nogueras’s Blog

Whitman begins his poem with two distances that must be “crossed”, the first is the I vs. tide. This means himself crossing the bridge. His body and self is physically crossing the bridge. Then their is the second distance that he is “crossing” which is himself vs. the crowd. In the beginning of the poem he talks of everyone and is observing everyone. It is not until the end of the poem I realized that he was gay, I feel as though the second crossing has to do with his crossing over or into the crowd, or people could call it coming out. In the beginning of the poem he speaks with a passive tone that turns into egocentric I believe this is because he is changing or “crossing” inside himself also because he is realizing that he is gay and is coming out with it to the people. So the problem is resolved by the end of the poem because he is physically accross the bridge and he is also out of the closet or out in society and he seems more comfortable with it now. For example at the end “We use you, and do not cast you aside- we plant you permanently within us…You furnish your parts toward eternity; Great or small, you furnish your parts toward the soul.” I feel as though he is summing it all up by telling people that you should be accepted no matter what and he is out and comfortable now that he can proudly say “appearances, now or henchforth, indicate what you are”

“Swiftly arose and spread around me the peace and joy and knowledge that pass all the art and argument of the earth;
And I know that the hand of God is the elderhand of my own,
And I know that the spirit of God is the eldest brother of my own,
And that all the men ever born are also my brothers . . . . and the women my sisters and lovers,
And that a kelson of the creation is love”

I chose this image because of the imagery that I can picture as I read the words. I am thinking of peace, joy, knowledge, art and Earth from the first sentence-”Swiftly arose and spread around me the peace and joy and knowledge that pass all the art and argument of the earth”  I feel as though this image has all of those things, then when I came across this image. It made me add the second half of Whitman’s quote-”And that all the men ever born are also my brothers . . . . and the women my sisters and lovers,
And that a kelson of the creation is love” as I glanced at the picture and read the words I just can’t help but see the love in the picture too. So feel like the photo really gives off Whitman’s Vibe of what he is talking about throughout the poem, love, connection, unity, ect. I feel as though this photo connects with the contemporary experience because people are all connected through time and space through their love and connection to one another.

 “Colleges and books only copy the language which the field and the work-yard made” (8). 

I believe by Emerson saying this he is stating how what we learn in college and the books we read are copied from real life and what someone has experianced on their own and discovered. I believe that he just wants this to be made important because it is important that we understand and achknowledge something that someone has said, created, and proved so that we will not take credit for thinking of it ourselves.  This fits into his arguments about “creative reading” and about the relationship between creation and imitation because he believed that their should be no institutions, be thought that books were tyrants because they were imitation and that creation is experiancing those thoughts and those truths yourself.  

I believe the most important thing that makes the narrator so attracted and facinated by the man is that fact that he has know idea who he is. He likes that he has no idea where he is going, and no idea of this strange old man he is following. He likes that he is just going on this adventure not knowing what is going to happen next. The story talks about how the narrator enjoys watching people and is facinated with how different everyone is, so I think this just adds to him being very adventurous and watchful, that is why he enjoys this strange man from the crowd.

A couple of ideas that I found interesting about our discussion on “Young Goodman Brown” was when we were talking about the theme of inside/outside and in between. We started by talking about how the event took place at sunset which can be in between day/night. I also thought it was interesting how that lead to us talking about the pink ribbon, because pink is in between red/white and in the beginning of the story he saw his wife as a holy, spiritual, pure, angelic person, like the color white, and then in the end of the story he began to see her as the opposite, like the color red, a bad, seductress color. I just think it’s so interesting how everything in a story signifies something and that can always be discussed and talked through to determine different aspects of the story line.

Hm…. a little bit about me… I love chocolate, myspace, and learning! I am an English Literature major, but I’m not sure that it will stay that way. I want to get a minor in Photography. I work part time for two of the departments on campus, the Criminal Justice and Geography Departments. I enjoy hanging out with my friends and family going to the movies, cooking, and conversing! I’m looking foreward to this class because I feel like I need to decide what I would like to do. I want to get more of a feel for literature and English classes to see if I am going to enjoy that field.