Final Reflection: Icarus Lives! (Bulbous Remix)

Ok, so this post is sort of a catch all for everything else. I haven't talked about the plot much, so let's start with that.

The book opens with a long and annoying introduction about how and why it was written, because that's how you draw people into your story. If I put out an album and the first track was me talking into the mic for 10 minutes about how I sat in my room recording and put up some acoustic foam, nobody would listen to it. So when the story actually starts, Hester is being yelled at for having baby, and is given a letter to wear to show that she had baby without being supposed to baby. Also her husband Chillington is missing for like a chapter but then they find him but don't tell anyone else because reasons. Doug Dimmadome, owner of the Dimmesdale Dimmadome, yells at hester for having baby and tries to get her to say who was dad. She says nothing because snitches get stiches, and later we learn that he was dad. Then Dimmesdale slowly goes crazy because Husband Chipotle says so, and Hester is nice and generally ignored, because theming, and then they finally all meet up and hug it out when meteor shows up to symbolism. Then Hester and Dimmesdale decide to leave and go to Europe and also child now has Dad and Dimmesdale is magically happy. The end. Except it isn't. Chillphin the Husbando learns and gets on the boat and then Dimmesdale dies because plot convenience. Then he also dies because reasons. Then Hester dies because old. Symbolism happens. The end.

The book was dumb and boring and totally not worth reading. It's like watching Titanic, except instead of everyone drowning they just sort of get Deus Ex Machina'd out of the story at the end. I also don't like Titanic. Why did she throw the jewelry into the ocean? What purpose does that have? Also she remarried later on, but then when she dies she and Leonardo Dicaprio are love friends again? What happens to husband? Does he just sort of accept it? Titanic sucks. The Scarlet Letter sucks. All I learned was that the Scarlet Letter sucks and that freud is sort of gross. Also there's a movie called Easy A which is vaguely inspired by the book and has Emma Stone in it. She's nice

Kthxbye.

Responding and reflecting 2: Zyglrox

The book continues to be not good. But that's not important right now because I already made that post.

Something you can learn from the book is to not care what others think. If you're ashamed of who you are, eventually you go deep down the rabbit hole of madness and become an actual insane person. Don't do that.

Critical Lens Experts 2: Have a Blast

So, later in Kilborne's analysis, he starts comparing Dimmesdale to Oedipus. This makes sense from the psychoanalytical standpoint, because Freud liked talking about Oedipus, and Freud is the generic basic entry to psychology. Unfortunately, most scholars agree that Freud was wrong on almost everything, which means that analysis based on him is going to seem weird from the perspective of not living in the 1800s or trying to pass off weird incest fantasies as something everyone has.

There's also some stuff about how feelings become the reality when you lock them up inside for too long but I don't have feelings so I wouldn't know. Basically Dimmesdale has no life because he sits around inside and feels everything. He's like the original neckbeard.

CRITICAL LENS CLOSE READING 2: Ow My Feelings

"Be not silent from any mistaken pity and tenderness for him; for, believe me, Hester, though he were to step down from a high place, and stand there beside thee, on thy pedestal of shame, yet better were it so than to hide a guilty heart through life (3.26)"

Dimmesdale is telling Hester to reveal the name of the child dad, in front of a crowd of people, because he's just a bad guy I guess. But in his speech, he talks about how it's better for the dad to be revealed and share in the shame for adultery. Of course, we find out later in the book that he was dad all along, and should have been played by Bruce Willis in the movie because of how much twist that twist had. 

This can be interpreted as him trying to justify himself in his shame, as he continues to be all mopey about how he was dad throughout the book. If Hester reveals him as Mr. Dad, then he thinks he might be able to be chill about it like she is. But Hester's a nice girl who doesn't need no dad, so she doesn't say anything.

Also, earlier in the chapter, Hester's husband shows up, meaning that the child has a second chance at dad. But because of the shame theme they have to hide his identity so he's stuck being not dad. The child had two chances at dad and both ended with not dad. Now she has zero dad. She's double de-dad-ed and left woefully dadless. That's not really relevant at all, but I thought it was sort of funny.

Responding and Reflecting 1: The Bad Thing

The main thing I learned so far is that I don't like this book. It's boring and drags on and the subject matter is fairly uninteresting. If I wanted to hear about someone getting shunned for their life choices I'd talk to my parents. There's also a lesson in there somewhere about how to express shame, and how outwardly embracing it is better than keeping it bottled up inside forever, but I already do that.

Critical Lens Experts 1: Heavy Heart

Kilborne's analysis of the Scarlet Letter can pretty much be summed up as "Hester displays her shame with pride, negating it. Dimmesdale is ashamed and it stews further". Hester represents social shame, and Dimmesdale represents personal shame. This makes sense, and lines up with my thoughts. Hester displays her letter prominently, despite the negative connotation, while Dimmesdale hides his away to try to avoid it due to his own personal feelings. By displaying her faults, Hester accepts them, while Dimmesdale's own personal shame leads to intense personal struggle.

The rest of it is rambling and shaky connections that could make sense, but seem like overanalyzed coincidence. I don't like when people assume that literally everything has some sort of deep metaphorical context, because it usually doesn't. Hawthorne's lack of dad may have influenced Dimmesdale's shame of not being dad, but when it leads to 10 pages of analysis on the subtle nuances on how it sucks to be not dad, you might be a bit too far down the rabbit hole.

Blog 1: Psychosphere

I chose to read The Scarlet Letter through the psychoanalytical lens, mainly because it's the closest to just reading the book and analyzing it normally. You look at it through the thought process of the author or character which is pretty much just how reading a book works anyway. As this is the only lens I have experience working with, it made the most sense to read with. The other lenses all require you to look at the actions and often thoughts of the characters through the additional lens, which seems redundant when compared to this one. What I hope to get out of this project is a decent grade, and maybe a decent understanding of the book as well.