12/21

We got the performance on Tuesday.  That was the first time running through with monologue and the other techs, and the experience was neither really good nor totally horrible.  There are still a lot of things that should be improved, but I am pretty happy about the scene 2.  Scene 2 asks the actors to act in a parallel mode, which means David will say his line while I am saying my words.  Each one is busy expressing his/her idea.  It shows a strong conflict.  However, it might cause chaos on the stage. The lines might be too massive to be heard, but I think we did good jobs.  David and I should speak the lines earlier so that mom David could catch the line and come back to the stage on time. 

For the weaknesses, I think I should watch out my right arm first.  I tried to not move my right arm because Caroline's one arm is a fake one in the story, so the fake arm should not be as strong as the other arm.  I found out I moved my right arm, so I should be more careful about it. The second is that I should practice my lines more.  I messed up the ending monologue, and once the lines are not proficient, the emotion cannot be shown well.  The last thing is that one time I turned my back to the audience.  I should pay more attention to that movement.  I might design a specific blocking there.

Final Draft

https://youtu.be/i4TXn_TvuJk
https://youtu.be/HCbFCtnkEz0

Uta Hagen's Nine Questions

Uta Hagen’s Nine Questions 

1. Who am I? Who is your character?

Name: Caroline
Age:  23
Physical traits:  She is thin but not skinny, tall but not strong.  She was born in one arm, but she is not bothered by her disableness.  (she might be frustrated for a while when she was young, but when she grew up, she got used and embraced her disableness.). Unlike her sister, who wear dark color all the time, pink is her color.
Relatives:  Has a sister, Grace, and her mother. 
Personality:  She is a little bit quiet, but she is also outgoing as well.  She is optimistic and innocent.  
Like:  She likes sweet. 
Dislikes:  She does not mind bone soup, but when she is asked to drink it every day, she is annoyed by bone soup.
Beliefs:  She is not religious, even though she goes to Christan church and does the religious activities with her mom.  She loves Christmas.


2. What time is it?

21 century.  2018.  The reason is that it is hard to assign the customs and 


3. Where am I?

Identify the country, the city/town, the neighborhood, the building, the room, the specific area of the room.

4. What surrounds me? What is happening in the environment around you?

Weather, landscape, people, animate/inanimate objects.

5. What are the given circumstances?

Identify events in the past, present, future. What has happened, what is happening, what is going to happen?

6. What are my relationships?

This is more than your relationship to other people. Think about your relationship to objects, characters, and events.

7. What do I want? What do you want immediately? What does the character want overall?

8. What is in my way? What are the obstacles to getting what you want?

9. What do I do to get what I want? What actions do you take (both physically and verbally)? What tactics?

View of Fall Play

        

The Importance of Being Earnest

Writer: Oscar Wilde

Director: Mr. Aronson

               Ms. Gaurino

               Ms. Riccio

Art: Peter Deng

Tech: McBreen

Cast:

Jack Worthing---

Algernon Moncrieff--- Aaron

Gwendolen Fairfax---Amalia

Lady Bracknell---Linda

Cecily Cardew--- Mao

Miss Prism--- Helen

The Reverend Canon Chasuble--- Zoe

The fall play this year is The Importance of Being Earnest, a comedy wrote by Oscar Wilde.  It is about two awkward love stories between Jack Worthing and Algernon Moncrieff.  Jack Worthing love the relatives, Gwendolen, of Algernon, and Algernon falls in love with Cecily, ward of Worthing.  The two ladies also love them only if their names are Earnest.  Earnest represents Honest, and the two families value honesty.  However, if two gentlemen want to gain the ladies' heart, they have to lie that their names are Earnest.  Therefore, when both ladies meet and talk about their fiancees, Earnest, drama appears.  In the end, their true identities are exposed, but the two girls forgive them.

The most surprise I got from the show is the new arrangement of the stage.  The stage is used to face the fire exit way, the long pathway to the exit door.  The stage was using the long side of the rectangle black box, but now the stage is using the wide side of the black box.  Then, the stage extends to the audience seats. (the T shape stage). The triangles are changing their position on the stage to show the changing setting.  In the past, stage crew painted on the three walls of triangles to show the different scene.  However, we can know the setting place is different by seeing the position of the triangles, and stage crews do not have to paint on the walls.  It not only preserves the function of triangles but also creates a more dimensional stage.

The cast also did great jobs.  I really like Algernon not because of his personality but the feeling of the acting out his personality.  His personality is too rare to be seen in the school life.  Maybe some people do have the same personalities as Algernon has, such as playful and flamboyant, but they are not as exaggerated as Algernon.  Aaron exaggerated this character's behavior and actions to make this figure more clear.  It is excellent.  (I bet Aaron must enjoy playing Alganon. :).  This character's behavior makes me think of another character I insanely loved for a while: captain of Jack Sparrow.  I love seeing them in the movie or on the stage, and I also want to try to play this kind of roles.  Helen also did a good job playing Ms. Prism.  I like her articulation and her pronunciation.  She was always nagging on the stage, which it perfectly match her character, an old teacher who was warring on a lot of things all the time.  The only shortcoming for her is her pinky clothes.  I do not think a grandma who is much older than me can wear clothes much more fashionable and fresh than I wear. (Yes, I was a little bit jealous.  A grandma has a better taste in clothes!)

Talking about clothes, I think the customs fit every character.  There are two big comparisons: one is between Jack and Algernon, and the other is between Gwendolen and Cecily.  Compare to Algernon, Jack is a more honest person.  Therefore, he wears the cold-colored suit.  Algernon is not a serious person.  His long red tailcoat made me think he is not trustworthy, even though he is cute.  Cecily and Gwendolen wear the same colored dress, but the style shows that Cecily is more traditional and Gwendolen wears the new dress to show a spirit of independent feminism.

IA Proposal

IA Proposal

Theme: We cannot cover the truth because we do not like it.  The only way to show respect to people who are dead is to tell the truth.

“When I wrote this novel, I thought of my older sister and her first love.  Some people who know the truth asked me to give my sister and her first love a union, and my mom told me to let my sister look better in the book at least.  It is the best wish, and people love to end the story full of happiness and satisfaction. However, the reality is not what we always want.

I thought and struggled for a long time before I made this decision.  I love my sister more than anyone, but I think the way, the only way to show respect to my sister’s life and the other death is to tell the truth.”

                                                                                                       ---- Lili’s younger sister

Plot: Combined The Wall of Rising Fire, Night Women, Children of the Sea, and the Background of Caroline’s Wedding and Epilogue

The story is set on a book publishment conference.  The awarded book “”(might has a name) is going to change the ending about the lives of one girl and one boy.  The audiences who love the book so much are confused and even mad at this change. Then, the writer, D, talks about the book (Stage change back to 30 years earlier), telling the original happy ending and changed ending.

Scene 1:

At conference, D, Lili’s younger sister is having a interview in the United States.  Reporters ask her why she reedited an awarded novel (and also her last piece) again and changed the ending into a way that people do not want to see.  50-year-old D smiles and says the story is about my older sister and her first love. It is not my story. What I remembered is the day that Lili’s first love leave Haiti.

Scene 2:

Time goes back to the day that the boy, Erik, leaves Lili when they are 18 years old.  It is the day that Erik and Lili’s have the secret meeting as usual. However, this time Erik brings a bad news for Lili.  His audio station is detected by the government, and he has to sail to the United States to survive. Lili wants to go with him, but when she runs back home to suit up her case, her father locks her at home.  She misses the boat. She is having a hard time for a while. Her 15-year-old younger sister, D, helps her go through the heartbreaking time. For boy Erik, he is waiting Lili, but when the time comes, he has to leave without her.  He leaves.

Scene 3:

With the camera’s light, 24-year-old Lili is standing near Guy with wedding bouquet in a wedding suit.  D, is happy for her older sister. After wedding, Lili ends her journey that it is writing to Erik and give this journey to D.  Then, Lili leaves home with Guy. They are going to create a new family.

At the same time, Erik lives in the United States for a while, and he marries Caroline, another Haitian American.  

Time can cure a lot of heartbreak, and make people forget something.  However, it is fine, because they both live in happy lives.

Scene 4:

Time goes to reality, 50-year-old D is still sitting on the chair having the interview.  Then, she remembered three years ago she received a report from Haiti: her older sister, Lili, is dead because of syphilis, a sexual disease.  Then, she finally realizes, what she heard from her mother and Lili is fake. Then, she searches the boat that Erik is on, and she found out the boat is sank.  No one survived.

Scene 5:

The Old D faces the camera.  She says,

“When I wrote this novel, I thought of my older sister and her first love.  Some people who know the truth asked me to give my sister and her first love a union, and my mom told me to let my sister look better in the book at least.  It is the best wish, and people love to end the story full of happiness and satisfaction. However, the reality is not what we always want.

I thought and struggled for a long time before I made this decision.  I love my sister more than anyone, but I think the way, the only way to show respect to my sister’s life and the other death is to tell the truth.”

Scene 6 (Optional)

This scene is an imagination without any lines or dialogue.  Imagine if everything does not happen, and imagine if they are living in a peaceful country.  They meet with the original place that they met before without any fear. They hug and kiss.

The End

Characters

Lili: Passionate, and outgoing when she is young; Kind, and tender when she married.

Old D: Old, tough, and peaceful

Young D: Innocent, quieter than Lili.  The same actor of Old D.

Guy: Lili’s Husband.  Ambitious. Can be the same actor of Erik. (No line)

Erik:  Passionate, strong and talkative when he is young; Steadier and gentle when he married.

Caroline: Erik’s wife.  Beautiful and quiet. Can be the same actor of Lili (No line)

Lili’s Father

Reporter’s voice

Staging: Three (Four) stages + Two Timeline

Clothes:

The actors of Lili and Erik wear white clothes inside, and then according to the change of age, they will put on the outfit quickly.  The time will change quickly, so the actors might be asked to change clothes in 5 seconds behind the plank or the barrier on the stage.  The younger Lili is wearing colorful dress, and then wedding dress. When she died, she wear white dress only to act out the “imaginated” scene.

Narrator’s voice:

The narrator’s voice will be recorded before the performance by D’s actor.  It will connect each scene during scene change.

Stage:

Stage will basically separate to two part.  One for Erik, the other for Lili. One scene might use three stage: one corner for D reading the report and cry, the other two for Erik and Lili, while the narrator telling the truth.

Musics (Soundtrack):

Atonement

The Imitation Game

Twilight

Two Questions

In the Children of the Sea, the author is talking about the stories between two narrators. Why did Danticat use Children of the Sea as a title?
        Even though the girl is not on the sea, her heart still follows the boy, who is on the sea.  She wants to see the boy, but her father does not allow her to meet him.  In addition, her father locks her up at home so she cannot go anywhere.  Then, the sea is like a symbol of freedom to her.  It is also a symbol of freedom to the boy since the boy escaped from the country because of the rebellion.
        However, I think the bigger meanings are hope and hopelessness.  They hope for freedom, so the first paragraph mentioned it.  The hopelessness is opposite to hope, but it can also be represented in the same story.  The boy writes on his diary in the beginning, "I also know there are timeless waters, endless seas, and lots of people in this world whose names don't matter to anyone but themselves."  The boy realizes how small a person is.  He knows that people are too small to be remembered and are too vulnerable to have cared.  Then, compared to endless seas and human, he felt hopeless because of the human's fragility and endlessness of sea. 
        The Children of the Sea also implies the baby that is born on the boat and also implies the people who die in the sea.  First, the baby is born on the boat and died on the boat, so the short life of the baby belongs to the sea.  Secondly, many people are buried in the sea due to a lot of accidents and tragedies.  For those people whose bodies are under the sea and cannot be found, they are like the children of the sea, which will "live" in the sea forever.     

What is the significance of not naming characters in a lot of Danticat's stories?
        Personally, I think the characters' names are difficult to remember.  Clearly, that is not the reason that Danticat did not name the characters in the book. 
        The other reason is that instead of remembering the names, the relationships between characters are more important.  In other words, the book does not emphasize the independent characters.  Danticat did not describe a person in details, such as the person's appearance, the personality, and the person's thoughts.   However, Danticat paid more attention to the relationship.  In Children of the Sea, she focused on the girl and boy's development of relationship through letters, and we can also know the father-and-daughter relationship in the girl's family.  In Wall of Rising Fire, Danticat mainly described what happens in Lili and Guy's family.  In Caroline's Wedding, Danticat shows the cultural contradictions in Caroline and Grace's family.  Therefore, the purpose of the characters is not to reveal who a person should be, but how a person fits into society and how the people reveal a problem in society.  
        Furthermore, the characters that mentioned in the book can also be the representatives of a group of people.  In this circumstance, their names are not important.  Guy jumps out of the hot balloon because he wants freedom, and he represents a group of people who want freedom.  The mother in the epilogue, Lili in The Wall of Rising Fire, the mother in Night Women, and the mother in New York Day Women demonstrate a women role.  Therefore, the significance of not naming characters is that we can focus on the most of people instead of knowing only one person's life.  

25 things

1.   Hair
2.   Sky
3.  Ocean
4.  Street
5.  Breast
6.  Innocent Voice
7.  Breath
8.  Night
9.  Roof
10.  Numb
11.  Pictures
12.  Beautiful Women
13.  Beautiful Boy
14.  Hope
15.  Candle
16.  Curtain
17.  Sugar Mill
18.  Orange
19.  Perfume
20.  Peace
21.  Craziness
22.  Flower
23.  Bystander
24.  Eyelash
25.  My love

4 questions

1.  Why the author chose to tell the stories independently and then connect them all together?
2.  What the male identity in this book should be?  Do you think men should live like that?
3.  What is the women role in this book?  Do you think women should live like that?
4.  Some people suggest they should follow the tradition, but some people suggest they should walk their own way.  Which side do you support?

Women Like Us

        For the last story, the author used the second view to tell her story.  A lots of paragraphs start with the sentence, "You remember thinking while braiding your hair that you look a lot like your mother.  Your mother who looked like your grandmother and her grandmother before her," to show how the tradition and heredity flow in her blood.  Haitian women always head down, so her family, her mom asks her to head down as well. They refused the author to be a book writer, so writing actually brought a lot of pains to her.  She also admitted that being a writer does not end well.

       "In our world, writers are tortured and killed if they are men.  Called lying whores, then raped and killed, if they are women. In our world, if you write, you are a politician, and we know what happens to politicians.  They end up in a prison dungeon where their bodies are covered in scalding tar before they're forced to eat their own waste."

       Someone thinks the sentence telling above might be too extreme, too cynical.  However, I believe what author mentioned is true. People judge an art or literature easily, and usually, they incline to judge or criticize the artists or writers easily through seeing their works.  They feel litterateurs are unreasonable, and they criticize the litterateurs just because litterateurs show something that they do not want to see. People will pretend the bad never happened because they are far away from the tragedy; the victim will keep silence because they are afraid to recall the mournful memories.  In addition, the society asked for silence, then no one will speak but the writers. Writers found the truth, poke the knife into hearts and unripe it, so that the readers can feel the same feelings that writers want to tell. It is truly a torture for writers.

       Lastly, I would love to quote these sentences.  I think they are pretty good.

       "This fragile sky has terrified you your whole life.  Silence terrifies you more than the pounding of a million pieces of steel chopping away at your flesh.  Sometimes, you dream of hearing only the beating of your own heart, but this has never been the case. You have never been able to escape the pounding of a thousand other hearts that have outlived yours by thousands of years."

       I cannot assert I totally understand the words, but I think what the author wants to tell us is the strong connection between you and your ancestor, the strong connection between individual and the whole society.  In other words, what you decided and what you felt were probably influenced by the culture and your ancestor in a great content, and what you did would decide the next generations. You think you are alone, feeling or suffering your own things, but it is never be true.  You think you are special, but actually you just transfer a thought or behavior from your ancestors.

10/25 In class writing

Theme

It is usually hard for the first immigrant, but second generation will live easily in the United States.  Therefore, immigration creates a generation gap and the feeling of unsettled simultaneously, and sometimes it requires the sacrifice of the first immigrants.  The first generation incures the culture habit, but the second generation often anchors the native culture.

Generation Gap

Bone Soup: “If she keep smaking this soup, I will dip my head into the pot and scald myself blind.  That will show her that there’s no magic in it.” “Ma believed that her bone soup could cure all kinds of ills.”

Marriage Shower: “I don’t really like showers, but I’ll let you give me one because there are certain things that I need” Caroline said. “A shower is like begging.  In Haiti we are poor, but we do not beg” mom said.

Sacrifice

“When I was born, they felt a sense of helplessness.  Papa would need to pull more carts. Ma would need to sell more water, more charcoal, more peanuts.  They had to try to find a way to leave Haiti.”

“She laid the bag on her bed, taking out many of the items that she had put in it years ago when she left Haiti to come to the United States to be reunited with my father.”

Caroline's weddings

        The storyline basically is from the preparation of Caroline's wedding to the end of her wedding with Eric, who is not a Haitian.  However, the story starts with Grace's verification.  She becomes one of the American citizens, and her mother cooked bone soup for them to celebrate.  Her mother is a really traditional woman, who dissatisfies that her daughter Caroline would marry a non-Haitian person.  She decides to cook bone soup for Caroline every day.  Because in her thought the bone soup is so magical that it can solve every problem, and then Caroline will not marry.  Actually, her mother agrees with her wedding and sends her best wishes to her daughter in the end.  In fact, compares to the tradition, rituals, and gossips, the mother respects Caroline and cares more about Caroline's happiness.  Even though Caroline is living like an American, she accepts it eventually even though sometimes she is not happy with it.
        The story also talks about Caroline and Grace's father.  They love their father so much that even their father died a long time ago, they still dream of him and remember the past with him.  The game of question is started between the children and the father, and I think this game is really important for readers to notice.  "Why is it that when you lose something, it is always in the last place that you look for it?" "Because once you remember (find it), you always stop looking."  This riddle appears the first time when the Narrator, Grace, recalled the memory of her and her father.   It is a great answer, and I can understand it.  However, after Caroline went to honeymoon and so many concerns were raised in Grace's mind, her mother mentioned the question again, and the answer ends up the story.  I am really confused about it.  I felt her mother wants to tell Grace one thing will end when you find the thing or achieve a goal.  Therefore, to make the life more abundant or interesting, it is okay sometimes we should keep looking and remain the questions and worries in our mind.

Comparison between New York Day Women and Night Women

        Women are trying to fight for more freedom and equality in modern history, but how they make effort, women are defined as a group of vulnerable people in both social bias and biological description.  The reason is that in biological and psychological explanation, the female pay more effort on having a child; in the social script, the female should become mother eventually, and they have to raise their children.  Therefore, in both subconsciousness and lead of gender role (or culture), the ladies in New York Day Women and Night Women are both mothers who love their children so much.   

       Besides the love, they are both ashamed of their jobs and even ashamed of themselves.  In Night Women, the mother chooses to be a prostitute, so that she can earn more money to provide her son having a good education.  The job decides once she becomes the night women, she is stuck in this job and will never go back to day women.  In a traditional mind, the job is really filthy and inappropriate so the mother cannot tell the truth to her son about her job.  She desires to be a day woman who she will never become from the time she decides to be a night woman.  

        The mother in New York Day Women holds the same shame about her job and her identity, I think.  In her traditional mind, she should be a mother taking care her child, but the truth is that she has to take care of other children, spending more time with other children instead of her daughter.  She is a nanny.  In addition, because of that, I feel she is a little bit guilty to her own child, and that is why she chooses to hide her job from her child.  She also ashamed of her identity.  When she lives in New York, she never goes out of Brooklyn, and she is living with a heavy Haitian tradition.  Back at that time, I know Brooklyn is a massive place that so many black people live there.  I watched some movies and read some books that mentioned people in 19 century would not go to Brooklyn because of chaos and filth.  Even though the black could have the opportunity to find a good job and a good place to live in the eastern coast of USA, the racism decides that the black people still cannot be treated equally.   Therefore, as a Haitian, the mother cannot get into society, and she is ashamed that she lives in Brooklyn with Haitian, black identity.  However, the mother is as proud to her child as the mother in Night Women.   

       These two mothers also have differences.  The mother in New York Day Woman is a little more fortunate than the mother in Night Women.  The mother still has a husband supporting the family, and she does not have to be a night woman.  However, the mother in Night Women has to raise her child by her own, facing the danger all the time because she is in Haiti.  For example, the driver will be responsible for the car accident in the USA, but in Haiti, "the owner of the car gets out and kicks you for getting blood on his bumper."  Haiti is lack of justice law, and it makes the mother in Night Women even more tragic.   

        After reading these two stories, I am confused about the gender role.  I think the gender role in these two stories suggest the children are the future of the mothers.  Children come first.  Therefore, as mothers, they have to sacrifice themselves, and they are so easy to be ashamed.  Women are tough and independent because of their children.  

New York Day Women

1.  Would you get up and give an old lady like me your subway seat?
2.  Tonight on the subway, I will get up and give my seat to a pregnant woman or a lady about Ma's age.
3.  She is standing in a circle, chatting with a group of women who are taking other people's children on an afternoon outing.  They look like a Third World Parent-Teacher Association meeting.  My mother, who never went to any of my Parent-Teacher Association meetings when I was in school.
4.  You're so good anyway.  What are they going to tell me?  I don't want to make you ashamed of this day woman.  Shame is heavier than a hundred bags of salt.
5.  I cannot just swallow salt.  Salt is heavier than a hundred bags of shame.
6.  With her blood pressure, she shouldn't eat anything with sodium.  She has to be careful with her heart, this day woman.

This story is like the Children of the Sea, one perspective in normal words front, the other is in bald.  However, the normal fronts are from the child, and the other is from her mother.  Like all the kids in the world, when we get puberty, we will have a period to go against our parents.  There is a big gap between the child and the mother.  For example, the child does not want to give the seat that her mother asks her to do.  However, she loves her mother, and that is why she meets her mother, follows her, and worries about her diet.  The mother does not know, and she feels her daughter is ashamed of her because of her job.  Actually, she is ashamed of her job.  For the child, after she stocks her mother, she suddenly feels that she will lose her at someday, just like she says that she might chase after a woman who looks like her mom.  She scared, and she tries to give up the seat.
I do not get the salt, is there any culture or metaphor behind it?

Ackerman's reading

1.  I've learned to write prose, too, and that has brought its own frustrations and freedoms. (?) Why?  What do you frustrate about?
2.  In both genres, writing is my form of celebration and prayer, but it's also the way in which I explore the world, sometimes writing about nature, sometimes about human nature.
3.  The real source of my creativity continues to be poetry.
4.  There is nothing like poetry to throw light into the dark coroners of existence, and make life's runaway locomotive slow down for a moment so that it can be enjoyed.
5.  Words are small shapes in the gorgeous chaos of the world.
6.  The apparent subject of a poem isn't always an end in itself.  It may really be an opportunity, a way for the poet to reach in and haul up whatever nugget of the human condition is distracting at the moment, something that can't be reached in any other way.
7.  As many have pointed out, poetry is a kind of knowing, a way of looking at the ordinary until it becomes special and the exceptional until it becomes commonplace. (?). Does that mean teaching us to be special as an ordinary person till make the extrordinary to commonplace again?

Krik? Krak! Performance Reflection

        In this performance, we were asked to act the character in the book who we analyzed.  I chose Lili, and a lot of people chose the characters from The Wall of Rising Fire.  However, our partner is the character from different story.  Therefore, the performance is to show the interaction of these characters.
        My partner is Helen, and her role is the unknown girl who loves the boy in Children of the Sea.  My character and her character have a big age gap, which means the communication between us is limited in some ways, so we were stuck in the plot.  How they meet is difficult.  The casual meeting, which you just force them to meet in the script without any reason, is kind of boring and not convincing.  Afterall, it is impossible to have a long conversation between two strangers meeting each other in a random walk.  Therefore, in the end we decided to start with the girl running away to say goodbye to the boy at night.  She runs so fast that she runs into Lili by accident.  Lili worries about her safety, so she tries to convince her to go back home.   However, it causes the girl miss the boat where boy is on.
        The girl still loves the boy, and Lili is as kind as always.  Besides that, I do not think the performance can reveal many possibilities of interactions between them but meet in accident, or Lili takes care the girl when the girl's father die by accidents.  The reason is that generations do not interact so often because they are living in different time line.  Look at others' performances, I think they can have interations, such as Guy and night woman who is Lili.
             

Between the Pool and the Gardenias

1.  Her lips were wide and purple, like those African dolls you see in tourist store windows but could never afford to buy.

2.  Her eyes closed as though she was dreaming of far other places.

3.  At night, I could rock her alone in the hush of my room, rest her on my belly, and wish she were inside.

4.  But Rose.  My, she was so clean and warm.

5.  Rose didn't stir or cry.  She was like something that was thrown aside after she became useless to someone cruel.

6.  There was my great-grandmother Eveline who was killed by Dominican soldiers at the Massacre River.  My grandmother Defile who died with a bald head in a prison, because God had given her wings.  My godmother Lili who killed herself in old age because her husband had jumped out of a flying balloon and her grown son left her to go to Miami.

7.  Maybe I was to do some good for this child.

8.  I pretended that it was all mine.

9.  Rose listened with her eyes closed even though I was telling her things that were much too strong for a child's ears.

10.  She looked the same as she did when I found her.  She continued to look like that for three days.  After that, I had to bathe her constantly to keep down the smell. 

11.  I left her in a shack behind the house, where the Dominican kept his tools.  Three times a day, I visited her with my hand over my nose.

12.  I knew I had to act with her because she was attracting flies and I was keeping her spirit from moving on.

     I thought it is a romantic story, but it actually ends up as a thriller.  The woman in the story is called Marie, who finds a baby on the street.  She adopts the baby and names her Rose.  She is the last one of her family, and she is the main key for the audience to connect the other stories in this book because the characters that showed up in the previous passages are her family members.  She also has an unfortunate marriage, so she leaves her husband.  As a result, she does not have any child by her side due to some unknown reasons.  

        She desires for control.  We can see it through her description.  She clearly said that she hopes everything is hers.  Therefore, based on the thoughts and the other evidence that I found above, I have a strong feeling that Marie is a psychopath.  I do not know whether she kills a baby, but I am really confident that she is keeping a dead baby from the beginning to the end.  When Marie first looks at Rose, Rose's lips are purple.  Then, after three days, Rose's body is corrupted quickly.  Besides, Rose does not cry, which it is really uncommon for a baby.  

        In addition, through what Marie does, I am scared completely.  When I read Rose smells and Marie compares Rose to a pig intestine, I know something wrong.  As a normal person, we usually feel something wrong.  Even though Marie is not a normal person, she should be panic and send her child to a hospital being a mother who she really wants to be.  If she is yearning to be a mother, whether she is a psychopath or not, she will act like a mother and worry about her child.  However, she does not.  Instead, she leaves Rose in a shack, where the Dominican kept his tools.  She treats Rose like a tool.  I do not get it, and I am afraid of her.  

Children and Hope

        Children are the hope of most parents.  Whether the love for children is driven by natural ability or nurture personal love, love for children and put hope on them is what everyone does in the first four stories in Kirk? Krak!  In  Children of the Sea, the girl is protected by her father, and Celianne gives birth on the boat.  In Nineteen Thirty-Seven, the mother passed her Madonna, also her religion and her hope, to her daughter, Josephine, before she died.  In A Wall of Fire Rising, Lili fully supports her son, and in Night Women, the mother also deeply loves her son and lives for this love and hope.  People live with hope and die with hopelessness.   Children of the Sea and Night Women show the two clear examples by comparing and contrasting Celianne in Children of the Sea and the mother in Night Women.
        Even though Children of the Sea is not Celianne's story directly, we can tell that she is pregnant after she is raped by the soldiers through the boy's letters.  Then, she gave the childbirth on the boat on the endless sea.  It is a brave action, and it is so painful for Celianne, but what happened after can be even painful and frustrated.  How to raise the child becomes a big problem.  In the first few days, the boy writes, "Celianne is holding her baby tight against her chest.  She just cannot seem to let herself throw it in the ocean."  The words are written when the baby is still alive but not crying.  Maybe the baby never lives because it is not crying, but at that moment, none of them is sure the baby is dead.  Celianne still holds her baby when water leak into the boat.   Many people slap behind Celianne, but she is not crying and not angry about it.  She sits in silence and lives for the baby until the baby turns to purple: the baby is dead.  Then, the words show, "she threw it overboard.  And quickly after that she jumped in too."  When the baby turns purple, Celianne is still waiting for the baby to turn back.  People want to throw it overboard while Celianne is sleeping, but Celianne does not sleep, which shows that she still keeps her baby and fight for it.  However, after she ensures the baby is dead, she throws it into the sea and jumps with it.  We can tell that she is hopeless and tired of everyone in the world.  When the baby is alive, she will endure every judgment behind her, but when the baby is dead, she cannot stand the life anymore.  It demonstrates how much hope and wish of living she put on her baby.
        People die because of children, but people also live because of them.  The mother in Night Women is a prostitute, which has the same condition with Celianne.  They experience what they do not want to.  However, the mother is more fortunate.  She has a healthy son, and the son is studying in school happily.  Therefore, the mother will live for it.  At the end of the story, "When I walk back into the house, I hear the rise and fall of my son's breath.  Quickly, I lean my face against his lips to feel the calming heat from his mouth."  It is casual description without so much emotion in it.  However, if we relate the words to the women last description that describing the sex last night, we can see that how numb she is when she works.  "Calming heat" is the heat from her son's mouth, and it can also show how calming that the mother feels.  It means that the heat will calm her down from the work last night.  It is like an atonement that heals the mother's negative self-cognition and warms her cold heart.  The mother put all hope on her son because her son is her hope, and the mother will live strongly with her son, with her hope.
         

Lili, A Wall of Fire Rising

        Lili, one of the main characters in A Wall of Fire Rising, is a wife of Guy and also a mother of little Guy.   She and her family are living in a sugar mill, and she has daily work to do.  Therefore, the family is not rich enough, but the family has the basic supply and has a stable life in peace.
        It is easy to meet Lili's satisfaction.  She is not blaming her husband, Guy, cannot earn a lot of money.  When Guy asks Lili how does she thinks a man is judged when he is gone, she responses, "People don't eat riches.  They eat what they can buy."  She thinks judging a man cannot depend on his salary or reputation but his deeds.  In other words, she does not care about the money too much.  As long as their boy is fed, she is fine and happy about it.  The words can be also regarded as a comfort.  She does not want her husband to have any burden, so she says this way.  Then, we can see how kind and thoughtful she is.
         Secondly, she is a good mother and a tough woman.  Being a good mother, she is always standing on her kid's side.  Truly, she is putting her most of hope on little Guy, which it is a parent's way of living I strongly disagree with, but from the reaction, we can see Lili encourages and supports her son all the time.  Specifically, Lili believes her son should go to college and continue receiving the education until they cannot afford.  Education decides the future of a child in a great content, and Lili thinks for her son.  She does not want her son to be limited by this small area by putting him on the lists.  Back to the old time, it is a rare and great choice that a mother can do for her children.  Being a tough woman, I can see through Lili teaching little Guy to speak his line louder.  "You know you must not humble," she talks to little Guy, "next time say them loud, so he knows what is coming out of your mouth."  Boukman is a leader of the evolution, and he is also a hero in many people's mind.  Therefore, Lili is excited for her son for acting this character.  Basically, when Lili teaches little Guy to speak louder so that others can hear is mainly teaching him to speak proudly.  Speaking loudly needs confidence, and speaking with confidence requires courage.  When Lili knows this idea, she is not a soft person I think.  Otherwise, she will not realizes and teach him in this way.
        She is also a good wife.  The description of her and her husband talking at night in bed shows a warm communication.  Lili would love to talk to Guy when Guy is lying on her chest even though sometimes she cannot understand him.  She is satisfied with this lives' condition, but her husband is not.  She would love to communicate with her husband and try to know him more, but her husband sometimes says "ask me nothing about today".  Therefore, when Guy talks about the hot balloon, she feels like Guy is going to leave her and her son.  However, she is not mad at him at first.  Instead, she asks whether she and her son will ride on the hot balloon together.  I can feel she worries, but she does not show.  And then, what happened on the next morning breaks her heart and solve her confusion at the same time.  For the first look at the balloon, she must think about whether Guy really left her and her son alone until Guy jumps out of the balloon, and until then, she remembers what Guy said and understands her husband completely.
 
       

Night Women

1.  Why the woman kiss her son after he is asleep?
2.  Why the woman mentioned the daily workers?
3.  Why she mention the roof at the beginning and the end of the story?

Note 1-4

Children of the Sea
        The main characters' names are unknown.
        The boy and the girl are in a relationship.
        The boy worked for radio and got into the college, but because of the radio action, he has to go far away from home.  Therefore, he is on the sea to the United States writing.  He does not end up in the United States.
       The girl is protected by her father at home.  She also writes letters to the boy.  She does not understand why her father refuses her to meet the boy, but later she understands.
        Celianne:  The girl that the boy meets on the boat.  Her brother is working at the radio station.  Her brother is prisoned, and she is rapped by multiple people.  She gave birth to the child and a few days later she tosses her child into the sea and she jumps out of the boat.
        The boy describes Celianne's story is that he feels like Celianne and her family's situation might be true for him if he does not run away from home early.  He will hurt others.
        Black Butterflies: Metaphor.  News.

Nineteen Thirty-Seven
        The main Character Josephine visits her mother in the prison periodically.  Every time she visits her, she finds her mother is getting weaker.  Josephine knows soldiers in prison do not treat her mother well because they all think her mother is a witch.  In the end, one midnight, Jaqualin, a woman in a white dress, tells Josephine that her mother is dead.  Her mother got burned, and one of her mother's property, Madonna, is passed to Josephine.  Watching the fire, Josephine is released and feel peaceful for her mother because the death is the freedom.
        Josephine does not understand her mother at first, but when her mother passes Madonna to her and dies, she knows her mother.
        Madonna, a religious figure.
        Fire: Metaphor.  Means blood, living life. A strong, passionate but dangerous spirit.

A Wall of Fire Rising
        A family lives in the sugar mill peacefully.  It is not a rich family, but they can survive without hunger.  Guy, the husband, gets a steady job, and his wife, Lili, also gets a job.  Their son is smart and talented on acting.  Their son, little Guy, will act Boukman in school.  Everything goes well until one day morning Guy rides on the hot balloon, jumps out of it and dies.
        Guy's wife does not expect Guy to be really tough and successful, but Guy often regards himself as a loser, and he is struggling on it for a long time.  Lili and Guy have some misconception about each other.  When Guy dies, Lili knows that freedom in his spirit is more valuable than his life.
        Sky: Metaphor.  freedom.

Night Women
        The woman is a prostitute.  Her husband is dead a long time ago.  The short story shows her struggling about her identity and education to her son.  She distains and feels sorry about her filthy body, so she always gave her humble love to her son when her son is asleep.  She fears that her son will know her job, and she feels distant from her son because of the job identity.  Actually, her son still loves her so much.  Her son is her hope and angel.  She is her son's angel appearing in his dream.
        Angel: Metaphor; Beauty and innocence.

Freedom

        Why there have to be some people die in the stories?  Born in troubled times, most people lead their lives of vagrancy.  Then, when we read their stories, we know the how insignificant an individual's strength is.  Therefore, how can we carry the heavy spirit of freedom on our shoulder?
        In the Children Of the Sea, two main characters put their freedom into letters with hope and love.  The girl has to stay at home, and her father does not allow her to go outside and does not allow her to meet with the boy.  Even though her father wants to keep her safe, she is yearning meeting the boy.  The boy is on the boat and leaving Haiti involuntarily.  He seems to look for freedom because he was going to the United States.  However, his heart always belongs to the girl, and his freedom is her.
        He wrote on his notebook, "I look up at the sky and I see you there."  Before the sentence, he mentioned the endless mountains and endless sea.  The mountains and sea can symbolize the overcome, and in his description, they are suppressing the boy's living space, and I felt the endless waiting of new life brings hopelessness to the boy.  Then, he wrote, "I look up at the sky and I see you there."  It is unrelated to the environment he mentions, and it does not fit the feeling that he wrote before.  It is a short statement without any word polishment.  The simple and straightforward sentence is written so easily that it is like the boy is discussing the weather, common and emotionless.  However, compared to the sentences before this statement, I can see a huge emotional crush between the sentences and the statement.  The statement is like a depressant of the negativeness; it is also like an only light shone through the boy's darkness and consoled his heart.  The sky can save you from the endless mountains and ocean, and the girl is there, so she is the savor for the boy to set him free.
        In Nineteen Thirty-Seven, the main character's mother is persecuted to death.  Actually, not only her mother is persecuted by the soldier in the prison, but also her mother's mother is killed by soldiers near the river on the same date that her mother gives birth to her.  At the end of the story, Josephine, the main character, remembered, "When Jacqueline and I stepped out into the yard to wait for the burning, I raised my head toward the sun thinking, One day I may just see my mother there."  The tone of the story is full of sadness because, from the beginning of the story, Josephine's mother is in the prison.  Her mother spends a long time in the prison and dies there.  Each time Josephine visits her mother, her mom's health is getting worse.  However, when Josephine really sees her mom's dead body is burning in the fire, she does not feel that mournful.  Instead, she looks up to the sky, to the sun and thinks she might meet her mom one day.  The sentence is not negative at all.  Instead, it contains a bit of wish and a bit of hope, because for her and for her mother, death might be a good choice.  After all, death is better than suffering through the life.  Compare to suffering, death is a form of freedom for Josephine's mother.
        In A Wall of Fire Rising, the setting is not as mournful as Nineteen Thirty-Seven.  The story tells a small family living in small lives.  Mother, Lili, is a strong and nice woman; father, Guy, a man who has a stable job and take care of his family all the time; their son, Little Guy, works hard and gets the main role, Boukman, and a lot of lines in drama.  The lives are simple until Guy flies the hot balloon.  When I read he is fling the hot balloon, I know everything cannot come back.  Their normal lives cannot come back, and the relationship between Lili and Guy is broken completely.  I think he leaves Lili and his son and flies away, but I don't expect Guy will jump out of the hot balloon.  I am completely shocked.  I do not understand his action until I read Lili's words, "No, leave them (Guy's eyes) open.  My husband likes to look at the sky."  Here comes another sky, and clearly, this sky represents the strong will of freedom.  Guy eagers to fly to the sky, so that he can escape from the unsatisfied job and an unsatisfied life.  Then, when he chooses to jump from the hot balloon, I think he denies every possible happiness in the future and there is nothing left for him to expect.  It reminds me of a Germany philosopher, Nietzsche.  He said if you cannot live proudly, then you should die proudly.  Therefore, Guy chooses to die in his most free, glorious moment.  I feel pity about him, but ar that moment, he is completely free.
        All three stories mention the sky, and their themes all contain freedom.  Different people in the different family environment look up to the same sky and seek for the different freedom figure in their minds.  Even though they use their stories and lives to define freedom, they are seeking for a same goal and a same spirit, freedom.

Children of the Sea

        There are two main characters in "Children of the Sea", one is the girl and the other is a boy.  They are both nineteen or twenty, and they are in a relationship.  However, they cannot get along with each other because of many situations, such as the radio station violation, military suppression, and the girl under her father's control.  As a result, the boy has to leave the country and sail to Africa, and the girl is locked in her house.  They wrote the letters to each other often.  The bolded words are from the girl.  

  

        From the letter, we can tell that both two people worried and were afraid of their future, and both of them were suffering a strong missing and loneliness.  The boy has sailed away from the country in a small boat, and the environment on the boat is really bad.  The destination, Africa, does him no good because African discriminate Haiti even though they are in the same color and share the same ancestor.  Girl stayed at home missing the boy.  She wants to marry the boy and is ready to marry him, but her father refuses her and locks her up at home.  Her father thinks there should be another man to take care of her and bring more benefits to her.  Then, the society gets crazy, and the girl is in a more dangerous place. 

        Borning at the wrong time in a wrong place, it is so hard for people to follow their wills.  The most mournful love is produced in chaos.  "Children of the Sea" reminds me a movie I watched last year.  The movie is called Atonement.  It is mainly about in WWII, British, a servant and the young lady of that big mansion fall in love, but they are separated immediately because of war and hierarchy.  The man goes to the battlefield in France, and the lady becomes a nurse in London.  They are communicating by sending letters.  In the end, the man died on the day before Dunkirk Evacuation, and the woman died in an air raid.  They miss each other so much, and they believe the man will come back and they will live happily in a white house near the sea.  However, their wishes never happen.  What left in the end? Sunset, ocean, reed marshes, and miserable and gloomy atmosphere.  People's innocence, wishes, passionate hearts, and fragile hope make a tragedy even more miserable.   

Haiti and Edwidge Danticat

1. Timeline for Haiti's history from Independence to present

1821

President Boyer invades Santo Domingo following its declaration of independence from Spain. The entire island is now controlled by Haiti until 1844.

1838

France recognizes Haitian independence in exchange for a financial indemnity of 150 million francs. Over the next few decades Haiti is forced to take out loans of 70 million francs to repay the indemnity and gain international recognition.

1862

The United States grants Haiti diplomatic recognition sending Frederick Douglass as its Consular Minister.

1915

President Woodrow Wilson orders the U.S. Marines to occupy Haiti and establish control over customs-houses and port authorities. The Haitian National Guard is created by the occupying Americans. The Marines force peasants into corvée labor building roads. Peasant resistance to the occupiers grows under the leadership of Charlemagne Peralt, who is betrayed and assassinated by Marines in 1919.

1934

The U.S. withdraws from Haiti leaving the Haitian Armed Forces in place throughout the country.

1937

Thousands of Haitians living near the border of the Dominican Republic are massacred by Dominican soldiers under the orders of President General Trujillo.

1957

After several attempts to move forward democratically ultimately fail, military-controlled elections lead to victory for Dr. François Duvalier, who in 1964 declares himself President-for-Life and forms the infamous paramilitary Tonton Makout. The corrupt Duvalier dictatorship marks one of the saddest chapters in Haitian history with tens of thousands killed or exiled.

1971

"Papa-Doc" Duvalier dies in office after naming his 19 year-old son Jean-Claude as his successor.

1972

The first Haitian "boat people" fleeing the country land in Florida.

1976

Widespread protests against repression of the nation's press take place.

1970s-1980s

"Baby-Doc" Duvalier exploits international assistance and seeks to attract investment leading to the establishment of textile-based assembly industries. Attempts by workers and political parties to organize are quickly and regularly crushed.

1981

International aid agencies declare Haitian pigs to be carriers of African Swine Fever and institute a program for their slaughter. Attempts to replace indigenous swine with imported breeds largely fail.

1984

Over 200 peasants are massacred at Jean-Rabeau after demonstrating for access to land. The Haitian Bishops Conference launches a nation-wide (but short-lived) literacy program. Anti-government riots take place in all major towns.

1986

Widespread protests against "Baby Doc" lead the U.S. to arrange for Duvalier and his family to be exiled to France. Army leader General Henri Namphy heads a new National Governing Council.

1987

A new Constitution is overwhelmingly approved by the population in March. General elections in November are aborted hours after they begin with dozens of people shot by soldiers and the Tonton Makout in the capital and scores more around the country.

1988

Military controlled elections - widely abstained from - result in the installation of Leslie Manigat as President in January. Manigat is ousted by General Namphy four months later and in November General Prosper Avril unseats Namphy.

1990

Avril declares a state of siege in January. Rising protests and urging from the American Ambassador convince Avril to resign. A Council of State forms out of negotiations among democratic sectors, charged with running a Provisional Government led by Supreme Court Justice Ertha Pascal-Trouillot.

U.S. Vice-President Dan Quayle visits Haiti and tells Army leaders, "No more coups." Assistance is sought from the Organization of American States (OAS) and the United Nations (UN) to help organize general elections in December.

In a campaign marred by occasional violence and death, democratic elections finally take place on December 16, 1990.

1991

Duvalierist holdover and Tonton Makout Dr. Roger Lafontant attempts a coup d'état to prevent Father Aristide's ascension to power. The Armed Forces quickly remove him from the National Palace following massive popular protest.

1992

Negotiations between the Washington, D.C. based exiled Government, Haiti's Parliament and representatives of the coup régime headed by General Raoul Cédras lead to the Washington Protocol, which is ultimately scuttled by the coup régime.  U.S. President George Bush exempts U.S. factories from the embargo and orders U.S. Coast Guard to interdict all Haitians leaving the island in boats and to return them to Haiti.The OAS embargo fails as goods continue to be smuggled through neighboring Dominican Republic. Haiti's legitimate authorities ask the United Nations to support a larger embargo in order to press the coup leaders to step down. The UN pledges to support efforts by the OAS to find a solution to the political crisis.

1993

President Aristide asks the Secretaries-General of the OAS and the UN for the deployment by the United Nations and OAS of an international civilian mission to monitor respect for human rights and the elimination of all forms of violence.

In June Haiti requests an oil and arms embargo from the UN Security Council in order to pressure the coup régime to give up power.

The UN calls for "strict implementation" of the embargo against the de facto authorities. The Civilian Mission's human rights observers are allowed to return in small numbers.

1994

In May additional sanctions were levied against the régime through a naval blockade supported by Argentine, Canadian, French, Dutch and U.S. warships.  Tensions increase as human rights violations continue. The Civilian Mission is told by the de facto authorities to leave the country. On October 15th, President Aristide and his Government-in-exile return to Haiti.

1995

In June Haiti hosts the annual OAS General Assembly at Montrouis.  Legislative elections take place that month and in December the presidential contest is won by former Prime Minister René Préval. (President Aristide is precluded by the Constitution from succeeding himself).

1996

President Préval is inaugurated in February. A Government is formed under Prime Minister Rosny Smarth. Agricultural production, administrative reform, and economic modernization are announced as the Goverment's priorities.

2.Haiti's fight for and gain of Independence:

Two months after his defeat of Napoleon Bonaparte’s colonial forces, Jean-Jacques Dessalines proclaims the independence of Saint-Domingue, renaming it Haiti after its original Arawak name.

In 1791, a slave revolt erupted on the French colony, and Toussaint-Louverture, a former slave, took control of the rebels. Gifted with natural military genius, Toussaint organized an effective guerrilla war against the island’s colonial population. He found able generals in two other former slaves, Dessalines and Henri Christophe, and in 1795 he made peace with revolutionary France following its abolishment of slavery. Toussaint became governor-general of the colony and in 1801 conquered the Spanish portion of island, freeing the slaves there.

In January 1802, an invasion force ordered by Napoleon landed on Saint-Domingue, and after several months of furious fighting, Toussaint agreed to a cease-fire. He retired to his plantation but in 1803 was arrested and taken to a dungeon in the French Alps, where he was tortured and died in April.

Soon after Toussaint’s arrest, Napoleon announced his intention to reintroduce slavery on Haiti, and Dessalines led a new revolt against French rule. With the aid of the British, the rebels scored a major victory against the French force there, and on November 9, 1803, colonial authorities surrendered. In 1804, General Dessalines assumed dictatorial power, and Haiti became the second independent nation in the Americas. Later that year, Dessalines proclaimed himself Emperor Jacques I. He was killed putting down a revolt two years later.

3. Toussaint L'Ouverture:

François Toussaint Louverture was a former Haitian slave who led the only successful slave revolt in modern history. Standing steadfastly, he fought to end slavery and gain Haiti’s independence from European powers, France and Spain. Forming an army of former slaves and deserters from the French and Spanish armies, he trained his followers in guerrilla warfare and successfully ended slavery in Hispaniola by 1795.

4. Boukman

      Dutty Boukman was an early leader of the Haitian Revolution, enslaved in Jamaica and later in Haiti. He is considered to have been both a leader of maroons and vodou hougan (priest).  According to some contemporary accounts Boukman alongside Cécile Fatiman, a Vodou mambo, presided over the religious ceremony at Bois Caïman, in August 1791, that served as the catalyst to the 1791 slave revolt which is usually considered the beginning of the Haitian Revolution. Boukman was a key leader of the slave revolt in the Le Cap‑Français region in the north of the colony. He was killed by the French planters and colonial troops in 7 November 1791,  just a few months after the beginning of the uprising. The French then publicly displayed Boukman's head in an attempt to dispel the aura of invincibility that Boukman had cultivated.The fact that French authorities had to do this illustrates the impact Boukman made on the views of Haitian people during this time.

5. 1937, Dominican Massacre

In September of 1937, the massacre of thousands of Haitians living in the Dominican Republic commenced. Rafaél Trujillo ordered his military to exterminate the Haitian population in order to cleanse the Dominican population of “foreigners.”

Most of the massacre occurred next to the border at what is now known as Massacre River, and was most casualties occurred from October 7th-12th when the Dominican Republic and Haiti drafted a diplomatic agreement to work towards peaceful relations as well as an official investigation into the massacre. In the course of the month, it is estimated that 20,000 Haitians were killed although the exact number is not known.

6. Rafael Trujillo

Trained by U.S. Marines in 1918 and elevated to commander in chief of the National Army by 1927, General Rafael Trujillo (1891-1961) assumed control of the Dominican Republic in 1930. While successful in reducing foreign debt and fostering greater economic prosperity for the Dominican people, Trujillo and his heinous human rights abuses—including the murder of thousands of civilians—managed to escape rebuke from the international community for decades. Although his reputation became tarnished after reports of a massacre against an estimated 20,000 Haitians became public in 1937, it wasn’t until his failed assassination attempt on Venezuelan President Romulo Betancourt in 1960 that the Organization of American States finally voted to sever relations with the brutal dictator. A year later, Trujillo was killed by a group of rebels determined to topple his regime.