it's about that time of the year.... midterms, papers, (blogs...wikis), not to mention all of the readings that go along with these academic endeavors. So far this term we've covered such a variety of readings and i think that i have enjoyed tomas rivera's work the best (convenient since he is also my wiki-subject.... but a coincidence none the less). i think i enjoyed this the most because of its abiguities - it's structured chaos within the very format of the novel. i enjoyed that there were no characters and that you had to jump from one 'chapter' to the next without very much warning.
going back to the beginning with "who would have thought it"; i didn't not enjoy this book, but obviously (and with, from what i can tell from class/blogs) with a class consensus, the books ending was somewhat ________. Despite this blank ending, the characters were vivid and, in my opinion, probably quite accurate with how people in the time and area would have reacted to such scandal.
marti's readings were, on the other hand, difficult and at the same time, rewarding. i struggled to no end with these readings but what i did comprehend from them, i enjoyed very much. marti is a poetic writer with a beautiful fluidity in his writing. he can take something like the brooklyn bridge and turn it into this living creation of the people. i loved that he took the time to describe the people alongside the bridge (even if it was difficult to read...) and how they impacted each other.
finally, i wanted to mention once again, that i enjoyed the movie very much, despite it's dated, and cheesey appearance. i can only imagine what it would have been like at that time to go through what the characters did and the rough, black and white images really enforced what we had read up to that point.
3 comments:
Hi Alana,
Very interesting observations! I don't know if I totally agree when it comes to Rivera's novel. I do think a lot of people in the class enjoyed it, and that the ambiguities in his writing were definitely present. I think that, like we said in class, his writing style has a lot to do with the message he wants to convey to the reader. The whole book is a jumble, jumping around all over the place and constantly forcing the reader to stop and think for a minute. I believe this is a direct reflection of the protagonists life.
As for Marti's readings, yes, for sure quite different. I think we, like you said, just need to enjoy his poetic style and take into consideration the audience he was writing for.
I also loved the movie, despite the cheesyness, etc!
Great observations.
Kaan
Hey,
The best part of the move (well, the most entertaining) was the little girl whose voice was dubbed over...anyways, I thought it was interesting that you mentioned that the movie was black and white.
Of course, it may have not been possible to have the movie in color at that time (I'm no film buff), but if it was a modern film, I think it would be rather appropriate to have the film in black and white. It really does (literally) polarize the entire film in terms of race and class.
Hey!
I agree with you about rivera's being the best so far, im glad we got to write on him for our midterm. I think the novels are about to get better though, such as the one for next week, very cute
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