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Post by moseymoo on Sept 1, 2014 5:45:17 GMT -5
74
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Post by moseymoo on Sept 1, 2014 5:44:52 GMT -5
The Cheshire Cat
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Post by moseymoo on Sept 1, 2014 5:31:58 GMT -5
Ahh I loved Artemis Fowl when I was younger I haven't read any of them for years, but certainly back then they were some of my favourite books
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Post by moseymoo on Aug 27, 2014 15:46:11 GMT -5
I think my experience of the canon is pretty similar to your description of tradition (or Tradition with a capital T, if you like). I don't necessarily agree with the concept, as it is, by its very definition, elitist and in the past has been known to exclude the works of some literary greats (notably Shelly) simply because they were "out of fashion". However, I do believe that it does exist -- at least in some sort of intangible yet referencable state -- in the same way that your concept of literary tradition exists.
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Post by moseymoo on Aug 26, 2014 15:38:18 GMT -5
Hmm I'm not American (I'm British) so I can't compare American attitudes to the Canon with British/European attitudes, but I've certainly always been encouraged by teachers etc to consider some given text's relationship to the Canon, or the dialogue it creates, or what have you. Certainly critical reading (thinking beyond Bloom and to, say, Eagleton's discussion of the Canon) always seems to focus around the Canon, whether it is being debated or asserted. Maybe it is something unique to the perspective I have been given by my teachers and the books I happen to have read, but I have always viewed the Canon as a sort of literary touchstone, with which every text is forced to communicate with in some manner simply because of its prevalence. Whether or not that should be, or whether the Canon even exists or can even be quantified, is an entirely different matter, but I have certainly felt that it is, in some respect (even in just a simple allusion to a Canonical text), relevant to every work of literature.
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Post by moseymoo on Aug 26, 2014 15:27:20 GMT -5
The philosophers playing football sketch from Monty Python
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Post by moseymoo on Aug 26, 2014 14:25:42 GMT -5
Cheese
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Doctor Who
Aug 26, 2014 14:23:17 GMT -5
via mobile
Post by moseymoo on Aug 26, 2014 14:23:17 GMT -5
I have to say that I really can't stand Moffat's writing. To me, Capaldi could be a truly great doctor (his darker, grittier edge reminded me somewhat of 9); but the episode was spoiled by some truly awful writing by Moffat. To be honest, I had stopped watching the series because I couldn't stand what Moffat had done with it, but I made an attempt to watch this one because I hoped things might have changed...
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Post by moseymoo on Aug 26, 2014 14:14:02 GMT -5
Thanks for all the feedback Hermes: I have to say that I never really divided the Canon into geographical areas (besides the obvious fact that, in part centuries especially, it was naturally shaped by dominant white male westerners). Certainly America does have a reputation for being somewhat more reactionary, but my own personal experience and reading of the Canon has, if anything, been pretty Europe-centric. I must confess that I have never read Momo, but the more I hear about it thelre interesting it sounds. I agree that a typical children's book is becoming increasingly difficult to pin down thematically, and the emergence of the YA genre most definitely is part of the reason for this, but I do feel that the advocation of experience is a fairly usual theme (certainly His Dark Materials is also exceptional in that respect); in my mind, most children's literature aims to preserve a state of innocence, or at least doesn't explicitly criticise such innocence. (As a final point, I have to say that I would contest that Blake's Songs of Innocence and Experience comments impartially on both states. It seems to me that Blake yearns for the true prelapsarian, pre-linguistic innocence expressed in Songs of Innocence, yet accepts that one can never realise the value of innocence until one has passed into a state of experience.)
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Post by moseymoo on Aug 23, 2014 18:07:45 GMT -5
Gosh thank you fragilethings -- of course you may quote passages, although I really don't think it's that good! Still, persuading friends to read Snicket is a noble pursuit, and if my essay can help in anyway then you may quote as much as you want (in the process of writing this essay, I persuaded my project supervisor and the head of English at our school to read some of the Series!!) No, the Bloom quote wasn't mandatory, the project allows you to explore whatever you want, but I had decided to base my essay around the relationship between ASOUE and the Canon, and I felt that Bloom's The Western Canon did the best job of communicating all that the Canon supposedly stands for I actually adore the link between Dante and Snicket, I just think it is so artfully set up and maintained; originally I planned to simply explore the parallels between The Divine Comedy (which is a truly excellent read!) and ASOUE, and it was only later that I broadened my focus to explore other Canonical texts.
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Post by moseymoo on Aug 21, 2014 17:19:39 GMT -5
I know, I realised that I had made that mistake once I had submitted the essay; I had been thinking of the Creepers series which is "written" by Edgar J. Hyde, a fictional character :/ and looking back on the essay now, I feel the need to apologise for those nightmarishly constructed sentences and some instances of awful grammar... an awful lot of it was written far too late at night/early in the morning.
Oh and thank you so much for fixing the italics issue! I certainly like to think that ASOUE has shaped the scholars of the future: if ever a children's book deserves to have a significant cultural impact, ASOUE does. I'm already planning a second essay on the post modern in the novels; it was an aspect that I wanted to incorporate but was forced to cut out because of the word count.
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Post by moseymoo on Aug 21, 2014 15:32:28 GMT -5
Autumn in Washington Square by Dave Brubeck, because everyone needs a little bit of Jazz in their lives now and again
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Post by moseymoo on Aug 21, 2014 15:30:50 GMT -5
Wow I've never heard of Momo but it sounds awesome I am currently reading Paradise Lost which is surprisingly awesome. Since I'm not religious in any way, I didn't think I would engage with it, but actually it is just so beautifully written and the plot is wonderfully crafted. (And of course, the link between it and The End is pretty striking!)
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Post by moseymoo on Aug 21, 2014 15:21:24 GMT -5
I agree with what's been said above about the Great Unknown being a metaphor. Handler seems to enjoy playing with the physical and the metaphorical (think the Slippery slope or the road less taken: in each case a metaphorical or allegorical concept given physical weight). In my opinion, the Great Unknown is much the same: much like similar characters etc in medieval romances (or, perhaps more aptly, The Divine Comedy, in which Dante undergoes a similar journey of self discovery that occupies both literal and allegorical spheres), it is merely the physical manifestation of all that is unknown in the world. Hence why the Quagmires were never heard of again: they chose to face up to the unknown quantities in their life (including death) and, because the Great Unknown is inherently unknowable, the reader can never be given an insight into the result of that confrontation (as a side-note, the Baudelaires also face up to The Great Unknown at the very end of the novel, which I see as a clever way of Handler saying "and nobody will ever know what happened to them). It is just my opinion, but, because of it, I have never had any burning desire to unearth the truth about the Great Unknown simply because I think it is meant to be left unknown.
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Post by moseymoo on Aug 21, 2014 14:54:05 GMT -5
Oh no wait a sec -- this doesn't seem to have included any of the words/letters in square brackets... and I have no idea why it goes into italics in the middle... Ahh well you get the gist I'm sure
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