Yvie Lock
2/22/2018 08:28:20 pm
The book initially starts by describing his experiences of being “free” in Suffolk. This is a contrast to the narrators experiences a year prior to the event when he was stuck in a hospital. He does not explain immediately why he was in the hospital. All we know was he was overcome with “immobility,” which heightens his sense freedom he is now experiencing. He references his friends Michel Parkinson and Janine Dakynes. These characters become prominent figures in the chapter. It is interesting that he knows so much about these people as he describes Dakynes’ studies and her passion for Gustave Flaubert. As he describes these characters in so much detail, it indicates to me that they are going to be significant figures in the rest of the book. His attitude and appraisal towards them seems as if the narrator holds them both in high regard. Thomas Browne’s work also seems to be key in this chapter. It is hard to understand where he is going to go with this line of reasoning. He is so engaged in death, body’s and the scull.
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Luca
2/22/2018 10:46:35 pm
This book is interesting and unlike any other book I've read so far. It is interesting that right from the first 20 pages are rather interesting topics that are confusing to me. For example the topic of death with a body and scull. Another thing that interested me was the pictures which leads me to the questions of how important are pictures going to be in this book. A quote that really drew me into the book was "several times during the day I felt a desire to assure myself of a reality I feared had vanished forever by looking out of that hospital window". I gathered from this quote that this book is meant to have a rather serious, sad tone. I struggle to truly recognize what story exactly the narrator is trying to tell but am hoping I can understand this more with more time and reading.
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Andrea Hernandez
2/22/2018 10:55:24 pm
The Rings of Saturn is an intriguing and confusing novel, to begin with. The book's first person approach depicts the narrative through the eyes and experiences of an unknown narrator. What was most confusing while also interesting was the unclear themes across the text. At times, the various introductions of different people and the reliving of past events became quite blurred and made it confusing to grasp the main themes across. Yet, one thing I appreciated when reading this first section of the text was the use the descriptive language. The extensive use of literary devices such as imagery, metaphor, simile, or personification creates an image and makes certain events quite clear; such as the moment in the hospital looking out the window. I think the rest of the book will explore the "shadow of annihilation" expressed throughout various moments in the text, as well as the "indestructibility of the human soul," that may be referencing to the idea of time, identity, or memory; which are the main themes that got across to me. The book may also explore the rational limit of humans throughout different moments in time.
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Erica Clay
2/22/2018 11:13:09 pm
I found this excerpt a bit strange, because the speaker's thoughts go in so many different directions. It doesn't feel like other books I've read before because the narrator jumps right in without much introduction or background. It is a bit mysterious in this way, and makes it even more challenging to track their thoughts because you aren't sure why they are going in a certain direction. An interesting thing about this narrator is their propensity to think so deeply about some subjects, while merely glossing over others. It is difficult to see if there is a pattern that determines what things the narrator chooses to focus on or not. For example, there is no personal introduction or explanation as to why they are in the hospital, other than immobilizing pain, which seems like it would be an intriguing plot points. Meanwhile, the narrator spends a great deal of thought on the topic of anatomy and human dissection.
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Raya Mahony
2/22/2018 11:58:46 pm
This book leaves the taste of a wondering mind unafraid to speak its thoughts. It transitions from recounts of walking around, lying in pain in a hospital bed, a long-winded history lesson about dissection, a heartwarming snapshot of a messy friend, the "vapour trail" of the human spirit, and the inevitable destruction from time. The way that the book shifts from each train of thought allows a reader to lose track of a central theme or underlying meaning. Nevertheless, connections are made and a deeper understanding of how the thoughts formed is made possible in the formatting. The speaker makes a point to not shy away from unpleasant and powerful phrases like "already quite rigid, his face curiously mottled with red blotches" and "there is no antidote...against the opium of time." The book is certainly untraditional in both the way it flows and the way that it convinces the reader of deeper meaning. It is unclear what the rest of the book may be about, but based on the way the first chapter bounces around and connects back, I have good reason to believe that a theme of unsolicited and very specific trains of thought will become even more frequent.
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2/23/2018 02:00:53 am
The beginning of this book started off with the flashback to the scene in the hospital. I thought it was interesting that the flashback was introduced first and then other events came after, while references to the flashback were still being made. It seemed similar to other books I read in the past, then it started to get more confusing. There were many people and concepts that were mentioned in this book that were confusing to me, although I found myself still looking them up online for background and context. The references to books or people that I did know about, such as Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, made me more intrigued in the book and how these people added to the story being presented. The speaker would introduce a person or a topic and then quickly move to the next topic, which made it vague and sometimes confusing.
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Hallie McManus
2/23/2018 02:35:58 am
My first thought when reading "Rings of Saturn", was the strong narrative that Sebald creates. His transition from his own narrative, where he reflects on his life and studies from a hospital bed, to the narrative of Janine, which he eloquently connects to the narrative of Thomas Brown, brings life to a story that could otherwise be muddled by complex concepts and language. His ability to describe seemingly trivial things with astounding detail is remarkable. He creates a beatiful landscape out of the papers that drown Janine's desk, and brings new life to Rembrandt's "The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp", by noting the position of the subject's hand and describing the view of the potential onlookers.
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Kamryn Lanier
2/23/2018 08:45:53 am
The book to me feels similar to a lot of books I read in AP literature, I think it is because there are a lot of moving parts that you have to follow. Giving off the sense that it is considered a sophisticated part. Something that was insignificant that I thought was interesting was how the narrator mentions so many names in the very beginning Michael, Ramuz, Emma, Janine, Anthony Nicolaas, Rene leaving the reader to identify the significant characters moving forward. Entering this book feels like I am about to go on a journey with the author for clarity and freedom. Freedom is significant because the narrator begins the novel by thinking back to a time he was immobile, but now he free. The narrator's reference to Kafka who is the author of the Metamorphosis, which I read, showed me that the search for knowledge and freedom will play a large part in this book. "Was no doubt a demonstration of the undaunted investigative zeal in the new sciences" give insight to the theme of the search for information.
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Fatema Yasini
2/23/2018 08:45:57 am
Upon reading the first few pages of “The Rings of Saturn,” I found it to be a bit strange. Although I don't tend to read books of such a nature, I go reminded almost immediately of “The Metamorphosis” by Franz Kafka. I read that book as a requirement for my English Literature class in High School. They both share the same feeling of scatteredness and confusion. What was interesting, is how the narrator compares himself to Gregor Samsa, the main character in “The Metamorphosis” on page 5. I feel that if I hadn’t read “The Metamorphosis” I would not know what Sebald is referring to, or what the character feels. One question I have is whether the speaker is Sebald, himself, or just an unknown person? The speaker is trapped in a hospital due to an injury that he endured while on his tour. Justifying his reason for the tour, he feels a sense of freedom. One thing that kept repeating is the connection to Michael Parkinson and Janine Dakyns. Although Michael dies, he was very close to Janine, which influenced her passion for the writer, Gustave Flaubert. The speaker describes her office as a “paper universe.” Not only that, but Janine indirectly influences the speaker's fascination with Thomas Browne. A good half of the first excerpt is an account of Browne, and his beliefs. I assume that the rest of the book will relate to Janine and Michael in some way, as they influenced his thoughts on writing.
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Kerry Xu
2/23/2018 10:02:55 am
This book is very complicated in language, but the sentences are so intricate and elaborate with fancy words that it somehow makes every sentence scream some form of significance. As I continued to read from the experiences of both freedom and paralysis he was reflecting on in the hospital at the beginning to the complicated thoughts of Thomas Browne. When Browne’s views on nature and the simplest details in life were being described, it reminded me a whole lot of the readings I had done in junior year on Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau’s works. Although the topics of interest aren’t necessarily the same, the attitude in which all these people approach their subjects are pretty similar. They don’t look at the big picture, rather they scrutinize the details of the most ordinary objects, almost forcing significance out of them. Also, the things that they focus on are always particularly odd, like caterpillars and purple silk left in an urn to every fleeting moment in nature and how self-reliant nature can make a person. The speaker uses a good portion of this chapter describing events related to Browne, whether that be his skull, his presence on the day of dissection, how complicated his use of language was, and how he sees every object as something that underwent tremendous annihilation before it formed. This both captivates my attention and confuses me on exactly why the speaker is so fascinated with Browne and how so much of his past could be known.
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Andre Gutierrez
2/23/2018 10:28:46 am
Upon my first reading of the book, I was very confused on what the author meant, especially with his use of complex words such as "insouciance" and "transposition". Upon further examination, the first chapter seemed at first to be a criticism of modern society through his expressed distain for the window in the hospital and the city below. However, as I read through the chapter, it became clear that he was not only critiquing modern society and humanity as a whole, but was also seemingly fascinated by our nature and the "indestructibility of the human soul." This book does feel like books I have read before in its structure and pose. However, it is different from others because of its presentation as an old-style literature but in the modern-era. I believe the rest of the book will discuss the themes stated in the first chapter in relation to the speakers life.
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Isaac Merritt
2/23/2018 10:35:09 am
The beginning of the book appears as a stream of consciousness thought process as the narrator bobs and weaves through several, seemingly always existential, topics pertaining to the mortality of man. From the story of his friend Charles's untimely death in his bed to his other friend Janine's subsequent passing, the narrator becomes fixated on several cases of spontaneous death in the world around him. Formally, the passage we read lacked the normal literary structure generally expected from prose, with its run-on sentences and lack of paragraph breaks, and this was of course very interesting and unusual to me. Unlike many other books I have read, the first portion of the book is no indicator of which direction the author plans to take the rest of the book, so I am excited to read on and follow the path.
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Evan Lane
2/23/2018 10:44:47 am
This book is similar to a few books I have read. It seems to stick the "stream of consciousness" literary writing style, which is readily apparent in the books of Virginia Woolf, Fjodor Dostoyevskij, James Joyce and William Faulkner. The first thing that I noticed about the book was this narrative voice with an apparent flow to it, never sticking to one topic for too long, similarly as to how our minds work. It is difficult to read at times, but after reading very carefully, I found the duality of mood very apparent, especially in his description that the sense of freedom he felt was accompanied by “the paralysing horror” provoked by “the traces of destruction, reaching far back into the past, that were evident even in that remote place.” (3) The next thing that I noticed was the theme of death that is found throughout the chapter, from his statement that, "sand conquers all," (8) which is reminiscent of Horace's "pulvis et umbra sumus," meaning, we are but dust and shadows. This gives a feeling of "dust to dust." He also mentions the duality of beauty found in pain, and order found in disorder, with his description of Janine's workspace and Rembrant's "The Anatomy Lesson." Perhaps the most powerful moment of this chapter was his description of life and the miracle that it is, yet hits from the other side when he talks again of how none of it truly matters, again bringing forth the idea of "dust to dust."
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Daniel Frise
2/23/2018 11:44:35 am
On the surface, the most striking difference between reading Sebald's "The Rings of Saturn" and Rankine's "Citizen" is that the former is a novel. "Citizen" was a collection of lyrics, with the occasional commentary; in that sense, due to its length, it was simpler to read than "The Rings of Saturn".
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Frank Ye
2/23/2018 11:56:09 am
It is a strange book, but in the good way. Relative to Citizen, it reads like all other books, which have coherent sentence and idea structures. The Rings of Saturn definitely has a bit of feel of philosophy, when looking at it as a whole. Sometimes the ideas and language in the book seem to be poking at something way deeper than what is explicitly said, though sometimes not very clear, as the author made the book fairly easy to read. But what stood out the most is the descriptive language. Sometimes there is the inner thought in the voice of first person, and at other times, there are descriptions about individuals, events in history, and ideas which they are so detailed that it is out of the ordinary. Although there were pictures and photographs in the book, this book itself feel almost like a painting, where there are things that you see on the surface, and there are things beneath that you can analyze and argue with.
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Cameron Wright
2/23/2018 11:57:55 am
Right off the bat, the almost complete absence of paragraph breaks is what jumps out to me the most. This gives the writing a very free-flowing feel as the author jumps from topic to topic with so little fanfare. The author moves from talking about Janine Dakyns and her office flooded with papers to discussing the whereabouts of Thomas Brown's skull.
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Sai Kapuluru
2/26/2018 12:52:04 am
The experience of reading this book for me was more educating than anything. I spent a lot of time looking up specific historical figures and their ideals in order to become aware of the principles that these specific people stood for, as I was caught becoming confused about certain descriptions. I was also getting confused because of how all these historical figures were connected as I did not really have a strong understanding of who these people were before searching them up. Although this is the part that is confusing it is also why the book is interesting, especially how the book transitions to the authors point of view to the authors thoughts as well. This book is different than any of the books I have ever read, but I think that as the book continues, the author will talk about his experiences with all these European artists and writers, in order to give a historical description and evolution of Europe.
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Isaac Merritt
4/4/2018 01:11:02 pm
The annotations seem to be her way of communicating with herself when she reads her journal in the future. She feels as though some things she writes about are too real or uncomfortable to explicitly mention, so she leaves little annotations as a way of indicating that there's supposed to be something there that isn't. They start out as small words, but evolve into almost incoherent symbols that obstruct the real words. This says a lot about the written word, in that it isn't always enough to be able to convey an entire idea or concept. The writing itself may not be sufficient and may require other methods of communication.
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