On the Tralfamadorian novel

Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five is often described to be an "earthling approximation" of the Tralfamadorian novel. While some may agree with this comparison, I found that my knee jerk reaction was a definite no. Sure as I spent more time thinking about it I was able to convince myself into seeing the similarities, but for the most part, the resemblance just doesn't strike me. Written in fleeting bunches, each clump describing a singular moment, Tralfamadorian novels are non-linear and lack a narrative. According to the text "there isn't any particular relationship between the messages", though they are strategically selected by the authors for effect. The appeal of this writing is found in how these distinct pieces all conglomerate together to give the reader insight into the beauty of life. Slaughterhouse Five, I feel, is an extremely poignant piece of work, but achieves this through different means. Despite the time warps and the jerky chronology of plot, there is an identifiable overarching story line that Vonnegut introduces the readers to.  I would also assume that without any relation between one message and the next, Tralfamadorian novels would not be able to sustain a central protagonist, and maybe not even include recurring characters throughout the text. In Slaughterhouse Five, Billy Pilgrim really acts as our sort-of anchor throughout the series of events, and I can't imagine a rewriting of the novel without the primary focus we have on Billy and his perspective. While both Slaughterhouse Five and Tralfamadorian novels may manage to have the same impact on readers, I wouldn't think to lump them together in the same category. Kurt Vonnegut's work remains, I believe, a still very human piece.

For the love of free will

The discussion we had in class on Friday about the differences in how humans and Tralfamadorians perceive, (or I guess believe in) free will really got me thinking about free will on a personal level. Growing up the way we have (especially with the huge sense of entitlement that is usually associated with our generation...) it's been hard to think that we have anything but free will. Class, race, economics and gender always play a role in how our opportunities are limited, but for the most part, I still think we all are led to believe that as citizens of the world, we are capable of achieving anything. At the same time, how we believe in the metaphysical, or even just destiny, can be hard to reconcile with the fact that we have free will. How can the idea of free will peacefully coexist with ideas of predeterminism? In my mind at least, it can't. I still have no idea which or what I believe in, but I find it much harder to have an optimistic view of the world when I know that everything in my life has already been predetermined. Should I be motivated to do anything if everything that's meant to happen will already happen of its own accord? That mindset is also too oversimplified a form of thinking as far as predeterminism goes, and this is where the Tralfamadorians have the upper hand. I guess we've all been conditioned for too long to quietly accept that absolute free will is a social construct. Why is it so painful for an individual to relinquish their free will? I guess in a way it feels like giving up your claim to your own life.

Mumbo jumbo--nonsense?

Having grown up hearing the phrase mumbo jumbo used frequently with the connotation of meaningless, I never thought to look into the etymology of the expression as it seemed so insignificant. The word itself seems to come from jumbled origins, with its clear roots lost to American culture over time.  An 18th century entry in the Oxford English Dictionary lists mumbo jumbo as "...a grotesque idol...said to have been worshipped by some tribes. Mumbo Jumbo is an object of senseless veneration or a meaningless ritual.". This obviously dismissive treatment of African culture may have been representative of the views that led to our eventual colloquial use of the phrase.  According to Reed, or the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, mumbo jumbo comes from a Mandingo word that literally translates to "magician who makes the troubled spirits of ancestors go away". Other sources, however, claim that mumbo jumbo stems from the Mandingo word maamajomboo, which refers to "a masked dancer that took part in religious ceremonies". Whatever its true meaning may have been, it seems more or less certain that it arises from the Mandingo language. Further research informed me that Mandingo isn't actually one concrete language, but a sort of family of languages (including Malinke, Maninka, and Bambara) spoken across western Africa. From learning this I realized just how extensive my ignorance of African history and culture truly is. This may have to do with the fact that I don't consciously go out of my way to seek more knowledge, but I think is mostly owed to the fact that American schools have almost entirely kept African history out of their curriculum. Despite the sheer number of African "immigrants" that were made to find new lives in America, their cultures were forcibly stripped and stolen from them, and did not get a chance to live on into the mainstream. Dehumanization was a tool used for years in antebellum America, and in the process a rich culture was lost and tossed aside as mumbo jumbo.

Setting and changes in viewpoint

After the panel presentation on Friday, I was left with a lot of realizations about the way in which I consume books. I became aware of the fact that how I read Ragtime in class almost definitely would have been different from how I would've read Ragtime as a random novel on my own time. Whether we like to admit it or not (and I know for a fact that that's something most people don't like to own up to), our likes and dislikes are always somewhat tied to our environment and how other people perceive things. In a classroom setting where I am essentially forced to analyze, reread, and contemplate each chapter (I'd even go as far as to say each passage), it becomes so much easier to appreciate the literary value of a book. That, combined with all the other voiced opinions in class, helps to solidify my budding curiosity into a full fledged interest for the book. On the other hand, wolfing down a novel on your own time provides a completely different experience. When I enjoy a book, I can't help but read through all of it in the shortest time frame possible. In doing so I miss out on a lot of the subtleties that would've otherwise contributed to the book's overall wow factor. When I am not immediately enthralled by a book (and this might have to do with our generation's ever-shrinking attention spans), I abandon it out of disinterest. It seems more and more now that a book either has to provide cheap thrill and action, or a solid recommendation from someone whose taste I trust, for me to really bother finishing it all the way through (let alone appreciate it for its full value...).

Who was Evelyn Nesbit anyways?

With all its scrambled plots and characters, its easy to get lost in the sea of stories in Ragtime. Despite its solid entourage of recurring characters, one specific character has particularly piqued my interest, Evelyn Nesbit. Painted as an especially confusing character, Evelyn's actions always strike me as a weird combination of hesitant and bold. Though we are given glimpses into her background (including hints at several traumatic experiences), it surprises me that more people are not more sympathetic towards her. Maybe her naivety and often resigned demeanor don't endear her to most readers, but I found Doctorow's rendition of her pretty realistic given the things she's lived through. As I read more about her from other sources, I was shocked to learn the extent of her misfortunes. The loss of her father at a very early age, the exploitation of her body by her own mother, and eventually the rape (rapes?) and physical abuse we come to read about in the book all contributed to the damaged psyche she now lives with. Reading about her from an 'objective' standpoint raises again the question of history vs fiction, as I found that I definitely consumed a 'historical' biography of her differently than I did the passages in Ragtime. Regardless of how she may have lived and suffered in her own lifetime, she is largely remembered posthumously as one of the last, great tragic beauties. 

What it means to love

I was very much in shock after reading about Sethe's past. The little hints and glimmers scattered throughout the book made it easy to see that yes, the baby was probably killed by Sethe herself, but the circumstances and motivations remained unclear. Before I actually got to the retelling of the events, I could, in no way, justify Sethe's actions. Isn't killing your child the absolute worst thing you could do? Hasn't it been ingrained in our minds by every medium of society that murder is just about the worst crime? You probably could argue yes, but in the context of this specific situation, Sethe wasn't killing, she was, as she said in her own words, just sending her baby away to a safer place. To finally taste freedom, to finally realize just how oppressed, how enslaved, and how restricted a life she lived in Sweet Home added a whole new layer of resentment to Sethe's dilemma. Sweet Home was intolerable, she knew she had to get away, if not for herself, then for her children. She took comfort in the fact that she sent away her children alone and vulnerable in the arms of strangers, because that, to her, was a fate more favorable than a lifetime of slavery. With no previous warning, no other means of escape, Sethe had to choose the eternal escape, the only place that her children could be guaranteed safety and protection. In her scrambled state of mind, only one thought ran through her head, and that was keeping her children away from the life that she had endured. If death was the only viable way to save her children, then well Sethe sure took it. Death was the ultimate gesture of her love, honestly the biggest sacrifice any parent could ever be forced to make. She took the cliche of loving someone enough to let them go to a whole new level, and at the end of the day, it worked.

The child that is Denver

So I haven't started my weekend reading, but from what I have read so far, if things weren't laid out in such an explicit chronological order, I honestly would have thought that Denver was a small(ish?) child. Isolated and friendless, Denver is not socialized, she is stubborn, and childlike in her ways. Reading the first few chapters (and even the first few pages) left me very confused. She was mad at Baby Suggs, her grandmother, for dying (dying?!?), overtly rude to Paul D within their first encounter, and much like a small child, she didn't want to share her mother. We are also told that she is basically 18. Still, even in the beginning, I found her character extremely sympathetic. She has essentially been deprived of everything we like to associate with childhood, and really only is hungry for love, attention, and friendship. In the early stages of the book, Denver really reminded me a lot of Janie from Their Eyes Were Watching God, because both characters were enamored with the idea of love (though different kinds), had grown up under the care of women who had lived through the realities of slavery, and had also grown up away and separated from children their own age. In a lot of ways, she also parallels the ghost of the dead baby. The spirit that haunts 124 is prone to tantrums and innocent mischief, and when Beloved actually enters the story, we see that she is a beautiful, young woman, trapped in a state of infancy. Denver too, just like Beloved, is a fully grown woman, that acts like a child. However this slowly changes along with Beloved's intrusion into the story, and we already begin to see changes within Denver as she adopts the role of an older sibling and caregiver instead of the childlike role she played before. I wonder how she'll continue to evolve.