Knowledge and endings

Many aspects of the plot remain deliberately unresolved, contributing to Murakami's idea that true knowledge is elusive. The actual events of the story are obscured in order to gain the perceptions of the characters. It seems to be that for this reason, the ending must remain so obscure. Although such an ending seems frustrating with such ambiguity, it may actually be necassary. One of the major themes thoughout the novel concerns itself with the attainment of knowledge. This seems to be an unending quest for most. Sumire and K seem to epitomize this theme of searching for knowledge, however they go about finding it the wrong way. Sumire finds it necassary to find knowledge through impersonating and emulating other figures, whether it be Jack Kerouac or Mui. K seems to be in a similiar situation in which he doesn't actually have much direction at all, not seeking knowledge at all. We discover that Murakami sees the only true path towards finding knowledge is to look deeply and insightfully within one's self. I believe that is why Sumire disappeared. She no longer needed to use other people as her source of knowledge. She no longer needed the midnight phone calls to K for direction or the glamour of following Mui. Relating back to why the ending is so ambiguous, I believe that Murikami wished to convey the power of self interpretation onto the reader. He saw it necassary to have the reader deduce for themselves, seeking knowledge actively.

Alienation within one's Self

The two aspects of "Sputnik Sweetheart" that arose most commonly were loneliness and the the individuals inability to know themselves beyond the surface level. The three characters, but esspecially K and Sumire, try to fill this empty space with other people, or are inevitably drawn into conforming with society. Throughout the majority of the novel, K is unable to recognize his true identity. He conforms unresitingly to the external stimuli and as a result he is sucked into the masses and is unable to control conscious thinking. Sumire to falls into the same trap following her relationship with Mui. While reading the text, I isolated the lines (pg 70) where her personality changes to that of a mindless drone shifting through society. Sumire realizes her inability to read and write, she is wrapped up in trendy clothing, and intoxicated by the glamour that surrounds Mui's life. All of these components lead to Sumire's alienation within herself. She can not write anything, and therefore is unable to think. I believe that this is a major theme and focus throughout the entire novel. This sense of alienation within one's self can not be filled with glamour or relationships. Knowledge is attained only through meticulous effort and therefore can not be found with the help of another individual, but rather through intensive self reflection.

The Phenomenology of Anger

This poem, the Phenomenology of Anger , states a number of points that we overlooked the other day in class. The first issue is that Rich was speaking of the necessity of more than one person to start a movement. Also, women feel strangelled and man doesn't want to see change because he is comfortable. Another issue is that her ideas border that of Nietzsche's views of conflict. The idea is that conflict has to be bloody and must also consist of anger in order to make change. Examples of this anger int he world is seen in Line 48 when she mentions "My Lai". She speaks of wars, battlefields ,and wars were results of male activity. The most obvious point of contention is that this poem is the first one that we have read that openly declares man the enemy. She directly states this in the stanza starting on line 64
"raking his body down to the thread
of existence
burning away his lie
leaving him in a new
world; a changed
man"
This speaks directly of how inherently evil man is and how opressive of a world women are forced to live in.

The standardization of Women

Adrienne Rich notes that the standardization of women affects culture in many ways. two specific ways that I noted as interesting were the ideals of women as portrayed by male authors and the undercutting of female creativity in an attempt to conform to the standard of good writing, "trying to sound as cool as Jane Austen, as Olympian as Shakespeare" (169).

The ideals portraye by males authors is particularly dangerous to women. Women come to believe that this is the way that they must look in order to fit in society and find a fitting husband. At the time, this seemed to be the only option for women and thus the unfair ideal seen in male writing put females in a stressful position, where if the "loss of beauty" and a "loss of youth" being a "fate worse than death" (170). This standard placed on women is merely propegated by the male authors who write of such beautiful icons in their poetry or literature. However, this idea of the past, this standardization of women, continues today. Instead of ideas being propegated through literature, it is being imposed throguh the media. Television, Internet, Magazines. All of these sources make women believe that they will never meet this standard of a beautiful woman. And although today marriage is not the only option for women, the desire to be beautiful is still strong enough to justify the alteration of natural body features through plastic surgery. This overwhelming urge to meet as standard began long ago, yet continues today.

The other standard placed on women was their standard to conform to the writing styles of established male authors. Every woman saw the proper way of writing as following in the footsteps of men who have blazed a trail. However, Adrienne Rich realizes that the blind adherance to male style would be undercutting the creativity of women. There is a desire to be like the male authors because they have already layed a foundation, so therefore equality in literature meant losing identity. Rich notes that she "wanted women poets to be eqauls to men, and to be equal was still confused with sounding the same" (171). This became an issue of contention because women were expected to write by the styles of men and in doing so, they lose their sense of identity, creativity, and feminism.

Character Development In Shakespeare

There are several characters that through their actions create a catharsis in the audience. Emelia is one such character that arises in Act 5 as a strong character who is able to see through the evil facade that Iago, her husband, fools everyone with. I find it somewhat ironic that the first to recognize the evil plot of Iago is a women of low social standing, while the men who are acclaimed as being elite and of the highest echelon are the ones who were tricked most easily.

The other character development of note was that of Othello's, back to the origional character of merit. He resurfaces after the murder of Desdomena as a character that the audience can understand and respect, for Othello recognizes the foolishness and evil in his actions and while still loving the one he murdered. His suicide therefore is not a means of escaping the punishment for his murder, but as a means of retribution to Desdomena for his actions. In death, he regains some of the respect that he had lost in my eyes.

Othello's Character Flaws

Throughout most of the early acts of the play, Othello is described as an innately honest and sincere character. He is noted for being very trustworthy and being capable of seeing the good nature in all people.

What astonished me was the negative development that was occurring in Othello's character. He made a complete shift towards the opposite, trusting no one except the one man who shouldn't be trusted. He has gone from an honest and caring character to a despised, untrusting, and vile character as seen by his treatment of Desdomena.

It is through this extreme character development that the reader is able to recognize the genius, intelligence, and quick thinking of Iago. Despite the his immorality and evil driven actions, one can not be impressed by the intelligence he utilizes to trick so many, including his own wife and the general of an army. He manages to trick all of the characters into believing that he is the only trustworthy man when in fact he is the one not to be trusted. Iago performs almost impossible tasks with his manipulative wits and therefore he becomes a character that is both admired and loathed by the audience.

Allusions and Assumptions

Throughout Othello, Shakespeare leaves out actions but alludes to them or hints to the fact that they may have happened. This occurrs fairly often in the first two acts, with the eloping of Desdomena and Othello, the attraction of both Roderigo and Iago, and the offstage drunkeness of Cassio. All of these events seem to be important to the overall plot of the story, yet are for the most part unannounced by Shakespeare. It appears that it is Shakespeare's intention to make the audience think, by picking up mentioned details and placing them into the complex plot that he is building. Therefore, with a complex plot and unspoken details holding weight, the reader and/or viewer is unable to sit idly by and mindlessly enjoy Shakespearian plays, rather they must actively concentrate to fully appreciate the beauty in these works.

Iago and Evil

I found Iago's soliloquy to be a fairly profound look into the evils of his character. He uses many excuses such as suspicions that he slept with his wife, to justify his intent to kill Othello. Yet none of these excuses seem like plausible reasons to murder an apparently innocent character. One point of this soliloquy that I found to be very interesting is where Iago takes the positive attribute of the Moor having "a free and open nature, thinks men honest" and utilizes this positive attribute as an opening to hurt the Moor. Therefore because of these reasons, the reader is able to deduce that Iago is an evil character by nature, and he is not able to justify his plan to kill Othello with such weak and unsupported excuses.

My own story

Augustine reflects on his life and the many epiphanies in which he experienced. In the process of making my digital story I did not realize the true impact of some of my experiences. I learned that this lesson that had more of an impact on my life than I had previously expected. The story I chose had a monumental impact on my life yet I did not give credit to the strength of my story. My perspective has changed since the onset of this project and I now know that I do have a story to tell.