Do So Directly

"They were sitting at either end of the couch, looking at each other as if some question had been asked, or was in the air, and every vestige of embarrassment was gone."

                                                                            F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby



"Communication is key"- This was the exact phrase passing through my head  as I imaged Gatsby sit with Daisy for the  half hour Nick was not present to watch them exchange feelings and take a 180 degree turn on the mood. But the scene really demonstrates the saying to be quite true. Befor Gatsby is more comfortable with Daisy, they exchanged clumsy, awkward greetings in a way that would make anyone cringe with embarrassment. At one point Gatsby even childishy cries to Nick, regretting his decision to meet with her. It was more than likely he though that Daisy would not reciprocate his feelings, figuring she wanted nothing to do with him. Amazingly enough though, between the time they get together and the time Nick rejoins them, the two speak about- although explicitly unknown to the reader-their past and the feelings held between them. It was not even a long time frame, where the two could have gone back and forth, hinting but never quite actually saying what they intended.

It just goes to show that the more direct one is about a situation, the more likely the truth will spill out, whether it be favorable or not. I have a friend who is especially good at this. Conveniently, it was only just recently I had discussed with her about such a character trait. She's only ever had good things to say about being exact on what she means, instead of beating around the bush, hoping whomever she speaks to can take the hint. It is also something I definitely appreciate about her as well; there are never guessing games. Although it is a hard thing to do, to communicate the honest truth can be the difference between an awkward exchange or the warm remembrance of an awoken past.

Mice Chasing Cats

On the left is the picture corresponding  to chapter three.  The image itself has cats with intimidating faces  (Nazis) standing over a mouse (Vladek the Jew), alluding to all the terrible things to come hence the title name "Prisoner of War."  This is quite opposite the image on the right, a piece of Nazi propaganda, where the Star of David sits on the forehead of a large monstrous Jew munching on who are presumably German people. In this scenario the roles of the Jews and the Nazis are flipped, obviously demonstrating the Nazis' hope of portraying  Jews as evil creatures attempting to destroy the German people or even Germany itself. To the Nazis, Jews were only hurting the country, practically demons seeking Germany's demise-- or at least, this was what the Nazis wanted the German citizens to think.

If you compare the two predators of each picture, they have a much more similar appearance than one might first notice. The "Jew" to the right has sharp teeth and pointed ears much like a cat. He almost appears-animal like as he slowly crushes the people in his jaw. Even more so, the "Jew" has a large broad face like the cats in Spiegelman's drawing, connecting the final dots between the two images. Although the Jews in Nazi propaganda are portrayed as terrible creatures praying on the "good folk" of Germany,  in reality, the Nazis were the monsters praying on the Jews, much like cats on mice. Art Spiegelman chose the cat and mouse for representation to emphasize that it truly was the Jews who had fallen victim to the Nazis, and not vice versa. Much like the Nazi's portrayed Jews as monsters killing Germans, Spiegelman portrays the Nazis as cats hunting Jews, the real predator and the real pray.

Do You Feel It?

Reading Maus was very thought provoking, especially by the way my English class analyzed the way words and images enhance one another and the many ways pictures can be interpreted by their design and visual. I personally have never been good at expressing myself, at least with words anyway. Maybe it’s my lack of vocabulary, or my jumbled thoughts, but getting something to come out right, it can be so hard. Even now, I’m still not sure if this is coming out the way I want it to. Through my many thoughts though, I came to this realization: the difference between words and art is understanding and feeling.

First off, think about music. How does it make you feel when you listen to it? Ok, now stop thinking about that garbage rap or pop music that has a bunch of unnecessary fast words or one single annoying beat. Try youtubing “epic music” or “inspirational music.” How do you feel now? Ok, try “sad music”. Now, “silly music.” What’s the pattern? What are you noticing with every listen? Are you feeling something? Can you explain it? What’s different? Now go to the comments and try to explain it, share the link to what you listened to as well. Do you think the words you used really evoked the emotions felt when listening? For those of you who read this later and see comments, try reading someone’s description and then listen to the music yourself. Was it explained well? Did you feel the way you felt when reading versus listening?

Now consider this: Texting. It is something people do. Every. Single. Day. Not a new concept. But then why are there still misunderstandings, misinterpretations, anger, annoyance over them? Shouldn’t humans have mastered the art of texting by now? I guess not. Still why do these things happen? It is simply the lack of feeling behind them, or the lack of a crucial piece that evokes emotion from the receiver anyway. In person, a conversation has words, voice influx, and facial expressions. These are our tools of persuasion, and the way to arouse something within another. Texting though, it really is just a bunch of words; it misses the mark.

This of course does not mean words do not create feelings, it’s just that they do not always inspire the right emotions for the time, or allow someone to feel what the other felt, just like those in the Holocaust versus those who were not. How can one make them feel what they felt with only words? Sure they understand it, they know it was bad, six million Jews died! But do you feel it-the loss the pain the trauma- do you? To be able to explain something, down to the last detail, is an amazing power, but to actually see it, or hear it, can make it capable of meaning so much more.

 

Here is one of my favorite of the "Epic music" searches, I found it about five years ago actually XD- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WU7SGn0MeP0

I was listening to Revelations by Vlado Hudec while writing this, it's a good song, I recommend giving it a look- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7L8hko4ExU

 

Masking the Unmasked

Never did I ever expect a comic to get extremely deep. Comics are something definitely enjoyed by many, but for the "comical-ness" of it, not the intense-dark-extreme-serious-symbolic-and-so-forth-ness of it. I am of course refering to Art Spiegeman's Maus.


I was reading the second volume casually, snacking on some food, when I turned to the first page of the second chapter and stopped to stare. On this page sits Spiegelman himself as he narrates specific dates and the death of his father. More importantly though, as he does this, he is sitting at his desk on top of countless bodies of dead mice surrounded by flies. The chapter itself is called "Time Flies" and as the flies surround him, dates are given all over the place. The sporadicness of the flies show how jumbled time and events are to Speigelman. When looking at the page more carefully, Spiegelman is wearing a mouse mask over a human face, rather than portraying himself as an actual mouse like the dead bodies. After taking in the shocking image and noticing this detail, I found it extremely thought provoking. Why in fact would Spiegelman separate himself from the dead bodies?

Throughout the first volume masks were most commonly used by the mice to hide their own identity. The mask was meant to resemble hiding who they were for protection, key phrase "who they were." So why would Spiegelman put a mouse mask on himself? After thinking about it for a while, it was this that I thought of: Spiegelman puts the mask on himself, and not on the other mice because he himself is unsure of who the mice, or Jews rather, were and how they lived during the Nazis' reign. Spiegelman throughout the book works hard to understand his father's situation and experiences, but in the end, he can never really know. His own mask represents this attempt to place himself in the Jews shoes.

The real Jews are the real mice, they knew their life, the way they lived, all the pains caused by the Nazis. Spiegelman on the other hand, can only dream of what really happned then, just like the rest of most of the world- Or so I thought. It was then a couple pages later that I realized that someone, a Czech Jew and a survivor of Auschwitz, was also wearing a mask. Why would he also be wearing a mask, if he were to really know the pain and sorrows? Maybe it still has to do with understanding. Although the survivor did in fact experience it, Spiegelman did not, therefore he still cannot realize the true truths behind all that happened, still keeping a true survivor masked away from Spiegelman and his own realizations.

Maybe this is true, but all I honestly know right now is that my head is spinning. This is not what I expected when considering comicbooks. Comical? Haha, very very funny. (That was sarcasm by the way).

Flying Free

"This is Water," it is probably one of the best speeches I've ever heard. Funny enough, one of my favorite things to do is swim. Being in the water gives me time to think, time to relax, a chance to reflect on whatever I need to. When I am in the water, I am free. Water and Wallace's ideas conveyed through his speech are actually the basis for the name of my blog- Two Be Fly 'n Free.

For starters, Fly 'n Free has a double meaning. If you happen to know about swimming, there are four strokes used by swimmers. These are backstroke, breaststroke, butterfly and front crawl, also known as freestyle. I'm sure it is more obvious now that my title comes from the two latter strokes. Of the four, those are my favorite. It just so happens that when you put them together, butterfly and freestyle, you achieve a small phrase that describes the feeling I get whenever I swim, fly 'n free.  But this phrase is not just about swimming, for me, it is also about life.  This is where "Two" and "Be" come in (There is a reason it is "Two" and not "To", but that is for another time).  Why? Because it makes an unfinished sentence: Two Be Fly 'n Free. But how does one fly free exactly anyway? It is explained exactly with Wallace's words. To be free, is to be aware, to be always thinking about more than yourself, and going beyond the "Default- setting" as Wallace puts it. It means exploring and wondering, questioning and learning. To be free is to be enlightened, looking at more than what is just in front of you.

These things are the reason I chose this blog name. It is a place for me to look at the world I live in, marveling at the words, the history, the people around me. It is a place for me, other than the water, to ever finish the sentence "To be flying free"