(Im)Possibilities

I took a day before posting this in the efforts to try to collect my thoughts in order to display them here cohesively. First, I’d like to thank you all. After undoubtedly an emotion-filled Tuesday night, I was very comforted that this was my first class after the election results. I really believe this class has created a very safe, comforting atmosphere where people feel that they can honestly discuss their opinions without the fear of letting “too much” emotion show- and that is in part facilitated by Beth, but also everyone else in the room contributes to that. I’m sure this is a common thought, but thank you all for letting everyone react however they needed to.

Next, when we were reading in class I kept coming back to this, on page 7:

“Words that seemed at first to bless them; later to confound them; finally to announce that they had lost.”

Continue reading “Using Morrison’s words today”

Hello all,

Thought  I would do a more detailed post after sharing that slam piece.

RUBY

I would like to spend a little bit of time writing about the prominence of the color green in Paradise.  The first page that I noticed it on was page 7, when the men are raiding the Convent.  Morrison wrote: “The man eyes the kitchen sink.  He moves to the long table and lifts the pitcher of milk.  He sniffs it first and then, the pistol in his right hand, he uses his left to raise the pitcher to his mouth, taking such long, measured swallows the milk his half gone before he smells the wintergreen.”  Immediately when I hear the word “wintergreen” I think of mint.  I googled wintergreen to see if it has some sort of medicinal properties, and it does.   Continue reading “Paradise is Going Green”

Hi all,

I know a lot people are trying to stay off of social media today, but if you watch anything at all, I ask you to watch this.

Think about how it connects to Morrison’s writings, or simply just watch because it’s important.

Sending love out to everyone.

-Ari

 

A couple of weeks ago, a friend who is taking a Morrison class at another university sent me a link to this Toni Morrison essay and insisted I read it. At the time, I was eager to do so simply because it was Morrison. Now, though, it seems more relevant than ever. I am sharing the link here with you, and perhaps we can let Morrison guide us through with her words, as we did so in class this week.

Love to you all.

 

Before I start, I want to take a moment to address a very specific group of readers–Every woman, every person of color, every Muslim, every immigrant, every child of immigrants, every member of the LGBTQI+ community:

I’m not going to pretend to know how you feel right now. Continue reading “Staying Focused”

As I’ve been sick at home with Bronchitis, I decided to do some research into other forms of adaptations of Dante and his Divine Comedy, and came across the Danteum. As you’ll see in the many links I’ll have pasted below, the Danteum was Giuseppe Terragni’s proposal to Benito Mussolini’s fascist regime, to build a monument in honor of the Poet in time for the upcoming Esposition of 1942 in Rome. Continue reading “The Danteum”