Reading Post #6

This week I finished the book The Sirens of Titan, and it was actually a pretty good book. Like before there were many similarities between this book and Slaughterhouse-Five. Both books addressed the idea of a sealed fate and how everything is set in stone. One of my favorite quotes from this book was when a Trafalmadorian(close to Sluaghterhouse huh?) was on the planet Titan, but he is a robot, and he says, "His mind buzzes and pops like the mind of an Earthling-- fizzes and overheats with the thoughts of love, honor, dignity rights, accomplishments, integrity, independence--". I really like this quote alot because it talks about how this robot was programmed to do something but when asked to do something he was programmed not to do, he changed it and decided to do things for the better.

Finally, this book was another great example of a satirical based book that uses death and diminshes it to make it seem much more pointless. Kurt Vonnegut did a great job at writing this book and I would love to read another one of his books.

Reading Post #5

This week I have decided to read another Kurt Vonnegut novel, The Sirens of Titan. this book follows the story of a man named Malachi Constant. From Beginning to end the book seems Topsy Turvy the whole way. The book addresses many problems in society as well as creating some just for the story itself. When I read this book it did take me a while to read because at some points it did get very boring. But as a whole the book, shows us how absurd and completely proposterous human beings are when it comes to life. Also it shows what happens when someone knows all things that are going to happen and act as a god over other people.

I think that think book is quite similar to Mr. Vonnegut's other book, Slaughterhouse-Five in that it uses the idea of time travel, not completely in the Sirens of Titan, but it also has a much less linear story line compared to other books. Also just like his other books, Vonnegut uses a lot of satire to play down some ideas like death. Finally, another great similarity to Slaughterhouse is that the idea of the pointlessness of war plays another big role. Perhaps, since this was written before, Kurt Vonnegut tried to come up with some of his ideas for Slaughterhouse in some other of his books; many of the ideas in this book are used almost the same in Slaughterhouse.

Reading Post #4

This week I decided to start a another book called The drawing of the Three written by Stephen King. The story follows the life of a gunslinger named Roland. He must get to the dark tower to find out why he is alive in the world; but that is in the seventh book and this is only the second. Anyway, Roland finds out that in order to reach the dark Tower he must find the "Three Doors". The book creates a dual/parallel universe where inside the doors is the "door" to a persons mind, but the thing is that they are in, what it seems like, a whole different dimension as well as different points in time. This sense of altered reality strikes as almost being quite similar to Slaughterhouse-five and I wonder if Stephen King was perhaps inspired by Vonnegut's use of time travel.

Roland's personality is one that he sees other people as a tool so that he can get what he wants. He couldn't care less if a person lived or died just as long as they bring him forward in his journey to the Dark Tower. This book brings a sense of time travel, complete surrealism, as well as euphoric states into a book that helps keep things interesting but still leaving much to the imagination.

Reading Post #3

For this week I have decided to blog about Slaughterhouse-Five written by Kurt Vonnegut. This book explores many different kinds of realities and addresses all of the many types of war. While reading, I noticed that whenever somebody dies he uses the term "so it goes". From his perspective it is from the Trafalmadorians because they time time in one continuous stream. But what I think is actually happening is that he is using satire to play off the idea of death and making it not seem that bad. Like in All the King's Horses Billy Pilgrim almost becomes detached from death and thinks logically and without emotion.
The fact that he uses his life story for the first chapter and melds it into a story inside of a story, shows that many things that he says in this book he agrees with and advocates. Also his sense of skewed time shows how people remember things in many different ways but also shows how people can be thinking.

Also I think that Vonnegut added the dual title in order to almost bring in his sense of how he viewed that war, but then he could also have Billy's "title" of the book as well. Since the book is a mix of a war story with some autobiographical parts in it, Vonnegut was able to not just write another book but indirectly tell some things about his life and how they have affected him.     

Reading Post #2

The more that I read this book, the more I think about the possibility of either another life form outside earth or that what the book suggests as humans who left their technology because of the lack of people to maintain it. Because the amount of people needed to sustain that technology was so great, the "humans" of hundreds of thousands of years ago could not maintain. The thing that really gets to me is the idea that some of these things have actually happened but the government is keeping all of it a secret. 

.As the story progresses that main character stays in the same kind of development the whole book. He stays the straight lined "Im gonna save the girl and the technology so that it isnt used for evil!" . There is very little twists and turns as well as good character development in the book. Even though the book is quite interesting and I keep reading, it feels as if I am only reading it based on its plot and not the symbolism, or lack there of. As I am almost done with the book. I think that I will choose a book that I can divulge into a little more and a little easier than this book was.

     

Reading Post #1

I am reading a book called Saucer by Stephen Coonts. It is basically about a group of archaeologists finding an alien saucer in the middle of the Sahara Desert. The thing thats most important is the fact that it is 140,000 years old. In order keep the saucer from being stolen by a bunch of Australian Commandos, Rip, the main character, must fly it out of the desert with the help of a female test pilot from the Air Force. Let alone faced with the dilema of trying to fly hundred thousand year old saucer out of the desert, they have to get out with the Commandos firing on them. The juxtapose of the saucer 140,000 years ago and the saucer today makes you realize how much trust Rip had in the saucer becuase if he was wrong he would have died. He creates the "trusting" hero part of the story so that you have someone to believe in. But by doing all of those things he puts himself in a very bad situation that causes him to get chased all around Africa.

Based on what has happened so far, Rip will porbably have to not only try and get away from the people chasing him, but find a way to tell the truth about the saucer to the people of the world. The thing that causes me the most trouble is that it seems like it will be virtually impossible for them to be able to get away safely without causing too much trouble anywhere in the world.

Overcoming Odds

I recently read an article in the Charlotte Observer about a boy who was burned extensively on his body, 87 percent, with third degree burns. The boy was outside tending a fire when all of a sudden it blew up on him as well has his mother who received second degree burns on her face and third degree burns on her hands. He was placed in a medical induced coma while doctors tried to reconfigure all of his skin.

Connor, the boy who was burned, finally was taken out  of the coma after two months. His body was quite frail due to the extensive amount of time spent laying down and being still. He will have to learn how to walk again and regain the use of his muscles.

I think this reminded me a bit of Night because while on the way to Auschwitz, they see flames coming from the crematorium. 

Jo Talbot Balasco, Mary. "Burned teen is overcoming odds, but still has way to go." Charlotte Observer 15 Mar. 2009. 22 Mar. 2009 http://www.charlotteobserver.com/597/story/598757.html.