Response to a handful of dates

I enjoyed reading the story a handful of dates I found the story very interesting. The story of the experience of a young boy growing up in rural Sudan I have gotten the opportunity to see a life and a culture entirely different from my own. The themes in the story make for a very interesting picture and feel that I find is very authentic. I was left at the end wondering if it was a memoir rather than a fictional account.  

The very vivid account of the desert, the Nile and the colorful characters made for a very interesting account of a world dissimilar to my own. It is filled with a certain warmth that is not only described physically in  the hot Sudanese sun but mentally through the grandfather an the other characters through the eyes of a child. It is also apparent of a sense of community and closeness that is almost unheard of in western society. All in all this makes for a wonderful escape story that can paint a very vivid mental imagery. For a person who has never been to Africa it is a wonderful escapist story. 

The setting also complements the story well as it permits the author to have a certain symbolism that enriches the story with feeling and compels the reader to feel as the narrator (and by extension the author) intends. This feeling is the core of the artistic enjoyment of a text and this short story really helps prove this. The boys emotions, the root of the story are propelled by the settings immersive atmosphere.

I personally recommend reading the story simply to hear a tale of a time and a land far away and see the life of a person who's culture and upbringing is completely perpendicular to my own.  

Reply to Ozymandias:

The poem Ozymandias is an excellent way of demonstrating the decay and impermanence of rule.
The author talks about many aspects of the king and how his tyranny must have affected the sculptors but how only their craftsmanship remains the hate of the king washed away by the sands. How only his feet remain and that his face has fallen. He has "lost face". This is also shown by the sand washing away his kingdom to dust, the sands and the impossibly powerful element of time. I really like this poem as it says the same as Charlie Chaplain. "As long as men die liberty will never perish." All rulers die and all people move on. The people who demand followers will be forgotten by time.

• alliteration
the repetition of the same sounds or of the same kinds of sounds at the beginning of words or in stressed syllables of an English language phrase.
• allusion
an expression designed to call something to mind without mentioning it explicitly
• assonance
 the repetition of vowel sounds to create internal rhyming within phrases or sentences
• ballad
a form of verse, often a narrative set to music
• blank verse
 poetry written in regular metrical but unrhymed lines, almost always iambic pentameters.
• caesura
 a complete pause in a line of poetry or in a musical composition.
• couplet
Couplets usually consist of two lines that rhyme and have the same meter.
• diction
choice and use of words and phrases in speech or writing.
• end rhyme
a rhyme that occurs in the last syllables of verses
• enjambment
incomplete syntax at the end of a line
• epic
 a lengthy narrative poem, ordinarily concerning a serious subject containing details of heroic deeds 
• foot
 the basic metrical unit that generates a line of verse in most Western traditions of poetry
• free verse
open form of poetry.
• imagery
 an author's use of vivid and descriptive language to add depth to his or her work.
• lyric
Lyrics are a set of words that make up a song
• metaphor
figure of speech that describes a subject by asserting that it is, on some point of comparison, the same as another otherwise unrelated object. 
• meter
 the basic rhythmic structure of a verse or lines in verse.
• ode
 is a type of lyrical stanza.
• onomatopoeia
a word that phonetically imitates, resembles or suggests the source of the sound that it describes
• repetition
 the simple repeating of a word
• rhyme scheme
the pattern of rhyme between lines of a poem or song
• rhythm
movement marked by the regulated succession of strong and weak elements, or of opposite or different conditions.
• simile
a rhetorical figure expressing comparison or likeness that directly compares two objects through some connective word 
• sonnet
 a poem of fourteen lines that follows a strictrhyme scheme and specific structure.
• stanza
a grouped set of lines within a poem
• stress
Stress is the emphasis that falls on certain syllables and not others
• theme(s)
 the central topic a text treats
• tone
encompasses the attitudes toward the subject and toward the audience implied in a literary work
• verse
 any division or grouping of words in a poetic composition

• volta
the turn in thought in a sonnet that is often indicated by such initial words asBut, Yet, or And yet

Continuation of the story "Hills like white elephants" By Ernest Hemingway

‘I feel fine,’ she said. ‘There’s nothing wrong with me. I feel fine.’
He sat down at the table on the platform, staring off into the distance down the tracks.
"You know dear? You have said that to me every time something worries you. Your a terrible liar."
"I'm not lying!"
He picked up his drink and finished it in one gulp but held on to the glass, inspecting it slightly.
"I understand you better than you think you know? I've traveled the continent with you after all.
He looked up at the girl in front of him, "I promise you we will be together."
"You make stupid promises."
"Why is that stupid?"
"You know that your employer will re-assign you."
"What employer?"
"You can't do that."
"Sure we can"
He got up and walked to the ticket counter, a man in a conductor uniform appeared from the back of the room. "Can I help you senor?" He pronounced in a thick local accent.
"Where are your next trains headed?" "Madrid senor you are on it."
"I don't want to go to Madrid."
"But your bags are already on their way."
"I don't care"
"Well the train for Barcelona is almost leaving."
"Then I'll go to Barcelona."
"Alright senor,darse prisa!"They changed tickets and he gave him some Pesetas for his trouble. He walked back to his table. The girl was staring at him but averted her eyes as soon as he noticed.
"Get your bags the trains here."
"There is no train."
"Yes there is get your bags."
"That ones headed north."
"Yes I know, we are going to Barcelona."
"We can't"
He helped her out of her chair and pulled her in to him kissing her.
"Yes we can,
 we have the whole world."

Today I have read The address as part of my ENG 3U class and personally I found the story mildly interesting at best. It is a recollection of a memory from a child how survived the holocaust and the grown woman revisiting her past by picking up her possessions.

The author talks allot about her experience before and after the war but chose not to discuss the experience during the war. This is most likely because she did not want to make the story particularly lengthily or detract from the main objective. However I think that had she spent atleast one page discussing her interactions with Mrs. Dorling it would have aided the comprehension of the character and her relation to the author (and narrator) as I am very curious to see if she was in-fact as self serving at the beginning of the war as she was at the end.

The author makes it apparent that Dorling wanted nothing more than to take her mothers things but I still would have liked to see more about Dorling's situation. It is possible that she felt owed for her work or that she felt that the author was still to young to have back all of her possessions. Her age is not clearly mentioned in the story. Personally I think that the author lacked many details on her relationship with Mrs. Dorling and that it would have made far more sense had she included some of those interactions because without them the story feels rather one sided.

I also feel that the story lacked a purpose, she talks about her past and tries to recover her stuff only to realize that she doesn't want it as it has become unfamiliar and leaves. The story has no climax and very little objective and I feel this really guts the substance from the story. Had she atleast attempted harder to get her things or gone more in-depth on the relationship on the pre-war Mrs. Dorling or even simply described the situation of the post war encounter with more flavor the story wouldn't be such a dry read. It simply failed to convey my interest.

To resume I must say that the story is another true story from the holocaust and the era in which it occurred. However the author should have included it as part of a larger story recounting the whole experience as on its own it is a dry read about repossessing property. I understand that this must have been emotional for the author but I fail to have any conveyed to me. However the author seems to make great use of timing and literary devices and I would love to read about her experience in hiding.
 

Work number 1 for ENG3U:

The Address or "Het Adres" by Marga Minco was cited in one article on the Literature resource center in the listed works of the author by Johnathan P. Snapper (UC Berkeley) under the "other works" section.

However the true source is a list of works from the author by the Holocaust novelists resource center rather than the original Story. This paper was a compilation of the authors work but it does talk about the piece in question. He cited page 9-16 of the address for the article.

Source citation in the article:

• "Het adres," in 3 bekroonde novellen, by Minco, Ingeborg Rutgers, and Anke Jelsma (Amsterdam: De Mutator, 1957), pp. 9-16.

URL of paper:

http://go.galegroup.com.ezproxy.biblioottawalibrary.ca/ps/retrieve.do?sgHitCountType=None&sort=RELEVANCE&inPS=true&prodId=LitRC&userGroupName=otta35732&tabID=T001&searchId=R6&resultListType=RESULT_LIST&contentSegment=&searchType=BasicSearchForm&currentPosition=2&contentSet=GALE%7CH1200011982&&docId=GALE|H1200011982&docType=GALE&role=LitRC

Test post

Test post for ENG3U