Reflection on Eve's diary: What Twain wanted

              Generally, there can be four types in the writers' attitudes when dealing with the social bias or problems:those who are obedient or unconscious about the bias, those who try to defy the bias, those who are neutral, and those who try to escape from the problems. And for the case of resistant, some of the attempts actually "changed the world". In human history, equality in gender was always the big issue. A lot of people including feminists tried to establish the equality between man and woman.
               In the story "Eve's diary", Mark Twain certainly depicts on the 'stereotypical' women and one's harsh reality. And he might have intended to reflect the normal woman in that period, making them aware of their status in society.
              To briefly say about the story, "Eve's diary" is a story literally written like a diary of Eve. It portrayed Eve as a 'woman'. She loves a lot of things ("I already begin to

realize that the core and center of my nature is love of the beautiful,

a passion for the beautiful"), she cares about the other(in this case, Adam), and importantly, she is interested in knowing something(" I learned a lesson; also I

made an axiom, all out of my own head--my very first one; THE SCRATCHED

EXPERIMENT SHUNS THE THORN.."). Definitely, Mark Twain portrayed Eve, the representative of women, in a positive way.

         However, still, it seems obvious that Eve is quite dependent on Adam. Whenever she's rejected or get hurt from Adam(although Adam doesn't realize about this fact), she keeps thinking, or more like captured about it("But when night came I could not bear the lonesomeness, and went to the

new shelter which he has built, to ask him what I had done that was

wrong and how I could mend it and get back his kindness again; but he

put me out in the rain, and it was my first sorrow.."). This represents the reality of women; they are smart, yet dependent on men. 

         In the end, Adam says "Wheresoever she was, THERE was Eden." This might imply that man would anyway realize the importance or the value of woman. Maybe Mark Twain wanted to tell other men about the importance of woman. 

         Throughout the whole story, Mark Twain tried to express the woman's status in the society(or maybe the environment). Although it is not definite to say that his story directly influenced women suffrage, at least this story tried to show woman itself, helping women to look back on themselves.
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Jiyoon Rhee: I liked your "four types" of writers, and I was hooked by your first paragraph, curious how you'd find relationship between the types and Eve's diary. However, I don't quite see the connection between your introductory paragraph and the rest of your essay. Maybe you tried to put the main paragraphs into four, analyzing the writer's attitude toward women?
I kind of disagree with you on your 2nd point. I agree that women are portrayed dependent on men, but isn't Adam more dependent on Eve than Eve is on Adam? Many events in the story wouldn't have happened if Eve have not take certain actions. As Mr. Menard mentioned in class, I think Adam is portrayed more passive than Eve. 
Anyway, I loved your essay and your analysis! Impressed about your own classification of writers.

Reflection on Poe's stories

         When doing a reflection to a certain art piece, people enjoy relating the piece into the creator’s life or his background. Similarly, it is very interesting to discuss about the relationship between the story and the writer. And when reading the two stories of Edgar Allan Poe, 'The cask of amontillado' and 'The telltale heart’, I found out that two stories are quite similar to the life story of Edgar Allan Poe.

         The first thing that came up to my mind while reading two stories ('The cask of amontillado' and 'The telltale heart') is insanity. Although there would be some issue on defining insanity, conventionally saying, both of the narrators in two stories are definitely out-of-their-minds. They commit murders with vague motives like 'the evil eye' or 'the thousand injuries.' And after all, they confess what they had done before they die. Two stories are almost in the same pattern.

         Those two, similar stories can be linked with Poe’s biography. Like his gloomy stories, his life was full of hardships and difficulties. He lost his parents and aggressively disciplined by his foster family. He also married his 13-years-old cousin who died two years later after that. And after all, he died in the age of 40. (The cause of his death is not known, but it is believed that he died by the diseases like heart disease, epilepsy, cholera and rabies.) Numerous difficulties in Poe’s life can explain the reason why most of the stories of Poe are dark, gloomy, and somewhat insane.

         So, why did Poe want to write such a gloomy stories?

         According to Freud, the father of psychoanalytic perspective, there exist three parts in human's mind: id, superego, and ego. Id is what leads human to have a basic desire while superego is what makes human to act in a socially acceptable way. In between, ego seeks to please the id's drive in realistic ways. And when one follows the id rather than superego, ego displays a lot of methods in order to minimize the guiltiness or anxiety comes from the superego. Some of the methods are immature like fantasy, projection, and passive aggression while other methods are mature like humor, sublimation, altruism, anticipation.

         Personally, I think Poe tried to sublimate his socially unacceptable desire that might have been occurred frequently throughout his life. Sublimation is a mature type of defense mechanism where socially unacceptable impulses are consciously transformed into socially acceptable actions or behavior, possibly converting the initial impulse in the long term. And Poe’s creepy and sometimes insane short stories might have been used to sublimate Poe’s unacceptable desire (It might be murder?).

         To sum up, while reading up the stories, I get to think Poe highly of his act of sublimation, which is a mature way to deal with the stress, and his story telling style which is elaborate and careful enough to express insane elements or events in a quite gentle manner. I should read Poe’s story more.
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-Nuri: I liked your analysis of combining the background of the author to the story. However, your first and second paragraph don't seem to fall in the same order- you first start out by talking about the motive and pattern of the two stories and then just jump to Poe's expression of himself in his stories. If you add a few transitional sentences, I think your essay will be great:) And while talking about Poe's background, maybe you can link what parts of his background was influential in his stories.


-Seungwon: Had Poe had a hunky-dory childhood, such mad stories couldn't have been created. I agree wholeheartedly on that point. I do wish you could elaborate a bit more on the link between Poe's life and his works. A bit of specificity is always good.


-Inhee Ho: Surely, Poe's abnormal (though I don't exactly know what 'abnormal' is) life should have affected a lot of his pieces! They are mostly horror, 'killing', mystery, and suffering. I really learned much about Poe's life reading your writing :). I see how much vicissitudes he had in his life. But I sort of don't get how these ups and downs he experienced were taken to his writing. Maybe there was specific disease or motivation he started writing 'Poe-style' stories.

Reflection of 'The Ambitious Guest'

         If someone asks me about the difference between animals and humans, I would say it as ‘free will’. Free will is the ability to control or manage one’s action and decision. While the desire makes people motivated, free will works as a brake and an accelerator which can speed up or slow down their action. The desire to be better also exists in other animals, but it is the free will what helps people to be human: rational, or sometimes warm-hearted.

         'The ambitious guest' is about those who failed to achieve their ambition. The family who used to be peaceful and modest became vain after they met the ambitious guest who talked about the city life and all those ‘leaving one’s name’. Being fanatic about the mysterious, appealing city life, the family rushed out of the house, and they ended up buried by the rock.

         In ‘The ambitious guest’, Hawthorne depicts the tragic ending of those who chased the vanity. It seems like Hawthorne wanted to warn the readers by showing the mountain slide that didn’t happen before the ambitious guest appeared.

         Some might think that this tragic incident was due to the ambition itself. However, what I think is that it is not the matter of ambition. Whether the pursuit of ambition would turn out to be tragic or not depends on the presence of free will. In other words, when chasing one’s own dream or ambition, one should know when to speed up or slow down. In the case of that family, it can be interpreted that they failed to have a free will.

         As for my case, I have done a lot of challenges. I planned to go abroad (England), I learned how to play Haegum (Korean fiddle), and I tried to do water-skiing. Some of them succeeded while others failed. To recall my experiences, I thought that the difference between succeeded case and failed case is the presence of free will, somewhat rationality.

        One of the experiences I want to say is the experience of water-skiing. Last summer, in the school activity, I had an opportunity to learn water-skiing. Being ambitious after watching others enjoy waterskiing, I made a grand plan to properly stand during water-skiing. Because I was too passionate at then, instead of listening some advices from the teacher, I just tried to do water-skiing and start off. And the result was pitiful. After less than 1 minute, I had to stop water skiing and just went back to the pier. I wasn’t able to stand up of course, and I also had to struggle to get out of water. It is the result of no free will, no control. If I had listened to what the teacher said, the tragic, pitiful incident wouldn’t have happened.

         Shortly, I think that free will is crucial in the success or realization of ambition or dream. It is easy to have an ambition, engine, but it is not easy to have a free will, the brake, to control the ambition. This can be the lesson that people should remember. 
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Comments!(before editing)
-So yeon Min: How do we verify that humans are the only species that possess free will? (Even though people often assume this fact as common sense) Also, what do you exactly mean by "free will"? Your writing would have been better if you had developed more on the point that the result of the ambition depends on the purpose. I do personally agree with your point, and I think your writing will turn out marvelous if you clarified on some points above.


-Yeji Park: You said "somewhat misleading will or purpose". How are we going to define the term "misleading"? Do you think that the city life is "misleading"? What is the desirable type of ambition then? You said "the ambition can turn to be (+) or (-) depends on one's thoughts or ideals. So are these thought/ideals chosen by the society or personality? Please clarify the "standards" of what makes ambitions (+) or (-), and I look forward for your revised reflection:)


-Rhee Jiyoon: You implied that chimpanzees have no ambition while people have "a desire to be or to live in better condition." But I disagree with you and I think chimpanzees-among other animals that you have mentioned to not have a free will-may also have some other kinds of ambition, according to your definition of ambition. I think even puppies would want to "live in a better condition"! In your essay, I hope you develop your idea further about how a pure ambition can "turn to be positive or negative", then your essay will sound even stronger!


-Chonghyun Ahn: I would have to say that I disagree on your definition of ambition as "the combination of human desire and free will". In that sense, Hawthorne's description of mountain people is also ambitious, it would be impossible to not to be ambitious. Anyway, great writing :)