Monthly Blog #3

   Procrastination is the action of not doing and it's a common theme among life and especially literature. In Hamlet, procrastination is a crucial factor to the plot, for if Hamlet didn't procrastinate and get his revenge on his uncle when he had the opportunity maybe the play wouldn't have ended with everyone he knew and loved dying along with himself. In The Importance of Being Earnest, Algernon and Jack procrastinate in telling Gwendolen and Cecily that their names weren't actually Earnest and this leads to Gwendolen and Cecily to meet and find out that they think they are engaged to the same man. Not only is the concept of procrastination affect the consequences in literature but also in our modern day society, as every modern teenager, myself included, has procrastinated at least once in they're lives. Procrastination also isn't considered a bad thing in our modern society in fact there is The Procrastination Association which expresses the advantages of procrastination and even has a creed which followers live their lives by.
   In my opinion procrastination is necessary thing in everyone's life because everyone has a problem that they can't face without preparation, in my opinion procrastination is like a preparation period, and sometimes it's necessary. This doesn't mean that I believe that procrastination is all good, if you look at Hamlet and Algernon/Jack, you realize that too much procrastination can be a bad thing. My main point is that no one can go their whole lives prepared to handle a problem right on the spot, they need to put it off, whether out of fear of the results or to prepare themselves for the problem, but everyone procrastinates once in a while and it's a necessary part of human life.

10/31/13 Blog Entry #2

   One reoccurring theme in the past books we've read is what constitutes a hero, is it that muscle clad hero that saves the damsel or just a person who helps others? In Beowulf, our hero Beowulf  is a strong famed slayer of monsters who sacrificed his life to fight a dragon for honor. So is a hero someone who does things with honor? Beowulf's version of a hero is a strong man who fights with honor and this is what the basic form of a hero is. Or can a hero be The Narrator in The Invisible Man who speaks out against injustice in a peaceful way, using his words to help the people realize their problems. The Narrator uses his words not to defeat physical monsters but the "monsters" within our society and this also constitutes a hero. In our society we need heroes, they are the people who we aspire to be. Our heroes are people with powers that dress up in costumes and fight evil and this is what our society's children dress up as for Halloween, we in our society use heroes to guide us. Our heroes teach us the best of both worlds, to be strong like Beowulf but to be peaceful like The Narrator, “Believe me when I say I wish that violence wasn't necessary. But violence is the price we pay to accomplish a greater good, as heroes we choose to protect that good with our lives," this quote by Superman sums up our society's heroes perfectly. 
    In my opinion a hero is someone who does anything for others that helps them. To me a hero doesn't need to save the day but they just have to be someone that helps another get by with their day. Evil doesn't have to be a giant robot hell-bent on destroying the world, it can be a kid that lost his dog and the hero is the person who helps him look for it. Or a hero can be a the person who cheers someone up when they're down. Of course not all people who help others with small things are not a big of a hero as Beowulf or Abraham Lincoln but to me they are heroes all the same. Any person who helps people and does it selflessly is a hero to me.

9/30/13 12 Ap English Post 1

    One question from the Socratic Seminar for The Invisible Man that stuck out to me was the concept of how women are treated in the novel and in general in our society. In the novel, women were seen as something to be used whether it was Mary who the narrator used for care and nourishment or Sybil the wife of a Brotherhood leader that the narrator slept with just to get back at the Brotherhood. Women were also used in The Power of One and The Fountainhead as well, in The Power of One it was Dee and Dum who just cleaned and served Peekay or in The Fountainhead it was exemplified by Catherine Halsey who allowed herself to be treated like dirt by Peter Keating just so she could please him. In society, gender roles have been in debate for the past 160 years making advances such as giving women the right to vote and giving equal payments for jobs. In fact, Hilary Clinton ran for President of the United States five years ago, something which would be unheard of when these books were written.
    In my own personal opinion I believe that women should have equal rights as any man in addition to  people of different races and sexual orientations. I believe that every human on this planet should be considered equal when in the case of physical traits. In my opinion I believe that equal opportunity is the most important concept in this problem. In our society I believe that women are still in some cases used and taken granted of, for example in some jobs like secretaries or nannies in which the purpose is to serve is taken up mostly by women. Unlike the past I consider women to be more respected now than as in the novels. In closing, my final thought is that these issues of gender, race, and sexual orientation will only get better with time.