Reflection- Mark Twain “The Celebrated Jumping Frogs of Calaveras County"

 For this reflection, I read "The Celebrated Jumping Frogs of Calaveras County" by Mark Twain.  The story is told in first person, and the narrator begins to tell the reader that he is trying to find information on a certain Leonidas W. Smiley.  He does not believe this man is real, but seeks out a friend of a friend to help him out.  I just found out that "The Celebrated Jumping Frogs of Calaveras County" is just an excerpt from Mark Twain's Life on the Mississippi.  I just wanted to point that out in case someone got confused as to why I was only talking about part of a story, but I really doubt whoever is reading this has read Life on the Mississippi.  He finds this friend of a friends in what seems similar to a tavern.  The man backs him into a corner, and proceeds to tell the narrator about the man that he is searching for.  Leonidas W. Smiley is a real person!  The man also tells him about a man named Jim Smiley, which really really confused me at first.  Although not very far into the excerpt of Mark Twain's Life on the Mississippi, I do not have any idea how the ideas and philosophies of the narrator have anything in common with those of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau.



Wilhelm, Jeffrey D., Douglas Fisher, Beverly Ann. Chin, and Jacqueline Jones. Royster. Glencoe Literature. New York: Glencoe/McGraw-Hill, 2009. Print.

Reflection- "The Red Badge of Courage" by Stephen Crane

 For this reflection, we had to read "The Red Badge of Courage" by Stephen Crane.  The passage in our book was very short, which may be a little difficult to summarize in the amount of words required for these reflection blogs, but like I always say: when the going gets tough, the tough gets typing!  Anyway, the story starts out by comparing the man of interest to a carpenter.  "He was at task.  He was like a carpenter who has made many boxes, making still another box..." (Glencoe Literature).  I think the author made this comparison to give the reader the visual of the man working hard.  He is obviously doing something repetitive, and something that he is used to doing because he is doing it quickly.  The man is not thinking about doing his work though, and his mind drifts off every once in awhile to "jolted dreams" (Glencoe Literature).  His dreams seem a little muddled because he is so involved in the war effort.  Judging by the time period and the war effort the author is talking about, this must have taken place during the Civil War.  Plus, this small passage also talks about rifles, which if I am not mistaken were the types of guns they used in the Civil War.  Anyway, the man in the story is starting to get full of rage, and is described as "a well-meaning cow worried by dogs" (Glencoe Literature).  I think the man is worried because he is putting his entire being into the war effort and is getting nothing out of it.  Maybe, which is most likely, he is forced to be in the war effort and has no say.  This would be easier to compare to the ideas of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau.  Both men did not like the situations they were in concerning the government, and stood up for what they believed in through their writings.  The man in the passage seems like he is building enough rage against what he is doing to do the same, or at least something similar.


Wilhelm, Jeffrey D., Douglas Fisher, Beverly Ann. Chin, and Jacqueline Jones. Royster. Glencoe Literature. New York: Glencoe/McGraw-Hill, 2009. Print.

Reflection- Kate Chopin's "The Awakening"

For this reflection, we were supposed to read an excerpt from the novel The Awakening by Kate Chopin.  The part of this novel in our book was very short, but I think I understand it enough to write an entire three-hundred and twenty-five word reflection.  Before the excerpt of the story, I read the "Before You Read" on realism and the life of Kate Chopin.  Kate Chopin is known for her writing because she is considered to be the first American woman who "frankly (wrote) about the suppressed passion and discontentment" of women in their confined state of their roles.  During this time--which is the Civil War time period--women had a very specific role in society.  They were supposed to be very delicate and ladylike and extremely sensitive to things like sunlight and curse words.  As I have said in previous reflections, my favorite movie in the whole wide world is Gone With the Wind.  From watching the movie so many times and from knowledge I already knew, I was able to understand The Awakening.  Kate Chopin was making the point of opening up the curtains of the sheltered woman's life and talking about how unsatisfying it really was.  Women were just expected to smile and go along with everything that their husbands.  I think that it was awesome that a woman like Kate Chopin had the guts to speak out for women.  The woman in the excerpt from her story is crying and wants to be by herself.  It seems, to the reader, that she is finally breaking down from all the stress of life.  I am sure her husband had said something sexist without knowing it (because that was normal at the time) and it was just the straw that broke the camels back.  Having a husband back then must have been horrible!  You never really married for love, and the men just expected the women to do everything and were worth nothing and had no idea about anything.  I know for a fact that I am no feminist or anything--frankly, the annoy me so much--but that would not have been fair.  I am all for equality between people, no matter race or gender.


Wilhelm, Jeffrey D., Douglas Fisher, Beverly Ann. Chin, and Jacqueline Jones. Royster. Glencoe Literature. New York: Glencoe/McGraw-Hill, 2009. Print.

Reflection- "A Wagner Matinee"

For this reflection, we were able to choose to read one of two of Willa Cather's stories: "O Pioneers!" or "A Wagner Matinee."  I chose to read "A Wagner Matinee" for no reason in particular, but I remembered that we had talked about it in class and it seemed interesting enough.  In this story, it starts out with the young man finding out that he has to pick his aunt up from the station.  I felt bad for him because of the comparison he made between he and his lifestyle, and she with hers.  The young man is taken back to a time when he was just a farm boy, and he helped her on the farm.  When his aunt finally comes off the train, he notices that she is not in a very good state.  Her skin is yellow, she is not in good shape, and she looks like she is very sick.  For a period in the story, the young man talks about the old days and how much his aunt had influenced him as a boy.  She helped him learn so many things, whether it be concerning school or life in general.  I think it was upsetting to him to see such an influential person of his life become so distant and lost.  The narrator takes her to the opera, where she finally seems to be aware of her surroundings.  So far in the story, I really have absolutely no idea how "A Wagner Matinee" is similar or different to the philosophies of Ralph Waldo Emerson or Henry David Thoreau.  The orchestra takes the young man back to all the places of his childhood; it is truly moving.  The next thing he knows, his aunt is crying.  The is pretty much the first emotion both the young man and the reader have seen from the aunt.  When everything is over and they are the only ones left in the theatre, the aunt exclaims "I don't want to go, Clark, I don't want to go!" (Cather).  This made me sad because she did not want to go home.

"Willa Cather's Short Story: A Wagner Matinee." Read Book Online: Literature Books,novels,short Stories,fiction,non-fiction, Poems,essays,plays,Pulitzer Prize, Nobel Prize. Web. 17 Feb. 2012.

Reflection- An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge

For this reflection, I read the story "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" by Ambrose Bierce.  I actually thought it was very interesting as I kept reading, because at first I thought it was a little bit confusing.  The story starts out on a bridge (obviously Owl Creek Bridge).  There seems to be many soldiers, both in the middle of the bridge and at the very end of the bridge, and a man who is tied up with ropes.  He is standing on boards with a noose around his neck because they soldiers plan on hanging him.  I felt really bad when Ambrose Bierce was describing the man.  He seemed like an average person, and he was even described as a "gentleman" (Bierce).  As the reading went on, I did not like him so much because he was a slave owner, but I guess it is not very fair for me to judge.  It was just his way of life that he was born and raised into, so he most likely did not even understand the harm he was doing.  I got a little confused at the flashback, when he asked the Federal Scout about what would happen if someone were to be hanged on Owl Creek Bridge.  I do not think the story even mentioned what he did to get the hanging sentence.  Oh well.  Then the man must have gone through some sort of dream or something, because he goes on the fleeing journey only to be hung and killed in the end.  It was very hard for me to find a comparison between "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" and the philosophies of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau.  The man in the story was a slave owner and literally died for what he believed in, which was the opposite of what Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson believed.  They completely opposed slavery and would have been on the side of the soldiers who killed him.
"An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge, by Ambrose Bierce." Page By Page Books. Read Classic Books Online, Free. Web. 17 Feb. 2012.

Reflection- "Letters to His Family" Robert E. Lee

I thought it was interesting to read "Letter's to His Family" by Robert E. Lee because he is writing this during the Civil War period in our history, which is personally my favorite time in the United States' past.  There was one sentence in Robert E. Lee's letter that really jumped out at me: "As far as I can judge by the papers, we are between as state of anarchy and civil war."  This was the sentence that made me realize that Robert E. Lee has a similar thought process as that of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau.  From what I can take from the sentence from Robert E. Lee's "Letter's to His Family," he is not a very big fan of the government, or he knows that a lot of people are not.  Anarchy means that there is absolutely no government control or influence in the lives of the people.  This can relate to the philosophies of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau because neither of them really liked the government either.  It is not like they wanted anarchy--this is pretty extreme and I can not even think of a instance where this has happened--but they did not want the government sticking their nose in everyone's business when it was not necessary.  Robert E. Lee talks a lot about how he loves his country and he would do anything for it.  This does contradict with the ideas of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau though.  While they did not like their government, they did not like it because they did not like slavery.  I am going to assume that they were from the north because if you opposed slavery when you were in the south, you were basically done for.  Robert E. Lee was a general in the south and obviously fought for slavery.  His views on slavery were the exact opposite of that of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau.

Reflection- "And Ain't I Woman?"

For  this reflection, we were supposed to read the poem "And Ain't I a Woman?" by Sojourner Truth.  I enjoyed reading this poem so much for many reasons.  The first reason of why I liked this poem so much was because she made so many good points.  Her story is told from the point of view of the slaves, so it is obviously during the Civil War and late eighteenth century.  During this time, the white men--particularly upper class, or high middle class--had a very specific way of treating the white, upper class women.  They were thought of to be very delicate and proper.  Sojourner Truth talks about how "a woman needs to be helped into a carriage/and lifted over ditches."  One of my favorite movies of all time is Gone With the Wind, which portrays this perfectly.  The women were thought to have to eat extremely lightly, be very sensitive to the sun, and to have the smallest waste in the country.  This is mostly for women in the South; I am not so sure about the women in the north.  At this time in our history, this was very normal and every woman was supposed to enjoy this and look forward to it once they were adults.  Soujourner Truth is asking why she, a woman, was denied the right to actually be treated like one.  This can relate to the philosophies of Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson because neither men wanted slavery.  Soujourner Truth also did not slavery because it was so unfair and she was being denied of her rights.  The similarity is the extreme dislike of slavery.  Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau believed that slavery was unfair from the point of view from a white man, which does not speak as loud as the point of view from Soujourner Truth because she actually had to go through it.  They did not like the taxes that slavery caused, so I guess it is not really the exact same concept.



"Sojourner Truth's Aint I a Woman Speech!" Women Writers: A Zine. Web. 13 Feb. 2012. 

Reflection- Swing Low Sweet Chariot

The song Swing Low Sweet Chariot is a very sad song that was sung in the cotton fields by the slaves before the late eighteenth century.  This song is about the chariot of God and the heavens coming down and saving the slaves from their horrible lives on the plantations.  The slaves sang many songs in their times on the plantations for many reasons.  First of all, the songs told the stories of what the slaves were going through and all of their hopes and dreams to one day escape and live in a happier place.  Because they did not have much access to writing tools or any sort of printing and/or publishing, they past down their stories through the songs to the coming generations.  "The brightest that I can say, coming for to carry me home, when Jesus washed my sins away, coming for to carry me home" (NetHymnal).  In all honesty, there are not many ways I can link the song Sweet Low Sweet Chariot to the writings and philosophies of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau, but I think that there is one key connection.  Both Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau did not like the idea of slavery at all.  Neither of them liked their government in general and were very opinionated about it, but slavery and taxes were the main thing that these men strongly disliked.  The statement I am about to make may be the most obvious, ignorant thing I could ever possibly say in a blog post...The slaves obviously did not want to be slaves and wanted to be freed and emancipated.  The link between the ideas of the slaves and Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau is quite clearly the dislike for anything that has to do with the enslavement of African Americans, or any human for that matter since not all of them were African American.  I am starting to like Emerson and Thoreau because they did not like slavery, which is something I oppose strongly.
 NetHymnal. Web. 09 Feb. 2012.

Reflection- Cavalry Crossing a Ford

For this blog, I read Cavalry Crossing a Ford by Walt Whitman.  This was a very short story and I am honestly not for sure how this has to do with the writing of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau.  I am not sure if I analyzed this correctly, but I feel like this could have several ways to interpret this.  When I read Cavalry Crossing a Ford, it took me a couple times reading it to figure out that it was talking about soldiers and a troop.  As of right now, the soldiers are just riding their horses by a creek or a river.  Their horses are resting and getting a drink.  I think they are just kind of chilling out in between battles, or maybe they are taking their time to the next battle.  If I had to guess, I would say this might be during the Civil War time because it talks about the colors of the flags.  "Scarlet and blue and snowy white."  I used this to make an extremely vague, but what I think is a very valid comparison, to the writings and philosophies of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau.  Both Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau had very strong opinions of their government.  They did not like taxes, and were extremely opposed to the idea of slavery.  The product of the Civil War was the emancipation of slaves.  Here is the thought process I used to link these very different things together: The soldiers in the passage from Walt Whitman were fighting in the Civil War--they were Confederates so they wanted to keep slavery, but that is beside the point--, which in turn ended slavery, which was exactly what Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau wanted to happen. I want to hank you for reading this to the end and not giving up on my lame ideas on this subject, which may or may not have been relevant or even made sense.

"118. Cavalry Crossing a Ford. Whitman, Walt. 1900. Leaves of Grass." Bartleby.com: Great Books Online -- Quotes, Poems, Novels, Classics and Hundreds More. Web. 09 Feb. 2012.

Reflection- The Gettysburg Address

The Gettysburg Address is such a moving speech.  Spoken by Abraham Lincoln in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania on November 19th, 1863, it was written to honor all of the soldiers who had fought and died during the gruesome battle.  The battle at Gettysburg during the Civil War was one of the worst in America's history.  During this speech, Abraham Lincoln makes the statement, "The world will little note, nor long remember what he say here, but it can never forget what they did here" (Lincoln).  Two years after this speech, Senator Charles Sumner made a comment on the Gettysburg Address that I found very comical, but also extremely fitting: "The world noted what he said, and will never cease to remember it.  The battle itself was less important than the speech" ("Gettysburg Address").  The soldiers fighting in the Civil War were not so much fighting for their freedom, as they had in the Revolutionary War, but more for their liberty and actually keeping it in the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave.  I think that Abraham Lincoln made the Gettysburg Address to honor the brave soldiers fighting for their country, but also for the cause itself.  He was speaking for the patriotism of America because he felt very strongly that it was important in keeping our country together.  Abraham Lincoln's main goal for the Civil War was to fix the Union (not so much getting rid of slavery, as everyone thinks it is).  He wanted to keep the Union together so we could literally be the UNITED States of America.  I think his philosophies can definitely be related to those of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau because they were all big fans of America and the idea of liberty.  Sure, Abraham Lincoln's number one goal was not to abolish slavery like it was for Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau, but he wanted the country to come together as one.  The similarities we can see are their love for their country and the desire to make it better with freedom and liberty.


"The Gettysburg Address by Abraham Lincoln." NetINS Showcase. Web. 07 Feb. 2012.

Reflection- The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro

From the writing of Frederick Douglass' The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro, the reader can really see his point of view of our founding fathers and our nation in general.  Frederick Douglass starts out to say that he can not view the men who started this country "with less than admiration" (Douglass).  As he goes on, he makes the point to give his reasons as to why he does not like the Fourth of July.  He speaks for the slaves, and says that the country had never looked so hideous except for this day.  I think he is saying that the Fourth of July was the day that "Americans" got their freedom and independence, but the "Americans" only included white people.  African Americans and slaves had absolutely no part in this new freedom.  He is asking if a man has his right to liberty, and if so, why should that exclude slaves?  The argument can be made that African Americans were robbed of their liberty and freedom because they were not thought of when America gained its independence from Britain.  The thoughts of Frederick Douglass can be compared to those of Henry David Thoreau.  Henry David Thoreau did not like his government at all.  He, along with Frederick Douglass, did not want and did not understand slavery.  He thought the government was being too aggressive in the Mexican-American war when they should have been more passive, and that slavery caused too many taxes to be put on the people.  Frederick Douglass and Henry David Thoreau can be compared by their thoughts and beliefs on slavery.  Obviously, neither of them liked it.  Frederick Douglass, having been a slave himself, did not understand why slaves were still being deprived of their freedom by a country who lived by the motto that everyone deserved liberty.  Henry Thoreau did not have the exact same point of view because he was white and clearly had never been a slave, but he still believed the act to be atrocious and blamed the government.


"Africans in America/Part 4/Frederick Douglass Speech." PBS: Public Broadcasting Service. Web. 07 Feb. 2012.