Analyze This

Surprisingly enough, I actually enjoyed the writing of fiction more than the studying of it this time around. Normally I'm always on the side of analysis, but after reading "A Hand in the Grave" and trying to make connections between Kanafani's story and the cultural context of his piece, I wanted to bang my head against a doorframe. Wasn't that a poem we read?

My troubles came from the research for the paper I had to write. Finding critique of this story was like trying to find a needle in a haystack. I'm also not entirely familiar with the history of the Palestinian conflicts, so I only was able to obtain a surface, quick bit of knowledge for the amount of time I had to do the essay. I'm sure there is a wealth of information out there that I was unable to look at.

The writing of fiction, on the other hand, was amazingly smooth (apart from my last paragraph which I began with 'For you see,' but Lucas corrected me there). Once we were given the structured topics, and sent on our 'Under what circumstance would...' the ideas started to fly. Especially when I read that 'dread the arrival of spring' was a choice. I dread it every year, thanks to allergies, so I was able to write from something I know.

Of course, reading the other pieces of fiction prior to the writing did alert me as to how to construct a narrative, how to build up suspense, and give that surprise little ending.

I guess it comes down to them both being valuable in the teaching of English. You can't really have high schoolers experience one without experiencing the other. It is important that they realize the effort put into writing, as well as being able to analyze others' works.

Maureen's Myth Making Merriment

Unlike with the creative writing that involved poetry, I experienced no anxiety or fear over this myth writing assignment. I think the fact that I worked with trickster myths, and learned that these could be as silly as a coyote stealing a dog's asshole, it dissolved the need to be profound and poignant which taints poetry writing for me.

When I sat down to write mine, I asked my boyfriend, "What should I do a myth on?" And he asked me to expand. "Well, I can do a creation myth, a male divine or female divine myth, a trickster myth, or a sacred places myth!" The fact that I had these jumping off points made the actual creating of my own so much easier, as they gave me a basic outline on where to take my myth. My boyfriend, ever helpful, said, "Do a sacred place myth." About what? "The merging of the 101 and the 405 freeway! It is hell on earth!"

Using his fantastic idea, and the information gained from the sections on sacred places from the book and from the group's presentation, the creating of my myth came much more easily than any poetry ever has or will. Having to take what I learned and apply it to my own myth actually made the information from the book real. The points of each myth were no longer was just words on a page, but tools I was actually able to use in my writing. For example, the group presentation who handled the sacred place myths described the bad luck that followed a family who removed stones from a sacred circle, so when I was creating mine I decided to make it the opposite - when a person removed a flower, it brought them good luck but left bad luck in its wake.

It is vital that when we teach we keep to this order - learning about myths, then creating, because the first supports the second so greatly. It was perfect to do the myth studying before the myth creating, as it allowed us to see the different aspects and points in the varying myth-types and then expound on those in our own writing. If the assignment had been, "Go create a myth!" before any knowledge had been gained, I'm sure I would have struggled with this as much as I did with the poetry!

Roses are red, violets are blue, poetry is difficult, but analyzing isn't!

I actually read Lucas’ journal before typing my own, to get an idea of what the topic was (as I was on a cruise to Mexico for a week of sun and relaxing, and that tends to melt the brain), and I find it interesting that he and I feel the complete opposite about poetry and the analyzing of it. I have this great fear of writing poetry, because I approach it with all of those analytical terms in mind. Does this rhyme? Can I fit alliteration in here? What is my theme? Oh my god, this isn’t profound enough! Backspace! My experience with the wrecking poem was just that. I had some ideas on the computer, and deleted them all because I thought they weren’t good enough, or moving enough. This fear of not provoking some great emotion in poetic writing cripples me, and it was only when I woke up at 6 am and decided to just write it without thought that it actually worked. That’s the problem! I think too much, which helps with the analyzing side.

It is much more difficult for me to write my own than it is to read and deconstruct someone else’s. Analyzing poetry is much like analyzing a novel, or a short story. Different terms, and different things to look out for, but you use these things (such as alliteration and rhyme) to expound on a greater theme or issue like you would use sentence structure in a novel. Finding support and evidence of this issue is like a puzzle, and trying to fit the pieces together to form the strongest picture for the case is an adventure. I’ve heard the phrase “Those who can’t do, teach” before, but I think it should be more along the lines of “Those who can’t write poetry, analyze.”

Please don't tell me you want to be a teacher...

Hello out there. My name is Maureen Grandchamp, and I'm an avid Disneyland goer. I work full time, school full time, and Disneyland full time. I'm 28, and fabulous! This is (part of) my story...

Ten years ago when I graduated High School I went straight to Boston University into the pre-med program. I had wanted to be a doctor since November 11, 1991 at 1:02 pm when my little sister was born. I was so amazed that someone could help bring life into this world, and something so perfect as my sister, that I thought I had found my calling. Everyone was so proud of me, and they threw a huge going away party the summer before I left. I was going to be a doctor! Once arriving in Boston, however, plans began to change. I was taking 2 science classes, and 2 electives: French and Shakespeare. As the semester progressed I found myself enjoying Shakespeare more than any science I was taking, and actually starting to dread the days I had to work with biology or chemistry. I would rather be reading As You Like It than learning about the Krebs Cycle. It was then that I started to wonder if I was doing the right thing. You're supposed to enjoy the field in which you choose to study, right? I was not supposed to find more pleasure in literature than in science! I couldn't give it up, though. Not something that had carried me through nearly half of my life at the time. The second semester rolled around, and again I had two science courses and two electives. Again I enjoyed my British Literature course more than my Chemistry 2. My experience in Boston wasn't turning out to be what I had imagined. Apart from not knowing anything about the white fluffy stuff that falls from the sky and covers the ground and makes it freezing cold and makes you want to just stay inside and ask these crazy people why they would ever live in these conditions (I think they call it "snow"), the thing I had wanted for 7 years of my life wasn't turning out quite what I expected it to be. When the semester came to an end, I mustered up the courage to call my mom and said, "Mom. I'm coming home. And I don't want to be a doctor anymore." Her response? "Please don't tell me you want to be a teacher..."

Guess what? I did want to be a teacher! My mom's concerns were based on salary, and once I assured her that I didn't need a house on the beach she was in full support of my new plan. I had tutored throughout most of High School, and I started to think how great it would be to actually take that talent and put it to use. Maybe I wouldn't be bringing life into this world, like a doctor, but I would be helping somehow. I enrolled at the community college and began to take the general education credits I needed. I was passionate about this, and would throw myself fully into this new goal. Suffice to say, I hit a few bumps in the road to accomplishing my teacher goals. I had to stop school for a while, and then I just didn't go back. I became lazy, content in my job at Kaiser and forgot about the future for a while.

It wasn't until two years ago, when someone I knew from high school came into my work that anything changed. I asked her what she was up to, and she told me she was an English teacher. At a high school. What was I doing? Why was I wasting so much time? The very next day I called Pierce College and asked what I needed to finish with my AA. One class, which I took over the summer. And now? I'm here at CSUN, on my last semester for my Bachelors in English. It took me ten years to get to this point, and now that I'm here, I'm not looking back. I cannot wait to be a teacher, to stop doing something I'm 'content' with, and start doing something I will fully enjoy. I don't regret the time it took me to get to this point, as I had many life experiences between then and now, but I can't say I'm not grateful to that woman for walking into my work and giving me the push I needed. I should send her a card or something. Maybe a nice fruitcake over the holidays.