Maus

The relationship Spiegelman has with his Jewish heritage is a strained one. He lives in the shadow of a generation that went through the most tragic hour in Jewish history, the Holocaust. He feels he can never measure up to what they had to go through and feels he will never be able to impress his father. This is most evident when he is talking to his wife on pg. 172 and states “but nothing can make him happy”. Spiegelman fears that he is in his own concentration camp living with his father especially after his mother kills herself. This is evident through the comic Prisoner on Hell Planet. Art uses himself in a prisoner uniform to show the reader that he feels trapped, much like the Jews did during WWII.
His relationship with his Jewish heritage is also strained due to the having to live in the shade of his older brother who died during the Holocaust. His believes his relationship with both his mother and father is strained because he is unable to replace his brother in his parent’s eyes. He also cannot understand why his father seems to gather everything and save it until he finds a use for it. This is an outgrowth from being in the camps were everything is a treasure and no one throws out anything. Art has a hard time learning how to adapt to how his father is and this leads to a strained relationship between father and son. Spiegelman comes to grips with his father after he passes away but still feels he is unable to fully allow himself to escape from his Jewish heritage.

Post 4

The story on the Interpreter of Maladies showed an unhappily married woman and the secret life she lived. While the taxi driver was also an interpreter at a local clinic his dream was to become an interpreter for diplomats and high ranking government officials. “In its own way this correspondence would fulfill his dream, of serving as an interpreter between nations.” This quote shows that even though his dreams of interpreting for government officials was never realized the notes he was going to write was going to serve as his release. Letting her know about India and learning about America would allow him to better understand our way of life.

When these two meet they began a short friendship that cumulates with the married woman expressing how she cheated on her husband and one of the children isn’t his. Looking for some advice the woman opens up to the taxi driver, but receives little in return. The taxi driver is at a loss of words and only tells her that honesty is the best policy. The title of the paper relates to what the woman wants. She needs someone to tell her that everything is going to be okay and here is how to fix it. While the taxi driver cannot help the woman he remembers them best by how they came together over the injury of one of the children. The Interpreter may be looked at how an outsider would view the U.S. and its moral issues. The relationship that the husband and wife have could be seen as how the U.S. is decaying morally in the eyes of strangers.

Blog #2 - Courage to Kill

Reading Eldridge Cleaver’s article on the Black Panthers, we see the type of courage it takes to stand up to an oppressor and not to be intimidated. When Mr. Cleaver first meets the Black Panther party he is amazed at their professionalism and their grit determination at what they are about to do. Knowing that carrying around weapons is a dangerous choice but one that they must take since they are arming themselves for the coming battle against the whites, the Black Panthers lend their support any way they can. The courage shown by the Black Panthers in their protection detail of Sister Betty Shabazz is amazing. Standing up to the police and knowing that they did nothing wrong but still wanting a show down with the officers, shows that the Black Panthers were ready to give their lives for the advancement of the black race. This is important because it showed they were willing to die for the advancement of future generations.
In the reading, Mr. Cleaver states that after joining the Black Panther party he continuously sees the courage that he saw that day. This courage, while at first may seem as if the person is crazy is exactly what the black community needs if they are going to rise up and have a voice in politics. The revolution is about picking up a gun against one’s oppressors and being able to withstand the possible backlashes. At the end of the reading Mr. Cleaver quotes Mao Tse-Dong in saying that “We are advocates for the abolition of war; we do not want war; but war can only be abolished through war; and in order to get rid of the gun it is necessary to pick up the gun.” This quote shows that the Black Panther party isn’t about having war but wants to end it and needs to fight the violence that they see with violence and that takes courage to kill.

Civil Disobedience

Henry David Thoreau’s piece on Civil Disobedience is about citizens of a country revolting against their rulers. While the entire piece was about going against the current practice of government in the United States, it was, as Thoreau saw it, for the betterment of America as a whole. His agreement with the phrase, “That government is best which governs least” shows that he yearns for a government that does not govern, or rule, but rather one that represents. The government should be there to discuss and argue for what the voters want instead of making laws to control the people. This idea is important because it prevents the development of dictatorships throughout the nation. He believed people should control and not be controlled.
Thoreau also calls for the American people to call out their government as being over-reaching and bending to the will of a few people and not to the majority. In other words, he wanted the government to be there for the entire populous and not for the people in each officials’ personal circle. This is important because it stops the domination of one solid idea among the nation. More people are represented which would cause a better acceptance of how the government is working.
Thoreau also talked about why the majority of a population is allowed to rule. He sees it as it is not their right but only because they are the strongest. He believes that the majority should look at their conscience and make their decisions based on that. The greatest part of the piece that Thoreau wrote is his belief in that men “should be men first and subjects afterword.” This belief agrees with his previous saying, “the smaller the government, the better the government” and shows that he believes in the individual first and the government second.

Opening

Just testing this out...