Reflections

I thought all of the presentations were rather interesting. Some people put a lot of work into theirs, and most had at least a clear summary of the paper and an interesting visual aid. Overall I would consider them very successful.

One of the ones I was most drawn to was Matt Leagre’s presentation about V for Vendetta. I have read the graphic novel and seen the movie, and I love both of them. Matt did an excellent job putting together ideas from the book, and I liked his use of the movie clip, even if it does not exactly follow the end of the actual graphic novel. However, Matt’s presentation was also interesting because he discussed the qualities of an antihero, which was I myself did in the presentation. I found the ties between our presentations interesting, and would like to read Matt’s paper in more detail to see if we analyzed our antiheroes in similar ways.

Steve Nisi’s presentation was also interesting because he chose a topic that did not necessarily lend itself obviously to the hero cycle, and so he had to stretch his ideas and the text in order to make the steps of the hero’s journey match up. This shows, though, that almost every story follows to one extent or another the hero’s cycle, and with a creative mind and a little wiggle room you can find the connections.

I also enjoyed Batu’s presentation on Batman and all of the others I saw, and I enjoyed learning more about the various aspects of the hero’s journey and applications of the hero cycle to various works, and can’t wait to see the remaining presentations.

Presentation (a bit late)

My presentation is going to be over my second paper, the topic of which was a comparison of the antihero qualities of the underground narrator in Dostoyevsky’s Notes from Underground and the protagonist of Andre Gide’s novel The Immoralist, named Michel. I plan on giving a brief overview of each novel and each character, discussing Michel and The Immoralist more heavily because the class should be familiar with Notes from Underground. As for visual aid, there does not seem to be much to do except make a PowerPoint with various insertions of text to illustrate specific points, perhaps accompanied by pictures of the novels, the authors, and maybe illustrations. It will likely depend on what I can find online.

I will discuss why I chose this topic, probably mentioning my intense interest in Dostoyevsky’s life and works, and the recommendation of The Immoralist by the esteemed Ms. LaMagdeleine. The comparison between the two works, thought up in collaboration between myself and noted educator, was of great promise and seemed interesting to me at the time.

The first example I will probably draw from the text would be my direct comparisons of the females in the two novels, Liza and Marceline, and their impact on the antihero qualities of the two protagonists. Any quote will do, and a lengthier explanation will be brought out as deemed appropriate and as time allows. The second example would be a direct comparison of two quotes, one from Michel on the uselessness of reason and morality and a similar one by the Underground Man.