The most difficult work I've ever read

Dante's inferno. It was difficult because it was written in a way that I had never encountered. Apart from this the text was very old and it was foreign (translated), so it had no direct relation to my life.

Bullfights (Francisco Serna & Mateo Wiesner)

Our video is uploaded on Francisco Serna's Blog.  Click on the link below to go directly to that post.
http://thereadingtavern.blogspot.com/2012/01/bullfights-francisco-serna-mateo.html

Marketing: There is No Substitute

Porsche’s commercial appeals to the emotions of the viewer.  It uses Pathos to make the audience dream, to imagine what it would be like to have a Porsche.  The music in the video adds a dreamy atmosphere to the idea of someday owning such a machine.  As a viewer I fell helplessly into the pitfall of the character, I yearn to drive the machine took my breath away when I first saw it.  To be the driver of a car that will take someone else’s breath away when they see it.  The use of ethos also invites the ignorant viewer to appreciate the 911’s value, it’s history, and it’s charm in a different light.  The reputation that Porsche has built up over the last forty years has defined it as a company that “redefines what’s possible.”  When the audience feels the warm rush that the commercial has, and hears the Porsche slogan, it awes in admiration.  Pathos, Logos, and Ethos: marketing weapons, rhetorical devices that when used well leave the audience dreaming, a dream they can only be satisfied once the product is theirs.

The Revenge of Vengeance

Topic: The Revenge of Vengeance
Aim: What themes can we expect to find in An Orestia?
WriteNow: have you ever been really angry with someone? How did you're solve the issue?

 Yes. I got really angry at my brother for pushing off the ski lift and laughing. As soon as I got on the lift, we hadn't started moving yet- He pushed me! I didn't really say anything to him at the moment, we skied down the slope in the way that we were used to doing it, nothing different. I waited a few hours until we were again waiting for the lift, I waited for him to get on first. As soon as we were a few meters above the ice, I pushed him off. I don't think that I really resolved the issue, the emotionally intelligent thing to do would have been to tell him how that made me feel and asking him not to do it again.

He's Done. I'm Only just Beginning

The ending to Slaughterhouse-Five didn’t disappoint. It did surprise me however.  I thought the end would be a concise explanation for all the bizarre questions that the book had posed earlier.  But how could I be so naïve?

Kurt Vonnegut ends his book the same way it began.  This may sound superfluous, but it really isn’t, at least Vonnegut didn’t think so. “Poo-tee-weet” is the aphorism that closes the novel, and in the opening chapter Vonnegut says, “There is nothing intelligent to say about a massacre.” There is a connection between this, and between all the other maxims that characterize his narration of the bombing of Dresden.  When finished reading, the idea that Vonnegut was less than insane, started to become available. On the other hand, only an insane person writes an entire novel to make a point that he made in the first Chapter.  There is no doubt in mind right now that Vonnegut wrote this book so that the reader would realize that war is cruel, vicious, and harrowing. Moreover, he wanted the reader to realize that life isn’t fair, that good people will be killed and nothing that he can say about what he has seen will make it less horrible.  He says at the end that Martin Luther King Jr died, so did Robert Kennedy, “so it goes" he says. This too shall pass, I say.  Kurt Vonnegut has finished the novel on a tone of acceptance, there is nothing that one can do to stop wars, prevent murders, or escape death.  That is why he invents the Trafalmadorians, Killgore Trout, and probably even Billy Pilgrim as well, they represent the spirit that he thinks we all should have. A philosophy of acceptance. 

The bird says to Billy “Poo-tee-weet”. What can Billy respond? Nothing. He is rendered mute by the fact that the bird can’t understand what he says, so it won’t make a difference. There is nothing intelligent to say to the bird, he realizes that the war is over, but nothing he will say will change what has happened or will happen. The lack of time continuity in the novel represents the eternal helplessness of the bystanders in life. I feel a little flabbergasted about the fact that Vonnegut wrote this amazing novel just to prove such a negative mind frame.

To you, readers of my blog, I promise that if I write a book, the ending will read two words: No regrets. 

Uncertain? Confused? Welcome to Slaughterhouse-Five

Who is Killgore Trout? Killgore Trout is a fictional character based on Billy. In Slaughterhouse-Five, Kurt Vonnegut describes his experience of the bombing of Dresden, throughout the eyes of one of his war comrades: Billy Pilgrim. Pilgrim creates an alter ego as well. Killgore Trout represents Billy's insanity. "Can I make a guess?" said Killgore trout. "You saw through a time window." This is one of many aphorisms that outlines the relationship between Trout and Pilgrim. Billy was affected because of the song that "The Febs" sang at his anniversary party, probably because this barbershop quartet would later die in the same plane that he crashed in. An inner part of him saw through a time window and realized this, this inner part of him has a name: Killgore.

In the movie Inception, every dreamer has a totem. This totem allows a frequent dreamer to distinguish from the dream and the reality.  There comes a point in the protagonist's life that he can't stop checking the totem to see in what reality he is at the moment. In the same way, as Billy's madness continues to grow, he needs to further elaborate Killgore Trout's role in the world he thinks is reality.  Billy can be unstuck in time indefinitely, but if Killgore Trout is there, he knows that he is in the "real" time. Trout is Billy's totem.

This may seem confusing to you, reader. Perhaps even overwhelming to you who like it when a book tells you the plot as opposed to you having to close read every word. That is how I feel every time I read Slaughterhouse-Five.  When I started reading the many possible interpretations of this guy flick contributed to my excitement. But now it seems that the more I read the more complicated it gets. Will there be a conclusion to the novel? No!  Every word has a hidden meaning, I can only imagine of the "ending" that is yet to come.  Sadly, I have reached a point in the novel where I don't want to read any more. Why? It will add to the seemingly endless list of unanswered questions that I already have. Now more than ever I want to apply the kiss principle: keep it super simple.

Guy flick:  Book or movie that is especially appealing to men because of the attributes of its plot. -- Antonym: chick flick. 

Diction? Or Vocabulary?

What makes every novel unique? The plot?  Yes.  The characters?  Yes.  But there is something that makes every word in every sentence in every novel different, the diction. Right there I could’ve used the word vocabulary instead of diction, but I preferred not to, the small difference in their meaning dissuaded me from doing so.  In the same way, Vonnegut chooses some gnomes over others, they shape the theme of the book.

After having read the majority of the novel, I noticed something new. Kurt Vonnegut uses the maxim “so it goes” many times, but there is a reason for this. He chose that axiom because it fit perfectly into the plot and the narration style that he was using. The informal register that the adage has reflects that of the entire novel. Used 106 times, it is safe to assume that Vonnegut didn’t just use it because he lost his thesaurus... “So it goes” has a conversational tone, as does the novel. “So it goes” creates a pattern that is detached from time, as is Billy’s life. “So it goes” comes after every death, it is passive and emotionless, as Billy is becoming. “So it goes” is the aphorism that represents Vonnegut.

Another aphorism that is often repeated during the course of the novel is “Billy came unstuck in time”, or some deviation from that.  I noticed that this pattern describes Billy Pilgrim’s life, the never-ending and yet never beginning story of acceptance.   I found that Francisco Serna’s blog post “Farewell, hello, farewell, hello” describes this very accurately.  By interpreting the theme of death that the novel has he makes the point that Billy may die in one moment, but he lives in another. Moreover, he compares it to the movie Source Code, this I believe, is where he turned a keen observation into a stroke of genius. This film portrays the idea that someone can live in a moment, die, and then relive the moment.  Francisco brilliantly pointed out this correlation, but he failed to distinguish the time traveling. In Slaughterhouse-Five, Billy knows the way that he is going to die, he can’t change it. It is because of this acceptance philosophy that the aphorism “so it goes” exists!  He accepts everything. On the other hand, in Source Code the protagonist is trying to change the past/present/future. 

Kurt Vonnegut carefully picked out every word in his novel, which is why every word is meaningful to the overall plot.  Will you change your diction?  Or will you settle for the established vocabulary?