Casual Contemplation

When Mrs. Valentino said this is a book that doesn't make sense until the very end, she wasn't kidding. Throughout the story it constantly seems as though things cannot possibly get weirder, and yet they do. After reading chapters 12 and 13, however, it seems as though things are finally starting to come together. It's happening really fast, though, so I thought I'd recap here, to make more sense out of it all.  In chapter 12, Milkman has discovered that the song the children are singing is actually the story of his family. Solomon and Ryna were Milkman's great-grandparents. They had " twenty-one children, the last one Jake " - Jake being Milkman's grandfather, the first Macon Dead. My interpretation of the lines "[Solomon] left that baby in a white man's house ... Heddy took him to a red man's house " is that when Solomon " whirled about and touched the sun " (escaped slavery), baby Jake was left with the sl...

In class, we discussed two black stereotypes. The first was that blacks can't swim/don't like water. The other was the "Mammy" figure of a nice old (and often obese) black lady who loves taking care of white children and especially loves to cook for them; Aunt Jemima being one example. For my blog I decided to research on some more stereotypes about black people. We are all familiar with the common black stereotypes still used today in movies and other areas which often depict black people as more violent/criminal, swearing more and lacking self control. They are also portrayed as being less educated and more athletic. Less common are stereotypes about the kinds of food that black people enjoy. Fried chicken comes to mind, but blacks are also associated with being especially fond of watermelons and waffles.  But there are many archetypal stereotypes which were very widespread during the 19th and 20th century. Variations of these figures were often used as charact...

 The idea of names - of people, places and things - is a compelling one. Naming something gives it meaning, significance and individuality, and indicates that the person who assigned the name has power. Knowing this, the characters in Song of Solomon came up with their own name for what was officially Mains Avenue, and why the whites  attempted to make sure "that 'Doctor Street' was never used in any official capacity," depriving the "Southside residents" even of the small liberty of naming their own street (5). Our names are one of the most basic pieces of our identity and who we are. A person's name always has a story behind it, and holds generations of family history. My first name - Iman - means faith in Arabic. It's a very common Muslim name, with many spelling variations (all different ways of transliterating the Arabic word). My mom said she knew what she wanted to name me since the very beginning; she picked it because she loved the mean...

Earlier this week, I was reading an article about a note that recently sold for over $1 million. The note was from Albert Einstein to a Japanese mail deliverer, given in place of a tip. It consisted of two snippets of life advice, one of them being "a calm and modest life brings more happiness than the pursuit of success combined with constant restlessness." If only Einstein met Gatsby and put that through his head. Gatsby spent his whole life working towards one goal - Daisy. He participated in illegal activities to gain enough wealth to make himself socially acceptable for her. He threw giant parties all the time in the hopes that some day she would show up to one of them. And he purposefully selected his house "so that Daisy would be just across the bay" (78). In the end, all his efforts were fruitless; in a way, his entire life went to waste. He lived here, though.  Despite the fact that he had so much wealth, consistent with the materialistic ideals ...