ROTTEN TO THE CORE?
Even though The Destructors takes place half a century ago in London, the problem it examines is a timeless one. Explore what you know about the prevalence of random violence and vandalism in your own community using the 5W-How questions (Who? What? When? Where? Why? How?).
Without a doubt violence and bandalism are some of the main problems in my community and in my country. Where I leave, Guatemala, we can find it in every single place at any time, even in the early morning you can become a victim of violence. This actions are committed by “mareros” who prefer to gain things by the easy way than by working and they do not care if tehy hurt you or not. They get into your house to steal,assaults in the streets,murders, etc. all these things can be seen, sadly, where I live. This is a problem that is very hard to stop; I truly see no way out from it because every day is worst.
Images of hollowness -of rotting from within- pervade the story. In three paragraphs, cite these images, and discuss how they apply to the house, to Wormsley Common, and even to th
Everything seems to be in a very fragile state, because you can see with what easiness the children can break everything down and destroy years of hard work and effort in constructing and decorating such a house. The wooden floors seem to be so old that they are easily destructed with the help of good will and a hammer.
It has an old architecture style, which is not common form the other houses of the time. But we should also remember that the owner was an interior designer. It is different from the others, unique… but rare and in a strange loneliness.
Most of the house is easy to break and it seems like it is coming down in any unexpected time… just waiting for it to happen. The wooden floors seem to be very old that they are easily taken off or it can be easily cracked.
The other side of the story: In a letter, tell a friend what happened to your house. Include your feelings about the gang and its motives.
Dear Friend:
How are you ? I am sure you are doing good and I wish I could be the same way but I am not. Guess what had happened to me, well to my house! I was coming back home after some relaxing time and when I looked my house it was totally destroyed, not only destroyed but also filled with water; it was terrible. You can imagin ethere was a terrible sensation th eone I experienced when I saw my house. I feel frustrated, sad,mad and I want to cry.
I am so angry right now that I can do anything to those destructors who care nothing about my house, about all the hard work they just destroyed…Well, I would like to tell you how all this ends but it will be another day.
Sincerely,
Paty
There`s no Place Like Home
How do you feel about home? Are you dying to get away, or do you hope you never have to leave?
My home is a very precious place and I love being there, there I feel comfortoable and loved, I feel nice and happy. Sometimes I want to get away because I would like to be more inependent and have my own space were I will be able to put the rules, but other times I feel that my home is my place and I wish I could stay there always and I would never want to leave it because it will be hard and sad to leave all the people with whom you have shared so many things and to leave th eplace were you have grown is not easy. So I think that If I leave it soemday, I will lawyas be coming back.
Whatever your answer, your feelings would probably be different, or sharper, if you were forced out of your homeland and locked up somewhere far away. How would they be affected if danger suddenly loomed, and common sense said “leave now”? (Think of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, and his two fragments Freedom to Breathe and The Bonfire and the Ants).
If I was forced to leave my home I would probably feel very said and without I doubt I will cry inconsolably. I probably think “How could I ever wished to get out of my home?”. It will be very hard and it will take a long time to overcome it; I will be living behind my memories and everything with what I grew up. I would feel such a strong feeling of returning back to it and have again one of the things I loved the most. It would be devastating because I will probably never come back again…
Love, Love, Love
Robert Browning: Mad for love
Briefly summarize the emotions the speaker experiences during Porphyria’s Lover.
The author here, from my point of view, has a mixture of many feelings such as love and fears, but it is hard for him to manage all his emotions correctly. As the poem goes on, he kills the lady and that makes him been able to experience a total different fear that is power. He was again confused after that without knowing how to control or distinguish his feelings, he loves her lady even more now that she is dead.
How do the speaker’s emotions change as the poem progresses?
At the bgining he knows what he is feeling even though he is a bit confused, then he feels desires to kill the lady, he feels he has doen the right thing even though he became sad later….then he felt love for her lady as he admires her while she was dead, later he can not control or clarify his feelings again.
Why do you think the speaker murders his beloved?
I think he was not able to manage or control his emotions and they went out of his hands, also he was like out of his mind, kind of crazy because he killed the lady that he loves, he did not knew how to use his emotions or feelings correctly
Elizabeth Barret Browning: Love without limits
Use words, symbols, sketches, or images to create a collage that summarizes the content of Sonnet 43 and communicates the emotions presented in it.
Do you think that the emotions presented in this sonnet are universal? Why or why not?
Well, this ppoem talks about love and love no matter the religion, the culture, the language, etc. is something that all humans had experience and will continue to experience through their lives. Love does not discriminates, is a pure feeling that can be feel in many was, it has many expressions and finaly love is what makes the world go around so the emotions here are finaly universal because all humans feel all the exisiting amotions not only once but thousands of times along their lives.
The most famous line in Sonnet 43 is “How do I love thee? Let me count the ways”. Why do you think this line is so popular?
Because is a very realistic phrase and at the same is kind of a metaphor I believe. Is popular because it really shows the meaning of love and how it can transform lives. This phrase is also very romantic because, I think that when somebody tells you -let me count the ways in which I love you- shows the inmensity love feeling that that soemone feels for you and that makes us feel importanta and good, is popular because is a very touching phrase.
Shadows of the Past
The past withput a doubt is an important part of a person`s life, the past is what makes us the human being we are today. As you said, it is true that soem people like to remember their past depending on what they are remembering; the past of every people is full with good and bad moments but both are really importnat. n the past I had made lots of mistakes, of course, but there are like three or two the really big ones…those mistakes that if I could leave again I will absolutely erase them from my life because I had receive my “punishment” for commiting them and the lessons were very hard for me because they were not given by my parents but form up above. But in general, when I look back I feel good of what I have been doing.
I do think that I live in the shadow of my past because everything that I doen is in my mind and in other people`s mind and it is not easy to forget. Besides, the past is what makes me who I am today so it is impossible to forget what has make me be myself.
Read Tears, Idle Tears, by Lord Tennyson
How caqn tears be “idle” -can you cry without knowing why?
Of course I can cry without knowing why. I will give you some examples, if someone is depressed she or he tends to cry without a specific reason or when a woman is “in her days” she feels sad with no reason and cries. But you do not only cry because of sadness you can cry because of happiness also, you just see something that is not happening to you, something good, and just start crying and you do not why.
Tears are a way in which you are able to show how you feel about a specific subject or person; it is not good to prevent them from falling, you better let them fall, it does not matter if you do not know why!
What do you think the “divine despair” is in line 2? Could you relate it to Adam and Eve’s fall in Genesis -would that story explain the speaker’s existential sadness?
Does the contradiction in the phrase “Death in Life” (line 20) make sense to you? Explain. What is your response to this line? Have you ever felt this way?
I think that it is a really good line, it means that a person is alive but he or she does not has something that impulses him or her to continue living, it is a person walking with no soul, with and empty soul and body, with no reason to leave and only waiting the time to pass away.
Of course I have felt lonely, desperate, and in one of those moments when you do not find the solution for your problems I even thought that it was not worth to keep on fighting. But I never really felt like if I had an empty soul and I always had something for what to live so I have npot really felt like that exactly.
The Test of Time
Suppose you’re a creator. Among architecture, sculpture, music, and literature, which do you think offers the most promise of an enduring monument? Explain your answer.
Frommy personal point of view, I think architecture is more likely to continue to exist through years and decades; I am a witnes of that afirmation and for sure, you are too. In our days we are able to see many amazing monuments of architecture that were done in the past-pyramids-and through them we have been able to learn about how people felt in those times, what their rituals were, the story of their people, their beliefs, etc.
In the pieces of architecture the essence of a culture or of a specific time will stay forever. Of course, architecture will not continue to esxist through years if the people is not worried about preserving them and treat them carefully to make them last.
Irony is the discrepancy between expectations and reality. Explain the fundamental irony in the sonnet.
Probably nthing is forever, I mean, you can be great and be full of wisdom and greatness…monuments can be built in your honor, but at the end nothing will remain because time destroys almost everything, you, other people, and things are very fragile and nothing is forever. You can be in the present just by uyour memory because the rest will disappear.
Discuss what you think is the speaker’s message about pride -and whether it also applies to artists.
All humans are able to feel price during their lifetime, but we all should know that it can last while we are alive but once our time is done it will dissappear with us. There is no way that your feeling would remain across time or will keep on growing as days pass, it is just a momentary feeling that as everything in life, will come to an end when you die.
Could this poem apply to any contemporary figures who wield political power? Explain.
Well, right now I do not have a particular figure in mind but I think it can be applied to every single person in this world, including political figures. As I have said before, this is a feling that every person will experience sooner or later, some will have more of it and others less but we will feel it. But as the poem says, all comes to an end and people with this feeling can end either in a good or in a bad way but anyhow this poem is applied to all humans, it is a real life poem.
SWEPT AWAY
FREE WRITING
Of course nature has some influence on our moods, as strange as it sounds. The environment in which you are can make you feel happy, sad, worried, tired, even hungry; it really depends. The sounds you hear and the landscapes you see will definitly make you feel different.
I went to a trip and I went to Vail, Colorado but before getting there we waited for about five hours in Dallas and the airplane were we travel to Vail was very old and the pilot was sleepy so I was scared and very nervous. Once we get to Vail and I saw the ice and the snow I felt like…I just can not explain. When we reach the hotel I spend the night outside my room in the place were the pool was and two chairs were there also. I sat down and the climate was cold and everything around was white, it was kind of snowing but after all the stress I had passed before with the package in the airport, etc. I sat down and saw all was white and in silence; it gave me a lot of peace, it was like if I just free my soul and my body from something.
I was sited like for about four hours talking with my cousin, all the environment: the snow the trees and the fresh air made me feel like if I was free of everything, like if tehre was no other moment but that one. It was a relaxed and peaceful sensation the one I had experienced that beautiful nigh.
The Eye of the Beholder
In the poem She Walks in Beauty, by Lord Byron, what in the woman’s appearance does the speaker praise? what conclusions does he draw about her character and personality?
She describes a beautiful woman who has many characteristics, physical characteristics, that match perfectly with her personality. She is a pure, innocent and fragile lady.
This poem has been criticized as sentimental and dependent on clichés. Tell me whether or not you agree and why.
I totally agree, he has that concept of beauty that almost all people has; she only talks about the beauty of the woman and he focus his poem basically on that. He is very direct so you are not able to go deeper into the poem or into the concept of beauty expressed there, you can’t interpret much.
Do you think that inward nature can be revealed by outward appearances? Explain.
Of course yes, I mean the kind of person you are is reflected in your gestures, in your words, in your eyes, in everything. You can not hide who you really are, most of the time the eyes are the ones that show who a person really is. By them you can see if a person is evil or good. You can not hide who you are because your appearance are part of you and obviously will be like a mirror of who you are.
Water, Water, Everywhere
He holds him with his glittering eye -
The Wedding-Guest stood still,
And listens like a three years’ child:
The Mariner hath his will.
Is always good to listen to what other poeple has to say because it could be that their experience will help us in a moment of our lifes, sometimes people have good advices that we should listen.
Ah! well-a-day! what evil looks
Had I from old and young!
Instead of the cross, the Albatross
About my neck was hung.”
Some people do bad things and then the guilt they feel is so strong that each day is a turture, but that is the consequence of doing bad actions so there is nothing else they can do but to accept the consequences.
I looked to heaven, and tried to pray;
But or ever a prayer had gusht,
A wicked whisper came and made
My heart as dry as dust.
When you do something wrong you feel like if you had betrayed God, in most of the cases, it feels like if a part of your communication with Him has been damaged and you feel so much guilt that you do not feel the right to ask Him for something or even to talk to Him.
The Power of Imagination
Have you ever felt fear, joy, wonder, or grief because of an animal?
There is one animal in this world that I fear the most, the spider. First of all the are really ugly adn have legs covered by hair, and there eyes, and the way they move and everything about them makes me feel fear and repugnance.
Once I was watching TV with my sister in my room and then she went to the gym, there in the gym she felt something weird in her leg like a “picason” but she did not put attention to it. Later, when she went home, she started feeling her knee and her leg very hot and a part of her leg was red, it was a little part but anyhow she was freaked out. There was a big red spot and around it there were smalerred point, my mom called my neighbor, he is a doctor, and he told her to put hot water in the bite before it weent black because if it did, it would be more serious. It did not had terrible consequences but I hate those animals, they are horrible anyway.
I also have repugnant feelings for worms, escorpions, and “alacranes”
POEM TO MY DOG
Hey you my dear puppy, you are the one that never judge me, always looking at me with the same eyes, between you and I there are no lies. Oh my dear dog, deep in my soul you live, `cause to me only good things you give. You have been my friend during many years, when you go away from my eyes will only fall tears. You are eternal for me no matter what, I will always have present the day you came and change my life.Why do human beings do evil?
All people from the start are good persons with kind souls and thoughts, but later on, circunstances change that kind soul for an evil one. Life and the world are what change a person from good to evil, it all depends in the kind of life you are supposed to live. Sometimes our thirst of ambitions makes us do evil things and harm others;ambition , I think, is the principal cause why people do evil.
Why do evil people sometimes prosper?
Because their thinking is “no matter whom I will harm in my way, I want to reach soemthing and I will not do it in a clear way if it is necessary;the end justify the means.” They do not care if they hurt soemeone in their way of reaching what they want so they do it in a much easier way than the good ones. They have no moral and no conscience.
Why does God allow innocent children to suffer?
This is a really hard question and I question myself the same thing: Why He allows the innocent to suffer while the evil are enjoying? I have no answer for that question, I really do not because I have not find one and is hard for me to understand that.
If you could cry out against an evil of our day -and get people to listen-, which social problem would you choose? Why would you choose it?
I will choose discrimination because for me that is one of the major problems of our society. I would love to make people understand that no one is less than no one no matter the religion, the race, the sex, nationality, if soemone is not very pretty, I mean…Please we are in a very modern world and is SUPID that people keep making others less just because they are different. We all share the same place to live and we need to be tolerant and understand that we are all the same, we are people, and we all can sometime get hurt by discrimination.
What happens to anger that is allowed to grow and fester, anger that is nurtured with our own deceit?
I grows with time ad become even worse, it harms our selves because we have that unconfortable feeling inside us that feels like if we werecarrying something big in our backs. It causes a lot of resentment and later, when you want to express it, it will be worse becacause it has accumulated so more hurful things will come out of you mouth and may want to retract yourself later.
What does confession mean to you?
There are private things that you prefer to keep for yourself and you will tell them only to someone you really trust a friend, a family member, or in another case a priest. You go to confess with the priest when you feel guilty for somethinga nd you need foregiveness, that are confessions for me, telling your private things to soemone else.
What purpose does confession have for the teller and listener?
Well, for the teller is like getting a huge weight off his or her back is like being released from something and for the listener serves to give her or him foregiveness.
Is a listener even necessary?
yes because he is the one that represents Jesus here on Earth therefore he is the only one that can give you a true foregiveness from God and release you from all your sins and purify your soul.
Why do you think the act of confession plays such an important part in law and religion?
In law they are very helpfull and necessary because you are supposed to be telling the truth so the truth will help clarify some case or process and will make it end fair for everybody.
Talking about religion, it is important because you are saying that you are “arrepentida” of the bad things you have done, this is the only way you can purify your soul and be foregiven by God and as a result of it, have a more direct road to heaven.
PERSUASIVE ESSAY
There are a lot of things in this woirld that make me feel unconfortable and I totally disagree with them, It is oviously that with some of them I can not do anything to change them but with others I can. For the things that are not in my possibilites to change there is nothing left but to express myself, to express my discontent, and let people know what I feel and see if they are willing to join what I am feeling and see if they agreee with my thoughts. I think that if you do not express the things that you desagree with and that you can not change is better to say them cause in that way, the weight feels less.
Something that I really disagree with is discrimination, which is an unffair treatment of a person or group because of many different reasons. There could be discrimination becasue of religion, race, sex, nationality, among many other things. It is really ridiculous to think that someone is inferior than you because we are all the same, and fro people that is soemtimes hard to accept.
Lets talk about discrimination because of religion, I really think that everyone has the chance and the liberty to believe in whatever they want to. There is some poeople that believe in two Gods, others that believe in one, and others that believe He does not exist…I mean, when talking about religion no one is ever right or wrong because every person is taught different things in his or her religion and each is very valid. So if people do not share the same religion, they should just give each other the liberty to believe whatever others want and stop judging their beliefs.
There is people that uffer race discriination, specially the black, today not as much as in the past but it still exist toward them and the chinese people. PLEASE, judging someone because of his or her skin color or the way of his or her eyes is the must STUPID thing I ever heard. I fsoemone is black, fr example, it does not matter because there is really nothing wrong with it, it is not the skin color, the eyes, the shape of the head, etc. what makes people valuable, is what they have inside. It can be really interesting being friend of a person from a different race, we would be able to know what their culture is like, we will be able to knwo a bbbit more of an interesting and different thing.
In conclusion, we all inhabit the same place and we all share many things, we need to learn to be tolerant and accept everybody because we-for sure- would not like to suffer discrimination, so do nor make others what you do not want them to make you. I f we learn to accept other people`s religion, culture, race, nationality, etc. many problems could be prevented and our world would be a better place.
