Giovanni’s Room
Giovanni’s Room Blog 2
by, Matt Berrian Within most narratives based upon the nineteenth century novel structure, the “hero” or protagonist will almost certainly encounter a vision that embodies their most horrible nightmares. The sort of nightmarish specter that they encounter depends upon the generic conventions that the text is operating within — it may be a magical…
Giovanni’s Room Blog 4
Schroedinger’s Giovanni In his article ‘A rhetoric of reading’, James Seitz makes the claim that “a good piece of writing must anticipate its reading” (143). To elaborate on this, he analyzes an excerpt from ‘A most Parisian incident’ (1890) which effectively dupes the reader into believing that two romantic partners are having illicit affairs with…
Giovanni’s Room Blog 3
I can’t stop thinking about The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway. While thinking of material to mine for this blog post, I became fixated on the idea that Hemingway’s novel could be a codex of sorts with the power to decrypt the many themes, contradictions, and whispered questions that live within James Baldwin’s Giovanni’s…
Giovanni’s Room Blog 1
Reading for Mimesis and Theme By Matthew Berrian Posted by Scott MacLean Giovanni’s Room, by James Baldwin, is a book that never left my mind. The last time I read this book was in 2015, a time in my life where I existed as a wholly different person than who I see myself as today.…
The Alchemist
Diving into the Unknown: The Alchemist’s Twist on the Hero’s Journey
By Daria Husni When I first started reading the Alchemist, something felt familiar to me. It wasn’t until I was halfway through that I realized what it was; the Alchemist is very reminiscent of the epics of Greek mythology. As someone who devoured Greek mythology as a child, I recognized so many of the story…
The Alchemist Annotated Bibliography
Embarking on the Quest Introduction Years ago, I received The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho as a gift from my thoughtful sister. She understood that reading had become an integral part of my identity, and that I loved nothing more than discovering the themes within a text. Sadly, the book remained on my shelf for years…
What kind of Reader Was I Supposed to be?
As I read through “A Rhetoric of Reading,” by James Seitz, I found that I was asking myself a central question: was I being a submissive reader? Or was I rebelling against what Paulo Coelho was trying to relay to me as a reader through his novel, The Alchemist? I thought back to the plot,…
The Symbols and Messages of Santiago’s Journey
By: Paige McTernan I first became aware of The Alchemist when I found the title on a summer reading list during my senior year of high school. I had never experienced the book up until now, but what I have experienced in this story of Personal Legends is indeed a miraculous one. I had mostly…
The Majesties
Annotated Bibliography: The Majesties by Tiffany Tsao
By Daria Husni Introduction: My “Reading For” What defines me as a reader? For years, my answer has only been surface-deep: I read as a form of escapism. I enjoy the fantasy genre most of all, but I like being able to experience a world I could never see on my own, and live a…
Finding the Truth in The Majesties’ Narrative
By Daria Husni Is it worth betraying your family to protect your humanity? Or vice versa, is protecting and supporting your family the most important thing in life, even if it means tearing away at the social fabric that allows our world to function? As I started to read The Majesties by Tiffany Tsao, a…
The Cultural Code in Tiffany Tsao’s, The Majesties
Upon reading The Majesties, written by Tiffany Tsao, I was immediately drawn to the numerous cultural codes littering the plot. Because the story involves many ideals surrounding close knit families in Japan post World War II, absurd wealth, privilege, and upper class ideals, it was easy to discern these specific elements, which are aspects of…
A Closer Look at Majesties: Reading Into Genre
By: Paige McTernan Majesties by Tiffany Tsao is a story chock-full of twists, turns, and shocking moments of truth. It creates not characters one would love, but instead characters one would hate or take pity on. The final chapter and closing scene definitely threw me off in a way I was not expecting! There was…
Wrong Mr. Darcy
The Wrong Mr. Darcy: My Role as the Authorial Audience
I was in a unique position while reading this book, because I am a huge fan of Pride and Prejudice. Jane Austen is a beloved author in my family, the 1995 Pride and Prejudice miniseries is regular viewing material, and it’s not uncommon to hear quotes from Austen’s works tossed around in everyday conversation. The…
Annotated Bibliography: The Wrong Mr. Darcy
Hara tells her dad (who is in prison) that she will interview a famous basketball player (+) Hara’s mother presses her to find a husband (-) The flight to Boston and limo ride from airport is unpleasant (-) Hara sees Derek Darcy for the first time (+) …and then embarasses herself in front of him…
A Look Inside The Wrong Mr. Darcy
When I stumbled upon The Wrong Mr. Darcy on Goodreads, I was fully prepared to read Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice all over again, but this time in a modern, 21st century setting. My taste in novels doesn’t stray very far from romance and fiction, however I did hope that there was going to be…
Unlocking the Codes in the Wrong Mr. Darcy
The Key When I began reading The Wrong Mr. Darcy by Evelyn Lozada, I knew my goals were to discover the symbolic and cultural codes, define the systems of oppositions that make up the text, and come to understand the networks of controlling values. One of the keys to unlocking the secrets of this text…
The House House in the Cerulean Sea
Prejudice in The House in the Cerulean Sea: How Fiction Mirrors Reality
By Daria Husni In The House in the Cerulean Sea, T.J. Klune weaves the story of a social worker, Linus Baker, who oversees the care of orphaned magical children. Through a special assignment from his organization, DICOMY, Linus comes face to face with his own prejudice, and begins to question his loyalties towards DICOMY and…
Annotated Bibliography: The House in the Cerulean Sea
Map of the plot of The House in the Cerulean Sea: Here is a map of important plot points in the book, The House in the Cerulean Sea. I have mapped them by their positive and negative charges in regard to the plot and themes of the book. Linus’s supervisor approaches Linus, gives him demerits,…
Understanding Rhetoric: How Submitting to this Story is Beneficial
When I first read The House in the Cerulean Sea, I was immersed in Linus’s life as a case worker for magical youth. Though he leads a dull life, any reader could tell that he cared about the children in the orphanages and made sure they were properly taken care of. His gray, gloomy world…
A Tale of Love and Finding Who One is Meant to be
The House in the Cerulean Sea, written by TJ Klune, is a book I thoroughly enjoyed. I was executing a light read, with themes of conquering fear and love being the answer, and was met with these and satisfied, but I was also given so much more. I absolutely adored the characters and how different…
All You Read is Love 