Seasons

Seasons play a role in literature by connecting unconscious concept to developing stories. Each season contains a specific conation associated with it that corresponds with natural feelings. Winter correspond with “old age and resentment and death,” while summer is justified by “adulthood and romance and fulfillment and passion.” Notice, in the natural world these seasons exists in opposing time frames with extreme differences in climate. This concept carries over into literature where the feeling they portray is just as contradictory as in the natural world. Spring radiates a joyful feeling of “childhood and youth.” Naturally these joyful feelings are hard wired into your minds and heart due to the blossoming of plants and expansion of life providing a feeling of a new start. Readers logically associate autumn “with decline and middle age and tiredness but also harvest.” While leaves fall of trees and things slowly die off autumn is portrayed as decreasing time period as while as thanks and celebration for another year’s harvest. This directly connected why Thanksgiving is in autumn, during a time of thankfulness before a time of hardship and little comes with winter. Autumn Begins in Martins Ferry, Ohio by James Wright illuminates on the concepts presented that seasons render specific feelings associated with that season’s duration of time. Throughout the poem the author uses the tactic of autumn’s expected climax of the year. Wright relates this time to the infamous football season in Martins Ferry, Ohio. He explains the parents and fans overwhelming happiness, appreciation, and praise for their star athletes that gain saint status. These exhilarating emotions parallel that of the infamous harvest and all the excitement included with that yearly activity. Just as farmers worked hard to plant, and harvest their crops these athletes trained vigorously to excel during their season, ultimately acting as their time to harvest.

Irony

If writing was baseball then Irony would certainly be the curve ball, giving unexpectedly and with a sudden change of direction. Thrown into a piece of work to keep the reader on their toes, irony stops the expected from happening and allows the unanticipated to grab the attention of the reader and invites them “to dig through layers of possible meaning.” Irony is taking the reader’s expectations and upending them, making them work against the reader. In Chapter 26, Is He Serious? And Other Ironies Foster clues how to piece irony together and how it goes against everything else a reader has learned about reading. Irony can be “comic, sometimes tragic, sometimes wry, or perplexing,” admitting for a multitude of possibilities to arise from within it almost working as a grab bag. Irony works in literature because the audience is able to understand something that is eludes the character. Foster’s example of a guy wrecking into a sign, his seat belt saving his life only to turn into to an object that causes his death a few moments later amplifies this concept of irony. “The Onion” is a paper from Ohio where irony is a full time job. It applies irony to modern day problems to amplify their wrongs. However irony isn’t just a innovative idea its existents has been around since the beginning of literature. It exist is apparent in Shakespeare for example Romeo and Juliet. The readers know that Juliet is only in a deep sleep and will awaken however Romeo seems to find his beloved Juliet died. Drinking poison Romeo ironically kills himself to be with Juliet in the afterlife. When Juliet awakens she finds Romeo died and then kills herself. The ending is catastrophic and ironic due to the fact that the reader knows more than the characters.

Christ Figures: Chapter 14

When reading English literature it is in extreme importance to understand the New and Old Testament even if you are not Christian or religious. Literature is composed from the author’s culture and culture is usually developed through some type of religion. For example the American culture was established and derived many of its traditions through Christianity due to America’s settlement by the English that was also Christian based. Readers may not share the same religious belief but having a basic understanding of the principles in the religion is unavoidable due to the mass implication of Christianity into our modern literary arts. Christianity main figure Christ is often displayed in many pieces of work. The author may not make direct biblical connotations however the author may imply Christ traits by a character being crucified, “thirty years of age,” “known to have spent time in the wilderness,” “employed as a carpenter,” and “self-scarification.” Due to Christ repetition of being a creditable person it allows for the author to build good repetition for their character. Although recognize Christ figures “don’t have to be male,” “don’t have to be Christian,” and “don’t even have to be good.” It is also important to remember that a Christ thing doesn’t need to do all the literal things Christ himself did, like stretching bread and fish to feed five thousand. These literal elements are not required for a Christ figure to be represented in literature it is all about the symbolic implications. Understanding the concepts of Christ figures or any other religious bodies will allow the reader to fully indulge themselves in the text, having a better concept of what the author is trying to imply. Although the reader may not practice or believe the same religion the author is portraying do not allow this to be a barrier between understanding the full meaning of the text.

Baptism: Chapter 18

“Baptism can mean a host of things, of which rebirth is only one. Literal rebirth—surviving a deadly situation—is certainly a part of it, just symbolic rebirth is the point of the sacrament of baptism, in which taking the new believer completely underwater causes him to die out of his old self and to be reborn in his identity of a follower of Christ. It has always seemed to me that the whole business probably ties in with some cultural memory of Noah’s flood, of the whole world drowning and then this small remnant being set down on dry land to restore life to earth, cleansed of the sin and pollution that had marked human life right before the flood”

When thinking of baptism there is a certain thought that always comes to mind, a ritual using water that admits a person to have membership to a church. Baptism is symbolic of a person’s religion and for God to take notice. It is universally practiced among a majority of the world regions making it a common ground of religious tribute. However Thomas Foster in Chapter 18, If She Comes Up, It’s Baptism, shows baptism in a whole new light connecting water, baptism, and rebirth all together. In literature when a character drowns or comes close to drowning it is usually for a remarkable reason for it causes “profound plot implications” for the characters. A near death experience of drowning can be the reason for everything to change at that very moment transforming the character. Before the character can undergo this alteration they must be prepared to have a characteristic changed, for example going from the weak one to the strong one. “The thing about baptism is you have to be ready to receive it.” It is uncomplicated to put rebirth and baptism beside each other to compare. Both can use the aid of water as a way to “get rid” of old. Baptism uses the water to save the person being baptized, purifying them. Water is used in literature as “restorative and cleansing” occasionally rebirthing the character. “Baptism is a sort of reenactment on a very small scale of that drowning and restoration of life.” One thing a reader must keep in mind though is that characters do not reform every single time they get wet in literature, the act of getting wet must have symbolic meaning greater then hopping into rain puddles. Instead a character must transform or gain something from jumping in the rain puddles, similar to losing self concisions in return for self freedom and expression.

Historical Context: Chapter 25

In Chapter 25, Don’t Read with Your Eyes, Foster underlines the process of the reader putting their self in the time era of the story. A reader must “try to take the works as they were intended to be taken” not the modern way they might see it. To fully understand a piece of work a reader must not read from their own fixed position in the “Year of two thousand and some” but from the historical moment the story is set in. When reading from the correct historical moment in time, it permits for the correct perspective on the literature. It allows for understanding of the text in its “own social, historical, cultural, and personal background” to be implicated. Barn Burning a short story by William Faulkner exemplifies the need to use of historical context. The story takes place when wagons where the main transpiration, transforming the reader from the mid set of modern eras to a historical one. It is important for this change of mid set to occur to gain a better quality of understanding of the characters and their actions. For example, Sartoris Snopes is faced rather to tell the truth about the barn burning down or to remain loyal to his family and father and lie. Mr. Snopes informs Sartoris that he must always remain loyal to his family and accused Sartoris of planning to tell the judge that Mr. Snopes was guilty. The idea of not telling the truth during a trail shows the time difference between the modern world and the time setting of this short story. It is important to understand the time era to be fully aware of importance of family ties, during this time period all they had were family when crops weren’t flourishing.