"My November Guest"

http://www.glogster.com/meliribotta2012/poem/g-6l62lto1evurgf08vkiola0

This poem appeals to my visual sense; it also evokes mental images. I feel sad since I remember somebody who is no longer near me. I also picture a detailed description of the setting: I imagine a typical autumn day with cloudy skies, silver mist and bare trees.These look lonely and sad as the birds and the leaves are gone. This scenery is in pale colours: only different shades of gray.

The poet remembers a female guest who is still vivid in his mind although she is gone. It seems that she had a strong influence in their relationship because she recalls her attitude about autumn and, also, about him. Although he used to let her talk without answering her comments, he listened to her attentively. This makes me think that these two people have different personality traits; the woman may have been a lively, cheerful person with a strong admiration for nature while the poet appears to be more like an introvert.

I see some relations between the couple in the poem and Mr and Mrs Ramsay in To The Lighthouse. Mrs Ramsay also exerted a strong influence over her family and friends. After her death, she still controlled everybody because her memory was strong in their minds. Mr. Ramsay was similar to the poet in the sense that the two of them were interested in their own thoughts and feelings, both unwilling to engage in conversation.

Postmodernism

I have chosen two videos: “Educational Uses of Second Life” and “War Games” 

In the first video, I can identify some postmodern features. Firstly, Lyotard says: “All knowledge must be digitable to be preserved, anything that is not digitizable will cease to be knowledge” We can support his idea throughout the video since the world of education is being turned into an interactive virtual one.Definitely, the PC is playing a key role in this virtual environment. The computer has changed the way knowledge is arranged, distributed and stored.Secondly, knowledge becomes functional - we learn things, not to know them, but to use that knowledge. This is clearly reflected in the video when it says that students learn by doing. This means that they have an active role in the learning process. For instance, learners  can work together to collaborate in a project and co-create virtual 3D objects.This virtual world also gives learners and educators the chance to form part of communities.They can achieve this by resorting to tools like blogging, for example.

In the second video, “War Games", I can identify one major postmodern feature: the lack of distinction between game and reality. The young man, who seems to be a master at playing computer games, finds it difficult to distinguish game from reality.

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Criticism of the Turn of the Screw by Marcella Holloway

M.H focuses on the following points:

1)  Firstly, she states that there is a close resemblance between Douglas and Miles; she also points out that they are the same person. I agree with her first opinion because both of them have a younger sister who is at home, under the tuition of a governess. Besides, the two are studying away from their home, as boarders. Another similarity is that both returns home in the country, for their summer holidays. Regarding M. Holloway’s second opinion, I don’t think that they are the same person because of the following reasons. In the prologue, we read about Douglas who gathered for the Christmas season with his guests at his country house. One evening he says that he knows about two ghosts that appeared to two children. When the unnamed narrator asks him if such experience had been his own he said: ‘Oh thank God, no’. This means that that he had not gone through such disagreeable experience and had only read about it in a manuscript. Another reason why I believe that Miles is not Douglas is because if we take Miles's death into account, we cannot say that they are the same person.

2)  Secondly, M.H considers that what Douglas read aloud to his guests from the manuscript is the governess’s revelation of her truth for him. Before dying, she had wanted him to learn about her love. I support this point of view. This is because the governess had sent him this manuscript with her experience about ghosts which she had lived through a long time before.

M.H also  talks about the love between Douglas and the governess.Douglas accepts that between him and the governess had existed a strong attraction. But, he says that neither of them talked about it. In the prologue, he tells his guests: ‘neither of us spoke of it’

3)  Thirdly, Holloway also talks about the governess’s love for her employer.In my opinion, it was not real love what she felt for him, it was just a silly infatuation because she had only met him twice when she had her job interviews before working as a governess at Bly.

4)  M.H also claims that the governess loved Miles. I don’t agree with her choice of the word ‘love’. From my point of view, the governess must have felt affection for him as well as responsibility; all this made her rescue the child from what she thought was the possession of Peter Quint’s ghost.

5)   M.H also states that the employer resembles Douglas. I support her opinion. I believe that the employer is like Douglas in three main aspects. On major similarity between them is that they are both single. Another is that they are well-off. They both have a country estate and an apartment in town. They are also similar in the sense that they are both superior to the governess in social status. In my view, marriage would have never taken place because of their different social standing.

6)  Another comment that Marcela makes is about the governess’s sexual repression. I share her opinion with this aspect. I believe that she never had the courage to show her love for him; but by writing the manuscript, she indirectly confessed her love. If she had married Douglas, she would probably have smothered him.

  

Biopoem pattern

Melina

Positive, friendly, determined, and hard-working.

Sister of Romina and daughter of Alicia and Sergio.

Lover of travelling in her own country and abroad,
of swimming at a club and in the river and of drawing and painting.

Who feels very happy when she goes on a trip and learns about
 the culture of the place, sad when she does not find the time to do sports,
 and worried when she cannot cope with all her duties.

Who needs her parents' encouraging words, the company of close friends
and her beloved pet.

Who fears suffering, failing exams and being lonely.

Who would like to see herself a good professional and an accomplisher of her short-term and long-term goals.

Resident of Arroyo Seco, Santa Fe.

Ribotta

I have chosen the Biopattern poem because I believe that it provides an easy pattern to follow. Besides, it enables me to illustrate some of my personality traits, in particular, for those people who don’t know me from previous years. I hope that you’ll enjoy it!