How does the novel (The Man Who Read Love Stories) relate to hope and the ideals of our class?

Fiction

What do you look for when you read a novel?

Plot- series of events that happens in a narrative, from beginning to end
Character
Symbolism/ meaning- a powerful image or object that reminds us of rich
Meanings
Metaphor-
Irony- the government in the book,

What are examples of symbols from the novel or any novel?

Ocelot
Gun
River

How do we interpret literature differently?

Literature is there to be interpreted- it is not deterministic- it is not the only way to interpret a novel- no one can tell you what it means! Always question- the way you read it, the writing of the novel, the symbolism.

Language- the different ways to read language and what ideas can represent.

Reader response

The fascists won- how does this relate to the novel?

To totally understand it? To enjoy it? To enjoy the beauty of language?

Misc. Discussion and ideas

Where is there christian imagery in the book? Are there christian ideals and ideas? Religion is a natural part of the cultural landscape.

p.130 Not that he has always lacked female companionship, it just isn’t the same, because he hasn’t found love, he’s found companionship with loving people that like him, but he is not one of them. He hasn’t been able to become a part of them.

Identity, anotonio

From mountains; male, young, vigorous, smart (apparently) intelligent, relaties well to nature and people. However he is lacking in something(unable to produce children) the whole reason he and his wife have to leave is because the town people are making fun of them because they could not bear children. Related to woman’s worth, criticize her or his worth by their inability to concieve chjidren….blame is placed on her.

Jivaros: corrupted by apaches

(among the tribes they called them this in eastern ecuador near amazon)

whites:apaches
shuar indians
jibaros

(go to internet and find out about how many jibaros and shuar indians are left)

jibaros shrink the heads of their enemies. They reduce the heads of their enemies because they want to keep them. the shrink them into the size of a fist.----they sew the eyes together because they don’t want the spirit or ideas of the enemies to come out.

Keep them bound to their spirt—positive relationship with enemy, not malicious, they don’t just kill, a part of respect as well…

2/3 words, define what novel deals with, challenge novel gives us

"conflict between nature and man"

man and man

trying to find lessons in what you read, are there lessons we may learn from the novel. At the end he was talking about how he had gotten bit by a snake so he got mad and went and killed snakes, in the end he had begun to do things like the white man with the gun, he was realizing that he needed to kill for the right reason, dahlia—that killing must have some justification, cannot just kill to kill….

Rita: facing suffering, learning how to live with suffering

Robbie, did you connect hope with this because of that suffering

Learning lessons, nothing is free, nothing is easy,.

enrique: does novel give you hope
 

this couple is dislocated from their homeland. Nothing survives in this area, she dies, he barely eeks our a living, but his life Is meaningful, even though he has practically no possesions, teeth, picutre, magnifying glass……

rich attachment to photograph---reminder of marriage, symbolic, important to remember that it is more than just a marriage it is his anchor to a group of people that he shares things with, not the just the formality of marriage, it is their life……arranged marriage—early in their lives became their life

struggle was manifestation of surival—

does that give meaing, is the struggle the blessing, the lesson—what we learn…

jose has a will to live, he has lost so much but he has a reason to live. Leave everything else out, one essential thing from novel to keep as a lesson in addition to suffering

apparent, insistance through novel

Michael: very strong sense of respect.somebody who finds harmony with himself and wiwth nature and with other people. Accepts the fact htat he is half/ rejected half accepted. Cannot have complete inclusion because he is from somewhere else

he was like them but not of them. he belongs but not completely.

We are all going to live through this at some point. We are going to be a part of something but not entirely…could be anything—a community in which we fit but we are not always completely a part of that community.
 

Jose has found harmony with environment, a kind of love which is relaly important. That doesn’t invpolve arrows. No eroticism in his image of love. Doesn’t know what an ardant kiss is..if he ever kissed his wife ardently he doesn’t remember

Refined decanted very idealized form of love

Acceptance, doesn’t’ need any more essential individual that can funcition for the trest of his life with some books, his teeth, his magnifying glass and a table he made himself, plus a knife, a machete, this indiviual becomes a symbol for what we could be if we decided to be less overpowering, abusive of the ennvironment, especially other people, how we exercise power over others.

One extreme, organized fincancial driven nation (mayor, the colonizers, "gringos") ---invaders, aliens that become and do really disgusting things in that environment.

They have to learn that lesson, it’s not only the foreigners, its also the nationals opening up that are for exploitation

Rita"ironic conclusion:::doesn’t fight the suffering, doesn’t try to alter the colonists, the gringos, does this offer a more complex conclusion, you don’t fight the very thing you find so harsh.’

Another kind of antonio: bitter—an embittered character, or The revolutionary who brings together the people and fights the man---che (chico mendex, led fight of brazil’s people, murdered because he fucked the corporations)—

Film made:dutch director, rolf something. Made in frech guyana, based on novel….richard dreyfuss looks very theatrical, he used to be in theater. The mayor unable to understand how to relate to the enviroment---fake shuari indians, in film they are native of french guyana.

Translation: has anything been lost, altered:

Some degree of inteference in the act of translating into another language. Ignored some grammar issues, made it flow. The language is not perfect and it has to do with the difficulty of translating anything. You want to translate the meaning but you want to be loyal to the ideas of the writer..walking between the lines of that

Ineveitably there will be something altered, notlost, just different. Written text to film—that’s translation, including adaptation….bigger than inter-language interpretation…

Sometimes what we say when we write is not always what we mean

Better writer one who finds best fit, best interpretation of their words, maybe the more accomplished but the more observed