Goophered

When I first started reading The Goophered Grapevine I couldn’t believe that the bulk of the story was written in a difficult dialect. Although it was somewhat hard to read and took a few times to go over a paragraph I started to become entranced by the words that Uncle Julius was using, and couldn’t wait to keep reading. There were many possible themes that could have been picked out in the tale, such as race and the slave era. But there were two things that jumped out at me when reading this short story, first was Anne and second was the clear and crisp image I was given throughout the story.
Anne is a very interesting character, and even though she doesn’t get many words in, she is the reason for the move and the purchasing of the vineyard. She is immediately viewed as weak because she is said to be sickened by the weather in the North, she is then viewed as a very proper lady who became “weary” while walking around the grounds. It is interesting to see her so interested in the man’s story and her inquisitiveness surprised me.
The other aspect of the story that engrossed me was the vivid picture I was able to form about the vineyard, Uncle Julius, and the slaves that used to work on the grapes. I almost thought of it as a flashback when Uncle Julius started to talk about his master when he first purchased the grounds. While he is talking about these stories, the reader can really picture the people and what was going on. Overall I thought it was a great story and kept me interested the entire time.

Huck

While reading the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn I noticed a common theme involving pride and honor. Throughout the novel Huck Finn and other characters comment on what makes an honorable man and how one can be proud of his accomplishments. We first see an example of this with Tom Sawyer; it also resonates throughout the life of Huck Finn and his relationship with Jim.
Tom Sawyer is seen early in the novel wanting to form a band of thieves with his friends. He comments on how robbers and thieves have a great sense of accomplishment and are quite honorable. He immediately forms this band of robbers in search of acceptance and pride. It is interesting how something so morally wrong such as robbing innocent people can be seen as a good deed to children in the South during this time period. It shows the inner calamities that are occurring during these children’s lives.
Next we see Huck Finn talking about life on the river and his time as a raftsman. He says, “There was a power of style about her. It amounted to something being a raftsman on such a craft as that.” I feel that Huck has been so beaten down with his father’s unruly nature and Miss Watson’s extreme strict attitude, that Huck needs something like this raft to boost his confidence and allow himself to have some place in society.
Huck battles with himself over his honor when taking Jim with him to a free state. Huck talks about how he would never turn Jim in, but realizes that he is committing a very serious crime. What’s most interesting to me is that Huck wants to help Jim to safety, but he wants to do it for himself, not Jim. Early on we get the sense that Huck wants to get Jim to safety for his own pride.

Scarlet

In the poem “the name of it is “Autumn”, there are many internal meanings and hidden meaninigs that can discovered. I think it is interesting that a female such as Emily Dickinson wrote a poem of this vulgarity and truth. I think it shows a lot about the female population during the civil war and the lack of knowledge that students have of women writers like Emily. When I first started reading her poems it was not what I expected. I think people sometimes pin point female writers to only speak of light subjects and that is very untrue with Emily Dickinson. I did some outside reading on this poem and some scholars said that it may or may not have been speaking about the Battle of Antietam during the Civil War. Due to the fact that this was based in the north, it could explain the emphasis of Autumn time and the leaves and nature.
The color imagery in the poem was phenomenal to me. The red of Autumn can directly link to the red color of blood that runs through veins and arteries which is then rained upon the ground and poured into a basin which forms a bloody pool of redness. The rose mentioned at the end is also red. My favorite line of the poem is “and spill the Scarlet rain”. When I read this line I not only thought of the color red/scarlet but I thought of the movie Gone With the Wind, which also discussed the Civil War years and the reconstruction era. Although this movie was released earlier than the poem was, it still came into my mind.
The turning point to me in the poem is early and immediately when she mentions the veins and arteries, I believe that the reference to the human body can suddenly makes things real and the imagery becomes even more important.

The Beat

The poem “Beat! Beat! Drums!” supports Neely’s claim. The poem and the word usage represents a man that is proud of his country, but doesn’t mention the emancipation of slavery, nor does he rejoice of it directly anywhere in the poem. The patriotism is quite evident in the forcefulness of the stanzas and the constant exclamation points. I don’t necessarily think that his lack of mentioning the slavery issue makes him not care about it though. He is a strong believer of the union and a strong national government which makes me believe that he would support anti-slavery and the emancipation proclamation. The reason I think it supports Neely’s claim is his lack of mentioning the emancipated and his abundance of references of the common man such as brokers, lawyers, mothers, children, and farmers. As I read the poem it reminded me of a show on the history channel. I could just envision this poem being read and the panning and cutting of the camera from one citizen to the next.
Whitman seemed to be more of a Timrod to me with a Horton soul. Timrod didn’t make a clear stance on what he believed in throughout “The Cotton Boll” while Horton was very direct in his beliefs about the runaway and the realities of war. Whitman said “make no parley, stop for no expostulation, mind not the timid, mind not the weeper or prayer,”. This sentence explored the heart that Whitman was trying to get across. He is saying that no one is stopping for a meeting or earnest protest, but just going on their way and not caring of the people affected. Overall, I think Whitman is being judged to harshly by Neely just because of his lack of diary findings.