Course Blog

In the short story “Harrison Bergeron”, Kurt Vonnegut describes an America that finally embodies equality in the truest form, where no one person overshadows any other person, and all people who have any additional talents or good looks are stifled by the government’s stringent laws. This reading, both deeply dark and ironically satirical, captures a real-life critique of the core values that America prides itself on – and supposedly carries out in the most effective way – while pointing to the obvious flaws regarding some of these beliefs.

Vonnegut makes his satirical target very clear from the get-go, stating “the year was 2081, and everyone was finally equal […] they were equal every which way. Nobody was better looking than anyone else. Nobody was stronger or quicker than anyone else (1). It seems as though Vonnegut directly responds to the Declaration of Independence that America was founded on, which states that “all men are created equal” – and Vonnegut refutes that by saying that, some 300 years after this document was created, America has finally gotten it right and made everyone equal through extensive trial and error. Vonnegut indirectly reveals his thoughts on total egalitarianism through his tale revolving around Hazel, George and Harrison, pointing out that although an aim for true equality is understandable, a world in which everyone is leveled off under the same conditions could be dangerous. Vonnegut touches on this in the second paragraph, stating, “some things about living still weren’t quite right, though” (1). He starts the second paragraph off with this contradictory statement to undercut the happiness and thrill that one might feel about a place that embodies genuine equality to its most literal sense. The use of the word “though” reveals that, although at surface level, true equality might seem to be an ideal situation, there are severe downfalls to placing everyone on the same playing field in a functioning society.

Vonnegut furthers this outlook in the way he chooses to describe how equality is achieved in this futuristic society. He uses the word “mental handicap” (1) to describe how George, a superior man with above-average intelligence, was handicapped and unable to utilize his natural given talents because of this all-equal society that is America in 2081. He was “required by law to wear it at all times” (1) to ensure that he would never have more intelligence than any other person, namely his wife, Hazel, in this case. Vonnegut’s choice in diction emphasizes the unfair nature of this “handicap” that was mandated by the government and placed on people who were more capable – smarter, prettier, happier, etc. – and further emphasizing the issues with a truly equal society. The word “handicap” has a distinct stigma attached to it that implies a quality that hinders ones success and power to perform basic tasks to the best of one’s ability. By placing a “handicap” on people, like George and the performing ballerinas, the government is disallowing them to utilize their full talents and skills.

Vonnegut’s short story portrays a supposedly ideal culture of equality and balance between all people of society. Vonnegut inserts both his own personal outlook on egalitarianism, as well as the effects he projects would happen should this type of society be implemented. Through directed diction and phrases comparable to historical American documents, Vonnegut displays the problems with true egalitarianism and how that outlook could affect society in the long run.

An interesting “turn” that made an impression on me in Good Bye, Lenin (2004) was the celebration of German unification in the film with aesthetics of cultural liberation. While Alex is trying to distance his mother away from word of the unification, even he is can not help but get swept up in mass celebrations and gatherings. In fact, I counted three “parties” in the film. Alex’s “date” with Lara thrums with energy and extremely “out-there” costumed oddities. In between small-talk with Lara, Alex also narrates his observations on the fluctuating world of Berlin. I blinked though a whirlwind of images: abstract art, scenery, and a bombed-out apartment that looked abandoned since the Second World War. And would you believe it? This party scene is just roughly two minutes and thirty seconds, and I’m being generous by adding the last few beats of the previous scene. Honestly, if I was Wolfgang Becker (The film’s director), I would have been tempted to just cut this whole scene for being so short and out-of-place.  But it has a purpose. Not only for advancing the relationship of Alex and Lara, but highlighting how Berlin is celebrating German unification in the months after the fall of the Berlin wall.

 

So, let’s see how far I can close read into two minutes and thirty seconds: First, Alex’s sarcastic comment that “we finally had our first romantic rendezvous” which does a quick cut to the the loud costumed party has it’s own set of implications that Alex is interesting in flipping the old conventions of a date. He calls it a “rendezvous” not a “date”, implying this was meant to be a private date after meeting in a public place. Alex and Lara try to get away from the music and lights of the party through a series of rapid camera shots. While I’m no expert in cinematography, I can definitely appreciate how the rapid pace of the scene matches the mood of the party. Each member of the band looks unique, as two of them wear different styles of masks and the other appears to be half-naked in body paint. Their appearance is a reminder that neither their music nor their fashion would be allowed under the GDP, and that a gathering of this size would have likely been raided by police. Then there’s the graffiti room. This struck for one as an artist’s expression of how it feels to be bombarded by GDP messages, with the color displaying a polarizing effect on the people. One is either black or white, East or West. The party also gave an impression that these people maybe had little else to do after the government collapsed, much like Author Christian Mackrodt who wrote  Ostkreuz. Coming of Age during the Transition about feeling confused in post-GDP. In a few short months after the wall fell, the creative minds of East Berlin were free to make parties like Alex’s “rendezvous”.

When the Alex and Lara get to the top of the building, they find privacy in a bombed-out apartment that captured my attention. Alex discusses the transition of the city with hope, in that, “The winds of change blew on the ruins of our Republic. Summer came, and Berlin was the most beautiful place on Earth.” (2004) Since the two are in a ruined room with an open wall, the winds literally blew into the ruins. While destroyed, I could also find that this living room  had a pretty 1940’s aesthetic. It is possible it was never changed or demolished since the Fall of Berlin in 1945. The juxtaposition of old with new (the winds of change and the party around them)  in this scene connects especially well to Alex’s new relationship with Lara. I say this because Alex mentions, “We were the center of the world, where things were finally happening. And we went with the flow.”(2004)  This entire comment can be focused on the party, where celebration of unification brought life into parties in East Berlin. The popularity of open air parties meant spaces like this needed to be adapted to make things happen. At the same time, I also believe Alex’s new relationship with Lara felt to him like “the center of the world”, in which he feels fulfillment in his own life was “finally happening”. As a result, this party scene is not only about celebrating liberation and unification, it is about Alex as he discovers bond with Lara.

“The Sea of Sunset” by Emily Dickinson

This is the land the sunset washes,

These are the banks of the Yellow Sea;

Where it rose, or whither it rushes,

These are the western mystery!

Night after night her purple traffic/

Strews the landing with opal bales;

Merchantmen poise upon horizons,

Dip, and vanish with fairy sails.

 

 

I decided to close read a poem by Emily Dickinson called “The Sea of Sunset”. I chose it at random, and I had never read it before. The poem is only eight lines and two stanzas long, but its language is not abrupt or staccato, but flowing and a little flowery. First I read the poem a few times and jotted down notes, then I read Stanley Fish’s article about poetic language from his “Reader-Response Theory” and recorded my thoughts, then I read it out loud and did the same.

My first thought was that the poem has color. I couldn’t read it without seeing the “Yellow Sea” (line 2), “purple traffic” (line 5) or “opal bales” (line 6) in my mind’s eye. The poem reminds me of a fish’s scale, or a beautiful phosphorescent shell. You could probably find both of these items on “The Sea of Sunset”, even though she never explicitly mentions fish or seashells.  Dickinson’s words expand upon themselves in the mind without her having to use more than 8 lines to elaborate on the scene. The colors in the poem are given an ethereal sheen by her word choice, such as “fairy sails” (line 8) and the words “dip, and vanish” in the same line evoke an ephemeral feeling, as though this moment is simultaneously otherworldly and fleeting. This perfect moment on the beach can’t last forever. Even if she hadn’t named the poem “The Sea of Sunset”, I probably would still have pictured sunset as the setting. It’s perfectly evocative of the yellow and purple hues of the poem, the fairy-like fluttering of sails, and the sense that this feeling won’t last, that it will soon be dark.

Even though the language evokes a fairy tale, she uses some particular words that ground the poem in our reality. For example, the speaker says, “merchantmen poise upon horizons” (line 7).  Referring to humans sailing upon this effervescent sea anchors the otherworldly poem to the world in which we live. Additionally, she names the sea “the Yellow Sea” (line 2), capitalizing “Yellow” and “Sea”. If she had not capitalized it, I might have glossed by it as another colorful and picturesque phrase, but since she did choose to capitalize it, she named it. This grounded the scene in real life, even if she did not mean to refer to the actual Yellow Sea. The “real” Yellow Sea is the northern part of the East China Sea. However, I do not believe she meant to refer to this sea, because a couple lines down, the speaker wonders “where it rose, or whither it rushes, These are the western mystery!” (lines 3-4). The word “western” really sticks out to me. This “sea of sunset” could fathomably be anywhere; why is it a western mystery? “Where it rose, or whither it rushes” seems to be questions of origin, how it got there, and how far it flows to. Either the speaker is saying that the sea is itself geographically western, or that the questions of how the sea got there and where it flows to are specifically “western” questions. I’m not sure about which one the speaker means. Additionally, the question of “whither it rushes” forces us as readers to imagine the size of the Sea of Sunset, expanding our minds horizons as we imagine the vast and glittering sea.

After reading the Fish article, I wondered, what poetic qualities does it have? Fish says, “…you know a poem when you see one because its language displays the characteristics that you know to be proper to poems”. Immediately, the punctuation comes to mind. She uses commas and semicolons liberally, as do plenty of poets, but Dickinson specifically uses exclamation points in almost all of her poems, which is not as characteristic of a poem as are commas and semi-colons. The exclamation points give her poems a child-like, straightforward quality. This reminded me of the intentional fallacy. I think poems, by their nature, are probably especially susceptible to the intentional fallacy, because they almost always use “poetic language”, words with multiple meanings, or have meaning hidden in their form. However, I do not find this to be true with Dickinson’s authorship. I could be (and probably am) wrong, but I think a lot of her poetry is straightforward, or about what it seems to be about. After reading the poem out loud, it’s clear that it doesn’t all rhyme perfectly, but I think the length of the poem allows for that.

In the future, I want to examine the significance of the fact that she is a successful American female poet, perhaps in conjunction with Fetterley’s article about American female writers.

In one specific scene near the beginning of the film Alexander is walking with a protest group to promote, “the idea of walking without borders.” The protest group wants East Berlin to be connected with the West. Right from the start of this scene everyone in the crowd with Alex is wearing dark shades of clothing and no one’s shirt or colors seems to stick out to the audience. While Alex is protesting with the large crowd his mother on the other hand is sitting in a cab trying to get to a specific location but is forced to get out of the cab as the protestors and officers have taken up the streets. The protestors start getting more and more angry and things begin to get out of hand. While Alex’s mom gets out of the car, Alex is getting arrested by the police. When Alex sees his mother from across the street in a red and white outfit she immediately faints. Alex tries to help save his mother but the cops drag him into the large vehicle and then the car immediately drives away. Alex is forced to watch his mom lay helplessly there as he drives away into the distance.

This one scene shows an importance of love and how love is portrayed in the film. As the audience I was able to see two different types of love in this scene that was being displayed by Alex’s mother. The reason why Alex’s mom fell into a coma was not only the fact that she did not want to see one of her children being arrested but it was also seeing her country ripping itself apart that sent her over the edge. Alex always saw his mother as being connected with the East Berlin and once East Berlin began to destroy itself from the inside that was when he knew how fragile his mom’s life really was. In my opinion Alex’s mother loved her country dearly and she always tried to remain loyal to East Berlin as that was her home. However, by seeing two of the most precious things in her life being taken away from her all at once she was unable to take it all in at and because of it she fell into a deep coma. This scene is about love because without love in a person’s life, human beings begin to lose strength not only physically but mentally too. Overall, as Alex’s mother dies their country dies with her too.

However, while this scene shows Alex’s mother losing two of the most precious things in her life it does also show a transition of who Alex will love in the future. At the beginning of this protest scene Alex is eating an apple and he begins to choke on it. While he is choking on the apple a woman in the crowd comes up to him and starts patting him intensely on the back. Alex coughs up the apple and is immediately mesmorized by this woman. He essentially is speechless when he sees her. When the protest begins to get more out of hand that is when Alex and Lara are separated from one another. This brief encounter shows a transition of who Alex will begin to spread his love to as his mother’s love slowly dies with the falling of East Berlin.

Louis Althusser’s article, From Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses, argues that ideology is simply a tool that allows individuals to realize their conditions of existence. He states that ideology is an imaginary relationship, meaning that it is not something physical that can be proven, “ideology represents the imaginary relationship of individuals to their real conditions,” (p. 738). Rather, it is something that represents each individual and therefore influences his or her daily lives. This idea can also emphasize the need for and reliance on power dynamics in society.

This idea is represented in society through examples of religion, among other things. However, religion is an appropriate topic to discuss because it conveys relationships of power. The “idea,” as the argument presents, is that man kind can be ruled by the wishes of an unseen power is a belief that goes back to prehistoric times. Human kind gravitates toward power dynamics, and Althusser’s article presents an argument for this. He states that, “God is the imaginary representation of the real king,” (p.739). The key word in this sentence is God, the ideological and mythical being that can hold power over all living things. The idea of a god is completely manmade in an attempt to keep human beings under control and in order. If one does not obey the rules set by this idea of “God,” the repercussions are punishments in the afterlife, which is also imaginary. The bulk of this argument aims to say that God is not an actual being that can physically keep humans in line. Instead, it is something we impose upon ourselves in an attempt to hold onto civilization, as we know it.

Furthermore, Althusser strategically uses the words “imaginary” and “representation” consecutively. The use of imaginary suggests that the concept in question is one that does not exist, or created by human fiction. Representation means that it is something portrayed and physical. By using these two words together, Althusser suggests that God is something manmade and something that may not exist, but it is also something physical in the sense that it is portrayed in art, for example. It also influences a believer’s life, by creating an idea in the individual’s mind that they need to attend church to make this being happy, and to obey a strict set of laws.

The third component of this sentence is the uses of the words “real” and “king.” As opposed to God, who is imaginary, the king is someone who is real and in the flesh; he is someone physical and appointed to a position of power. However, this sentence by Althusser suggests that the king uses god as a way to stay in power and to hold onto it. Not only do these two entities of power exist on their own, they also exist side by side, and depend on one another. A king, during the eighteenth century, was brought to power through a God-given birthright. Without the manifestation of a god, there would be no king, and hence, no ruler.

The idea that a figure of power can influence an individual to honor certain laws is quite evident in this argument. Not only do we honor physical beings, but also we crave order and rule so much that we manifest imaginary beings to keep us in line, and monitor our behaviors. We are good citizens if we go to church regularly and if we obey the laws set by a physical ruler such as a king.

In the film Goodbye Lenin (2004), color symbolizes Germany’s political reality and communicates it to the viewer. When the viewer first meets the grown up son, sleeping in his room, the bedroom windows are shrouded in red cloth that spreads red light throughout the room. This directly relates to communism and East Germany as a police state at that moment in the movie. The red light that permeates the room acts as a visual signal to the viewer that the son remains oppressed by communism, an ironic message considering that when East Germany merges with West Germany, the son is relieved of communism’s pressure institutionally, but domestically he must resume living as a communist subject to comfort his mother. Thus, the son’s bedroom curtains foreshadow the movie’s remaining exploration of the characters’ relation to communism, whether or not it is officially installed in the country’s government.

The color contrast between Germany’s communist and unified state is partly due to logistics and partly functions as a visual communicative device through which the director can inform the viewer that the film’s environment has changed. Logistically, East Germany was not allowed to import goods from other countries, meaning that if East Germany did not make its own Coca Cola, for instance, none would appear on supermarket shelves. This explains the color contrast between the first part of the film, in which East Germany is still a police state, and the second half, in which capitalist, commercial goods begin trickling across East Germany’s borders. The son’s experience shopping at the supermarket provides another example of the film employing color as a signifier of progress (or perhaps a more observational and less biased word is simply “change”). When the son wanders the supermarket aisle, searching for the German pickles his mother craves, the camera ensures that the viewer registers the drastic alteration of the supermarket’s appearance. Where shelves once stood sparsely stocked, the son now finds them brimming with imported food, including pickles from the Netherlands. The variety of colorful labels in front of the viewer’s eyes offers evidence of the notable, daily adjustments East Germans are experiencing – even a mundane activity like going to the supermarket rattles the son.

The Coca Cola sign similarly acts as a color-oriented marker of major shifts in the culture being documented and examined in the film. There is a dramatic clip in which four giant trucks drive by the camera with a whoosh while the camera, and therefore the viewer, stands at eye level. This ensures that the viewer internalizes the feeling of being dwarfed and insignificant among national and governmental shifts. But the red Coca Cola trucks themselves also embody this. When the trucks plow past the camera, the viewer is struck by their number (four Coca Cola trucks in a row is a lot of soda), but also alarmed by the adjustment their eyes must make to digest the bright, deep red in contrast with the grey, rainy, melancholy background. When the Coca Cola sign is hung outside the mother’s window, it divides the party into those who wish to uphold the ruse the son has constructed, and those like his girlfriend, who feel uncomfortable and “creepy” maintaining a pretend past. The red of the Coca Cola sign contrasts so sharply with the grey building from which it hangs that the viewer immediately senses that an element of the environment is awry – the red does not fit with the yellow and brown of the mother’s bedroom, so on a visceral level the viewer registers a problem. And of course there is a problem, because the sign would not have been allowed in the East Germany the mother believes she is recuperating in.

Goodbye Lenin uses color to convey alteration (mostly governmental rather than emotional or mental) to characters and viewers. Prime examples of this are the plethora of Coca Cola signs and labels that pervade the scenery in united Germany, along with the use of red to communicate communism’s continued hold on East Germany. It is interesting that the film uses Coca Cola to signify the defeat of communism, because Coca Cola red and the red the Communist Party employs are almost exactly the same shade (but there remains no room to discuss that here). Still, Goodbye Lenin explores Germany’s communist and unified states, using color to signal the shift.