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Maus Research

http://www.gradesaver.com/maus/study-guide/major-themes/

Although this seems like a very cheesy source to use for an outside analysis of Maus II, I feel that there are very good points and themes that are discussed that shed light on Spiegelman and the Holocaust. One of the themes talked about was guilt, in “Art’s feeling of guilt over not being a good son” and feeling guilty over “the publication of Maus”. From the beginning of the novel it was shown that his father and he did not get along and things were always tense between them. The publication of Maus was four years after his father’s death and he hoped that publishing his dad’s story would help the pain that was between them. However, things did not help and Spiegelman felt that “’[his] father’s ghost still hangs over [him]’”. This also ties in with survivor’s guilt, in that Art was not a part of the war so he never experienced the struggles both his parents suffered through. The struggle effected Art’s dad greatly and it was evident in both books that is wore on Art in that he said, “’ I wish I had been in Auschwitz with my parents so I could really know what they lived through! I guess it’s some form of guilt about having had an easier life than they did’”.

Another theme that was discussed in this online analysis was the distinction of race and class. Giving Jews the personification of a mouse, Germans as cats, and the Americans as dogs gave the biggest distinction between everyone and showed the hatred in real life towards one another because cats eat mice and dogs attack cats. This metaphor is an attempt to explain an existing social stratification, while other aspects suggest this is an illusion. This is most clearly illustrated when Spiegelman is having doubts about the animal metaphors that form the backbone of the story. Here, people are still characterized by animals based on race, but these characterizations are now clearly only masks that have been tied to their heads with a bit of string. Thus the idea of race is only an artifice, Spiegelman suggests, and “underneath the masks we are all essentially the same”.

Cat's Cradle

Postmodernism has no distinct center or controlling source where it originated from, which makes it difficult to exactly define what is postmodernism. In  the book Postmodernism for Beginners, the author describes life as "all the world's cultures, rituals, races, databanks, myths and musical motifs are intermixing like a smorgasbord in an earthquake." Meaning that postmodernists' goal is to take the separate groups, or as Kurt Vonnegut would say "granfaloons", and represent them. Postmodernists seem to believe that there is no central truth to life and that there is beauty within the chaos of multiple perspectives of life. I would even go so far as to say that postmodernists would say that holding a central ‘truth’ to life leads to the destruction of humanity because then everyone conforms to that idea and the idea of the individual is obliterated.

In Cat’s Cradle the postmodernist views come out when analyzing it with the lens of postmodernism. For starters, in the book there is a man named Bokonon who creates a religion on his discovered island in order to form a utopia of sorts, and in the first line of his book that defines the religion, he says: "All of the true things that I am to tell you are shameless lies." This shows that Vonnegut’s, the author, opinion of religion in itself is faulty since people are always on the search for something that they can believe and place their trust in. And with this quote in the very beginning of a religious text, the postmodernist ideals come out because Bokonon is straight forward in saying that it is all a lie, and that people trust that his religion is the ultimate truth are misleading themselves into finding ‘happiness’. Philosophies, like "Bokononism," are simply meant to give man something to think about, another way to sidetrack himself from the brutality of reality. This happiness that people find themselves in is usually because of the ignorance of what is truly going on around them and how cruel the world really. Postmodernists have this same ideal because you are broken off from the rest of the world and are in your own state of mind that everything is good in the world, which is embracing the different perspectives of life; just like what Cat’s Cradle is showing its readers.

Developing a Topic for Brave New World

So after reading Brave New World and pondering over the purpose of the writing, I finally found a solid argument to base my essay on. It has come to my attention that a major parallel that can be crossed between life under the government in the New Order and life today is that the majority of people live in such a way to obtain instant gratification.Whether its from popping soma to having sex more often than rabbits, people under the control of the government are conditioned to please their feelings in the moment. Likewise, in the world today everyone seeks to please themselves through the consumerism and fast-food nation we have become.
The sources I plan on using to help contribute to my arguments is Sir Ken Robinson's Youtube video about Changing Education Paradigms and Naomi Klein's chapter in her book called "Alt. Everything: The Youth Market and the Marketing of Cool". In Sir Ken Robinson's video, there is a point when he talks about the "Epidemic" of ADHD and how if you pop a pill, everything instantly becomes better since the student can now focus in class instead of paying attention to the distractions around him/her. This shows the parallel between the New Order and life today by soma being the "solve all" pill if you ever feel down, which follows the same paradigm as with ADHD pills. In Naomi Klein's writing, it is mentioned that the youth today are all about consumerism and how if there was a concert without any merchandise, there would be an uproar; meaning that Americans are 'programmed' to buy, buy, buy. Likewise, in the New World government, the people that are produced are conditioned to consume whatever the output the economy is creating, whatever it may be. This conditioning occurs during the early production of the fetus and is necessary to the overall stability of the New World, which in a way is the same as the economy today.

Brave New.. Education?

     First off, I just want to say that this clip is very informational and the man who created is an absolute genius basically because.. he is right. Something that I found interesting in these short 10 minutes of film is that the current system of education was designed and conceived for a different age: the Enlightenment. This is absolutely the truth because at the time, you were either rich or poor; or in a better sense, smart or non-smart. Some benefit from this system, but the vast majority doesn't. This is because there are a select few who are deemed as smart and then focused on to become prodigies in their certain field of genius. Education is modeled on interests of industrialization and the image of it, or in simpler terms, a production line. Kids are placed through the schooling system based on their age, or production date, and then are sent to the world to make a difference armed with the knowledge of what they obtained in school. The smart ones receive the most attention because teachers want to make them into great success stories, while the average are hidden in the background doing what they do best.. being average. And for those who don't believe it's the kids fault, they diagnose them with AD-HD saying that all they need to do is pop a pill to focus and everything is going to be all right.
      There are many parallels in the education system of American and the world in general to the society of Brave New World. For one, when talking about the creation of new life, it is mentioned that "ninety-six [seems] to be the limit" and that it promotes "social stability" (8). The parallel with this is, like being taught in the education system, kids are produced on a factory line and already predestined in regards to what their job is going to be in life and what social class they are a part of. Likewise, in the real world students are given out grades and based on their efforts it gives a basis on who will succeed in life and who will struggle with intelligence. Soma is also a drug that makes the world easier to bear, like when Lenina recognizes Bernard is upset, she says "'.. take soma when you have these dreadful ideas of yours. You'd forget all about them. And instead of feeling miserable, you'd be jolly. So jolly'" (92). In the education system of America, if a person isn't "normal", that is of the same caliber of "intelligence", then they are diagnosed with a learning disability and are given pills to make them better and obtain knowledge better. Soma has the same effect in the World State, if you are not feeling in tip-top shape, just take some soma and in a snap you are all better with "happiness". How surreal?

Brave New World Order

We are finally done with The Tempest! now onto something completely different.. sort of.
In Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley, the government, like that in 1984, works to control the population through the desensitization of sexual desire and the obliteration of the concept of family. In chapter three, Mustapha Mond talks about the inter workings of the function of the government:  "Wheels must turn steadily, but can not turn untended. There must be men to tend them, men as sturdy as the wheels upon their axles, sane men, obedient men, stable in contentment." Ultimately this means that everything must work in unison, with no unnecessary parts, but if left alone it will be demolished. Those who tend to this process are men who have had the values of family and desire stripped from them since birth so that the only thing they know to love and are content with is in the work they do to provide for the success of the government. You may ask though, how does the government handle what has happened in the past and the questions that rise from it? Well, according to the Controller, "history is bunk." Or in other words, a lie or unnecessary in accordance to the world in which they live in. This means that all the family values and desires of the body that happened in the past were obliterated for the new age of babies being made in factories, deeming the process of childbearing pointless and a waste of time. The reason why this is done is so the government can condition the babies when they are born to like what they were born to do and be afraid of whatever the government wants them to be afraid of; so in a sense they control society through fear and manipulation. Although this is not the only method the government uses to control its own, it is definitely a big part of it.

I wish I could "vaporize" The Tempest...

In discussions of Shakespeare's The Tempest, one controversial issue has been deciphering the meanings and characters Shakespeare uses and whether said characters portray the events that paralleled its time period . On the one hand, many scholars, such as George Will, argue literary works should be viewed distinctly from the text, leaving inferring out of the question of analyzing its meaning. He goes as far to say that "by 'deconstructing,' or politically decoding, or otherwise attacking the meaning of literary works, critics strip literature of its authority. To only look for political meaning in books and make it the only perspective you, or the people you influence, look at, then it takes away what the piece of literature is bring forth to the world. On the other hand, Stephen Greenblatt contends that it is suitable, and even sometimes necessary, to look between the lines of literature and seek out meanings that are intended for the reader to discover. "I am deeply committed to passing on the precious heritage of our language, and I take seriously the risk of collective amnesia." He feels that looking for political values in literature is a necessary component in reading literature and to take that away is to take away and wipe out the memory of all that has occurred in the past. Language is what intertwines us as a people and the collective history our ancestors have created, and, according to Greenblatt, taking that away is like taking away all that they have done. Although I do agree to this perspective somewhat, I believe that limiting ourselves to analyzing literature with only one lens to spark our creative thinking causes us to miss the bigger picture of what message the piece of literature is actually portraying. It is good to let keep open the possibilities of each perspective, but the ultimate conclusion of what each work is about should not come from anyone else except for what the individual believes. Nothing more, nothing less.