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BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker
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Subject: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Sorcha Date: 25 Apr 03 - 06:48 PM Who knows well and loves the Bram novel Dracula? Kate has to write a paper, due Tuesday, about the relationships between characters in the novel and the latest corporate collapses, ie, Enron, Qwest, etc. Stuff like: Establish parallels between key players in corp. scandal and important characters in Dracula. Examine motives/roles of both corp. execs and characters in Dracula Conclude if Dracula is really dead at the end of the novel and make it consistent with your economic interpretation of the novel. HEEEEELLLLLPPPP! I have not read the book and she is a slow reader, only on page 203 of some 400. Somebody please, please help. I have no clue where to start to help her and she has no clues either. This is for her College English Lit class. Thanks! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: wysiwyg Date: 25 Apr 03 - 06:50 PM RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker.... yeah, that f***er is rough trade! Call the damn bouncer! ~Susan |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Sorcha Date: 25 Apr 03 - 06:57 PM Oh, thanks! That helps! (LOL) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Amos Date: 25 Apr 03 - 07:16 PM Sorch: I understand Jen reads it every years on Halloween, so she probably knows it better than most. A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: kendall Date: 25 Apr 03 - 07:19 PM Never cared for that story, in fact, it sucked. Well, Drac did. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Amos Date: 25 Apr 03 - 07:33 PM Not your favorite vein of drama, Skipper? A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Sorcha Date: 25 Apr 03 - 07:41 PM I can't e mail Jen and she seldom checks in here. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Gareth Date: 25 Apr 03 - 08:00 PM Sorry, Sorcha, this may be politically incorrect - Count D arrives at Whitby Steps, seduces fair maid, disappears back to Transilvania in cargo container ex London Docks. Fair maid's fiance has dreams, travells to T' to assist. Accepts unwittingly Count D's hospitallity. Big fight, chase, rechase, all live happily ever after, well apart from exreamly large "hickys on neck". Correct version, Count D terrorises county, imperialist venture to USA. Leaves USA with conivence of Customs an Exercise (audited by Arthur A) Fiance seeks girl. travells with assistance of CIA to Tran's'. Bribary gets customs clearence, travells to Cast;e D, infiltrates Castle, fight, encourages locals to uprise, Count D staked out. Enron, for a suitable bribe, provide permenant daytlight. Count D ends up in Coffin in Gutamno Bay - GWB2 says we caputured Benladin (Ooops Count D) Count D offers massive contribution to GWB2's election fund. Count D appointed Prime Minister of Trans' Enron and Arthur A get the contracts. Fair maid becomes Count D's concubine. Hero terminated with exteam prejudice by "friendly fire" Sorry best I can do after a few pints. Gareth |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: catspaw49 Date: 25 Apr 03 - 08:04 PM Just remember what the vampire said to the schoolteacher........."See you next period!" Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 25 Apr 03 - 08:05 PM All sounds a rather daft idea. Some teacher showing off in a rather contemptuous way, I'd say. However I imagine a paper saying that probably wouldn't go down too well. I suppose one notion to play with would be that the companies involved were walking dead by the time the public became aware of it. And the condition was transmitted from company to company. The process by which that came to light would have an analogy with Van Helsing's pursuit of the vampires, and once the truth came to light they collapsed.And vampires crumble once they are exposed to the light of day. But it'd be a lot easier with the cartoon Dracula of the movies than with the more complicated narrative of the book. (That might be a line worth pursuing in the paper.) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 25 Apr 03 - 08:13 PM And there is no question but that Dracula is thoroughly dead and de-vampirised by the end of the book: It was like a miracle, but before our very eyes, and almost in the drawing of a breath, the whole body crumbled into dust and passed from our sight. I shall be glad as long as I live that even in that moment of final dissolution, there was in the face a look of peace, such as I never could have imagined might have rested there. I can't imagine a valid parallel to this with the companies involved, or any suggestion that, through being revealed as corrupt, and so destroyed, their souls have been saved! They seem much molre like the kind of vampires in the movies, who manage to survive and come back time after time, as thirsty for blood as ever. Here is an online text of the book - which means it's easy to search for key words and so forth, and lift chunks of text to pad out the paper. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: RangerSteve Date: 25 Apr 03 - 08:13 PM Confirms what I've thought for years, English teachers can be out of their minds. Dracula is meant to be read for entertainment. This reminds me of my 12th grade English class, where we read The Great Gatsby, analyzed it to death, then MacBeth, compared it to the Great Gatsby, followed by Death of a Salesman, compared it to MacB and the Great G. On to Hamlet, compared to Mac B, D of a S., and the Grt G. Romeo and Juliet, compared to ..... ending with the GG, Hard Times by C. Dickens compared to....again with the GG. Oliver Twist, Fahrenheit 451, all ultimately compared to the Great Gatsby. I think he had a fetish. Comparing Ft451 to the Great G, in my mind, is like comparing harmonicas to Chryslers. I've never met anyone who saw the connection. The only good thing that came of all this was that whenever the teacher gave us a book, I new what the final homework assignment was, although mostly what I learned was how to write reams of BS. Oh, yeah, I just remembered, Gullivers Travels compared to all the rest ending with the Great Gatsby. I graduated highschool in 1968 and still haven't forgotten the horrors of that class. Tell her to write a bunch of hooey and use big words. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Amos Date: 25 Apr 03 - 08:32 PM Well -- you could tell her to write her actual thoughts, and use correct words. Maybe she doesn't have the same teacher you did! A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Sorcha Date: 25 Apr 03 - 09:53 PM Thanks for the validations of my thoughts....will pass along your ideas to her......but still, bloody paper is due Tues. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Bat Goddess Date: 25 Apr 03 - 10:16 PM I think Ranger Steve's got the right idea. Sounds like a real bullshit assignment to me. Tom asks if it was assigned on April 1st . . . Read the novel years ago and more Bram Stoker as well. None of the movies are at all accurate to the book. But what it has to do with economics or corporate collapse, I haven't a clue -- and probably neither did Bram Stoker. Sorry I can't be more helpful. Linn |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: NicoleC Date: 25 Apr 03 - 10:23 PM Isn't there a Cliff Notes version? If she can't finish the thing in time to write her paper, it could tell her the important bits -- or even the important bits to read. Skipping around Dracula would be a hard row to hoe, though. Everything's connected; it'd be hard to keep track. Shallow comparison to Enron. etc. -- the money-sucking vampires eventually get killed when their fodder rises up and drives a stake through their corporate hearts. Ultimately, the corporation's greatest power is the fear of investors and employees. She could even veer off on a tangent about how corporations only have the power granted them by the people (of the state), and like the characters of Dracula, the people can rise up and remove parasitic corporations. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,.gargoyle Date: 25 Apr 03 - 10:31 PM It is HARD to imagine a daughter IN A UNIVERSITY who still uses her mother to "bail-her-out" of undisciplined habits.
The best lesson you can teach this child is the discipline of the Wyoming winter wilderness. You prepare - or you die.
A failure in a non-critical "event" which she can repeat is better than failure throughout her life. Sincerely,
It is hard to "let-go" ...but you can never expect her to fly on her own....until she feels the hard-knock of the ground....and if she doesn't make it....perhaps, she was a rodent and not the bird you believed...like begets ...like. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,Q Date: 25 Apr 03 - 10:34 PM My condolences. I can't see the relationships. I think that professor needs a stake driven through his/her heart. Don't pay any attention to Gareth, I think he saw a third-rate movie (I saw it on TV as well) that had little to do with the original novel. Or maybe that is where this teacher got the idea and Gareth is on the right track. Some literature instructors are OK. After reading and analyzing about a dozen novels, the final exam question was: "Select one book. In one page tell what it means to me, to me!" After floundering thoughts about the "great novels" and more than half the time gone, I selected one that hadn't received much attention, a tale by Conrad. His story was the only one that had made a lasting impression on me. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: NicoleC Date: 25 Apr 03 - 10:36 PM Got another one -- While Dracula and the AIDS epidemic are a far better comparison (death, blood, infection), comparing vampirism to the catagious infection of modern corporate corruption would at least strike somewhere near Stoker's parallels. In Europe in Stokers time, vampires were not only undead bloodsuckers, but widely considered to be carriers of infectious disease like TB, Syphilis, etc. I.E., in order to compete with corporations that use dirty tactics, more corporations use the same misleading tactics, and we get the epidemic we've seen recently of diseased corporations unearthed in their accounting coffins. (Okay, that's going a bit far.) If you want a movie version that captures the spirit of Dracula, try "Nosferatu" (the original, 1922 silent film, not the 1979 German remake.) Often labelled, "Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horrors" |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,.gargoyle Date: 25 Apr 03 - 10:45 PM Personally,
Being a daily reader of the news (less than 5% of the population READ the news daily)...and a devote follower of Stoker's DRACULA (read first in 9th grade - checked out from a reluctant librarian)there are POWERFUL metaphorical parallels.
Your child has a brillant teacher. Sorry your child is not yet worthy.
Sincerely,
A "hint" a family friend, Tom Holland (writer/producer/director) when interviewed regarding "Fright Night" explained that "all vampire stories are tales of seduction." There is your thesis statement - spin the alagorious analogies from there....
Ahhh...I forgot she hasn't finished the book and she doesn't read the news, besides history is boring and if it isn't repetitious plebian prose of c-nt, f-ck, s-ck, wh-re, b-tch, there is NOTHING seductive about it. Education - wasted on the young!!! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Sorcha Date: 25 Apr 03 - 11:27 PM LOL, Greg. No, she is still in High School, but taking College English, but thanks for the tip.Love ya,dear! Nicole, Great help! Thanks! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: katlaughing Date: 25 Apr 03 - 11:57 PM Well he's got one thing right, IMO, they are all tales of seduction. Oh! And, who would've thought? She's got to keep reading, Sorcha, even if it is the cliffnotes, or at least scan the online version. I would go with the seduction thing, though I think the teacher is spoiling the enjoyment of a good story by such a stupid assignment. Enron/Dracula seduce with promises of immortality, a kind of wealth/riches, have their way, leave the stricken in their wake while the valiant bring to light the evil and triumph ONLY in the novel, not in the Enron debacle; here is where the teacher is full of it...Dracula was undoubtedly done in at the end, while the corps(es) are still at it in some fashion. Oh that it was as easy as driving a stake through their hearts and returning investors their monies! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,.gargoyle Date: 26 Apr 03 - 01:59 AM Oh, Bram, Tom and I throw our pearls before swine....what fools these mortals be. You ain't caught the cigar.
Sincerely, |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: katlaughing Date: 26 Apr 03 - 02:34 AM HeyaSorcha, Mudcat's got its own Resident Pop-Up! Got the new version of Pop-Up Killer?! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Hollowfox Date: 26 Apr 03 - 09:52 AM *sigh* As much as I hate to recommend this...have her go to the library and look up Dracula in Masterplots. It will give a synopsis of the action in a few pages. Then she can check out a copy of Annotated Dracula, which can give commentary and insights in columns parallel to the text. She has my sympathy for this paper. Perhaps the teacher made some comments in the class that she could use as a hint/jumping off point? Good luck to her. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Nigel Parsons Date: 26 Apr 03 - 10:44 AM Taking a view from one of the characters in 'Dracula', Zander Nyrond (A 'Filker') came up with the following: MINA'S SONG It is turn-of-the-century London. In a few short years the world will change beyond recognition; but to the five people in this fashionable drawing room, the status quo seems eternal, unalterable. The four men are relaxing after a hard day pursuing their respective careers; one stamping out the aberrations of madness; one preserving the rule of law; one defending the privileges of the aristocracy in the House of Lords: one carefully inculcating old knowledge in young minds, lest they stray into freethinking and error. They look with proprietary fondness on the woman as she moves among them, marking with satisfaction her composed, submissive demeanour. Her husband may compare her favourably with three women he once met in a castle, who, though enslaved, dared to defy their master, and thus doubtless merited their deaths. The noble lord may think for a moment of his sweet, gentle bride-to-be who came to her own doom by abandoning the protection of the divine order. "Sing for us something, Madam Mina," van Helsing says, a kindly suggestion with the force of a command. It is the only sort of communication she receives now from these men who own her. She sits dutifully at the pianoforte, looking from one blandly smiling face to another, wondering whether she will dare, this time, to put aside the familiar Schubert and Chopin and play the song that uncoils dangerously in her heart. They tell me...I am all right now They tell me I can go out in the sun. They tell me the mark is gone from my brow They tell me the battle is won So why do I feel betrayed and alone When I lie with my husband at night? Why am I no longer happy Just being all right? They tell me I am all right now They tell me I have beaten the curse They tell me that I was enslaved to the Devil In danger of death, or far worse So why do I long for the keenness of senses Made dull by the sun's cruel light? Why can I not be content To be merely all right? Two old foreign men have fought to the death Over me, and the older man lost And now I am saved, and with every breath I count the unbearable cost For a moment I've seen what my life could have been But I'll never know freedom again Just a nightmare unending of wise, condescending, Complacent, contemptible MEN... They tell me that he was a demon They tell me he killed men for play But I saw the sadness and pain in his eyes That only true death washed away That other man talked about souls now at peace But he only lived for the fight And now there is nothing to be Except simply all right. I could have been ageless, immortal, and fair, And joined my dark prince in his flight But now he is dead, and I... I am simply all right. Condemned to a short, bitter lifetime Of being all right. (picked up Here ) Nigel |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Amos Date: 26 Apr 03 - 10:50 AM Wow! I love it! A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: katlaughing Date: 26 Apr 03 - 11:30 AM Outstanding!! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: SINSULL Date: 26 Apr 03 - 11:35 AM And does poor Renfried represent Mr & Mrs America, trying to get rich on the coattails oftheir more knowledgeable and corrupt betters? This takes me back to Graduate School when one desperately unhip over the hill hippie wannabe professor had us analyze the Beatles Sgt. Pepper for days. It was a Latin Poetry class! garg has it right. Seduction is the theme. Who is seduced by whom and with what? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: NicoleC Date: 26 Apr 03 - 02:11 PM I'd say the teacher was doing a fine job of prepping kids for college writing; these kids of far-fetched comparison/contrast papers are ubiquitous in college -- but they do wonders for abstract thinking skills. Sorch, she's gotta learn to read faster. She'll get hammered in college if she can't; my freshman year I had to plow through at least 1000 pages a week of reading and churn out about 30 pages of writing. I saw a lot of really smart kids being miserable and sleepless with mediocre grades because they couldn't keep up. You might try to find a speed reading course. It'll teach her to make the jump from reading individual words to reading phrases and blocks of words. It'll give her more time to party when she does get to college :) Personally, I wouldn't make seduction the sole thesis unless it's a very short paper. It'll be hard to find much to say on the subject that isn't blatantly obvious... it has no nuances -- one is seduced or one is not, and why. One COULD stretch it out over several pages, but {*snore*}. I think it's a good concept to use in backing up another theory -- it'd be great for a paragraph or two. JMHO. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,Q Date: 26 Apr 03 - 03:32 PM To me, the story of Enron and its executives as well as the investors who helped to built up the prices, was one of unprincipled greed. You could call greed the great seducer, but I hate seeing Bram Stoker's great tale parlayed into an exercise that will destroy the story forever in the minds of the reader. Bubbles based on greed go back to tulipmania in Holland and similar frenzies. I prefer to keep my sex and seduction simon-pure! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Peg Date: 26 Apr 03 - 04:00 PM PLEASE don't suggest using Cliff Notes or Masterplots! Yes, you'll get the plot that way. But you don't get the STORY, because you get no sense of the writer's style. Literature is not about plots; it's about storytelling. As a teacher of college writing and literature, may I state for the record I think it's far better for a student to read half the orginal novel than a Cliff Notes version. This is simply pointless. The original assignment seems a bit daft to me, unless one considers corporate greed to be akin to "bloodsucking" or "draining the life" our of people or our economy...also, there is the question of versions of morality. The Crew of Light thinks they are fighting some great evil with their stakes and garlic. But Dracula gives pleasure and a form of immortality to his victims... There are some interesting books and articles out there having to do with "psychic vampirism"--psychic vampires being peope who can drain the energy of others. Many of them aren't aware they're doing it. Think about the people you know; is there anyone in your circle of friends/acquaintances who literally leaves you feeling drained, depressed or exhausted? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: SINSULL Date: 26 Apr 03 - 04:16 PM Guess I won't mention that there are more than a few movie versions that stick to the original. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST Date: 26 Apr 03 - 04:24 PM I *am* a college English teacher, and I'd like someone to tell me, at last, just why Stoker's Dracula is *really* about "seduction" rather than *really* about the existence of motivated human evil, its ability to thrive on and destroy the innocent, and the grim task of heroically opposing it ? (In more general terms, fighting the vampires.) Furthermore, the purpose of reading literature, it seems to me, is to *experience the reading of it* and in some meaningful way bring it into your life - and not to use shortcuts, bailouts, etc., mainly for the purpose of providing oh-so-ingenious "answers" to tendentious assignment questions. Hmmm, guess I'll remain anonymous for the present. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Pushkin Date: 26 Apr 03 - 06:14 PM There are similarities between Count D and corporate state or corporations. D drinks the blood of society to survive and in a metaphorical way corporate state or corporations also do this, ie drink the life force of society. Both can be classed as parasites depending upon one's viewpoint. If one takes the classical view of communism then the capitalist state, eg corporations, are blood sucking vampires ergo Count Dracula. Yes Dracula is dead at the end of the novel but if you wish to take the Hollywood view he can be resurrected, as can corporations, particularly with slippery lawyers:-) As for a direct comparison between the characters of the novel and those involved in corporate collapses, that I can't say as I'm not too familiar with any recent collapses other than the Guinness scandal a few years ago. The only comparison I can make is that of Renfrew (not sure of spelling!, (Dracula's mad admirer!), and those that work for corporations - They are all slavishly obedient and lack humanity. Once you fall under Dracula's spell you become his willing slave. The same can be said for those climbing the corporate ladder. This comes from the Orc and not me and I deny all responsibility and all the usual clauses etc etc etc. I shall start singing 'Shall we dance' in a minute..... Pushkin (dictated by Orc) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 26 Apr 03 - 06:37 PM Easy enough to fake ths kind of stuff using the cinema versions. A lot harder with the books. It's a game, so it it should be approached as a game. A pretty silly game, so cheating is in order. Actually Bram Stoker's book is riddled with racism directed at gypsies. As well that this seems to have been dropped, in the translation to the big screen. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Cluin Date: 26 Apr 03 - 07:02 PM Sounds like another English Lit. teacher coming up with some daft thesis and forcing their students to develop their Bullshit Quotient another notch, thereby ruining the enjoyment of another book for all involved. I guess that doesn't help with the assignment though, does it? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Mudlark Date: 26 Apr 03 - 07:05 PM Nigel...thanks for that...the lead in and Mena's Song are both mindblowers...hadn't expected to find something so fetching in this thread... Sorcha...if she's really up against it, and can't come up with anything she might courageously take a different tack...one that makes sense to her...lead in with a couple of BS paragraphs about the original precis, then go on with her own. She will get something out of writing it, that way, whatever the grade. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Gareth Date: 26 Apr 03 - 07:16 PM Actually "Q" it was the 'Comic Book' version, but hey, whatthe hell, I think Cliun may have a valid point. Gareth |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 26 Apr 03 - 07:35 PM A story such as Dracula can be used as a source for a kind of myth - and that is what has happened to it in all its translations and adaptations. The myth being about a conspiracy of powerful and evil people intent on seizing and holding power, and very hard to defeat, and only to be defeated by a kind of ruthless fanaticism. A very scary and rather dangerous myth actually, which can be applied in all kinds of contexts - anti-semitic contexts, anti-red contexts, anti-capitalist contexts... Of course it's possible to apply it so that Enron's executives were the vampires. Or perhaps Bin Laden. Or for that matter you could have an Al Qaida version in which they were the vampire hunters. The thing is, in no sense is Bram Stoker's story about any of those things. That's pretty obvious about the things that happened long after the book was written, but it's equally true about things that predated it. To use a distinction that Tolkien made in respect of the Lord of the Rings, it isn't an allegory of things that happen in the real world, it an example of a story which is applicable to such things. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,Q Date: 26 Apr 03 - 08:10 PM Racism directed against gipsies? Most non-gipsies hated gipsies in Bram Stoker's time. The social beliefs of the time must be considered when reading older literature (1897). The racism was reinforced by the teaching of the time. This from the Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Ed., 1911. ""Less than fifty years from the time that they emerge out of Hungary, or even from the date of the Charter of the Emperor Sigismund, they found themselves exposed to the fury and the prejudices of the people whose good faith they had abused, whose purses they had lightened, whose barns they had emptied, and on whose credulity they had lived with ease and comfort. Their inborn tendency to roaming made them the terror of the peasantry and the despair of every legislator who tried to settle them on the land. Their foreign appearance, their unknown tongue and their unscrupulous habits forced the legislators of many countries to class them with rogues and vagabonds, to declare them outlaws and felons and to treat them with extreme severity." Later on in the essay, in comments on assimilated gipsies, it is stated that they "retain some of the prominent features of their character, such as the love of inordinate display and gorgeous dress; and their moral defects not only remain for a long time as glaring as among those who live the life of vagrants but even become more pronounced." The essayist in Chamber's Enc. of 1890 takes a more tolerant view: "The better sort are quick-witted, courteous, likable, trustworthy---." Later is the statement that "their vices are ascribable to centuries of opression." A much more liberal view. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: curmudgeon Date: 26 Apr 03 - 09:00 PM This assignment is patently absurd. However, since the paper must be written, begin with Pushkin/Orc's thesis; it's better than none and not all that farfetched. Also consider Jonathan Harker (Arthur Anderson) sent to Dracula to pursuade him to part with a substantial sum to gain the "protection" afforded by his purchase of Carfax Abbey. And don't forget Van Helsing, a Harker "insider" who "blew the whistle" on the count. This is all really gobbledegook, but if written up convincingly should make for a passing grade at the least. BTW, the toady's name is RENFIELD. I've seen all of the "reputable" Dracula films. many of which were not, and the closest to the book is "The Horror of Dracula" Hammer Films. Good Evening -- Tom |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,Q Date: 26 Apr 03 - 10:13 PM Dracula on line: Dracula Hate to read books on line- much prefer to have the book in hand. But for those with the computer disease, there it is. May have been posted before, but too much to read through now. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,Q Date: 26 Apr 03 - 10:48 PM Much more suitable for the assignment would have been "The Monster Men," by Edgar Rice Burroughs: The Monster Men Gad! Some of the Tarzan books on line here as well. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Amos Date: 26 Apr 03 - 11:15 PM This assigment is genuinely idiotic, Sorcha, if you don't mind my saying so., How dare he enforce such an off-the-wall, dis-located interpretation on an inexperienced college student? He's just dumping his agenda on them and disguising it as a learning experience!! "My view of the world is deep, profound, and right. Discuss..." Ridiculous, and in my opinion a serious betrayal of trust and a lapse from his charter. Dracula -- the novel -- has nothing to do with corporations, for Christ's sake. It's just ridickle-dockle!! If he wants to flaunt a left-wing agenda, he should stick to Sinclair Lewis. A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,Q Date: 26 Apr 03 - 11:44 PM Working on my Master's, someone in Admin. noted that there was no Civics course credited from High School! By regulation, everyone had to have had the course, or must take it in university. A number of us from other states were caught up. The instructor was a young, very left-wing twit. He loved assigning essays. We went to work producing stuff an old Commie of the 30s would have enjoyed. The fellow seated next to me was the son of a Republican National Committeeman (exact position forgotten). We passed the course with A's. When trash is required, writing to the teacher's bias is at least 75% of the grade mark. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: catspaw49 Date: 27 Apr 03 - 12:30 AM Ya' know Sorch, ever since this thread started I've been thinking about it and I haven't changed my mind a bit. This is about as stupid a fuckin' assignment that I've ever heard. Tell the Prof or whatever that you think (as I do) that the biggest scandal in the country is the belief that the American Educational System is worth a shit. BTW, it qualifies as a corporation on several levels. Suggest that like Dracula, it sucks the blood of it's victims (under educated taxpayers) and benefits only itself in return without passing on anything good and much that is bad to the victim. Many of these victims go on to become a part of the corporation themselves (vampires=teachers,admins,etc,) and the worst of these need a stake through the heart for inflicting themselves on helpless others coming along the way. Turn that in accompanied by a sharpened stake and a mallet with a note attached that says, "You know what to do....I can help" In the meantime, have Kate finish the book which is a wonderful work and should be read for enjoyment. I hate symbolism and even more, I hate the people who MUST make a symbol out of everything!!! Reminds me of a panel discussing James Dickey's book, "Deliverance." Several folks had analyzed/symbolized it to death and when James Dickey took the podium, he thanked them all and said he had no idea that his book was about those things and he thought he should read it again himself! Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Amos Date: 27 Apr 03 - 01:10 AM If I were teaching this course and someone tuirned in Spaw's note and mallet and stake, I think I'd have to give him an A for creativity, even if I had to give him a C- for following directions badly. But, we have plenty of people who can follow directions, and not enough who can genuinely be creative. I dare ya!! A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,Al Date: 27 Apr 03 - 02:48 AM This was my favorite book in high school, and I read it several times. I must admit, it was a little long in the tooth. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: katlaughing Date: 27 Apr 03 - 02:51 PM If someone turns in the WEDs (Weapons of Educator Destruction) as Spaw suggests, get ready for a school lock-down and a government Spaw, I hate it when someone has to analyse and look for symbolism in a good yarn, too. I went to see The Doors with a friend I'd never been to a movie with before. She drove me nuts analysing and *reminiscing* throughout the entire show. I never went to another movie with her. Why can't something just be a good story/movie/book, etc? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,Q Date: 27 Apr 03 - 03:32 PM Negro sayings collected by Joel Chandler Harris, before 1880: Ha'nts don't bodder longer hones' folks, but you better go 'round de grave-yard. De howlin' dog know w'at he sees. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: SINSULL Date: 27 Apr 03 - 04:08 PM Have to admit, Sorcha...I read this one when I was about nine. Probably because neither my Mom nor my teacher would have approved. How do you get as far as high school without reading Dracula? Or Jane Eyre? Or Wuthering Heights? Or Frankenstein? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Sorcha Date: 27 Apr 03 - 07:45 PM I don't know, SINSULL. Just never got around to it, I guess. Busy reading Hemmingway, Faulker, Shute, Fitzgerald in 9th grade. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Cluin Date: 28 Apr 03 - 01:58 AM Well I was reading Tolstoy and Joyce in Kindergarten. nyahh nyah! ;b |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Gloredhel Date: 28 Apr 03 - 02:49 AM Wow. Very glad I had a sensible English teacher when I read Dracula in school. I was assigned papers like, "Find the mistakes in Stoker's representation of Catholicism." (Catholic school.) Anyway, yah, Orc's dictations to Pushkin would be a good place to start. Corporations sucking the life out of good people like vampires sucking the life out of Lucy and Mina. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 28 Apr 03 - 05:30 AM But you could probably just as easily supply it the other way round, with all those nasty liberals sucking the blood out of those lovely corporations. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 28 Apr 03 - 06:21 AM But you could probably just as easily apply it the other way round, with all those nasty liberals sucking the blood out of those lovely corporations. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: fiddler Date: 28 Apr 03 - 09:13 AM Thumping good thread. I'm with the wicked end evil preying on the innocent and trying to be goods! Direct comparison. This is where it goeas wrong because the Tax mana nd the public accountants do not equate well to the good folk exposing the vampires at a later date although the suspicion by the local communities and stuff really realtes! good lucj and will you publich the essay - scan it and mail it to me if needed and I'll do it. I'd love to read it and I think so would some others. I have a site I cna publish it on. A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Nigel Parsons Date: 28 Apr 03 - 05:57 PM My earlier post of 'Mina's Song' by Zander Nyrond was purely an act of propaganda for 'Filk' (a meeting of Folk and science fiction [among other things]). As it was well received, when I went bowling tonight, I played Zander's tape "Wassaliens" en-route to listen again to this version of the Dracula story. It is a moving version, and causes a serious re-think on the question of Van Helsing's justification. If I had the capability I would be tempted to either post the tune, or post a recording of the song. But such is beyond me. Nigel |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: SINSULL Date: 28 Apr 03 - 06:22 PM Interesting thought, Nigel. Should any species be eradicated, even Enron executives. Could put an interesting ecological spin on the it. Good on her, Sorch. I still cannot abide Hemingway...or any of his stage relatives. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Nigel Parsons Date: 28 Apr 03 - 07:15 PM For an interesting view of vampires as a life form, I can recommend Brian Stableford's "The Empire Of Fear". It is a rather long book, but worth working through. Nigel |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: katlaughing Date: 28 Apr 03 - 07:23 PM You amd me both, Sins. I never could get through his stuff! Sorcha, I hope you've kept your foot down and are not taking on anymore. You know what I'm talking about, darlin'...:-) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Amos Date: 28 Apr 03 - 07:31 PM So, Sorch, when are we going to learn the outcome? A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Sorcha Date: 28 Apr 03 - 07:44 PM She is writing the paper tonight and in the morning.......a Big Time Procrastinator. Will let you know........... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,Q Date: 28 Apr 03 - 08:37 PM After all this- let us know the outcome and the teacher's comments. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 29 Apr 03 - 06:47 AM It'd be interesting to hear the teacher's rationale for this rather bizarre assignment. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Hollowfox Date: 29 Apr 03 - 10:53 AM Yeah, I'm curious too. BTW, I see that my Infernal Machine didn't send one of my postings through. Peg, I agree with you on Cliff Notes, Masterplots, and their ilk. The only reason I mentioned it in the above thread was because of the time constraint. Your wicked, wicked librarian, Mary |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Sorcha Date: 29 Apr 03 - 02:15 PM Well, the paper is written and sent to fiddler for him to put on his website. Fiddler, let me know when it's up and post a link to it. Thanks! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: fiddler Date: 29 Apr 03 - 03:22 PM The work |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Sorcha Date: 29 Apr 03 - 03:42 PM Thanks, fiddler! Considering that she didn't have a clue until yesterday evening after work, I think she did a pretty good job. I think her style could be a bit more formal, but it's not my paper! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Amos Date: 29 Apr 03 - 03:50 PM Not half bad, Sorcha!! The whole thesis is kind of unreal, but she certainly answered the mail, shows she can think and put what she thinks down on paper. I'd say give the lass a hug for pulling it out of the fire, so to speak; I hope the teacher appreciates what a huge mental contortion he was asking for!! :> ) A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: stevetheORC Date: 29 Apr 03 - 04:22 PM Well done Kate a rather good interpretation hope the daft sod who set it appreciated it. De Orc |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 29 Apr 03 - 04:25 PM I hope some of this helped her. At least it demonstrated a measure of solidarity, which is always a good thing. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Sorcha Date: 29 Apr 03 - 04:29 PM She used pretty much every comment anybody made that was worthwhile. (Not G's of course) Showed her how much can be done by a small circle of friends! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: MMario Date: 29 Apr 03 - 04:32 PM Brava! hugs from over here too! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Sorcha Date: 29 Apr 03 - 11:05 PM Bunch of you wanted to read this............. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,.gargoyle Date: 30 Apr 03 - 12:45 AM It is nice to see you did not write the essay for her. (She deserves to fail on her own merits) In an American high-school, senior-English class, it could rate a C- (if graded on a curve and depending on the classe's ability.) For a university it should immediately place her in two semesters of 001 and 002 ("dumb-bell" English)
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST Date: 30 Apr 03 - 12:52 AM it would have benefited from more preparation, focus, and editing |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,Dreaded Guest Date: 30 Apr 03 - 01:19 AM Well, Enron's not dead. Lord Wakeham took posession of the Enron remnants for the N.M. Rothschild banking conglomerate, and Enron is still doing water-theft deals in countries like Argentina under various corporate names. The Rothschilds would be the vampire, Dracula, corporations like Enron, etc. their Renfield types used for sucking the lifeblood out of an economy. Been a while since I read the novel, so I wouldn't know about parallels with the characters, but does that make sense? Sounds like my kind of teacher. Could you let me know if that's what the prof had in mind? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Seamus Kennedy Date: 30 Apr 03 - 01:51 AM Garg, "classe's," "ruberic," taight?" Where the hell did you learn grammar and spelling? Seamus |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: DMcG Date: 30 Apr 03 - 05:21 AM What does Bram Stoker's novel Dracula have in common with Enron and economic terms?
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST Date: 30 Apr 03 - 06:36 AM Gargoyle was spot on |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 30 Apr 03 - 07:09 AM What on earth is a "ruberic"? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: katlaughing Date: 30 Apr 03 - 07:17 AM Here's an example of one, Kevin: clickety |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: catspaw49 Date: 30 Apr 03 - 07:28 AM No kat, it's an abbreviation for "rubber dick." A Tumeric Ruberic is a swollen/large rubber dick. Also known as a "Gargoyle Lollipop." Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: catspaw49 Date: 30 Apr 03 - 08:32 AM As I read the paper I was instantly reminded of one of the creative writing classes I had in college. Kate stated her assignment at the top (What does Bram Stoker's novel Dracula have in common with Enron and economic terms?) and it triggered a funny memory. I think there were only about a dozen of us in the class and the Prof was a great guy, very quick and with a good sense of humor. Semester exam rolls around and the "in class" part of the final he wrote on the blackboard. I recall about four questions but it started as three. He copied his first two, whatever they were, and began to write the third, all the while we are making cracks and jokes about what he's writing. The third question was supposed to be "Describe briefly the Berea College Handbook." A wacky-ass question but it could be fun. What was more fun and more interesting though was what turned out to be the third question. He wrote the first word, "describe," on the board and we all made assorted boos and snorts. Then he wrote the second word, "briefly," and several of us piped up with cheers and shouts of, "That's better!" He turned around and with a big grin asked, "Is it?" He turned back to the board and put a period after the briefly. So question number three was "Describe briefly." I don't remember what I amswered but I do remember we all gave Pam Golden the award for the best answer. She wrote, "Briefly is this." I think if I were Kate I might still have been tempted to turn in a paper which said: What does Bram Stoker's novel Dracula have in common with Enron and economic terms? "I have no idea, but here's my report on 'Dracula' so you know I read the book. You can take it from there since I know diddly-squat about economics and this isn't an economics class." The best thing for Kate here is that this one is over!!! Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: fiddler Date: 30 Apr 03 - 08:42 AM Hi guys, Well I thought it was stupid question and spaw had it right! Any attempt at this is a sterling attempt 'cos it is a load of b*ll*x - the title not the work! Sorch assuming you are not the teacher Is he she it a pretentious pr*at? Or Just a supercillious ....... It is possible he she it is a nice guy or gal or similar but I think the thing all of us have not worked out is Is this a genuine essay serving a purpose if so what purpose we'd like to be enlightened - creative writing is an option. If not where do we go to sort he she or it out or report them to the relevant authorities for fiction abuse! Well Dacula was true stoiry and Enron reads like a work of fiction!!!! Damm good show all round and damm good effort. A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Amos Date: 30 Apr 03 - 10:39 AM Sorcha: Well, I guess from all the news on this thread that you got the help you needed with yer bram stoker. Now, I wasn't sure what to tall ya about it, as I don't know who it is that does your bram stoking fer ya, and I was kinda upset to learn you needed help with it. Seems to me a nice lady like you should have no trouble getting their bram taken care of properly. But if'n you got the help you wanted, and your bram is now properly stoked, well, I'm all fer that. If'n it happens again just PM me an' me an' Spaw'll come up. We're both retired bram stokers, y'know, a little rusty, but maybe havin two of us kin make up for it. I hev stoked many a bram in my day an got no complaints aside from a couple of deevorces here an' there...an' I am sure Spaw is equally experienced with a variety of precious brams, so no worries, jus' let us know! A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: stevetheORC Date: 30 Apr 03 - 01:35 PM Why do some people get pleasure out of belittling a young childs homework, suerly they have better things to do?? There again it could be how they get there Jollies!! Gargoyle & guest you have managed to lower yoursels to new depths with your attack on this young girl who is unable to defend herself. Hope that you both feel proud. De Orc |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 30 Apr 03 - 01:46 PM No, that was a "rubric", kat. I think spaw was probably closer to the true sense in this case. (But do people in America really write their essays in that bizarre kind of way? Traditionally "rubric" means a direction for how to carry out a religious service. I'd be inclined to say that the word should be reserved for that.) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: katlaughing Date: 30 Apr 03 - 02:23 PM Kevin, google or the people who input stuff on google have it spelled both ways. In this case, I would take it to mean a guide for students to give them an idea of requirements for structure and content. Here's what the dictionary says: 1. A class or category: "This mission is sometimes discussed under the rubric of 'horizontal escalation' . . . from conventional to nuclear war" (Jack Beatty). 2. A title; a name. 3. A part of a manuscript or book, such as a title, heading, or initial letter, that appears in decorative red lettering or is otherwise distinguished from the rest of the text. 4. A title or heading of a statute or chapter in a code of law. Ecclesiastical A direction in a missal, hymnal, or other liturgical book. 5. An authoritative rule or direction. 6. A short commentary or explanation covering a broad subject. 7. Red ocher. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,Q Date: 30 Apr 03 - 03:38 PM This is a rant- I mostly agree with McGrath. What dictionary, Kat? It is a poor one if it doesn't classify its definitions. The first category in Merriam Webster's covers two usages, a.An authoritative rule, esp: a rule for conduct of a liturgical service. b. second most common usage- a name, a title, specifically the title of a statute. The second category 2. a. a heading or a part of a book or manuscript done differently from the rest (underlined, colored, etc.). This comes from the first usage, since headings and directions for divine service were usually printed in red. The third- 3. An established rule or custom (The order in the OED is different since it is based more on historical principles). A rubric to designate a man's name is another archaic usage. "Ruberic," if in Google, is just an example of someone's ignorance or mis-spelling (Catspaw's usage excepted!). Rubric for red ochre is archaic (still preserved as the first category in the OED because it is the root- red). There is a verb, rubricate, in print since the 16th century. The example of a "rubric" linked above is part of what we used to call an outline guide, a reminder that helped us to keep thought ordered in an essay. Never heard one called a "rubric." One form of rubricizing that should be punished by summary execution- highlighting of material in books. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: katlaughing Date: 30 Apr 03 - 03:44 PM No need to rant, Q. I wasn't disagreeing with Kevin, just pointing out what one dictionary, online, had to say for definitions. I'd never heard an outline called a "rubric" before either and yes, "ruberic" does show someone's ignorance, but that is one of the beauties of google, imo, is that a person can enter what they think is the right spelling and google is intuitive enough to find it, bygosh, correct or not!:-) Just was trying to answer Kevin's question as to what was a "ruberic." |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: catspaw49 Date: 30 Apr 03 - 06:20 PM Probably too late for a joke about having a "Rubric's Cube" huh? Thought so....... Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 30 Apr 03 - 07:05 PM I think comparing these crooked directors to Dracula is much too flattering. Bloodsuckers alright, but more comparable to leeches. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: katlaughing Date: 30 Apr 03 - 07:16 PM Naw, Kevin, leeches can be good bloodsuckers, helping to keep wounds clean and the circulation flowing.:-) Enron just stagnates, like a bloated tick; that's it they are disease-ridden ticks! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Sorcha Date: 30 Apr 03 - 08:09 PM Well, ya know, at least someone loves me enough to help me have children. Pretty sure that is not the case with someone else! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,Q Date: 30 Apr 03 - 08:43 PM Enron, like the phoenix, rises from the ashes. I still think Bram Stoker, if I believed in such things, must be whirling in his grave over that teacher's assignment. He would be the first to say that he wrote it just to make a few pence. Has anyone read his "Lair of the White Worm"? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Malcolm Douglas Date: 30 Apr 03 - 10:50 PM Yes; and The Jewel of Seven Stars and The Lady of the Shroud, come to that, but a long time ago. Stoker never repeated his success with Dracula, though the stage play did rather well for him. The Jewel of Seven Stars inspired the original Mummy films, of course, and Ken Russell (I think) made a memorable, if uneven, film of The Lair of the White Worm. The word rubric was certainly used of examination guidelines when I was at school in the '60s, but I don't think I've ever seen that definition in a dictionary. And now, to give the teacher the benefit of the doubt (hardly anyone has so far): The assignment doesn't in any way imply that the teacher actually believes that there is any particular parrallel between Dracula and Enron, or for that matter that the novel is allegorical at all. A lot of knee-jerk assumptions seem to have been made about the teacher, based on very little evidence (and no doubt unhappy memories of school days). Nichole C is, I think, the only person who has made what ought to be the obvious point; that this is most likely an exercise pure and simple, designed to develop the children's skills in analysis and the clear presentation of argument; and without value-judgements attached to it. The subject matter isn't really all that important (though it has the advantage of being a bit different from the usual things) and neither is whether or not anybody agrees with the proposition. The object is to advance a theory and adduce some salient points to back it up, that's all. It's useful if you think that your theory might have some value, but not by any means essential. What matters is how you present it. It may be that the children are a little young for the particular question (but I have very little knowledge of education in the USA); the principle is sound, though. It's just an exercise and, like many exercises that prepare us for later things, may seem useless or perverse to someone who doesn't see the larger picture. I've always thought that it would help to explain the purpose of such things at the time; though it may be felt that that might diminish the educational effect. The sensei in the films never tells his pupil the purpose of an exercise until the lesson is learned, after all. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: NicoleC Date: 01 May 03 - 12:52 AM It may be an exercise, but I still think it's a waste of a great book. Many great works of literature were ruined for me by that kind of academic nonsense; "compare, contrast and regurgitate." Since no one told me I wasn't advanced enough to like Homer and Melville and Tolkein at age 8, I thought they were just great adventures. Never fear, they ruined Melville for me by high school. Then there were the "great" books we were forced to appreciate that just plain weren't very good, but someone decided at some point that "Across Five Aprils" was good for our development. It reminds of me of losing the State Forensics Championship because one of the judges didn't like the political leaning of the satire I read, which, ironically, they didn't interpret correctly anyway. Or having a creative writing teacher who gave me C's because the plots of my stories didn't go where she expected. I had several good teachers in high school, but it wasn't until I got to college that I regularly encountered teachers who made learning fun, even while they worked our tails off. I guess I can't really complain about the quality of teachers out there -- I suffer from a complete dearth of ability to teach myself. But it's sad that for this entire class, Dracula has now become a chore instead of a the delightfully dark and inadvertantly campy story that it should be. Sometimes I suspect all the really good teachers are in kindergarten teaching finger painting and sharing. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: katlaughing Date: 01 May 03 - 01:10 AM Anyone else belong to Junior Great Books as a kid? I only went a few times. Like you, Nicole, I didn't have anyone telling me I was too young for any of it, in fact my parents encouraged us to read anything and everything in our home library and, even more importantly, imo, we read aloud to one another. I really lucked out in teachers, too, as I cannot think of one who ruined a classic for me in this manner, thank goodness! Wouldn't the assignment have been a lot more fun and thought-provoking if they were told to create their own fictionalised version of Enron in their favourite genre...sci-fi, western, etc.?**bg** |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: NicoleC Date: 01 May 03 - 01:30 AM Home library? I just had the public one. The first day I distinctly remember looking forward to was my 5th birthday -- which was the age the library let me have my OWN library card! Mom faithfully carted me to and from the library once or twice a week, and I always left with a tall stack of books. That stirs up memories! The first book I remember really having an effect on me was called "The Littlest Elephant." I can still remember the story and some of the pictures. I haven't ever been able to find it again, but I just did a google for it and found a "vintage" copy for sale. Which I propmtly purchased :) My friends' baby girl may like it... in another 3 or 4 years. I guess good writers and good stories, like good teachers, never really leave us. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: katlaughing Date: 01 May 03 - 03:58 AM Kewl find, Nicole! we used to make weekly trips to the library, too. I am pleased to say my daughter is doing the same with my twin grandsons.:-) Well...it wasn't a huge home library, but both of my parents came from a long tradition of such. My maternal grandfather had the first lending library of any kind in the town where both fo my parents were born and raised in CO. I still have some of his books with his rubber stamped imprint in the front with his name, etc. Let's see...first book I remember has to be my grandma and I reading Goldilocks together, then her reading to me from her copy of How to tell stories to children which stories she'd used as a teacher. She later gave me her copy. I also remember poetry books of James Whitcomb Riley. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: fiddler Date: 01 May 03 - 08:26 AM Waht a thread, It gets more interesting from here - I can relate to the ruined a book by the analysis route - although I did tend to enjoy it usually - so I'm weird I don't mind, No1 Daughter doen't understand whay it has to be doen and switches off. But first books - we had few at home my mother still refers to a magazine as a book but she is a geat mum and I won't criticise her for this. She also used to throw my books, aquired for Jumble sales, away when I was on Holiday or out of the house - she denies it of course. Coral Island - Balantyre - a classic proabably more for boys than girls but I've lost count of the times I've read it, I have an old - now falling to pieces hardback copy. Probably classed as homosexually explicit now as there are few women involved and 3 boys on a desert Island - B*LL*X! Much as I have enjoyed the JK rowling books I don't think they will ever fit in to the Classic mould. I always found extrapolations like the one which spawned this thread are better if they are beleivable, or make a logical jump even the good Lord Denning in his day would never have made this one. A X |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: catspaw49 Date: 01 May 03 - 08:53 AM Ya' know fiddler, you bring up a side point here in a way that is worth mentioning. I'm sure I am not the only one who tends to perform up or down to the level of my own perception of the task. It's true in sports of course that people often play up to the level of the competition which is the reason dark horses win sometimes. They are inspired and the favorite isn't. It happens in everything. I don't know that I could make any kind of credible effort on this assignment. I would have been honestly tempted to turn in exactly what I mentioned above and roll the dice. If my writing is being judged then I would prefer that someone reads a solid effort such as I could do by writing a synopsis or report on Stoker's work rather than the hodgepodge, half-assed, non-attempt that I would make following the assignment. When I read Kate's report, some of that came through to me. Many of us could sit down with red pencil in hand and rip it apart but I really don't believe it is her best effort or actually indicative of her writing. Garg made some points in his inimitable and cruel manner that might be true, but I can't really tell nor would I make those criticisms without reading some other writings where she was more inspired. In the case of this one, as I said before, it was a serious job just to get the stupid thing done and now I would be breathing a sigh of relief that it's over! So Kate...sometime post something you've written that you wrote simply for the sheer joy of writing and we'll be happy to comment, rip it up, praise the bejesus out of you, and probably all three! Spaw--who thinks your prof is an asshole and would have done far worse than you on this one |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: fiddler Date: 02 May 03 - 03:39 AM Spaw LOL And Your probably right! If there is any copy Sorch can send me I cna publish it too! Me site is there for my use and I like this one. More interesting than testing web sites. A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,.gargoyle Date: 03 May 03 - 12:43 AM OK- the MudCat admissions committee review is in: The totaly B.S. catagory determines that a University Education, and higher education, or even seconday education is totally B.S. for this child.
Therefore, SORCHA - teach her cooking, cleaning, and chastity....pay a dowery for a husband.
For those that believe there is a future in the twiddling's education...contributions in $500.00 sums are being greatfully accepted....PM them to Joe, Kat, or Max.
Sincerely,
WANNBE - U's that would accept even YOU's are found at U's of: Phonix Kaplan Brooks Minnesota Michigan Santa Cruz Santa Barbara Wyoming Yes, even in your OWN BACKYARD - the bachelor of "health science" is freely available to those less than able. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Amos Date: 03 May 03 - 02:03 PM Garg, Ya know, the way you keep slipping from one persona to another is entertaining as hell -- do you have any idea who the arrogant, condescending asshole with the cruel smartass attitude and the total lack of compassion who takes over your brain from time to time is, or where s/he comes from? Any chance you could maybe just send him back there, and get on with your life with the intelligent, communicative self we know is really in there? Do let us know -- we'd enjoy hearing that you found out who you are... Sheeshe. A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 03 May 03 - 03:36 PM Well, the "the arrogant, condescending asshole" might be a completely different person using the same handle, which can of course be done easily enough. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: GUEST,Sorch Date: 14 May 03 - 02:10 PM Well, she got it back today--159/195=81%. Lots of red ink on it, and stuff I/we knew it needed, but I wasn't about to say anything that close to the wire. Thanks, friends! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: Catherine Jayne Date: 14 May 03 - 03:10 PM Well done Kate! I enjoyed reading it!!! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Sorch needs help w/Bram Stoker From: stevetheORC Date: 14 May 03 - 03:10 PM Well done very good result. Keep up the good work. Orc n Pushkin |
