Journal 37: the true cold

Quote:
“This man did not know cold. Possibly all the generations of his ancestry had been ignorant of cold, of real cold…But the dog knew; all its ancestry knew, and it had inherited the knowledge” (London 1061)

Summary:
This is a quote from the story “To Build a Fire” by Jack London. This thought appears after the man, who had managed to build a fire and eat his biscuits, decides to keep on traveling in this “real cold”. At this point the man is starting to get scared about the cold and about the numbness of his fingers but he decides to keep traveling, and the dog will follow him.

Response:

I think this quote explains the situation in which the man is right now. He basically doesn’t know what he is dealing with, and he is arrogant enough to think that the freezing cold won’t kill him. On the other hand, the dog knows, it has lived there all its life, and it knows that during such a cold weather it is supposed to hide and wait for it to pass. Thus, in this situation the man is the newcomer, and neither he nor his ancestors know anything about nature and the land where he is now.
Seeing the situation from the eyes of the dog, the man is the true ignorant, and he is totally unaware that the cold will kill him, but led by his greed, he won’t stop and think about it, he needs to move on and abandon the fire that could have saved him. Plus, the dog does not only see through the man because it compares the man’s ignorance to the ignorance of the man’s ancestors, because they were all strangers to that land, they invaded nature, and they didn’t know anything about how nature works in the Klondike.
Furthermore, like discussed in class, if we focus in the Marxist criticism, the dog would represent the Native Americans of the Klondike, and this comparison between the white man and the Native Americans would mean that even if these Native Americans had been conquered and reduced to the position of a dog, where they had to follow the white men and serve them, they still knew more than them. The Native Americans knew the land because they had lived there for hundreds of years, and this newcomer who thought was in control was just a fool who doesn’t know what he is doing, which is why at the end of the story the dog will live and the man will die.

Journal 36: Victory and loss

Quote:
“The little taste of victory did not satisfy a hunger in my heart. In my mind I saw my mother far away on the Western plains, and she was holding a charge against me” (Bonnin 1121)

Summary:
This is the end of “The School Days of an Indian Girl”. After Bonnin won a prize in the speech competition for her college, she is not totally happy because she feels she had abandoned her mother and had disobeyed her and taken a totally different path of life.

Response:

I think this moment was a very defining moment in Bonnin’s life, because before she still felt like she was in a liminal place between her Indian self and her assimilated white self. However, from this point on, she decided on her own to stay in the white people’s land and make her way through with effort and dedication, even if that meant disobeying her mother.

It is true that the taste of victory wasn’t enough to satisfy her heart, and it would have been very sad if it had satisfied the hunger in her heart. The struggle she is having between returning to her old life and staying in this new world, is the struggle that will lead to her success, because once she tasted victory she proved to herself that she was capable of making a change, that she was capable of making a difference in a world where her race was being looked down on.

Furthermore, the charge her mom would hold against her is basically her conscience telling her that she must not forget where she came from and that, even if she wins the world, she must keep her feet on earth and know that she can’t have everything. I think this charge against her is the weight of making her own decisions, because Bonnin chose to stay and continue her education, and by doing that she challenged her mother, but she can’t do anything about it, because she is choosing her own path to follow, and she must be aware of and accept the consequences.

Journal 35: Red Apples and Iron Horse

Quote:
“‘Mother; I’m going East! I like big red apples, and I want to ride on the iron horse! Mother, say yes!’ I pleaded” (Bonnin 1112)

Summary:
In the story “Impressions of an Indian Childhood” by Gertrude Bonnin, here is where Bonnin is being lured by the missioners to come with them to study in the East, which is where white people had settled in America. Here the missioners are asking Bonnin’s mother if she wants Bonnin to go study with them. At this moment Bonnin desperately wants to go with them.

Response:

This is Bonnin falling in the missionary’s hands and being lured into going to this really beautiful and different land that is full of apples and where she can still be free and enjoy life. Analyzing the symbolism of the red apple, at the moment when Bonnin pleads to her mom to let her go with the missionaries, it is clear that Bonnin bit the apple, she fell into temptation and was finally caught into this delusion of a perfect and beautiful place where she was going to have fun and experience new things. Plus, the apple is the temptation, but is Bonnin who driven by curiosity, like any other kid, is not aware of reality, she just wants to try the apple, see the world and change.

Bonnin’s words sound so eager, but at the same time they are so innocent. She is just thinking about red apples, without considering her mother’s feelings, she is totally blind by this desire of going to the unknown, of seen this different world. Also, calling a train “the iron horse” shows that she doesn’t know anything about it but what she’s heard from other people. In other words, Bonnin was just a child, with the illusion of experimenting something new, different and delightful; but the truth was far off from what she was hoping for. I think Bonnin describes herself when she was little in such a way to show us how these white men, arrived for another land, saw and conquered her world, making a change that didn’t allow going back to the same old life she used to know.

Journal 34: The pet of the class

Quote:
“The mission woman talked as she walked. She told Lae Choo that little Kim, as he had been named by the school, was the pet of the place, and that his little tricks and ways amused and delighted everyone” (Sin Far 886)

Summary:

This comment from the mission woman happens at the end of the story when Lae Choo is finally able to take her child back. This is happening in the school where “the little one” is being kept. The mission woman is leading Lae Choo to where her child is, while commenting about him.

Response:

After reading this story and reading “The School Days of an Indian Girl” by Bonnin, I can’t help but find a great similarity to the way both children are treated. First of all, “the little one” was taken to a school, was given an American name, Kim, and was “the pet” of the school. This means the baby is being assimilated into American society in ways that he cannot comprehend because he is merely a baby, and since children “so often forget”( Sin Far 886); it would be easier to assimilate him into American society. Maybe this was not the same case with little Bonnin, because when she was taken to the missionary school, she realized of what was going on and she fought against it for a while, but in the end both kids are evolving to be part of American society.

However, the real similarity is that these two kids are treated like animals. Of course in this story, Kim, the little one is “the pet” which is a more soft way of saying that they are using Lae Choo’s kid to amuse everyone and he is basically being reduced to a pet. But this is ok because he is just a little child, different from white American kids, which is so funny and entertaining for everyone. In Bonnin’s case, the logic was “kill the animal, save the man”, which is a harsh way to say that all Indian kids where little animals that needed to be converted into humans. Therefore, this similarity between both characters shows that there was a common belief about how strangers to white American society should be treated.

Journal 33: Not One hundred man good

Quote:
“Pointing to the lawyer, she cried: “You not one hundred man good; you just common white man.”/ “Yes, ma’am,” returned James Clancy, bowing and smiling ironically” (Sin Far 885)

Summary:
In the Story “In the Land of the Free”, this is Lae Choo answer to the lawyer, after she thought he was really trying to help them recover their child, but she was told that they had to pay, so she yells at him. In the end he takes for payment Lae Choo’s jewelry, and they manage to fix the paper for the child.

Response:

From this passage I can draw some conclusions about who is the “common white man”, according to Lae Choo, who reflects Bonnin’s feelings. First, Lae Choo thought the lawyer was going to help bring “the little one” back, but it was too innocent of her to think that a “common white man” would help her without seeking his own interests. Lae Choo realizes she is like every other American man, no different from the ones who took her baby away. This white man wants to bring the baby back but for a huge amount of money, which Hom Hing doesn’t have, but Clancy doesn’t care about this, because he is playing the role of proposing a solution to the couple’s problem but if they can’t pay, there is nothing he can do about it. Basically, this man has no feelings; he is only there to do business, because he knew the parents were really frustrated and hopeless about getting their baby back, so he will take advantage of this situation to make his own profit.

Furthermore, the fact that the lawyer simply answers “yes ma’am” and the smiles ironically means that he couldn’t care less about what Lae Choo thinks. He is after all a common white man, and he doesn’t care about their situation because they are the ones in trouble; he is only doing his job. Plus, the irony for him would be that he is after all white and they are the immigrants, they do not belong there, so whatever the Chinese woman says to him is meaningless. I think with this passage, Sin Far is clearly showing the position of the Chinese immigrants in the American society by that time.

Journal 32: Sin Far

Quote:

“‘This is the law,’ said he… “and ‘twill be but for a little while—until tomorrow’s sun arises”/“You, too,” reproached Lae Choo in a voice eloquent with pain, But accustomed to obedience she yielded the boy to her husband, who in turn delivered him to the first officer” (Sin Far 881)

Summary:

This quote from the story “In the Land of the Free” of Sui Sin Far happens at the beginning of the story, when Lae Choo comes back to America with Hom Hing’s child. At this moment the officers who control the entrance of people to San Francisco tell Hom Hing that the child cannot go with them because he has no papers. At this point Lae Choo refuses to let her child go, but in the end the officers take him away.

Response:

When I read this passage I really imagined a very helpless Lae Choo, it is like she was not even considered in the moment when the decision was made. She was supposed to be obedient, even if it was her child that they were taking away. When Hom Hing says “this is the law” he is resigning to his child, because there is nothing he can do about it. Maybe the officers told him that if he didn’t give the child away, his business was going to be in jeopardy, because as we saw in class the Chinese Act was passed in 1892, so anything Hom Hing did against the American law would put him and his wife in danger.

Furthermore, it is interesting how the gender roles are portrayed. The officers only talk to the father of the child and they see the wife as nothing but a burden, which is why when she takes the baby away and says that she is not going to give him away, all the officers do is talk to the husband. Thus, they are taking away all the importance the mother can have. Plus, like it is said in the passage she was “accustomed to obedience” so she had to follow the orders, she has no authority at all, which is perfectly accurate to the time the story took place.

I think Sin Far wants to portray the cruelty with which Chinese immigrants were treated during this time, and what worse cruelty that taking a baby away for his parents, just for the reason that he had “no papers”. And the way Sin Far portrays the mother, when the mother says “you too” it is like she is making the husband part of the American people, part of the injustice. Sin Far in these few lines made me understand the social, political and racist injustices made to Chinese immigrants.

Journal 31: Daisy Miller: A Study end

Quote:
“‘You were right in that remark that you made last summer. I was booked to make a mistake. I have lived too long in foreign parts.’…he went back to live at Geneva…A report that he is “studying” hard—an intimation that he is much interested in a very clever foreign lady” (James 329)

Summary:

This is the end of the story of Daisy Miller: A Study. Here, Winterbourne is talking to Mrs. Costello, saying that she was right about the Millers. After Ms. Miller death, Winterbourne went back to Geneva and went back to his normal life, where he was supposedly studying and also was having an affair with a foreign lady. Hence, nothing changed.

Response:

This ending shows how these rich people live their lives without worrying about meaningless details such as the death of Daisy. In the end Winterbourne considers the entire story a “mistake”, taking away any other possible meaning to the relationship he had with Daisy. Plus, he admits this to Mrs. Costello, who from the beginning was against the Millers, because they weren’t of status enough. In other words, Winterbourne faced this fact to and now knows that it was indeed a mistake to get involved with such a family, making the acknowledgement of Daisy just one more experience where he could learn something about American young ladies, who are actually just flirts.

It is really unclear what Winterbourne’s final thoughts about Daisy, because even though he had been thinking about her after her death and about the message she left him, it is not clear if he is really hiding the fact that he liked her or he is just thinking about the experience he had. Either way, he ends up returning to his normal life, which didn’t change at all, because he is still breaking social rules where he is interested in this foreign older lady, and he is supposedly studying really hard. I think Henry James is showing the superficiality of the world of rich people. It is just useless to think that such a gentleman as it was Winterbourne would worry too much about trivial matters such as the death of this American young lady. If he finally concludes that he made a mistake maybe it was the mistake of meeting her or liking her, but then he will not bother to think about it anymore, he will just go back to his usual life, like nothing happened.

Journal 30: Château de Chillon

Quote:
“Miss Miller looked at him a moment; and then, very placidly—“I wish you would stay with him!” she said. / Winterbourne hesitated a moment. “I would much rather go to Chillon with you.”/“With me?” asked the young lady, with the same placidity. She didn’t rise, blushing, as a young girl at Geneva would have done…” (James 398)

Summary:
In the story “Daisy Miller: A Study” by Henry James, this pretty American girl, Ms. Miller, is talking to Winterbourne about going to Château de Chillon, a castle. She is talking how she can’t go because neither her mother nor her brother want to go. At this point she is telling Winterbourne if he could stay with her brother so she could go to the castle, to which Winterbourne answers that he wants to go with her, not a very decent proposal for a young lady.

Response:

I read this story like a complete study about this young American lady, Ms. Miller. As the title says this story is a study about Daisy Miller, and it that is how I read it, because it seems to me the Winterbourne is doing everything in his power to try to understand this new woman that intrigues him, so he is studying her. In this quote I see how Winterbourne is pushing his luck with Daisy, because as he is thinking, such a proposal to go to the castle would be considered really indecent by any girl from Geneva, but not by Daisy. This is the exact moment where Winterbourne realizes that this pretty young lady is basically a flirt, but it is really confusing to not know what Daisy is thinking, on one side she could be manipulating the situation to get Winterbourne to go to the castle with her, on the other hand, she could just be like any innocent girl who wants to visit a castle and would be enchanted to have some company, rather to go alone.

However, the tone she uses while talking seems like she is truly flirting with Winterbourne. She is talking “placidly” with him, she is not nervous or worried to think that what she is doing is wrong, and she is perfectly fine with it. She might not be nervous or she might not show it, but the fact that Winterbourne a very well known gentleman doesn’t notice this means that she is in perfect control of the situation. But then again, since there is no an Omniscient narrator, I cannot know for sure that this is the situation. Henry James is putting us in the situation where we can broadly speculate of what is going on in the characters minds, and we need to get our own conclusions. Still, is really intriguing to not know exactly what Ms. Miller is thinking, because we can draw totally wrong conclusions according to our different perspectives and values.

Journal 29: The Yellow Wall-Paper

Quote:
“I am getting angry enough to do something desperate. To jump out of the window would be admirable exercise, but the bars are too strong even to try. Besides I wouldn’t do it. Of course not. I know well enough that a step like that is improper and might be misconstrued” (Perkins 818)


Summary:
This is almost the end of the story in The Yellow Wall-Paper, the main character is spending the last day in the mental institution. She has locked herself in the room and she is almost done ripping off all the yellow wall paper.

Response:

This is where I started to think that the main character is actually really crazy herself. Before, I had tried to understand why she wanted to free the woman behind the bars, why she was going delusional about the pattern in the wall paper. But to this point, I see her concepts of what is acceptable and what is not are kind of twisted. Before, thinking about jumping from the window, she had been ripping off the yellow wall-paper, and she had been seeing the creeping woman out of the room and behind the wall-paper. But here, she says that even if she could jump out of the window, she wouldn’t do it, because doing that would be “improper and might be misconstrued”. That means that everything she has done before is proper, but jumping down the window would be misunderstood by people, which means they might really think she is crazy.

Even if she locked herself in her room, even if she sees these creeping women, and she creeps herself, all this is not improper for her, but jumping off the window would be really bad. Nevertheless, leaving aside this fact, I also think that by jumping out of the window she is thinking about freeing herself, because even though she is already out of the wall-paper, she is still in the room, behind the bars. Therefore, she is also thinking about committing suicide to escape from everything, or maybe she just wants to get out of there. The problem is she is also scared of the creeping women outside the window, she is basically trapped in the room, and I think this is why she is going crazy. Being trapped in the room shows how useless her efforts to be free are. And she doesn’t have the strength nor is she able to do a desperate act.

Journal 28: I am glad my case is not serious!

Quote:

“John is away all day, and even some nights when his cases are serious. I am glad my case is not serious! But these nervous troubles are dreadfully depressing. John does not know how much I really suffer. He knows there is no reason to suffer, and that satisfies him” (Perkins 810)

Summary:
This quote is one of the main character’s thoughts about her illness when she is resting looking through the window of her room. She is explaining why John, her husband, is not with her all the time, and how she really feels about her illness, which is basically neurasthenia.

Response:

Here again, the figure of the husband appears, but this time it is an absent husband, who believes his wife is not sick, however, she is still in the mental institution, or holiday house. At this point the caring John has gone back to his normal life, where he is a physician and he is helping his patients who have serious cases. But why John would leave her alone and go back to his normal life? Basically, he is trying to hide his wife from society, since she is not sick, but she might cause trouble for him and his job.

It is really interesting how the main character talks about her illness, she says “I am glad my case is not serious!”. She puts this phrase as if she was glad her husband didn’t spend time with her, and she was happy she is alone. But also, it could be a sarcastic comment about what her husband thinks of her, she could be saying “how can my case not be serious?”. It is like she is declaring that she truly is sick but her husband doesn’t see it. Plus, it could also mean that she is glad her case is not serious so she doesn’t have to trouble her husband too much. All these possibilities could put together to understand the main character. This woman, who is supposedly sick, is been told that she is not sick, when she truly is sick, and she is taking pills for this sickness. Plus, she is starting to understand that her husband can’t help her, because he doesn’t understand; thus, she is alone with an illness that nobody but her understands.

Journal 27: Loving and caring husband

Quote:

“He is very careful and loving, and hardly lets me stir without special direction. I have a schedule prescription for each hour in the day; he tales all care from me, and so I feel basely ungrateful not to value it more” (Perkins 809)

Summary:
This quote from The Yellow Wall-Paper of Charlotte Perkins Gilman is at the beginning of the story, when the main character arrives to the resting house, which is a mental institution, and she is describing how “well” her husband takes care of her.

Response:

This is the beginning of the story and from the beginning I got the right idea about the husband. He might seem as an overprotecting husband who doesn’t want to leave her alone for the fear of what she might do or because he’s worried about her. But I think he is more worried about things she might do that would cause a bad impression to other people, hence, hurt his reputation, this is why he brought her to the mental institution. But of course she doesn’t know about it, she thinks they are taking a holiday, but the reason her husband is making her take pills every hour, and doesn’t let her “stir without special direction” shows that he wants to have total control over her.

At this point she seems like a very gullible and submissive person, she talks with so calmly that is almost sarcastic. I feel her tone of voice and the words she uses show her mental state, she totally under the spell of her husband, she thinks all he does for her is for love and with no other motive. But if I imagine Charlotte Perkins saying that I would think, they are nothing more than a joke. She is mocking the love the husband has for the main character, and she is using this sarcastic language to show how submissive and how passive a woman can sound under the total control of a husband.

It is really interesting how she says that she feels “ungrateful not to value it more”, which means she is not valuing her husband’s care because she is still sick even with all the care her husband gives her. In other words, she shouldn’t be sick because the husband takes care of her. This means the wife should be like a little child with no mind of her own and be fine as long as the husband is there to take care of her.
I think Charlotte has made a clear point with this words, about the role men and women play in a marriage.