The Great Deportation Quiz

1) From the beginning these diary entries are heavily fragmented and occur in a stream of consciousness narrative. What is the impact of this style of writing? Why do you think Lewin wrote as he did?
- This type of writing that Lewin uses makes the reader think about the situation more rapidly. Lewin gives the reader a lot of information in a relatively short period of time, so the reader needs to quickly absorb everything on the page. This writing also gives the reader a sense of panic and makes the viewer uncomfortable. Lewin uses this type of writing in order to give the reader a real sense of what he was thinking during this time. During this period of time Lewin’s thoughts were most likely racing through his mind, this is extremely noticeable in the text.

2) On page 167, Lewin enters his diary for the first time with his own thoughts and feelings. What do you make of this moment?
- Lewin’s thoughts and feelings at the beginning don’t differ from the prior pages too much. He delivers the reader information, but doesn’t show much emotion when he does it. Lewin just gives the reader the facts and this is pretty much it. The tone of the piece does change when this occurs. The writing doesn’t seem as strict and stable as it was before he incorporated his own thoughts and feelings.

3) On page 176, Lewin learns his wife, Luba, has been seized. What do you make of his recorded reaction? Do you sense a shift in his tone in the diary after this event? If yes, what is the shift? If no, why do you think he is not fazed by this event?
- Lewin’s reaction to his wife, Luba being seized is documented very similarly to the rest of the piece. He probably shows the most emotion when this occurs, but it still doesn’t seem like this even fazes him to a point of depression or extreme sadness. After this event there is no shift of emotion or tone in his diary. The reason that Lewin doesn’t seem to be fazed after this event is rather simple. The diary is a written piece of work, Lewin isn’t standing in front of us explaining what has happened to his wife. This information is directly given to us on a piece of paper. Lewin could have been devastated by this event but the reader wouldn’t know because he didn’t write it this way.




4) What do you make of Lewin’s distance in his writing? Does this read like a typical diary? Do you see his inner thoughts? What does he choose to record?
- Lewin seems distant throughout his entire diary. He almost seems emotionless and without a voice. I got the feeling that it was very difficult for Lewin to write the things that he saw in a diary, and this can be felt by the distance in his writing. This doesn’t read like a typical diary. Lewin’s inner thoughts are not felt. Maybe the only time Lewin is remotely emotional is when he learns his wife has been deported. He records the facts, and more interestingly, very detailed facts about many mundane events. House numbers, streets, names and numbers are very detailed throughout his writing.

Genre of Interest

My genre of interest is sports writing. It wasn't difficult to think about what my interests were, and what type of writing I could come up with according to my interests. As I'm writing my piece I feel as if I would enjoy doing this for a living very much so. Although writing a sports column for a newspaper is a hard job to come across, there are a lot of newspapers in this country, right? Five pages, and 200 points kind of made this project a little intimidating, but as I write it seems to get much easier.

Rough Draft: Genre of Interest

Genre of Interest

Writing Exercise
Genre of Interest
Matt Taflinger

Interests: Sports
Music
Reading
Traveling
Film

I am most passionate about music, reading and participating in sports. The most important thing in my life as I’m writing this would be music. I’m not sure why I’m so passionate about music, but I just know that I really couldn’t function without it. During high school, there’s no question the most important thing to me was golf. That pretty much what I lived for, but now since this school lacks a men’s team I can’t be as passionate about it. The first experience I had with music was most likely with my dad at a young age. He loves 60’s British rock, in particular, the Rolling Stones. My first concert was with him at a Stones concert when I was seven; still to this day it’s my favorite concert I’ve attended. I was also very young when I had my first experience with sports, which is also a very interesting topic to me. I pretty much participated in every sport that had a boy’s team in my town. I played soccer, baseball, hockey, football, basketball, tennis and golf. There was never a moment where I had nothing to do as a kid.

5 Genres that interest me: Short story, song lyrics, musical reviews, screenplays and documentary

The most enticing writing genres for me are song lyrics, musical reviews, Newspaper columns and screenplays. I read reviews of new albums and songs pretty much every week, whether it’s online or in a magazine. I also enjoy making up my own reviews of albums with my friends. Writing song lyrics and analyzing song lyrics has always been something that I have liked to do. I’ve always wanted to write a screenplay but I’ve never got around to starting one. Translating my main interests of sports, music, reading, traveling and film to certain genres of writing is pretty simple. Take sports, music, reading and film. For these three of my interests I could write lyrics, a screenplay, reviews of books or films and I could also write a newspaper column on the latest sports news. Criticizing as well as praising music is something I love to do; this goes hand in hand when talking about magazine or newspaper articles on certain musicians or new albums. Analyzing films is also a huge interest to me, which is why I really liked our last project even though I didn’t pick to use my film analysis outline. Writing about sports is a relatively easy thing to do. Either writing a newspaper article about different sports teams or blogging about information about sports thats on your mind. Choosing to write a short article on Detroit sports teams is something I want to do and am most likely going to do for this project

Robert Frost-Nothing Gold Can Stay.

Matt Taflinger

Analysis

Poetry/Nothing Gold Can Stay

The initial reaction I had towards, Nothing Gold Can Stay, by Robert Frost was very positive, in a sense that I felt I knew exactly what the poem was about. I noticed that Frost was writing about nature, more specifically about the transformation from dawn to day. The first line, as well as the last line has the word gold in it. The word is used in two different ways in the first line, and then eventually in the last line. “Natures first green is gold” is the first line of the poem, describing the beginning of the day, or the beginning of a new life. “Nothing gold can stay” is the last line of the poem describing how everything good comes to an end. In this poem I believe Frost is describing the progression from life to death.

The purpose of the poem is to describe the difference of life and death, as well as the progression from the beginning of life to eventually dying. The intended audience for this piece of poetry is anybody who can comprehend what point Frost is trying to get across by writing this piece. The tone of the poem is very reserved, it seems that Frost was holding something back as he was writing this. The voice is very soft and tranquil. It is a written piece of art.

2 Questions about the poem:

-What is the poem about?

-Why did frost choose to write a poem about nature?

Analysis Model:

-What is the poem about?

-I believe the poem is about life and death.

-The poem, Nothing Gold Can Stay, by Robert Frost is about the transition and progression from life to death.

I.               Thesis: The poem, Nothing Gold Can Stay, by Robert Frost is about the transition and progression from life to death. The first time reading through the poem I felt a sense of melancholy from the first line to the last. It’s as if Frost wrote the poem while he was an elderly man and he used the words to describe how fast his life progressed. The poem is very short, only being eight lines but it does describe the circle of life very completely.

II.             Supporting Evidence #1

A.              The first two lines of the poem depict the early stages of life.

B.             The third and fourth lines of Nothing Gold Can Stay deal with the rapid pace that people grow into themselves, and eventually become adults.

III.             Supporting Evidence #2

A.              In the fifth and sixth lines of the poem, Frost describes the latter years in life, by describing the normalcy of middle life and realization of death that people go through.

B.             The last two lines clearly describe death, by using the death of dawn to day as a metaphor for dying and the afterlife.

IV.             Supporting Evidence #3

A.            The poem describes the process of life in order, moving from birth to death.

B.             Frost uses nature and more specifically a flower, it’s leaves and then finally the beginning of a new day to describe the progression of life to death.

 V.            Supporting Evidence #4

 A.             “Natures first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold.”

 B.              Frost is simplifying the fact that childhood goes by fast, it’s the hardest to hold because once you live it, you look back upon it and realize how fast it truly went. He also stresses the fact that it is the best time in your life which adds to childhoods importance.

VI.            Supporting Evidence #5

 A.             “Then leaf subsides to leaf. So Eden sank to grief,”

 B.            These two lines are the only two where the meaning isn’t very clear to me. Although Eden is a exotic garden mentioned in the Bible, I can’t pinpoint a clear connection with the text and Frost’s intended meaning.  

VII.             Conclusion

II.             A.             Frost successfully uses nature, and the world around us to describe the progression of life, and then finally death. It is clear throughout the poem that Frost uses nature as a metaphor for growing up, from a child to an adult. It is apparent that the ending of Frost’s poem deals directly with old age and eventually death. He uses imagery throughout, describing nature, more specifically plants and images of early morning and then eventually daytime. This poem evokes many different emotions during different parts of the poem. I felt this poem was very melancholic. Frost seems to dwell upon the fact that life is short, and one needs to cherish every day.