Class Entry

So The Great Gatsby sort of has me thinking about relationships. Like affairs and how they happen all the time and that despite what society deems as acceptable; love will appear when and where ever it wants to. In The Great Gatsby Tom and Myrtle are having an affair. I used to just assume if a person was going to have an affair, unless they were a sex addict, it was because they loved that person. Yet, with Myrtle and Tom I don’t think their really is any love. I mean I am assuming Tom told Myrtle that Daisy is catholic and doesn’t believe in divorce but that doesn’t really make sense since in that time men were in control and could leave a woman if he wanted too. Also Tom totally broke Myrtle’s noise! I don’t care who you are male or female you don’t break the person you love noise because they’re taunting you. That’s not love thats abuse and it’s definitely not okay.

As I was writing about Tom hitting Myrtle I realized that abuse has been a big part of the book so far. I mean really not only has Myrtle had her noise broken but there’s also been a pretty intense car accident within the first few chapters and that car accident was evidence of alcohol abuse. I mean if there is entire group of classic books in literature that has sex, drugs, and violence I am guessing that this is one of them. Which kind of excites me though because I am sort of starting to dig the novel. It has the potential to be really entertaining and the last book that we read that I really liked was The Scarlet Letter so I think it’s about time that we read something that doesn’t make we want to drill a hole through my brain.

As for As I lay Dying I can honestly say that despite our little session of let’s discuss As I Lay Dying on Friday I still don’t know what’s going on. Which only bothers me to an extent because in all honesty I don’t like it. It’s boring, the characters aren’t all that interesting, and it’s not like there’s a character in the novel I can relate to so that I find it more entertaining. Also it doesn’t seem to have any real point and I would be very happy to walk into class tomorrow and find out that we no longer have to read it. I mean I try really hard not to judge things too quickly and I’ll be the first to take back my judgement if it’s wrong but this book is totally horrible and makes utterly no sense. I mean the book has potential to be funny: there’s a fat doctor can’t walk up a hill, people having wild forest sex, and people abusing the one they love by building a coffin outside their window. That stuff would make for a really entertaining story if Faulkner had written it that way but he didn’t and that’s annoying. I hope it turns out that I am wrong and As I Lay Dying does a one eighty and totally becomes entertaining but for some reason I just don’t think that’s going to happen.