English A1 HL Paper 1 TZ1

[Emmi]

Re: Birth of the Owl Butterflies - did anyone comment on the responsibility of man to nature, paralleled to the relationship of father to daughter?

No D: D:

Should I have? I mean, too late to change this now, but was this a major point in the essay and will not talking about it cause the examiners to deduct a point or two?

[drmar]

Eek - No! Did not mean to panic anyone! There is no 'correct' interpretation to the poem. As long as you support your interpretation you will be fine. I was just curious.

[hehe101]

I do not really know why but a lot of my friends chose the fever passage because they said it was much more understandable to them, but when I read it I completely blanked. I instead chose the owl butterflies poem and talked about the theme of deception (the father with gentle hands kills the butterflies in the jar, the ferocious appearance of the butterflies' wings mask that it is extremely delicate, how the speaker starts of in a disconnected tone and language and ends up describing the birth with lots of captivating imagery) and how life can be taken away mercilessly.

Yup! Deception was definitely one of my biggest arguments.

[Neko_K]

How did everyone interpret the drums in the fever passage? I reread the passage several times but I still had no idea what the drums were alluding too..

[sleepykid]

Re: Birth of the Owl Butterflies - did anyone comment on the responsibility of man to nature, paralleled to the relationship of father to daughter?

I can't find the poem online, but are you sure the speaker is a girl? I don't remember the gender of the speaker being specifically mentioned/hinted at in the poem.

[Shelly Tsui]

Re: Birth of the Owl Butterflies - did anyone comment on the responsibility of man to nature, paralleled to the relationship of father to daughter?

I can't find the poem online, but are you sure the speaker is a girl? I don't remember the gender of the speaker being specifically mentioned/hinted at in the poem.

Ruth Sharman is a female poet but that alone cannot be used to determine the gender of the narrator. It's not wise to jump conclusions since it will show a lack of reasoning. To be on the safe side, always be vague and say "the narrator" or "the persona".

[Daniel Inchan Jung]

I talked about the contrast between the artificial setting and the natural feeling of the birth. I thought it was a beautiful poem.

I took it on a similar level, however I also talked about alienation. Take note of the destruction of the Owl Butterflies and their distance from home.

In response to Neko_K

How did everyone interpret the drums in the fever passage? I reread the passage several times but I still had no idea what the drums were alluding too..

I thought that the fever had to do with the eventual westernization of the new world and that the drums were signalling its coming. Wasn't a 100% sure with my knowledge of history so I stuck with the poem.

Edited May 7, 2012 by Daniel Inchan Jung

[Nicktom24]

I chose the prose, John Edgar Wideman's The Fever. The main thng I saw in it was that it was full of religious allusions, but maybe thats just me ("everything begins with water and ends with water" or something like that" could refer to baptism. Also the idea that the fever did not kill very many people, but would inevitably return again is very comparable to baptist ideals. God is merciful, but the fever is his punishment for sin. People will inevitably sin again, so the fever would inevitably return again. However the harshest sinners would die from the fever. I kept finding little things like these. Does this make sense? Did anybody see it the same way?

[Daniel Inchan Jung]

I chose the prose, John Edgar Wideman's The Fever. The main thng I saw in it was that it was full of religious allusions, but maybe thats just me ("everything begins with water and ends with water" or something like that" could refer to baptism. Also the idea that the fever did not kill very many people, but would inevitably return again is very comparable to baptist ideals. God is merciful, but the fever is his punishment for sin. People will inevitably sin again, so the fever would inevitably return again. However the harshest sinners would die from the fever. I kept finding little things like these. Does this make sense? Did anybody see it the same way?

I can see where you're coming from. It works well and I never would have thought of this.

[Peanut Butter Jelly]

It's probably a bit risky, espicially if the marker is non-religous and has no idea what you are talking about.

[Nicktom24]

Hopefully the marker is well informed and knows what I'm talking about! Or at least the markscheme says something about it, because I am not religious either but religious allusion was all I kept seeing!

[Neko_K]

How did everyone interpret the drums in the fever passage? I reread the passage several times but I still had no idea what the drums were alluding too..

I thought that the fever had to do with the eventual westernization of the new world and that the drums were signalling its coming. Wasn't a 100% sure with my knowledge of history so I stuck with the poem.

Hmm interesting observation. I should've at least noted something about the drums.. I talked about human sin like the above poster and linked it to slavery. For instance, in the last paragraph, the author says that "nothing is an accident," suggesting that fever was a direct result of human acts. Subsequently, the author also reaffirms that all this trouble arrived once we started "selling each other" or something along those lines, and I think that this was in reference to the extensive slave trade at the time. The ships from Santo Domingo carrying slaves had brought the fever? And how all of us are a part of this problem, and that this problem will come back if inhumanity persists.

So I talked a lot about sin and punishment and linked it all to slavery... At first I thought this was too simple of an interpretation but nobody in my class understood it the same way.

[MagicSophie]

I chose the prose, John Edgar Wideman's The Fever. The main thng I saw in it was that it was full of religious allusions, but maybe thats just me ("everything begins with water and ends with water" or something like that" could refer to baptism. Also the idea that the fever did not kill very many people, but would inevitably return again is very comparable to baptist ideals. God is merciful, but the fever is his punishment for sin. People will inevitably sin again, so the fever would inevitably return again. However the harshest sinners would die from the fever. I kept finding little things like these. Does this make sense? Did anybody see it the same way?

I can see where you're coming from. It works well and I never would have thought of this.

I used a great number of religious references, too. Personally, I'm not religious, but when you're talking about western literature, I think it's crucial to at least have a vague knowledge of Judeo-Christian tradition, and be able to recognize and interpret Biblical and religious references.

I didn't talk about the water in terms of religion, though come to think of it, that's really insightful, and may have provided some needed perspective in my essay, but nevermind.

What I did talk about was the imagery of paradise/nature/beauty, which I likened to Eden, as contrasted with the stink/rot imagery which I compared to Hell and/or, sort of outside of Eden, if you will. The mention of it all starting because "one of us decided to sell one of us to another" all seemed very-original sin to me, as well.

I actually only mentioned these in my analysis, though. My thesis was something along the lines of "the juxtaposition of beauty/nature imagery with rot/disease/decay imagery represents the way that humans have thrown away the beauty of nature because of an innate evil in them" or something like that.

One thing I definitely did wrong, though, was thinking that Wideman was refering to an island in the Carribean. My friend told me immediately after that he was talking about Delaware (he was very convinced, he told me that they mentioned it by name in the passage). Turns out we were both wrong, since I looked it up and Fever takes place in Philidelphia.

I definitely mentioned "an Island" a few times. How much do you that that's going to cost me?

EDIT: I also talked a lot about nature being represented by the circle and the rhythm, which was reflected in the discussion of the drum, of all things being connected, of the circular nature of the fever and of the nature in general, his mention that things have no beginning and no end, and of course the rhythmic diction that someone already mentioned.

Edited May 9, 2012 by MagicSophie

[Nicktom24]

Yea Sophie I mentioned Eden also. Although I think I mentioned the unpaved roads as a symbol of purity and beginning, as in Eden. And the poison that they breathe referred to in the next sentence as the poisons of industrialization along with the "poisons" that influenced Adam and Eve after they ate the forbidden fruit. Hopefully that works. And I do not believe that mentioning an "island" will hurt you much, if at all, as long as it was not central to your argument.