Image: When I first saw this image, my first thought was amusement at the exaggerated sizes of the buildings in the picture and the confusion of the man in the white coat. However, what made me look at the picture closely is just how the roads and buildings were proportioned in terms of each other.The shorter path leads to the small building, while the longer path leads to what can be assumed as a city. The man is thinking about which path to take. This picture illustrates that the amount of effort he puts in is journey, the man can expect a similar sense of reward.
Verbal Punctum
In English, we often times say words that may initially sound right when said aloud end to be wrong. One of such word that I had this experience with cavalry. Being fascinated by history during my high school career, I no doubt ran into this word several times. I knew how it was spelled, but I, as well as man of my classmates, pronounced the word "calvary," and it wasn't until my senior year that I learned the proper pronunciation. I can not believe someone with m interest in history got this wrong for so long.
Haiku
Since this exercise concerns the mood of our blog, I will explain why I chose an ocean setting for my background. An ocean can symbolize many things for people, whether it a beach vacation or a boat trip across the ocean. The mood I wanted to create, however, was one of serenity and reflection. With most of my blog entries, I try to invoke thinking in other people. One of the images I envision while thinking and reflecting is that of a peaceful ocean, thus a picture of an ocean was an obvious best choice. I choose simple fonts for my blog so that my entries will be easy to read while having a sense of formality and clean writing.
Illumination
An image that lead me to insight back in eighth grade was a mid-semester progress report. Being a student who usually always got straight A's, I was shocked to see that it was mostly straight B's. Wondering how this happened, I came to the realization that my habits of rarely studying in the past were not doing enough for me to get m regular grades as they had in the past. Thus I studied every night for the rest of the semester and by the end of the semester I obtained straight A's again. The insight I gained from the image of my progress report was that no matter how smart or talented we may believe we are, we all need study or practice to uphold our expected standards.
For one of my 3 required posts, I chose to comment on your blog. As you said in your Haiku Design section, it is interesting how the ocean creates a mood of calmness. Many poets have tried to imitate the rhythm, sound, shape, and mood of waves lapping on the shore, and some have come close to doing it justice. I think what Ulmer is trying to get us to understand (in part) is that the poetry does so much, but the picture without word adds something that the verbal description could never accomplish. Nice job. -Trevor
ReplyDeleteI chose to respond to your post as I connected with the image of the man at the crossroads. I feel there are many paths in life to take, but the path you have to work for is the path that will grant you greater rewards. This image is an image to look at when one is lacking motivation. Thank you for reminding me that the effort we put into our life somewhat determines what we get out of it. Great post! - Rebecca Gordon
ReplyDeleteLike your fellow students, I like the mood of your blog and the picture of the two paths. Not only are the paths and the choices they suggest interesting, but I like the very rendering of the artwork. I also appreciate what you said about the infinte possibilites of space. We always, thereby, have more than two choices to make. It is never a matter of either/or but, perhaps,, both/and . . . .
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