There was a time when I was your son. There was a time that I no longer remember when you used to smile a mother's smile and tell me stories about gallant and fierce warriors who protected their lords with blades of shining steel and about the old woman who found a peach in the stream and too took it home and, when her husband split it in half, a husky little boy tumbled out to fill their hearts with boundless joy. I was that boy in the peach and you were the old woman and we were Japanese...(15)
Well, I was that boy too. Momotaro is a classic Japanese folk tale, a book version of which my mother gave me when I was in first grade. In fact, for Halloween at my elementary school that year I came dressed up as the famous peach boy. You can bet there was nobody else in Winthrop, Massachusetts, 1964, wearing that costume. I would have preferred having had a Batman or Superman costume and not some weird foreign costume with miniature samurai swords stick in a sash around my waist.
No-No Boy is many things: a historical novel about an event and time that is rarely written about; an immigrant story; a story about what it means to be American. The book, originally published in 1957, disappeared quickly, rejected by the exact audience one would think would have devoured it—Japanese Americans. It was rediscovered in the 1970s by a group of young Asian American writers and has not been out of print since. It is a classic of post war American literature. As playwright Frank Chin writes in the afterward of the novel: "Back in 1957 John said things Asian Americans are afraid to think, much less say today [1976]. Things that every yellow feels. I've known all my life that I am not Chinese and I am not white American. I was brought up to believe there was nothing else for me to be but a Chinese foreigner or a fake white American...The [1920's] produced a generation of Asian Americans who didn't know who they were. We still don't. John Okada shows the 'identity crisis' to be both totally real and absolutely fake in a book that is still too strong for many yellows to read." I don't know if Asian Americans feel this way today, 37 years later: maybe we'll talk about this. I do know I did—my generation, the children of Ichiro's generation, many of whom only learned of that time in American history from school. Much as you learned of it.
Enough of me. Some questions for you:
1. Reactions to the novel so far?
2. What moment or scene especially jumped out at you—and why? Quote in your reponse.
3. Finish this statement: Ichiro Yamada is ____________. And then explain your statement.
Finally: go this site. It has good pictures of what we will talk about in the novel, and shows where the film we watched clips from today—Come See The Paradise (1990)—got many of its images. In particular, the banner in the window of the business that reads I AM AN AMERICAN, and the picture of the little girls waiting to get on the buses, the white tags pinned to them.
Hang in there guys: 50 more minutes of me, and then you have a week off.
Thursday, March 28, 2013
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Blog #14. "Show Yourself, Thought Nigel. I Am Gonna Murder The Fuck Out Of You Tonight." Drama City to The End.
"Things happened to that dog on this cruel earth to make it the way it was. Wasn't his fault, but still. It's not like God is gonna step in now, point his finger down from heaven, and touch that animal, make it so it can be around people and other animals the right way" (230).
"Maybe. But I'm still gonna avenge my friend. Rico Miller? Shit, motherfuckers like him, they're in their element behind those walls. I ain't gonna let him have that gift. Boy needs to be put down like an animal...I'm not goin' back to where I been. I'm gonna be at work tomorrow and the day after that. But I'm still gonna do this thing tonight."
"It don't work this way."
"We'll see."
"You been out of it so long, you forgot how it goes. You go in, you got to go in fierce. Forget they're human. Forget that you're human too."
"I know it. Remember, I've done this before."
""But you cleaned your slate. Now, what, you gonna go and throw away your soul again?"
"What about yours?"
"Mine's been lost forever..." (257-258)
"There go my name, Mama," he said, pointing happily at the tree. (266)
He walked down to the steps where Melvin Lee lay unconscious in the grass. He shot Lee twice in the chest, holstered the Colt, and walked on.
Nigel could see this boy was not much older than Michael Butler. Or Rico Miller, the boy he'd just killed. (274)
A couple of teenage boys, school age but not in school, walked across the field and chuckled at him, standing there wearing a uniform a uniform and holding a bag of shit as they passed. Go ahead and laugh, thought Lorenzo. I don't care. (279)
Deacon's troops were still out there, working the corners. And if you were to go away, there would always be other young men to replace the Marcus Griffins, Lawrence Grahams, Nigel Johnsons, and Deacon Taylors. Lorenzo understood why boys went down to the corners; he had been one of them and he knew. Still, the knowledge didn't lessen the bitterness he felt. (281)
Lorenzo said a prayer for all the people who looked after him and were looking after him still: Mark Christianson and Irena Tovar, his grandmother, and Miss Lopez.
"...I'm dating a man, a police officer. I don't know where it's going, but it's good today. And that's what I'm focusing on, today."
Lorenzo said a special prayer for the soul of Nigel.
"...so thank you for letting me share," said Rachel Lopez. (287)
So everything comes together, almost all by happenstance, mistake, and misunderstanding. If DeEric hadn't embarrassed Melvin Lee in front of Rico...If Rachel hadn't come to Lee's apartment when Rico was hiding out there (or had come an hour or two earlier when Lee was there)...If Lorenzo hadn't seen Rico's car at the dogfight...If Lorenzo hadn't spent two more minutes to find out what that scream was about in the hospital...If Nigel hadn't lowered his gun in front of Griff...
Then again: if the schools worked...if the police didn't take their time getting to dogfights or make cursory drives through drug areas like Columbia Heights where "sales of one kind or another had been ongoing for over thirty years" (147)...if "a federal law enacted in 1996 [that] imposed a lifetime ban on female offenders from receiving family benefits and food stamps" (88) didn't exist...if the drug organizations didn't follow the model of corporate America, where workers—like Rico and Lee—are disposable, despite all the talk of their value to the company...if people were just smarter and stronger and kinder...then Michael and DeEric and Rico and Melvin and Nigel would all be alive at the end of the book.
I apologize: I wish I had done a better job of elucidating the depth of this book—a depth some of you I know do not think exists in it. I do think it is there, though, even in spite of my fumbling the presentation of it. In my mind, the book is a heartbreaking depiction of American at the precipice. It's the Youngers' Chicago forty six later; it's Gatsy pushed to its logical end, where bootlegging has become drug dealing, and Gatsby's huge, ugly car (as Elizabeth pointed out in class) has become the ubiquitous Escalade (starting, today, at $63,000 and topping out at eighty two eight). An immigrant couple's lifetime of honest work becomes the rationale for a perverted vision of the American Dream where imprisonment and/or death replaces the son who becomes an Army general and the daughter who becomes a chemist at the National Institute of Health.
So:
1. Your reaction to the end of the book? Is it a happy ending? A sad ending? Exactly what kind of ending was it for you—and how so?
2. You may have addressed this above, but it's still a major question for our understanding of what the book is about. Your reaction to Rico's— and Melvin Lee's—death? Do you feel satisfied by their deaths? Are we supposed to agree with Lorenzo that he "needs to be put down like an animal"?
3. We talked a lot about Rachel earlier in our reading, but we haven't talked very specifically about Lorenzo. At the end of the book, what do you think of him? He is a man who has done much violence in his life—in many ways, he is a mirror of Rico—and in the book, he does violence too (arguably unnecessary violence): he is, in many ways, not a good man. Is he a good man at the end of the book?
4. Last question: is Nigel a good man at the end of the book? Yes? No? Why—in a couple of sentences.
It's just taken me over an hour to write this entry. I'm not expecting an hour of writing from you, but nor do I expect five minutes on this either. Give yourself twenty minutes or so to respond. See you all tomorrow.
"Maybe. But I'm still gonna avenge my friend. Rico Miller? Shit, motherfuckers like him, they're in their element behind those walls. I ain't gonna let him have that gift. Boy needs to be put down like an animal...I'm not goin' back to where I been. I'm gonna be at work tomorrow and the day after that. But I'm still gonna do this thing tonight."
"It don't work this way."
"We'll see."
"You been out of it so long, you forgot how it goes. You go in, you got to go in fierce. Forget they're human. Forget that you're human too."
"I know it. Remember, I've done this before."
""But you cleaned your slate. Now, what, you gonna go and throw away your soul again?"
"What about yours?"
"Mine's been lost forever..." (257-258)
"There go my name, Mama," he said, pointing happily at the tree. (266)
He walked down to the steps where Melvin Lee lay unconscious in the grass. He shot Lee twice in the chest, holstered the Colt, and walked on.
Nigel could see this boy was not much older than Michael Butler. Or Rico Miller, the boy he'd just killed. (274)
A couple of teenage boys, school age but not in school, walked across the field and chuckled at him, standing there wearing a uniform a uniform and holding a bag of shit as they passed. Go ahead and laugh, thought Lorenzo. I don't care. (279)
Deacon's troops were still out there, working the corners. And if you were to go away, there would always be other young men to replace the Marcus Griffins, Lawrence Grahams, Nigel Johnsons, and Deacon Taylors. Lorenzo understood why boys went down to the corners; he had been one of them and he knew. Still, the knowledge didn't lessen the bitterness he felt. (281)
Lorenzo said a prayer for all the people who looked after him and were looking after him still: Mark Christianson and Irena Tovar, his grandmother, and Miss Lopez.
"...I'm dating a man, a police officer. I don't know where it's going, but it's good today. And that's what I'm focusing on, today."
Lorenzo said a special prayer for the soul of Nigel.
"...so thank you for letting me share," said Rachel Lopez. (287)
So everything comes together, almost all by happenstance, mistake, and misunderstanding. If DeEric hadn't embarrassed Melvin Lee in front of Rico...If Rachel hadn't come to Lee's apartment when Rico was hiding out there (or had come an hour or two earlier when Lee was there)...If Lorenzo hadn't seen Rico's car at the dogfight...If Lorenzo hadn't spent two more minutes to find out what that scream was about in the hospital...If Nigel hadn't lowered his gun in front of Griff...
Then again: if the schools worked...if the police didn't take their time getting to dogfights or make cursory drives through drug areas like Columbia Heights where "sales of one kind or another had been ongoing for over thirty years" (147)...if "a federal law enacted in 1996 [that] imposed a lifetime ban on female offenders from receiving family benefits and food stamps" (88) didn't exist...if the drug organizations didn't follow the model of corporate America, where workers—like Rico and Lee—are disposable, despite all the talk of their value to the company...if people were just smarter and stronger and kinder...then Michael and DeEric and Rico and Melvin and Nigel would all be alive at the end of the book.
I apologize: I wish I had done a better job of elucidating the depth of this book—a depth some of you I know do not think exists in it. I do think it is there, though, even in spite of my fumbling the presentation of it. In my mind, the book is a heartbreaking depiction of American at the precipice. It's the Youngers' Chicago forty six later; it's Gatsy pushed to its logical end, where bootlegging has become drug dealing, and Gatsby's huge, ugly car (as Elizabeth pointed out in class) has become the ubiquitous Escalade (starting, today, at $63,000 and topping out at eighty two eight). An immigrant couple's lifetime of honest work becomes the rationale for a perverted vision of the American Dream where imprisonment and/or death replaces the son who becomes an Army general and the daughter who becomes a chemist at the National Institute of Health.
So:
1. Your reaction to the end of the book? Is it a happy ending? A sad ending? Exactly what kind of ending was it for you—and how so?
2. You may have addressed this above, but it's still a major question for our understanding of what the book is about. Your reaction to Rico's— and Melvin Lee's—death? Do you feel satisfied by their deaths? Are we supposed to agree with Lorenzo that he "needs to be put down like an animal"?
3. We talked a lot about Rachel earlier in our reading, but we haven't talked very specifically about Lorenzo. At the end of the book, what do you think of him? He is a man who has done much violence in his life—in many ways, he is a mirror of Rico—and in the book, he does violence too (arguably unnecessary violence): he is, in many ways, not a good man. Is he a good man at the end of the book?
4. Last question: is Nigel a good man at the end of the book? Yes? No? Why—in a couple of sentences.
It's just taken me over an hour to write this entry. I'm not expecting an hour of writing from you, but nor do I expect five minutes on this either. Give yourself twenty minutes or so to respond. See you all tomorrow.
Sunday, March 17, 2013
Blog #13."She Bragged To Her Friends At Church About Her Son The Businessman." Drama City through 22.
"...'my entrepeneur,' who had the NJ Enterprises shop up on Georgia, and they had gone along with the charade, which she knew to be a lie herself. She rarely spoke of it with Nigel and never with anyone else" (234).
"While she was preparing his food in the kitchen, she'd run the cash through the electronic counting machine she kept back there in one of the cabinets. She liked to do that soon as he made the delivery" (234).
"[There is] a hollowness at the core of capitalism. We knew there was some shit in the blood of society in that sense."
—David Simon.
The last quote comes from an interview David Simon and George Pelecanos made in the midst of Pelecanos's work on Simon's series The Wire. Both certainly see something having gone wrong in America, Simon creating a microcosm of this ill in his hometown of Baltimore while Pelecanos makes his hometown of Washington D.C. his microcosm.According to the Washington Post, in 2005, the year the novel is published, "Across the [D.C.] region, there were 466 homicides in 2005, compared with 420 in 2004—a rise of about 11 percent. About half of those slayings have been solved." Earlier in the book, Lorenzo finds out about Michael Butler and DeEric Green's murder when he "automatically went to Metro's page 2, where they had the Crime and Justice feature, which many called the Roundup and some cynical types still called the Violent Negro Deaths" (159).What the novel dramatizes is one reason for this epidemic of killing. And it makes a case for why it might never possibly abate (according to the Post, in 2012, "The city has an annual murder rate of 2.38 murders per 10,000 citizens, which is much higher than the nation average").
So write a couple hundred words on the following questions:
1. Who's the villain in the novel? Or maybe more specifically, what does Pelecanos argue has gone wrong here in this microcosm of America, 2005? Think about this before you respond—and do not defer to the simple and simplistic "society." Quote from this weekend's reading in your response.
2. In the several times I've read the novel, I've always found Nigel Johnson to be the most compelling character in the book. Who do you find to be the most compelling character in the novel—and why?
"While she was preparing his food in the kitchen, she'd run the cash through the electronic counting machine she kept back there in one of the cabinets. She liked to do that soon as he made the delivery" (234).
"[There is] a hollowness at the core of capitalism. We knew there was some shit in the blood of society in that sense."
—David Simon.
The last quote comes from an interview David Simon and George Pelecanos made in the midst of Pelecanos's work on Simon's series The Wire. Both certainly see something having gone wrong in America, Simon creating a microcosm of this ill in his hometown of Baltimore while Pelecanos makes his hometown of Washington D.C. his microcosm.According to the Washington Post, in 2005, the year the novel is published, "Across the [D.C.] region, there were 466 homicides in 2005, compared with 420 in 2004—a rise of about 11 percent. About half of those slayings have been solved." Earlier in the book, Lorenzo finds out about Michael Butler and DeEric Green's murder when he "automatically went to Metro's page 2, where they had the Crime and Justice feature, which many called the Roundup and some cynical types still called the Violent Negro Deaths" (159).What the novel dramatizes is one reason for this epidemic of killing. And it makes a case for why it might never possibly abate (according to the Post, in 2012, "The city has an annual murder rate of 2.38 murders per 10,000 citizens, which is much higher than the nation average").
So write a couple hundred words on the following questions:
1. Who's the villain in the novel? Or maybe more specifically, what does Pelecanos argue has gone wrong here in this microcosm of America, 2005? Think about this before you respond—and do not defer to the simple and simplistic "society." Quote from this weekend's reading in your response.
2. In the several times I've read the novel, I've always found Nigel Johnson to be the most compelling character in the book. Who do you find to be the most compelling character in the novel—and why?
Tuesday, March 12, 2013
Blog #12. "'You Know How This Go. It's All In The Game.'" Drama City Through 17.
"You know how this go. It's all in the game." It was something they had said to each other many times in the past. Nigel did not sound like he believed it anymore. (172)
This is Nigel's reaction to the murder of his two "soldiers," DeEric Green and Michael Butler, shown in a scene that rivals the dog fight (and perhaps the sex between Rachel and Aris) in terms of graphic detail. DeEric understands the "game"—or at the very least he accepts the risks it brings. "Green like what this life gave him. He wasn't ashamed of one thing" (102). Michael is another story: "Green wondered why Butler wanted to be in the life at all." Lorenzo knows why Nigel keeps this boy around, a boy who had never handled a gun and didn't "take pleasure in being hard," who "didn't talk about football, fucking up dudes, killing bitches in the bed, or none of that" (100). Lorenzo knows "Nigel liked to pick the most promising, most intelligent ones out and take them under his wing. It never did work out. None who stayed on came to a good end. This was the one definite of the game. Still, Nigel kept trying to promote the ones he felt had promise. He was an optimist that way" (112).
Lorenzo, as Aldo called him today after class, is a survivor: he now knows "'but if these kids knew how it has to end...I mean, if you could only tell 'em'" (146). But he can only know this because was lucky enough to survive, unlike poor DeEric and Michael.
That's a lot of lead in, I know, to the questions. So here they are.
1. Your reaction to the murders of DeEric and Michael? And is the book in this glorifying violence?
2. The question I want to start off with tomorrow is what is the book's commentary on the drug culture in the book, specifically the dealers? To get at this, we have to think about what the book says about why these young men fall so easily into it—and, as the book repeats again and again, it is a choice. The obvious reason is money, we get that. But what else? Quote from the book in this answer. And try not to repeat what others say: there are only so many answers to this, but try to add shadings to what others have said before you. And: is the book glorifying the dealers, glorifying the "game"?
3. Last question: what do you think of the Lorenzo we see at the end of the reading? Surprised? Not surprised?
Finally, here's a clip from the first season of The Wire, from an episode written by...George Pelecanos. It could come straight from the book. These are three old friends.
See you all tomorrow. Remember: your answer needs to be up by 8:30.
This is Nigel's reaction to the murder of his two "soldiers," DeEric Green and Michael Butler, shown in a scene that rivals the dog fight (and perhaps the sex between Rachel and Aris) in terms of graphic detail. DeEric understands the "game"—or at the very least he accepts the risks it brings. "Green like what this life gave him. He wasn't ashamed of one thing" (102). Michael is another story: "Green wondered why Butler wanted to be in the life at all." Lorenzo knows why Nigel keeps this boy around, a boy who had never handled a gun and didn't "take pleasure in being hard," who "didn't talk about football, fucking up dudes, killing bitches in the bed, or none of that" (100). Lorenzo knows "Nigel liked to pick the most promising, most intelligent ones out and take them under his wing. It never did work out. None who stayed on came to a good end. This was the one definite of the game. Still, Nigel kept trying to promote the ones he felt had promise. He was an optimist that way" (112).
Lorenzo, as Aldo called him today after class, is a survivor: he now knows "'but if these kids knew how it has to end...I mean, if you could only tell 'em'" (146). But he can only know this because was lucky enough to survive, unlike poor DeEric and Michael.
That's a lot of lead in, I know, to the questions. So here they are.
1. Your reaction to the murders of DeEric and Michael? And is the book in this glorifying violence?
2. The question I want to start off with tomorrow is what is the book's commentary on the drug culture in the book, specifically the dealers? To get at this, we have to think about what the book says about why these young men fall so easily into it—and, as the book repeats again and again, it is a choice. The obvious reason is money, we get that. But what else? Quote from the book in this answer. And try not to repeat what others say: there are only so many answers to this, but try to add shadings to what others have said before you. And: is the book glorifying the dealers, glorifying the "game"?
3. Last question: what do you think of the Lorenzo we see at the end of the reading? Surprised? Not surprised?
Finally, here's a clip from the first season of The Wire, from an episode written by...George Pelecanos. It could come straight from the book. These are three old friends.
See you all tomorrow. Remember: your answer needs to be up by 8:30.
Sunday, March 10, 2013
Blog #11. "'Who's That Mama?' Said Shay. 'Nobody,' Said Shirelle. 'You Come Along.'" Drama City Through 12.
"I don't want no trouble," said Lorenzo.
"Ain't gonna be none," said the man.
"I'm her father."
"I know who you are."
Lorenzo shifted his feet. "I just want to talk with her."
"That's not gonna happen," said the man. "You already made your choice. You care about Shay, you got to let her be." (118)
So Butler had made his choices. Same way Green had made his, early on. (101)
"Melvin was scared. I could tell by lookin' at him 'cause I been knowin' him a long time. He used to run with my brother James, back when." Green blinked away the image of his brother, playing basketball down by the courts, imitating MJ with his tongue out the side of his mouth, laughing about it, having fun. "Melvin don't belong out here no more."
"You punked him," said Butler with admiration.
"Wasn't me," said Green, a touch of regret in his voice. "He got his ass broke in the cut." (125)
Many offenders she had known, those who were clearly not going to make it, had spoken almost wistfully about going back to prison, In a couple of cases, she had told these offenders to violate themselves, go back to jail, get fat and recharged, and then come out and try it again. Many, of course, never did come out. (89)
"Mommy, why you sad?' said the daughter.
"Just play your game, girl," said Nardine with an angry slashing motion of her hand. (88)
At this point you may be asking when does the conflict of the novel begin—how will all these characters and stories we're getting come together? What does Rico's story have to with Lorenzo? Who cares about Nardine or Deanna or Nixon Velsaco or Rafael Salamanca, any of Rachel's offenders who will never show up in the book again? I'd argue that Pelecanos wants us to know this world intimately so when we judge, as we cannot help but do, we do so with some depth and understanding of the complexities of this world and the complexities of the people who inhabit it. Nixon and Rafael work side by side, but one is probably going back to prison—"Salamanca...had recently confessed to Rachel that he craved drugs as a means of escape from the harsh reality of what his life had become" (96). Nixon will probably make it, not because "jail time, remorse, or conscience had reformed him," but because he "was too old to survive the new game" (95). Nardine is probably going back to prison (where she spent the prior 6 years), leaving her two kids with her grandmother, because life is too hard. Does this make her a horrible parent? A useless human being? Do we poo poo Nixon's success, knowing that if he were younger, he might have gone back to the game? DeEric Green is not the sharpest knife in the drawer—where should he put that television screen?—and he isn't ashamed of the his life in "the game," but he genuinely cares for his younger charge, Michael Butler. As we know Melvin Lee feels for Rico Miller. The book may feel like a beach read, but it strives for an acknowledgement of the ambiguity in this world that most pop books won't go for.
So:
1. What scene or moment in chapters 9-12 jumped out at you and why?
2. Look at one of the quotes I've given at the top of the entry. Write about its significance in the book—what does it open us up to, or show, that's important to our understanding of the character(s) and/or the world we're in? Please don't repeat what you wrote about in question 1. And don't simply repeat what someone else has said.
Tomorrow will be a reading day after you turn in your paper. We'll try to start pulling together all the strands of this book on Tuesday. It's a rich stew: part history, part sociology, part page-turner, part tragedy, and certainly a questioning of the subject of our study, The American Dream.
"Ain't gonna be none," said the man.
"I'm her father."
"I know who you are."
Lorenzo shifted his feet. "I just want to talk with her."
"That's not gonna happen," said the man. "You already made your choice. You care about Shay, you got to let her be." (118)
So Butler had made his choices. Same way Green had made his, early on. (101)
"Melvin was scared. I could tell by lookin' at him 'cause I been knowin' him a long time. He used to run with my brother James, back when." Green blinked away the image of his brother, playing basketball down by the courts, imitating MJ with his tongue out the side of his mouth, laughing about it, having fun. "Melvin don't belong out here no more."
"You punked him," said Butler with admiration.
"Wasn't me," said Green, a touch of regret in his voice. "He got his ass broke in the cut." (125)
Many offenders she had known, those who were clearly not going to make it, had spoken almost wistfully about going back to prison, In a couple of cases, she had told these offenders to violate themselves, go back to jail, get fat and recharged, and then come out and try it again. Many, of course, never did come out. (89)
"Mommy, why you sad?' said the daughter.
"Just play your game, girl," said Nardine with an angry slashing motion of her hand. (88)
At this point you may be asking when does the conflict of the novel begin—how will all these characters and stories we're getting come together? What does Rico's story have to with Lorenzo? Who cares about Nardine or Deanna or Nixon Velsaco or Rafael Salamanca, any of Rachel's offenders who will never show up in the book again? I'd argue that Pelecanos wants us to know this world intimately so when we judge, as we cannot help but do, we do so with some depth and understanding of the complexities of this world and the complexities of the people who inhabit it. Nixon and Rafael work side by side, but one is probably going back to prison—"Salamanca...had recently confessed to Rachel that he craved drugs as a means of escape from the harsh reality of what his life had become" (96). Nixon will probably make it, not because "jail time, remorse, or conscience had reformed him," but because he "was too old to survive the new game" (95). Nardine is probably going back to prison (where she spent the prior 6 years), leaving her two kids with her grandmother, because life is too hard. Does this make her a horrible parent? A useless human being? Do we poo poo Nixon's success, knowing that if he were younger, he might have gone back to the game? DeEric Green is not the sharpest knife in the drawer—where should he put that television screen?—and he isn't ashamed of the his life in "the game," but he genuinely cares for his younger charge, Michael Butler. As we know Melvin Lee feels for Rico Miller. The book may feel like a beach read, but it strives for an acknowledgement of the ambiguity in this world that most pop books won't go for.
So:
1. What scene or moment in chapters 9-12 jumped out at you and why?
2. Look at one of the quotes I've given at the top of the entry. Write about its significance in the book—what does it open us up to, or show, that's important to our understanding of the character(s) and/or the world we're in? Please don't repeat what you wrote about in question 1. And don't simply repeat what someone else has said.
Tomorrow will be a reading day after you turn in your paper. We'll try to start pulling together all the strands of this book on Tuesday. It's a rich stew: part history, part sociology, part page-turner, part tragedy, and certainly a questioning of the subject of our study, The American Dream.
Tuesday, March 5, 2013
Blog #10. "Fuck That Animal. Let It Suffer Some. Cur Deserves To Suffer For Showing No Heart." Drama City Through 8.
So says Melvin Lee when the dog he bet on, Mamba, loses its fight to Lucy. "Mamba, confused and in agony, rubbed his snout on the bloody carpet, trying to do something about its useless, dangling eye" (67). We never find out what happens to the animal, but there's a good chance he will end up like the dogs Mark Christiansen found back in the nineties "when the fight-dog craze was at its peak...Dogs, especially those who had lost fights, were disposable, like a shirt friends ridiculed because it had gone out of style. Mark found dogs shot in alleys, lying curbside with broken necks, thrown off roofs, and disposed of in Dumpsters with the trash" (68-69). Two years after Drama City was published, America got a glimpse into the world we see here when then Falcons (now Eagles) quarterback Michael Vick was convicted of running a dog fighting ring. He served 21 months in federal prison. Some thought he got off too easy; some thought he shouldn't have been punished at all. As I remember someone writing in the wake of his conviction in an email to the AJC, they were only dogs, what was the big deal? Sounds not that far from Lee's reaction.
So:
1. What is your response to the dog fight scene? Go ahead and quote in your response of a hundred words or so. Just don't use the quotes I've used above.
2. We talked today about Lorenzo and Rachel's (and Shirley and Irena's) efforts to not judge the people who do the sometimes questionable, sometimes awful, deeds that they have to deal with. Rachel can make the distinction between the man who had to have done bad in his younger days from the older man who is doing good. Lorenzo can distinguish between ignorance and "a crime of deliberate abuse" (16). Can you not judge what happens at the dog fight? Should we judge what happens? And if we should, what should/would we say about it? Write about a hundred words.
As I said in class today, Pelecanos amps up the moral quandaries facing his characters (and the reader as well) with every new chapter. I think he wants us to struggle with forgiveness, tolerance, and possibility of redemption along with Rachel and Lorenzo.
I apologize for this being late. If you happen to finish this by the end of break, that would be acceptable.
So:
1. What is your response to the dog fight scene? Go ahead and quote in your response of a hundred words or so. Just don't use the quotes I've used above.
2. We talked today about Lorenzo and Rachel's (and Shirley and Irena's) efforts to not judge the people who do the sometimes questionable, sometimes awful, deeds that they have to deal with. Rachel can make the distinction between the man who had to have done bad in his younger days from the older man who is doing good. Lorenzo can distinguish between ignorance and "a crime of deliberate abuse" (16). Can you not judge what happens at the dog fight? Should we judge what happens? And if we should, what should/would we say about it? Write about a hundred words.
As I said in class today, Pelecanos amps up the moral quandaries facing his characters (and the reader as well) with every new chapter. I think he wants us to struggle with forgiveness, tolerance, and possibility of redemption along with Rachel and Lorenzo.
I apologize for this being late. If you happen to finish this by the end of break, that would be acceptable.
Sunday, March 3, 2013
Blog #9. "Does She Love People In Her Heart?" Drama City, Ch. 1-3.
Drama City is the most contemporary work we're reading this year, published in 2005. George Pelecanos has since published five more novels (he has written 17 in all) as well as having written for the HBO series The Wire, Treme, and The Pacific. Pelecanos is a much respected crime novelist; and while Drama City certainly fits the description of a crime novel, it is, much like The Wire (for which he also served as a producer) something more and greater. It is a sociological study of urban America, specifically of Washington D.C., and it asks, as did The Wire, what happened to the American city? In this novel, we will never come near the Washington most of us know. The world of Lorenzo Brown and Nigel Johnson, of Rayne and Lakeisha, of Rachel Lopez and Sarge and Shirley, is only a few miles away from the Smithsonian and The White House, but as we read on, we realize those destinations may as well be in another country for our characters. But their world is absolutely real: Pelecanos makes sure we know exactly where we are in the D.C. of these characters. Google Map Park View Elementary School, Washington: it is exactly where Pelecanos says it is, a block from where Lorenzo sees Nigel's mother's house. Pelecanos is not making this world up.
So write a couple hundred words answering the following questions:
1. What's your reaction to the first three chapters of the novel?
2. What moment or scene particularly jumped out at you—and why? Go ahead and quote from the book here.
3. In a word: what is the depiction of the city so far in the novel? And why? Quote from the book here.
Finally: no doubt Pelecanos's research in writing for The Wire influenced this novel. Take a look below at a scene from the final season of the series. It's an N.A. (Narcotics Anonymous) meeting and some of the dialogue comes straight from the novel.
Hope everyone had a restful break. See you all tomorrow.
So write a couple hundred words answering the following questions:
1. What's your reaction to the first three chapters of the novel?
2. What moment or scene particularly jumped out at you—and why? Go ahead and quote from the book here.
3. In a word: what is the depiction of the city so far in the novel? And why? Quote from the book here.
Finally: no doubt Pelecanos's research in writing for The Wire influenced this novel. Take a look below at a scene from the final season of the series. It's an N.A. (Narcotics Anonymous) meeting and some of the dialogue comes straight from the novel.
Hope everyone had a restful break. See you all tomorrow.
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