5th Blog Response ( Maps to Anywhere)

Sudden Extinction

 

I enjoyed this short story’s message and use of imagery. The author describes the brachiosaurus and triceratops in a way I never thought of but it makes perfect since and you are able to understand the image as you are reading. The narrator compares the brachiosaurus to a candle; he says “The Brachiosaurus’s brain, for example, sat atop his tapered neck like a minuscule flame on a mammoth candle.” If you know about dinosaurs you know the Brachiosaurus was the largest thing to ever walk the earth, with a neck about 3 times larger than a giraffes. However in relation to body size the head and brain of the reptile was much smaller. The narrator says “My Favorite is Triceratops, his face a hideous Rorschach blot of broad bone and blue hide. The museum of Natural History owns a replica that doesn’t do him justice. One front foot is poised in the air like an elephant sedated for a sideshow. And the nasal horn for shredding aggressors is as dull and mundane as a hook for a hat.” To me the narrator was describing the triceratops bony facial features that included the two large horns protruding from its forehead and one smaller horn jutting from his nose. The image the narrator gives you is that of a powerful creature, however the narrator then says it the horns are now as useless as a hook for a hat. I believe this meant that the dinosaurs were once a powerful species with large horns and teeth, but now they are extinct and put on display and the once ferocious horns are remnants of the past just like the once popular hooks for hats. To me the narrator of this short story was not just talking about the extinction of the Dinosaurs but our extinction as well.

The narrator says “There are guys at my gym whose latissimus dorsi, having spread like thunderheads, cause them to inch through an ordinary door; might the dinosauria have grown too big for their own violation?” I believe with this sentence the narrator compares us to dinosaurs. Saying that maybe us are humans are growing too big for our own good and maybe that is what caused the dinosaur’s extinction. The narrator then says “Once, I imagined our exercise through X-ray eyes. Our skeletons gaped at their own reflection. Empty eyes, like apertures, opened onto an afterlife. Lightning-bright spines flashed from sacrums. Phalanges of hands were splayed in surprise. Bones were glowing everywhere, years scoured down to marrow, flesh redressed with white.” To me this whole paragraph is the narrator also comparing us to the dinosaurs, but also explaining we could share the same fate. To me it means that no matter how strong we are we all are just made up of bones. Just like the dinosaurs were large strong beasts, they too were just flesh atop of skeletons and they perished, just like we as humans might, despite our physical prowess.

The last paragraph of the short story talks about the human’s extinction. The narrator says “And I knew our remains were meant to keep like secrets under earth. And I knew one day we would topple like monuments, stirring up clouds of dust. And I almost heard the dirge of our perishing, thud after thud after thud, our last titanic exhalations loud and labored and low.” To me when the narrator mentions that we were meant to be like secrets under the earth, it means that our bones will be kept under the earth until they are excavated like the dinosaur’s fossils. The narrator also says we are going to topple like monuments one day. To me this means that just like the largest and tallest creature, the Brachiosaurus, humans too will fall and our great skyscrapers will crumple to the ground returning to dust after our extinction.  In the last sentence the narrator talks about our last breathes as humans become extinct and fade into past.

4th Blog Response

Goldberg Writing Down the Bones

The Samurai

            I enjoyed reading “The Samurai” even though I don’t enjoy poems. “The Samurai” is a short story that deals with writing poetry. The narrator talks about releasing the inner Samurai part of their writing selves. The narrator says “So when you’re in the Samurai space, you have to be tough. Not mean, but with the toughness of truth. And the truth is that the truth can never ultimately hurt. It makes the world clearer and the poems much more brilliant.” This to me means that the inner samurai is meant to convey honesty when reviewing the works of others. That it may be hard to be honest when reviewing peoples work. It means don’t be mean but be truthful don’t sugar coat anything if you see a problem with the work express your concerns and help the writer better their work.

The narrator also talks about how you should write the way you want to write because that is where true passionate writing emanates.  The narrator says “They just mean we woke up, like on a Sunday morning after a late party Saturday night where we drank too much. Our eyes are open but we’re not very alert. It’s good to know where our writing is alive, awake, but it’s when our writing is burning through to brilliance that it finally becomes a poem or prose piece.”. These sentence to me, means that when we write about topics that don’t interest us we are not truly writing. When we write about our interests that’s when our writing has passion and becomes a true work of fiction. In the last paragraph of the story the narrator says “There’s enough bad writing in the world. Write one good line, you’ll be famous. Write a lot of lukewarm pieces, you’ll put people to sleep.  This means that you should follow your passion as a writer and not to write about what other people want you too because there are plenty of people doing that, but to follow your own writing dreams.

 

I Don’t Want to Die

            I also liked “I Don’t Want to Die” which is an interesting short story. The story talks about finding peace in writing and in our everyday lives. The story says that if we do not find peace when writing we will burn out from using up all of our energy and vitality.  When the narrator talks about the death of the Zen master Suzuki Roshi he says “Right before Suzuki Roshi’s death, Katagiri Roshi, an old friend, visited him. Katagiri stood by the bedside; Suzuki looked up and said, “I don’t want to die.” That simple. He was who he was and said plainly what he felt in that moment.” We must also do the same when it comes to our writing. We must plainly express what we feel through the words we write down on paper. That no matter where we might be we must accept who we are and not try and change it but express who we are through our writing.