Robert Frost

Robert Frost was a writer that interested me. He not only brought forth his own style of writing, but also brought his readers into his stories. His hidden secrets of personification and other elements like in his poem "The Silken Tent" really showed his creativity that some writers didn't use. Growing up with hard times like many other writers in his era, Frost never let things bother him as his work expressed most of his feelings. He wasn't a crazy person and didn't seem to scare many readers away like some of the writers did. He expressed family a lot in his work going back to his poem "The Silken Tent" he used personification to talk about his mother and protection he felt from her like a silken tent. Being one that didn't understand poems very well, Frost helped me find a different type of meaning in poetry and give me interest in his work.

Response On The Class

Before entering English 102 I honestly didn't no what to expect. Like many others English 101 didn't really steer me in the direction that caught my interest. Entering Farmingdale as a freshman and having previous success in English classes in the past I believed it wasn't going to be as hard as I thought. Although having success in English, it never really stuck with me due to my lack of wanting to read. I never liked reading as a child and even after taking this class I still don't find reading as a hobby of mine. I have picked up a lot from this English 102 class though by finding out how to identify different types of elements in stories and also go a step further into writers work to truly understand their message being put across. One thing I would change in this class would be to not have it as much as a lecture class, but more as a class to interact and find my other classmates opinions as well as expressing my own. I feel as though lectures on different types of writers and stories throw students off from the real meaning of what the professors are trying to teach their students. Overall, I did enjoy taking English 102 and it was an experience that really helped me become more educated.

Response #3 - Greek Tragedy

Greek tragedy was another favorite of mine because of the way it was spoken. Greek tragedy was performed live and for me that was easier for me to understand and picture the main theme of the play. I took a sense of understanding and concentration from Greek tragedy, meaning I enjoyed having the play acted out in front of me giving me the imagery I needed to understand the true meaning of the play. Emotions were expressed easier and gave their audience a feel at which they were in the play with them. Oedipus the King was a great Greek tragedy that by using the characters own emotions and acting helped bring readers into the story and back into a time where there was an ruler that everyone either loved or hated.

Response #2 - Romanticism

Romanticism was a different type of event in history where writers used their emotions in order to create a piece of art. Romanticism in poetry has been used for years beyond where writers had their own choices to pick which emotion they wanted to go by throughout their work. Some features of romanticism in poetry was:

• Emotion over reason
• sensory experience before intellect
• Imagination to the road of experience and spiritual truth
• The human personality

These features all use a different type of romanticism in order to express a type of story the writer is trying to express. Romanticism to me really interested me due to it is based off of true emotion. I enjoy using different types of emotions when writing in order to bring my own readers into a different world where they can picture it in their minds. 

Response #1 - Symbolism in Poetry

Symbolism in poetry enables the writer to convey images directly to the mind of the reader - it serves almost like an emotional short-cut. A symbol works two ways: It is something itself, and it also suggests something deeper. Symbolism in poetry gave me a different look on the types of symbolic elements that all poets use in their work. Robert Frost was a strong believer of symbolism in his work and used it in mainly all of his poems. His personification, metaphors and similes weren't always announced throughout his poems but analysing his work a step further showed his ways of using them. Symbolism to me really gave me a different outlook on poetry and how to use different types of literary elements to bring the readers to whatever world you wanted to bring them in. 

Facts About Robert Frost

• Robert Frost was born on March 26, 1874 in San Francisco, California. 
• When Frost was two years old, his mother fled to Lawrence, Massachusetts, to get away from her husband, who was a drunk. 
• She stayed there until her second baby was born, Jeannie, Robert's sister. 
• Then they went back to San Francisco. 
• A few years later, Robert's father died, so they took the body to Lawrence to be buried in the family cemetery. 
• By the time he was 11, Robert Frost had crossed the U.S. three times.
• He married Elinor White and had 2 kids. 
• Robert never in truth had any jobs, except being a poet, but he published many poems in his lifetime. Some of them are: The Road not Taken, The Raft of Flowers, The Pasture, and others. 
• Robert also won four Pultizer awards and read The Gift Outright at the inauguration of John. F. Kennedy. 
• He died on January 29, 1963 of a heart attack. He was 88 years old.

Biography of Robert Frost


Robert Frost's Poems

Essay #2

Thomas Rydzewski

Professor Candia

English 102

March 7, 2012

            Poets use their strong grammar and creative minds in order to convey their readers to understand what hides behind the stories they create. Within every piece of poetry there is always an untold story that lies behind its original figure just waiting to be discovered. A great piece of poetry that tells an untold story is “To See a World in a Grain of Sand” by William Blake. This poem really was able to capture the meaning of a creative and inspirational writer that was able to write very little in this poem, but mean so much more. His strong grammar in his poems really captures the reader’s eyes into finding out his untold mystery.

            To begin, William Blake used his own creativity in order to express his huge meaning of his poem in such little amounts of words. In the very first line of his poem “To see a world in a grain of sand” (1), Blake used a metaphor by comparing the world to a grain of sand. Blake was using this metaphor to create the image in a readers mind that the world is similar to a grain of sand due to its round and rocky shape. Also the image of how unpredictable both the world and a grain of sand really is because you never big or small the two of them could be. Right from the beginning Blake uses a literary term in his poem in order to instantly grab the reader and bring him into the story Blake wants to tell. The imagery Blake uses throughout this piece of work really shows his strong creativity and unique character.

            Another amazing line from William Blake’s poem “And a heaven in a wild flower” (2) really expressed his second type of metaphor. He used the same type of literary term in order to make the similarity towards heaven and a wild flower. Blake used the two in order to build off of his first line and create yet another image in the reader’s mind that a wild flower, being unpredictable and all different shapes and colors, could define what heaven could possibly be like. No one understands heaven or could describe it to anyway and that’s why Blake compares the two being so unpredictable and mysterious in their own specific way. Blake tries to give an image to the reader of both heaven and earth and how they can both be metaphorically similar to certain everyday things. Blake tries to convince his readers that the biggest things can have the smallest meaning when the smallest things can have the biggest meaning.

            Yet another line from William Blake’s poem “Hold infinity in the palm of your hand” (3) really sets a different mood in his story. Blake sets an image for the readers to think about being able to hold infinity, virtually holding the world in the palm of your hand. It’s almost as if his metaphor here is giving the readers the opportunity to become god himself and also bring you back to the previous two lines and get you to put all his untold pieces together like a puzzle.

            Finally the last piece of William Blake’s poem showed his strong grammar skills and his creative way to bring the reader into his story and make them think. The final line of his short but meaningful poem really put the whole story together, “And eternity in an hour.” (4) This ending line helped set up his previous lines in his poem to finish his untold story. This whole poem together grabbed the reader into thinking more than just sand, wild flowers, and the world around it but brought everything together to make it whole. Blake used his metaphors in order to show the readers that the largest things in the world could have the smallest meaning and the smallest things in the world could have the largest meanings.

            In this poem “To see a World in a Grain of Sand” by William Blake he was able to create through literary terms of simply metaphors that the world is too big to fit in the palm of someone’s hands and a person cannot control everything. Blake’s untold story was hidden behind his poem and without his grabbers that brought the readers into his work; no one would be able to understand his poems just like many writers and their poems as well. William Blake wrote this particular poem to convey his readers that having too much on your plate isn’t good and having just enough to handle to and be able to swallow is better for you to understand. All poetry serves its own purpose to tell different messages to their readers. 

Essay #1

Thomas Rydzewski

Professor Candia

English 102

February 13, 2012

            Writers from every era have used all types of literary terms in order to develop characterization within their stories. Literary terms such as theme, setting and conflicts between characters help in developing characterization in a writers stories such as " A&P " by John Updike and " A Rose for Emily " by William Faulkner. Writers of all styles use literary terms in their stories in order to give the readers feeling and imagination to the story that they are reading. Writers have their own unique ways of introducing the readers to the story and also being able to keep the readers interested in what they are reading about.

            In " A&P " by John Updike he narrated his story through the eyes of the cashier at the local food store in town. Upon his choosing of making the cashier the narrator, Updike specifically described the setting within the story by describing the town itself and its townspeople living in it. This story takes place within a food store when three young teenagers walk into the store wearing nothing more then a bikini with short jeans on. Updike uses imagery in the beginning of his story in order to give the reader an image of the three teenagers as the walked into the store. For example, he says "She was a chunky kid, with a good tan and a sweet broad soft-looking can with those two crescents of white just under it, where the sun never seems to hit, at the top of the backs of her legs."(Updike) The big surprise about what these girls were wearing was the fact that their wasn't a beach around the town for miles so this was a new scene for many townspeople. The cashier (narrator) of the story didn't find what they were wearing to be much distracting and disrespectful in public but his manager thought otherwise. Upon paying for their items that the three teenagers wanted to purchase, the manager of the store rudely told the girls that their outfits were inappropriate and not aloud to be worn in the store. The manager then rudely kicked them out of the store. Updike then uses another literary term such as irony to yet again characterize the characters. "The girls, and who'd blame them, are in a hurry to get out, so I say "I quit" to Lengel quick enough for them to hear, hoping they'll stop and watch me, their unsuspected hero."(Updike) The irony is that they don't hear him. The cashier then stood up for the girls surprising his boss and started talking down to his boss. He then not only gave his boss a good argument but after he quit right then and there trying to impress the girls by sticking up for them and showing up his boss. Updike used conflict within that scene of the story to characterize the true feelings of the characters and to give the readers a true look on the characters feelings and thoughts throughout the story. "I fold the apron, "Sammy" stitched in red on the pocket, and put it on the counter, and drop the bow tie on top of it."(Updike) The literary terms used throughout the story not only created more dramatic scenes but also helped the use of characterization in the story by describing the characters emotions and appearance.

            Another story that gave more literary terms that expressed characterization was " A Rose for Emily " by William Faulkner. This story took place in a good neighborhood. Unfortunately, there was always a mystery that came from the main character Emily's house. Emily was a normal girl that by the end of the story seemed to go mentally insane by killing her husband Homer. This story is narrated by the townspeople and their reactions towards Emily and her life. Faulkner used a lot of irony in this story in order to characterize Emily and her surprising personality that had the readers minds, as well as some of the other characters in the story, trying to figure out what was going to happen next. "She did not ask them to sit. She just stood in the door and listened quietly until the spokesman came to a stumbling halt"(Faulkner) The townspeople criticized Emily for not being social when they were the cause of her being anti-social. Similar to " A&P " by John Updike, Faulkner used internal conflict within the main character Emily herself to reflect in his characters by showing you in the story how Emily loses his sanity and shuts herself down from the world. "She was sick for a long time. When we saw her again, her hair was cut short, making her look like a girl, with a vague resemblance to those angels in colored church windows--sort of tragic and serene."(Faulkner) The final piece of literary terms that were used was the setting itself that helps reflect on the characters in the story. Faulkner used setting to describe the house that Emily lived in and the dark and mysterious look to the house. "But garages and cotton gins had encroached and obliterated even the august names of that neighborhood; only Miss Emily's house was left, lifting its stubborn and coquettish decay above the cotton wagons and the gasoline pumps-an eyesore among eyesores."(Faulkner) This gave a good reflection on the characters and how they acted within the story.

            Writers have always brought different types of literary terms into their stories in order to reflect the characters they put into their work. By using terms such as theme, setting and conflict it gives the readers a true description of the story and how the characters are. By doing this the authors give the characters they create different types of traits that the readers could relate to or even find surprising after reading the book till its conclusion. Many writers use this method of writing in order to bring the readers interest into what they are reading and give them a vivd picture in their minds of whats taking place within the story. 

Blog Assignment #10 - A Doll's House

The play "A Doll's House" by Henrik Ibsen is a very interesting story in my eyes. Although I am not into plays at all I did happen to catch myself in the pages of this piece of literature. The main characters that I believe brought the play to life was Nora and Torvald Helmer. Nora was known in the play as a nice and respectful woman who seemed to lose her sanity by the end of the play. Trovald worked at a bank that he enjoyed and was pleased working there. Nora created a big problem for herself by forging her fathers signature in order to take out a loan of a large some of money. This did nothing but put Nora into debt and force her to work at an incredible rate to try and pay off her debt. It seemed as though Nora always had a mental block on herself and also on the people around her trying to hide who she truly was. Nora became suicidal which she got out of later on in the play but still hid her bunched up emotions from everyone including Torvald. Also Nora believed that she wasn't herself in her marriage and was hiding who she truly was just to please Torvald. Also Nora hid a lot of things from Torvald as well such as a little thing like eating macaroons and then lying to him about it. Torvald is another character in the play that showed some type of security similar to Nora. The character Dr. Rank diagnoses Torvald with the fact that he cant face up to anything, that he should be sheltered from the realistic world. Also Torvald is very curious about what everyone around thinks of him. It also seemed as though that Torvald was a very self conscious man who didn't want anyone to give him disrespect. For example Torvald ended up firing Krogstad simply because Torvald believed Krogstad showed him no respect while working at the bank and despite Nora trying to convince Torvald to let Krogstad keep his job Torvald made his decision and fired him. Finally Torvald is really embarrassed by Nora forging her way to get the loan she wanted and didn't think too highly of her. He tried hiding from the humiliation of being involved in Nora's problems. The Helmer's try to maintain their "charmed" lives simply because they believed that they wanted what they wanted and there was no way around it. Torvald seemed to make most of the decisions when Nora really just wanted to be independent and ended up leaving both Torvald and her children to try and fulfill her destiny.