Ms. Cavallaro’s Class Blog

By popular demand, here’s a link for you to download and view the Beowulf PowerPoint (in PDF format). Peruse at your leisure.

Ethics

In ethics class so many years ago
our teacher asked this question every fall:
if there were a fire in a museum
which would you save, a Rembrandt painting
or an old woman who hadn’t had many
years left anyhow? Restless on hard chairs
caring little for pictures or old age
we’d opt one year for life, the next for art
and always half-heartedly. Sometimes
the woman borrowed my grandmother’s face
leaving her usual kitchen to wander
some drafty, half-imagined museum.
One year, feeling clever, I replied
why not let the woman decide herself?
“Linda,” the teacher would report, “eschews
the burdens of responsibility.”
This fall in a real museum I stand
before a real Rembrandt, old woman,
or nearly so, myself.  The colors
within this frame are darker than autumn,
darker even than winter—the browns of earth,
though earth’s most radiant elements burn
through the canvas. I know now that woman
and painting and season are almost one
and all beyond saving by children.

– Linda Pastan (b. 1932)

===============

What is Pastan attempting to express? How does “Ethics” connect to the other texts we’ve been studying in our 1984 unit? In your response, be sure to cite specific phrases from the poem. Dig into this poem, and s t r e t c h your brain as you respond. For the poetryphobic among you, this poem can be interpreted many different ways, so there is no one “right” answer.

And don’t forget–while you are required to address your classmate(s)’s posts in your response, I look forward to seeing what you think about the poem.

Responses due by midnight Sunday 9/15

Ethics

In ethics class so many years ago
our teacher asked this question every fall:
if there were a fire in a museum
which would you save, a Rembrandt painting
or an old woman who hadn’t had many
years left anyhow? Restless on hard chairs
caring little for pictures or old age
we’d opt one year for life, the next for art
and always half-heartedly. Sometimes
the woman borrowed my grandmother’s face
leaving her usual kitchen to wander
some drafty, half-imagined museum.
One year, feeling clever, I replied
why not let the woman decide herself?
“Linda,” the teacher would report, “eschews
the burdens of responsibility.”
This fall in a real museum I stand
before a real Rembrandt, old woman,
or nearly so, myself.  The colors
within this frame are darker than autumn,
darker even than winter—the browns of earth,
though earth’s most radiant elements burn
through the canvas. I know now that woman
and painting and season are almost one
and all beyond saving by children.

– Linda Pastan (b. 1932)

===============

What is Pastan attempting to express? How does “Ethics” connect to the other texts we’ve been studying in our 1984 unit? In your response, be sure to cite specific phrases from the poem. Dig into this poem, and s t r e t c h your brain as you respond. For the poetryphobic among you, this poem can be interpreted many different ways, so there is no one “right” answer.

And don’t forget–while you are required to address your classmate(s)’s posts in your response, I look forward to seeing what you think about the poem.

Responses due by midnight Sunday 9/15

Ethics

In ethics class so many years ago
our teacher asked this question every fall:
if there were a fire in a museum
which would you save, a Rembrandt painting
or an old woman who hadn’t had many
years left anyhow? Restless on hard chairs
caring little for pictures or old age
we’d opt one year for life, the next for art
and always half-heartedly. Sometimes
the woman borrowed my grandmother’s face
leaving her usual kitchen to wander
some drafty, half-imagined museum.
One year, feeling clever, I replied
why not let the woman decide herself?
“Linda,” the teacher would report, “eschews
the burdens of responsibility.”
This fall in a real museum I stand
before a real Rembrandt, old woman,
or nearly so, myself.  The colors
within this frame are darker than autumn,
darker even than winter—the browns of earth,
though earth’s most radiant elements burn
through the canvas. I know now that woman
and painting and season are almost one
and all beyond saving by children.

– Linda Pastan (b. 1932)

===============

What is Pastan attempting to express? How does “Ethics” connect to the other texts we’ve been studying in our 1984 unit? In your response, be sure to cite specific phrases from the poem. Dig into this poem, and s t r e t c h your brain as you respond. For the poetryphobic among you, this poem can be interpreted many different ways, so there is no one “right” answer.

And don’t forget–while you are required to address your classmate(s)’s posts in your response, I look forward to seeing what you think about the poem.

Responses due by midnight Sunday 9/15

This blog is a place for us to engage in various discussions of literature: our thoughts, our reactions and ideas, our struggles, and our questions. It’s also a place for us to ponder and respond to each other. Here there’s no real “rubric,” and responses may wander off on a tangent from time to time. In other words, we are a community of thinkers engaging in dynamic discussion. You are free to comment more than once and to bring up questions that may seem only parenthetically related to the topic.

In order to receive credit, the only “rules” to follow are that you respond by midnight, that you respond thoughtfully and eloquently, and that you read all of your classmates’ posts and respond to at least one of them.

For this first post, we’re going to dive right into 1984 and some weighty questions related to Orwell’s classic text. Our fair protagonist, Winston, is expected to unquestioningly follow the rules and norms of his society. Indeed, nearly all of his peers seem to mindlessly march to the beat of Big Brother, since the government in Oceania discourages any sort of behavior that would cause a person to be distinguished from his/her peers. The idea of an individual being recognized for anything other than traitorous acts is basically nonexistent.

This topic of the individual’s role in his society is relevant not only to 1984 but also to our modern world, and it connects directly to many of the issues currently being debated by our government and our presidential candidates. The idea of individualism versus collectivism was also addressed in a recent NY Times op-ed about the Beijing Olympics, which you can read here.

And so this leads us to our big questions: What are the real-life consequences of putting the individual before the community or vice versa? Is the role of a human being to become one with his society and to sacrifice individual needs for the greater good? Or should we as a society be more concerned with the individual’s rights and privileges? Is there a middle ground? Should there be a middle ground? Please be sure to refer to 1984 in some way in your response.

Responses are due by midnight Thursday 9/4 Sunday 9/7

** If you haven’t received your new password, please let me know via e-mail. Thanks for your patience! **

This blog is a place for us to engage in various discussions of literature: our thoughts, our reactions and ideas, our struggles, and our questions. It’s also a place for us to ponder and respond to each other. Here there’s no real “rubric,” and responses may wander off on a tangent from time to time. In other words, we are a community of thinkers engaging in dynamic discussion. You are free to comment more than once and to bring up questions that may seem only parenthetically related to the topic.

In order to receive credit, the only “rules” to follow are that you respond by midnight, that you respond thoughtfully and eloquently, and that you read all of your classmates’ posts and respond to at least one of them.

For this first post, we’re going to dive right into 1984 and some weighty questions related to Orwell’s classic text. Our fair protagonist, Winston, is expected to unquestioningly follow the rules and norms of his society. Indeed, nearly all of his peers seem to mindlessly march to the beat of Big Brother, since the government in Oceania discourages any sort of behavior that would cause a person to be distinguished from his/her peers. The idea of an individual being recognized for anything other than traitorous acts is basically nonexistent.

This topic of the individual’s role in his society is relevant not only to 1984 but also to our modern world, and it connects directly to many of the issues currently being debated by our government and our presidential candidates. The idea of individualism versus collectivism was also addressed in a recent NY Times op-ed about the Beijing Olympics, which you can read here.

And so this leads us to our big questions: What are the real-life consequences of putting the individual before the community or vice versa? Is the role of a human being to become one with his society and to sacrifice individual needs for the greater good? Or should we as a society be more concerned with the individual’s rights and privileges? Is there a middle ground? Should there be a middle ground? Please be sure to refer to 1984 in some way in your response.

Responses are due by midnight Sunday 9/7

** As of this writing, at 2:52 p.m. on Friday afternoon, you have each been sent your new password. So if you haven’t received it, please let me know via e-mail. Thanks for your patience! **

This blog is a place for us to engage in various discussions of literature: our thoughts, our reactions and ideas, our struggles, and our questions. It’s also a place for us to ponder and respond to each other. Here there’s no real “rubric,” and responses may wander off on a tangent from time to time. In other words, we are a community of thinkers engaging in dynamic discussion. You are free to comment more than once and to bring up questions that may seem only parenthetically related to the topic.

In order to receive credit, the only “rules” to follow are that you respond by midnight, that you respond thoughtfully and eloquently, and that you read all of your classmates’ posts and respond to at least one of them.

For this first post, we’re going to dive right into 1984 and some weighty questions related to Orwell’s classic text. Our fair protagonist, Winston, is expected to unquestioningly follow the rules and norms of his society. Indeed, nearly all of his peers seem to mindlessly march to the beat of Big Brother, since the government in Oceania discourages any sort of behavior that would cause a person to be distinguished from his/her peers. The idea of an individual being recognized for anything other than traitorous acts is basically nonexistent.

This topic of the individual’s role in his society is relevant not only to 1984 but also to our modern world, and it connects directly to many of the issues currently being debated by our government and our presidential candidates. The idea of individualism versus collectivism was also addressed in a recent NY Times op-ed about the Beijing Olympics, which you can read here.

And so this leads us to our big questions: What are the real-life consequences of putting the individual before the community or vice versa? Is the role of a human being to become one with his society and to sacrifice individual needs for the greater good? Or should we as a society be more concerned with the individual’s rights and privileges? Is there a middle ground? Should there be a middle ground? Please be sure to refer to 1984 in some way in your response.

Responses are due by midnight Sunday 9/7

****As of 2 p.m. Monday afternoon, I’ve emailed everyone’s passwords. If you have not received yours, please send me an email. Thanks again for your patience!**