I AM MOST THANKFUL FOR....

The secret life...revealed.

You are Rosaleen. Write a note to your friend in Monroe and tell her a little bit about what you've been doing lately.  Remember to assume the character's voice.  (Due:  THURSDAY, November 11, 2010, 10 a.m.)

The fog rose around the old mansion....

There is something howling, and a creaking door.  The air is damp and chills the bone.  All of these sensory details set the scene for a scary experience in literature.  Below, write the first three paragraphs of a story. Be sure to send the message that this will be a scary one, by offering sensory details that will make it clear that this is going to be bloody.

Journals #63-65

#63: Identify your favorite restaurant and explain in detail why you like it.  Or do the same for your least favorite restaurant.


#64 is a free write.


#65: Many poems are simple descriptions, or images, of ordinary things, or moments. Find inspiration in this room or building, locker, home… anywhere, and write a short poem using descriptive language. Here is an example of an imagist section of a poem:
I walk along a street, returning
at midnight from my unit. Meet a man
leaning against an illumined wall
and ask him for a light.
His open eyes
stay fixed on mine. And cold rain falling
trickles down his nose, his chin.
"Buddy," I begin...and look more closely--
and flee in horror from the corpse's grin.

JOURNALS 57-62

Here are your journal assignments 57-62

57:  Free write.

58:  Ten things I do (or don't do) when I'm depressed. 

59:  Comin' Thro the Rye -- what does it mean?
Comin Thro' The Rye



O, Jenny's a' weet, poor body,
Jenny's seldom dry:
She draigl't a' her petticoatie,
Comin thro' the rye!
Comin thro' the rye, poor body,
Comin thro' the rye,
She draigl't a' her petticoatie,
Comin thro' the rye!


Gin a body meet a body
Comin thro' the rye,
Gin a body kiss a body,
Need a body cry?
Gin a body meet a body
Comin thro' the glen,
Gin a body kiss a body,
Need the warl' ken?
Gin a body meet a body
Comin thro' the grain;
Gin a body kiss a body,
The thing's a body's ain.

60:  Attempt to analyze this Emily Dickinson poem. What may be her message?

The Body grows without—

The more convenient way—
That if the Spirit—like to hide
Its Temple stands, alway,
Ajar—secure—inviting—
It never did betray
The Soul that asked its shelter
In solemn honesty

61:  If you were to re-title The Cather in the Rye what would you name it and why?

62:  Describe a smell that reminds you of childhood.  Explain why.

Journal #56 -- Who are you?

Read the poems. Explain the message in each. What do they have in common? How are they different? Write your own version of one of these poems, attempting to answer the question:  Who are you?




But someday


But someday, somebody'll


stand up and talk about me


and write about me


black and beautiful


and sing about me


and put on plays about me!


I reckon it'll be


me myself!


Yes, it'll be me.


-Langston Hughes





I'm Nobody


I'm nobody! Who are you?


Are you nobody, too?


Then there's a pair of us - don't tell!


They'd banish us, you know.






How dreary to be somebody!


How public like a frog


To tell your name the livelong day


To an admiring bog!


-Emily Dickinson

Journal #54 and #55 -- -- March 4 and 5

Journal #54 -- Identify three songs that you feel apply to Catcher in the Rye. Quote the lyrics in the song that apply and explain why it connects (in more than three sentences for each song).


Journal #55:  You are on a small rowboat in the middle of a storm.  Your oars have fallen overboard and because of the rain and the wind, you cannot see them or retrieve them.  The only person with you is an eight year old child, a sibling, relative or child of a friend.  There is only one life jacket.  Who gets it and why?  Write your response in poetry form.  :)

Journal entry #53 - March 2, 2010

Journal #53: Personification is a valuable tool because being humans, we have a tendency to relate to body language and emotion that mimics our own actions. When using personification, be fully aware of how the imagery affects the tone of the poem. If you are trying to convey a dark feeling, you wouldn't uses images like "The butterflies danced in a circle of wind," but you could use the butterflies and say, “The butterflies kept vigilance of the garden, and they sliced the wind with their wings."


For the following words, use personification to describe the objects.

The ocean

A car

The wind

An unfinished poem

A roach

The curtains

Example for the above: The ocean sways his hips to the monotonous hum of the steady wind.

Journal for Friday 2/26-March 1

Journal #52 – Read the two poems. Paraphrase the message in each. Which is more powerful? Explain why and use specific examples from the text.



My Dead Wife
My tears swell as I think of her beauty,

Everything reminds me of her,

Tears fall from my eyes when

Thinking of her soft skin and eyes azure.

Her belongings taunt me,

They fill me with despair,

She was in my arms,

Now she is as solid as this frigid air.


Poem #2

The Piercing Chill I feel

The piercing chill I feel:

my dead wife's comb, in our bedroom,

under my heel...

---Translated by Harold G. Henderson.

Two poetry journals, #50 and #51, due February 23 and 24.

Journal #50


Mending Wall by Robert Frost

Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it
And spills the upper boulders in the sun,
And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
The work of hunters is another thing:
I have come after them and make repair
Where they have left not one stone on a stone,
But they would have the rabbit out of hiding
To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,
No one has seen them made or heard them made,
But at spring mending-time we find them there.
I let my neighbor know beyond the hill;
And on a day we meet to walk the line
And set the wall between us once again.
We keep the wall between us as we go.
To each the boulders that have fallen to each.
And some are loaves and some are so nearly balls
We have to use a spell to make them balance:
"Stay where you are until our backs are turned!”
We wear our fingers rough with handling them.
Oh, just another kind of outdoor game,
One on a side. It comes to little more:
There where it is we do not need the wall:
He is all pine and I am apple orchard.
My apple trees will never get across
And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.
He only says, “Good fences make good neighbors.”
Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
If I could put a notion in his head:
“Why do they make good neighbors? Isn't it
Where there are cows? But here there are no cows.
Before I built a wall I'd ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out,
nd to whom I was like to give offense.
Something there is that doesn't love a wall
That wants it down.” I could say “Elves” to him,
But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather
He said it for himself. I see him there,
Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
e moves in darkness as it seems to me,
Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
He will not go behind his father's saying
And he likes having thought of it so well
He says again, “Good fences make good neighbors.”

Notes:

The wall that the poet refers to is made of rocks. Every year, moisture gets between the cracks and gradually as it freezes and thaws, expands and contracts, the wall falls down. The subject of his poem is the annual mending of the stone wall.


In your journal:

1. Why does the narrator think that “we do not need the wall”?
2. Why would the narrator mend the wall if he does not like it?
3. The neighbor argues that "good fences make good neighbors." What do you think he means by this?
4. “Something there is that doesn’t love a wall.” Who and/or what are those something(s)?
5. . What simile does the speaker use near the end of the poem to describe his neighbor? What does this tell you about the speaker’s attitude toward him?
6. What do you think the wall symbolizes?
7. What is the author’s tone? What is the mood of this poem?
8. Explain the title.

JOURNAL # 51:


Haiku is a type of Japanese poetry that has seventeen syllables and just three lines. It is a short poem that captures a moment in nature. Often the last line contains a ‘surprise’ or interesting thought. Line 1 has 5 syllables, Line 2 has 7 syllables and Line 3 has 5 syllables.
Examples:

A bitter morning

Sparrows sitting together


Without any necks.



How beautifully


That kite soars up to the sky


From the small boy's hand.


Write at least one haiku poem about something you see in nature.

You're the doctor...

Have you ever known anyone like Holden?  Pretend you have agreed to become his counselor.  He's begun telling you this story of his escape from Pencey and his days in Manhattan.  What do you think is his biggest problem?  Is he healthy?  What strengths does he have?

Here are the third quarter's journal entries you should have done through February 12.

#40. The worst date ever...
#41.  The best date ever...
#42:  What three things do you do tghat may 'signal' to your firneds that you are not like everyone else?
#43:  J.D. Salinger passed away at the age of 91, having led a life in seclusion.  Based on what you've read in the novel, how do you imagine J.D. Salinger was like?
#44:  When I need the advice of an adult, I...
#45:  If you're choosing a menu for your last meal, what would it include.  Write detailed descriptions of each item.
#46:  Write two sentences describing a visit to the planet Jupiter.  In the first sentence your words should be arranged in alphabetical order.  In the second, your words must be in reverse alphabetical order.
#47:  Free write.
#48:  I wonder... start 10 sentences with these two words while revealing something about your personality in each.


BE SURE TO BRING YOUR CHAPTER 17 SUMMARY TO CLASS ON MONDAY, FEBRUARY 22.