Who're you, outsider?

     "Who're you, outsider? / Ask me who am I."  The last two lines from Langston Hughes' "Visitors to the Black Belt" sums up how I assume natives feel in tourist land.  Countries like Mexico and Jamaica, where poverty and drugs are prevalent, are huge tourist traps.  People come to the country to stay at a resort and pretend like they understand the culture.  They might pick up a few words in the native tongue of the country and repeat them to the natives, feeling like they now can connect so well to their culture.  The resorts are safe and blind the visitors to what's really going on in the country.  Tourists might get glances of what life is like while taking a tour bus from one sight to the next, but their exposure to the truth is limited, and they can continue to pretend that the country is beautiful and tropical, void of problems.
     Even I can't pretend like I know what it's like to live permanently in a poverty stricken country.  I go for a mission trip, get exposure to the culture and the true living conditions of most people, and leave a week later, back to my safe home in America.  We can talk about "across the railroad tracks" (line 2) or "up in Harlem," (line 6) as Hughes points out, but we can't truly know what life is like--because we are outsiders.
     Hughes poem is somewhat of a reality check for privileged people like myself, who haven't ever had to experience poverty or poor living conditions firsthand.  But Hughes isn't asking for pity in his poem; he isn't asking for us to go home and report the poor conditions for others' sympathy.  His question is simple: "Ask me who am I."  He's wants us to ask, but more importantly to listen.

Come and See

     This is the second time I have read Their Eyes Were Watching God this year, and I still can't decide whether or not I like Tea Cake.  I was wary of him toward the beginning of he and Janie's relationship.  He seemed too good to be true.  Then he left for long periods of time with no explanation--other than gambling--but he didn't seem to slip up anywhere else.  However, in chapter 17 he beat Janie, and with that event my respect for him dropped significantly.  I don't like the idea Tea Cake had of owning Janie, like she was an object.  "Being able to whip her reassured him in possession" (147).  It sounded all too familiar to the trophy wife Joe Starks wanted her to be, and nothing more.  The second Janie showed signs of rebellion, he would verbally abuse her and put her back in her place.  The way that Janie acted after he beat her also displeased me, because Tea Cake knew that he now had the power in the relationship.  All he had to do was suck up to her a little and "the helpless way she hung on him made men dream dreams" (147) and even made the women jealous--of an abusive relationship!!

     Tea Cake won a few brownie points back when he saved Janie from the dog, but not enough to win me over completely.  Especially because he then tries to kill her.  I know that he was mad out of his mind with rabies, but it still bothered me that he would try to shoot his wife.  However, Janie loved him deeply, and that made him somewhat lovable in my eyes.  The way she speaks of him makes it almost impossible not to like him, or at least see him from her eyes.  Here is one of my favorite quotes about Tea Cake:

          "He drifted off into sleep and Janie looked down on him and felt a self-crushing love.  So her soul crawled out form its hiding spot" (128).

     It's obvious that Janie has never loved another man the way that she loves Tea Cake, with a "self-crushing" love.  She is willing to sacrifice for him because she loves him so much.  At the very end of the book, this love is shown again with the beautiful imagery and personification of the horizon.  I love these last lines, and I don't think any of my words could ever do them the justice they deserve, so I will just leave them here:

          "Tea Cake, with the sun for a shawl.  Of course he wasn't dead.  He could never be dead until she herself had finished feeling and thinking.  The kiss of his memory made pictures of love and light against the wall.  Here was peace.  She pulled in her horizon like a great fish-net.  Pulled it from around the waist of the world and draped it over her shoulder.  So much of life in its meshes!  She called in her soul to come and see" (193).

Hair and Freedom

     Throughout Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie's hair has served as a symbol of her freedom, or lack thereof.  Joe made her keep it wrapped up when they were together, because he noticed men staring at it and even trying to touch it.  However, once Joe dies, Janie is able to wear her hair down--she is free.  But in chapter 11, we have the scene with Tea Cake combing Janie's hair.  On one hand, we recognize the freedom Janie now has because of the fact that a man (other than Joe) is able to touch her hair.  But on the other hand this scene foreshadows the power Tea Cake will have over her.  By power, I don't necessarily mean domineering, cruel,  or suppressive power, but rather power over Janie's emotions.  The next morning, this foreshadowing begins to manifest itself in Janie's thoughts:
          "All the next day in the house and store she thought resisting thoughts about Tea Cake.  She even ridiculed him in her mind and was ashamed of the association.  But every hour or two the battle had to be fought all over again.  She couldn't make him look like just any other man to her.... He was a glance from God" (106).
     With Tea Cake now in the picture, Janie begins to lose her freedom in the sense of independence.  She is no longer satisfied to be alone because she wants to be with Tea Cake.  She falls so deeply in love with him that the power she once had over her own emotions begins to deteriorate, and is replaced with a dependency on Tea Cake and his affection for her.

The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

     Poor J. Alfred Prufrock.  This man seems to have a pretty crappy life.  He's super insecure, suffering from unrequited love, has social paralysis, and greatly lacks confidence.  At the beginning of the poem, he is already aware that what he is about to say is basically meaningless; the girl he wishes to share his feelings with will never know them or share them with him.  In lines 8 and 9, "Streets that follow like a tedious argument / of insidious intent" suggest that he is already tired of what he is about to say.  He himself doesn't even want to hear it, which leaves us, the readers, wondering why he's even saying it.
     You know how when someone has a bad breakup and can't quite get closure, so they write a letter to their ex-partner, but then never actually give it to them but end up burning it?  I think that's pretty much what J. Alfred Prufrock is doing in this poem.  He constantly questions himself, "Do I dare / Disturb the universe?"  He wonders if sharing his feelings is worth his time.  As he begins to pity himself more, "No!  I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be; / Am an attendant lord, one that will do / To swell a progress," (lines 111-113) we come to understand that he sees himself not as the main character--the one who the story is about, the one that everyone is looking at--but just an "attendant lord," someone seemingly unimportant in the background.
     At the very end, Prufrock is awakened from his trance.  If even for a second he thought he might give this letter to the woman he loves, or share his feelings with her in person, he now knows that was completely ridiculous.  The last stanza, "We have lingered in the chambers of the sea / By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown / Till human voices wake us, and we drown," relates to the idea of Greek mythology and sirens, where sailors get drowned by sirens who lure them in with beautiful singing.  Prufrock relates himself to a man that has been lured in by the song.  The song being the idea that this woman he loves would ever know his feelings and reciprocate them.  But in the end, he is awakened from this seemingly ridiculous thought, and drowns in the reality that he will never be with her. 

Sunday Morning

     Although "Sunday Morning" by Wallace Stevens seems to be questioning and critiquing Christian theology, I think the speaker in the poem may be onto something, and may even have a stronger grasp on what Christian theology truly hopes for than most Christians who set their eyes on "heaven."  In line 76, the question is posed: "Is there no change of death in paradise?"  The speaker is concerned with the fact that in the after life, everything is still, stagnant, unchanging.  Where on Earth humans could move about, have passions and emotions, enjoy the seasons, in the heaven that is so often described by the Church and Christians, everything seems to stay the same.  This concerns the speaker--especially the fact that people sit in wait of this as their desired future.  "Death is the mother of beauty; hence from her, alone, shall come fulfillment to our dreams and desires" (lines 63-65).

     It's somewhat humorous to me that Christians, who so adamantly claim that God created the earth, are so willing and ready to leave it.  Christians, who fight for pro-life rights, recognize humans as precious, believe life is sacred, focus so much on their own death. They essentially await their death in order to be with God, in order to be fulfilled.

     But Stevens seems to be giving an alternative to death: life.  Line 19 he says,
   
          Shall she find not comforts of the sun,
          In pungent fruit and bright, green wings, or else
          In any balm or beauty of the earth
          Things to be cherished like the thought of heaven?

     The speaker is suggesting that life needs to be lived; the beauty of the earth we live on is a gift, and should be cherished like the thought of heaven is cherished by those longing to be there already.  Although Steven's ideas about "heaven" may be informed by some bad theology, he offers a good suggestion to those who live (or wish to die) by those beliefs.

Good Fences Make Good Neighbors

     "Mending Wall" by Robert Frost validated some feelings that I have about neighbors and people in general.  It seems to me that people try as much as possible to avoid one another and be alone rather than get to know each other and live in community--which is something I am just as guilty of as anyone.  I have heard the phrase "good fences make good neighbors" before and thought it was kind of rude.  Because essentially what is being said is that good neighbors stay away.  Frost seems to share the same belief as I do.  He wants to question this old folkism.  In line 28, he begins,
          Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
          If I could put a notion in his head:
          "Why do they make good neighbors?...."
     He goes on to talk about how he and his neighbor don't have cows to keep out of each other's yard, they only have trees.  In doing so, Frost is challenging those who are cemented in their old ways; his neighbor certainly seems to be.  The neighbor is described as "bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top in each hand, like an old-stone savage armed" as he is preparing to mend the wall.  Just as he grasps firmly onto the stones, the neighbor seems to be grasping on to old ways of thinking without questioning them.  He lives by his father's motto, and doesn't think twice about the implications it has.  But Frost acknowledges "something there is that doesn't love a wall," possibly saying that there is something within him, even if he can't quite explain what it is, that doesn't like this old idea of separation and isolation.

Open Boat

     While reading "Open Boat" by Stephen Crane, I couldn't help but think about how much I am not in control of my life.  The men in the boat have no control over the seas; they are "impressed with the unconcern of the universe."  Nature was "indifferent, flatly indifferent" to their suffering (616-617).  These men couldn't get away from the fact that there was something more powerful in charge of their lives.  In our Western culture, we can deceive ourselves into thinking that we are in control of our lives, that we can control nature.  We can minimize the impact nature has on us.  That is, until the wifi goes down or a hurricane destroys an entire city.  Only when we are confronted with these drastic occurrences do we realize how small and weak we are as human beings.  This can seem extremely overwhelming if we don't have an idea of who or what is in control.  For these men, it was "the seven mad gods who rule the sea."  This was the best they could come up with in their situation.  Even though they are aware they aren't in control, one thing they do have is each other.  "It would be difficult to describe the subtle brotherhood of men that was here established on the seas.  No one said it was so.  No one mentioned it.  But it dwelt in the boat, and each man felt it warm him" (607).  This was a gift to the men--not having to die alone like the Legion soldier in Algiers.  The relationship and sense of community that was built between these men gave them hope to keep going, even if they didn't know what lie ahead for them.