Note for the practice essay

5. Patterns, aimed at the mind, the heart or the ear of the reader, are used by poets to 
achieve their purposes. In the work of at least two poets you have studied, examine various 
patterns and their effects.

Hope is the thing with feathers - the second and third stanza have the exactly same syllables
mood - bright, hopeful,optimistic, awe / after "yet" - becomes serious, dark, a little depressed 
analysis of pattern -  enjambment - continues the idea - hope is still there 
rhyme - emphasizes 
repeating - emphasizes 
dashes - connects the metaphor (hope and bird) 

My father and the fig tree - 
chronological - at age six -> years passed -> the last time he moved 
repeating "fig tree" - emphasizes the meaning - father's relationship with his country (symbolizes)
largest, fattest, sweetest figs (rhyme?) - father wants universe's gift - perfection 
enjambment - continues describing the importance of figs to father 
listing words - lima beans, zucchini, parsley, beets / ripe tokens, emblems, assurance 
once , or , or - alliteration 

Practice Essay

“Poets often withhold certitude, which can at the same time empower readers to think creatively.”Consider a poem you have studied in which ambiguity has enabled readers to reach their own conclusions about meaning and implications. Explain.

“Hope” is the thing with feathers - 

That perches in the soul - 

And sings the tune without the words - 

And never stops - at all - 

And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard - 

And sore must be the storm - 

That could abash the little Bird 

That kept so many warm - 

I’ve heard it in the chillest land - 

And on the strangest Sea - 

Yet - never - in Extremity, 

It asked a crumb - of me.

A poet Emily Dickinson often does not provide "certitude" of what she meant by this and that. Most of the time, she leaves ambiguity in the poem on purpose and let her readers reach their own conclusion, provoking to use their creativity and interpretation. All she does to her poem are not putting titles, randomly capitalizing words which somehow shows the importance of the words, and ending lines with dashes which make a resting point and a rhythm. Dickinson provides some hints what could be significant when interpreting her poem and the minimum amount of implications of the meaning. One of her well-known poems "Hope is the thing with feathers" shows the feature too.  

In the first line of the poem, a word "Hope" has quotation marks, implying that it might be a keyword in this poem. The narrator's tone seems to be very hopeful and lively. Furthermore, "hope" is described as if it is a bird. It is with feathers, perches, and sings the tune without the words. It has exactly same features as a bird. Just like the bird, the narrator draws "hope" as a free and unrestricted thing because it never stops to sing at all. However, the author never speaks directly what "hope" actually is. All we can do is just to assume it as a positive thing. Then, in the second stanza, there is a word "Bird", saying "the storm that could abash the little Bird". It means that there must be the storm that will destroy or harm the "hope", which has so many warm (beneficial heritage), whose true meaning is up to one's interpretation. From here, the tone of narrator changes into depressed and hopeless. It was once very sweet with the existence of "hope", but as the gale has come, it changed. Eventually, in the last stanza, when the narrator is in such extremity, "Yet never ... It asked a crumb of me". This line particularly depends on readers creativity because this can mean two things : hope gives everything without asking in return or hope is untouchable that can not be reached. 

In the poem, Dickinson provides clues by using end rhymes. In the first stanza, it has ABAB structure where "feathers" and "words" make a rhyme, and "soul" and "all" make a rhyme. Same for the second stanza, it has ABAB structure where "heard" and "bird" make a rhyme, and "sea" and "me" make a rhyme. However, for the third stanza, it has ABBB structure. The changed rhyme structure implies the atmosphere of the poem is somewhat changed. Such word choices as an extremity, the chillest and the strangest make the atmosphere more heavy and serious. They are not easily read compared to the first two stanzas, and especially, the tone in the first stanza is very hopeful. For this poem, Dickinson only provides a few implications and hints of the meaning of "hope". The rest of the meaning of this poem and interpretation are all up to readers. 

Writing about "Nature is what we see"

"Nature" is what we see—
The Hill—the Afternoon—
Squirrel—Eclipse— the Bumble bee—
Nay—Nature is Heaven—/
Nature is what we hear—
The Bobolink—the Sea—
Thunder—the Cricket—
Nay—Nature is Harmony—/
Nature is what we know—
Yet have no art to say—/
So impotent Our Wisdom is
To her Simplicity. /

In this poem called "Nature is what we see" by Emily Dickinson, the narrator speaks about wonderous factors of nature. It has only one stanza and the stanza consists of 12 lines. It is always ambiguous to divide Dickinson's poem into sentences, but I think this one has four sentences, even though it has only one period (I marked with a slash). She used verbs like see, hear, know, and say. These verbs are mostly used for us, human. By listing verbs, she made uniformity in the format. After each verb, she listed things in nature such as the hill, afternoon, squirrel, eclipse, bumble bee, bobolink, and cricket. Then, she added, "Nay - Nature is Heaven/Harmony". It is her admiration onto the nature she sees or hears. She meant whatever we see or hear from nature, it is not just an object or a sound, but heaven and harmony. As one of her characterized skills, she referred nature to as "she" and made abstract concepts such as afternoon observable. There are some rhymes too. ABABCA structure for the first 6 lines (See-bee-sea / afternoon-heaven) and ABACA for the last 5 lines (nay-harmony-say-simplicity). 

In my opinion, the one thing that the poem is saying is the comparison between our wisdom, which is weak, and nature's simplicity. The author changed the order of words which had to be "Our wisdom is so impotent to her simplicity" into "So impotent our wisdom is to her simplicity". Perhaps the poet wanted to emphasize this sentence. Nature's simplicity, which literally could mean simple, but actually is very strong and could be overwhelming. As the narrator spoke above, because nature is actually heaven, and nature is actually harmony, nature is always something more than what we think, and what we think is our wisdom. This poem ultimately shows we are merely a small piece of a huge puzzle called nature. 

The Curious Incident feat. Broadway Technology

It was yesterday when our entire English class went field trip to New York. The day before, I was already excited thinking that we are going to have a field trip! And I got on the bus with that mind and waited for the arrival. Unfortunately, we arrived a little late due to the infamous traffic of NYC. Intro part of the scene was already passed. However, as I had read the book, it did not matter much.

The play that we watched was The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time originally written by Mark Haddon. The first thing I notice was a very strong British accent. It gave me the basic sense of background which is the United Kingdom. Obviously, the one thing that caught my eyes was the stage. I had watched the trailer for the play version, so it was even more interesting to watch and find what I had seen on the trailer. The stage looked like a cube that consisted of a number of square tiles. On each point of tiles, a dotted light came out and created a cool effect. Firstly, I was surprised at light effects. It was so bright and moved in a hectic way that I almost got a headache but they were really good. Combined with the sound effects, they helped show Christopher's perplexed inside and thus helped audience view plot from his side. Especially when he was in London Train Station, he was confused by a lot of people and unusual signs, and they were drawn by all the light and sound effects. Furthermore, their use of motion was very effective. There was no useless motion. Even if the motion seemed not important and very subtle, they were all connected in the end. For example, when Christopher connects railroads, it seemed very random. However, when suddenly all lights turned off, and toy train started moving, we can know that train actually shows the solving of his confusion.
People who were there have been saying that the best part of the show was the puppy at last. It was really cute and I did not expect that a real dog would appear so it was a pleasant surprise for everyone.

As a person who was expecting a pure act, this was a little surprising. A lot of modern technologies were used. This made me realized that a digital projector can be used in play in this way. The actor who acted Christopher did really well in my opinion. Also, the math question Christopher solved was interesting too.

In Class Poem Writing

Religious Belief 

- It is directly written that Allah is their god, which shows that they are Arabians. 

- i'm talking about a big straight from the Earth - a gift from Allah! (My Father and A Fig Tree)

Homesick

- A figtree represents father's hometown. So he adores a figtree and even when he moved to Texas, he plants it and thinks about his hometown.

- For other fruits, my father was indifferent .... They always involved a figtree.

Love of Family

- Grandma is somewhere far but the narrator belives the star they are watching is the same and the memory will tie them together. It shows the narrator's love to Grandma (family)

- It is possible we will not meet again / and only memory making us rich 

Diorama of the Whale Rider

I set up my stage as our black box. My stage is mainly focused on the atmosphere. So I drew the background first. Stage left is ocean and stage right is ground. Also, on the rightmost side, there is a wall that has a whale miniature, a mini light, and a dream catcher. Stage right is used not only as outside but also as inside (Kahu's house) too, so there is a carpet that has very traditional patterns. On the top, there are five lights and two speakers on each end. Five lights will function to light each character usually. Two speakers will make sound effect such as wind sound with bird singing sound and wave sound to show the beauty of New Zealand nature. Five characters are a storyteller, Nani Flower, Kahu, Koro, and Pourorangi. Men are basically wearing T-shirts with shorts and women are wearing dresses. Especially, Pourorangi is wearing "Vineyard Vines" T-shirts since the brand's logo is a whale. Their simple, cheap, but somewhat modern costumes show the time period as well as the tribe culture.

The Nature And The Legend : The Whale Rider

The Whale Rider, written by Witi Ihimaera, is "the triumphant novel that inspired the award-winning movie". Its movie version actually received audience award at 2003 Sundance Film Festival, people's choice award at 2002 Toronto International Film Festival, and Canal Plus audience award at 2003 Rotterdam International Film Festival. (pretty impressive!) It is about an eight-year-old girl Kahu who is to be the next generation's heir. However, because she is a girl, her great-grandfather Koro Apirana does not approve her as he is blinded by traditions. So this story is about Kahu's struggle to prove her as the sacred gift, the chosen one and to earn her great-grandfather's attention. This story, interestingly, was created when the author was inspired by his daughters and a shocking news. When one of his daughters said "Why are the boys always heroes?" and the news about which a whale swam up the Hudson River to Pier 86 announced, he decided to write the novel. As if it was destined to be written, this novel was created. If I was going to adapt this novel to the stage, I would choose to highlight the beauty of nature and the conflict between the role of gender and tradition. 

Firstly, when I was reading, I liked the atmosphere of the Maori tribe. It gave me such feeling as nature-friendliness, freshness, and indigenousness. Their language, their tradition, all that kind of things made me think like that. Therefore, when I stage it, I want to have a really beautiful background. Assuming I am setting at black box studio, I want the background picture to contain green plain, hills, and field as well as beach and ocean. Maybe beach and ocean on the stage left and greens on the stage right. And I would like to have some sound effects like wave sound of an ocean and light wind sound. It will also be really good if I could compose a song of the tribe using Maori's custom language. As whales are their legend and are related to whale-rider (Paikea) heroic story, I want to have a whale sculpture made with stone somewhere on the stage. 

Second, there is a major conflict about a girl being a new leader of the tribe. It is a similar theme to the author's daughter's point which was "Why are the boys always heroes while the girls yell out, 'Save me, save me, I'm so helpless'?" So I want to focus on that theme as I think it will be really interesting to show how hard to make a decision : tradition or renovation. Koro's standpoint is understandable because he, as a chief of Maori, has a duty to maintain the tribe's future. And Kahu's situation is also understandable as she, obviously, is the chosen one and there has to be an update in tradition if it is in need. Therefore, I want to stage it mainly focusing on that aspect. As a result, I think I may have to delete some characters who are not directly involved in the main conflict such as Raiwiri, who is a narrator of the novel, Jeff, and Rehua, but give more stress on Kahu and Koro. Also, I would like to add a storyteller (just like in Peter Pan) to tell the whales and gods stories.

Third, the props will be tricky part because it is in modern days but at the same time, they are a tribe who are somewhat apart from the contemporary culture. I would like all of them to wear a little old but not bad clothes. Just normal casual look, for example, T-shirts and shorts for boys and a simple dress for a girl (Kahu) to show that she is a girl. Even for the adults, I would like them to wear similar looking clothes to children's. I don't think I will use a digital projector. (I don't know when I will need it honestly). 
It will be really interesting but difficult to adapt this into a scene. I think this novel also has as many  features as other books we have read.


Ihimaera, Witi. The Whale Rider. Orlando: Harcourt, 2003. Print.