Reflection over Civil Disobedience

The era of transcendentalism was alive and defiantly prominent in the story "Civil Disobedience basically the entire time. Although I am not going to lie, the author himself, Henry David Thoreau, was very partial and almost rash when it came to what he was saying. This can be considered a sure quality of transcendentalism because of how politically pressured it was. "How does it become a man to behave toward this American government to-day? I answer, that he cannot without disgrace be associated with it. I cannot for an instant recognize that political organization as my government which is the slave's government also" (Thoreau 1) This to me is a bit much and over dramatic for my taste. Especially when he begins to talk about how his government would not be like the "slaves" government that he is apart of now. This idea of independence in himself and in man is also a huge part of transcendentalism. The fact that one is able to know that a government is right or wrong on their own is also a characteristic. "If you are cheated out of a single dollar by your neighbor, you do not rest satisfied with knowing that you are cheated, or with saying that you are cheated, or even with petitioning him to pay you your due; but you take effectual steps at once to obtain the full amount, and see that you are never cheated again." (Thoreau 2) This in a way displays how we do now of when something is wrong and when we are wronged. Thoreau then goes on to explain how why if we do not rest when we are wronged by our neighbor do we rest when we are being wronged by our government. I actually really enjoyed this part of the story because it made me really open my eyes to how true this is even today! As a whole our world does look at these probabilities but we all do not take a stand as much as if we were to know that someone had stolen from our bank accounts or wallets. We all would be hiring a lawyer and taking action right away, most do not take any stand to the government. Transcendentalism also very much connects to nature. Tiffany K. Wayne said "The Transcendentalists drew upon romantic thought in the formulation of an "organic" aesthetic, the foundational Transcendentalist theory that language and art are expressions or translations of nature and that human and universal meaning is to be found in the forms of nature." This is displayed in Civil Disobedience when it says "I saw to what extent the people among whom I lived could be trusted as good neighbors and friends; that their friendship was for summer weather only; that they did not greatly propose to do right;" (Thoreau 3) He connects the natures season of summer to be the reason his neighbors and friends did not do right. He believes that we are truly connected to the nature and world we live in.



Thoreau, Henry D. "Thoreau's Civil Disobedience - with Annotated Text." The Thoreau Reader. Richard Lenat, 2009. Web. 24 Jan. 2012. .


Wayne, Tiffany K. "romanticism and Transcendentalism." Encyclopedia of Transcendentalism. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2006. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= GETRA321&SingleRecord=True (accessed January 24, 2012).

Break Laws?

Breaking laws is actually not okay at all, obviously, but is there any reason for it to be okay to break the law? Is there any reason that completely breaking a law would be acceptable? This is something that had been debated for years because of circumstances. When the circumstances are different, should the laws be different? Obviously when a person goes into a store and takes something it is against the law. But think about this, what if it is poor homeless women with a new born getting food to feed her and her child. Does that make it okay to break the law? That circumstance is not as common as a regular old shop lifting story. How about this idea, what if there is an awful man who has been doing bad things. This man rapes a father’s daughter and she tells her father. She showered after so any evidence was gone. The father and daughter knew who it was and took him to court but the guy was let go because of not enough evidence. The little girl finds out the man has raped another friend of her after her, the father knows that this man will not stop. He finally goes to the man’s house and kills him. That is murder, which is a felony. Yet, the man was a rapist of little girls and wasn't getting caught. The man himself was a sick human being. This man ruined lives and made little innocent girls suffer. So technically this man deserved to be punished, and be punished by death so is it okay for the father to have killed him. The man did deserve what he got but is it okay for someone to do that. It is no one’s job to kill someone who was not convicted of their supposed crime/crimes. This to me is such a wishy washy way of life and law because there is so many cracks. There is no way that this can be fixed though because the law cannot say it is okay to kill someone because they “deserved it”, because that would cause even more grey areas.

Reflection over The MInister's Black Veil

First I want to start off by saying that I truly enjoyed reading this story. From the very beginning it captured my attention when it said ""But what has good Parson Hooper got upon his face?" cried the sexton in astonishment. All within hearing immediately turned about, and beheld the semblance of Mr. Hooper, pacing slowly his meditative way towards the meeting-house. With one accord they started, expressing more wonder than if some strange minister were coming to dust the cushions of Mr. Hooper's pulpit."Are you sure it is our parson?" inquired Goodman Gray of the sexton."" (Hawthorne) This statement made me want to keep reading to learn what was really over their beloved ministers face. Come to find out it was a black veil, like a women might wear. This shocked the people of the town and intrigued me as the reader. This idea of mystery and dark sadness is a symbol of dark romanticism. This makes the story very mysterious because the minister does not move the veil or allow his face to be shown at all, not even at the end on his death bed. Nathanial Hawthorne did a fantastic job on giving the veil a very realistic feel to it, it almost gave it a life. This is a huge example of personification. The also makes the story very eery and unnerving keeping the dark romanticism style very much in tact. Hawthorne also displays dark romanticism when he writes "And thus speaking, the Reverend Mr. Clark bent forward to reveal the mystery of so many years. But, exerting a sudden energy, that made all the beholders stand aghast, Father Hooper snatched both his hands from beneath the bedclothes, and pressed them strongly on the black veil, resolute to struggle, if the minister of Westbury would contend with a dying man. "Never!" cried the veiled clergyman. "On earth, never!"" (Hawthorne) This displays dark romanticism because it gives the story a true terrifying reveal to a long life of sorrow. This man will never reveal his face and that in itself lets your mind wonder and imagine what he looks like. One huge characteristic of dark romanticism is imagination. Critical Companion to Nathaniel Hawthorne: A Literary Reference to His Life and Work, Critical Companion says “Since the character himself never reveals the mystery of the black veil, readers have been forced to propose their own theories. Edgar Allan Poe, as well as other critics, have suggested that Hooper wears the veil as penance for a "specific sin," perhaps connected with the young woman whose funeral he conducts. Other theories are that the veil symbolizes the sins of his congregation, but that in the end it has made him a monster, severing his link with humanity.” (Wright) Showing how imagination in the story is displayed. The story is fantastic on displaying how you can let your mind wander to scary fantasies of what could be in the story. This makes the story more interesting and makes me truly love “The Minister’s Black Veil”.

Hawthorne,, Nathaniel. "The Minister's Black Veil, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1836." Eldritch Press. Twice Told Tales. Web. 23 Jan. 2012.

Wright, Sarah Bird. "'The Minister's Black Veil'." Critical Companion to Nathaniel Hawthorne: A Literary Reference to His Life and Work, Critical Companion. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2006. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= CCNH403&SingleRecord=True (accessed January 23, 2012).

"Pit and The Pendulum" Poe

The story itself has a very eery and sick feeling to it, almost to the point where I literally felt tension in the pit of my stomach. Larger part of that consists of the talk of death and process of death. In the beginning he is talking about how he is listening to his sentence of death. "The sentence -- the dread sentence of death -- was the last of distinct accentuation which reached my ears." (Poe) The sadness in the part pours out of the words. The idea of death and almost mourning of the fact of him losing his life is very much a dark romanticism quality. Mourning especially is a large part of dark romanticism because it gives a very dark and eery side to the idea of the nature and happy romanticism period. The idea of mystery then plays a huge part throughout the rest the poem because you are questioning whether he is still alive, dying, or just dead. A little later he defines slightly what he could feel was happening "Then silence, and stillness, night were the universe. I had swooned ; but still will not say that all of consciousness was lost. What of it there remained I will not attempt to define, or even to describe; yet all was not lost." (Poe) Even here though he still keeps the dark romanticism theme of the fact that there is still a mystery on whether his state is alive or dead. Another very largely uses characteristic that Poe uses in “The Pit and the Pendulum” is the idea of a subconscious mind and dreaming. This is largely uses concept because it stays consistent with the imaginary aspect of romanticism writings. Charles E. May says in his criticism about Poe’s “Pit and the Pendulum” that “Focusing on a character under sentence of death and aware of it, it moves the character into a concrete dilemma that seems to "stand for" a metaphysical situation in an ambiguous way that suggests its "dreamy," "indeterminate" nature. In this story we find the most explicit statement in Poe's fiction of his sense of the blurry line between dream and reality.” (May). This means that he is basically saying that Poe likes to exaggerate the things that happen in this dream like state. These are the times when we aren’t truly here nor are we truly anywhere else either. The idea is very dark romanticism because it again gives mystery and depth to any story. The “Pit and the Pendulum” is a prime example because of how it talks about his time in which he is not quite dead nor is he alive, but truly he has absolutely no idea which one he really is. There is a time within the story when he begins to almost become happy about the idea of dying and that is when he begins to come back to “real” life. Talking much of the idea of madness or loss of control in his mind he describes this time of feeling like he were dyeing with many of the dark romanticism qualities that Poe was so very good at.

May, Charles E. "Alternate Realms of Reality." In Edgar Allan Poe: A Study of Short Fiction. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1991, pp. 96–97. Quoted as "Dreams and Reality in the Story" in Harold Bloom, ed. Edgar Allan Poe, Bloom's Major Short Story Writers. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishing, 1998. (Updated 2007.) Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= BMSSEP39&SingleRecord=True (accessed January 19, 2012).


Poe, Edgar. "The Pit and the Pendulum." Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 97-99. Print.

Journal #24

Things that give you shivers up your spine, hairs stand on end, and make you feel like your stomach is dropping to you feet are the things that spook you. These are the things that make you scared to move or even breathe. The spooks give you a chance to be scared and nervous about something that may or may not be real. I have had this same weary chill go through my spine many times but this one time was the worst. Terrifyingly mysterious may explain it better than anything. It started out as a normal night in my house. Everyone was asleep besides my mother, my friend Cara who was staying the night, and me. We were all just sitting in the living room minding our own. My mother was on the computer looking up various make-up things, because she is slightly obsessed. That began a few years ago when she became very interested in the idea of making your face abnormally beautiful, which she did very well. Cara and I were just watching some TV snacking on things that were definitely unhealthy in every sense of the word. Reaching for another huge chunk of brownie we were all stopped in our tracks when we heard the loudest crash of glass I have ever heard. We have many glass things in our house including a large glass door; I and my mother ran to the other room thinking that it was that large door or something huge. Cara followed behind us much slower being a lot more cautious than me and my mother. We all thought we would walk around the house and find glass scattered in one of the rooms, but we found nothings. We searched for hours and hours and found nothing. We all were confused and then it was obvious that there was nothing broken. I looked at Cara and my mother and that feeling of spooked came over all of us, it was silent to the point where you could hear a pin drop. Shivers went up my spine to where I actually have to shake my body to get it out. We all slowly walked back to the living room, back to what we were doing before. It was nothing but normal the rest the night because we all kept an ear open to hear of any more signs of the mystery broken glass. My mother and I have yet to find any sign of anything broken in or outside our household.

Edgar Allan Poe Poem Reflection

I read the poem called "Alone" by Edgar Allan Poe. When I read it through the first time I didn't exactly understand it completely but I could tell it was sad. I then went through the story a second time dissecting it line by line. The first four lines talk about his childhood. It says how he was not like the other children in any way. He did not find any happiness in the thing that brought happiness to other children. His passions were not like theirs and didn't come from the same place as theirs did. (Poe 1-4) This is a symbolism of dark romanticism because it displays how dark the truth of a man is. One idea of dark romanticism is just that, that every man has a true deep side inside of him. In the poem "Alone" it is shown when he talks about "And all I lov'd -- I lov'd alone --" (Poe 8) that he felt a dark sadness inside him. He felt that he was alone in the world and enjoyed things alone, ultimately making him confused. That then leads into another characteristic of mystery being displayed in dark romanticism writing style. "Then -- in my childhood -- in the dawn; Of a most stormy life -- was drawn; From ev'ry depth of good and ill ; The mystery which binds me still -- " (Poe 9-12) This quote shows how his life was full of mystery and questions that he did no understand himself. He began the quote by talking about how his life from the beginning was a "storm", meaning it was a mess and would continue to be just that. This life he believed was brought on by all things good and bad, which was most confusing because how can something bad come out of good. The idea of bad coming from bad makes sense, obviously, but bad from good was something neither he nor many ever understand. His display of questioning this is just much more intense and dramatic than most peoples. This is an example of another romanticism characteristic of that over-dramatic-detailed style. Poe then went on to talk about things that should be considered beautiful and good to look at such as”autumn tint of gold --; From the lightning in the sky” (Poe 17-18) “And the cloud that took the form; (When the rest of Heaven was blue)” (Poe 18-19). There is almost a sense of happiness regained when he talks about these things. Still he then does add things that keep the dark romanticism style but those happy things just went against all romanticism style things. The very last line he threw all non- dark romanticism ideas out the window when he wrote “Of a demon in my view –“. (Poe 22) Which was right after he wrote about the heavens sky as I quoted above, showing how although there is beauty everywhere around him, he could not see it. All he could see was the bad in things and the bad in the life around him. This is a very cynical view of life, which is also a largely used characteristic of dark romanticism. Obviously Poe is a picture perfect, although he would probably not want to be thought of that way, idea of how dark romanticism should and was written.

Poe, Edgar Allan. "Alone." The Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore. LFC Hosting, 5 Aug. 2011. Web. 17 Jan. 2012. .

Journal #23 Scary

The idea of scary is all around us. People are always thinking of how to scare others. Whether its just hiding around a corner and popping out, the director of the new thriller, or the author of a new scary story. The ideas of things that can make the human mind go crazy with fear are going through a lot of peoples heads on a daily bases. That to me is scary in itself. I remember when I first began to be exposed to scary things. The first real scary movie I ever watched was the Ring. I remember hiding behind furniture and holding onto my brother and dad as if I were drowning and the were my life vest. I have never been so terrified of a movie in my entire life then I was that night. I hadn't realized it then but the movie itself was really not that scary in comparison to movies I have seen since. I have seen the Ring many times since that first time and I have never been that scared as I was that night. Maybe it was because it was the first real scary movie i have ever been, or maybe it is just because the night itself was scary. Scary things are different for everyone and tend to change over-time. When I was younger I was scared of the dark, being alone, and things like that. Now I am scared of getting in a car crash, death, and losing a loved one in any way. Those are things that make me nervous and shake as the dark did when I was a child. As we age we realize that things like the monster under the bed, the goblin in the closet, and the boogyman aren't real and especially are nothing to be afraid of. We tend to live in a world of fear and fearless. Very few let themselves have a medium between the two because of a fear they can't get over or the idea that they are unstoppable. Neither are good but both are most common. Letting oneself be able to get over a fear while still keeping slight cation will allow one to live life much easier.

Journal #22

The snow fell onto the ground with a force
It was as white as Billy's neighbor horse
The hill made for a good, large, and steep slope
Little kids looked to their parents with large hope
Parents gave a concerning sighing look
The children gave them the best line and hook
With a little convincing and some tears
The parents tried to block out all the fears
All of the children ran happily there
It was to much for their parents to bear
The kids went all the way up to the top
They showed not a sign of a single stop
Not thinking of what could be the dangers
The children made friends with complete strangers
With the red sled and toboggan in hand
They prepared for the big white hill so grand
With their butts on the sled and ready to go
All the way down the kids face was a glow
At the bottom they were met by grown ups
So very happy to see their little pups
After a few runs down the great white hill
The children had finally had their fill
Walking hand and hand with their parents home
Given hot chocolate double the foam

Journal #21

The blank slate of white pureness covered the land. It was untouched and beautiful as the sun rose that beautiful morning. The world was quiet on the seventh day of the week, for no one was up early for work or other alternate things one would need to attend to. The first child that saw the beauty was wide eyed to the blank slate of which he knew he could enjoy. The trees were covered with white fluff and shook because of its bitter cold, or maybe just because of the light breeze running over its body. No blade of grass was in sight nor a leaf on a branch. The beauty of the dancing snow flakes in the air was like a ballet show. They twirled right and left and around the world below as it fell to the bottom. It landing beautifully without a clash, bang, or sound of any kind. It was soft and innocent without any intention of harm. It gave life to the dead world around it that had been stripped away of its beauty by the cold that came before it. When the sun hit the flakes it turned into glitter and shined everywhere. The shower of glitter feel into piles and soon enough the children were make balls and throwing it in the air without a care in the world. These children filled with pure joy raced down the hills on their sleds and toboggans. Those who were to scared to ride the hill made beautiful white men with coal eyes and carrot noses. The happy smiles of the snowmen were unfailing, along with the children who created them. Parents called to their children to come in for lunch in the warm hot chocolate. Even as they all left the glittered snow trampled and balled up, it was still as beautiful as ever. It was tinted but still its pureness was evident. That was something that was unfailing no matter how many little feet and hands were to play with it.