1) FIRST PARAGRAPH: Read and evaluate critically Andrei's work. What aspects (if any) strike you as being particularly effective?
2) SECOND PARAGRAPH: compare your essays on Son of Italy (superstition, economics, self reflection on notes) to Andrei's work. What do you have to learn from it, and what could he learn from yours?
- Son of Italy seems to focus on the themes of control and escape. The control lies with the landowners and foremen, and Pascal constantly tries to escape that control both in Italy and America. By observation is that those who seek to subjugate those in desperate situations are able to find a way to do it, whether it is the landowners in Italy or the companies that told their laborers that they are “indebted” to the company, thus keeping them as long as possible. They exploited people that they knew would accept any job and only kept those that they knew were going to spend their earnings quickly, forcing them to stay with the company longer. I am even more surprised that some companies didn’t even pay with American money but instead used vouchers, further helping them contain their workers in a cycle of poverty and dependency that makes it extra difficult for one to escape their situation and find something better.
Son of Italy is an account that can resonate with many immigrants who
came to America without much and built a life for themselves through hard work
and perseverance. Based on my notes, I tend to focus more on the emotional toll
that the author experienced and sympathize with the struggles that he faced day
to day, for many years. While I did not experience such difficulties, I still
find that this theme sticks out to me the most because it is a positive
statement about the goals I can reach. For example, my notes tend to constantly
compare his life in America to that of Italy. I point out, numerous times, that
he has been in America for years and still faces the same problems that he and
his family faced before he moved. In the last comment, I make sure to note that
he finally improved his life in order to show a contrast between his first few
years in America and the triumphant stage he is at by the end of the book.
I believe that I focus mainly on Pascal’s transformation because I see that
perseverance in myself and believe that many others would too, should they read
Son of Italy. If anything, this narrative is a demonstration of how one
can get themselves out of unfavorable circumstances, even when it may not seem
possible. To look further into this, consider what he had to do in order to
achieve success. For a long time, he lived in the cheapest room he could find,
with bad odors and poor heating. He ate the cheapest food and wore torn
clothes, all because he wanted to escape his life of hard labor and become a writer.
He even had to BEG in his final letter in order to get recognition.
Essentially, he did whatever he had to do to realize his dream, and I believe
that this is an excellent example to myself that encourages me to do whatever
it takes to get to where I want to be, even in unfavorable circumstances.
Furthermore, this theme applies to my own family. We arrived in 1997 and, like
Pascal, were escaping from poverty. We had nothing to eat and little money to
our name, yet now we are considered middle class and are far more well off than
before, which is another reason why I sympathize with his story.
Andrei's work was very well formulated and interesting to read. One thing that specifically stood out to me was when he stated “ I tend to focus more on the emotional toll that the author experienced and sympathize with the struggles that he faced day to day, for many years. While I did not experience such difficulties, I still find that this theme sticks out to me the most because it is a positive statement about the goals I can reach”. I have to strongly agree with this statement, when I read Son of Italy I absolutely focused more on the emotional aspect that D'Angelo experienced. I believe that we tend to focus more on emotional tolls due to our own personality and our own experiences of feeling lost at times.One thing that I discussed in my essay's about Son of Italy was that my grandfather experienced the issues of immigration and I compared my grandfathers stories to the stories that Pascal told. I think that Andrei can learn about the direct impact immigration had on my family members from my essay's, and I learned about how to connect D'Angelo's experiences to my life and how I should feel a sense of encouragement, from Andrei's work.
ReplyDelete1) I particularly like how Andrei pulled out the themes of control and escape. I think that this is particularly effective because it highlights the challenges that immigrants faced once they got to the U.S. We see immediately that the American dream is in fact very hard to achieve and it is often faced with extreme hardship and pain.
ReplyDelete2)I too related very much to D'Angelo's journey as an immigrant and can see that Andrei did too. It is definitely hard to not feel for the author as you yourself (or your family) went through similar struggles. For me, I also search for major themes in the work and want to understand why D'Angelo chooses to tell us certain details over others. Although the theme of struggle ran through this work, there was also comedy and oneness with the earth as well as perseverance and the need to form one's own identity even separate and distinct from that of your own family.
1. Andrei's work here was concise and straightforward, in that it stayed true to the chosen themes of control and escape in the narrative while offering supporting details to support those notions. However, I feel that it can be made even stronger by adding in a connection to immigrant experience as a whole; many immigrants coming to America in the Early 20th C were faced with these same themes of control and escape, and including it in the paragraph will drive this point home further.
ReplyDelete2. I especially like Andrei's work in the second paragraph because he places emphasis on the positive aspects of the narrative; that of success and achievement earned through hardship and trial. This immediately tells me something of Andrei's character (optimistic), which is a good skill to have in writing. I also chose to focus on the percolation of Pascal's experiences in his narrative, but with an analytical approach. Perhaps analyzing the events of the text a bit more can make this paragraph even stronger for Andrei.
1) I like that Andrei had a strong focus on the themes of control and escape. I particularly liked when Andrei pointed out about the American companies not even paying their workers with American money but instead paid them in vouchers, forcing them into deeper poverty therefore trapping them into still working.
ReplyDelete2) I had the same type of notes that Andrei is describing in these paragraphs. I also focused on Pascal's transformation and the characters emotional toll. We both spoke about Pascal's success and achievement and the hard work that he took to get to where he is now. When asked how our notes reflected us as a person, I said that it showed I am always aware of how the people around me feel and I feel as though this is how Andrei is also.
After reading Andrei’s work I was very impressed. His sentences were very strong and full of great thinking. For me was interesting first paragraph of his response. Idea about Control and Escape was something that I never think before. He gave very strong explanation to it. I never think that much about landowners and people relationships.
ReplyDeleteI have to learn to build grammatically strong sentences, I feel that because of my small vocabulary I use same words over and over, whereas Andrei used a lot of difficult words for me. I have to learn to think more on each situation that book has, and give more meaning to them. I have to learn to pay attention to emotional parts of author and his book.
I found it very effective that Andrei started the paragraph by pointing out two main ideas, and made that connection throughout the book. It gave the opportunity to nicely explain important main ideas in the book, and supported it with good examples. Anyone who hasn’t read the book, and read Andrei’s paragraph would get a good idea and understanding of the book is about.
ReplyDeleteAs Andrei mentioned his notes to reveal the pattern on emotional toll to the character in the book, my notes also revealed these same patterns. I also sympathized with Pascal and his journey from growing up in poverty in Italy, to moving to another unknown country and living through the same disadvantages, he seemed to not be able to escape from.
1. I really liked the connection Andrei made between control and escape in the book. What I found most effective is that he started off by blatantly stating the two themes he was going to address. I liked that his paragraph was not unnecessarily wordy, but just enough to get his point across so that we could understand his thought process.
ReplyDelete2. Unlike me, Andrei focused on the emotional toll the author experienced in America as an immigrant. I like how he focused on Pascals transformation throughout the book, it inspires me to pay attention to a character's development throughout the story for future reading.
1. I enjoyed the way Andrei used the theme of "control" to describe Pascal's hardships. I completely agree with her statement "They exploited people that they knew would accept any job and only kept those that they knew were going to spend their earnings quickly, forcing them to stay with the company longer." This part of her writing was particularly effective towards me because exploitation is the most prominent and reoccurring theme in the book.
ReplyDelete2. When comparing my work to Andrei's, I realized that we share extremely similar deductions and experiences with the book. Like Andrei, I too was concerned with the emotion toll of Pascal's experiences. What really stood out to me was when Andrei said "I still find that this theme sticks out to me the most because it is a positive statement about the goals I can reach." This was my biggest takeaway from the book. I too felt that in a certain way, this book has motivated me to pursue my goals even more than I already have been.
1. Andrei chooses two main themes that are very important to understand in Pascal's autobiography. His interpretation of these themes is interesting and concise, so that we understand the message he is trying to convey. His response is also effective in that he explicitly states the theme and explains what in the text is related to it.
ReplyDelete2. My response and Andrei's response are similar in that we both focus on the emotional toll of Pascal as a character. We both talk about our empathy towards Pascal and how he deals with hardships in order to transform into a successful writer. One thing I feel that I need to work on is simplicity and getting my point across in simple terms, just like Andrei did in his response.