Assignment 2

Assignment 2

Sheery D’Ancona, OCA creative arts

Part 1 – Close Reading

“So this was – it had to be – what Rashid Khalifa had called it: The River of Time itself, and the whole history of everything was flowing along before his very eyes, transformed into shining, mingling, multicolored story streams. He had accidentally taken a stumbling step to the right and entered a World that was not his own, and in this World, there was no River Stinky, but this miraculous water instead.

He looked in the direction the river was flowing, but a mist sprang up near the horizon and obscured his view. ‘I can’t see the future, and that feels right,’ Luka thought, and turned to look the other way, where the visibility was good for some distance, almost as far as he could see, but the mist was there too, he knew that; he had forgotten some of his own past and didn’t know that much about the universe’s. In front of him flowed the Present, brilliant, mesmerizing, and he was so busy staring at it that he didn’t see the Old Man of the River until the long-bearded fellow came right up in front of him holding a Terminator, an enormous science-fiction-type blaster, and shot him right in the face. BBBLLLAAARRRTT!”

Text from: Luka and the Fire of Life ( P47-48 ), Salman Rashdie (2010), Published by Jonathan Cape (2010)

In the process of browsing through texts for our creative reading assignment, a novel I have read years ago, by Salman Rushdie kept flashing through my mind. I remembered it contained some interesting thoughts on our course themes and as I began reading through it once again, my intuition was reaffirmed, Following much contemplation on which text to use for our close reading task, my chosen lines are taken from Luka’s ‘Crossing of the First Threshold‘ into the World of Magic and his first sail through the ‘River of Time’  ( page 47-48).

At a simple glance, Rushdie’s novel seems to be yet another great fantasy fiction, a sequel to his popular 1990 novel: ‘Haroun and the Sea of Stories’. Both books are classified as suitable for all ages, including young readers, yet below the surface, we find a parallel philosophical narrative, which is abundant in reflection and analogies on the themes of Time, Place as well as a third theme of Stories.

Characters appearing within the extract lines : Luka Khalifa, an imaginative and brave 12 year old boy and the Protagonist, or hero. Rashid Khalifa, also known as ‘The Shah of Blah,’ Luka’s beloved father, and a gifted story teller, Luka’s confidant or mentor Character. Old Man of the River, is a random territorial villein type, appearing out of the blue to take one of Luka’s game lives.

I would like to briefly observe the novel’s general plot structure, as I believe it may provide relevance ahead of the analysis of the short extract lines:, Rashid Khlifa falls into a mysterious endless slumber, which represents the Call to Adventure, or reason for Luka to leave his ordinary world to embarks on a perilous journey in order to obtain the ‘Fire of Life’, representing the Reward, that would save his father.  A correlation with stages of ‘the hero’s journey’ can be identified 

The story is told by an Observer-type narrator, which brings us the details from a third person perspective and a witness point of view, including limited omniscient access to the spectrum of inner thoughts and feelings of Luka Khalifa. The exclusive view into the inner world of a specific character, has an effect that stimulates compelling feelings and empathy towards the hero. This encourages, or hooks readers to continue following his journey. An example of the narration point of view effect can be found within the following lines:

‘I can’t see the future, and that feels right,’ Luka thought, and turned to look the other way, where the visibility was good for some distance, almost as far as he could see, but the mist was there too, he knew that; he had forgotten some of his own past and didn’t know that much about the universe’s.

We observe the narrator’s access into Luka’s mind, inner thoughts and knowledge, as well as his view on current plot settings and natural surroundings. In this case, Luka reflects on what he sees: the myst obscuring his view into the future and past is a metaphor, representing human perception of time, including the limitations of knowledge and memory.

Beyond the narration effects, Rushdie is utilizing a ‘Flashback’ narrative structure to transport his readers back and forth along the plot’s timeline: From progressive on-goings & current time, to Luka’s past events, memory moments & Rashid’s story telling. Each stage of Luka’s adventure represents a new challenge or a type of riddle, where answers and information are found through going back into flashes from the past. This is where the additional theme of ‘Stories’ can be identified, focusing on our ability to transcend time through our memories, imagination and stories.

“So this was – it had to be – what Rashid Khalifa had called it: The river of Time itself, and the whole history of everything was flowing along before his very eyes, transformed into shining, mingling, multicolored story streams.”

In this example from the extract lines, the ‘Flashback’ timeline technique can be detected. Our protagonist Luka, draws information on his current settings through going back to his past stories.

We can clearly sense the themes of Time and place evoked through the plot setting: The element of time itself is represented here as the actual Place of setting: ‘the River of Time’ our protagonist must journey through the river, or otherwise symbolically through time, in order to reach the plot’s various stages and fulfill his quest. We can find the idea of time travel connecting both plot setting and timeline structure mentioned above.

The analogy or Simile of Time as a river is a philosophical metaphor that dates back to ancient times, originating in reflective observations on the nature of time and the comparative similarities to traits of rivers. Here are some examples : time is fluid, time never stops flowing, time can be rough or peaceful, time takes us places, eventually delivering us towards our destiny. During my research on the history of the analogy, I’ve found a fascinating blog article by Kensy Cooperrider, his research includes many examples where is was adopted and developed by poets, writers and philosophers, including Leonardo da Vinci. *1″“Time is a river, a violent current of events, glimpsed once and already carried past us, and another follows and is gone. Marcus Aurelius, mediations, written between 161 and 180 AD”.

The text evokes a mood of wonder and mystery. The lines leave me feeling what could be described as similar to a “Déjà vu” or day dream. Due to this atmosphere, readers may continuously be wondering whether the plot settings within the ‘World of Magic’ are real, do they exist in the realm of stories ? or possibly within a dream on character’s mind and imagination. Rushdie successfully applies a ‘curiosity’ type literary hook here, to keep his readers engaged in questioning. We find an example of this possibility in particular lines: “He had accidentally taken a stumbling step to the right and entered a World that was not his own, and in this World, there was no River Stinky, but this miraculous water instead.” We note the Capitalization of the word: ‘World’, emphasizing that Luka had left his own ‘World’ (or Place) and traveled into a different kind of ‘World’, another indication that this is a potentially imaginary place.

As a reader, I couldn’t stop admiring the beauty of Rushdie’s word-play and language, while his writing style seems simple and colorful enough for young readers to appreciate: “and in this World, there was no River Stinky, but this miraculous water instead.”, it is equally rich and abundant in poetic style as he gracefully utilizes multiple poetic devices within our text lines. Here are some examples of poetic devices I noted, along with sample lines and some impressions : 

”So this was – it had to be – what Rashid Khalifa had called it: The river of Time itself, and the whole history of everything was flowing along before his very eyes” This line contains Rhythm, it is structured and the pauses and gaps emphasize the feeling of awe and wonder, which is made even stronger by the Consonance used: ”the whole history of everything was flowing along before his very eyes”, the sounds ho and hi create a feeling of surprise and wonder, while ing ing ong, represent the movement of the river and time. This continues with further Alliteration found in the next line: ”shining, mingling, multicolored story streams.Once more, the sounds ing, Sh, S, M are used as a literary sound effect, representing the sounds of the magical, mingling river Luka sees. The Imagery of ‘‘a Terminator, “an enormous science-fiction-type blaster”, provides readers with an indication that despite being located in the magical world, our story takes place in contemporary times. Onomatopoeia is found in the word representing the sound of the blaster : ”BBBLLLAAARRRTT!”, 

The metaphor of River continued to stay on my mind as I observed the general prose style, line structure & Rhythm : Firstly, the lines describing the river, flow beautifully, in notable rhythmic and poetic styles and sounds I previously mentioned, a simile of a curvy, peaceful steam:”shining, mingling, multicolored story streams’” As we read this sentence aloud, our voice produces an effect resembling water and gentle rapids. This continues as Luka’s draws conclusions on his vision into past, future and mesmerizing present, written in the same dreamy and colorful style:“In front of him flowed the Present, brilliant, mesmerizing”. From here, we’re headed towards a sharp drop down an unseen waterfall – which takes us by surprise as the last few lines are totally different, both in rhythm and prose – we find ourselves carried away by an unexpected, sudden science fiction torrent: “and he was so busy staring at it that he didn’t see the Old Man of the River until the long-bearded fellow came right up in front of him holding a Terminator, an enormous science-fiction-type blaster, and shot him right in the face.” These are also the lines I probably least understood, yet my impression is that it is pretty funny and was intended as a fresh & humorous ‘wake up’ gesture by the author.

I would love to conclude with the line that stayed on my mind most : “In front of him flowed the Present, brilliant, mesmerizing”. I love the language of this line, which feels marvelously accurate in describing the sensation of the present. It was inspiring for me, as it evokes deeper, mindful thoughts: on the miracle of consciousness, our perception of time and reality. When we find the time to truly think about it – each present moment of our lives truly is miraculous, brilliant and mesmerizing, probably Just as magical and amazing as sailing through Rushdie’s River of Time.

Reference and research links: 

Novel Wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luka_and_the_Fire_of_Life

The River of Time, Blog by Kensy Cooperrider, May 16, 2018 : http://kensycooperrider.com/blog/the-river-of-time

Part 2 – Observation from my Log and notes

Overall, I feel that I’ve enjoyed learning, and was equipped with new tools, ideas and constructive materials. The reason I particularly appreciated our Creative Reading Unit, is that I’ve always been fascinated by writing and story crafting arts. I’ve even written a children’s book a couple of years prior to my OCA course. Yet I haven’t taken any writing classes before, therefore I feel that this unit projects expanded my comprehension of constructing good narratives, developing a writing style and poetic skills. For instance: understanding the hero’s journey as a writing tool: “It’s a powerful and flexible framework, and if you want to tell stories that actually impact your audience, it’s a useful tool to have at your disposal.”, Patrick Moreau, Science of Storytelling blog. I would potentially structure better stories and create greater narratives due to tools & impressions acquired through this unit projects, my work into deeper poetic analysis for our assignment and understanding the powerful effects of metaphors such as the river in my chosen piece.

Our research point on the evolution of the written word, from traditional literature through the print revolution to new media in the digital age and writing through coding and algorithms was very interesting in providing broad vision on text as a medium. The ‘Hero’s Journey’ project provided an insightful breakdown and explanation of elementary dramatic writing building blocks, which helped my understanding of basic, skeletal narrative structuring and development. For the original story script exercise, I’ve used a personal idea for a writing project that’s been on my mind for a while. Analyzing the idea for the exercise had given birth to new perspectives and elements that would enrich and ripen the idea, for instance: identifying the stages and organizing course of events, adding a mentor character etc. The character type exercise was additionally important, and would surely become useful in future writing plans.

I genuinely appreciated the touch of humor in both ‘Modern Postmodern’, ‘Rap or Romantic’ exercises. Our project on poetic devices and their different effects was truly interesting as well as useful, as I always loved writing but haven’t had the chance to study creative writing related technical skills.

My favorite part of the unit was surprisingly the poetry writing exercises. I found close reading and poetic thoughts similar to meditation: taking the time to read and process each word, followed by observation of my own reflection and how the words affect my mind, my mood and feelings. Doing that after so many years truly reminded me how much I do love and enjoy poetry. I enjoyed working on both our close reading projects: ‘Fern Hill’ and ‘The Road’, which left me so curious that I felt I needed to obtain the book. I spent a couple of days reading, reflecting and appreciating McCarthy’s powerful and direct writing style and the gloomy imagery & atmosphere it supported. This helped later, as I progressed into working on my second assignment, I was feeling more confident and able to identify the narrative and poetic devices we studied such as metaphor, simile Rhythm, consonance etc.

I believe the unit demonstrated the connection between the visual and written art forms. A link that artists can implement as a bridge when seeking inspirational thoughts or creative ideas – for instance, it is easy to write a poem, inspired by feelings triggered by viewing a beautiful painting, and in reverse, create a painting or sculpture after reading a moving piece of poetry or literature. 

It seems that similar parts of our brain are activated when expressing our feelings through art, whether we use paint, text, music or movement. Multiple neurological studies suggest this finding and I can support this conclusion, as I observed similar feelings of satisfaction, happiness, even ‘’Euphoria’ I tend to experienced whether I danced, drew or painted: “engaging in any sort of visual expression results in the reward pathway in the brain being activated,” says Kaimal. “Which means that you feel good and it’s perceived as a pleasurable experience.” “Anything that engages your creative mind — the ability to make connections between unrelated things and imagine new ways to communicate — is good for you,” Girija Kaimal, professor at Drexel University and a researcher in art therapy.

To summarize, my journey through this unit tasks left me with multiple useful creative reading / writing developmental tools that I am certain to carry on & implement throughout my course and future art projects. I can report experiencing more contemplation, coherent ideas and urge to allocate more of my time to active artwork. Additionally, some local creatives and new projects manifested into my life and I’m excited to blend in and find my saying. Finally, I’d like to end with a favorite poem from my notes along with my latest painting as a token of gratitude for learning new ways of connecting the written word and my art.

Reference and research links: 

What Happens In Your Brain When You Make Art, Article by Malaka Gharib, January 11th, 2020 link:https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/01/11/795010044/feeling-artsy-heres-how-making-art-helps-your-brain

How Does the Brain Process Art? New imaging techniques are mapping the locations of our aesthetic response, By Abigail Tucker, SMITHSONIAN MAGAZINE, NOVEMBER 2012, link: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/how-does-the-brain-process-art-80541420/

Patrick Moreau, Science of Storytelling blog, link: https://www.musestorytelling.com/blog/heros-journey