Tag Archives: death

April 9, 2024 · 12:34 pm

RMST202 in a nutshell: Shitty men, intrusive thoughts, nameless characters, and death

Alas, we have reached the end of this course! This course was strangely nowhere near what I expected but in the best way possible. I think the texts we have read and the discussions we have had, truly make me think about literature in different ways which was one of my main goals for this course. Often times I usually just take the text for what it is, but it was interesting to apply the context of the environment and time period to truly understand some of the intentions of these novels. 

I think if I had to pick a favourite novel for this course, it would be Nada by Carmen Laforet, which is strange because I remember that not many people chose that book. I felt like I experienced every emotion possible while reading that book. Seeing such a significant change in Andrea’s character and her own narrative perceptions of herself truly stuck with me the most. I also think it was so interesting how Laforet’s writing made me love a character on one page, but then absolutely despise them on the next. Usually, I feel like when I have a perception about a certain character, it is really difficult for a book to change my mind about them because I either want to defend them or absolutely trash their entire existence, but for some reason, this book gave me whiplash the entire time. I found myself being able to justify certain characters who I know deep down are still horrible people, and despise characters who I initially liked. Looking back on it now, Andrea’s friendship with Ena kind of resembles Elena’s friendship with Lila in My Brilliant Friend in terms of dynamics, jealousy, and reliance (although I will admit I liked Andrea and Ena’s friendship way more).

My least favourite book without a doubt has to be The Time of the Doves by Mercè Rodoreda. Honestly, I feel like I don’t really have a good reason for hating this book other than I simply just didn’t like it. I felt like I was so frustrated the entire time that it just wasn’t enjoyable for me. Every single character made me angry to the point where I didn’t really care much about them or about what happened to them so I never got invested in the novel. I noted how it has similar themes to Nada regarding changes in perception and character after one goes off to fight in the war, but every time I think about that damn tapeworm in a jar I need to take a few minutes to meditate. 

I mentioned this in one of my previous blogs but I literally had to start keeping track of how many Judas metaphors there were in these books and out of the 11 books that I read there were a whopping 6. Which doesn’t seem like a lot but it’s quite interesting to notice. I realized that most of the times they would pop up as metaphors regarding betrayal obviously, even though it could be recognized as one of the more subtle themes across these books. I am not a religious person myself, but I do enjoy the Lady Gaga song therefore to describe my experience of this course, I would use that song.

Question: What song would you pick to encapsulate this course and why?

4 Comments

Filed under Uncategorized

Tagged as , , , ,

March 26, 2024 · 9:47 pm

Saramago; The feminist text we didn’t know we needed?

This week’s reading of Jose Saramago’s Death With Interruptions definitely interrupted my daily thoughts. I listened to this book via the audiobook online as to appear mysterious listening to the philosophies of death while gazing at the various forms of life around me (the only accurate way to read this book in my opinion). This book started off very interesting to me when discussing the political, and religious aspects of a nation without death, and the family taking the grandfather and the baby across the border, but then slowly started dragging along more with the discussion of the Maphia and the border soldiers. However, for me, it picked back up again when death made her cameo again.

I was definitely annoyed at some parts of this book because truly sometimes the suspense was very frustrating and repetitive. It felt like so many of the plot points would set up something climactic like with the Maphia’s tactics about charging to take people across the border and then bringing them back to get buried, and then also the whole ordeal with the mysterious violet letter showing up to the Director General of television’s office. I understand the need to build up suspense and tension but honestly, these felt like they dragged on quite a bit. But regardless I did still enjoy this book (I realized over the span of this course that it doesn’t take much for me to enjoy a book, I think I am impressed quite easily. Except with The Time of the Doves, I wish death would interrupt my thoughts about that damn tapeworm.). It felt like quite a different dynamic to the books we have read about upbringing, yet still touches on themes like family dynamics, politics, and religion.

The use of flags was also very notable in this story for me. Flags start off as this sort of nationalistic representation as people initially post them in front of their houses reveling in the fact that they have now unlocked eternal life. However, upon hearing that deaths are going to begin to reoccur, flags go on to represent a mark for doctors to arrive at certain houses and announce the dead. death herself is a very interesting character in a world where dying became not only a crime but also a miracle to those suffering. Whether writing her note of return on violet-coloured paper or writing another letter as to correct everyone on the proper capitalization (or perhaps lack thereof) of her name, was pretty girlboss behaviour. She still gets called heinous names as she tries to carry out her job but is still romanticized as this beautiful young skeleton. And yet, she even finds love and her smile while experiencing a lot more shenanigans along the way. She had civilians, politicians, religious actors, and practically everyone else in her grasp. But perhaps that’s just life. Does death have us in her grasp too, regardless of whether she is here or not?

My question for this week would be as follows: Does death have you in her grasp? Or perhaps like Saramago possibly suggests, have you escaped her with love?

3 Comments

Filed under Uncategorized

Tagged as , , , ,