89:

“ Hannele was most uneasy because she seemed to have forgotten him in the three days whilst he had been away. He seemed to have quite disappeared out of her. She could hardly even remember him. He had become so insignificant to her she was dazed. Now she wanted to see him again, to know if it was really so. She felt that he was coming. She felt that he was already putting out some influence towards her”.

Reading this passage made me believe that Hannele doesn’t really love him, it’s just a fantasy. She probably visualize that she does or just like the idea of being in love. Personally I think that if a person truly cares about someone, they don’t forget them in three days. She actually has to see him if to figure that out then it’s not real. She mostly seems to be in “love” with his physical appearance, since she does describe his looks a lot. But then again as the passage goes on, it does states that “she felt that he was coming”, maybe it’s more than just physical appearance. However, she does question her emotions and all and it could also be that she already knew that he was coming and the feelings could all be in her mind.

This passage indeed makes you speculate about the whole story, if it’s a love story or not. It kind of makes sense if you really think about it, that throughout the whole story you don’t really get a strong sense of “love” between either one of them, it seems more like a compromise some sort.

The Captains Doll/class discussion

sehrash tanveer — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 02:38:22 +0000

I haven’t finished reading it yet, but i like the book so far and ill write more about it once i am done with it… By reading the tittle of the book i did think the captain (of a boat since we read the secret sharer, i assumed that the story of this book also took place on the boat) played with dolls, i don’t know why but i did… Today class discussion was about if reading online is better than reading a book (or something like that), I honestly hate reading only esp any required text from my classes, so i don’t read it, simply i either print out the text or find the book at the library. I prefer reading it from a book, because 1) it doesn’t hurt my eyes and 2) its very easy and comfortable to read. For Where Angels fear to tread, i got the novel from the library, it’s a lot easier that way, because than you can read it anywhere, anytime. Books (or print outs) you can carry with you and read in on the bus or such, you don’t have to wait to be online. Its personally really hard for me, so pretty much killing trees by printing out the text…

The Secret Sharer

sehrash tanveer — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 02:15:55 +0000

One word, Confusion…Okay so the main character is the Captain of the Ship, though the way he is portrayed he seems like young, confused, uneducated(in a way), person, who has no clue to what he is doing and no sense of right and wrong. He does not act like he is the Captain, he hardly knows his crew members and the ones he does mentions, i doubt he even knows their names since he refers to them by their psychical appearance ( not very mature or captain like). The confusing part was if the other guy(can’t remember the name at the moment, will refer to him as the fugitive) was real or not. At the beginning i thought he wasn’t and that he made up an imaginary “friend” because he felt alone, bored and disconnected with his crew members, so to entertain himself he created this person, so he can relate to him(in a very pathetic way). But the second part sort of convinced me to believe that he was real after all, unless the captain(is he given a name, cause i can’t remember, i am horrible with remembering names) made up the other guy, Archbold, as well and probably his crew members, maybe he is some lunatic, making things up…He really can’t handle a ship, wondering who made him the captain, he did mention it was all of a sudden he wasn’t ready for it yet, but then again, when are you really ready for anything… oh another thing i mentioned it at the top, that he has no sense of right and wrong, why is he helping someone who killed a person??? that makes me really wonder if the captain is sane at all, one might think many years on the boat makes a person lose their mind but he just started and he already seems like he lost his and is bored of it…

late response to Edgar Allen Poe and Hawthornes readings…

sehrash tanveer — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 21:43:21 +0000

In Edgar Allen Poe’s short story “The Oval Portrait” and Hawthorne’s “The BirthMark”,it is portrayed how the obsession with perfection could lead to ones down fall. Both character’s (the painter and Aylmer) are married to the women that are described as the most beauitful but each one doesn’t realize what they have is better than nothing. One is fixated with creating his wife’s beauty on canvas and the other is trying to get rid of he bithmark to make is wife perfect and at the end both achieve what they desired, but it cost them the death of their wives. They both went to great ends to achieve perfection, while losing the veryt thing they wanted to be perfect and wihout it nothing matters…

I liked the stories it teaches you a lot, like how to appreciate what you have in life rather than trying to achieve something better than that, some people get all while others don’t, so be happy with what you have, otherwise you might end up losing that and you would be left with nothing. The readings have a great irony to it that’s what i like most about them, but i don’t really like are the lenghty details, that drives me insanse, it feels like it would never end…

“The Last Leaf”

This short story was very clear and had a good point to it. The character Johnsy is very sick and loses hope and the only thing she is hanging on to are the leaves outside the window. I think that if Behrman didn’t paint the last leaf on the wall she would have lost hope. Not only did Behrman got to paint his materpiece (which he had waited most of his life to paint), but he also arose hope and strength in Johnsy. It made her realize that she wanted to live and that it was very foolish of her to give up just because the leaves were dying…The ending was different than what i thought. I thought that as soon as the the last leafe fall she’ll die (very predictable, but that didn’t happen). Never thought that Behrman would end up paiting his materspiece and that it would the leaf to save somones life. Good short story…

“The Barn Buring”

I don’t understand the point of William Faulkner, writing that story. I didn’t completely understand what was going on when i read it, did not know who was speaking and to whom, the story was really confusing to me, I don’t have much to say about it, but that it was the worst reading that we have read, it was boring, confusing and totally didn’ t like. The father goes around buring farms just because the owners get him mad?? really that’s all i got from the story and that’s what the point was pretty much, and the details provided in order to get that point were tiresome and unexciting…

Where Angels Fear To Tread

sehrash tanveer — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 21:11:04 +0000

The first 2-3 chapters of this book were boring, the detail was just excruciating, i felt like not reading it but I continued with it and the story got interesting. First of all I did not like the character Lilia, I personally found her very selfish and uncaring person and a mother. She thought only about herself, she left her child behind never to see her again and she is very imulsive. She gets married to man who is not only younger than her, but knows nothing about him. She knows no one is going to happy with her decision but she still marries him. I think what happened to her she deserved it…(going into the story)When Lilia’s In-law recieve the news that she is getting engaged and Philip is send to stop that from happening, from then on I found the book more amusing then any other readings. It felt like I was watching a comedy moive, since the details provided made you visuaize the whole scenery. The ending was not what i expected, I thought the baby would go on living with Lilia’s In-laws and such, didn’t think Forster would kill the child. Forster’s ending of the story shows how some people try to achieve a certain thing even though they don’t really care about it they just want it for the sake of wanting it, but when it’s gone they move on without feeling poignant. The characters Philip. Herriton and Ms. Abbot, even Gion, all four of them are fighting for the baby but when its dead,they all move on with their lives like it didn’t mean anything…

Hello world!

sehrash tanveer — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 00:53:45 +0000

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