Author Archives: nflores8

OMG Brave New World 1980

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As soon as Brave New World movie from 1980 started I LOVED it! It was exactly how I had pictured it. The fact that they wore uniforms with there cast system was identity and community which is what they live by. The Hatchery was similar to what I thought it would be. I think for it being made in the 80’s and the book being advanced, they did a pretty good job. I could only imagine what could be done with the book if it were to be made today. Yes, it was longer but I think it need to be that way because it needed to show every major detail.

I like how they showed the Thomkin and Linda part even though that wasn’t talked about in detail in the book let alone happen in the very beginning. While I was watching the movie in the beginning I really thought it had jumped to the part where Lelina and Bernard were visiting the Reservation. The Reservation looked similar to how I thought it would just a little more dirty and it was completely different from the World State, unlike the 1998 version.

I did like the fact that they showed how Bernard got too much alcohol while being made in the Hatchery because that showed the possibility of what may have caused him to be so different from everyone else. I think the babies coming out of plastic bags filled with air was funny because it’s supposed to resemble a womb and the babies can also be “aborted” which just means to stop processing it. They showed him being different while he was growing up and in the book they didn’t do that, they just showed him being different as an adult. When Linda finally gave birth to John, he looked like I thought he would and he resembled those in the World State. Bernard as an adult doesn’t look that different. He looks like he got shocked because of the way his hair looks and when he walks he trips which I think is to show he got to much alcohol. He also, looks pale and a little fragile.

John looked different then I expected, I thought he had long hair, he does however, still look more like those in the World State then those in the Reservation.

When he takes them to go meet Linda her reaction was just like I thought it would be. She connected more with Lelina because they were both beta’s. when the come from the reservation to the World State it showed how different John was from Bernard.

This movie had more of the important scenes which I liked because it made more sense it didn’t leave people wondering. I think the party scene where everyone goes to see John they should have gotten dressed up, still with the same idea of sameness but more party like. This scene however does show how everyone truly feels about him, it’s captured perfectly in this part of the movie,which is something the 1998 one doesn’t. The friendship between Helmholtz, Bernard and John is captured very well. When they were discussing the poetry, and Bernard runs out it shows how he’s jealous of their friendship.
The scene with John and Lelina where he is explaining his views on marriage shows the difference between the two worlds. It shows how he feels and how she feels and how the two are nothing alike and neither one of them understand the others views. This isn’t shown in the other movie which I think is what makes the savage such a complex character. When John is talking to Linda on her death bed it shows the bond between a mother and her son, which nobody in the World State has.

I absolutely love the 1980’s version, it showed everything it needed to and went by the book even though it was long. It had the same ending like the book unlike the other movie. I don’t think this movie needed to be remade. The 1998 movie wasn’t worth it, it was worse then the original one. if there was to be a remake done today I think it should follow exactly like this one except the technology would be the only thing I would change and it would make it far better and actually seem to be in the future. For the time period it was made it was ahead of it time I think. I don’t think I would change anything.

Brave New World 1998

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While I was reading Brave New World I pictured it to be different from the movie. The book had a lot of details that made it easier to create imagery. One major difference from my interpretation and the 1998 movie version was the hatchery, I thought it would look like today’s hospitals bright and white but in the movie it was extremely dark. I expected the room to be all white and bright, the test tubes were just how I thought they’d be. The movie was very dark as far as lighting goes, which I thought since “everyone belongs to everyone else,” everything would be out in the open so a lot of light would be needed. The dark light in the movie to me seemed as though they were trying to hide something, whereas, if there were to be more light it would emphasize the “freeness” they claimed to have.

I think Helmholtz not being in the movie wasn’t a good idea, only because it would have been nice to see the bond he had with Bernard and John. The friendship and attachment the three men had to one another would have made the movie stronger. Bernard could have been made to look more of an outcast because I feel as though he blended in with everyone else around him and in the book everyone looked at him because of his weird appearance.  Lenina in the movie looked modern yet plain, in the movie she only wore green but was high fashioned. I think the reason why the director might have done this was to make it more realistic and appealing to the audience so that they might be able to relate. I did like the window’s however, the way one was able to change what they wanted to see based on their mood. Although I did like the windows, I wondered why would they want to see these pleasant images. They live in such a “perfect world” they should want to see it all the time and not see something else. I did like how they showed the conditioning of the kids, which was very similar to how I pictured it to be.

I didn’t understand why the director made a big emphasizes on that one particular child. At one point I thought that was Bernard when he was younger and the movie was him in the future but then I ruled it out. Maybe the director did it to be a cliffhanger and/or to show that there would always be someone different just like Bernard no matter how hard you try not to have someone like him in the society. Also, Linda wasn’t that bad looking, I pictured her to be extremely fat, horrible teeth, her hair I think did look bad in the movie. The reservation looked more like the city, maybe an hour away from the World State, not a helicopter ride away. I pictured to be jungle like, maybe a forest, because I remember the details describing it mentioning a lot of green. Also in a conversation john and Bernard were having in the reservation john pointed to a mountain, and he also talked about learning how to make pottery by a lake which none were shown in the movie. If the director would have depicted the reservation how it was in the movie maybe the differences would have been easier to see to a person who has never read the book. Had I not read the book I would have thought john was just from a low class neighborhood and the World State was a high class neighborhood.

I-330 vs O-90 – Adventure vs Boring Standards

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D-503 cannot live without I-330, but 0-90 is still his. These two characters, I-330 and O-90, are total opposites, which shows what attracts D-503 towards each. His life was like any other ordinary person, regular and according to society, up until he met I-330. Now having met her his life is a complete adventure.

I feel as though before he wasn’t really living, no one in that world was because everyone does the same thing, that’s boring. His relationship with O-90 describes life of the One State, to me it’s as if they embody what a perfect “couple” would be in the One State. O-90 doesn’t seem to be a threat; she basically follows the rules to the t, although she also belongs to R-13. That part of her belonging to both confused me a little because they all know each other. As I read further along it seemed to me as though R-13 has also been in encounter with I-330. The way D-503 describes I-330 is nothing compared to how he would describe O. R-13 having been with someone like I-330, one would think he wouldn’t settle for someone so boring and plain. Being that R-13 and D-503 both share O, I wonder why R didn’t tell D-503 about him being with I-330 in detail, he vaguely told him about it, which I thought wasn’t fair to their friendship or to D-503’s “illness”.

I-330 and D-503 are better then D-503 and O. I follows the rules, D-503 can do that without her, I-330 changes the way D-503 views his society, thus changing the way he’s going about his writing. In the beginning, when D-503 has yet to meet I-330, but is still with O, he is writing for the benefit of the One State as he originally set out to do. Now that he has met I-330, his entries are no longer according to the One State, facts based, it now his feelings and sense of confusion to try to figure things out. I-330 is totally different, something he never knew existed, which is why I feel like he’s intrigued and attracted to her.

With all of these “new things” going on between I-330 and D-503, one thing that confused me was the letter O wrote to D-503 on page 106. She tells him “I cannot live without you- because I love you”(106), I thought love didn’t exist just like hunger didn’t. I’m assuming since love didn’t exist neither does jealousy, which I think is the reason O wrote the letter to D-503 because she is jealous that he’s giving all of his attention to I-330 now. I am also confused about whether or not D-503 and O had a child together, I know she asks him for this favor, and several conversations hint a little of it being true (112) but I’m still not completely sure. I hope he didn’t have a child with her because that would make me a little upset although I don’t know why it would.

Math VS Normality

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In the One State everything is logical, number related. Any problems the One State has can be solved mathematically. D-503 is a mathematician so I guess its only right that the story is told in his eyes.  It probably would have been better off told by someone else because it wouldn’t be biased but after all it is being told based on his thoughts.

“Naturally, having conquered Hunger” (21), I wonder why the ‘h’ in hunger is capitalized. While reading it was said that they no longer have to worry about hunger because mathematically they can produce enough food for everyone in the One State. “Each number has a right to any other number, as to sexual commodity (21), this reminded me of Brave New World, when they say “Everyone belongs to every one else.” The only difference between these two worlds was that in the One State you need to get permission, which are the pink slips, whereas, in the World State you don’t need permission.

In We, I don’t think it said whether the people in the One State are made or born. What I do find strange is that people in the World State were made and yet they still had an identity because they had names. One would assume being made like most things in the world have numbers attached to them for identification. Another question I had while reading is what the letter before the number stands for, like D-503 and I-330. I’m thinking maybe a ranking or job related, because D-503 and I-330 have different jobs in the One State.

“To be original is to be in some way distinct from others. Hence, to be original is to violate equality” (28).  I-330 said this quote, but yet I feel as though she doesn’t believe in this herself. She seems important to the One State because of the strings she’s able to pull. She was able to get D-503 to be at the auditorium, she was able to get him a doctor’s note for not showing up to work, and she seems to know all the right people. For some odd reason, D-503 knows all of this is wrong but he would not tell anyone what is going on. He felt different because of her, I think he felt more alive then ever before; more excited and intrigued then any math problem. He might have felt this way because he has never experienced anything like this before, although I do think his friend R-13 has experienced what it was like to be with I-330. I believe R-13 knows what his friend is going through because he knew he felt “ill” or was troubled by something, and D-503 hinted what it was and R-13 identified with it immediately.

What I want to know is why certain people are helping I-330 with all of this. The doctor for giving them the doctor’s note, the old lady that sits in the sun, why did she let them go into the house, and ‘S’ guy. When ‘S’ tells D-503 that he has an incurable case of ‘soul’, I wonder if the doctor has told this same thing to R-13. ‘S’ said “I’ll tell you in confidence- you are not the only one […] Try to remember-haven’t you noticed anything like it, very much like it, very similar in anyone else?” (91). To me the doctor could be talking about I- 330 or R-13 but why would he tell D-503 without telling him who. As if he didn’t already have enough to worry and think about with all these changes.

 

Ending didn’t meet my expectation

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After finally finishing the book, I found it over all to be disappointing. I felt as though it took forever to get to the point, the chapters in between were pretty good, the last few chapters fell short.

I am very disappointed when Linda dies. I think her death was provoked with all the soma that was being given to her. In my previous blog I spoke about how the doctor moderately told John how it could possibly kill her. I believe she died of an overdose and not of old age or any type of disease, true she didn’t have soma before her return to the New World but she did have the alcohol. To me it seemed the soma gave her the same affects as the alcohol did because she said “Pope! Oh I do so like it, I do”(pg 185) to John. Her death might not have seem to affect the story much because at this point she was always on holiday and no one seemed to pay her any attention. I believe her death is important because I feel it affected John in a very strong way although it might not say that in the story. In the New World death was normal and nothing to be sad about, but where John was from it was a life changing moment. No one had a bond like the one he had with Linda because having a mother wasn’t something someone had.

The stunt the savaged pulled while the workers were about to get soma after their shift was over, to me I think was because of his mothers death. I think he believes that so much soma is what killed her and he wanted to put a stop to it. If Linda were still alive I think she would have been able to stop him, to me she was able to better explain things to him as to why things were the way they were. She did this best because she knew how to compare it to things that he was used to for him to better understand, but she wasn’t there this time to talk him out of it.

The fact the Helmholtz helped “And suddenly there was Helmholtz at his side-‘Good old Helmholtz!’ also punching-‘Men at last!’- and in the interval also throwing the poison out by handfuls through the open window”(pg193), he savage was important, because yes John wasn’t fro this world but it proved that even people who were from this world can have different thoughts and rebel because they aren’t as happy as everyone thinks they should be. I would have thought that Bernard would have helped them instead of being a coward. “’Send me to an island?’ He jumped up, ran across the room, and stood gesticulating in front of the Controller. ’You can’t send me. I haven’t done anything it was the others. I swear it was the others. He pointed accusingly to Helmholtz and the Savage (pg203).The reason I say this is because he was always viewed as an outsider, so maybe he could have used this as a way to get revenge or prove a point to everyone. Another reason as to why I think he should have helped was because he was the one who brought the savage into this New World, so I feel as though he should take some sort of blame, being that the savage isn’t accustomed to what’s right and wrong and because he doesn’t think like the rest do. Helmholtz was his only friend even before his new found popularity, he never judged Bernard, or denied him of a friendship when he was in trouble so for Bernard to throw him under the bus like that shows he was never really his friend to begin with.

I didn’t like the way the story ended John to me was such a strong character and had such strong views that with the right help could have changed the New World for better. I think that instead of Helmholtz leaving to another island he should have went with John only because of the strong friendship they had built. Had they went of together I think they could have made some changes and the story wouldn’t have ended up John’s downfall. I really wonder why Huxley ended the story this way.

Linda vs soma

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These middle chapters are what caught my attention the most because in the beginning I thought the book was rather boring and pointless. Different things caught my attention, how the New World react to Linda and the savage, how would they treat Bernard and Linda for bringing such people into their world, etc.

What I found to be more interesting was how once everyone knew about Linda and her son everyone wanted to only see the savage and not Linda. This bothered me a little more because it wasn’t fair. Through out the whole story being a mom or dad was considered wrong and no such thing was heard of. “Nobody had the smallest desire to see Linda. To say one was a mother-that was a past joke: it was an obscenity”(pg.142). Yes she was a mom but after all she still was one of them but I don’t think anyone in the New World wanted to accept that. “Moreover, she wasn’t a real savage, had been hatched out of a bottle and conditioned like anyone else”(pg142). If I were one of them I would probably have gravitated towards wanting to see her more first only because in a way I might feel more comfortable because she’s the same as I. I say the same in that she was produced the same way, however she did look different, fat, bad skin and no teeth. Maybe trying to understand what happened to her would then ease my curiosity into seeing what the savage was like, but at the same time I can see why everyone wanted to see the savage first, he was totally different from what they were.

It saw in chapter 11 that Linda too had no desire to see anyone, but I think deep down inside it would have made her feel better. She might have been a little jealous of her son I think because of the amount of soma she was taking to escape what was actually going on. “She took as much as twenty grammes a day”(pg143). Maybe she thought after everything she’s been threw she needed that much, since she was deprived of it in her savage life, not realizing taking so much would be a bad thing. She might have thought the risk was worth it because of the way it made her feel. “Which will finish her off in a month or two. One day her respiratory centre will be paralyzed. No more breathing. Finished. And a good thing too, if we could rejuvenate, of course it would be different. But we can’t’(pg143).

Maybe the alphas or who ever was considered important and well educated knew the risks of soma, which is why it’s controlled in a way. People get a certain dosage after work and probably only have a certain amount available outside. I think the doctor knows she can die of an overdose, and thinks it would be a good idea if she did. In a way soma was an anti-aging drug as well, because people thought the way she looked was weird because everyone for the most part looked the same. “No we can’t rejuvenate. But I’m very glad, to have had this opportunity to see an example of senility in a human being”(pg 144).  Thus, the people can be further more conditioned into thinking soma is a good thing.

My Utopia

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I never really put a lot of thought into what my utopia would be only because I know it will never happen. Everything would probably be different shades of orangeorange-modern-art-wallpapers and everyone would have the freedom of being creative. Everyone would be able to go around and draw anything and everything anywhere. Its weird that I say everyone would be able to be creative, because in my world you would be able to become whatever you want in lifeo-BASQUIAT-JAY-Z-570, but what if someone wanted to be an artist, they wouldn’t really be able to because everyone can do what they can. Everyone would be viewed as equal and everyone would be very blunt like me. There wouldn’t be any poverty, because everyone would be equal. Everyone would go to school for free without having to worry about how they are going to pay for school. The reason why I would have this is because people wouldn’t be financially unstable. By allowing people to go to school for free it’s a guarantee that they will become productive members to society. I would eliminate animal cruelty and crime over all. In my utopia jail would be pointless, although people are entitled to have emotions and thoughts. There wouldn’t be abortions and same sex marriage would be allowed. The slogan I would put for my utopia would probably be “If it doesn’t affect you, why do you care?” mostly because I think people should be allowed to do whatever they want, at the end of the day it’s there lives and they should do as they wish, if that’s what makes them happy.  Suicides would be no such thing; there would be no secrets because everyone would be honest. Just because there aren’t any secrets that doesn’t mean that everyone needs to know your business, just keep what you tell people short and simple, if someone asks you something answer it, but don’t go with excessive details if you don’t need to. Everyone would have a home and food to eat, there wold be no such thing as winter, it would only snow on Christmas, the lowest temperature would probably be 35 degrees. Only certain day in the summer would be super hot, for beach and pool days, but it would mostly be spring/fall weather. People would take picture of almost every little thing, that way they always have memories captured. Being different wouldn’t be frowned upon, if anything it would be encouraged because that’s what makes people different and interesting, instead of everyone being the same and boring. Sad days wouldn’t happen so often because being sad is boring; everyone would wake up in a great mood everyday. Getting the things one wants wouldn’t be so hard, traveling would be something people do on a regular basisWorld_Travel___Tourism_Traveling_around_the_World_034435_, and adventures are always something one should always look forsky diving. That’s all I can think of for my utopia, but I’m pretty sure there are some glitches with some of the things I came up with.

Brave New World Ch:1-5

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As soon as I started reading Brave New World I found it to be interesting the way people were being produced, the carefulness it took, as well as the organization held within the facility. As I got further into the book I don’t like it at all, I think its rather boring, more so because I find the story strange.

What I got out of chapter 4 was that it was ok to be debauched in this world, as Lenina is, “She was a popular girl, at one time or another, had spent a night with almost all of them (pg 62).” In today’s world being promiscuous is somewhat frowned upon depending on how one views women.

What I also found rather strange was that once you were born you ere “trained” for the life you were going to live. As early as eight months, babies start getting trained, from what they should and shouldn’t like, as well as what color they should wear to distinguish them from the others. “They’ll grow up with what the psychologist used to call an “instinctive” hatred of books and flowers. They’ll be safe from books and botany all their lives (pg 30).”

This book or shall I say world has discrimination and superiority, which I think is bad. People don’t have a choice in who they would want to become because that is chosen for them when making them. Also, there is not much individuality, but rather uniformity in a sense, more so between each kind of person rather then the whole society. The fact that each kind of person has to wear a certain color to be distinguished is unfair, everyone in the society knows what “kind” of person you are. In knowing what “kind” person one is, someone who is a different kind automatically feels superior to you, especially Epsilons.

As far as Soma goes, I think it’s pointless because people in this society seem to not have much to worry about so why take Soma to be “happy”, when they already seem to be happy. The reason as to why I say they seem to already be happy is because they are “trained” to like they way they will be living for the rest of their lives, so one should already know what to expect out of life, and therefore shouldn’t be a “problem” needed to be solved by using Soma.

There seems to be a lot of emphasis on Bernard’s character, although I think he’s portrayed to be a bit of an outcast in this society. Throughout the story people have different speculations as to what exactly is weird about him. Some people think he was made differently, or that he lacked an “ingredient” while they were making him. What I find sad about Bernard is that not only does everyone in the society think he’s weird, he himself finds himself weird, and he himself knows something is wrong with him, he is also very aware that everyone around him thinks he’s weird. I think maybe he seems like the outcast of this world because he’s going to do something very important later on in the story.

Reading Response #2

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Out of all three stories we have read so far, “The Machine Stops” by E. M. Forster is the one I like best.  It caught my attention as soon as I started reading it. I felt as though I was reading the human version of the Cartoon The Jetsons. I pictured the setting to be in outer space until I read further along “we have lost the sense of space. We say ‘space is annihilated,’ but we have annihilated not space, but the sense thereof (pg 11).  The title of the fist chapter “The Air-ship”  made me believe it took place on a plane flying in otter space where there was a civilization. Writing my blog now I don’t really know why I dismissed earth completely, aside from the fact that I know this course is based on utopias and dystopias.

The way they communicated is similar to today, when people video chat. Although today people can still interact with one another, it is true technology is advancing more and more everyday. In today’s world we are more dependent on technology, work related, school related, medical advancement, or even just for entertainment purposes. People would say “what would we do without technology, life would probably be so boring” but we forget to look back on how people did things before technology even existed. Which is why people of an older generation might agree with these lines in the story: “Year by year it was served with increased efficiency and decreased intelligence” (pg 20), ‘it’ referring to technology and “beautiful naked man was dying, strangled in the garments that he had woven”(pg 25). “That it is we that are dying, and that down here the only thing that really lives is the Machine? We created the Machine, to do our will, but we cannot make it do our will now. It has robbed us of the sense of space and of the sense of touch, it has blurred every human relation and narrowed down love to a carnal act, it has paralyzed our bodies and our wills,, and it now compels is to worship it” (pg 15).  “This was a book of the machine. In it were instructions against every possible contingency” (pg 4). I took this to represent our constitution, laws, religion, and or beliefs. “while there was the Book there was security”(pg 23).The Machine brought everything to the person, instead of having the person go to the object. We would normally say “ oh my! If only we had this in real life, it would be perfect!” If we did that would bring about several problems, like obesity, because of lack of exercise, although, obesity might bring about Homelessness. It would also, make me go insane, not being able to interact with others, having to be in a single room with just a Machine, to me that sounds pretty boring. Going back, “Homelessness means death”(pg 10). “People were almost exactly alike all over the world” (pg 8), which makes sense if one were actually living in the perfect world, where one is not allowed to be different. This line I thought conflicted with “By these days it was a demerit to be muscular. Each infant was examined at birth, and all who promised undue strength was destroyed” (pg 11), only because that’s equivalent to abortion today, which people have different views on, but wouldn’t they want to have people with certain abilities to do certain things to help keep things the way they are in a sense. By this I mean if the machine had to be taken out of a room for repair and another was installed in the mean time, if the machine were to be a heavy machine they would need someone to be strong. Although, some people might think being strong is wrong, and the strong would be either looked down on or they would be superior. Then again I wondered if the Committee was made up of real people or if the committee was apart of the Machine, which would then defeat the purpose of bring any complaints to them about the Machines malfunctions.

Kuno’s escaped was maybe just the tip of the iceberg as to what was yet to come. This proved that there could be no perfect world, while having the knowledge that there had been one before. The discovery Kuno made went against everything everyone believed and therefore he was threatened to Homelessness because this would cause chaos and emotions to stir in their civilization and soon everyone would start trying to do what he did.  The lack of feelings by his mother made Kuno not only made at her for not understanding but also mad that she worshipped the Machine, thus making his mother mad for him talking bad about the Machine. Vashti thought kuno’s discovery was the worst thing that could happen but little did she know everything he was saying was true the machine could stop. Then what? What bothered me is how could people come up with new ideas without really going out and discovering new things, “First-hand ideas do not really exist. They are but the physical impressions produced by love and fear, and on this gross foundation who could erect a philosophy? (pg 18). This didn’t make sense to me because I think the person who made the first idea must have gotten it from somewhere, like actually making a discovery. If first hand ideas didn’t exist then where do the ideas that were based off of the fist come from?

Reading Response #1: Le Guin

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The first page of  “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas” had very vivid imagery, almost as if one was there, almost too good to be true. Once I finished reading the first page I didn’t see how the title related with the story, if I were the Le Guin I would have named the story something else, a more obvious title. As I continued on reading, the second page to me felt as though I was reading nothing. After reading one line I felt as though the next contradicted the first, a lot of questions were being asked but none answered by the narrator or characters in the story. “Happiness is based on a just discrimination of what is necessary, what is neither necessary nor destructive, and what is destructive. In the middle category, however—that of the unnecessary but undestructive, that of comfort, luxury, exuberance, etc.—they could perfectly well have central heating, subway trains, washing machines, and all kinda of marvelous devices not yet invented here, floating light-sources, fuelless power, a cure for a common cold” (pg2). This part to me felt as though it went against all the imagery in the first page, I think because we today take these things for granted. The first page has such rich detail and this scene is portrayed as though the people of this town think it’s the best day to look forward to in their lives. Everything in the city seems so peaceful, until they get to the basement and start talking about the child who’s locked inside. Now I must admit, the imagery was very peaceful and relaxing to read but I wasn’t into the story until this part. The town seemed to not have anything wrong with it but in fact according to them it did, this problem was the child, whom they thought might have been born defective. Sadly, in today’s world there are still people who would prefer to have people with certain defects locked away somewhere. Although, I think there is nothing wrong with being different at all, intentionally or not. Mary Temple Gradin, http://www.templegrandin.com born autistic but yet she contributed a great insight to animal science and she was also an author, even though many people thought she was not capable of doing anything remotely to this. As they described how people in the city came to this basement to see the child the question that comes to my mind is “ If everyone is so interested in seeing the child, why not let the child live amongst those same people? What is the purpose of hiding the child that everyone wants to see?” The fact that people are so moved by the “imprisonment” of the child to the point where some people even leave the city. “Delight of Omelas would wither and be destroyed,”(pg6) if the child were to be let out, why this would be I’m not too sure.

I liked the “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas” more then “The Day Before the Revolution” only because I felt this story was all over the place. I also felt as though the story was way too long and pointless. I understood she was in a home and that she is an “important” figure of a movement, but she (the old lady) refers to a lot of people from her past some who were in prison but now dead.  I really didn’t understand why she referred to these people, or what was the significance in the character Noi.  When she was in the bathroom before Noi arrived she was worried about her hair and upset about the stain on her shirt, the way Noi was described made it seem as though she was some what attracted to Noi.  What I got out of the story was that her and her husband were activist in a movement, her husband died and all she had was a folder, Noi helped her write response to people who wrote her letters, she made a trip to see the outside world, the one she considered herself a part of. When she went outside she saw all these different things, feeling dizzy someone who lived in her house helped her back, for her to then find out once getting there that there was going to be a march the very next day, when everyone asked her for advice she said she wouldn’t be here, im guessing she knew her time was coming. Im assuming she dies because of the way the story ended. She was old and fragile, she felt very tired, very weak, once the march for the revolution came, I take it as though now she can finally get real rest. Everything that made her tired, everything she worked for was now being accomplished and carried on by the younger folks to whom she spoke and wrote to. After reading this I think I’m missing the bigger picture or the actual reason/purpose as to why the story was written.