Reflecting back on the piece that I have just read, I can only think of the extremity of desperation that the two authors were going through to make them feel the way that they did: that suicide would possibly be better than living in a “white man’s world”. If these powerful documents were not enough to let people come to the realization of how bad African-Americans had it (and still do to a degree) then I do not know what could possibly be more convincing. I cannot stop thinking about the atrocities that the woman in the first writing was calling upon to spite the whites in which had caused her so much pain. Though seemingly extreme, I can clearly recall an instance in history where tactics such as these denouncements and curses actually worked. In Egypt, Mosses did the same thing in order to lead his people (the Jewish slaves) out of bondage so that they could find their own land in which to dwell freely. The curses, though wishing pain and suffering upon their offenders, were not unlike the ten plagues that Moses called upon the Egyptians, the last of the ten being the death of the youngest son of all the families. It was then that the Jewish people were given the permission to leave Egypt in search of a new life. These documents remind me much of that because, like the Jews, these blacks are searching for their freedom in a white world in which it does not exist. They feel as if their last resort and the one that will finally bring about results in these denouncements and prayers to God.
The second document alludes to a statement that I remember from the movie The Matrix. The author states that it is the whit mans goal not only to dominate the country, but the planet and universe as well. In the movie, one of the men stated that the human race (and in this case, the white race) are like viruses, they multiply and then move on to consume every natural resource in an area until it is time to move on once again and multiply and then the cycle of destruction continues on.
In Our Time Reader Response
In Our Time Reader Response
“In the early morning on the lake sitting in the stern of the boat with his father rowing, he felt quite sure that he would never die” (19).
The first four readings of In Our Time seem to be primarily focused on the life/death relationship that life presents. After reading the first story, I have to be perfectly honest in saying that I do not believe that I understood all of the underlining themes, but did start to focus more intently when the story describes the women on the pier with the dead babies. Automatically, this imagery made me think of the response passage from this set of reading. Denying oneself that death exists and that it, ultimately, a part of everyone’s life seemed to be a common philosophic element that both of the stories possessed. Just as Nick reassured himself that the inevitable would never to him, the women on the pier with their six-day-dead (!) babies that “wouldn’t give them up”. I think that the connection to Hemingway’s life in these elements possibly show or admit the Lost Generation’s tendency to deny to themselves that they were susceptible to harm and death. An example of this is the character in Jack Kerouac’s novel On the Road tended to lead a free and reckless lifestyle of drugs, partying, and freedom that seemed to have no limits or consequences.
Another example of the life/death relationship that seems to be exemplified in the first four pieces of Hemingway’s novel is the conflicts that arise during Indian Camp. Rather than Nick expressing the sole fact that he believes he is not going to die, I believe that, because of his father, he misunderstood the concept of dying. I believe that the passage that stated, “he felt quite sure that he would never die” was essentially a reaction to the pregnant woman’s husband’s suicide. Because that was the topic that arose during the story, I believe that Nick interpreted the situation that “death” was equal to “suicide” and, in believing that he would never commit suicide, ultimately believes that he will, thus, never die. I also believe that there is significance in the way in which Nick’s father spoke to him while performing the C-section on the woman. He said something along the lines of “you can watch this or not” meaning that, even I Nick didn’t watch his father perform the surgery, it was still taking place and, thus, just a part or fact of life.