Othello Response... and Alphie

Recently in school, we have been reading one of Shakespeare's plays, Othello. This is, by far, the best play that I have read of Othello's. This may be for two reasons: I am now used to Shakespeare's language, and I feel like my teacher, who reads with us, has a much better overall understanding of Shakespeare. She really likes this play, and I feel that it has rubbed off a lot on me. I am really august about how he writes and uses rhetoric. Anyway, I am going to talk about many of the things that have caught my eye thus far.


First I am going to talk about Iago (obviously), the antagonist of the play. The way that he can manipulate people to do what he wants is just unbelievable; it's obvious that he is no neophyte when it comes to this. Something that caught my attention was how quickly he notices changes in status, and how easily it is to force somebody else to do something to regain their status. For example, recently in Act III Scene III, Iago used many different techniques and schemes to make Othello believe that Desdemona had been sleeping with his Lieutenant, Cassio. It was interesting how Iago slowly had higher status than Othello through all of this. Towards the beginning of the conversation that the two had, it was clear that Iago was merely suggesting what he "heard," but it was clear that Othello had the higher status. However, after Iago tells Othello this, impunity races into his mind. He immediately forgets any reality, and begins to listen and follow whatever comes out of Iago's mouth. It is pathetic that Othello is completely obsequious to listen and follow anything Iago says, and will do almost anything to get his status back. It is evident that Iago has a knack for playing mind games in order to have a higher status than the ones around him. But that leads me to my next question: Is there something that Iago's hiding?

In my opinion, I feel like there is a lot that Iago is not telling us. The first thing that instantly pulls a trigger in my mind is that Iago may have a predilection for men. We have talked a lot about that in class, and it makes sense. First of all, Iago has talked more about men than women in this play. In this scene specifically he goes on and on about how Cassio laid his leg over him and kissed him over and over. I don't recall once being given such a.. well... detailed description about a woman and him together. It may be because he is very blasé with his wife, and no longer is interested with her antics anymore. All we've heard so far from Iago about his wife is a litany of complaints and insults. You also must remember that in this era, it was the custom to get married to somebody of same status or class. So this may be the only reason why Iago married Emilia, because there is clear evidence that he does not love her. This could just be a facade that he is putting up in order to mask his real sexual status. I don't know, just something to think about.


One last thing to add... Today our school had the pleasure to listen to some of Alphie McCourt's readings and were able to ask him questions on writing and influences. Recently I also read his brother's book, "Angela's Ashes," so it would be especially interesting to be able to hear from him about anything that his brothers wrote. There were two things that really stood out in my mind. The first thing was the aftermath of Angela's Ashes after it came out. He said that it was weird to see your life be published, and it was weird for everyone to know how you grew up. He said also that he owned a bar at the time and started to get invited to all of these parties to meet people. I personally feel bad for the man because he makes a good point. Angela's Ashes is a great novel, but it was extremely dramatic and sad also. I completely understand why Alphie did not like his life to be published for everybody to see. I mean, I can't imagine a life like Alphie's that was made into a book and was talked about around the country and world for years and years. So just some feedback to that.

Wow. Blog entries are done for this MP. Well done, Max.

Stories, pt. 2

Raised $406. Egg cracked, but didn't explode (that's an 80 instead of a 70). SATs are done (for now), and a tough week next week. Anyway. Stories.


Barn Burning was difficult to interpret and just a very difficult read. It begins with Abner Snopes being driven out of town for apparently burning another person's farms down. This immediately tells me that because this was written in 1950, burning farms must have been a somewhat common thing to do. Why? Because there was a standard penalty for it, and Snopes must have gotten the idea from somebody other than himself. Anyway, a lot was extremely difficult to understand because of the way that William Faulkner writes. I mean, I'm only human. And to say that I can also read Shakespeare well and read this with tons of frustration is something to say also. The one part that was especially confusing to me was the very last part, where Sartoris hears the shots that his father is shooting. I read this a couple times, but I did not understand who was murdered with the three gun shots. I think that it is the older brother and the father, but I cannot be positive. Overall I really do not have a lot to say about this story like I had with the other ones because the story was just not that good. In my opinion, of course. But next and lastly I read Everyday Use.


Everyday Use, written by Alice Walker, was a bland and really non-moving story until the end. First, the dream that the mom had reminded me of how anybody loves to be appreciated. The mother has this dream that Dee will come up to her and hug her and tell her how much she appreciated everything that she did, but we can already tell that this dream is not going to happen. The way her mother describes her before we even meet Dee is depressing. It's obvious that Dee is just some kind of vixen that used her family for everything they had, and really does not appreciate them at all. The surprising part is that all three girls believe that Dee has the highest status in the family. Maggie is embarrassed because of her scars and thinks that Dee is the perfect daughter who has gone out into the world and is coming back to tell them all of the things that she has done. The mother also has to practically beg for a nice thing to come out of Dee's mouth to her. It is evident that until the end of the story, Dee has the highest status, although she has not really done anything. The end of the story, however, illustrated that the mother now accepts that fact that Dee is just a waste of her time, and refuses to give her any of the dresses. Instead, she gives them to somebody that appreciates her and has helped her through her entire life; Maggie. This demonstrated that at finally the mother realizes that she has to accept that Dee is just a person who had taken advantage of them. This was a not great story for me, but I'm sure for a female reader this may have been a bit better.

Los Cuentos, pt. 1

Well, this week has been a rough one. I am hosting a fundraiser tonight, debate tomorrow, and somehow have to create a device out of straws that will miraculously save an egg from a nine meter drop. By tomorrow. Somehow, though, I found time this weekend to just finish up the rest of the short stories that I had to read. I found that I did not enjoy these as much as "How to Become a Writer," probably because I am either rushing to complete all of my work or because I just did not relate to them as well. Anyway, let's get to them.


Cathedral was by far one of the best short stories that I have ever read. The entire story is just extremely inspirational and I do not have a great way to describe it. Towards the beginning, it is clear that the narrator is extremely ignorant of the blind, what they are and what they do. It reminded me kind of how when a cripple is being rolled through a hallway and everybody watches him, they ask themselves questions about how they get around and how they do their thing. I mean, some of the things that the narrator asks his wife are simply simpleminded. I remember that when Robert entered the house, the narrator seemed like he was extremely nervous and did not know what to do. He eventually found a common hobby that both had: drinking. This led to the conversation that they had and the understanding of Robert. The understanding of each other was by far the most significant part of this story, and I really enjoyed it. I mean, it was not the narrator's fault that he did not know anything about the blind man; he asked many questions at first because he did not understand, but at the end they fully understood each other. Great story.


"Everything that Rises Must Converge" by Flannery O'Conner is the one that I am going to talk about. This story was the classic difference of how large minds think as to small minds. We have talked about this in my Social Studies class before. Convoy explains that every generation afterward is a little more liberal towards a main issue than the generation preceding them. In this society, for example, we are becoming more and more liberal towards gay marriage, and there has been specific evidence that demonstrates that we, as a society, are much more pro-gay now. This is the same idea in the story. The mother is small-minded, and thinks of herself of higher status than all blacks. This supports my point because she is the preceding generation, who are much more conservative and do not want to change their ideas. Her son, Julian, is the more liberal generation, who is open to communicating and sharing ideas with blacks and whites alike. The mother is too small minded and conservative to see what really lies beyond the "old world" she keeps talking about, and does not acknowledge that because the world is desegregated she does not have a higher status than blacks anymore. Julian understands where his status lies, and often is the liberal who sits next to blacks on the bus and talk to them. The last part of the story was important because it really demonstrated that Julian's mom does not have the status that she thought that she had, and the blacks really hit it into her (literally). So in sum, the story excellently depicted the difference between small minded people and large minded people.

How to Become a Writer & the Writing Center

I am in the Writing Center and in AP English at my school. One would think that I may have a panache writing style that flows throughout, but that's not how I feel about my writing at all. The first short story I read this week was called "How to Become a Writer," by Lorrie Moore, and it describes the process of writing and the problems that many writers face when they do write. I decided to read this short story first because writing is a subject that I am very sensitive about. It may seem that from my involvement in the writing process, I am a great writer, but I never feel confident about my writing. This year, for example, we have had about three-four essays assigned to be done at home. I redid every one of those essays two to three times. And by re-do, I don't mean changed a word here and there. I mean that I made an entire new outline, new avenues, and a new essay in general. I feel like I am a step back as to the rest of my english class, and I have to try that much harder to become a great writer. But I think that this short story has really, really given me confidence because I now know that it does not just happen to me; it happens to everybody.


First, the story as a whole."How to Become a Writer" has fortunately interested me greatly because of the very creative way that it follows a person through a story and all that writers have to go through. I thought that it was very creative how Moore goes through in explaining how writing is a craft that one loves, although it has its highs and its lows. For example, in the story there are many occurrences where writing had not helped her in society. She writes what she loves, and is told that it lacks a plot. Tells someone that she was going to be a phycologist instead of a writer. The person simply replies that she would be great with kids. She goes to parties and says that she writes. She tells her mom that she wants to pursue a career in writing. The mother replies "sure, sure you wanna be a writer," but obviously the tone is gloomy. All of these examples demonstrated how difficult being a writer and producing is. I mean, the girl did find out what she wanted to do, but it is such a difficult craft and art to master that nobody can master it. I guess this gesture really grounded me because it took me back to that reality that my writing is not going to be a work of art on the first time. Or second. Probably not the third. Writing is something that you continue to learn and practice with and if you don't get it right the first time, just like the girl in the story, you just have to try (and hopefully not fail like her) again.

I appreciated this short story for many different reasons. First, it was funny. Let me just say that I did not expect to hear that author talk about Playboy or what kind of gender you have to write in or any of that. It was a very funny story about a struggling writer. It also was something that kind of gave me advice about my writing. I am one of those kinds of kids that gets too thought up in thinking about what something means or what I am trying to say, so a lot of the time it comes out wrong. A lot of the time I get criticisms that say that I am leaving something out, just as the protagonist was criticized for missing the plot also. I did not think I had the liberty of editing someone else's paper and telling them what they should do because I had flaws in my own writing. Now I understand that writing is a process, and is certainly not an easy one. It is common for somebody to want to write again and again to become better. Overall this was a very good short story that informed me a lot about writing and the detriments of it. Oh, and the few benefits.

My favorite (school) movies...

I was about to spit off a list of my favorite movies, but I just thought that it would be too normal. So instead I have decided that I am going to make a list of the top movies that I have watched in school (and not on my Macbook for fun). These movies all lack foibles and actually are very well put together. So without further bunkum, here are my favorite movies that we have watched in school.


5. Philadelphia
A couple months ago my gym teacher told us that we would be watching Philadelphia in health class. I heard prior to watching it that this movie is, "about some guy with AIDS. Yeah it's sad." But that review doesn't really cut it. I was so transfixed by the pain that the movie demonstrated and the themes it illustrated. First, I learned just how ignorant people were during the 80's about AIDS, and also how everybody did not want to learn either. Tom Hanks played Andrew Beckett, who is really an ingenuous individual and worked hard as a lawyer. It crushed me to see him get fired for his job because of the ignorance of his bosses. This movie was made to depict the fear of AIDS in the 1980s to the best of it's ability, and it really succeeded in it. This movie really shows that ostracizing an individual just because they are different does not benefit everybody. Thank god that nowadays, nobody believes the false accusations of how noisome the disease is, but they are not correct about how it is contracted. Overall Philadelphia is an excellent movie that may actually be the only movie on this list that taught me something.



4. A Civil Action
Last year in Chemistry, we watched this film. Now to think of it, I have not the slightest idea why. It may be because there was about one and a half minutes about how to find evidence using chemistry, but I'm not entirely sure. Anyway, I liked this movie because it demonstrated how hard it really is to be a lawyer. Before I watched this movie, I thought lawyers just had to pass the BAR test and then audition for a job on Law & Order: SVU. Apparently there is a lot more to that. It starts out as a town that is extremely bereft because of the deaths that have been taking place in the town. The town suspects that it is the terrible water filtering system because some company dumps waste into it. So a huge vendetta takes place between the suffering families and the company about if the water was the cause. John Travolta, the head of a law firm, undergoes a (I think) 30 million dollar investigative plan. The worst part -- they lose the case! The good guys lose, and lose all of their money! And as much as I disagree with the ending, there was an evident and tacit reason it ended that way; to demonstrate how difficult it really is to win a case. Overall there was really no reason to watch this movie unless I was taking some kind of law-firm class, but it's okay because I liked it anyway.




3. The Amistad
One of Jasper's favorite things to do was just to, "kick back and chill." Although I did not learn as much as I would have hoped in Honors U.S. History I, I sure did learn a lot about great movies and girls basketball. And La Amistad, of course. I mean, this is the one thing I remember that actually interested me that entire year. It was a great story where America must find out where a ship named La Amistad had come from, after the slaves had taken the ship over and come to the shore off of the Atlantic. The problem is that the Africans were very jejune when they tried communicating with the Americans because there was no common dialect nor enough evidence to show that these were slaves that were illegally transported. I did get a lot out of this movie, though. In a world where blacks and whites are not supposed to get along or like each other, the lawyer overcomes this stereotype and does everything that he can to give enough evidence that these men are from Africa and exculpate them. Many people at the time thought of these Africans as just lilliputans who were worth nothing, but they showed in the end that they were full of courage and strength and could step up and prove themselves. Overall, probably 3/5 stars. But for a movie that is being shown in school, that is extremely good.




2. Saving Private Ryan
Well I don't know if this one counts; I saw it on a bus on a school field trip. But I really could not leave this movie out, because it is just a special movie (and not to mention Tom Hanks' second appearence on this list). One thing that I remember Mr. Jasper saying is that it is much easier to teach U.S. Hist II than Hist. I because there are more pictures and video to use to explain to the students. Well, this could not serve as a better example. Even the first two minutes showed me that I was not at all as erudite to the subject as I previously assumed. D-Day had always seemed a little blasé to me in the classroom. The film really emphasised the difficulties taht a lot of these men went through during war, and that the war was tough for everybody. The soldiers who went in and saved Private Ryan were really hurculean characters, even risking their lives for this one man. The excitement of it also never made me take my eye off of the screen also. Awesome movie.




1. Office Space
Last, but most certainly not least, Office Space. A lot of people may ask, "How could this be even somewhat related to a school subject?" or, "Are rated R movies even allowed to be played in classes?" Well, I don't know, and I don't care. Office Space is by far the best in-school movie I have ever seen, and still one of my favorite movies to date. In 10th grade, my International Business Firm teacher, Flynn, had a baby and was out for the rest of the year. Fortunately we had a much more sophisticated teacher, Ms. Tacne. Tac was not trying to be a malevolent person by showing us this; she wanted to show us a great movie that involved business (to some extent). The Movie is basically about these three guys who act as sinecures all day, doing nothing but going out and getting coffee and not work. This movie taught me a lot about International Business. First, it taught me that Tacne is the coolest teacher ever (omitting the lovely english teacher who will be grading these blogs in about a month). It also taught me that a cubicle can be an extremely horrible place, full of TPS reports, broken copying machines and Human Resource Directors.

So there you have it. If my principal found out that we watched most of these movies in school he'd probably have to take a soporific item in order to get him asleep at night.

The Interesting parts of an interview

I did something very interesting this week, which was to interview a veteran. He told us a lot about the war, and was very clear about it; he was only 92. We had to use it for some Social Studies project, but I really feel like I did not get to mention a lot of the interesting things that he told us during the interview. We had to look for more of facts about the war rather than the interesting things that happened. I felt like I could not get all of that out onto my paper because I really was more interested in this stuff than what was required for the assignment. So I wanted to mention a lot of interesting things that I did not think many people did at the time.


The first thing that piqued my attention was that he was not drafted into the war; he volunteered. He explained to us that the reason he did was because he knew that they were going into war, and thought that if he volunteered, he would be able to have as many options as he wanted. He made a good point that he did not want to become a ground soldier, and could go into any area that he so chose to. I thought this was worthy of note because from what I have learned and heard, most kids and parents were afraid of joining the military and would rather have been at risk being drafted in than volunteering. I mean, here's a terrible analogy: being in a plane is a sinecure job as to being a soldier on the ground. Also, it seemed to pay off for him, because he was able to finish his last year of college, something he said was very important to him and his family for his entire life. He was very smart because he knew that he might have to sleep with fear of not being alive next morning on the ground. You gotta remember that planes also subjugated wars, so he had a just as important job too. In the long run, the decision that he made to volunteer and become an officer was probably an excellent decision.


Another thing I noticed during the interview was that he always focused on the positive things that were happening on the Pacific Theatre. For example, when I asked him how he was able to keep his moral up despite terrible conditions, he only spoke about the advantages that he had compared to everyone else, and how he, “had it good,” despite the fact that they were mal-nutritional and were not sleeping in their beds at home at night. I mean, reconnoitering areas where you could get shot down with just one pellet hitting a plane seems a little more scary to me. It just seemed like he felt he was so lucky to be in a “great” condition instead of other people. He stayed in the officers’ tents, which they served beer and peanuts to them, as well as being able to stay far away from the fighting every night, so he did not have to worry about being bombed in the middle of the night as well. He said that his job was the best, because you had so show up in the island that they were bombing about for about half an hour, bomb what they could on the ground, and turn back and return home and their job was over. He even said that he was lucky to fly a B-24, because unlike other airplanes that could only land on carriers, he had the fortune of being able to land only on the ground and on islands. In my opinion, I could not even imagine being in his position during World War II. Apparently, however he considers himself lucky that he was in that condition.


Another thing that he told us that was very interesting was his first return home. Right after his first battle in war, he returned to his home in Missouri to visit. He saw old friends who cheated getting in the draft by doing this trick where you would smoke a cigarette prior to having an x-ray, and it would look like you had too much fluid in your lungs. While his friends at home laughed and were proud of what they did, he was furious. I thought that this was interesting because he was in the war, and could not believe that they were just taking complete advantage of the others who got drafted in. I mean he was trying to be resilient and become adjusted again to normal conditions, and then he finds out that he may have been able to cheat this the entire time. I never thought of this before he told me it; I knew there were people who did everything they could to get out, but I did now know what other soldiers who were in the army thought of it. It was very interesting to hear how rightfully angry he was that some people were fighting for the people who got out of it, and stayed at home and got married instead. Staying at home was like a mecca to these you teenagers who could be drafted in, and everybody wanted to stay here. This is really something that makes you think about what you would have done if you had a chance of being drafted in World War II.


The most interesting thing that he told us was his life after the war. Before returning home and becoming an FBI agent, he was asked on a special mission from the army for the next couple months. He could have returned if he wanted to, but he and his entire crew that was left (everybody but one person) stayed and joined him in this mission. So he was on hiatus from his family for about a year doing work for the government. Not only does it demonstrate the amount of trust and loyalty the entire crew had for each other, but it also demonstrates how much of a important task that they had. Jeez, I wish I had friends like that. He told us that even his wife and kids do not know what he did, and that no reporter has ever been given permission to talk about it. This was extremely captivating because none of us had a clue about what he did in his top-secret mission given to them by the government. All I knew was that he did something in China during the time.


So overall this was an awesome experience. I really found most of the stuff that I didn't need to know more interesting though and got a cool experience with being able to talk to him. I also just got an egg-drop project for Honors Physics due some time in March (I think), so don't be surprised to hear from me soon about how my egg dropped like a bomb and exploded everywhere.

Si yo no estuviera en esta clase... qué estaría haciendo yo?

Should there be cap salaries for Major League Baseball?

While many baseball fans in New York are ebullient for the baseball season this year, the entire rest of the country may not be. This year, the Yankees have spent over half a billion dollars on players, the most money ever used by a private team in professional sports. The problem is while the MLB deems this imprimatur, and allows for it to be printed and done. A high percentage of their team have proven themselves worthy of being deemed all stars, and their contracts prove that true also.

Question: Why don't other teams just spend more money on players like the Yankees have done?

Answer: These teams to not have close to the salary that the Yankees can afford, creating a big choler towards the Yankees. For example, the left side of the Yankees infield makes more money than the majority of other Major League teams are able to afford. Yearly, the left side of their infield, Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez, make approximately 42 million dollars combined. The majority of other teams in the Major Leagues have had to cede the opportunity of taking all star players because the salaries they can afford is about $2 million less than what the left side of the Yankees infield is paid. And fans have two different opinions on this action taken by the Yankees: whether this is a perfidy that they have taken advantage of, or if it is beneficial for the fans.

Let's look at the negative standpoint first. Many people think that the Yankees have taken advantage of the high salary that they are able to afford, and have created an all star team that can't lose. This, in one respect, is true. They have more money than any other team in Major League Baseball, and have a ten times bigger budget than about 6 other teams in the MLB. And why? Because they can. I wonder if they had even scrupled as to whether or not what they are doing is wrong, and if they should back off of some of these players. Most teams can only afford one all star, while the Yankees not only have what I assume to be four of the best pitchers in the league, but another nine great players in the field also.

Some people in contrast say that it is just a waste of money because the Yankees management really does not know how a player will do every year. Playing in New York is almost an anathema, which I like to call the "New York City factor." The "New York City factor" is the pressure of performing baseball in the area of New York City. Unlike many other areas in the country, there is no place where baseball is talked about so much. Over sixteen newspapers write articles about the Yankees every game, castigating every wrong move performed by the players. Many acclaimed "all stars" have come to New York City to play, and have not been able to remain sang-froid due all of the pressure that is put on them.

However, many people do not think that what the Yankees did was a bad thing at all. Although the Yankees have been disparaged by many people, they know all that matters is becoming a World Series Champion by the end of the year. There is no salary cap for a reason, and the Yankees took that into consideration and did nothing illegal or wrong. They simply signed great players with the money they have. They were malcontent of the result of the team last year (not making the playoffs), and decided that they were going to get better players who are very consistent every year. Besides, they have another huge budget to pay off; the new stadium. With better players and more all stars, more fans will want to attend games to watch the players perform.

Also, the Devil Rays have proven last year that one is able to win despite having hardly and budget to work with. With the smallest budget in the MLB (about 24 million), they were able to make it to the World Series. They had the best record in the Major Leagues and became the parvenu of baseball. Therefore, it is always possible for a team with a small budget to come out on top.

I do not know whether or not what the Yankees did was good or bad, however I am excited to see how it plays out. They have had many stars come to play on their team before who could not stand the pressure very well and played poorly there. Although the Yankees look supercilious to the rest of the Major Leagues, they may not be just as good as they previously thought.