Author Archives: kimberlys

Respondent to: First Readers – Bechdel’s feelings about her dad

As we discussed on Tuesday, Bechdel did not want to accept that maybe her father’s death really was a suicide that had nothing to do with her. She wanted to keep a connection with her father no matter how bad or insignificant it was. In the next three chapters we see this occurring. Bechdel even says they tried to make the other more of what gender they should be instead of focusing on their own. Her father makes her wear a barrette in her hair. He also buys her dresses he wants t her to wear that are feminine. Bechdel tries to suggest to her father of what kind of suits he should wear, for example the blazer that she was looking at in a magazine. In both cases they failed but they still had an odd connection with each other. There is more of a connection seen, however small, between the two of them than any other member of the family. Even her mother is not so connected with the family, seems to be in denial about what is happening to husband and daughter.

Even thought the family is as she says, “…a sham. That our hose was not a real home at all but the simulacrum of one…” (Page 17) she seems to have some sort of contentment with the relationship she has with her father.  Maybe that small connection is something she wants to keep of her father since she seemed to always have a small connection.

-Kimberly S

Searchers: More Uzumaki and a little Santiago

I found a small interview with Junji Ito on youtube and he talks about the manga and the movie Uzumaki a bit as well as a  little bit about his other horror manga.

Also to add to Leon’s link about the Uzumaki movie, here’s a link to a review for the movie. Beware: there are images from the movie and some are a little graphic.

Junji Ito interview

Uzumaki

As for Wilfred Santiago, I found his official site if anyone is interested. You do have to click around a little as when you first get to the site it’s blank.  Although there doesn’t seem to be much on the site.

Wilfred Santiago

First Readers – Persepolis and Bonds

After reading the first part of Persepolis, the think that stood out to me the most was the bonds that Marji had with each of the people she knew. The bonds with her friends were like most children friendships: if you agree with each other then you friends. The bonds with her her family were of course stronger but the bond that stood out to me was her bond with her uncle Anoosh. This bond looked to me like the typical favorite niece with her favorite uncle bond but then I noticed that she was more interested in her uncle then her father. If you look at the cover of the book, when Marji is looking up at her family she’s looking at her uncle and not her father. Her uncle has had adventures and can tell cool stories while her father was a plain father that wasn’t cool. Marji even told her friends about the stories Anoosh told the show her friends how cool he was. This bond of theirs was so close that she was the last person he talked to in the prison.

I guess the bonds were prominent to me since I have some close bonds with own family. So far in the novel no matter how bad things got the family bonds kept everyone together. At this point in the novel I think Marji’s bonds are still tentative and I’m wondering what will happen to those bonds.. With the exception of Anoosh it does not look as if she takes any of the bond that she has seriously. My question to the responders is about the bonds in general. What do you think that about the bonds between Marji and her family or friends? Good? Bad? Happy? Finicky? Ironclad? Just naming a few things to get you started.

Searchers: Nazi Concentration Camps

After reading Maus II, I thought thought about when I visited the Holocaust Museum. The first link is from the US Holocaust Memorial Museum gives a brief overview of what the Nazis tried to do before the camps were used. there are also many links to various parts of the site and also interviews with the survivors.

http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10005144

This second link I found searching google and it has a picture like of the entrance to the camps like in the last pages of Maus I. at the bottom of this link there is another link that shows an article about Auschwitz name change.

http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/31

On a lighter note, I found that the clash between Spiegelman and Spielberg was interesting and I found in google books a the part where Spiegelman commented about this part in his life.

http://books.google.com/books?id=uhlOpk8bGoEC&pg=PA72&lpg=PA72&dq=art+spiegelman+steven+spielberg+maus+tails&source=bl&ots=n1fIzC-g5p&sig=7rcoASRM8JZuU8hPIV3ptror4YQ&hl=en&ei=wbDKSo3UDpXdlAfO09SSAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4#v=onepage&q=&f=false

First Reader (Group 3) : A Look at Laurie

When reading The Watchmen, the thing that jumped out at me was that Laurie (the Silk Spectre) was everywhere, both physically and emotionally. In the physical sense she was in various places. She was in New York, then she went to Mars with Jon (Mr. Manhattan). Emotionally, she could not keep herself together. She had just left Jon and she goes to Dan (Nite Owl) and sleeps with him then goes to Mars with Jon as soon as he shows up again. All the while trying to figure out what she wants. I think a reason why she is everywhere is because when she was growing up she could not be herself. She was groomed to follow her mother’s footsteps even though she did not want to.

Since Laurie was unable to choose want she wanted to do when she was growing up, she does almost anything she wants now that the Keene Act forced her to retire. She choose to stay with Jon. She choose to break up with him. She choose to go to Dan and many more choices thereafter. Even though she makes all these choices, they seem to lead her to trouble. To me it almost seems as if she can’t make a decision on her own without getting into some sort of emotional trouble. She’s a thirty-five year old woman and I see a teenager that thinks she can do anything but pays the price for it. As I said before I think the fact that she could not make her own decisions when she was younger effects the way she is now. Now she can make those decisions but they are immature decisions.

-Kimberly Stokes