Tuesday, September 22, 2009

A Tale of Two Cities

Lily Tikijian
September 22, 2009
Great Books Period 5
Mr. Priest

In book 1, chapter three, “he was on his way to dig someone out of a grave.” Jarvis Lorry having a fake conversation with Mr. Manette.

In this whole chapter, it refers to Jarvis Lorry having a dream about Dr. Manette. Dr. Manette is a ghost and has been in the ground for almost eighteen years. The chapter goes on to talk about how Dr. Manette was recalled to life and if he had lost hope that he was going to be dug out. He had. The importance of the saying, “He was on his way to dig someone out of the grave,” is that it refers to someone being “saved” or recalled to life. This is a foreshadow to what happens in the rest of the chapters. Dr. Manette was never actually dead; he was just missing and was “recalled” to life. When is says he was on his way to dig someone out of a grave, Lorry is going to safe Manette. He is going to help him to remember life and to teach him to try and rejoin the world as if nothing has ever happened. Manette had been “dug out of a grave” when he was released from prison and put up in the room where the winemaker was. Jarvis Lorry and Lucie were “digging” him out of this other grave he was in, the grave where he doesn’t remember anything about his life before these days. There going to help return to his old life and help him remember who he was and what he did. These words hold a lot of meaning in this whole book. This sentence is a foreshadow for what is to come in the next chapters.

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Why Do We Care?

Lily Tikijian
September 8, 2009
Great Books Period 5
Mr. Priest

Why is it difficult not to care about what others think of you? Do we control the way other people see and think about us?

It is very difficult not to care about what others think of us. It is difficult not to care about what others think of us because humans are social people. We are all extraverted in our own ways. We want people to like us and accept us, and if that means not being yourself, that’s what must be done. People think that being accepted by friends and peers in their lives is one of the most important things. If people don’t accept you for who you are, many people change who they are to please others. Why do we do this? I don’t think we really know why we do this. We feel like we must establish this self-image of ourselves that people like. We do control the way other people see us but we can’t control how they think of us. We can control this by dressing the way we want, looking the way we want, and being the person they want us to be. We can’t control what they think of us, even if we are trying to be someone else, some people can see right through that act and some can’t. Even if we are being the person they want us to be, we have no control over their thought process. We want to be accepted and in some cases, people want to be different and stick out. It depends on the type of person you are and what kind of community you are in. I feel like people at University are more likely to be “themselves” then they would at any other school. We all have to try and be someone were not to fit in with the crowd. We can control the way other people see us, but not the way they think. We want to control the way people think of us, but no matter how hard we try, we can't.