Blog Post Example (from the vaults)

Jumping back to 2020 for a blog where I REALLY went in depth. (I may have been struggling with quarantine and online teaching here)…

Section 1; Page 1-225

Well, like I said in my previous post, I’m at least farther this time in reading the book than the first time, but I’m just not sure about the book.  Yes, it is interesting to learn things about the 12th century (for instance, a chimney while building a home was a radical idea rather than just a basic, yes, we should have a way for the smoke to go out thought about constructing), but I don’t know if I like these characters.

Stonemason in Medieval England

First off, there is Tom Builder.  His last name is his job, which is interesting as a way to think of how last names came about. He is a mason who builds things, so why not just call him that. I guess I would have at some point come from both a free man (my maiden name) and a man whose father was named John. So I have been thinking about this aspect lately.

But he seems to make a lot of really bad choices to start off.  First of all, maybe don’t get a rich man mad at you.

Serfs and Peasants at the bottom -Craftsmen like Tom are in this level

Yeah, he fired you and almost ran over your daughter, but he seems like someone who you don’t want to be on the bad side of.  Rich, land-owning people at this time have ALL the power (and maybe still a lot of power now, but let’s not get into that here…) and there really aren’t any social safety nets in England 1137.

For instance, after Tom made William mad, Tom wandered with his family for months without work, without money, and his wife Agnes was pregnant the whole time.  AND THEN he decided that he needed to chase down the man who stole their pig.  Granted yes, this pig was worth at least a year’s worth of money, but waiting for a whole day in the rain to end up killing this guy…

Again, I wonder why I’m reading this book.

But that isn’t even the part of my first section that was the most difficult to read.  When Agnes died after giving birth in the forest in the winter (what a horrible horrible way to go), I thought that was bad enough.  But then Tom decided that they needed to leave the LIVE BABY ON THE GRAVE TO DIE –

I was done with him.  Done.

But I kept reading and he decided this was a bad idea (duh, dude) and then went back, but the baby had disappeared (luckily we learned that a monk had found the baby and was took him (the baby) to the monastery).  So all of this plot info (and my opinion of it all) really was leading up to an idea I have about what Follett is trying to say here.  Maybe there is an overall theme of the fragility of life, or of the harsh reality of life in the 12th century.

Most of the first section focused on the story from Tom’s perspective, but then it switched to Philip, the prior of the monastery that found the baby.

This is what I picture for the little monastery where Philip is prior. This is where the baby (they name him Jonathan) ends up (luckily not dead due to Tom’s HORRIBLE choices)

He is probably the only character that I really like.  He was on a trip to visit the archdeacon of his whatever (there were a lot of church terms in this part) when he encountered Tom and Ellen (a lady he met after Agnes died who he is now in a relationship with…apparently in this time period you don’t really mourn dead people too long because people die all the time of everything, and you just move right on to the next lady to help you raise your children).

Ellen was in the prologue of the book as a pregnant lady who cursed a priest, monk, and some others for hanging the father of her unborn child. This was actually really intriguing and this mystery of why these men hanged the boy and why they fear Ellen continued to come up.  Follett does a great job of keeping my interest (even though I don’t like many characters, and I think life during this time period is horrific, and the book makes me feel angry a lot).  When the archdeacon Walerean (who was the black haired priest that was cursed in the prologue) sees Ellen, he is TERRIFIED and talks to himself about how she can be alive and all of that.  I want to know the deal with her and her connection to Walerean and why they hanged her baby’s (Jack is the kid’s name) dad.  So I guess I’ll keep reading until the next time.

On a final note, I now know what a trencher is.

A Trencher, made more recently than 1137

In Romeo and Juliet, one of the servants uses the term and I’ve never actually known what it is.  But here it is: “yard-long loaves of white bread” cut “into thick slices to be used as trenchers — edible plates.” The more you know…

Intro to Blogging About Lit

Oh Blogging About Lit…my favorite project of all.

This is what my students are always like…right?

Each semester I look forward to reading the ACTUAL THOUGHTS of students about books, written in their own voices rather than being forced into academic voice (don’t get me wrong, I understand the need to write in academic voice, but come on, we have to have other options here).

 

*****This is an example of what I’d like you to write for your first post. The overall directions are: What is your book? Why did you pick it? Who are you reading with (if you are)? What are you looking forward to in this project? What are you apprehensive about? What are you going to do to ensure your success? –
(150 words, why you are reading that book, at least one image). This is due by the end of the block on Tuesday.*****

I’m going to be reading/finishing Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt. I’ve been meaning to read this book for awhile now, as it was our neighborhood book club’s book for October. However, I am not the best at reading things on time…or doing lots of things on time… I have heard from SO MANY PEOPLE that this is a great book and I’m really enjoying the first few pages/chapters. It’s been described to me as more of a feel good kind of story, which is what I really like to find in my choice fiction. I have enough stress and worry, so it’s hard to read books that are so dark (also, I assign all the dark ones to my classes, so I need some lightness ;))

I love talking/writing about my thoughts on books, so I can’t wait to blog about this, but I am quite the procrastinator, so the schedule worries me a bit. I know that if I have a directly written out schedule, I’m usually better at sticking to it, so that’s what I’m going to do.

Also, I wanted to use this post to share some of my favorite Crucible memes/Sparknotes posts:

Here’s a random Crucible meme for us all

Messages of Cultural Encounters and Frontiers

1. With your group you are going to talk about our large topic (Cultural Encounters and Frontiers) and how it can be tied to the three most recent readings we have done.

Columbus' Confusion About the New World | Travel | Smithsonian Magazine

What MESSAGE ABOUT cultural encounters and frontiers do these three selections communicate? Not just that they show cultures encountering one another, but detail out a specific message about the encounters that they show.  Please use textual evidence in your argument.

Post your group’s answer as a comment and make sure all of your names are listed in the text of the reply.

Once your group has discussed the topic “Frontiers and Cultural Encounters” and tied these three authors to it (and written it with textual evidence as a reply to this), work on your own to answer the next question.  (You will answer this NEXT QUESTION on your blog)

2. Do you think any of these (de las Casas’, Columbus’, Red Cloud’s) accounts changed the audience? How? Why yes or no? If no, what could they have done to more affect their audience?

Aim for around a paragraph, making sure to answer all of the questions and connecting them to each author. This answer doesn’t have to have direct textual evidence, but paraphrasing could help you identify specific points where you think it was strong/could be stronger.

Poetry Explication Resources

Here are a few links that you may find helpful as you research and explicate the next few days:

The overall directions for the assignment

An interesting step-by-step approach to poetry explication

(to explicate means to unfold -to help make sense of that word)

Poetry Algorithm 

Genius Lyrics Explications for “My Shot” from Hamilton

Poetry Foundation Glossary (terms and definitions)

Poets.org

 

Here is an example of an explication done extremely well from a few semesters ago and a few links for ones from 2020 and here’s another one from a few semesters ago.

The original was color-coded for the four different categories/topics