NRJ #1: Groups/Cliques

As humans, all we every really want is to be a part of something. We each have a desire to be involved with some sort of group because groups give us a sense of connection. Connection fills an emotional gap; it replaces loneliness and allows people to feel like they belong. In Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go groups and cliques are one of the central things that divide and define the characters. Many cliques come about intentionally, one person chooses who is acceptable for the group and who is not, however this is not always the case. Sometimes people are members of a group because they were born into it or because they live in a specific place or have a specific job. The cliques found within Never Let Me Go encompass both of these. There are the broad groups, the clones and the humans, but within these groups there are much smaller ones. There are the carers and the donors, the children and the adults, the students of Hailsham and the students who went to other, more cruel, places.

Ultimately when one is involved with a group of people they have a level of certain level of loyalty to the group. People are not inclined to turn against the place where they belong and the people that they get along with. The protagonist of Never Let Me Go, Kathy, shows her loyalty to the students of Hailsham within the first few pages of the book when she states that “I’m a Hailsham student—which is enough by itself sometimes to get people’s backs up. Kathy H., they say, she gets to pick and chooses her own kind: people from Hailsham, or one of the other privileged estates” (Ishiguro 4). Kathy says that she is making her job as a carer easier in choosing donors that she can relate to and feel for. She is loyal to the group that she belongs to because it brings her comfort while she does her incredibly depressing job of taking care of donors. The students of Hailsham also had cliques in their childhood, like Ruth’s secret guard. Only Ruth could choose the people who were in the secret guard, it was a group that she was in entire control of Kathy addresses this when she recalls “I was never sure in Ruth actually invented the secret guard herself, but there was no doubt she was the leader. There were between six and ten of us, the figure changing whenever Ruth allowed a new member or expelled someone” (Ishiguro 49).

The groups and cliques found within Never Let Me Go essentially serve two purposes. They are proof of the fact that the clones are separate from humans. The students do not realize it at first but they are not normal humans, they were raised for a different and horrific purpose. The clones are not considered normal people, and yet they still have human characteristics. The clones share a common human desire to belong. They group together, divide themselves, and create places and find people that make them feel comfortable. Ultimately, this adds to the tragedy of the story, because it helps the reader understand that the donors, the people who are having their organs harvested while they are still alive, are human beings just like the rest of us. The cliques in the story are a way that the author proves how similar the clones are. The separation between clones and humans is not strong, the clones come from humans and consequently are beings that we can understand, relate to and have sympathy for.



DRJ #4: IV & V

One thing that I saw in Act V that still relates to life today is the way that Laertes and Hamlet responded to Ophelia’s death at her funeral. They did not want to leave her. Their attitudes of unwillingness to let go are not uncommon for their situation. Oddly enough their feelings and actions illustrate the grieving process as it is today. It really goes to show that death and the way that people respond to it does not vary that much.

In both Act IV and Act V it is very obvious that Laertes is quite the opposite of Hamlet. Though Polonius is ultimately the foil to Hamlet in the play, it almost seems as if Laertes is acting in his father’s place in the final acts of the play. As soon as he heard of his father’s death Laertes rushed back. He immediately took action almost without thinking, whereas Hamlet is slow to act. The use of Laertes’ rash behavior and quick action is a way of making clear Hamlet’s more thought out form of problem solving. In actuality the interaction between Hamlet and Laertes in the final acts are rather brief. Laertes’ role in solidifying the thoughtful way that Hamlet acts is something to been seen by the outsider, not the characters of the play.

An interesting theme in both Act IV and Act V is suicide. Ironically, although Hamlet is the one who spends so much time considering death throughout the play, in the end it is the women in his life who end up committing suicide. It can be argued of course, that both women might not have meant to kill themselves. Ophelia might have simply fallen into the water and Gertrude might not have understood what she was drinking, in the context of the play though it does seem logical that their lives were ended by choice, not accident. Ophelia had gone mad, her father was dead and she thought that Hamlet had gone crazy. Live as Ophelia knew it was destroyed and as a result she went insane.  Because Ophelia was very obviously mentally unstable, it is easy to see why she would kill herself. Gertrude’s act of suicide is a bit more thought out and logical. It almost seems as though Gertrude knows what is going to happen next and is trying to spare herself from it. Ophelia was suffering from the aftermath of the destruction of her life, but Gertrude was trying to prevent herself from ever seeing the destruction of hers. It is really interesting that Shakespeare uses this theme at the very end of the play. Suicide is a sign of weakness; it is really the coward’s way out. In a difficult situation the easy thing to do is give up; the hard thing to do is to keep going. So why would Shakespeare want to illustrate the weakness of Ophelia and Gertrude so late in the play? It could be that Shakespeare was not illustrating Ophelia and Gertrude at all but rather he was trying to prove something about Hamlet. Throughout the play Hamlet not only considers suicide but also has the issue of his delay in seeking revenge. Hamlet does not really give a sense of power and strength. But through Ophelia and Gertrude’s act of ultimate weakness we are finally able to witness Hamlet’s strength.

DRJ #3: Hamlet Act III

One situation that really stood out to me in this act was the set up of the play. Hamlets plan mirrors that of a modern day interrogation. The way that Hamlet presents the situation and watched Claudius’ reaction is ultimately the same thing as the integration tactic that detectives use to figure out whether or not a suspect is guilty. Of course Hamlets plan was more visual, Claudius actually saw the play, rather than having it described to him as a scenario or question, but ultimately the idea behind it is the same.   

Hamlet is of course the protagonist of the play, but, on a more centralized level, he is an important character in this particular act. It is in Act III that we find the famous “to be or not to be” speech. Having never read Hamlet before, I have to say that I was surprised to find the speech in such an obscure place. It seems almost like a mistake. However upon closer inspection it is easy to see the significance in its supposed randomness. Through the speech we get a clearer understanding of Hamlets inner though process. The speech seems to be about suicide, this is a slightly confusing concept to grasp at first. If Hamlet wanted to avenge his father’s death, then why would he even consider suicide? Both the subject matter of the speech and the placement of it within the act serve as a window into Hamlet’s character. We see just how often Hamlet contemplates death. I think that the obscurity in the placement of the speech is meant to lead the reader to believe that thoughts like this are a normal thing for Hamlet. In my opinion, the nature of the speech does not necessarily mean that Hamlet was suicidal, but rather that his thoughts of death were so deep  and frequent that they travel past murder and revenge to other forms of death such as the self-inflicted.

One theme that I found particularly prominent in this act was revenge/ forgiveness. This is evident in the scene where Claudius is praying. Essentially this scene has two parts to it. Forgiveness is displayed through Claudius. After the play Claudius is stricken with guilt, it is almost as if he realizes the severity of his actions for the very first time. Claudius acknowledges his feelings and tries desperately to get rid of them through prayer. The odd thing about this is Claudius’ attitude. He understands that he feels guilty and what he did wrong, but it seems as if he is not actually sorry. Claudius wants forgiveness, but he wants it not because he is sorry for what he did, but rather because he wants his feelings of guilt to go away. On the other side of the story we have Hamlet. He is the one that is responsible for the play that made Claudius feel guilty. Hamlet walks past as his uncle is praying. Having already witnessed Claudius’ reaction to the play, Hamlet knows that Claudius is guilty of murdering his father. For a brief second Hamlet considers walking over and killing Claudius but quickly dismisses this thought because if killed during prayer Claudius would go to heaven and Hamlet would not have actually taken revenge. The fact that Hamlet put that much thought into it, even if the thoughts only took a few seconds, shows just how serious he now is about taking revenge. Now that he knows for sure that it was Claudius who murdered his father, Hamlet is not only willing to carry out his father’s wish of taking revenge  he wants it to be perfect, true revenge.   The ironic thing about this scene is that through seeking forgiveness, Claudius is saved from death.

DRJ #2: Act II

The thing that really drew a parallel for me with a situation in my own life in this act was the exchange that Claudius and Gertrude had with Guildenstern and Rosencrantz. The way that Claudius and Gertrude ask them to check on Hamlet and try to make him feel better reminded me of situations that you see with middle school and high school students. Often students will gang up on each other and elect people to fix the problem when another student’s behavior is abnormal. As a mentor, I see it happen all the time. It is interesting to see something so similar occur in two entirely different contexts.

Although she is only in Act II for a very brief period of time, Ophelia’s actions in the act still raise questions. In the previous act Ophelia is very quick to defend Hamlet when talking to her father, but in this act her behavior seems to switch. Ophelia goes running to her father after having been scared by Hamlet showing up in her room while she was sewing. The shift in Ophelia’s attitude seems odd. Why would she tell her father? It makes more sense that she would want to protect Hamlet, not turn him in. It could be said that Ophelia is immature. Her actions seem rash and poorly thought out. Ultimately though, through telling her father about Hamlet’s strange behavior Ophelia proves just how strange Hamlet’s behavior was. If she, the one who should be most concerned for Hamlet’s health and should be the most aware of a problem or switch, thinks that Hamlet has gone mad then it seems likely that he actually has. Shakespeare uses Ophelia in this act to paint a picture of Hamlet and his behavior and to show how well that Hamlet is fooling all of the characters.

Deceit is definitely the most obvious theme of this Act II. Even at the very beginning of the act we see deception through the conversation between Polonius and Reynaldo. Polonius, in a sense, asks Reynaldo to spread rumors about the behavior of Laertes so that Polonius can get information about his son’s actual behavior. In some of the cases in this act, the situation is almost confusing because the true feelings, desires and motives of the characters can get lost in the midst of their actions. Hamlet for example, is acting as if he is crazy. He has not told anyone else of his plan and because of this all of the other characters in the play believe that he has gone mad. Hamlet’s behavior is very convincing, at certain points it is easy for the reader to forget the he is not actually crazy, he is deceiving those around him. The odd thing about the interactions between each of the characters is how common they really are. Their plans to deceive one another are in actuality situations that occur in daily life all of the time. In a group of people, be it family members, friends, coworkers, even complete strangers, it is not at all uncommon for people to lie about others, act differently from how they are feeling, or send others to gather information. It happens. Perhaps Shakespeare was using the deceptive characters for a reason. It could be that through these situations of deceit, Shakespeare was making a statement about human behavior in general and our unfortunate tenancy to manipulate situations in order to get what we want out of someone or something.

Walker Extra Credit

As he watches her slowly make her way down the aisle he is overcome by his feelings for her. He loves her, he wants a better life for her. She looked beautiful in her own way as she walked toward him. Beautiful, but not perfect. Staring at her tired face, he is reminded. Reminded of her and all of the work she has done. He wanted to take that work away, to give her a live that she deserved. His only fear was that it would not be what she wanted.

Hemingway Extra Credit

  As a youth mentor, I sometimes go to summer and winter camps in order to be able to form relationships with students so that they can feel comfortable talking to me and other leaders as well. While camps are amazing experiences that I would not trade for the world, it is sometimes difficult to transition back into life with my family one I get home. Life still goes on while I’m away and it is easy to feel misplaced and left out once I get back home. Camp really helps me to understand Krebs’s feelings. Coming home after being gone for a while can make you feel uncomfortable even around those who you are most comfortable with.

SSRJ #4: Carver

In life, one thing that we all have in common is the search for answers. We want to know why things happen. We want to know what to do. We want to know the future. And, most importantly, we want to know why we don’t know. We all want answers, but our methods of finding them are very different. Some people answer a question through research, others would rather just guess. Some people talk through their answers, others keep their thoughts to themselves. Sometimes circumstances will cause us to change the way that we answer a question or solve a problem. I know that through my own experiences that I respond differently to problems and questions when I am under a lot of stress. As I was reading Raymond Carver’s “Popular Mechanics” I took particular note of the way that the characters were behaving. It seemed to me that the main character’s situation was causing him to react differently. If he had really wanted custody of the baby, I would think that the couple would have discussed the matter before he started to pack up his things. In my opinion the main character’s situation, the taunting from his wife, caused him to behave differently than he would have under more normal circumstances.

In my opinion, the literary element that is most crucial to the story “Popular Mechanics” is irony. The story itself is very short, and the reader does not get much insight into the lives of the characters, but the irony found in the last sentence gives the story the same amount of, if not more, power than a longer, more intricate story. Honestly, I am a bit torn by exactly what the author meant to communicate through the irony. On the one hand the entire point of the story could be very simple. The irony could be found in the fact that both parents wanted custody of the child and their struggle to obtain it is what lead to the unfortunate solution to the problem. This is the obvious way to look at the story, two parents, each fighting desperately for their child until their efforts solve the problem by killing him. This was what I had thought that the author wanted to communicate through the story at first. When I read it a second time a thought occurred to me. Maybe the man did not actually want to keep the baby, maybe he wanted to hurt his wife. She was the one taunting him and telling him to leave, could it be that he wanted revenge? There would really be no better way to get back at the woman than to take away her child. If this is the case, then the point that author is trying to communicate is very different. If the irony is simply that the fight kills the child, then both parents would be equally effected. On the other hand if the man wanting custody of the child was a form of revenge, then emotionally both parents might be affected equally but the death of the child would be more of a lesson for the wife. Ultimately it was her behavior that caused the fight that killed her baby.

The thing that I found most intriguing about the story was the man leaving. I constantly wondered why. What do you think happened? Was it a slow steady build of things that finally sent him over the edge or was it a quick reaction to a one-time argument or problem?