English Essay #6
Tuesday, April 30, 2013
Sunday, April 28, 2013
Poetry Essay #4
Fourth and last essay of the weekend.
Analyze two conflicting sides of a character and explain how this conflict illuminates the meaning of the work as a whole.
Book chosen: Hamlet
Forks in the road offer up unique opportunities to show values held by individuals. These decisions help reveal themes within a story, and paint a picture of the author's intended message. In Shakespeare's Hamlet, the protagonist goes mental agony throughout the book. His decision on life or death drives the story, and is summarized in his famous soliloquy To Be or Not to Be. This inner conflict of whether to live or die allows Shakespeare to share his message of internal struggle and revenge's folly to his audiences and readers.
The choice that Hamlet must make is one based on internal conflict. He struggles with the pain related to the death of his father, and the cruelty of life, and faces the decision of whether to face his trouble, or to end it in one fatal sweep of a knife. Shakespeare explicitly magnifies this conflict in Hamlet's self reflection. On one hand, Hamlet wonders if he should face his troubles and deal with his inner emotions. On the other he wonders whether he should just end them and his life. This shows that Hamlet doesn't have a handle on his inner emotions, and his passion driven actions are clouded in misdirection, and this leads to tragic revenge.
One choice Hamlet ponders is that of ending his life. To make his own suffering end in an instant. This particular choice reveals the struggle that he faces. The harshness of life and the desire to just make your challenges go away in a blink of an eye. This highlights internal struggle, and Hamlet's inability to think straight. His other option is that of facing his issues. He takes this route, but due to his struggle, he follows the path of revenge, and ends up paying the price for his actions.
Analyze two conflicting sides of a character and explain how this conflict illuminates the meaning of the work as a whole.
Book chosen: Hamlet
Forks in the road offer up unique opportunities to show values held by individuals. These decisions help reveal themes within a story, and paint a picture of the author's intended message. In Shakespeare's Hamlet, the protagonist goes mental agony throughout the book. His decision on life or death drives the story, and is summarized in his famous soliloquy To Be or Not to Be. This inner conflict of whether to live or die allows Shakespeare to share his message of internal struggle and revenge's folly to his audiences and readers.
The choice that Hamlet must make is one based on internal conflict. He struggles with the pain related to the death of his father, and the cruelty of life, and faces the decision of whether to face his trouble, or to end it in one fatal sweep of a knife. Shakespeare explicitly magnifies this conflict in Hamlet's self reflection. On one hand, Hamlet wonders if he should face his troubles and deal with his inner emotions. On the other he wonders whether he should just end them and his life. This shows that Hamlet doesn't have a handle on his inner emotions, and his passion driven actions are clouded in misdirection, and this leads to tragic revenge.
One choice Hamlet ponders is that of ending his life. To make his own suffering end in an instant. This particular choice reveals the struggle that he faces. The harshness of life and the desire to just make your challenges go away in a blink of an eye. This highlights internal struggle, and Hamlet's inability to think straight. His other option is that of facing his issues. He takes this route, but due to his struggle, he follows the path of revenge, and ends up paying the price for his actions.
Poetry Essay #3
Show how McCarthy's techniques convey the impact of the experience on the main character.
Dramatic experiences must be felt, and relived by a reader. McCarthy does just this is his novel The Crossing, retelling the chilling story of a man trying to put to rest the life of a wolf in the wild. He brings the author to the scene with vivid imagery, relives the action play-by-play, and takes the reader with him. The struggle with death can also be seen allegorically through the smoldering fire, and the nature that encompasses him. Through his action-to-thought structure, symbolic imagery, and his third person writing style, McCarthy conveys the main character's psychological struggle, and their connection to nature that they gain through the experience.
This insert in the essay is structured so that the reader goes through the actions in the main character's eyes without pause, then hear his inner thoughts. This form serves a two pronged purpose. The first half of the insert allows the reader to tell real time, through indirect characterization, how the main character was impacted by the experience first hand. His very careful and delicate proceedings with the wolf show his care of the animal. In doing this, you get a raw feel of the emotional connection that the main character has with the wolf. The second half of the insert has to deal with the inner workings of the character's thoughts. His self reflection on nature shares how he feels part of it, and how even a vicious creature is an integral part of the world how we know it, as are we.
The author uses very powerful, symbolic imagery throughout to help tell the story. A smoldering fire helped represent the struggle to stay alive. A wolf running through fresh morning grass before the rise of the sun showed the fresh and innocent view on life. Blood running from the wolf showed its life was whisked away from it. This was able to share the character's inner thoughts without explicitly saying the feelings that they had. It allowed for a more free flowing, action oriented text, with still conveying the significant impact the experience had on the main character.
In writing in third person, the author is able to gain a third person perspective on the character. By doing this he was able to share the characters perceptive in a different manner. He allowed the character's actions to speak for themselves, and for his inner thoughts to paint a picture fore the reader. By objectively peering into his inner imagery and thoughts, a general view on how the character changes through the experience can be made.
Dramatic experiences must be felt, and relived by a reader. McCarthy does just this is his novel The Crossing, retelling the chilling story of a man trying to put to rest the life of a wolf in the wild. He brings the author to the scene with vivid imagery, relives the action play-by-play, and takes the reader with him. The struggle with death can also be seen allegorically through the smoldering fire, and the nature that encompasses him. Through his action-to-thought structure, symbolic imagery, and his third person writing style, McCarthy conveys the main character's psychological struggle, and their connection to nature that they gain through the experience.
This insert in the essay is structured so that the reader goes through the actions in the main character's eyes without pause, then hear his inner thoughts. This form serves a two pronged purpose. The first half of the insert allows the reader to tell real time, through indirect characterization, how the main character was impacted by the experience first hand. His very careful and delicate proceedings with the wolf show his care of the animal. In doing this, you get a raw feel of the emotional connection that the main character has with the wolf. The second half of the insert has to deal with the inner workings of the character's thoughts. His self reflection on nature shares how he feels part of it, and how even a vicious creature is an integral part of the world how we know it, as are we.
The author uses very powerful, symbolic imagery throughout to help tell the story. A smoldering fire helped represent the struggle to stay alive. A wolf running through fresh morning grass before the rise of the sun showed the fresh and innocent view on life. Blood running from the wolf showed its life was whisked away from it. This was able to share the character's inner thoughts without explicitly saying the feelings that they had. It allowed for a more free flowing, action oriented text, with still conveying the significant impact the experience had on the main character.
In writing in third person, the author is able to gain a third person perspective on the character. By doing this he was able to share the characters perceptive in a different manner. He allowed the character's actions to speak for themselves, and for his inner thoughts to paint a picture fore the reader. By objectively peering into his inner imagery and thoughts, a general view on how the character changes through the experience can be made.
Saturday, April 27, 2013
Poetry Essay #2
Poetry Essay #2:
In June, amid the golden fields,
I saw a groundhog lying dead.
Dead lay he; my senses shook,
And mind outshot our naked frailty.
There lowly in the vigorous summer
His form began its senseless change,
And made my senses waver dim
Seeing nature ferocious in him.
Inspecting close maggots' might
And seething cauldron of his being,
Half with loathing, half with a strange love,
I poked him with an angry stick.
The fever arose, became a flame
And Vigour circumscribed the skies,
Immense energy in the sun,
And through my frame a sunless trembling.
My stick had done nor good nor harm.
Then stood I silent in the day
Watching the object, as before;
And kept my reverence for knowledge
Trying for control, to be still,
To quell the passion of the blood;
Until I had bent down on my knees
Praying for joy in the sight of decay.
And so I left; and I returned
In Autumn strict of eye, to see
The sap gone out of the groundhog,
But the bony sodden hulk remained
But the year had lost its meaning,
And in intellectual chains
I lost both love and loathing,
Mured up in the wall of wisdom.
Another summer took the fields again
Massive and burning, full of life,
But when I chanced upon the spot
There was only a little hair left,
And bones bleaching in the sunlight
Beautiful as architecture;
I watched them like a geometer,
And cut a walking stick from a birch.
It has been three years, now.
There is no sign of the groundhog.
I stood there in the whirling summer,
My hand capped a withered heart,
And thought of China and of Greece,
Of Alexander in his tent;
Of Montaigne in his tower,
Of Saint Theresa in her wild lament.
In June, amid the golden fields,
I saw a groundhog lying dead.
Dead lay he; my senses shook,
And mind outshot our naked frailty.
There lowly in the vigorous summer
His form began its senseless change,
And made my senses waver dim
Seeing nature ferocious in him.
Inspecting close maggots' might
And seething cauldron of his being,
Half with loathing, half with a strange love,
I poked him with an angry stick.
The fever arose, became a flame
And Vigour circumscribed the skies,
Immense energy in the sun,
And through my frame a sunless trembling.
My stick had done nor good nor harm.
Then stood I silent in the day
Watching the object, as before;
And kept my reverence for knowledge
Trying for control, to be still,
To quell the passion of the blood;
Until I had bent down on my knees
Praying for joy in the sight of decay.
And so I left; and I returned
In Autumn strict of eye, to see
The sap gone out of the groundhog,
But the bony sodden hulk remained
But the year had lost its meaning,
And in intellectual chains
I lost both love and loathing,
Mured up in the wall of wisdom.
Another summer took the fields again
Massive and burning, full of life,
But when I chanced upon the spot
There was only a little hair left,
And bones bleaching in the sunlight
Beautiful as architecture;
I watched them like a geometer,
And cut a walking stick from a birch.
It has been three years, now.
There is no sign of the groundhog.
I stood there in the whirling summer,
My hand capped a withered heart,
And thought of China and of Greece,
Of Alexander in his tent;
Of Montaigne in his tower,
Of Saint Theresa in her wild lament.
1982 Poem: “The Groundhog” (Richard Eberhart)
Prompt:
Write an essay in which you analyze how the language of the poem
reflects the changing perceptions and emotions of the speaker as he
considers the metamorphosis of the dead groundhog. Develop your essay
with specific references to the text of the poem.
Poetry Essay #2
Transitional shifts in tone and perspective are very necessary to the power of poetry. In the poem "The Groundhog" by Richard Eberhart, the shift can be found through the speaker's mental and physical transition in the middle of the poem. The groundhog, once seen as rotten and disturbing, is now seen as in the vast circle of life. Peace is found through the years that the poem sifts through, and this can be seen through the language difference before and after the shift in the poem. The poem starts off very somber with grotesque and unsure language, jumps to self reflection right before the shiftt with a pause, and then shifts to a very free flowing second half which embraces nature for what it is.
The poem's language starts off very uneasy and fearful. The imagery in the first few stanzas paints a bleak picture with words such as "dead", "frailty", and "maggots". This shows the first reaction to seeing the dead groundhog. The narrator becomes unable to think clearly, emphasizing on his or her system shock. They tell every emotion concretely, and do not let their thoughts flow at this point. The uneasiness can be seen through the use of the words "naked", "senseless", and "trembling". These points of uncertainty and fear set the stage for changing emotions, and this emotional stage for the narrator sets the stage for the theme of the poem to shine through.
Right before the shift in the narrator's perspective, he enters a brief period of deep thought. This period starts at the line "My stick had done nor good nor harm." and ends with "Mured up in the wall of wisdom." Sadness turns to indifference in this time, with the second viewing of the groundhog. Here the diction changes to using very calm words and adjectives for the tone. The words "quell", "control", and "wisdom" all convey this new perspective. The middle of the road attitude is also seen through the use of antonyms when his feelings are described, such as, "I lost both love and loathing.". This leads up to the shift in which the speaker changes their perspective once more.
At the shift, the narrator's attitude drastically changes from indifferent to accepting and joyful. The dead groundhog is all but gone, and in its place is a beautifully described scene. In juxtaposition with the previously dead groundhog corpse, the setting is now "Massive and burning, full of life". The use of the word life contrasts with the the use of the word dead in the first stanza, and shows a concrete change in viewpoint. Instead of emotions being described, the narrator focuses on the scene before him, showing his acceptance of nature, and his inner peace.
The groundhog offered a medium that the narrator's change in mentality could be shared through. The tone, diction, and psychology of the situation changed throughout the poem in accordance with the narrator. The narrator's final peace can be seen through the allusions used in the last stanza. It relates each individual to where they found their peace at, and the narrator found theirs in nature.
Poetry Essay #1
Pre-write
Body Paragraphs:
Paragraph 1: Fundamental Differences in Speakers.
To Helen: Speaker views statue as beautiful, glorious, a sight to behold. Once which brings both joy and comfort. Yet is distant to the narrator himself. Uses allusion to Rome.
Helen: Speaker sees the statue as a destructive becon. One which signifies the downfall of roam. It's fault lies in its perfect beauty. Hatred comes from its larger than life persona
Paragraph 2: Imagery/tone
To Helen: Describes beauty, welcoming in contrast to the lonely seas. Tone is calm, longing.
Helen: Very harsh tone, using the word hate on multiple occasions. Describes a statue that is too perfect, almost mocking. White, juxtaposition between the two.
Paragraph 3: Diction and Form
To Helen: Alliteration, Anaphora, iteration. Uses Greek references making the statue feel in place. Beauty, longing, Admiring
Helen: Hate, Past Ills, and wish for future destruction. Clear diction, no olden or cosmopolitan language.
Body Paragraphs:
Paragraph 1: Fundamental Differences in Speakers.
To Helen: Speaker views statue as beautiful, glorious, a sight to behold. Once which brings both joy and comfort. Yet is distant to the narrator himself. Uses allusion to Rome.
Helen: Speaker sees the statue as a destructive becon. One which signifies the downfall of roam. It's fault lies in its perfect beauty. Hatred comes from its larger than life persona
Paragraph 2: Imagery/tone
To Helen: Describes beauty, welcoming in contrast to the lonely seas. Tone is calm, longing.
Helen: Very harsh tone, using the word hate on multiple occasions. Describes a statue that is too perfect, almost mocking. White, juxtaposition between the two.
Paragraph 3: Diction and Form
To Helen: Alliteration, Anaphora, iteration. Uses Greek references making the statue feel in place. Beauty, longing, Admiring
Helen: Hate, Past Ills, and wish for future destruction. Clear diction, no olden or cosmopolitan language.
Essay #1
Objects of great beauty often are met with contradicting views, such as Helen in the poems To Helen by Edgar Allan Poe, and Helen, by H.D. In Edgar Allan Poe's Helen, the speaker sees Helen as a beautiful, welcoming, caring figure. He gets lost in his words, and is found in the poem through Helen. She is described through long, flowing sentences, with very complimentary words. In H.D.'s Helen, the speaker views Helen with great contempt. She is seen as the beauty which brought down their society, and sees her as perfect to the point of flaw. She is painted as a purely white figure whom caused disaster for Greece, and these descriptions are accompanied with vindictive words. These drastically conflicting views of Helen can be seen through the speaker's tone, imagery, diction, and form in which they delivered their viewpoints.
The speakers in the two have two different stories about Helen. In Poe's version, the speaker tells of a beauty across a lost sea. Of someone who brings great comfort and homage to those whom allow it. Troy is seen as home to the speaker, and Helen a motherly figure. In contrast, in H.D's version the speaker viewed Helen with great enmity. As the single factor whom destroyed their beloved Greece with her beauty. This beauty has brought great distress to Greece, and the speaker shares this side of Helen. The two sides from which the story of Helen is told lays the foundation for the speaker's viewpoints of her.
In accordance to these views, each speaker uses unique imagery to describe Helen, and in conflicting tones. To Helen's describes a the contrast between the lonely ocean waves, and the relaxed beauty of Helen. The speaker uses a very calm tone to describe the comfort they feel when viewing Helen. In Helen, the speaker has a very harsh tone, using the word hate on multiple occasions. They describes a statue that is too perfect, almost mocking.The imagery of a perfect white statue is used in juxtaposition with the tone used.
The different views on Helen can also be seen through the narrator's word choice, and how they put their story together. One speaker gets lost in their words, often repeating and emphasizing their comfort in Helen through both an alliteration and an anaphora. Their story is one of longing, and solace through Helen. In the other poem, the narrator uses very harsh words in very short lines to describe their hate of Helen. They describe their current hate, why they hate her, and their desire to be rid of the beautiful figure.
Both speakers acknowledge the beauty of Helen, but one sees it in comfort, while the other through hate. Comfort is seen through a very calm, easy tone, which describes the lonely seas. Through long mellifluous sentences which ooze harmony with the statue. The other has a hatred of Helen, and is very clear of this through harsh words, and viewing the beauty as flawed.
Friday, April 26, 2013
Poetry Analysis
Title
of poem means |
|
Paraphrase
parts of the Poem |
|
Connotation
of some of the words – changing literal meaning to implied or associated values |
|
Attitude
What is the attitude of the author, characters or yourself? |
|
Shift
At first we think or feel one way – then there is a shift: identify the shifts and explain them |
|
Title revisited
Any new insights on meaning or significance of title? |
|
Theme
(Your soul is the key to your freedom)
|
Tuesday, April 23, 2013
Seventh Reading
My favorite author is Edgar Allan Poe, but to brighten the mood of poetry and this class, I have chosen a poem by W.B. Yeats, a free-spirited Irish man.
A Crazed Girl, by William Butler Yeats
That crazed girl improvising her music.
Her poetry, dancing upon the shore,
Her soul in division from itself
Climbing, falling She knew not where,
Hiding amid the cargo of a steamship,
Her knee-cap broken, that girl I declare
A beautiful lofty thing, or a thing
Heroically lost, heroically found.
No matter what disaster occurred
She stood in desperate music wound,
Wound, wound, and she made in her triumph
Where the bales and the baskets lay
No common intelligible sound
But sang, 'O sea-starved, hungry sea.'
A Crazed Girl, by William Butler Yeats
That crazed girl improvising her music.
Her poetry, dancing upon the shore,
Her soul in division from itself
Climbing, falling She knew not where,
Hiding amid the cargo of a steamship,
Her knee-cap broken, that girl I declare
A beautiful lofty thing, or a thing
Heroically lost, heroically found.
No matter what disaster occurred
She stood in desperate music wound,
Wound, wound, and she made in her triumph
Where the bales and the baskets lay
No common intelligible sound
But sang, 'O sea-starved, hungry sea.'
Sunday, April 21, 2013
Essay Skeletons
For each of the books that there was a mini-presentation on, I am going to structure an essay for each based on an essay prompt given by the group. Here goes nothing.
Themes known from presentation:
1. The difference between dreams and reality
2. The power and beauty of mucis in the world
3. Interactions between family members.
Characters in Kafka:
Kafka and Nakata (One and the same?)
What I know about character relationships:
1.Kafka has a bad family life, with a longing to see his mother and sister whom also ran away
2. There is a similar sex life as in Oedipus Rex.
3. Kafka's plotline meets up with Nakata's plotline.
General Statement to summarize essay:
Through Kafka's broken family affairs, the author exhibits the sense of longing and confusion which encompass him as a character.
Paragraphs:
1. Based on how he comes from a broken family life. Shows how broken his life is at the beginning of the book. He plotline is completely seperated from Nakata's, and he begins his journey to find himself
2. Plotlines converge. Nakata's character and Kafka's seem to become one as they come together. Through the murder of Johnny Walker, you are able to see both Kafka's mental and physical struggles in the book.
3. Confusion. He confusion in his sexual relationship with his family.
Essay Prompt:
Is bullying a good enough reason to kill? Use examples from the novel "Carrie" to support your position.
Themes:
1. Need of acceptance in society
2. Revenge on those who deserve it.
3. The play of religion and its restrictions
Bullying in Carrie:
1. Other girls are mean to her
2. Her parents tell her everything she does is wrong and sinful
3. A group of girls pour pigs blood on her at a dance.
4. This causes Carrie to unleash pyschic powers, killing 440 people in the town in a rampage called the assassination.
Ideas:
1. Hard topic to relate to since it encompasses the death penalty argument. Stick to things in the novel.
2. Schadenfreude
3. They drove her to the breaking point. So she broke them.
4. They lead their own fate.
General Statement for essay:
The book Carrie exhibits a situation in which characters in the book seal their own fates through horrible deeds that go unpaid for expect through their untimely deaths.
Paragraphs:
1. Bullying. The effects it has on Carrie, and how is slowly drives her to the breaking point
2. The assassination. How Carrie went crazy on the member on the town, and the way she wasn't completely in control as it happened
3. How it was deserved. The members in the town made her life hell, and she sent them there.
Essay Prompt: Religion plays a big role in Life of Pi. Discuss the part of religion in the novel and how it affected Piscine's journey.
Themes in Life of Pi:
1. Self Discovery
2. Religious Acceptance
3. Territorial/Animalistic Behavior
Religion in Life of Pi:
1. Piscine grows up Hindi, and lives his life in that manner, until he meets a priest and accepts Christianity, then meets an Imam and adds Islam to his list.
2. It is a story of self discovery, and he takes the best parts of all three religions, and refutes none of them.
3. He takes religion in a very pure manner, just wanting to worship god.
General Statement for the Essay:
Religion plays a role in Piscine's story by showing how he discovers himself through the ideas and experiences he meets and accepts throughout his life.
Paragraphs:
1. How Pi sees all three religions. How he accepts each one as it comes.
2. How Pi shows the three religious leaders how poorly they are acting towards each other. How his purity opens their eyes.
3. How through his journey on the boat, he truly finds himself, and how his background in spirituality plays a vital part in this discovery.
1. Kafka on the Shore:
Essay Prompt: Explain how the author develops a character through the use of relationships and encounters with othersThemes known from presentation:
1. The difference between dreams and reality
2. The power and beauty of mucis in the world
3. Interactions between family members.
Characters in Kafka:
Kafka and Nakata (One and the same?)
What I know about character relationships:
1.Kafka has a bad family life, with a longing to see his mother and sister whom also ran away
2. There is a similar sex life as in Oedipus Rex.
3. Kafka's plotline meets up with Nakata's plotline.
General Statement to summarize essay:
Through Kafka's broken family affairs, the author exhibits the sense of longing and confusion which encompass him as a character.
Paragraphs:
1. Based on how he comes from a broken family life. Shows how broken his life is at the beginning of the book. He plotline is completely seperated from Nakata's, and he begins his journey to find himself
2. Plotlines converge. Nakata's character and Kafka's seem to become one as they come together. Through the murder of Johnny Walker, you are able to see both Kafka's mental and physical struggles in the book.
3. Confusion. He confusion in his sexual relationship with his family.
2. Carrie
Essay Prompt:
Is bullying a good enough reason to kill? Use examples from the novel "Carrie" to support your position.
Themes:
1. Need of acceptance in society
2. Revenge on those who deserve it.
3. The play of religion and its restrictions
Bullying in Carrie:
1. Other girls are mean to her
2. Her parents tell her everything she does is wrong and sinful
3. A group of girls pour pigs blood on her at a dance.
4. This causes Carrie to unleash pyschic powers, killing 440 people in the town in a rampage called the assassination.
Ideas:
1. Hard topic to relate to since it encompasses the death penalty argument. Stick to things in the novel.
2. Schadenfreude
3. They drove her to the breaking point. So she broke them.
4. They lead their own fate.
General Statement for essay:
The book Carrie exhibits a situation in which characters in the book seal their own fates through horrible deeds that go unpaid for expect through their untimely deaths.
Paragraphs:
1. Bullying. The effects it has on Carrie, and how is slowly drives her to the breaking point
2. The assassination. How Carrie went crazy on the member on the town, and the way she wasn't completely in control as it happened
3. How it was deserved. The members in the town made her life hell, and she sent them there.
3. Life of Pi
Themes in Life of Pi:
1. Self Discovery
2. Religious Acceptance
3. Territorial/Animalistic Behavior
Religion in Life of Pi:
1. Piscine grows up Hindi, and lives his life in that manner, until he meets a priest and accepts Christianity, then meets an Imam and adds Islam to his list.
2. It is a story of self discovery, and he takes the best parts of all three religions, and refutes none of them.
3. He takes religion in a very pure manner, just wanting to worship god.
General Statement for the Essay:
Religion plays a role in Piscine's story by showing how he discovers himself through the ideas and experiences he meets and accepts throughout his life.
Paragraphs:
1. How Pi sees all three religions. How he accepts each one as it comes.
2. How Pi shows the three religious leaders how poorly they are acting towards each other. How his purity opens their eyes.
3. How through his journey on the boat, he truly finds himself, and how his background in spirituality plays a vital part in this discovery.
Monday, April 8, 2013
Literature Analysis: The Signal and the Noise
Prelude: This is my second economics book, in a series of very different books which I am reading relating to my eventual major in the field. This being said, I am still analyzing the book based on literary elements, as well as how the author decided to puts thoughts into words. So here it goes.
Summary: The Signal and the Noise by Nate Silver is a book based on predictions in today's world. How to make them, why you should be cautious, what can be seen, what can't, etc. The main message of the book, is that in an information intensive day and age, we have to sift through endless amounts of information to determine what is truly important (signal), and what can be forgotten (noise). Prediction plays a key role in economics, and failed predictions can lead to events such as the market crash in 2008, after the housing bubble exploded. And here is where the book begins.
"Big Data"
The book has logos strewn into its pages into the fullest extent, using series of numbers and graphs to help prove its point. These numbers are brought about in one of two ways. Either through an anecdote, or by raw data.
Anecdote: " It was October 23, 2008. The stock market was in free fall, having plummeted almost 30 percent over the previous five weeks. Once esteemed companies like Lehman Brothers had gone bankrupt. Credit markets had all but ceased to function. Houses in Las Vegas had lost 40 percent of their value."
Raw Numerical Data: "IBM estimates that we are generating 2.5 quintillion bytes of data each day, more than 90 percent of which was created in the last two years."
In order to keep the book both interesting and relevant, the author wrote about pop culture incidents to keep the reader's attention, as well as data that affects many of us on a daily basis.
Allusion: "At the time Michael Lewis was busy writing Moneyball, the soon-to-be national bestseller that chronicled the rise of the Oakland Athletics and their statistically savvy general manager Billy Beane."
The book also uses personification in one part to make the ideas more easily understood by general audiences
"The fox knows many little things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing. Hedgehogs are type A personalities who believe in Big Ideas-...Foxes, on the other hand, are scrappy creatures who believe in a plethora of little ideas and in taking a multitude of approaches toward a problem."
Pun: "How to know if your forecasts are all wet."
Now much of the book is about numbers. Recessions, earthquake forecasts, loan forecasts, how the stock market reacts to different phenomena. However, there were parts of the book which significantly peaked my younger minds interest in the subject. Starting with this quote:
"Voulgaris had watched a lot of Lakers games: he liked what Jackson was doing with the club. So he place $80,000- his entire life savings less a little he's left over for food and tuition- on the Lakers to win the NBA championship."
This being a success story in a sea of failed gambling yes, but the author included it to show what happens when predictions succeed. From that point on he used both keen knowledge of the sport, along with a computer program specifically designed by himself, to gamble on almost every professional sports game, earning 1-3 million dollars a year on the craft. Now from this side story, he introduces a very important equation to the prediction style that the author supports. Bayes's theorem. Like Hayek's book, the author mixes in relatively unimportant interesting topics, in his the heart of the subject to both keep the reader interested, and get the message across in one fell swoop. Which is what seems to be the pattern between the two economics books that I've read so far. More to come.
Summary: The Signal and the Noise by Nate Silver is a book based on predictions in today's world. How to make them, why you should be cautious, what can be seen, what can't, etc. The main message of the book, is that in an information intensive day and age, we have to sift through endless amounts of information to determine what is truly important (signal), and what can be forgotten (noise). Prediction plays a key role in economics, and failed predictions can lead to events such as the market crash in 2008, after the housing bubble exploded. And here is where the book begins.
"Big Data"
The book has logos strewn into its pages into the fullest extent, using series of numbers and graphs to help prove its point. These numbers are brought about in one of two ways. Either through an anecdote, or by raw data.
Anecdote: " It was October 23, 2008. The stock market was in free fall, having plummeted almost 30 percent over the previous five weeks. Once esteemed companies like Lehman Brothers had gone bankrupt. Credit markets had all but ceased to function. Houses in Las Vegas had lost 40 percent of their value."
Raw Numerical Data: "IBM estimates that we are generating 2.5 quintillion bytes of data each day, more than 90 percent of which was created in the last two years."
In order to keep the book both interesting and relevant, the author wrote about pop culture incidents to keep the reader's attention, as well as data that affects many of us on a daily basis.
Allusion: "At the time Michael Lewis was busy writing Moneyball, the soon-to-be national bestseller that chronicled the rise of the Oakland Athletics and their statistically savvy general manager Billy Beane."
The book also uses personification in one part to make the ideas more easily understood by general audiences
"The fox knows many little things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing. Hedgehogs are type A personalities who believe in Big Ideas-...Foxes, on the other hand, are scrappy creatures who believe in a plethora of little ideas and in taking a multitude of approaches toward a problem."
Pun: "How to know if your forecasts are all wet."
Now much of the book is about numbers. Recessions, earthquake forecasts, loan forecasts, how the stock market reacts to different phenomena. However, there were parts of the book which significantly peaked my younger minds interest in the subject. Starting with this quote:
"Voulgaris had watched a lot of Lakers games: he liked what Jackson was doing with the club. So he place $80,000- his entire life savings less a little he's left over for food and tuition- on the Lakers to win the NBA championship."
This being a success story in a sea of failed gambling yes, but the author included it to show what happens when predictions succeed. From that point on he used both keen knowledge of the sport, along with a computer program specifically designed by himself, to gamble on almost every professional sports game, earning 1-3 million dollars a year on the craft. Now from this side story, he introduces a very important equation to the prediction style that the author supports. Bayes's theorem. Like Hayek's book, the author mixes in relatively unimportant interesting topics, in his the heart of the subject to both keep the reader interested, and get the message across in one fell swoop. Which is what seems to be the pattern between the two economics books that I've read so far. More to come.
Sunday, April 7, 2013
Slaughterhouse-Five 20 Literary Elements
20 Literary Elements in the book, Slaughterhouse-Five:
1. Motif: The repeated phrase which signifies the theme of the story is "So it goes." "Now, when I myself hear that somebody is dead, I simply shrug and say what the Tralfamadorians say about dead people, which is 'So it goes."
2. Metonymy: The third bullet was for the filthy flamingo, who stopped dead center in the road when the lethal bee buzzed past his ear.
3. Allusion: "Weary looked like Tweedledum or Tweedledee, all bundled up for battle. He was short and thick."
4. Illustrations: Vonnuget actually provided three or four small illustrations to add to the writing. (Page 79)
5. Dark Humor: "Billy coughed when the door was opened, and when he coughed he shit thin gruel. This was in accordance with the Third Law of Motion according to Sir Isaac Newton...This can be useful in rocketry."
6. Aphorism: "There is no why."
7. Juxtaposition of attitudes: When Billy was stuck on a boxcar to be sent off to a German camp, he had a hobo is his car who stated, "I been hungrier than this. I been in worse places than this. This ain't so bad."
8. Symbolism: "But, lying on the black ice there, Billy stared into the patina of the corporal's boots, saw Adam and Eve in the golden depths. They were naked. They were so innocent, so vulnerable, so eager to behave decently. Billy Pilgrim loved them"
9. Irony: "The dog, who had sounded so ferocious in the winter distances, was a female German shepherd. She was shivering. Her tail was between her legs.She had been borrowed that morning form a farmer. She had never been to war before. She had no idea what game was being played. Her name was Princess."
10. Perspective: "The soldiers' eyes were filled with a bleary civilian curiosity as to why one American would try to murder another one so far from home, and why the victim should laugh."
11. Repetition: "The congregation had been theoretically spotted from the air by a theoretical enemy. They were all theoretically dead now. The theoretical corpses laughed and ate a hearty noontime meal."
12. Direct Characterization: "He had been unpopular because he was stupid and fat and mean, and smelled like bacon no matter how much he washed."
13. Indirect Characterization: "They supposed that he was a splendid specimen. This had a pleasant effect on Billy, who began to enjoy his body for the first time."
14. Figurative Language: "The hobo could not flow, could not plop. He wasn't liquid anymore. He was stone."
15. Antagonist: Paul Lazzaro. Vows revenge on Billy Pilgram.
16. Dialect: ""Yank," told them "Good show," promised them that "Jerry was on the run," and so on."
17. Allusion #2: "He was given a book to read. The book was The Red Badge of Courage, by Stephen Crane. Derby had read it before."
18. Onomatopoeia: "Poo-tee-weet?"
19. Hyperbole: "An unseen hand turned a master valve. Out of the showerheads gushed scalding rain. The rain was a blowtorch that did not warm. It jazzed and jangled Billy's skin without thawing the ice in the marrow of his long bones."
20. Protagonist: Billy Pilgram. Travels through time and space realizing this will go how they will.
1. Motif: The repeated phrase which signifies the theme of the story is "So it goes." "Now, when I myself hear that somebody is dead, I simply shrug and say what the Tralfamadorians say about dead people, which is 'So it goes."
2. Metonymy: The third bullet was for the filthy flamingo, who stopped dead center in the road when the lethal bee buzzed past his ear.
3. Allusion: "Weary looked like Tweedledum or Tweedledee, all bundled up for battle. He was short and thick."
4. Illustrations: Vonnuget actually provided three or four small illustrations to add to the writing. (Page 79)
5. Dark Humor: "Billy coughed when the door was opened, and when he coughed he shit thin gruel. This was in accordance with the Third Law of Motion according to Sir Isaac Newton...This can be useful in rocketry."
6. Aphorism: "There is no why."
7. Juxtaposition of attitudes: When Billy was stuck on a boxcar to be sent off to a German camp, he had a hobo is his car who stated, "I been hungrier than this. I been in worse places than this. This ain't so bad."
8. Symbolism: "But, lying on the black ice there, Billy stared into the patina of the corporal's boots, saw Adam and Eve in the golden depths. They were naked. They were so innocent, so vulnerable, so eager to behave decently. Billy Pilgrim loved them"
9. Irony: "The dog, who had sounded so ferocious in the winter distances, was a female German shepherd. She was shivering. Her tail was between her legs.She had been borrowed that morning form a farmer. She had never been to war before. She had no idea what game was being played. Her name was Princess."
10. Perspective: "The soldiers' eyes were filled with a bleary civilian curiosity as to why one American would try to murder another one so far from home, and why the victim should laugh."
11. Repetition: "The congregation had been theoretically spotted from the air by a theoretical enemy. They were all theoretically dead now. The theoretical corpses laughed and ate a hearty noontime meal."
12. Direct Characterization: "He had been unpopular because he was stupid and fat and mean, and smelled like bacon no matter how much he washed."
13. Indirect Characterization: "They supposed that he was a splendid specimen. This had a pleasant effect on Billy, who began to enjoy his body for the first time."
14. Figurative Language: "The hobo could not flow, could not plop. He wasn't liquid anymore. He was stone."
15. Antagonist: Paul Lazzaro. Vows revenge on Billy Pilgram.
16. Dialect: ""Yank," told them "Good show," promised them that "Jerry was on the run," and so on."
17. Allusion #2: "He was given a book to read. The book was The Red Badge of Courage, by Stephen Crane. Derby had read it before."
18. Onomatopoeia: "Poo-tee-weet?"
19. Hyperbole: "An unseen hand turned a master valve. Out of the showerheads gushed scalding rain. The rain was a blowtorch that did not warm. It jazzed and jangled Billy's skin without thawing the ice in the marrow of his long bones."
20. Protagonist: Billy Pilgram. Travels through time and space realizing this will go how they will.
SO IT GOES
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