Communication

Communication is overlooked, but people being able to communicate effectively is necessary to carry out the thoughts and emotions of people. Without communication people wouldn’t be able to get their true feelings across to one another which in turn can lead to confusion and misunderstanding. The way of communication has changed over the years with technology and people don’t even know how to speak in public anymore. They’re so tuned into talking over a computer screen or a phone that it has changed the means of communication.

Communication in relationships is very important, it exchanges information in the form of ideas, wants, desires, feelings, and much more. Incomplete or stopped communication can create an argument in the relationship. In the short story “Hills like White Elephants” by Ernest Hemingway shows us that if you don’t communicate with each other in a relationship mishaps can happen “I know. But if i do it will be nice again if I say things are like white elephants, and you’ll like it?” (Hemingway) That quote shows that if they weren’t to talk about her getting an abortion it could change the rest of their lives having a baby they didn’t want to have. They never once mention an abortion, but they hint at abortion when the man says, “It’s really an awfully simple operation, Jig.”(Hemingway)

Miss-communication is the biggest breakdown of relationships, body language plays a role to because if you cant communicate with each other people will give body languages  to ensure the person knows there feelings of the situation. Guys are very big for not communicating, they will get in a fight with there girlfriend and just brush it off or try and leave it alone. Overall communication is a huge part of the way people live and makes it able for people to come together as a group and produce ideas and creativity.

 

Reference:

Hemingway, Ernest. “Hills like White Elephants”

Porter, Katherine. “Rope”

Heart of Darkness: Thank god this book is finished

Heart of Darkness  is a novella written by Joseph Conrad. He is an Englishman who takes an across seas assignment from a Belgian trading company as a river-boat captain in Africa. The story centres on Marlow, who narrates most of the book. This novella puts life into a whole different perspective and makes you look deeper into the meaning of life. Joseph Conrad’s purpose in writing his novella Heart of Darkness was to expose the evil within humanity, and how it has corrupted the people that think there doing good but there acts are justified as evil. Civilization battles everyday with good vs. evil. “A haze rested on the low shores that ran out to sea in vanishing flatness. The air was dark above Gravesend, and farther back still seemed condensed into a mournful gloom, brooding motionless over the biggest, and the greatest, town on earth.” (Conrad, pg.4) However this is only the beginning of the novella the evil is already being struck out.

Conrad’s protagonist, Marlow, travels at along the coast of the Congo to meet Mr. Kurtz, the epitome of humanities inner evil. Upon arrival of the ivory extraction company’s third station, Marlow witnesses how the evil has “taken [Mr. Kurtz], loved him, embraced him, got into his veins, consumed his flesh, and sealed his soul” (Conrad, p.205). The evil has pushed Kurtz to look deeper into the ivory shipment and shocked him as to what he sees. Which is just like a tobacco company, the make their products knowing that it will hurt people but all they want is the money and the feeling of power all in there hands; knowing that they can achieve all this through an addictive product that will most likely never be taken of the market. “Most people who become smokers start in their teens. Tobacco companies are desperate to get teens hooked; as hundreds of thousands of adult smokers die off and quit, tobacco companies need teens to start smoking, so the tobacco companies can stay in business. Teens need to know how tobacco companies are targeting them, so they can fight back” (2011). It’s just how Joseph Conrad is portraying this novella to us; we don’t know what the evil is among us, and that everybody has evil within them no matter how good they may be. Wal-Mart, one of the world’s largest money makers, is known for taking advantage of poverty stricken people in many countries, like China because they have no human rights there so they can put people to work for very low wages which is almost like slavery.

People that have been caught in tragedies across the world are all hit by the inner evil that promoted these tragedies. The rebels across Africa that take over small villages and kill many innocent people and ruin their homes are all paralyzed by the evil these people portray, all these deaths are all because people want power. Power brings out the evil in everybody, if you give someone the power over a group of students there whole personality can change over the matter of seconds and the power will bring out the evil within them. “I raised my head. The offing was barred by a black bank of clouds, and the tranquil waterway leading to the uttermost ends of the earth flowed somber under an overcast sky seemed to lead into the heart of an immense darkness.” (Conrad. pg.69)

Joseph Conrad used his talent of writing to show the darkness hidden within us in the novella Heart of Darkness. For anyone to get anything out of this book you have to look deeper than just the reading, you have to take every word for what it is. Starting the novella I found it very difficult to go from page to page not having a clue what is going on but as i kept reading i slowly started seeing more than just words on a page. In the end now when I really think about it this book gave me a whole new perspective on life and I would like to burn this book but I have great respect for Heart of Darkness now.

References:

http://www.lung.ca/protect-protegez/tobacco-tabagisme/facts-faits/teens-ados_e.php

http://www.botar.us/foto/heartofdarkness.jpg

 

Book 1: Is it really worth it?

When I first started reading the novella Heart of Darkness(Conrad) I was in shock at the use of vocabulary, I wasn’t used to the words used. As i read on I felt as if the words were getting harder and harder and most of the vocabulary being used i had to look up in the dictionary so it was very hard for me to stay focused on the main idea of the story, leaving me very confused. But reading on made me really look deeper into the world and gave me a new prespective of what is really going on and people don’t even have an idea what is going on around them. I found as i was reading i would read one page then go back and think twice about it and scan over the page again to really think about what just happened, In a normal book i would read i wouldn’t think twice ever about what just happened. The movie Blood Diamond portrays the same idea what is happening in this novella with diamonds and rings and so on. It realy makes you think that are all these diamonds really worth all these African peoples lives, to me its not worth it, becuase a persons life is more important than a single object worth lots of money. “To rear treasure out of the bowels of the land was their desire with no moral purpose at the back of it than there is in burglars breaking into a safe”(Conrad 177). That quote shows the greadyness of the men in the novella showing they have no purpose of their acts but they want the money and there very sneaky and dark about it. Some of the sentences in part 1 of the book you really have to focus and read it and actually put it through your mind to understand it or you’ll be very confused and lost. As much as I dread reading this book it has really opened my eyes to what is happening around the world and opened up my little box i live in.

Conrad, Joseph. Heart of Darkness

Marlow encounters first section

Marlow encounters his departure on to the boat, there not leaving though hes telling the story of the voyage he was on. After Marlow hears he has gotten the job he travels across the english channel to sign his employment contract he has been offered. Then he begins his story of his events to the congo. He also stops by his aunts house to say goodbye, who expresses her sadness but joy for him during his employment to the company. This first section reveiles to us that Marlow is very intelligiant with maps and as a young boy he learned to read and know them to a very great understanding. As Marlow was waiting in the room of the companies office he looks at a map of Africa which interests him but then the secretary takes him into the inner office to meet with the head of the company where he then signs his contract.