The theme of truth and reconciliation has been a prominent theme that has been discussed thoroughly these past few weeks in ASTU class. Initially when I thought about this theme, I didn’t realize the underlining meaning behind  “true” reconciliation comes from the heart. In South Africa, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission was official in 1995. This invited victims and perpetrators to tell their stories, confess, and apologize. The confessions and the remorse feeling from the perpetuators were shown but were they “real” or was it just a performance? This context of performative versus real remorse is seen in the book Disgrace by John Maxwell. The book is set in South Africa post apartheid, with its main character being a communications professor named David Lurie, who has an non consensual affair with his student Melanie Issacs. Throughout the book, he deals with his sexual desires, his court case for sexual harassment, and his relationship and traumatic event that happens with his daughter. David Lurie’s confession to the jury for his case was very significant when eyeing the performative aspect in truth and reconciliation. His confession came off as very straight forward to the jury and his voice had this sense of entitlement. David Lurie knew he could not give them what they wanted which was a confession from the heart or in other terms catharsis. He knew that he needed to perform his confession without the essence of sincerity as it was not necessary and seen as not measurable. The talk of performance was seen in the book by the lawyer recommending David to perform these external acts which won’t change him. Moha explores this theme of truth and reconciliation in the context of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa. She questions the true nature of the white people’s emotions in the hearings. She shows how their guilt is differentiated when it comes to their actions happening due deindividuation or individually. The remorse was felt when the action was done individually, however when done individually within a group the remorse was veiled.

Digging deeper into the reasoning on David’s actions with Melanie, it can be interlinked to a generation change which can be seen in Daniel’s blog. I never thought of understanding David’s train of thought by linking it to the generational gap. In accordance to Moha’s take on reconciliation, in Daniel’s blog, he explores how the term “reconciliation” in South Africa expresses how at some time there was a peace relationship between the blacks and whites in South Africa which needed to be brought back. In this process of reconciliation, Daniel states how the confessions from the whites about the system in South Africa and their actions was not sincere, but rather done as a fundamental thing to do, which links to David’s confession about Melanie. Moha and Daniel both come to terms on how Davids’s confession was not sincere, and ultimately I believe in order to show remorse and sincerity the act of catharsis needs to come into play. Going back to Moha’s blog, she questions if the “TRC can actually ever achieve real truth and reconciliation,” and I believe that it can be achieved by taking Daniel’s perspective of integrating personal reflection that actually comes from within. This personal reflection has to release all the repressed and personal reflections which can bring out real confession and reconciliation.

On an alternative route, Azumi draws on truth and reconciliation by analyzing David’s daughter Lucy. Azumi draws on the connection between “Country of My Skull” and Lucy’s relationship with animals. I found it very interesting and I totally see her perspective on how Lucy’s acceptance of marriage with Petrus can relate to the Afrikaans adapting to the change of  “racial positionality” in South Africa. Azumi indicates how reconciliation can be slowly seen by Lucy as she is breaking down the boundaries between races even when facing trauma (rape). This “racial postionality” can be seen as Petrus has power over Lucy by him controlling her land and marrying her, which in return she would get protection. This would have not happened in the apartheid era, but post apartheid Lucy is seen to break this boundary.

Gaining on the many perspectives of truth and reconciliation, this theme in the book Disgrace, alludes us to how history plays apart in the future, which corresponds to the term I learnt in geography called path dependency. From reading this book, I have gained the knowledge on how performative actions can come into play and how the sense of entitlement can affect ones remorse for an action that is worth a sincere remorse.  This failure of sincerity is an actual disgrace, it is a disgrace from within the perpetrator and towards the people who have been affected by the persons action. The act of reconciliation comes from within deep down, and one cannot force another to invoke that type of feeling not matter how hard they try, because that feeling of real remorse comes from within and has to be felt by that person in order for proper reconciliation.

Can reading a work of fiction that portrays violence cause the same discomfort as seeing a violent act? I am sure that after reading the novel Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee the answer is an assertive yes. Uncomfortable, disgusting and tense were some of the words I heard from my classmates when describing the novel and its protagonist. David Lurie is a professor of communications at the University of Cape Town, who rapes one of his students and faces a jury, which in turn results in him moving to the rural area where his daughter, Lucy, lives at a farm. Although the novel is set in the post-Apartheid period, the racial tensions are felt explicitly and implicitly through the actions of the characters and by the ascribed moral standards. The Apartheid was a series of policies implemented from 1948 until the early 1990s which institutionalized racial segregation and was based on a minority rule by white South Africans while black South Africans, Coloured, and Asians faced state-led oppression.

Two of the main themes we discussed in class regarding the novel and the post-Apartheid period were reconciliation and truth. These themes were very popular among my classmates’ posts, yet I was really interested in Azumi’s take on these themes. Based on her personal experience, prior to university, she wasn’t very familiar with the word reconciliation, however, when she looked up the definition, “the restoration of friendly relations” or “the action of making one view or belief compatible with another”, it made her feel uncomfortable. Reflecting on the limitations of language, Azumi mentioned Lurie’s theory of communication which describes how language is often not enough to express one’s feelings and emotions. Thus, her argument is that words may have complex meanings but it is hard to convey them in words or even harder to translate them into actions. Consequently, we could question the efficiency of the hearings resulting from Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which the novel alludes to, where perpetrators faced the families of their victims and had to tell the truth in order to receive amnesty. Similarly, Etana also reflected on the implications of telling the truth in the novel. She refers to a particular scene where Lucy tells the police about the robbery at her house, however, she doesn’t mention the fact that she was raped. Hence, Etana asks if whether telling half of a story is still considered to be telling the truth. Just like Azumi, she wonders if truth is achievable and comes to the conclusion that it is hard to define this word in a way that encompasses all the nuances of human nature. By acknowledging its subjectivity, Etana urges us, readers, to consider the intentions behind the actions of the characters instead of trying to fit them into the complex box of truth.

Another theme present in the novel which Suvi chose to analyze is the theme of vulnerability by comparing how different characters demonstrate being vulnerable. While Suvi explores the impact of rape in making both Melanie and Lucy feel vulnerable, she considers the fact that David Lurie only felt vulnerable once he was physically targeted and once his own daughter had been raped. Despite the minor changes in his character, the only moment where in my opinion David is truly vulnerable is when he puts the dog to sleep. Furthermore, based on Jodie’s and Jessie’s blog posts regarding sexual harassment I came to notice the impact of the power relations in the novel and how these relations may allow or may not allow space for vulnerability. Jodie researched on the issue of professors and students engaging in sexual relations. The argument that Jodie brings is that although both may be adults, the added pressure in such circumstances and the impact of non-consensual sex can be devastation. As she mentioned, on December 8th, 2017, the Quebec government passed Bill 151 which seeks to “prevent and fight sexual violence in higher education institutions”, representing a move towards the protection of students and disruption of power relations. In addition, Jessie described how Disgrace is a “difficult piece of reading to digest” especially due to how sexual assault is approached and weighted differently by Lurie when he is the perpetrator and when his daughter experiences it. Jessie argues that by choosing to portray David Lurie as disgraced, the author of the novel emphasizes the unjustifiable instances of sexual assault that women are subjected to. However, it is interesting to note that Lurie only lost his position of power, as it seems to me, once Lucy was raped and due to who the rapist was, a young black man who is considered to be part of Petrus family, the helper who works for Lucy. Even though I agree with Jessie’s argument that the fact that David raped Melanie might make him disgraced in the eyes of most readers, I believe that the author is trying to make a broader argument about the conditions of South Africa in the post-Apartheid period and how the racial tensions haven’t been reconciled.

Both Tracy and Meghan examine on their blog posts the intriguing role that animals play in the novel by serving as allegories to the racial relationships and aspirations of a new South Africa, the so-called rainbow nation. Meghan introduces in her blog the concept of speciesism which is defined as “discrimination in favor of one species, usually the human species, over another, especially in the exploitation or mistreatment of animals by humans”. According to her perspective, Lucy challenges the concept of speciesism by expanding on the notion that there is only one life that we share with animals and that in another existence she wouldn’t want to come back as a dog or a pig and live their lives of inferiority. Based on the relation of power and hierarchy that humans hold towards other animals, Tracy argues how the exploitation of animals can be compared to colonial violence. She believes that the dogs in the novel represent the non-whites in South Africa and while David at first feels no connection to the dogs and animals in general, his daughter has always been portrayed as an animals’ rights activist, implying that she understands the oppression experienced by non-whites during Apartheid and its legacy. Additionally, Tracy reflects on how the aggression of the black men towards Lucy’s dogs which is racially based resulted in the question of who are the victims? Is it Lucy who has been raped or is it the perpetrators who suffer from the legacy of racial segregation? Personally, this is what makes the novel so uncomfortable to me, the fact that I cannot make a valid moral judgment of who the victim is and if I decide that both Lucy and the perpetrators are victims, what does this imply about violence and segregation as policies or as revenge? What does this tell us about reconciliation?

Lastly, Daniel’s post really opened my mind about the larger effects of Apartheid and its legacy in the country and people of South Africa. He reflects on the “generational struggle to adapt to change” which can be seen in the character of David Lurie as his attitude towards sexual harassment and rape evolves as it happens to his own daughter. Daniel ties the idea of change in human social behavior to that of reconciliation introduced in the post-Apartheid period, suggesting that it is harder for a society to reconcile (“emphasis on the re”) if the relations between people in a society where never friendly. Building on this argument, I would like to bring in the work of Sisonke Msimang, author of Always Another Country, which I read for my GRSJ (Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice) class. In her book, Sisonke tells the story of an exiled child whose parents were part of the leadership of the ANC and who grew up dreaming with a liberated South Africa, where racial tensions were no longer the norm. Once she went back to South Africa, already much older and married with children, she felt disappointed at the leaders she held so much admiration from afar. South Africa was not a rainbow nation and a lot of the more subtle structures of Apartheid were still held in place. Sisonke mentions the friendship that her grandfather had developed with a policeman, who would often come to his house and ask whether or not he had heard about where his son was. As she describes it in an interview, there was a prescribed hatred and familiarity in their relationship, something which might take years and several novels to change.

In conclusion, I believe that reading the novel Disgrace because it puts us readers in a position of discomfort forcing us to at least try to imagine the reality of post-Apartheid South Africa. It asks us questions about morals and above all, it calls for change. I believe that reading other resources such as an autobiographical novel about exile such as Always Another Country is important for us to understand the real consequences that Apartheid’s legacy has on the life of people.

Sisonke Msimang

Quote found at the entrance of the Apartheid Museum in Johannesburg.

For the past two, and a bit, weeks we have taken a dive into, and dissected “Disgrace” by J.M. Coetzee and “Country of My Skull” by Antjie Krog. Both pieces of literature cover the time of Apartheid in South Africa, which took place between the end of the 40’s and continued until the mid 90’s. Each piece covers different perspectives of Apartheid, with “Country of My Skull” being an amalgamation of accounts from the Truth and Reconciliation Commissions and “Disgrace” standing in as a representation of the effect on white South Africans of before, during and after Apartheid.

This past week for our blogs, the class has explored different topics such as what is truth, communal memory, counter narratives and ideas on reconciliation.

Venus and Amanda brought up good points of the appearance of “truth” when analyzing “Disgrace”. They go on to point out how David Lurie in “Disgrace” never acknowledges the truth of what he had done to Melanie, especially during his trial. Venus continues and ties in ideas of truth to our everyday life, and more accurately, the world we live in today, by expressing the idea of how in modern society, the truth is often distorted and hidden and controlled via images and stereotypes.

Aleksei on the other hand goes on to discuss about the idea of communal memory in both “Disgrace” and “Country of My Skull”.

On “Disgrace”, Alexsei elaborates on how David Lurie’s views might may represent the views and resentments of white South Africans and their communal memory after apartheid.

On “Country of My Skull”, he concludes that any of the stories and actors involved show a lack of cohesion in constructing a communal memory due to them trying to do it in a way which would exonerate them of their crimes.

Finally, Geoff looked at counter narratives and metaphors in “Disgrace”. From his blog, I can extrapolate that he came to the conclusion in which he finds that the prominent counter narrative is that of the racial conflict found throughout the apartheid era, as well as in the intruder scene in which Lucy is sexually assaulted.

To close this short summary of the work done by my classmates, I’ll say that both “Disgrace” and “Country of My Skull” are both work that provide and important inside into the apartheid and pose- apartheid era in South Africa. It forces the reader to get uncomfortable and try and imagine the extent to which another human can suffer. Also, by reading more and interacting with accounts of truth and reconciliation, perhaps it can help us here in both Canada and the United States to better do just that, seek the truth and reconcile with it.

Ever since our last blog assignment, we have been thoroughly analyzing the book, Disgrace by John Maxwell Coetzee. Disgrace is a novel about the events of a South African Professor, David Lurie who committed rather inappropriate and unethical sexual deeds that brought disgust to my eyes as I was reading through the story. The setting of the novel takes place in post-apartheid South Africa.

Throughout this novel, we are offered the chance to hop inside the mind of David Lurie who to others, may seem rather abnormal and inhumane to the social norm, as well as his perspective and theory of communications, which would also aid us in discussing, in this blog, the concept of Truth and Reconciliation (as known as TRC) in the book. Truth and Reconciliation was a concept that Dr. Sean McAlister consistently referred back to when analyzing the book Disgrace with the ASTU G02 class. It is a unique concept that most students would not normally look into. With the help of Coetzee, we were able to insert ourselves into the unusual mind of David Lurie and uncover his perspective on Truth and Reconciliation through his lens. All analyzing would be through the support of my fellow classmates’ blogs, as well as my own view on said concepts.

One of the many significant events that will be able to help us discover his view of TRC is when David Lurie was in court on trial for his crime. When David pleaded guilty to everything Melanie, who was a student of his who he allegedly raped, claimed without even reading her statement, everyone was thrown off guard and confused about the decision David made. In Amanda’s blog, she stated that the lack of emotions and unapologetic actions reflected an insincere “truth” that was revealed, made many people in the court questioned the truthfulness of David’s words. In both Venus’ and Amanda’s blog, they stated that David’s confession in this chapter is vital with the relations of Truth and Reconciliation as it certainly had shown the truth of the event, yet contradicting the ideas of reconciliation, showing no feeling of remorse towards the deed, making it appear unjust even though David pleaded guilty. It is elucidated throughout this chapter that, although the truth had come out, there was a lack of cohesion as many characters did not entirely agree and favour David’s response to the whole trial, and that nothing was really healed or justified with the truth out. The idea of “truth” is also questioned by both Azumi and Venus in their blogs, as there are multiple perspectives and various situations of “truth” that indicates that it is subjective and there is no stable perspective of truth. In Venus’ blog, she stated that in modern society, the truth is distorted and manipulated by controlling images and stereotypes, in which I am in agreement with. In fact, manipulative media information has been around notably longer than modern society, as propaganda from the government was used often during desperate times. In Persepolis, which was a book we read in the first term, and Maus, which was a graphic novel, the concept of propaganda played a crucial role in affecting the minds of the population. We also had a view of how skewed and not necessarily truthful propaganda can truly affect the perspectives of the majority in the book we read in the first term, The Reluctant Fundamentalist a.k.a TRF (not TRC!!), where the book allowed us to envision the perspective of a Pakistani-American businessman named Changez and the difficulties he faced after the 9/11 incident. Another effect of lopsided media is that it creates a (mostly negative) stigmatization and stereotype of certain cultures and harming their reputation.

Ultimately, Disgrace is a book that I believe is worth reading, as it gives you quite a different perspective on an unusual, suppressed opinion and thought processes of a communications professor, but do be aware, as the detailed novel may contain sensitive topics to certain individuals. I have only briefly described parts of my classmates’ blogs. I strongly suggest you to read more of ASTU G02’s own personal blogs, to absorb a better understanding of their thoughts and opinions with the novel.

How people remember things varies – not just because they experience different things, but even common memories such as the war or gender inequality often get intertwined with one’s personal backgrounds and emotions, which change how they convey their memories. Indeed, being a class blogger is tougher than I thought, since everyone has different but amazing ideas while we all took the same class and read the same texts. Unfortunately, I don’t have the ability to incorporate everyone’s ideas, so I strongly recommend you to read through everyone’s blogs!

For the past few weeks, we have read Art Spiegelman’s comic book “Maus” and the Helen Weinzweig’s novel “Basic Black with Pearls”, and explored different genres of representing memories, experiences, and their identities. “Maus” depicts Jewish people’s struggle during the WWII and through the author’s father’s experience. One of the remarkable features of this comic book is that Spiegelman uses “mice” and “cats” to represent Jews and Germans (and “pigs” for Poles). Diego and Etana argues that this use of animals plays an intermediate role to remove the discomfort of conveying the harsh story from the holocaust. Many students also argued the purpose of using “cats” and “mice” as to indicate the predator-prey relationship (Cherisse, Etana, Suvi, and Tessa), to link how the Nazi’s propaganda depicted Jews as rats during WWII (Diego, Etana, and Tessa), and to emphasize the impression of cats as adorable, worthy pets (Etana, Suvi). Tessa also points out this clear racial distinction in the comic as a representation of how Jews were eradicated in the real life. Furthermore, Etana argues that the way Jews were depicted as rats during the war shows how they were judged only by their race, which resulted in people’s lack of interests and humanity towards them during WWII.

“Basic Black with Pearls”, on the other hand, is about a middle-aged, middle-class woman Shirley (or Lola as she identified for travelling) trying to find her lover Coenraad just by the secret code he sends to her through the journal National Geographic. As Kriveena mentions in her blog, Shirley’s life is “revolved around Coenraad”, while she starts to recall her memories and traumas of her life by visiting her own hometown Toronto. In our class, we are trying to find what Weinzweig is trying to describe through Shirley by considering her gender, class, and personal experiences.

Interestingly, I noticed that these two different books both talk about a woman’s life and struggle. “Basic black with pearls” shows how the society determines women as a belonging of men who support their husband in their house. Jodie argues that Shirley is “financially and emotionally dependent on Coenraad”, and that Coenraad is strictly determining her life by the rules, while Shirley herself doesn’t realize that she is in a toxic relationship. Mirella also argues that this book challenges the boundaries of old women’s life and love, while also depicts the societal and personal constrains on women’s liberation. Moha similarly points out how Shirley’s character is introduced only in relation with Coenraad, which shows how the society’s message says women are determined by men.

In “Maus”, everything is about the author’s father (Vladek), while Spiegelman (Artie) in the comic seems to be strongly interested in his mothers’ (Anja’s) story. However, Suvi points out the possibility of Vladek’s memory being inaccurate, and that he could have hidden what he wanted to since he had that control over his story. William also mentions about Vladek abandoning Anja’s diary, which shows Vladek’s guilt and inability to deal with the experience of her suicide. Overall, we cannot measure how much this book was able represent Anja’s memory. This made me think about how Shirley’s life in “Basic Black with Pearls” is determined by Coenraad’s life. Also, how she went between reality and imagination in her first-person text can question her agency on her story too. Both of these women’s lack of agency in their story seems to reflect how women lack agency in their own life.

However, Meghan’s blog post also stood out to me when I was thinking about how Anja’s story is represented in the book. Meghan argues that Spiegelman portrays his guilt explicitly through the storytelling process in order to reverse his guilt towards his mother. She highlights how guilt can have a long-time effect, and how it influences one’s way of expressing stories. I personally agree with this, and think that Spiegelman decided to trace and write about his parents’ story not only because he wanted to keep the memory of the holocaust alive, but because he wanted to know about his mother. I feel like he would have done the same thing even if there was no such a holocaust nor war in Anja’s history. I believe that his wish to recall her mother’s story made him write about the whole process of how he heard about Anja’s experience through Vladek, how Vladek met Anja, and how Spiegelman himself went through Anja’s suicide.

In summary, “Basic Black and Pearls” and “Maus” takes different strategies to convey stories. Use of comic, spy genre, the animals, a woman in an affair, and a mother’s suicide reflects how the author wanted to represent their stories. Also, who gets to talk their story is remarkably important to consider as we have been talking about it through the year. It seems to be the same for blogs as well. Indeed, writing these blogs is part of our assignments, while what attracted each of us and how we expressed them differs according to our interests, experiences and stream of thoughts. The agency we have over our blog is larger than scholarly writings, and that’s what I find interesting about blogs. I am looking forward to reading everyone’s last blog posts!!

Since our last blog posts, our class has read two works: Maus by Art (Artie) Spiegelman and Basic Black with Pearls by Helen Weinzweig. Maus is a comic that details the story of Art Speigelman’s father, Vladek, as he was sent to the Auschwitz Concentration Camp during the Holocaust . The comic represents its characters as anthropomorphized animals, with Jews as mice, Germans as cats, and Poles as pigs. Basic Black is about a women named Shirley Kaszenbowski born to an impoverished family who moves up the class ladder but experiences great dissatisfaction with her life as a housewife. She begins a global affair with a spy named Coenraad as a means of escaping her mundane reality. Both literary works deal with issues relating to memory and trauma and today, I will examine what my peers have said about them, however, when reading the blogs, I noticed that most of my peers decided to write about Maus. Perhaps its comic book style made it more accessible?

In his blog, Geoff discusses the issues related to authenticity. He indicates that while Vladek’s stories may or may not be exaggerated, they still bore a great effect on the author. Geoff also acknowledges that there is a certain difficulty and a certain moral aspect towards retelling traumatic stories. In William’s blog, he compares Vladek Spiegelman to the “tragic hero” character trope, noting that Vladek’s many personality flaws have helped him survived the Holocaust. However, William also believes that these flaws eventually led to the suicide of Vladek’s wife, Anja.

On the otherhand, Megan examines themes of guilt in Maus. She states that guilt can be adopted without wrong doing, as Artie feels for his mother’s death. She notes that guilt is a long lasting feeling and that Artie may be attempting to relieve some of his own guilt by telling these stories. Patrick also examines ideas aroung guilt in his blog. He adds that Artie feels intergenerational survivor’s guilt not only for his parents’ experiences during the Holocaust but also for not born to experience it himself.

In Tessa’s blog, she examines the significance of Spiegelman’s choice to portray specific racial groups as animals. She examines the significance of the predatory relationship of cats and mice, as well as the the fact that pigs are not a part of this food chain. She also recognizes this may be because of the Pole’s perceived unwillingness to help Jews during the War. Suvi also discusses Spiegelman’s choice for representing ethnic groups as animals. She examines how Spiegelman draws a comparison between his family as survivors and mice as survivors while conceding that the mice/Jews would still be no match in a conflict with the cats/Germans. She also draws a comparison to a previous work we read: Persepolis. Suvi recognizes that this work is also a comic about personal experiences which challenge master narratives. Jessie also makes this comparison, adding that the comic medium requires a greater analysis of artistic steal to discern meaning from imagery and symbolism.

Kriveena, on the other hand, wrote about Basic Black. She examines the themes of memory in the novel and how Shirley experiences bad memories about her working class past that associated with Shirley’s childhood city of Toronto. Kriveena also examines the significance of Shirley’s disguise (the black dress and pearl necklace) as a means of veiling her modest upbringings while also interprating the dress as a means for Shirley to hide her identity under a man.

Overall, this week’s blogs examined many aspects of the novels that our class read. I look forward to the final blogging assignment. Thank you for reading!

Until next time,

Aleksei Zhukov

Throughout the year, our ASTU class had a large frame focusing on memory. During our ASTU class these days, we’ve been focusing on the graphic novel Maus. A graphic novel was written by American cartoonist Art Spiegelman that published in 1991, depicting Spiegelman father’s interview about his experiences as a Polish Jew and Holocaust survivor. The graphic novel implies postmodernist techniques and represents Jews as mice, Germans as cats, and Poles as pigs. As one of the most representative novels that demonstrate the tragedy of the Holocaust, it was interesting to read my interesting to read my classmates’ blog posts about their opinions towards the representation of memory in Maus.

In Diego’s Blog Etana’s Blog, he focused on the significance of “mice and cats” in Maus. Normally, a mouse is described as dirty creatures that are useless in society. Just like a mouse, Jews were seen as invasive species that were detrimental to human society, in which the Nazis’ perspective of the Jews during the Holocaust and treated them like animals. Also, Etana added up a point that although there are diverse species for mice, people still categorize them as “mouse”. As the identification of mice, Jews were recognized just by their race. As result, people were more desensitized and dehumanized towards the Jewish population. Cats on the contrarily, are totally different from the mouse. They are demonstrated as a lovely and adorable creature that removes mouse for their owner. Like the relationship between cats and mouse, Nazis can be viewed as cats and heroes that executed the Jews, and the idea that cats can be portrayed as graceful and noble, which can be connected with the belief of Aryan supremacy.  Furthermore, Spiegelman used animals rather than humans in her graphic novel is because it is easier for the readers to accept serious and dark topics from the past, to remove the discomfort towards the event.

The discussion of Maus was also mentioned in other student’s blogs, about the representation of “time”. There were 2 eras, one is when Artie is interviewing his father, and the other is when Vladek’s memories were portrayed during WW2. From Amanda’s blog, she was able to notice that the author connected past and present timelines by the use of chapters to demonstrate certain events to the readers. Also, Spiegelman uses the gutter, technique of a comic strip structure, which can make the readers have to fill in the space between panels. This would let the readers connect the images even if the image is irrelevant to each other. She used implied page 14 frames don’t have any borders that show the contrast between storylines. Conversely, from Isabel’s blog, she mentions that the characters are portrayed differently from different timelines. This can be shown from changing attitudes of Vladek when he treated his former wife better compared to his new wife and his son. In addition, based on different time eras, Vladek becomes older and younger.

Personally, I personally enjoyed reading this book knowing more about more about the Holocaust in a comical and a light way. However, as we read the graphic novel more in detail, readers can find out how Spiegelman implied different techniques and symbols to illustrate the representation of memory in Maus.

Having found our conversations this term in ASTU very interesting, I was excited at the prospect of getting to read my fellow classmates blogs, comparing and contrasting their takes on the work of psychologists William James, Sigmund Freud and Silvan Tomkins along with the literary works of Big Two-Hearted River by Ernest Hemingway and Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Wolf. With the exception of Tomkins, who wrote later in the century, all of this great body of work was done in the context of the early 20^th century, a time stained by the horror of World War 1.

Such was the profound effect of the war on the culture at the time that many of my classmates focused their blogs particularly on examining the shift that the war brought on in Europe. Aleksei, very interestingly, described what set WW1 apart from the wars before it as a lack of “politeness,” illustrating a fundamental alteration in the perception of warfare, particularly by those fighting, from a chivalrous endeavour to a frivolous loss of lives. William also explored this change and summed it up nicely through artwork with Monet’s Water Lillies analogizing the bright mentality of Europe before the war and Edvard Munch’s The Scream, though it was painted before the war, coming to “represent what it (Europe) had become.”

Moving from a societal scale change to a more individual response, for the over 3.5 million men discharged from the British Army between 1918 and 1922 the effects of the war on many of their mental states was severe. This change in the psychology of the men that fought was a commonly explored theme across my classmates blogs, particularly post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or shell-shock as it was first described at the time. The early 20^th century saw the birth of Freud’s psychoanalysis to join the already growing developments in the field of psychology under the likes of William James. Whilst, as William points to, the analysis of James and Freud is often viewed with a “vs” mentality, pitting the two theories against each other, Tessa flipped this notion in her blog. She argued that explaining James’ analogy of consciousness as a totally continuous stream “played a vital role” (Tessa) in her appreciation of Freud’s understanding of PTSD. This is particularly pertinent to the apparent realness of PTSD symptoms as the brain experiences it in real time as part of their stream of consciousness and thus the experiencer understands it as a real threat rather than contextualizing it as an internal memory related to a past event.

The experience of an individual suffering PTSD and the realities in which they live formed defining parts of both Hemingway and Wolf’s respective works. A number of the blogs focused on examining the differences between the portrayal of PTSD in the characters of the two novels. Tracy points to how Big Two-Hearted River is a very individual focused story where “the reader’s perspective is limited by Nick’s consciousness” placing the focus onto the “personal struggles of memory.” In contrast, Mrs Dalloway instead explores the PTSD condition of Septimus Warren Smith through “multiple perspectives,” expressing clearly the loss of the older generation in being capable of understanding his condition that ultimately leads to his death. Kirveena focuses also on the different narrative styles of Hemingway and Wolf, particularly Hemingway’s use of Iceberg Theory whereby the true meaning of the work is submerged below the manifest story of Nick going on a fishing trip. This means the reader has to work to get a deeper understanding of Nick’s mental state whereas “Septimus openly talks about these repetitive compulsions” (Kirveena) and the work of the reader is instead shifted to navigating the relations between different characters inner consciousness. It was very thought provoking to read Etana’s blog which went into considerable detail examining Hemingway’s Iceberg Theory and its relevance not only as a literary tool but, as most literary tools are, its concurrent relevance to our everyday lives. She ended her blog beautifully with the thought that “just as literary works require critical analysis, life often asks us to read beyond the lines as well” (Etana). It is that nuanced take on the reality of people’s lives that I believe makes literature so valuable to explore and has made ASTU so interesting this term. I look forward to getting to explore a whole variety of new books through my own blogs over the coming months.

For the past few weeks in our ASTU class, we have been discussing topics like self, PTSD and memory through the writing of psychologists: William James, Sigmund Freud and Silvan Tomkins. Additionally, we saw how these concepts are applied in literature through the analysis of Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf and Hemingway’s Big Two-Hearted River. Reading my classmates blogs, I enjoyed the variety of topics and how everyone has taken away something different from these classes.

When discussing Woolf’s work, many of my classmates discussed how the function of free indirect discourse in facilitated the concept of “stream of consciousness” into the novel. Azumi questions whether free indirect speech is exactly the character is thinking or; a version that has been filtered through a narrator that makes it easier for the reader to understand. This raises an interesting questions about who gets to tell the story, and Azumi relates this back to “Stories We Tell” where both forms of literature seem to “incorporate different people’s experience towards the same event”. Jessie explains that there is complex punctuation and no clear distinctions between characters, which are some of the methods Woolf uses to incorporate the stream into her writing style. She also notes that this atypical sentence structure allows each character’s thought and emotions to flow in a constant stream with a “series of ideas and emotion”.

I like this idea because I think this sentence structure may be seen as a metaphor or related to, the plot of the novel. The plot of the novel seems quite plain— Mrs. Dalloway is holding a party. Yet, there are moments of flashback, a suicide and interjection of thoughts which are all intertwined into this plot line, which makes it difficult to understand. Rather than having a typical plot, Mrs. Dalloway focuses on a certain part of the stream, where we see thoughts and ideas flowing through this one time period. Especially when you perform a close reading analysis, we can see how there is an underlying complexity to the novel; through punctuation, subliminal messages or repetition. This technique is known as the Theory of Omission, which was used largely in the Hemingway’s Big Two-Hearted River. 

In Big Two-Hearted River, Meghan provides a description this technique as “writing everything except the most important points”. Etana notes the importance of recognizing the theory of omission because without a deep analysis or “reading beyond the lines”, the author’s full intent may not be realized. Kriveena finds a link to James’ stream of consciousness link when identifies the river as an analog for Nick’s model of thinking. She sharply contrasts the river with the swamp where it may be represented as part of his mind where there are dark, repressed emotions that are lingering. 

In regards to how James’ and Freud’s publications have shifted modern thinking, Aleksei compares music from the 20th century modern music to the 19th century romantic. He describes the modern “dissonant harmonies and abstract melodies” as symbolic of the modern darkness of humans. The music that was composed during this time reflects the societal changes that were occurring possibly due to the trauma that war veterans were experiencing when they were returning home. 

I found the writing of the psychology scholars particularly difficult to read, however it fostered an understanding for a relationship between literature and psychology. Not only is stream of consciousness a psychology term, it is also where the reader may enter into the character’s thoughts and feelings through literature. The readings were helpful for me in understanding the protagonists and realizing that there may be more to the characters than what the author has written. 

Last term, the central theme in ASTU was the distinction between individual and collective memory and the construction of personal and public narratives. Essentially, we worked from the outside in. This semester, we studied Freud and James, two of the most groundbreaking psychologists. We began our exploration of the psyche and how it constructs our reality and perspective of the world. In other words, we worked from the inside out. The literature we studied this term, namely Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway and Hemingway’s Big Two-Hearted River, combined several themes studied over the course of the year. My classmates wrote insightfully about the connections between the themes we have studied so far to draw incredible connections between the literature we have read.

Overall, the impact of PTSD upon individuals was a popular topic. Almost everyone considered the link between the national trauma of WW1 and the personal trauma of war, yet everyone chose to focus on different aspects. Tessa provided an especially astute observation regarding the connections between James and freud’s writing and their sociological implications. She describes memory as reenactments of previous actions which restricts individuals to perceive themselves of victims of their own fates. This extended lens that widens the individual psychological phenomena to a sociological breadth is explored more closely in other blogs.

Continuing from last terms exploration of individual versus public memory and the construction of master narratives, many blogs considered the marginalized and master narratives created within the literature we read this term. For example, Jeremy looks at personal memories as representations of collective trauma where he describes Septimus as ‘….the personification of the collapse of the imperialistic pride and power of England after the war….’ Here, Jeremy presents Septimus as the symbol of the master narrative of the martyred war veteran whilst Isabel takes on an alternate perspective where she delves into Septimus’ neglected personal trauma as shell-shock was thought to be cowardly in previous eras. Together, they display the concept of how public narratives minimise or suppress personal narratives. Additionally,  Moha explores how the use of third person writing styles and iceberg revelations demonstrate the disconnect between collective and personal memory as despite the intensity of the character’s traumas, the distance we feel due to the third-person perspective means we can never fully understand them. This was a particularly interesting link between literary structure, thematic material and its implications.

The aforementioned ideas are explored in depth in the suppression and marginalisation of specific perspectives. To begin with, Suvi does an impressive job of linking Freudian ideas of the suppression of innate drives and Woolf’s presentations of her characters’ homosocialities. She examines the relationships between Septimus and Evans and Clarissa and Sally to be close friendships derived from the suppression of homosexual drives due to the heteronormative narrative of Victorian Society. Meanwhile, Jodie and Mirella analyze the exclusion of women from the narratives of war and PTSD. Jodie draws an important link between the wives of war veterans in American Sniper and Mrs Dalloway. In both pieces, the perspective of the spouse who bears the emotional weight of a troubled husband is spotlighted thereby displaying the male-dominated narratives of war. This is important as it shows how the effects of war are widespread and go beyond the individuals affected by the war. Similarly, Mirella focuses on the gender constraints of war narratives and uniquely points out how the novel is called ‘Mrs Dalloway’ indicating that Clarissa’s position in society is defined by her husband’s name. She elaborates on the neglected perspective of the wife who struggles to help her tormented husband thereby underlining the importance of destigmatizing mental health issues. Overall, my classmates have highlight the marginalization of subordinated narratives which perpetuate societal ideals that are oppressive and fulfill Freudian theories of victims of fate.

These discussions of personal and public psychology are impactful in underlining the idea of community and the influence one person can have on a group.  The epistemological succession of narratives in our society determine the values we uphold therefore it is significant that my classmates were able to draw connections between the master narrative of WW1 and the individual perspectives created and communicated via the characters in the literature we read. The readings on Freud and James helped deepen our understanding of the complex characters and writing style of the literature we read by giving them a more leveled and modern message. Given the rising attention on mental health in the media, these explorations were imperative to our understanding of societal stigmas and the urgency to adapt them for greater communal and psychological comforts.