Being a Good Person

A list of traits a good person would have: Kindness, hardworking, respectful, had their own belief, obeyed authority, helpful.

What it means to be a good person is to be respectful toward others, and to help those in needs. To be a good person is to not be selfish, but do things for others, for the greater good. Being a good person means that you do what you're supposed to do, and not expect anything in return. You do things because you like to do them, not because you were told to do it or were forced to do it. Good people are polite and care about others.

I think some characters in our texts lack the "selfless" trait. I think a lot of the characters are selfish and only really care about what's good for them, rather than seeing the whole picture. Trying to think of every single character that I came across over the course of the semester is tough, but from those that I can remember I think that's the main thing, is that a lot of the characters were too selfish and the story line forced them to be selfish or do things their way rather than doing things for everyone. But most stories go like that.

Antigone

I do think that Antigone is a good person. A character who just lost both of her brothers in war, but only gets to see the one get honored and buried. So she takes it upon herself to defy Creon's orders and bury her brother. This gets her in trouble, but she owns up to trying to bury him, and defends herself, because she knows it was the right thing to do. The people know that she was trying to do the right thing, that's why the people were in support of her. She told Creon to just kill her and get it over with, and she wasn't going to wait, so that's why she took her life I believe. I don't think that takes away from who Antigone is, she was defending her brother, and doing what she knew was right and what she knew the Gods knew was right. In that context, I think that she is a good person, she defended what she believed in and didn't try to run or hide from the consequences. Although she probably had a good chance to live a full life as Creon was going to release her.

Good People

These definitions of being a good person are more between the two characters who are in a relationship. They are two people thought to be in love with each other. However that's where the boy starts to think that he may not be in love with her after all and how would he tell her that as they are expecting a child. The girl believes this guy to be a good person, but she doesn't quite know what he is thinking. That's how the hypocrisy plays into the "good person" definition. Ideally, a good person, when expecting a child with a girl, would be there for her, and wouldn't second guess his feelings after learning of a potential child. At the beginning of the story, they seem inseparable and they he is with her all the way and supportive and will be there for her. Towards the end of the story, he's not sure if he loves her and not sure how he would even tell her. So the story kind of takes a complete 180.

A Good Man is Hard to Find

One of the ideas of being a good person is respect. As the grandmother says "children were more respectful to their native states and their parents and everything else." Having respect for others and being able to show that respect is showing a quality of a good person. The grandmother's definition of good is different from the Misfit's because the grandmother is all about Jesus and praying where the Misfit doesn't really care for that. He comes off at first respecting the old lady, until she tries to get him to pray. I think the grandmother is probably the most good out of all the characters, the way that she explains things and talks to people, she shows interest and respect. What I make from the Misfit's final comment on the grandmother is that he thinks that she lived her life wrong, and if someone would have been there to shoot her every minute of her life, he believes that she's messed up all her life and that she lived her life wrong.

Reading vs. Watching

I went ahead and watched an adaptation of the play "A Midsummer Night's Dream" written by William Shakespeare. The adaptation that I watched was "A Midsummer Night's Rave". This is basically a parody of the original play in which the characters are all at a rave and Oberon turns into your typical club drug dealer and Puck, who is a little more feminine in this parody becomes the middle man meant to deliver this "potion" to the right people. The difference between reading the play and watching the film is that the characters are made out a little different. Oberon doesn't seem like mighty king as he's telling Puck about this potion or drug. Puck seems like a servant, he's a young, weak, somewhat naive person who goes around executing the orders received from Oberon. Also, the characters in the film are portrayed as young, adolescent at best. Whereas when you read the play, and are familiar with Shakespeare's work, you envision these characters as somewhere between 40 and 55 years old. So reading and then watching changes your view on the characters, but at the same time, it has to be acknowledged that this is a parody, not an actually depiction of the play.

Protagoist in A Midsummer Night's Dream

I find the protagonist in this play to be Puck. Puck is basically the servant to Oberon who is the king of the fairies. Puck is the person in charge of retrieving the magical flower in order to get the juice that is to be spread on the eyes of Titania so that she falls in love with the first person she sees when she wakes. Puck is also ordered to spread some on Demetrius' eyelids after he was seen being rude toward Helena. Puck would mess up these orders however and place the juice from the plant on the eyelids of Lysander thinking that he was the man that Oberon was talking about. This leads Lysander to fall in love with Helena, who Demetrius is also in love with. So this introduces the conflict between Demetrius and Lysander. Anyway, Puck has to make things right and fix this which he eventually does by placing more juice on the eyelids on Lysander which then makes him fall in love with Hermia. I believe Puck to be the protagonist because after he's introduced in the play it becomes about him putting the juice from the flower on certain peoples eyelids and he messes that up so it becomes about him making things right again. For me, the play focused more on Puck trying to fulfill the orders of Oberon and then fixing his mistakes which lead me to believe that he is the protagonist.

Connecting the Dots

A connection I can make between "Those Winter Sundays" and "Death of a Salesman" are that both the main characters are hard working men. Both are blue collar, likely middle-class, who go out in the harshest of conditions and work to provide for their families. Both men seem to be after the same thing, and that's the American Dream. I can relate to the man in "Those Winter Sundays" as could many people in this region of the Country because the winters are typically pretty harsh as far as temperature and precipitation go, so having to go out and work in freezing temperatures are normal for most of us in the winter. Another connection I can make with this poem is from another story titled "To Build a Fire" written by Jack London. As this man is on a journey to reach a camp where his friends are and he has to travel through harsh weather conditions to get there. Much as the man in the poem is also in harsh weather conditions trying to make a living for his family. This also ties in with the recent film "The Revenant". As the main character in that film is living and journeying through harsh conditions in the northwest.