Monday, March 30, 2015

Stefano Fantini Delmanto Summative Blog Post Anthem

Best Post-

Question Commander

Question 1:
Why are the citizens from the city called by names such as equality, liberty?

In my opinion, there are many reasons that the government. But from I understood from the text about the government wanting to keep everything fair etc... It makes me think that the government wants the people to remind themselves about some core-values such as equality and liberty. Which in my opinion is ridiculous. This adding to the fact that the parents of the kids don't even get to see or name their own children!
Until this part of the book I can clearly see that the government of this society is trying to create a utopia. But they don't realize that people need to have the ability of choosing! Freedom? A basic of any society independent of their goals is to have freedom. It is wrong for the government to put two people together to have kids against their will!
Now that I am writing these thoughts down I realized that this book reminds me of a book that I read in 7th grade called Uglies. In this book, The city is separates Uglies and Pretties. Basically, Tally Youngblood wants to have the surgery that will make her pretty; but then she gets caught up in a rebellion against society and comes to appreciate a world where not everyone is pretty.The book does not give people freedom and they have to live separately so there are no comparisons between them.

This is the book Uglies by Scott Westerfeld

Question 2:
Who takes care of children once they are born?

Since parents don't see their children when or even after they are born who takes care of them? This is completely wrong. To begin with, they should not have that mating age. People should love people that they actually like. It is morally wrong in many senses to be forced to love someone. Anyways, moving on; wouldn't it be good for the children to al least see their parents for a while so they passed on some hints to their children. Place your-self having a child and not being able to take care of them, It is just horrible!

People are not free to love!
This is what I feel like the book expresses to the reader.

Question 3:
Why is it wrong to be different?

To be honest I need help answering this question? Why is it wrong?
Why can't people love?
While reading I noticed that the goal the government is to  have everybody treated equal. No love, no ideas, no thinking. In my opinion, the government is manipulating the people by forbidding things and adding laws that if broken will cause severe consequences such as being  burned, chop of your tongue etc...

This image expresses that people try not to be different, in other words no freedom.

As we can see, one person stands out in the image and in the context of the book Anthem this person is Equality.



1)
Why was this book controversial?  Which themes or ideas were challenging to society?  

To begin, Ayn Rand intended the book Anthem to be a critique of collectivism. Collectivism is giving priority over some things, and in this case, humans! It's no big surprise Ayn hated collectivism so much  because she experienced it and that scared her for life. "Rand was born in Russia in 1905, to a fairly well-off, intellectual Jewish family (her father was a chemist and pharmacist). At age twelve, she witnessed the Russian Revolution, in which the communists (most definitely "collectivists") took over the county and began to "expropriate"  forcefully take away) property from the well-off in the name of "the people" (the poor, working class)." (Spark notes, 1)

Rand's family lost almost everything to the government, including their pharmacy, and Ayn herself was later almost expelled from the university for not being "proletarian" enough. Basically she was not allowed to be different. At the end, this book was controversial because it challenged many principles of the society in Russia during 1905. In my opinion, it was challenging for the society to deal with this topic and that is why the book was challenging for the society.

2)
What theme or themes does the author explore in the novel?  Which passages in the text connect to theme?

"It is a sin to write this. It is a sin to think words no others think and to put them down upon a paper no others are to see. It is base and evil. It is as if we were speaking alone to no ears but our own. And we know well that there is no transgression blacker than to do or think alone. We have broken the laws. The laws say that men may not write unless the Council of Vocations bid them so. May we be forgiven!" (Anthem Page 1)

The theme that the author explores in the novel is freedom and how people basically don't have the right to "live" in this utopia. As you could see writing is a sin. People don't even have real names! The citizens are named after a core-value such as equality and liberty so they always remember that. If you read forward, you discover that a pattern after birth never meets his child! In my opinion, the government of the city wanted everything to be so perfect that forgot how a human should be treated. An example is on page number 8. In the book Anthem by Ayn Rand, emotions are a big no no. When International meets Equality. In that scene, Equality tells the reader that no one can have affection towards another. Basically no love! Everyone must be friends with everyone. Though you think this is a perfect way of living it is not. We are humans and we all make mistakes. Mistakes that can be forgiven. Now if our mindsets change and suddenly we are perfect people. We are not humans anymore, we become robots that do what the others want. We follow commands without we even knowing it. As my dad told me when I was a kid, perfection is not accomplishable, mainly because people think differently and have their own opinions about things. In this book what sounds perfect is a dictatorship. People can't, can't believe, can't speak,  and can't feel. "Perhaps the greatest utopia would be if we could all realize that no utopia is possible; no place to run, no place to hide, just take care of business here and now." Jack Carroll
To begin, this quote can be seen in many ways. In my point of view, the quote expresses how we humans should believe that we are not perfect at all and never will be. Something very peculiar about this quote is how he wrote that we need to do things here and now. Meaning that we need to "use" our life well, get things out of the way and enjoy your life.

3)
Describe a choice made by a character in the novel.  Why did the character make this choice?  Was his or her action justified?

One choice that the character made was when he finds an abandoned tunnel, which he immediately realizes is from the ancient times. Equality 7-2521 tells International 4-8818 that they will not report the tunnel to the Council; rather, it belongs to him. Each night after that, when his brothers sit in the darkened theatre watching plays about the virtue of toil, Equality 7-2521 steals away to his secret tunnel. There, hidden beneath the ground, he has three hours in which he does scientific research and performs experiments. He also steals manuscripts from the Scholars, and every night he studies. This activity goes on for two years.

Equality made this choice based on the fact that it was the first time that he knew something that someone else did not. He had a place where he could think of the things that he wanted. If I were in his place, I would do the same thing. If you think about it, it must be very hard to treat everyone the same way and think the same as other people. So his action is completely justified for the fact that he wants to have his own opinion.

   4)
How did the author use a particular literary technique (allusion, metaphor, imagery, symbolism, etc.) and what effect does this technique have on the reader?

"WE ARE ONE IN ALL AND ALL IN ONE.  THERE ARE NO MEN BUT ONLY THE GREAT WE,  ONE, INDIVISIBLE AND FOREVER."

Throught the book, Ayn adds some quotes. This one is intriguing. It plays with words and makes the reader think.
"WE ARE ONE IN ALL AND ALL IN ONE. THERE ARE NO MEN BUT ONLY THE GREAT"
This part of the quote means that: if we work together we are invincible. This is because she says that all in one there are no greater man. Meaning that they are all equal and have rights.

The last part; ONE, INDIVISIBLE AND FOREVER, means that it is such a strong force that it will never break.
This is a great way to start of a book, the author starts making the reader to think a little about their society and how things work.
The quote that Ayn used was wise, it relates to the book and introduces it to the reader. This quote in particular represents flaws in the society of the book and if people come together things will be better.

At the end of the day, the book Anthem by Ayn Rand is a book about freedom and rights. I would recommend this book to people that like a mysterious/utopia sort of books. Out of five stars I would give this book a four. Mainly because I wish it had some more historical context into it.

Citations:

Rand, Ayn. "Anthem." Gutenberg. Gutenberg, 3 Feb. 2009. Web. 31 Mar. 2015. <http%3A%2F%2Fwww.gutenberg.org%2Febooks%2F1250%3Fmsg%3Dwelcome_stranger>. 

Carroll, Jack. "Utopias." BrainyQuote. Xplore, 1 July 1999. Web. 30 Mar. 2015. <http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/j/jackcarrol185511.html?src=t_utopia>.

Rand, Ayn. "Anthem By Ayn Rand Book." Book. Sparkl, n.d. Web. 30 Mar. 2015. <http://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/a/anthem/book>.

Pedia, Wiki. "Secret Passage." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 30 Mar. 2015. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_passage>.

Barros, Reinaldo. "Aviso De Redirecionamento." Aviso De Redirecionamento. Reinaldo Barros, 20 Dec. 2011. Web. 30 Mar. 2015. <http://www.google.com.br/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CAcQjRw&url=http%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FSecret_passage&ei=SBoaVdi_LcuTyATOuYHgDg&bvm=bv.89381419%2Cd.aWw&psig=AFQjCNHJtagWn7_GKM99ffxDYZKwScEqWQ&ust=1427860423615119>.

No comments:

Post a Comment