WWII Texts

This past week, we were assigned to read three texts over the WWII era and the Holocaust. "I Never Saw Another Butterfly" is a poem written by a child out of a series of collections from Volavoka. "The Shawl," by Cynthia Ozick is a short story that is about one mother's struggle to keep her child alive. Lastly, "Ladies and Gentlemen, To the Gas Chamber" by Taduesz Borowski is a story from a worker's point of view.

In Ozick's "The Shawl," the shawl is considered a magical shawl because it is the only source of nourishment Rosa's baby, Magda receives. Rosa is the main character in the story along with a girl named Stella and baby Magda. The story takes place during WWII and they are Jews at a concentration camp, under Nazi rule. They are trying to survive day in and day out, however due to the treatment they are under their bodies have become weak and Rosa can no longer breast feed Magda. Magda is constantly wrapped up in a shawl by Rosa and is constantly sucking on it like it is milk and it gives her a sense of contempt. Ironically, the shawl has a scent of cinnamon and almonds.

I think the most signifcant way to celebrate the human life and the strength of humans in Ozick's story is highlighted at the end when Rosa is reacting to Magda's death. "She only stood, because if she ran they would shoot, and if she let the wolf’s screech ascending now through the ladder of her skeleton break out, they would shoot; so she took Magda’s shawl and filled her mouth with it, stuffed it in, until she was swallowing up, the wolf’s screech and tasting the cinnamon and almond depth of Magda’s saliva; and Rosa drank Magda’s shawl until it dried." I think by Rosa drinking Magda's shawl until it died was her way of celebrating Magda's life and as much as she wanted to run to the electric fence where Magda was thrown, she held herself back because she knew if she did, she would die. I think that represents her strength.

In "I Never Saw Another Butterfly," the imagery and the symbolism of the yellow butterfly described is so significant because it was something so simple, a part of nature that most people got to see everyday. However, when you are in a concentration camp, you lose sense of the simple, beautiful things in life because they are no longer there.

"The last, the very last,

So richly, brightly, dazzlingly yellow."

 I think the fact that the poems were written by the young children of the Holocaust is heartbreaking and makes the reading more somber to read, knowing that these children's lives were stolen from them.

"The Fly"

Mansfield's short story "The Fly" is about a man who is referred to as "the boss" and the impact of his son's death on how it has affected him as a person. An old man by the name of Mr. Woodfield who works with "the boss" stops by on a Tuesday, which is noted because it is the only day he is allowed to go out in town since his wife and daughters try to keep him at home since he suffered a stroke. He goes to visit "the boss" and as they get to conversing, Mr. Woodfield tells him about how his daughters saw his son's grave the other day. This brings up old wounds in "the boss" as it has been 6 years since his son's death from fighting in the war, (WWI) perhaps. Not really knowing how to cope with remembering this memory, he has become a bitter, numb man and is unable to cry even though the thought of his son makes him want to. He had big dreams for his son one day, he was hoping his son would be able to take over the business for him. But since that dream was cut short, he was forced to move on and represses those memories he had of his son. After Mr. Woodfield changes the subject briefly, "the boss" says his farewells and ushers him out of his office. He starts to reminisce about his son and how he used to be before he went off to war and is flabbergasted that is has been 6 long years since he received the news of his death. All of a sudden he spots a fly, and begins dropping ink droplets on it. He does the four times and after each time encourages the little guy to make his way through the ink and get up again to try to survive. By the fourth and final droplet, the fly had sucumbed to death and the old man could not remember of what he was thinking of before his thoughts surrounded this fly.

Here is a lists of details from the story that I think reference to WWI:
- His son's grave was in Belgium, Germany which was a country that was involved in WWI
- When thinking about his son, he thinks of him being unharmed in his uniform
- The picture he had of his son was one in which his son had a cold, stern look in his face ( an expression he didn't have before the war)
- When receiving the news of his son's death, he recieved a telegram that read "we deeply regret to inform you..." ( that's how people found out about their loved one's death back then)

"The Metamorphosis"

Kafka's "The Metamorphosis," is a story about a traveling salesman named Gregor Mendel that provides for his family and enables them to have the lifestyle that they live. One day Gregor wakes up and finds himself to have morphed into a disgusting beetle. Although he is alarmed, he is more concerned with getting out of bed and getting to work rather than focused on how his body has changed. His parents come up to his bedroom door to check on him consistently and try to get him out of the room so he can go to work. However, each time fails, as Gregor remained in his room because he knew if he showed himself things would never be the same and he would appall his family. Eventually, his office manager shows up to the house and is outraged that Gregor is not at work. Gregor begs and pleads with his manager to just give him a chance to get himself together and to spare his family the sake of him not losing his job. However, the manager is not having one bit of what Gregor has to say and as everyone starts to get really concerned, Gregor realizes he has no choice but to show himself. Once he does, his fears come true and everyone is completely disgusted at the sight of him. His family decides to lock him in his room so that no one else will have to bear the sight of him. Over the course of time Gregor is left with nothing but his thoughts since no one can understand him when he talks or even wants to talk to him. His health deteriorates day in and day out. Gregor's family is forced to have to learn to provide for themselves as his father, mother and sister all start to work. One day after having visitors rent out their place and they spot Gregor creeping out of the room, his sister Grete, decides that the family must get rid of "it" as she refers to Gregor believing that the beetle was never Gregor like they thought it was. Eventually Gregor dies as he became very ill and the family moves on with their life, with the parents focusing on their daughter becoming the next provider for the family and finding her someone to marry.

According to Dictionary.com - a metamorphosis is, "a profound change in form from one stage to the next in the life history of an organism--a complete change of form, structure, or substance--a form resulting from any such change."  Before Gregor's transformation he lead the life of a hard working man, just trying to provide for his family and make something out of himself. He had a lot of confidence in himself and his family loved and adored him. After his metamorphosis he was reduced to nothing, physically and emotionally. He lost his job which he really cared about and more importantly he lost the love and respect of his family. Due to this he became depressed and felt like the best thing he could do for them was to die. I believe Gregor's metamorphosis was metaphorical. I don't think he literally turned into a beetle because I was not convinced when reading the story that he became a bug, but I do believe something happened to him. I think maybe he became really ill, to the point where is didn't look recognizable and was not able to go to work. Over time his illness began to make his health deteriorate and he became worse until he shriveled up and passed away.

Kafka makes several references to hunger and food in this story, some of them are:
pg. 2010- the first time his sister brings him food (bread and milk)
pg. 2011- his sister brings him rotten food, which he seems to enjoy
pg. 2023- Gregor was deteriorating, now eating next to nothing.

I think these references about hunger and food are a metaphorical reference to Gregor wanting to be able to work and provide for his family in order to gain their love and acceptance again. In other words he's hungry for his to passions - his job and his family.

James Joyce's "The Dead"

"The Dead," is a story about a group of family and friends coming together during the holiday season for their annual dinner party. Gabriel Conroy is one of the main characters who is a scholar that is suppose to make a speech at the dinner party in regards to his aunts who are hosting the party. However, he is quite nervous the whole time because he is a scholar and is worried about speaking in front of people and them being able to understand the message he is trying to convey. His wife, Gretta, is also another main character and oddly enough throughout most of the story they seem to avoid each other while Gabriel has several other encounters with other female guests at the party. Even though the story is set around this dinner party that Julia and Kate Morkan, (Gabriel's aunts) are having and is supposed to be a happy occasion, there are several mentions of death in this story besides the title.

Some examples that stood out the most to me were:
pg. 1961- Mr. Browne, Mary Jane, and Aunt Kate talking about how the monks sleep in their coffins.
pg. 1973- Gabriel thinking about what would happen when his Aunt Julia died.
pg. 1974- Gabriel thinking about the snow covering Ireland and falling on the coffins of the dead.

In the midst of having the holiday dinner party, the real story seemed to lie in Gabriel and Gretta. Towards the end of the story, after listening the song Mr. D'Arcy was singing and becoming emotional, Gretta told Gabriel about her teenage love. His name was Michael Furey and Gretta felt like it was her fault he had died because he was very ill and stood outside in rain waiting for her before she was supposed to leave town, and after she had left she received the news that he had passed. She had been harboring this guilt inside for a long time and when seeing how distraught Gretta was over this man, Gabriel couldn't help but feel that she was still in love with him and maybe as her husband, he had never fully loved her the way Michael had. Michael and Gabriel are names that have significant meaning because they are angels in the Bible. Michael is the Archangel and basically has the most power under God. Gabriel is an angel too but he is subservient to Michael. I think this makes sense in the book because Gabriel was always second in Gretta's heart next to Michael.