Happy People

Wow! What a brilliant and insightful person Washington was. While reading through his excerpt from Up From Slavery I got the feeling that I would've loved to listen to him speak. From his writing, he comes across as a very humble and genuine person. Because of this, his argument often seems subtle, but it is also very strategic and powerful. 

Just reading about how he grew up, I can't imagine having such a drive for learning. It makes me feel like I under appreciate the opportunities I have in furthering my own education. Learning about how much effort Washington had to put towards even getting to school, I should really start to be more grateful.  

"I have found that the happiest people are those who do the most for others; the most miserable are those who do the least." - Booker T. Washington, Up From Slavery

I love this quote. Imagine how happy people would be if they started to care more for others than themselves! Washington's words remind me of what Paul says in his letter to the Philippians. 

"Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vein conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others." - Philippians 2: 3-4

So perhaps instead of trying to find happiness within ourselves (like so many self-help books suggest) we should simply do good to others and the joy of serving will fill us with inexplicable happiness. :)

Cheating?

We talked in class this week about how Hemingway, along with others, believe that everything Twain wrote after chapter 30 was cheating in terms of what a realism novel should be.  Although I agree that the novel had a very different feel to it during this section, I have a hard time calling it cheating.  Maybe it was Twain's intention all along to make it more of a fantasy novel towards the end.  Either way it was completely up to Twain how he wanted to write the story.  I do find it interesting however that he chose to go this direction with novel.  Going back to the first few chapters, it almost seems like a completely different book.  Maybe Twain's notice at the beginning of the novel was also an indication that he was going to take his readers in a variety of directions.  Perhaps he put it there to prepare us for the less realistic parts of the story and to tell us not to take it too seriously.  

Ok, was anyone else seriously annoyed with Tom and his idiotic plans?  I had such a hard time getting through the last couple chapters cause I just wanted to shake Tom and tell him his ideas were dumb and unnecessary.  I was also a little angry with Huck for just going along with it even though he knew they were terrible plans.  And poor Jim! I would've been so upset with Tom if I was Jim. As likable as Huck is, there are not a lot of good qualities in Tom.  For me at least, he is a hard character to put up with.  Is it bad that I was happy he got shot playing out his senseless plan? 

Probably time to start this...

Well...I have been putting this off long enough.  Since I have never blogged before and would never consider myself a person that would ever blog this could be interesting.  It is required for this class however, so i guess i'll give it a try.  We just finished reading The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn this week. I've never read this novel and i'm not going to lie, I wasn't very excited to read it.  Much to my surprise, however, I actually enjoyed reading about Huck's crazy life.  Twain writes Huck to be such a likable character that its hard not to jump onto the raft with him and Jim as they venture down the river.  

I found it very interesting that Twain took a three year break between writing the first seventeen chapters. To me, the story had a different feel after this lengthy break in writing, although that might just be because I knew he wrote that section at a different time when I read it.  However, I think Twain starts to move away from the realism he had at the beginning of the novel and starts to tell more of a fantasy adventure novel.  I actually enjoyed this section of the book the best probably because I am a fan of fantasy novels.  In my opinion the story started to flow better with chapter 18 as well.  It became easier for me to engage with the characters and events that were happening.