Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Lit term: restraint, rhyme scheme
"Stopping by the woods on a snowy evening" by Robert Frost.
Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening
Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.


Intro from packet? Who read it? - reread intro about Camus.

Myth of Sisyphus- anyone read anything? See notes below.

Write out your own ideas to questions 3, 7, 12, 17 from packet on the back page of Stranger packet

The Stranger chapter 4 (98) of part 2

Reminder:
Tuesday 11-29 Sisyphus
Monday 12-5, Stranger final test AND packet due.
Monday 12-5 checking out Siddhartha

Sisyphus was the most cunning of mortals. Near the end of his life, when Hades approached him to take him to the underworld, Sisyphus saw that Hades had handcuffs, which were a novelty at that time. Sisyphus tricked Hades into demonstrating the handcuffs on himself. With Hades thus bound, Sisyphus lived for a time with Sisyphus in his closet. The problem became that no one could die without the Lord of the Underworld around to take them away. That doesn't sound so bad, but if no one could die, soldiers could be hacked up on the battlefield and would still show up for dinner. Sick people could be in awful pain but have no relief from death. The gods intervened and Sisyphus was forced to let Hades return to his domain.

Even then, Sisyphus was a cunning man. Before he reported to the Underworld, he asked his wife not to bury his body. When Sisyphus arrived in the Underworld, he approached Persephone, the Queen of the Underworld, and told her a sad story. (Some stories state that he asked Pluto this favor.) He said that his wife should be rebuked for not burying him properly. She hadn't even put a coin under his tongue to pay Charon, the ferryman, for passage into the Underworld. Persephone agreed to let him go back to Earth. There he passed the time freely, forgetting about his agreement. Eventually the gods grabbed him and returned him to Hades to be condemned to continually roll a rock up a hill, only to have it roll back down again.

Camus wrote a book called . He uses the myth to illustrate man's futile search for the meaning in a world devoid of god, truth, and value. Camus asks if the answer is suicide. He answers with a resounding "No! Revolt!" First we have to acknowledge the absurd: Much of our life is predicated on the hope for tomorrow, yet tomorrow brings us closer to death and death is the ultimate enemy.