Friday, April 25, 2008

Spring Break

So far Spring Break has been excellent. However I have not worked on my english project as much as I had planned. I was hoping to have finished a Brave New World by the end of break but I still have about two thirds of the book left to finish. I have been working a lot at my two jobs and when I come home I normally go for a run, take a shower and then try to see my friends for some amount of time. I have been reading, just very very slowly. The book has lost my attention for now and I feel that I must be in the mood to read it. If I'm not in the mood to read it I end up reading only a few pages, not paying enough attention and having to re-read it over and over again. I feel as though I have too much going on. School, two jobs, taking care of my horse Cutter and trying to see my friends as well is very difficult.

Thursday, April 17, 2008

Dystopian Novel Study

A few days ago I began a study of Dystopian Novels. The novels that I have chosen to study are 1984 by George Orwell, Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, and A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess. My first thoughts after choosing this topic for my final senior english project is "How am I going to incorporate all this and tie it all together?", "How will I be able to demonstrate how these novels are dystopias if most programs will tell you that the word 'dystopia' is not even a word?" SO it came to me. The first thing that I would need is to give the reader a good background on exactly what a dystopia is. I would have to explain the characteristics and how a dystopia is created. Then I would be able to use the books that I am reading and the movie that I am watching in order to give examples of what a dystopia is. I would have to make my readers understand through my examples.

I have already begun reading one book, Brave New World. I have already finished reading 1984, as that was one of our previous required reading novels. So far I have noticed a great deal of similarities between the two and I am only on chapter 3 of Brave New World.