Journal #2

Prompt: (Analytic): Pick a passage from your reading (between one paragraph and half a page). Copy the passage onto your blog and make a list of the decisions that Hurston made in writing that passage. What techniques, what patterns, what questions, what tone, what word choice, etc.

It was a spring afternoon in West Florida. Janie had spent most of the day under a blossoming pear tree in the back-yard. She had been spending every minute that she could steal from her chores under that tree for the last three days. That was to say, ever since the first tiny bloom had opened. It had called her to come and gaze on a mystery. From barren brown stems to glistening leaf-buds; from the leaf-buds to snowy virginity of bloom. It stirred her tremendously. How? Why? It was like a flute song forgotten in another existence and remembered again. What? How? Why? This singing she heard that had nothing to do with her ears. The rose of the world was breathing out smell. It followed her through all her waking moments and caressed her in her sleep. It connected itself with other vaguely felt matters that had struck her outside observation and buried themselves in her flesh. Now they emerged and quested about her consciousness.

Zora Neale Hurston's decisions:

 Plot/Plot Structure - motif of remembering vs forgetting
 Plot/Plot Structure - motif of tree, paralleling with Janie
 Plot/Plot Structure - motif of circles
 Plot/Plot Structure - dramatic irony
 Language - involving "spring" and "blooming"  
 Language - varying sentence lengths
 Language - personification
 Language - ambiguity
 Language - verb choice (blossoming, stirred, caressed, connected, struck, buried, emerged, quested) 
 Language - calm rhythm
 Language - senses (hearing/touching/seeing/smelling)
 Setting - time and place
 Setting - soft tone
 Setting - very many figurative words

Journal #1

Prompt: (Reflective): If you could tell your life story to one person, to whom would it be? Where would you begin (moment that changed your world view)?

If I were to tell my life story to one person, I would tell it to someone that would benefit from hearing it. Realistically, I would tell my life story to one of my younger cousins who have yet to enter high school. I would hope that my experiences and setbacks would provide them some insight into what they should or should not do. However, I would not tell them if they did not want to listen. My story would begin in 8th grade when my family and I took a trip to visit family in Vietnam. I would try to set the background by telling them about how seeing the people living in poverty in Vietnam made me realize that I was taking things for granted. I would follow up by letting them know that my older cousin had also given me advice when I was around their age and how his advice ended up being true.