Howl—The Movie (Required)

Hey all. As indicated in the title, I'd like to hear from all of you on this one.

Toward the end of the film, James Franco as Allen Ginsberg says, "The poem [Howl] is misinterpreted as a promotion of homosexuality. Actually, it's more of a promotion of frankness about any subject. . . . When a few people are frank about homosexuality in public, it breaks the ice, and then people are free to be frank about anything." How does this statement sound in the context of your recent readings—Emerson and Thoreau? And is this statement consistent with other aspects of American culture, as you understand it?

Thursday Update

For those of you who were there for the full period, this is redundant. If you left early, or if for some reason you need a capsule of our last class, here it is:

We began the "triangular nexus" inquiry, to the extent that we read Crevecoeur's letter, "what is an American" and talked about it. At the time, I had not set the "share" feature correctly and you all could not see the document. It is now posted under "Essential Documents" so that you can (re)read it.

The date of that letter is difficult to determine exactly. Crevecoeur wrote a series of essays including this one starting in 1769 when he operated a farm in New York state. These were eventually published in 1782, bringing the author some fame and celebrity.

We did NOT yet get to look at either PBS clip on YouTube, or get into Whitman. We did however establish Emerson's thirst fot "An American Poet" which is doubtless influenced in some ways by the definition of "American" Crevecoeur put forward. The identification of Walt Whitman as that poet, and an investigation of why, is our next step in our next class (after we do a little peer editing).

Thursday Class Notes

Hi all,

A number of you will be leaving before class ends or will miss the whole day. So I've put links to the two PBS clips on YouTube we will see in class, as well as links to the full text of Leaves of Grass (Whew!), an excerpt from Emerson's essay, The Poet (and a link to the full text) and an excerpt from Crevecoeur's letter in which he defines an American. The triangular nexus of Emerson, Whitman and Crevecoeur is where we'll be by the end of the day today. So if you miss it, the resources are all here for you. We'll be back with more Whitman on Monday. But your homework is to craft the finished first draft of your essay for which the formal topic is also posted here.

Don't forget the option to blog about our Outside experience. Just one so far (Thanks, Callan!)

Outside

Here is an optional invitation to respond to the out-of-the-classroom exercise today. If you have a comment in general, please post what's on you mind. I am wondering specifically how "Nature" seemed to you out there, and in particular what your experience of solitude and quiet was. What came up in connection to Thoreau?