It’s 10:09 A.M. on Memorial Day and I have to write my last AP English blog. Instead of feeling jubilant about the end of my blogging career, I’m actually a bit…surprised that it’s over. I don’t feel sad….but I’m definitely not happy. My senior year has changed course many times and for many different reasons—quitting my job, multiple breakups, Covid-19, and now a seemingly never-ending battle with my own digestive system—which seem to make what was always my favorite thing, school, harder. Not because I don’t like remote learning, or I’ve contracted “senioritis,” but because all these distractions take me away from all the people that make my life so much more interesting, whether physically keeping everyone at home for safety reasons or my own tendency to become trapped in my own head for days on end. And I know saying school is my favorite thing gets me an eye roll, and I can hear my audience (because I know exactly who reads my ramblings) saying something along the lines of “What are you talking about? School is your favorite thing?! You read like two of the books—I couldn’t get you to do any homework—you literally wrote ONE blog for Wuthering Heights—you have no work ethic—you’re such a loser!” While I can’t think of a smug response to give this man, even after he’s given me so much (including many smug responses), I can offer a glimmer of hope. A Visit from the Goon Squad was so fantastic that I enjoyed reading it. And not just enjoyed reading the novel itself—I actually finished the book a few days before I even had to, solely so I could move on to a book Reagan gave me earlier in the year (not the weird Amish fanfic, The Secret History, by Donna Tartt)—because I genuinely want to read now. Maybe not in the ways that I’m supposed to, where I must read all of the classics, build a shelf to store hundreds of books in my lifetime, quote my favorite lines to friends at cocktail parties, no. I love reading because I finally figured out not only the time of day I should read (at night when my borderline-autistic brain actually shuts the fuck up), but the types of novels (contemporary) I enjoy. But this final blog, as with all my other blogs, doesn’t need to have this solemn undertone. I don’t need to be selfish here on this last one and talk all about me. As with all my other blogs, this one is about a book: how I perceive the book, why I perceive it this way, and maybe a witty line at the end that leaves the reader thinking damn, that last line was pretty slick.

A Visit from the Goon Squad is not your typical novel. Through its thirteen chapters, it switches perspective thirteen times—and not only does it switch perspective with each change in chapter, but it occasionally even changes the medium for which the perspective is given, making us read fifty pages of weird dialogue boxes and organizational charts straight from Microsoft Excel. Although I’m not really a fan of the change in mediums, the changing of perspectives is what makes this novel so much fun. It easily captured my attention as I saw characters like Scotty from the perspective of his young friend, his successful middle aged friend, and his own mind. To say the constant switching of perspectives is refreshing is like saying the sky is blue or the grass is green, so I won’t spend too much time gushing over the narrative technique. Sure, swapping from character to character—and time period to time period—provides a lot of fun, but what makes this a piece of literature and not just my mom’s scrapbook? Jennifer Egan gives us lots of life lessons through her story, but only obvious ones, like control your horniness around actresses and don’t cheat on your wife and yes, stealing makes even kleptomaniacs feel guilty or even don’t smoke four blunts while on MDMA and then go swimming. And then I realized this isn’t a book about life lessons at all. It’s no mistake I’m not finding anything profound, there simply isn’t anything profound. Egan isn’t trying to tell us how to live our lives at all—weird, considering she’s an author. But if Egan is writing this vast book of short stories with different narrators, but the point of swapping perspectives is not to provide different lessons, then why? Why do I have to read from Scotty’s jagermeister-infested mind and hear him out when he slaps a goddamn wet fish onto his friend’s desk? This is a question I, as the author, won’t try to answer with complete confidence. I can only give my readers what I think about a particular topic, but I don’t want to sound—as I often do—like I’m some sort of authority on the novel. So I’ll start my hypothesis with an ‘I believe’, even though I’m not supposed to, because it will weaken my argument and allow for other people to continue with their interpretations too. I’ll start…I believe A Visit from the Goon Squad to be the quintessential novel in understanding the human experience to the fullest and in the most detail. 

But what does such a loaded statement even mean? 

Let’s break it down. Quintessential, basically meaning the best, or highest class, means I’m saying this is the best novel. The best novel in “understanding the human experience to the fullest” and “in the most detail.” The human experience, how we live our day-to-day, is a lot more than just the actions we take and the things we perceive. Unless my reader believes everyone is an NPC (Non-playable character, gamer lingo that buys into the interpretation of one sole consciousness on the entire planet, that sole consciousness being me. Or you. Whichever one of us is actually a real person, I guess), then the human experience must include the perceptions of others. Empathy. Putting oneself into the shoes of another in an attempt to better understand their emotions, thoughts, and actions. Although this isn’t a new idea, I sometimes forget how everyone actually works. It can come off like we’re alone in the world sometimes, but then someone says something profound we’ve never thought of, seeming to prove that they’ve been consciously thinking just like we have. A Visit from the Goon Squad embodies this idea by giving us such detailed accounts of its characters and their inner thoughts and feelings that we almost feel we understand the things they represent. We can’t truly know what divorce is like until we experience it, but I can see how it has completely warped the brain of a once “cool guy” Scotty into believing the government is out to get him, and constantly thinking about not thinking about his ex-wife. This and the other twelve characters give a glimpse into completely different lives, from unhappily married art professor to child with two loving parents and an autistic brother. In getting what feel like real accounts from these different characters, A Visit from the Goon Squad allows for a much better understanding of the world around us.

“Oh so you’re saying you liked the novel because of the characters. What a boring, safe thesis that adds absolutely nothing to the discussion. I’m giving you a 15/25 on this one, which will mean a B+ in AP English, you’re such a loser.”

Well not necessarily, because it’s more about how the characters give a better understanding of the situations they’re a part of. Like Sasha being a kleptomaniac.

“You already used that example.”

Okay well like Sasha’s deceased best friend, Rob, who won’t admit he kinda liked kissing his friend (a man), but also suffers from serious social anxiety and depression. How would I know what any of these things are like if I don’t know what it feels like to enjoy kissing boys, be constantly socially anxious, or have depressive episodes that make me want to take my own life?

“Read a book on it.”

I did.

I won’t attempt to soften the blow: I’m still on chapter 9 of Wuthering Heights. What’s interesting isn’t my lack of work ethic—something I could attribute to covid, a lack of self discipline, and a complete shift in needed preparation for the upcoming AP tests—no, these extraordinary conditions aren’t interesting at all, despite everyone constantly talking about them. What I do find interesting is that regardless of what chapter I’m on (nine…I’m on chapter nine, couldn’t let anyone forget), I’ve actually enjoyed it so far. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not a fan of where this book seems to be going: another tale of revenge that’s rather outdated and doesn’t bring any questions to the table. What I am actually a fan of is 

1.) how it’s written and 

2.) how the audience learns information about Heathcliff

Now I could be totally wrong about where I think Wuthering Heights is going, and maybe it even brings something for me to chew on after I finish reading it (which at this pace, would be in about two years). Because I don’t want a substanceless blog, I mentioned the two things I’ve really enjoyed so far with some eye-popping numerics to let you know that, yes, I actually do have some sort of a positive opinion and will be presenting it as best I can. Let’s talk about those opinions.

When I say I enjoy how Wuthering Heights is written, I really mean I enjoy how well written it truly is. Emily Bronte has a great vocabulary and a knack for using the right words, but more specifically, is really talented at character building and scene setting. Not only were the descriptions of physical places like Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange vivid, but the atmosphere of things like conversations or rooms was almost palpable. The introductory conversation with Heathcliff and Lockwood comes to mind, where not only do we see Lockwood’s egoism and Heathcliff’s gruffness, we see how these two starkly contrasted personalities clash. I could feel how uncomfortable the setting and conversations made Lockwood feel, without the need for Bronte to just tell me his inner thoughts with the pen.

I just praised Bronte for not using the pen to tell all the characters innermost thoughts, and I’m going to do it again and tenfold for how the story is told in Wuthering Heights. So far, Wuthering Heights has been mostly a recount of Heathcliff’s early life, told almost entirely from Nelly’s perspective in a single night in Lockwood’s room. This means that everything we’re reading is essentially dialogue, yet I applaud how it doesn’t feel like dialogue. Not to say everything that’s being said couldn’t believably come from Nelly’s mouth, no, I mean that usually dialogue is pervasive. When everything is written in a spoken-word style, it often drops the formality of the story and thus the ability for the author to show off his vocabulary. With better vocabulary comes a more distinct picture, and if Wuthering Heights is a picture it’s more of a Michaelangelo than a Claude Monet, so to speak. Which is interesting—nothing says the style of Michaelangelo is better than Monet, it’s simply refreshing to see in contrast to what we normally see (read).

Love. Writing about love usually sucks, and I’ll be the first to admit that. Usually books that broach the topic of love do it in a very routine, simplified way. Oh, a character and another character from similar circumstances meet and slowly fall for eachother. Oh wow, they overcame an obstacle and became closer because of it. And would you look at that, they just got married and the story is over! This gets really—REALLY—tedious after awhile, which is probably why we never choose to write about love or offer our thoughts on it ourselves. It’s already been done so many times, another opinion, film, even book surely couldn’t bring anything new to the table. Here’s where Exit West comes in, Moshin Hamid’s attempt at putting a spin on something that normally, frankly, sucks. How did he do?

It’s probably evident I’m going to praise this book for painting a different picture, so if you want a TL;DR: Hamid accomplishes a differing perspective by making love do something it isn’t supposed to do—fade. Strangely enough, Hamid makes love fade not only with time, but with locations, customs, and even intimate events. 

When Saeed and Nadia begin their journey, their love is strong. Yet Saeed finds interest in Nadia only after noticing her, an event that takes weeks of them being in the same classroom to even happen. This already takes the usual narrative and flips it on it’s head, as usually characters meet, make eye contact, and that’s that. Here, Hamid does an incredible job with realism (something he later throws out with magic doors) and modernization. Most people can sympathize with this unlikely pairing because in a busy world like we have today, people are looking at their phones or too focussed on their jobs to have that instantaneous, fairy tale-like connection. 

As the journey continues, Saeed and Nadia start to have relationship troubles. Instead of walking through the door and embracing each other and freedom in Greece, Saeed quickly pulls away from Nadia upon their arrival. Despite going through traumatic event after traumatic event, such as running from a group of men in the dark, overcoming the perilous journey after perilous journey, Saeed and Nadia do the opposite of what they’re supposed to do: they drift apart. At the end of the novel, they don’t even bother keeping track of one another for fifty years! 

What’s interesting in Exit West isn’t the journey itself, but how it affects the relationship between Saeed and Nadia. By defying the usual love story, Hamid brings up an interesting question: does love have bounds? It seems the answer is yes, it does, as Saeed and Nadia quickly learn that when put in a different setting, with different people, they aren’t the same couple they had been previously. 

Well I was going to write a blog about marriage and its different definitions for different people….but after scrolling through my reader page, I thought the idea too unoriginal. Instead, I’ll save the 4 or so paragraphs I wrote about marriage and slap them on to the end of this substanceless blog to give it more…substance. Actually, there’s plenty of substance already. 

Holy shit there’s a large volume (mL) of substances in Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? I thought today I’d write a blog out to the livers of our main characters, who endured much more hardship throughout the play than any of the characters themselves. One could argue that the ability to not have children—something most couples take for granted—is much more a hardship than some alcohol. Those people would be wrong. I mean hey, if George and Martha had a kid, they wouldn’t even be able to drink so much. Martha especially, that kid would definitely be at risk for FAS. FAS is Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. Anyway, after losing my train of thought, I’ll just give you my thesis: the livers of our main characters are damn impressive. Like…defying science impressive. 

The play opens with our main characters, George and Martha, and later Nick and Honey leaving one party to have a little get-together. We can assume all of them have been drinking, especially George and Martha, who are already drunk. A conservative estimate here—in terms of BAC—would be somewhere in the 0.08-0.12 range. There seems to be a lack of inhibition among George and Martha, who willingly scream at each other in front of their guests, and Martha particularly seems at least tipsy. 

Once the characters all arrive at George and Martha’s abode, the already-hurting livers are in for a special treat—more alcohol! Specifically, hard liquor. Yeah, they’re fucked. So basically everyone in the room is drinking something in the ballpark of 40%-60% alcohol content, which gets anyone fucked up pretty quick. If we do an estimate post-first-drink, we’re looking at about 0.15 BAC. Thank god Nick and Martha are on the thicker side, or they’d be blacking out already. It’s actually quite impressive the dialogue here is so coherent, and the words being spoken actually SOUND like real words (I know this because I actually watched the first part of the play). Shoutout to our underrated heroes yet again, the livers, who are allowing for the story to actually develop.

Moving on, Nick and George keep drinking. BAC probably still chilling in the 0.15-0.16 range, as they’ve talked, sweat, and most importantly—they’ve been away from the party where they were originally drinking. Martha and Honey decide to take a break from drinking (why?) and go spill tea upstairs. Upon their (re)arrival, Martha and Honey engage in some more heavy drinking with the boys. Now, I’m no doctor, but I do know that Honey is like fifty pounds less than anyone else here. When is she gonna black out?

Predictably, this is when Honey throws up. Considering she’s probably blowing a 0.2 now, this is a pretty mild reaction (we know she’s 0.2 because this is where movement, even walking, requires what I like to call ‘foreign aid’). After receiving foreign aid from Martha, Honey stops drinking (why?), yet Nick and George are still sipping a third drink and Martha asks for a third drink. BAC around 0.2 now for them as well? 

Honey seems to quickly go back to drinking after throwing up (puke and rally baby), as she does a toast for her fellow drinking buddies while screaming ‘VIOLENCE, VIOLENCE’ like a wicked witch. This is a decision she soon will regret, as pretty soon she’s literally lying on the bathroom floor blacked out. So it finally happened. 

The other three, Martha, George, and Nick, continue drinking in Honey’s absence. It’s tough to even estimate the BAC at this point, but because none of them black out or even puke, I’m guessing it never quite gets past that 0.2 level, which to be fair is pretty Chadly of them to do. Surprisingly, this isn’t a play set at Ohio University, where people blow 0.2 before they go to class. 

What was the point of me writing this? I’m not entirely sure. I just thought that maybe it would be interesting, but after spending time on it, I’m not so sure about even that. Just know that the true heroes of this play are the livers of Nick, Martha, and George, who endure so much fucking alcohol yet keep their persons’ relatively cognitively…available? I’m not sure. 

A quick glance at the flawed but believable characters in Little Fires Everywhere—their faults—because I’m a pessimist. Lightning round!

Mrs. Richardson—Bitch. Well…sort of. She’s kind of like my mom. Helicopter parent, always needing to know what’s going on and bitching if she doesn’t. Unlike my mother, however, Mrs. Richardson is so incredibly quick to judge. What? No, don’t give me that “b-but it was her environment growing up in Shaker Heights! She could totally be a good person! What about her final regrets?” You are so dumb. Izzy, her own child, was able to see everything wrong with this perfectly planned society, yet Elena, with almost three times as much life experience, was unable to see it. 

Izzy Richardson—Brainded. Oh wow! I want to inspire change! I know, I’ll vandalize the locks in my school to make my teacher who is mean piss herself. This is totally intentional and planned, and I totally knew she would be the one most affected by my misdemeanor. Okay but side note from this pessimistic character I’m playing, this was kinda lame by Celeste Ng. If you want the “evil” teacher to be punished, do it in a way where she is personally targeted and that’s somewhat believable. I loved how Little Fires Everywhere was believable. Except when it wasn’t.

Lexie Richardson—A.K.A. Stacy, Brittany, or Tiffany. Can be used interchangeably. Lexie is actually a character with more depth than a Stacy, Brittany, or Tiffany, but falls into the same traps that they do. Cares way too much about the opinions of others without realizing it, thinks she has it all figured out. Pretty basic! Not a lot here. Not much to talk about. I guess the depth comes from her bad experiences, like the abortion, so I’m not sure I can give her a lot of credit. 

Trip Richardson—A.K.A. Chad, Brad, or Brock. Can be used interchangeably. Trip is an absolute unit. Athletic. Jawline. He even has black Nike tube socks that turn girls like Pearl on. Trip is kinda like Lexie in how there isn’t a lot here for me to critique, other than him being a total Chad. Low-hanging fruit.

Moody Richardson—Beta. 

Mr. Richardson—Boring. Strikes me as the dad who grills but isn’t particularly good at it, just does it to keep up with the dad across the street who grills and has a slightly hotter wife. Hard to imagine that in this instance as Mrs. Richardson is being played by Reese Witherspoon in the new Hulu series. She’s hot.

Mia Warren—Total virgin. Well actually, wait no I’m not going there. Mia is the least easy to criticize. I genuinely don’t know what I dislike about her or if I even dislike her. Let me think…nah, she’s cool.

Pearl—Gonna have to go with the Mia thing here and say that I honestly don’t hate Pearl. I do think she is a little bit too horny though and I do not support the fetishism of feet.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m just messing around here. I actually loved Little Firees Everywhere, even more than Atonement, and I think I’d give it a solid 47/50 on my previously defined objective literature scale. The characters, although sometimes really easy to hate, were so human. More human than any book we’ve read so far in AP, and I think Celeste Ng did a really great job in that regard.

One of my favorite shows of all time, The Boondocks, crosses the line way too much in terms of humor. Jokes vary from shootouts and robberies performed by cartoon black kids to making fun of people for voting for Obama because he’s black. It features a mainly privileged African American cast and does a great job of using satire to poke fun at modern issues in the black community. Not to mention its frequent use of the dreaded N-word. It cracks my shit up. 

The first five or so chapters of Song of Solomon caught my attention for these very same things I enjoyed (and continue to enjoy) in The Boondocks. I genuinely found this book, written over 40 years ago, hilarious. At first. I’m not sure if the decrease in humor was intentional or if the initial humor was just unintentional, but either way, I wasn’t laughing by the time the actual plot set in motion. Maybe it was because the book was delving into serious topics for serious people, in which case I should’ve bowed my head at the door as a non-serious person interested in non-serious topics. 

Toni Morrison’s exploration of thematic topics is really hard to follow as a non-close reader and non-serious person, but I did my best to understand the themes she was trying to discuss. Immediately I understood the feelings of dissociation with reality and with society, Milkman’s struggle to find his identity in a world full of people telling him different things. Milkman’s flimsy personality—his flimsy identity—was evident. Other than this, however, I had a really tough time trying to understand what Morrison was trying to say. Does she simply want to give a fictional yet accurate recount of African American life in the 1900s? I doubt it would be that simple, no writer’s aim is only to stay in the literal realm. Did she want to draw attention to the unfair treatment of women in relationships? I mean yeah, Milkman was a pretty shitty dude but I doubt something basic like treating women right is what Morrison wants me to understand. Maybe it’s about racism. Lol no, that’s too easy of an answer.

I think the most profound inkling I received from this book was the message of anti-materialism. Throughout the novel characters find things they love and become married to different ideas or feelings that are weak and without true meaning. Well, kind of. I mean Macon loves being a greedy bastard but he doesn’t have a problem with being one. His trouble comes from his horny wife, which is a different problem altogether. 

Anyway, back to my original narrative (I’m moving in a circle…this is called a circular narrative. like the one employed in Song of Solomon. Get it? I’m sensing a bonus point opportunity) about the Boondocks. The humor in that show is so funny, and Song of Solomon’s initial chapters reminded me of it. In the spirit of making me laugh, I went through and saved all my favorite lines from the beginning of the novel, you know, when it was actually funny and not about history racism relationships love and greed. 

• “Freddie, however, interpreted her look as simple shame, but that didn’t stop him from grinning. Have mercy. I be damn.” So Ruth gets caught being super horny with her way-too-old son and yeah, it’s hilarious. Not only the act she gets caught in, breastfeeding her four year old son, but Freddie’s reaction. It’s like he doesn’t know if he should be turned on or reporting her to the authorities.
• “I want to fuck! Send me up somebody to fuck! Hear me? Send me up somebody, I tell ya, or I’ma blow my brains out!” There are many different ways to turn a woman on: you can meet the love of your life and subsequently fuck the love of your life, you can pay a prostitute, or maybe just do a one night thing. Hell, you can even look for a fuck buddy. Threatening to kill yourself is probably the most desperate of these choices, but I respect the lengths at which Porter is willing to go just to tap some ass. 
• “Do it have to be a woman? Do it got to be human? Do it got to be alive?” Pretty self explanatory, Porter is so drunk that the people around his home are trying to get him to fuck whatever they can instead of an actual woman. In doing so they hit all the different sins one can commit: homosexuality, bestiality, even necrophilia. Interestingly homosexuality is okay now, with bestiality on the rise too. Maybe these people were on to something.
• “And you, you baby-dicked baboon!” Just a classic small dick joke. 
• “General Lee was all right by me…Finest general I even knew. Even his balls was tasty.” Okay literally what the fuck. I don’t know if I’m missing the context with poor comprehension but it sounds to me like Macon is making the case that General Lee has tasty balls, a hot-take I was never expecting to hear from a black man about a confederate army general.
• “Milkman was twenty-two then and since he had been fucking for six years, some of them with the same woman, he’d begun to see his mother in a new light.” Making the reason Milkman see his mom in a new light about him having sex with various women and not about him growing up is so funny. 
• “Sleeping with Hagar had made him generous. Or so he thought. Wide-spirited. Or so he imagined.” It’s just post-nut clarity, bro. 
• “I ended up telling him that nothing could be nastier than delivering his own daughter’s baby.” A conversation that I’m sure was not awkward in the slightest and definitely shouldn’t be a conversation. I may be wrong here but I’m pretty sure delivering your own daughter’s baby would be pretty weird. Maybe.
• “And she had his fingers in her mouth.” Yeah okay what the fuck.
• “He hit her. I hit him. That’s tough.” Yeah bro I beat the shit out of my dad, but he started it. Bro… that’s sick. Let me know next time he swings first so I can join you, sounds like a great fuckin’ time. 

Today I am going to embark where no man has gone before. Because Atonement is one of Mr. Wasowski’s top five novels, I am going to simplify his opinion into being wrong or right based on a 50 point system that takes into account five major functions of a good book: syntax, plot, characters, themes, and personal enjoyment. Because of the obvious objectivity on display, especially in regards to the “personal enjoyment” category, there will be no room for debate—this “opinion” is purely objective. Let’s begin. 

Syntax—10/10

It’s the most boring category so let’s get it out of the way. Ian McEwan’s writing style is truly gripping. I honestly don’t care enough about syntax, being that it’s syntax, to give any examples of it, however, I will say that even reading the somewhat boring descriptions of the Tallis household was interesting simply because of how well it flowed. Compound that with the style of narration McEwan employs and the reader is now in for random jabs or foreshadowing that intertwine so well with the main blocks of text that a reader could easily gloss over them. So was McEwan’s writing style perfect? Is it worthy of the highest literary mark, a 10/10 from an AP English student (with a 90.0 A- in the class)? Yes. 

Plot—9/10

The plot of Atonement is pretty solid after page…100? I’m not sure. The inklings of actual conflict are present pretty early on with scenes like the fountain scene between Robbie and Cecilia or the weird/rapey Lola chocolate feeding session with Paul Marshall. What I’m trying to say is, although beautifully written, the exposition lasted a little longer than I was hoping for. I mean basically 25% of the novel was descriptions of various characters and easing the reader into understanding the inner workings of the Tallis’s, which I felt was a bit much. After the dragging exposition, Briony reads the dreaded cunt letter and we have ourselves a story. From here, Atonement pulls the reader in like a Heroin addiction—full throttle. Every waking moment will have readers who are invested in the novel thinking about the next time they get to shoot up, I mean read. Well, because it’s required reading, the psychological aspect of addiction probably can’t be applied but you get the point. It’s gripping. I’m feeling a light to decent 9. 

Characters—10/10

While others probably disagree, this is the main pull for me in Atonement—Ian McEwan made some really believable characters. Every character is flawed. Every character has some sort of passion or motivation. Everyone serves a purpose—the bag boy who never speaks? Used as a scapegoat to the reader for the rape of Lola. The bag boy’s dad who never speaks? Used as a point of conflict when he dies. The random friend of Leon? A rapist. It’s like McEwan knowingly took the challenge of having ‘too many’ characters and ran with it. It’s a giant middle finger to conventional storytelling and yet it works. If you know me you know I love giant middle fingers and hate conventional storytelling. 10/10.

Themes—8/10

Atonement brings interesting questions to the table, and as a Thanksgiving-table philosopher, I do enjoy a good theme or two. Not only does Atonement raise questions about guilt and forgiveness, but also about the human experience—can we truly grasp another’s perception? Well yeah dumbass, but the fun is in the followup—how? McEwan introduces the idea of sharing ideas through storytelling, an idea ironically echoed in another coming of age story, Life of Pi. There were some early lines thrown into the exposition that had me questioning the fabric of my existence but besides those, the thematic ideas were pretty standard. Not too existential yet somehow profound, Atonement does a good job of keeping it simple, stupid. The lack of complexity does detract from the score, however, so for ‘Themes’ Atonement will receive an 8/10. Nobody really cares though. 

Personal Enjoyment—8/10

I don’t really like reading, but reading Atonement was alright. There isn’t much too my score here—normally I give reading a 2/10 but here it was bearable. When taking into account my perspective and thoughts on reading previously, I realize that the average reader would find reading average—a 5/10. Well if reading’s “average” for me is 3 points lower than it is for the average reader, I need to balance my average feelings towards reading Atonement with a +3, thus netting us an 8/10. Math.

With a final score of 45/50, simplified to a 9/10, or 90.0%, or an A-, Atonement is, for someone who doesn’t like books, a good book. This is objective because I used numbers to represent my feelings and therefore from now on Atonement will be recognized as a 45/50, simplified to a 9/10, or 90.0%, or an A- in the AP English hall of fame. Objectively.

Let me be clear: I didn’t read Kite Runner. I had (have) no intentions of reading Kite Runner. Let me also say that from my limited understanding of the novel, Kite Runner is an example of fluff writing designed purely for entertainment and not discussion. If you’re okay with me having an opinion of a novel I haven’t technically read, then continue. If not—you’re wrong—but you don’t have to read my blog. 

It’s obvious Kite Runner is a fluff novel from a simple Google search. Googling “Kite Runner” nets a high rating on Goodreads (a sign the book isn’t required reading at most high schools), a whopping 92% approval rating by Google users (a sign the book was engaging, not always a bad thing), and, the kicker: a critic’s review that the novel will encourage “teens” to view the world and “goodness” in new ways. If this isn’t evidence enough, the top 3 reviews, also included on the initial Google search, are the most poorly written pieces of garbage I have ever read. In the first, a mom gives her five favorite thematic topics from the book and how they made her cry. It goes on to give an astonishingly unprofound message for a conclusion. I didn’t read the second review…well, fully, because it included the word “elucidating” in the first line and I knew it would be pretentious and talk up the novel as a literary masterpiece. The third review includes horrible grammar, punctuation, and even a #thekiterunner tag in it. 

It isn’t that people can’t enjoy Kite Runner for what it is, just don’t put it in the same class as novels that genuinely raise questions in unexplored territories. Kite Runner is simply…simple. It isn’t bad by any means—my fellow classmates seemed rather engaged throughout the various discussions had in class. The problem is what these discussions often centered around: plot points, symbols, essentially any way to score points by speaking was rewarded with…points. This isn’t bad until you realize our class is an AP course and novels are just long-winded stories with deeply rooted opinions held by, or not held by, the author. What is the opinion being expressed by Khaled Hosseini? Speak up when your friends are in trouble? Don’t believe your father is infallible? These groundbreaking “opinions” seem geared towards teenagers and it’s because of this obvious target audience that the book doesn’t hold much literary merit. 

I would like to reiterate, however, that I don’t dislike Kite Runner. By using my sarcastic persona and poking fun at Kite Runner, I seem like an asshole, but I’m really not. I’m glad my classmates were able to find a novel that made them want to read. That’s more than I can say. I just question the inclusion of Kite Runner considering the vast pool of books most of us haven’t read, and the questions they raise, and how we could discuss or write about them …juxtaposed to Kite Runner, a novel with about as many deep philosophical questions as a piece of toast. 

Nora Helmer is an object. There, I said it. Women are objects…sometimes. To certain people. Like Torvald Helmer, for example. 

A Doll’s House, a groundbreaking work by Henrik Ibsen, known as “the Big Daddy of theatrical realism” on Shmoop, explores the life of Nora Helmer—a married woman with seemingly the worst husband on the planet. I say seemingly not to belittle his horrible, possessive nature, but rather to explore the psychology behind it. To the female audience, this may come as a shock, but Torvald Helmer is just a more apparent version of the inner feelings of a large group of men. No, this doesn’t mean I or most others hold his patriarchal—and rather sickening—views on women. I’m simply saying that maybe his way of thinking is more biological than the average reader may know.

Throwing it back to prehistoric times, men were the primary meat-winners. This isn’t a sex joke, but rather a knock on the hunter-gatherer way of living: it requires physical prowess that frankly many women don’t possess. No, this doesn’t mean I wouldn’t get my ass clapped in a fight with Amanda Nunes, but rather that generally, men were more physically capable of killing an animal with their bare hands—or a rock—than women. Anyway, this inherent physical ability caused men to be the primary meat-winners (again, not a sex joke) who were completely depended on for survival. In this need for survival, women were essentially objects for men to keep alive, like a dog, cat, or pet tarantula. This dependence on men from prehistoric times caused, through evolution, a horrible effect: toxically possessive men in modern times. 

But instead of jumping to modern times, let’s instead look at 1879 in Norway (this is the setting of A Doll’s House, not a random time and place I pulled out of my ass). Women are still dependent on men for meat-winning (which is now termed breadwinning) but why? By this time, women can work, yet only about 15% of them actually had jobs outside of the home. Women are still thrown into the role of dependence, but are perfectly capable of being valuable in a now-capitalist market economy. Yet men, with their possessive and egotistic nature, keep them in the home. Women are so used to this by now they might as well just concede…so generally, they do. Nora’s attitude before ending her relationship with Torvald is one of ditzy happiness. Nora is a total airhead—she can think of no better thing to do than spend Torvald’s money, set up a beautiful Christmas tree, or be Torvald’s lark (ew). She is Torvald’s object of obsession and possession yet is perfectly happy as just that—an object. 

Being an object does get rather boring, historically and for Nora, so eventually both society as a whole and Nora moved away from this possessive attitude. Now, women are commonly in the workforce, commonly breadwinners, and usually (well, sometimes) don’t date assholes who treat them as objects, just as Nora did in 1879. What’s important to understand is the psychology on both sides hasn’t necessarily changed. Most women still want to be showered with attention, something simply unrealistic to expect of a significant other. Even more egregious, however, is the inherent possessiveness of women hasn’t left either. Jealousy permeates men who watch their girlfriends go to someone else, even months after a breakup. Some men are incredibly controlling, not allowing their significant other to mingle with other males for fear of abandonment. Even worse are men like Torvald who expect Nora to, instead of be Nora, be Torvald’s version of Nora. 

Society may have moved away from the outward oppressive nature women once faced, but it still lingers in relationships and it’s paramount that those in relationships realize these evolutionary tendencies and move away from them to experience unadulterated love.

“Pray God defend me! A little thing 

would make me tell them how much I lack of a 

Man.”

I know starting my blog with a penis joke is stereotypical, especially for me. Trust me, there is a point. Although veiled as a comedy, Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night raises significant questions about the nature of gender. In the above quotation, Viola believes she will lose her bout with Sir Andrew simply because of her lack of a phallic member. Viola Assumes confidence, strength, and bravery are solely for the male sex. Yet in the context of a comedy, Shakespeare seems to be making the opposite assertion. Maybe gender is a bit more complicated than male or female, and maybe categorically placing unique individuals into these two very distinct boxes simplifies the issue. 

The issue of gender is often simplified to the point male or female. Shakespeare seems to disagree with this notion by giving power to the eunuch, Cesario, who is actually Viola, who would’ve been played by a man in the play’s original adaptation. Wow. That’s a lot to unpack so let me take it a bit slower: Shakespeare had female roles played by men in his various plays of the 17th century. This is explained by the role of the female in those times, yet is oddly counterintuitive when considering the complex oppression of women. Women couldn’t perform on stage until the restoration in 1660, so Shakespeare was forced to have men play the roles of women. Men masquerading as women on stage actually allowed for Shakespeare to add more social commentary into his plays, such as Twelfth Night.

In Twelfth Night, Viola disguises herself as a eunuch, Cesario, in order to secure a position within the Duke’s court. After settling into her position, and finding herself in love with the Duke, this male role hinders her ability to establish a sexual relationship with the Duke. Alright, now that the boring plot summary is out of the way, I can make my main point: this simply isn’t true. If a good reader reads between the lines, specifically the conversations between Cesario and the Duke, homoeroticism jumps off the page. Shakespeare adds this underlying homoerototicism to begin the construction of his claim that gender is not simply male or female. The Duke continuously compliments the feminine voice and features of the other man on stage, Cesario. This probably made the more traditional audience members a little uncomfortable back in the 1600s…just like it does now in 2019. Anyway, the Duke seems fascinated by Cesario because of his feminine features and voice despite his “male” gender-themed name tag. This is interesting because it provides a concrete example to the male/female labelers of four centuries ago…and those of 2019. How does one put a eunuch, with objectively “female” features, into the male or female box? 

The answer you should be coming to is “you can’t.” Yes, purely based on biology, there are males and females based on their individual genitalia. But who bases any of their ideas on a borderline fake science like biology? Males and females refer to sex anyway, not gender. So what is gender? A societal construct? An attempt to categorize for convenience? A way to establish general likes and dislikes between opposite sexes? The answer, as always, is a resounding “yes.”