Yohan is still reflecting upon his story. These upcoming chapters show how he is alone. He made companionships with people who are no longer in his life. It must be difficult because in order to tell his story, he has to talk about them. Bia and Santi are the two orphans that walk in and out of Yohan’s life. It is very intriguing how Yoon writes that Yohan was not used to the weight of sweaters. He writes that Yohan had not worn one since the war. It is assumed that Yohan is very thin. Sweaters should not weight heavily on people. It took Yohan a moment to find his words when speaking Korean to the sailor. This shows how he was growing accustomed to the portuguese language and living Brazil. In chapter 6, it is automatically assumed that when Yoon writes, “A girl lifted her arms and stretched, her body a blade against the light of fire, a leaping fish” that he is talking about Bia. it seems like Yohan only really connected with the orphans, the sailor, kiyoshi, Peng and Peixe. Santi and Bia must be getting abused because of the bruises that consistently appear on their face. They could be getting abused by Peixe. It is immoral for Yohan not to do anything about that. He sees that they have bruises and does not even act like he notices them. Later on in the chapter, it is revealed that Santi does hard labor. He could possibly be getting bruises from working. The end of the chapter is very sweet because Bia tells Yohan why Santi is standing on the rock. It is beautiful how she describes her dream of Santi grabbing everyone by the waist and throws them in the air. It is also heartbreaking knowing that Santi is blind and all he has is his imagination and memories (83). Yoon does not give any vivid descriptions when naming the new towns and places that Yohan has been to. He lacks the use of complete sentences and just writes names of places without saying much about them (83).
Snow Hunters Chapter 3 (Paul Yoon)
This chapter is different from the first two because Yohan is reflecting upon his experience in the war. Yoon captures the reader by starting off the chapter by saying, “There were hundreds of them.” This makes the reader wonder what he is talking about. It is then revealed that he is having flashbacks. On page 39, it seems like he is using moonlight as a metaphor for a bomb. This is because his Friend Peng becomes blind from it. Yoon writes about how Peng holds onto Yohan’s elbow while working. They converse with one another. This chapter is sad, but it is also beautiful. These two people managed to be friends while going through severe hardships. Sometimes Yohan fed Peng and slept behind him. This exemplifies true friendship. It also shows how much kindness Yohan is receiving in this novel so far. No one hates him. Peng eventually dies because his health slowly descends each day. The most interesting part of this chapter is the end when the Yoon writes, “In those times, in that vast tent in the field, there was only his voice, a steady wind, the whistle of the glass, and a story.” This sentence foreshadows how the novel is going to be about his experiences. Yahoo’s flashbacks will be a main part of this story. It also shows that Yohan is alone. There are many people he met in his life, but they are not necessarily with him today. All he has is his story. It is interesting how Yoon does not use quotation marks at all. This could be because the reader to imagine how Yohan would be saying certain things. It leaves the readers the opportunity to make their own interpretations instead of reading exact words from each character. Also, some of the people Yohan met have died, so it is not like their dialogue would exist either. Yoon is writing about Yohan’s experience with those people.
Snow Hunters Chapters 1 & 2 (Paul Yoon)
Paul Yoon wrote a very short novel. It is also small in size. This is the story about Yohan, a man who had just gotten out of a prison camp. It is revealed that Yohan went to Brazil. There is repetition throughout the first chapter about how much it is raining. People usually assume that rain connotes with negativity just because it might be the opposite of happiness and the rain drops may resemble tears. They think that sunshine and no rain is the ultimate happy setting. After reading A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway, my interpretation of rain changed. Rain is the symbol of the inevitable disintegration of happiness in life. A sailor hands Yohan an umbrella which is an act of kindness. Even though the Korean war had just ended, it seems like Brazil is filled with good things for Yohan. Being in Brazil with kind people is a lot better than being a prisoner in Korea. I do not know much about history of the Korean war, but obviously when someone is going through battle, it changes their perspective on life and it can damage them sometimes. Yohan makes friends, including Kioshi, a Japanese tailor. They laugh together as the farmer’s wives flirt with him. There seems to be a lot of diversity so far. It is interesting how Japanese and Korean men are just bonding together in Brazil. This reflects upon Yoon’s imagination. It allows us to ignore history and just read the story and focus more on Yohan’s life, rather than what actually would have happened to prisoners after the Korean war.
Nawabdin Electrician
The story talks about a man named Nawab who slows down electric meters to cheat an electric company. It takes place in Pakistan. It is assumed that the author might be from Pakistan because of all his knowledge of the culture. Daniel Mueenuddin talks about how Nawib had thirteen children. Reading this seems like maybe Mueenuddin might have seen people who have struggled with a lot of children or maybe he experienced this himself. The beginning of the second paragraph on page 14 says, “Unfortunately or Fortunately,” to begin talking about Nawib’s family situtation. Those first few words foreshadow that maybe Nawib tends to have some sort of luck or something good happens to him because of his huge family. Usually people with that many children have to be very mindful of how they spend their money. I would think that it would be hard to financially support a family as large as that, unless you were rich. This foreshadows how Nawib is a lucky man who is able to obtain a motorcycle just by telling his boss that he needs one. In America, that is very unlikely to happen. The pakistani culture seems to be extremely different from the post-industrial world that Americans live in. We have cars, buses, trains, planes, ect. Nawib only had a bike to get to work until he asked for a motorcycle. Obviously, there are people in America who cannot afford vehicles. However, in this story, Nawib seems to make a successful life for himself. On page 18, in the beginning the second paragraph it says, “‘Hello, my love, my chicken piece, he said tenderly that evening.'” I am not sure if the word “tenderly” is supposed to be a pun, but I noticed that him using the words chicken piece to describe his wife seems unusual. He is referring his wife as a piece of meat. Maybe this term is common for that culture, but it seems as if he is dehumanizing her. The Pakistani culture is represented throughout the whole story. An example of this is on page 20, when Mueenuddin talks about the ghee cooking on the griddle.
Ysrael by Junot Diaz
The story is a memoir from an unidentified character because the subtitle says ‘my story’ and the narrator’s name is never revealed. It is assumed that the colmado that the narrator refers to is a store because in the first paragraph he was talking about how they went there for an errand and his uncle got a beer. Yunot Diaz might be the narrator but it is not revealed if he is or not. It is assumed that the boys in the story are Hispanic because of all the Spanish words used. They are also living in Santa Domingo. On page 88, the narrator introduces Ysrael who’s name is the title of the story. The most intriguing part of this story is when the author talks about how Ysrael is wearing a mask. This pulls the reader in because they do not reveal why he wears the mask until page 95. Ysrael is nice to Rafa and his brother by pointing the way to where the water would be in the mountains. Rafa comes off as very envious and mean. His envy is very clear on page 95 when the narrator asks Ysrael where he got his kite. He says that his father got it for him and Rafa frowns because his father barely sends them anything. He is mean as a defense mechanism. Instead of ignoring his feelings about the kite, he makes a mean comment. He says, “What the hell are you wearing that mask for, anyway?” It is very immature of him. He changes the subject by pointing out Ysrael’s flaws. He then insults American doctors because he probably does not want Ysrael going to America. He is jealous. He also probably does not want Ysrael to get his face fixed. It is very selfish and makes his jealousy clear. In the end, when Rafa ripped off Ysrael’s mask, it is revealed that a pig bit off his face. It is interesting how the narrator is always following Rafa and never defending Ysrael. This shows that the narrator might be insecure as well. Ysrael is seen as ugly on the outside, but he is a better person than Rafa. Ysrael might have a reason to be bitter and mean, but he is more composed than Rafa is.
Excerpts from Requiem 1935-1940
The poem starts off with an epigraph. The epigraph represents being solitary. The use of the word survivor foreshadows hardships that might be shown in the poem. The place where a “preface” would be, has a very depressing poem. It says, “In the terrible years of the Yezhov terror I spent seventeen months waiting in line outside the prison in Leningrad. Nikolai Yezhov was a member of the communist party of the Soviet Union. He was head of the NKVD which was a law enforcement agency under the Soviet Union. Joseph Stalin was the leader during this time. The “Great Purge” occurred during this time which consisted of millions of executions and imprisonments. The author of the poem was standing outside of the jail for two years. She recalls her experience making it seem terrible. There is nothing cheerful about this first “preface”. The beginning of the prologue says, “That was a time when only the dead could smile.” This line is heart wrenching because people who lived through that terror thought they would be better off dead. They did not want to live through it anymore. The first excerpt talks about how someone was taken away from the poet. The use of the word “dead” was reiterated to show how solemn the poet felt during this time, recalling someone she knew in 1935. The second excerpt is about a woman who is alone without her husband and son. It is clear now that all of these excerpts are about experiences during the Joseph Stalin era. There are eleven excerpts. The epilogue is the longest. The diction being used relates to the subject of pain. Those two years spent outside of the jail were very painful for the poet. The use of the words broken, death, wounded, tortured, teardrops, poor, and snatched are all used in the epilogue. These words all have negative connotations.
The River-Merchant’s Wife: A Letter
The culture that is being reflected here is Japanese. This is clear because of the use of the word Chokan in the first stanza. The author is clearly reflecting upon her childhood in the first stanza because of the first line. She says, “While my hair was still cut across my forehead” Usually, that haircut is resembled on children. She starts off with a meditative tone. After the poem ends, it says that it was translated by Ezra Pound. The title gives away the fact that this was a letter intended for the river-merchant. His wife obviously wrote this letter because it says that in the title. The two met when they were little. The first line of the second stanza says, “At fourteen I married My Lord you” which shows that this letter was written during a time period where children getting married was normal. The wife lowers her head and looks at the wall which shows that she is shy and does not want to look at her husband. She is a young girl and she obviously felt a little uncomfortable getting married so young. Not giving eye contact makes it seem like the wife is just uncomfortable by the idea of being married. The tone becomes solemn in the fourth stanza when the wife begins to talk about how the river-merchant departed. In the fourth line of the fourth stanza it says, “The monkeys make sorrowful noise overhead.” The use of the word sorrowful shows how sad the wife was when she left. Monkeys are animals that cling to their mothers until adulthood. This line can be interpreted that the river-merchant impacted many people including the monkeys. They did not want him to leave. The second to last stanza says that the river-merchant dragged his feet when he left which shows that he did not want to.
Jacklight
A jacklight is a portable light that is usually used for hunting at night. The poem begins with an epigraph. It talks about how the Chippewa word is used for flirting and hunting game. These two concepts are depicted in this poem. The hunters and animals are two groups that connotate with the relationship between man and woman. The Native Americans hunted for game, which relates to the sexual desires that men have for women and vise versa. Men can “hunt” for their prey (women). Chippewa is a group of Native Americans, so the hunters in this poem are probably Native American as well. Erdrich uses assonance when she repeats the lines, “we have come to the edge of the woods, out of brown grass where we slept, unseen” Does she repeat these lines because she is trying to stress a certain idea? Is she trying to say that no matter how well women hide, men will still catch them? It seems as if she is saying that women lack safety. Does Erdrich feel as if most men take advantage of women? The last two lines are very interesting because maybe the author is trying to say that the two genders should reverse their roles. It seems like she is saying that women should no longer fear men that they do not know and assume they are dangerous. Sadly, in society today, women have to assume that all men are dangerous based on the numerous amount of sexual assaults that happen in the world. She repeats the word “smell” eight times. Is she trying to say that the hunters have a certain aroma that gives off bad vibes for the people in fear?
The Pillow Book
The author, Sei Shonagon, is reflecting upon the Japanese culture. This excerpt is translated to English. Her observations were made in Japan because she talks about her experience with Yukinari and other people with Japanese names. China is mentioned a couple of times in this excerpt which shows how much of an influence they had on Japanese culture. Shonagon is clearly a lady in waiting because she mentions her experience at court. This excerpt mostly consists of what happened when she met Yukinari. I am curious to know whether Yukinari and Shonogan fell in love with each other. She says, “You can never love an ugly woman” which makes me wonder if Yukinari thinks that she is ugly or ends up falling for her anyway. Shonagan comes off as insecure because she calls herself ugly and feels as if Yukinari would not love her.
There are four short poems. They are written as fragments, rather than complete sentences which means that the poetry might be ancient. It is allegorical, because the poems do not seem relevant to Shonagon’s experience of meeting Yukinari. The free verse poetry depicts how Shonagon decided to modernize the traditional form of poetry. She rambles her observations of what she sees in everyday life. Her descriptions of what she sees are very sophisticated. One of the poems consists of a list of things she finds adorable. It is clear how traditional the poem is because she mentions that she finds “the face of a child drawn on a melon” to be adorable. Now a days, people do not normally see that. One of the things that Shonagon finds rare is a “servant who is pleasant to his master,” which is interesting because masters were existent in early-modern Japan. Shonagon’s observations are very well written and vivid. She wrote all of her thoughts down, which was surprising to me because of how restricted the lives of Japanese women were in court during this era. The excerpt has a humorous tone. ‘Things that Make One’s Heart Beat Faster” is right before Shonagan talks about Yukinari which shows that her placement might mean that she develops feelings for him later in the memoir. This excerpt is interesting because it so personal and lets readers know how Japanese women actually felt during this era. Shonagan’s observations are very complex because she does not just write what she sees. She describes things to give readers very vivid pictures in their minds.
chagerma 