Nineteenth-Century Literatures in Dialogue

Andersonville and The Killer Angels

For my final post, I wanted to talk a little about the topic of my final paper. I was interested in how authors of the past 50 years, particularly those who wrote during or after a major global conflicts, have portrayed the Civil War. I decided to compare two Pulitzer Prize winning novels—MacKinlay Kantor’s 1955 Andersonville and Michael Shaara’s 1974 The Killer Angels.

Andersonville depicts the infamous Confederate prisoner of war camp of the same name through the perspectives of a variety of characters, from neighboring plantation residents, to Yankee prisoners, to the commanding officers of the camp. The book is quite lengthy—a tome of nearly 800 pages—and full of description of the horrible conditions of the Andersonville prison, where nearly 13,000 soldiers died. The book is very dense and laden with rather disturbing details of sickness, malnutrition, and death. However, it is equally poignant and sentimental in its portrayal of the lives of the many characters it follows, an aspect which made the book for me a very enjoyable read. I’d recommend it to anyone who has the time to devote to a long novel.

The Killer Angels follows the movement of the Northern and Southern armies during the Battle of Gettysburg. Each chapter is titled with the name of the general from whose perspective the section is written. The book is, from what I have read, a very historically accurate representation of the battle; however, the book’s real merit in my opinion comes from the characterization SHaara gives each of the generals that allows the reader to enter the minds of some of the most famous masterminds of the Civil War. A much quicker read than Andersonville, I would also recommend The Killer Angels as an interesting and education Civil War book, particularly for those interested in battles but who would rather read a more creative interpretation of the events.

Both Andersonville and The Killer Angels are written from a variety of viewpoints, which seemed to me to indicate an effort on the part of the authors to personalize and individualize aspects of the war (Andersonville prison and the battle of Gettysburg) that we often think about in broad terms. While one can easily read off the statistics that nearly 13,000 Union soldiers died at Andersonville or that over 50,000 men died at Gettysburg, these are, in the end, merely numbers. What Kantor and Shaara have done is to bring war to a personal level, entering the mind of those profoundly effected by the tragedy of the Civil War and dispelling the one-dimensional view we often have of historical figures.

Capote thoughts

I meant to post this weeks ago when we were talking about Capote and his “new journalism,” but I am very interested in seeing the new Truman Capote biopic that I think should be coming out soon, “Infamous.” Apparently it concentrates on the same period of time as “Capote” does, during Capote’s investigation and manipulation of the criminal justice system while writing “In Cold Blood.” Here is what the New York Times has to say about the new movie in relation to “Capote”: “The release of two movies on the same subject is somewhat unusual, and the arrival in close succession of two good movies that tell more or less identical stories, each one distinguished by real intelligence in conception and execution, is downright uncanny.” — A. O. Scott. I saw “Capote” before reading “In Cold Blood” and I’m glad I did. It made it that much eerier to read, though the writing in “In Cold Blood” itself was pretty darn eerie too. I remember one line in particular where he describes the carpeting in the Clutter’s house as “liver-colored” or something to that effect. Anyhow, I am really looking forward to seeing Infamous and I find it so interesting that a historical figure/writer with as large a personality as Capote has 2 films made about the same time in his life. I wonder if one of these films were made about his life pre-Clutter, or for that matter of his life post-Clutter, if they might have the same chilling effect.

Poe, southern or american?

Poe, although he had lived in Virginia, moved about quite a bit, and is more of a mid-atlantic man than a true Virginian. While his crticial essays to me have always revealed a bookish man who found in poetry and art a power greater than life itself, his capacity for self abuse through narcotics was surpassed by few of his contemporaries, and his social standing was never that high.

one can easily pull out english parrallels, but its more important to look at Poe in a literary context, as he was a great consumer of criticism and contemporary literature in general.

His comments regarding Tennyson betray his capitalist leanings, and are in no way tradiitonally Southern in mindset. I must've said this a ton in class but he really pushed for the end to epics and said that short poetry had to be able to be listened to in one sitting and that was it.

Just google him and you'll be able to find some great stuff, but I think most of the world views him as much more American and intensely gothic/detective fiction than anything else. Truly not a regionalist so much as a real character.

Zadie Smith, One of Time's 100 People Who Shape Our World

I had originally planned to post about one of the top 100 lists I found online; however, since Katie has compiled a pretty extensive list that includes the site I found, I thought I’d just talk a little bit about one of the people on Time's 100 People Who Shape Our World of 2006 (http://www.time.com/time/2006/time100/). Given the recent success of writers such as Jonathan Foer, I was surprised to see that only one novelist was on the list and that she was someone who I have never heard of—Zadie Smith.

Zadie was born on October 27, 1975 in Brent, a borough in northwest London. She has two younger brothers, and a half-brother and -sister with whom she shares a father. Reading and writing always played a major part in Zadie’s youth and young adulthood, and her experience with such authors as David Foster Wallace and Franz Kafka would later influence her own writing career greatly.

David Foster Wallace has had arguably the greatest impact on Smith’s. In an interview, Smith expressed that her weakness as a writer is in detailing the “evil that man does.” Wallace, in his book Brief Interviews with Hideous Men “writes brilliantly about hideous men and hideous women and the hideous culture that produces them.” Not only is Smith inspired by his ability to write about the uglier side of humanity but also by the way that he integrates his scientific knowledge into his writing.

Smith started publishing her writing at Cambridge, where she pursued an English literature degree. Her short stories began to appear in 1995 in the May Anthologies, an collection of writing by students from Cambridge and Oxford. Her first novel, White Teeth, was published in 2000. It is the tale of two ethnically diverse families and their assimilation in North London, which was partially inspired by the diversity of her early home life—the varying influences of her British father and Jamaican mother. White Teeth was an immediate bestseller, and critics praised Smith as a master of “drawing fully-realized, vibrant characters” possessing “an extraordinary ear for dialogue.”

Smith went on to write two more novels, The Autograph Man, published in 2002, and On Beauty in 2005. The Autograph Man was also successful despite a stretch of writer’s block, allegedly due to the hype surrounding the extraordinarily successul White Teeth. On Beauty won the 2006 Orange Prize for Fiction. Smith has published four short stories within the past five years and continues to pour out essays featured in publications ranging from “The New Yorker” to online newspaper “The Guardian.”

Seeing her on Time’s Top 100 list sparked my interest in Zadie Smith, and after reading about her life and works, I hope to be able to read one of her books over Winter Break.

More on Zadie:
http://www.contemporarywriters.com/authors/?p=auth257

An interview in which she discusses White Teeth:
http://bailiwick.lib.uiowa.edu/wstudies/ogrady/zsmith2004.htm

Edgar Allen Poe, the Southerner

A question was brought up a while ago concerning antebellum southern writers who have remained in America's literary memory. Perhaps someone already mentioned him, but I for one was surprised to learn that the unequivocal Edgar Allen Poe (1809-1849) was indeed from the south. He was born in Massachusetts, but he moved to Virginia when he was two, which I think makes him essentially a real southerner. Perhaps he is forgotten because he did not really write about regional issues, but rather explicitly aspired to "universality." Or perhaps because most of his works were published in Northern newspapers, though he did split most of his life between Richmond and Baltimore.

Indeed, the Encyclopedia of Southern Culture insists that Poe belongs to the south: "Thoroughly trained in the classics and in the rhetoric and aesthetics of the Scottish common-sense school of philosophers, Poe was, according to the critic Robert D. Jacobs, indeed a southerner by temperament and inclination...He did not defend his region's politics or social customs, like other antebellum southern writers, but his lyricism was common to southern poets. Raised a Virginian, Poe sometimes posed as the southern gentleman, even if transcending regionalism in his work." Many of his stories and poems have the gothic element that will appear later, transformed, in the form of the Southern Gothicism - whose writers included Faulkner and Tennessee Williams (my favorite), as well as many others.

One should also note that he was noticed by Twain (was this as well already mentioned in class? I don't remember...) Twain said of Poe: "To me his prose is unreadable--like Jane Austin's." Indeed it seems many later southern writers had kind of a love-hate relationship with Poe. Flannery O'Connor said that Poe's influence on her work was "something she would rather not think about," and T.S. Elliot, though labeling him the best English-speaking critic of his era, also said that he had "the intellect of a highly gifted person before puberty."

One should note as well that Poe spent some time in both London and Scotland as a child while travelling with his foster father, John Allan. Thus I feel almost certain that Poe must have read Scott at one point, especially when I read poems like this one:

Romance

Ah, broken is the golden bowl! the spirit flown forever!
Romance, who loves to nod and sing,
With drowsy head and folded wing,
Among the green leaves as they shake
Far down within some shadowy lake,
To me a painted paroquet
Hath been- a most familiar bird-
Taught me my alphabet to say-
To lisp my very earliest word
While in the wild wood I did lie,
A child- with a most knowing eye.

Of late, eternal Condor years
So shake the very Heaven on high
With tumult as they thunder by,
I have no time for idle cares
Through gazing on the unquiet sky.
And when an hour with calmer wings
Its down upon my spirit flings-
That little time with lyre and rhyme
To while away- forbidden things!
My heart would feel to be a crime
Unless it trembled with the strings.

http://www.literarytraveler.com/literary_articles/poe_on_sullivans_island.aspx
http://poetry.lastpromise.com/content/poe_edgarallan/
http://docsouth.unc.edu/southlit/poe/bio.html

In response to questions about the lack of protest...

I want this entry to actually respond to the one posted by Samantha below it, however I'm having trouble with the site, which seems to not be letting me post comments.

In response to the question of why more people aren't out there protesting the war, it is my opinion that the hippy movement of the late 60's/early 70's is considered to be a failure. This is interesting, considering that most people tend to acknowledge that the drive to get the soldiers out of Vietnam was entirely valid - that's to say, the hippies were right. However, I think at this point people think more often of drugs and sex when they think of the flower children as opposed to their political leanings. And I don't think that connotation is entirely unfair, as the hippy movement was not - as one might like to think - a unified entity of the idealistic youth. Perhaps it began that way, but I'm pretty sure it evolved into more of a style than a real political movement. I think people aren't out there protesting the Iraq war because they don't think it will really do that much, and because they don't want to be tagged with the label of an idealistic hippy/extreme leftist, which I think has somehow become very uncool.

In response to your question, I did protest the Iraq war. I went to San Francisco and participated in a huge protest right before it began, and I went to several smaller marches in Los Angeles. I would also get defensive when people would tease me about being a "hippy." The thing is, I really started to get the impression that these marches made no difference whatsoever. People protest/march in DC every day about something or other, and honestly I don't blame politicians if they don't really pay attention anymore. That doesn't necessarily have to be depressing - it might just mean that we need to find a new form of political protest.

Though it is obviously a much less extreme case, I do think that the moment in American History in the late 60's/early 70's did carry some aspects of a civil conflict. The youth were very much pitted against the older generation at that time, and in a way I think the older generation won. What became of those hippies? I feel like a lot of them are living in the suburbs now, driving SUV's, and deciding not to protest Iraq. However that doesn't mean they can't nostalgicize the hippies, romanticize that time, talk about that era as if it was a moment when the youth were unified, when musicians like Bob Dylan could speak for a generation as opposed to just a corner of the internet. I wonder if there are similarities to be drawn between the romanticization of the antebellum south and the romanticization of the hippies of the late 60's...both sides did lose, in my opinion.

Chivalry in Vietnam/Iraq?

To summarize on a very basic level, I am writing my paper on a comparison of the Vietnam and Iraq wars. As they are being compared these days from all outlets of communications and from the President himself, I cannot help but to ask why we, the students of American, are not responding in the same way students did in the 1960s and 70s? There is a lack of passion among the youth today that can be seen through the lack of student protests and demonstrations. The polls clearly show that we do not support the war, so why are we keeping that to ourselves? I am just curious to know whether any of you have participated in or merely thought about any sort of protests or rallies and what the right to protest mean to you.

Also, on another note, I was thinking about the difference between Vietnam and Iraq and all major American wars that preceded them. I began to think about them in relation to our class and instantly the notion of chivalry came to mind. Vietnam was the first war to be nationally televised in the United States. Does seeing images of our soldiers fighting possibly take away from the glamorous image that we used to assign to them? Especially with the type of guerilla warfare that was used in Vietnam, I do not see people attributing any chivalric qualities to those soldiers. I think that a lack of visual images from American wars kept the chivalric fantasy alive and kept American’s support. Similarly, although soldiers still come home as “heroes” today, there is not as much celebration in their fighting. Overall, I think we have come to a stage where reality has struck and the glamour of war no longer exists.

I think the abundance of particularly influential artists in the mid-19th century is evidence that the years surrounding the Civil War are important not just because the war, one of the landmark events in U.S. history, occurred then, but because it was a more general turning point for U.S. society. Kerry mentioned the upheaval of traditions. The war also helped accentuate and even accelerate technological and social developments, however, and though I don't remember ever talking about this in class, it's important to note that the Civil War is known as the "first modern war."

The most obvious reason for this nickname is the technological progress that was evident in the tools of war. It was the first war in which railroads and telegraphs were widely employed for transporting masses of people and supplies and ensuring efficient communicate respectively. The rapid-fire Gatling gun was also introduced, which greatly improved the efficiency of soldiers trying to slaughter each other. The death toll during this war was catastrophic in part because of the increased lethality of weaponry. Combat style also evolved so that a few years into the conflict the dominant field strategy involved trench warfare, which had previously been snubbed but would become infamous during the first World War.

A less explicitly martial technological advance that I think we all found intriguing during the presentations was the development of photography. It seems like truly a transitional moment in history when same event is both sketched by hand and photographed for the purpose of journalism. The likes of Alfred R. Waud, who sketched the war not to be artistic but because it was the obvious and legitimate way to capture it for the media, and Matthew Brady won't meet again.

And of course the Civil War was the last war of chivalry. Robert E. Lee was the personification of chivalric manners, many Southerners chose to go to war because of their loyalty and pride, and even the northern Grant had his troops respectfully salute Lee's as the confederate forces surrendered. It's hard to imagine a future war involving any analogous circumstances.

The broad point is that the Civil War was not a pivotal event in history just because of the magnitude of death and destruction and the "resolution" of the debates over states' rights and slavery, but also because it occurred during a period of technological and social transition and was a focal point of progressive ideas. There is plenty more that can and probably should be said on this subject, but I just wanted to make sure it was mentioned.

My Favorite Top 100 Lists

Ok, so I had a really great entry on Top 100 lists all ready to go, and then I accidentally clicked on something and the browser went somewhere else - so I lost it. So what I'm going to do is create an abbreviated version of my original post. Basically, I love Top Ten/100/Whatever lists, and I've run across a lot of them over the past few months. I think they incite a lot of strong reactions because no lengthy explanations of the order ever accompany the publication of the list, and because ranking things inherently places a hierarchy on them that's nearly impossible to view objectively. The following lists are some fun and unusual Top 100 entries that bring to light these very concepts - I hope you enjoy them as much as I do!

First, here's the link to the list The Atlantic might consider as the predecessor to its own recent publication - Time's 100 People Who Shape Our World of 2006. I guess George Clooney had to be on there...
http://www.time.com/time/2006/time100/

Next, Random House went ahead and created their own lists of Top 100 novels and nonfiction books of the 20th century. What I really like about their lists here is that each entry actually features two lists; a group nebulously named "the Board" came up with one compilation, and Random House readers voted to create the other. Here's the link to both the "novels" and "nonfiction" categories:
http://www.randomhouse.com/modernlibrary/100best.html

Forbes.com, aside from their 100 Most Powerful Celebrities list, also comes up with an annual (?) ranking of the 100 Most Powerful Women in the world. Sadly, this year we did not capture the #1 spot - Condi, noooo! And also note that Oprah's a mere #14 on this list. Slacker.
http://www.forbes.com/lists/2006/11/06women_The-100-Most-Powerful-Women_Rank.html

Every year since 1998, AFI (American Film Institute) creates a wildly popular "100 Years..." list that notes the Top 100 Thrills/Songs/Laughs/Etc. of the past century. Most notable were the 1998 list, which counted down the best films of all time, and 2003's list, which selected the top heroes and villains of our favorite films. They air these lists as a lengthy TV segment each year on Bravo - this year, on December 28th at 6pm, enjoy their countdown of the 100 Most Inspiring Films of All Time. Spoiler alert - the list is up on the web, so don't click on the link to that list if you want to be surprised by the TV special!
http://www.afi.com/tvevents/100years/100yearslist.aspx

This next list is one of my favorites. YourDictionary.com built a list of the 100 Most Often Mispronounced Words, and I have to say, I learned quite a bit from it. Note that he does seem to make judgments on certain dialects that may be unfair. Also, look at the lone entry for the letter "K;" it's highly amusing.
http://www.yourdictionary.com/library/mispron.html

Businessweek.com recently made a list of the Best Global Brands of 2006. The list isn't totally surprising, though I wish McDonald's hadn't made it on there at all...
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/toc/06_32/B399606globalbrands.htm

I love this next list - it's a compilation of the Top 100 (American) Speeches of the 20th Century. The website provides full audio clips for most of the speeches, so you can listen as you browse the list! Sadly, I don't recognize a lot of these speeches, though I probably should...
http://www.americanrhetoric.com/top100speechesall.html

I had to slip this one in here: IMDb.com, in addition to posting an oft-fluctuating Top 100 films list, also frequently updates a Bottom 100 list, whereby user votes determine the worst films of all time. Gigli's been a mainstay since its appearance on IMDb.com:
http://www.imdb.com/chart/bottom

Finally, I ran across a few articles that discuss The Atlantic's highly contentious list that we reviewed in class. These two authors have wildly different takes on the list, and yet I'm not sure any of us would fully agree with any of them. Here's the first article, taken from The Boston Globe:
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2006/11/28/whos_missing_from_this_top_100_list/
The second article comes from the Columbia Journalism Review (also powered by MovableType!):
http://www.cjrdaily.org/behind_the_news/the_atlantics_top_100_list_is.php

I think one thing that these lists and criticisms show is the collective need to categorize and create hierarchies. Inherent in creating lists is the prioritizing of certain items above other items; something has to be #1, just as another thing must be in last place. But how we arrive at such categorization is fascinating, because so many factors go into how we prioritize. The order of a list can say a lot about its creators as well as its critics. And the sheer amount of lists available - ! One could probably create several volumes of books full of published Top Ten/100 lists: Top Ten Banned Books of 1997, Top 100 web searches for 3:06pm on August 19th, Top 100 Children's Books to Feature the Color Green. It's unbelievable. We really do have a tendency to categorize, that goes beyond mere organizational habits. Why do you guys think we obsess over lists like this? What does it really matter (and yes, it does seem to truly matter to many!)?

So much for brevity - have a happy break, and Happy Holidays!

A Possible Explanation

When we discussed the 100 Most Influential People according to Atlantic Monthly in class, we kept noting that the few artists who were lucky enough to make the cut all seemed to be from the same mid-19th century period. I believe one reason we ventured as explanation for a concentration of influential literary figures in this era was that Americans—or, at least, the Atlantic Monthly—deems the time circa the Civil War highly significant to the way the United States is today. I also think another explanation discussed was that, as opposed to more recent artists in the modern era, enough time has passed to see the actual influence of the figures from the mid-1800s.

I think both of these arguments are true. Yet while researching for my final paper, I have perhaps found a third reason for the production of influential art in this mythic period of American history. As I’ve mentioned in a previous post, I’ve recently read Allen Tate’s The Fathers. Tate, apparently, had theories about “formal” and “informal” societies. He argued that the antebellum South had a traditional, agrarian, and formal society. In turn, he also “associated high levels of consciousness with situations in which myths had fallen into decay, where there were large and fundamental uncertainties which impinged upon life at the most practical level” (349).

Essentially, to Tate, the crash of the modern world with the traditional South, and then the subsequent explosion of the Civil War, caused the South to be a place where “myths had fallen into decay” and where an older traditional people were unsure of how to deal with a new, modern way of life. Yet a positive result of such change, such uncertainty, was a “high level of consciousness.” Tate believed the Southern Renaissance, the (European) Renaissance, and the “collapse of New England Puritanism” (349) were moments of high consciousness and also, consequently, moments “of great art” (349).

Long story short, as long as a strict traditional society remains, there is no force to impel a people to be introspective, to be conscious of themselves, because ritual and tradition makes life simple. Thus, according to Tate, a reason why so much art—so much influential art—was produced at this important time in American history was because the upheaval of traditions around the Civil War-era caused an introspection that in turn caused art to flourish. And in my opinion, works that explore the human condition and the individual in relation to society tend to transcend time, which therefore are more likely to be considered “influential.”

Law, Richard. "'Active Faith' and Ritual in The Fathers." American Literature 55(1983): 345-366.

Influential People that never lived

As I mentioned in class today, there was recently a list, and apparently a book, of the 101 most influential people that never lived. Though it is not Americans exclusively (in fact, most are not americans), its good to know that the literary pieces whose authors were left off the lists we saw in class today have their figures included in this list. A few from class that made the list:
#3 King Arthur
#11 Uncle Tom
#65 Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn
#97 Ivanhoe

Also, though completely unrelated to class, the Marlboro Man was deemed the most influential person who never lived. Which I think is absurd. Compared to the rest of the top 5 (Big Brother, King Arthur, Santa Claus and Hamlet), I think the Marlboro man is least influential but it sadly shows how much advertising and the cigarette industry has entered our consciousness.

As i also mentioned in class, I think it would be interesting to combine the two lists, if there were an exclusively american list, and see if Uncle Tom ranks higher than Beecher Stowe, and where the imaginary and literary figures make the list and push others off.

Here is the entire list, its a really interesting combination of mythical figures, characters from novels, films and TV and even expressions (like Jim Crow).
http://www.usatoday.com/life/people/2006-10-16-influential-people-list_x.htm

The influence of sports and literature

In just leaving our class I could not help but make comments about the 100 most influential people in history. When I began to question their list, I had to stop and ask myself what influential (or influence) really means. In the Webster dictionary (possibly confirming his place on the list) the definition of influence reads: The capacity to have an effect on the character, development, or behavior of someone or something, or the effect itself. This definition definitely brought me back to a few aspects of our discussion today and also made me question what or who has had the greatest influence on my life.

Regarding Michael Jordan, I do agree with the class that he has created a commercial empire and deserves recognition. However, I see Michael Jordan as so much more. He is an athletic icon, the best ever to do something, whether it be playing basketball or not is less important. Jordan has inspired in me in my athletic career, but an even bigger inspiration has been Mia Hamm (one of the top paid female athletes in the world). More pertinent to my life because of soccer, she was an incredible force in my decision to begin playing soccer and proof that women can make it to the top of the game as well. To further her influence upon my life I will just say that I have played soccer now for almost 16 years and would not have come to Penn in the first place without it. So, regardless of their place in history or culture, I think athletes do deserve a place on this list. And deservingly so, Michael Jordan has earned this title by having affected more people than most.

Next, I would like to discuss the lists lack of modern authors/poets. I do think that although we have other outlets such as television, music, and movies, that it is important to have great writers and great numbers of people reading their works. Tying in to what I am writing about in my final paper, I believe that this generation is lacking the drive to make changes in our society. I realize it is no easy task, but I feel like even 40 years ago brought about more progressive writers than what we are producing today. It would only take one book or one author to represent our generation and our nation as it is today. I also think it is important to continue to represent reading as something of vital importance to kids in school. I am not saying we should not incorporate modern methods of learning via internet, television, etc, but I think we should put more emphasis on reading and striving toward a new literary generation.

A Very Merry Christmas, from Mark Twain

My friends and I are running a Secret Santa through Elfster.com - it's a fun little website that draws the names for you, and allows you to make a wishlist and pester your choice with annoying questions about what they want. Anyways, I received an e-mail from Elfster.com about setting up a wishlist - and, what do you know, they included a nice little Twain quote at the bottom of the page.

I'm going to go ahead and assume this was written by the bitter Mark Twain of the early 1900s:

"The approach of Christmas brings harrassment and dread to many excellent people. They have to buy a cart-load of presents, and they never know what to buy to hit the various tastes; they put in three weeks of hard and anxious work, and when Christmas morning comes they are so dissatisfied with the result, and so disappointed that they want to sit down and cry. Then they give thanks that Christmas comes but once a year."
-Mark Twain

Um - Merry Christmas?

Social Tenuousness, Language, and Symbols

One of the aspects of Horwitz's book that I found so engaging and relevant was the idea of tenuous harmony. To me, this means an unspoken pact formed between two sides whereby certain rules are made that cannot be broken. We see this in Horwitz's book in many ways; most notably, it appears in race relations. The story of Michael Westerman provides a perfect example of this. Prior to the misunderstanding between the two men, the townspeople, both black and white, lived in a state of general happiness. The citizens lived with one another, worked and studied alongside each other - but underneath the surfcace, there were certain unspoken rules that everyone inherently understood you could never break. Westerman, and the men following him, both apparently broke a silent social code. Consequently, one man was martyred and another was condemned.

Two of the most powerful catalysts for an eruption of this semi-harmony come from language and symbols. In the Westerman case, the sacred Confederate flag faced a defacement of sorts; thus, those who wronged it faced a social (and legal, brought about by social conditions) punishment. That the social consequences reached as far as influencing the law is a really scary reality for Freddie Morrow and his friends. The symbol of the flag has such an amazing power over the people who believed in it that it could almost be the law itself, in a sense. It takes on a mythical power. Ironically, those who believe in this particular symbol often don't understand its original meaning. Many co-opt it as a symbol for their own cause against the government/liberals/heterogeneous society. Westerman himself couldn't even go this far; the flag was, for him, something pretty that matched his car. Horwitz points this out as a negative feature of Confederate remembrance, but I'm not so sure co-opting a symbol in this way is necessarily a bad thing in all cases.

The sensitivity regarding language has come up a lot recently in the news. We've already discussed at length Michael Richards' ordeal, as well as Mel Gibson's remarks. These examples again demonstrate a co-optation of sorts, but in a slightly different way. The word used by Richards has become a derogatory slang word when used by one group of people against another (aka, any group besides blacks to blacks), but when utilized by African-Americans, it's almost a pride symbol. I'm not sure if that's the best way to describe it, and certainly many are against its use in this way. But the proliferation of the word in certain subcultures - specifically, music and film genres - suggests it does have a great deal of power to break down whatever ties existed between previously harmonious groups.

The specifics of such social codes would be fascinating to examine - I feel like one parameter is that everyone has to be in on the unspoken rules (so paradoxical!) for the society to function. When Sacha Baron Cohen, for example, breaks this rule by not letting his interview subjects in on the prejudicial jokes of the film, social outrage results. Intriguing as well, a concept that follows from this is purposeful provocation - in the misunderstanding between Westerman and Morrow, one mistook the flag for a provocative racist emblem; the other understood the agitator as threatening his beloved symbol. A clash resulted from the aggressive actions both sides took to protect their pride. This leads to the idea of protection of ideas within the code - when people honor concepts differently within a social system, the hierarchy of favoring can lead to social breakdown.

I'm clearly still trying to work a lot of these ideas out in my head - any further thoughts on this theory?

‘The Simpsons’: Art that Speaks to the Masses

Thinking back to last weeks class discussion about Twain’s ability to speak to the masses, I came up with another form of art that I personally think speaks to the present day masses: 'The Simpsons'! This award-winning, animated American sit-com is the longest running sit-com to date and has been on the air for almost 20 years. 'The Simpsons' parodies the middle-America lifestyle and is set in the fictional town of Springfield, named for its commonality because over 30 U.S states have a town called Springfield. Moreover, like Twain, 'The Simpsons' is full of political, social and historical commentary. For example, it tackles controversial social issues like homophobia, and in the episode “Homer’s Phobia” he triumphs over his homophobia and even becomes friends with a gay man. Also, everyone from the Pope to the President is fair game to mock and parody on 'The Simpsons'. Similar to how Twain comments on chivalry and Sir Walter Scott in “A Medieval Romance”, 'The Simpsons' also use humor to comment on history and present day society. I personally love this show and think that its ability to relate to all ages makes it a form of art that speaks to the masses.

Pervasive stereotypes

Apropos our discussion towards the end of class today regarding hateful language and ideas as pervading the United States as a whole and not necessarily any region in particular, I’ve pasted below a letter to the editor of our local paper that my parents wrote after this Thanksgiving. (Timing works in weird ways, as I was thinking on the plane ride home while reading Horwitz, clearly closed-mindedly, that real anti-Semitism only existed in the boonies of the United States):

“Mel Gibson and Michael Richards Live Here
The other evening our young adult daughter, who was home for the Thanksgiving weekend, experienced hate in the sanctity of our front yard. As she was exiting a taxi after an evening out with friends, three young men who had just left an underage drinking party at our neighbors’ house affronted her. These North Shore thugs were looking to engage the taxi for their own use, and as our daughter was paying the driver, one of the intoxicated and impatient young men hurled ethnic and sexual slurs at her. Our daughter, who has lived in several large urban centers, and who has traveled extensively in Europe and other parts of the world, had never been the recipient of such vitriol and was horrified and distraught. Luckily, she is a strong young woman so was not permanently traumatized though it took her several hours to calm down, and the rest of this usually happy weekend was pervaded by this episode. We have dealt with the situation as we see fit, and know through our more than ten years in Winnetka via our friends and our children’s friends that this expression of anti-Semitism and misogyny is an aberration and not a dominant local world view. However, we recognize that foci of hate and intolerance are clearly everywhere, even in supposedly “enlightened” areas such as ours. As we move into the holiday season where thoughts of “peace on earth” are paramount, it would behoove parents to remind their children that violent acts begin with hateful words.
Names withheld by request”

Words are powerful, and when words were directed towards me, it made a difference who said them. The young men who hurled the harsh language towards me were upper-middle class and over-privileged, and I don’t think this language came out of a vacuum, regardless of alcohol consumption. They transformed a well known albeit erroneous stereotype into verbal bombardment, so at home, with friends, etc., they are not taught that these stereotypes are heinously wrong.
Someone also brought up Michael Richards today in class, and as I was sitting at brunch with extended family over Thanksgiving weekend, someone said something to the effect of, “That’s just what we need,” implying that he gives Jews a bad name, even though they know he is, in fact, not Jewish. I guess I’ve never realized how conscious people are of group differences and stereotypes from all over the spectrum this day and age all over America.

Borat and Regionalism

In discussing current issues today in class about racism, regionalism, comedy, etc. I could not help in drawing a connection to the movie Borat, which came out about a month ago. At first glance, this ridiculous comedy, written by and starring Sascha Boran Cohen, seems like a waste to discuss. In this mockumentary we see one of Cohen’s many alter-egos, Borat (originated from Da Ali G Show) travel through the United States in search of Pamela Anderson. Yes, I realize this sounds like it has nothing to do with our discussion today. However, Cohen, a Cambridge graduate, is a comic genius (in my opinion) and successfully mocks the ignorance of Americans as a whole.

The first comparison I am going to make to Tony Horwitz is their modes of writing. Both Borat and Horwitz go on journalistic-type expeditions in search of what they are looking for. Through his journey, Borat interacts with people from all parts of America and people from every place he visits (from New York to Texas to California). Each are portrayed as equally naïve, ignorant, and down right stupid. The reason I find this significant, however, is the fact that each are made fun of in there own way, specific to their region. For example, New Yorkers are afraid of close contact; while in the South, they are mortified by Borat’s bad manners and at Texas a rodeo the audience applauses his ridiculous banter about destroying all Iraqi terrorist. Each region of America is made to look bad in their own way, demonstrating the notion that all parts of America have those qualities that can-and maybe should be-made fun of.

On that note, when has a comedian gone too far? As we discussed today with Michael Richard’s use of a very controversial word, Borat haphazardly throws around insults about Jews. What seems to make this PC is the knowledge that Cohen himself (not Borat) is Jewish. Is it okay for someone to make fun of their own race, religion, or region? And if it’s okay for them doesn’t it seem to open the door for others to do the same thing? I personally did not take offense to Cohen’s persistent insults about Jews, but who’s to say nobody else did? I am not sure how I truly feel about this problem. Should we all discontinue the popular jokes making fun of these topics or should we let them fly and merely alter our sensitivity levels?

Lastly, that brings me to the question of whether words are more harmful than actions. When Kate Moss was brought up in class today, I was surprised for a moment to hear that others think what she did was worst than what Michael Richards said. In retrospect, I suppose actions do speak louder than words, but I can’t help to defend Kate Moss. I do think that some addicts have a disease that is often out of their control to help and that using speech like “rehab” is effective. However, words of hatred are chosen. And what these famous people choose to say will undoubtedly reflect how we see them. I am not defending either type of behavior, but I do cast more blame on those who are hurting others in their speech.

Lincoln Images: A Dramatic Change in Four Years

Below are links to 3 images of Lincoln from the beginning and end of his presidency. His visible change in appearance is shocking!

1) http://www.abrahamlincolnartgallery.com/archivepg1pic2.htm
In this image, taken in 1860 by Mathew Brady, Lincoln looks young, healthy, strong (and beardless!). He is going to be elected president in a few months.

2) http://www.abrahamlincolnartgallery.com/archivepg4pic22.htm
This is another Brady photography, taken on April 6, 1861, a month after Lincoln was inaugurated president. In this photo Lincoln has a glimmer in eyes that exudes strength, confidence and poise. He also has his beard.

3) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Gardner-Photo-Lincoln.jpg
Finally, this photo by Alexander Gardner, is considered the last living photo of Lincoln taken. Look at the utter exhaustion in his eyes and the overall toll the Presidency and war took on Lincoln.

I think these three photos are so interesting because they show how aged, sickly and anxious Lincoln looked after four years of war and being President. In Lincoln's final photo his eyes are sunken in and he looks ill, wrinkly and burdened.

Horwitz and New Journalism

Although I have never read Capote’s In Cold Blood or seen the movie “Capote”, our discussion today about Capote’s influence on Horwitz and the notion of New Journalism relates to a Comm. class I took last year called Critical Perspectives on Journalism.

New Journalism looks at journalism, as a craft, from a storytelling perspective, where fictional techniques are used to create a flowing narrative. New Journalism evolved from elements of Yellow Journalism, which was a sensational form of journalism in the late 1800s, where people like Hearst and Pulitzer would create false, exaggerated stories, in order to sell more papers. A buzz word for New Journalism is “style” and the author uses both elite and non-elite sources to create personalizing, literary, and creative content.

After reviewing New Journalism, I definitely sense Horwitz includes aspects of this form of journalism in Confederates in the Attack. Horwitz uses a mix of literary forms throughout his novel, like pros, poetry, humor and quotations which emphasize an intimate, multi-faceted view of the people he meets and his project. Moreover, Horwitz provides the reader with what feels like a sincere view of events from both elite sources, like Shelby-Foote, and non-elite sources, like Rob Hodge and the other Civil War “living historians” (10). By talking about real people, Horwitz offers a unique, humorous and at times chilling slice of southern life which provokes reflection on the legacy of the Civil War and how obsessed some Americans still are with it.

I think Horwitz uses elements of New Journalism in an attempt to deal with the memories surrounding the Civil War through a different perspective that questions the difference between “history” and “storytelling” and suggests the two are inevitably linked.