How the mighty have Fallen, a talk on Fallen Angels

By -
Oh, hello there! Welcome to the first blog post I've made in quite some time. I'm sorry for the extreme delay, but I've struggled with my own existence all semester, and I'm sorry to say that I've come dangerously close to dropping out and living as a beekeeper many times, but for now I'm here!

Shifting gears slightly to the book we just read, I believe that "Fallen Angels" is better than most would give it credit for. I wasn't enthralled by the book in the beginning, but opposed to what Alan said the other day, I think it was written really well. True or not, I was just not a large fan of the setting itself. The Vietnam war, at least to me, isn't a point of extreme interest. However, I think that Walter Dean Myers really makes the most of the setting, partially because of his own relation to it.

The quote that I picked for us to discuss is from the titular Lieutenant Carroll, and speaks to the theme and tone of the book. "My father used to call all soldiers angel warriors... Because usually they get boys to fight wars. Most of you aren’t old enough to vote yet" (Myers, 44.) This, I believe, is the main crux of the book, and represents a real paradigm shift in the tonal consistencies previously found in the book. This quote shows the hopelessness and futility of war, as it's not fought by people who believe in their country's cause, it was a massacre of a generation, many of the men not even 18. He compared these soldiers to angels because in his father's eyes, they were already dead.

Comments

  1. UnknownNovember 11, 2016 at 9:18 AM

    I also agree that this book is really well written but was not a fan of the setting either. I didn't really feel that this book was something that many adolescents can relate to, because not all adolescents understand or even care about the army. I like the quote that you chose to talk about, and I found it interesting the way the term "fallen angels" is symbolic to the bible.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Growing Pains - The Symbolism of the Tree in Speak

By -
I have felt the paralyzing pain of internal disease. The kind of trauma that causes your mouth to curl in and swallow you whole. I, like so many other women, are walking the halls in Melinda’s shoes in “Speak.” I thought Laurie Anderson did a phenomenal job of twisting all of the tribulations a high school girl goes through, into the tree that Melinda is. Whether we’re as strong as an oak or weak as a bush, we have all gone through the disease that strikes Melinda from the inside out. Melinda is like a half-dead tree. Some parts of her strive to blossom and create beauty. Other parts are broken and diseased. Like a dead tree, Melinda needs to save herself and “cut off the damage, [so it] is possible for the tree to grow again” (187). The symbolism of a tree is significant in “Speak.” Trees reflect her growing process. In the beginning, Melinda is a sick and lifeless tree. Her view is negative and dark. She’s so far past repair, bursts of sunlight do her no good. Sunlight would be pe
Read more

How Starr Goes from Acting to Embracing in The Hate U Give

By -
In The Hate U Give, Starr Carter is caught between two worlds. She lives in a predominantly black neighborhood, but her father sends her and her brothers to a private school where she is surrounded by white people. She talks about acting differently depending on what group she is around, which can create some identity problems. She says on page 11, "Funny how it works with white kids though. It's dope to be black until it's hard to be black." When at Williamson, she sees white kids that think it's cool to engage in black culture, but she knows they don't understand what she goes through in her Garden Heights community. She witnessed her friend Natasha's death when she was 10 years old, and she sees gang activity in her community all the time. When she is among her black friends, like at the party, they tease her for hanging out with the white kids. This reminds me of a Drake song where he says, "I used to get teased for being black, and now I'm
Read more

Postmodernism in Curious Incident

By -
Before I start writing, I first want to acknowledge that I just really loved this book! It seemed like a lot of the class had trouble enjoying or appreciating the novel because it's so different stylistically, which is understandable, but all of those unique elements helped make the novel more authentic. The main topic I want to focus on (also what I'm writing my paper on) is how a lot of postmodernist elements were used in the novel to make Christopher come to life. While obviously not every postmodern novel is about an autistic kid, I think Haddon really used a lot of these elements to his advantage and they ended up working out really well to characterize Christopher. One of the major postmodern elements which helps this book really craft an authentic portrayal of autism is the fact that it's metafictive. Basically, this means it's a "story within a story." Readers would be extremely limited just reading the parts of the novel which are meant to be C
Read more