AP Lang & Comp

This blog is a forum for discussion of literature, rhetoric and composition for Ms. Parrish's AP Language and Composition class

Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Invisible

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4 comments:

  1. connor s.April 6, 2011 at 8:08 AM

    The fact that Spring, Summer, and Fall of the novel within Invisible travel through first, second, and third person cannot be ignored. Second person stands out the most as we rarely come across it in literature as we also rarely come across such grotesque subject matter. To me second person brings you into the novel more, after reading "you" so many times you get a slightly more personal connection and it becomes easier to put yourself in the character's shoes. Which Auster certainly needs to do in a section of his book that is so dark and un-relatable and would make us want to hate a character who me must like to get all we can out of this book. So if that is the device of second person, what about first and third? Is first used to let us get to know our hero? or because Walker was planning to write his whole memoir like that? Is Fall written in third person so it seems like we're getting a bigger picture of what is going on when things begin to get even crazier? Answer to these would allow us to know more about Walker in his last few days and how aware of his reader he was. I think we can guess if he was so careful in how he presented his story it may lead us to the conclusion that he wouldn't just make such stories up.

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  2. RosieApril 6, 2011 at 2:18 PM

    I found that certaion types of narration were more effective than other. The first part of the novel, written in first person, I found to be almost more relatable than the second and third parts. When hearing the word "I", I feel almost as if my 'self' and the 'self' of the novel almost blend together. I am seeing what they are seeing and I am thinking what they are thinking. When Auster switches to second person, there is an abrupt and clear seperation. Suddenly the personal cannot blend with the fictional, and I felt almost as if the switch made it clearer that I was not part of the story. I found myself thinking, No, This is not me (literally no longer "I" but now "you"), and I felt very removed from the text. The second person tone made reading difficult for me because I was very much aware that "you" was not "I" and I was distinctly seperate from the novel. So far as Fall, I found myself feeling as if the third person gave it almost a tone of inevitability, almost as if everthing had been determined. It was written as if "Walker did this" and "Walker did that" and there were no significant emotions attached to the events (in contrast with the emotional scarring of the first chapter and the phsyical scarring of the second chapter).

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  3. AnonymousApril 7, 2011 at 12:59 AM

    I don't think that I would agree with Rosie that certain types of narration was more"effective" but rather that I would say it had different effects on the reader. I think that it also depends on the goal of the person who is reading it, or writing it, or editing it etc. For example, Walker might have felt that second person was the better narration for him as it allowed himself to be detached. However, this would lead me to ask, which narration do you think Jim would have preferred?

    Also in response to Connor's comment (I don't know if he meant to use this) but he calls Walker a hero? Do you guys think that he had the potential to be a hero? Or is he a hero?

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  4. connor s.April 8, 2011 at 1:17 AM

    Calling Walker was somewhat of an accident on my part, mainly I refereed to him as he since he fits the role. Walker is front and center, he tells us the story, we get to know him, and he does a handful of things that make us as readers like him but in many other ways he doesn't fit the role of a hero at all. Leaping to mind first is that he takes part in something as immoral and disgusting as incest, can anyone who is involved in something so looked down upon by society as incest really be a hero? or does it take all his credibility and ability to judge others away? Plus is seeking revenge a truly heroic act? He has good intentions as to reveal that Born murdered someone but at the same time he is attempting to ruin the man's life, which although he may deserve it setting that as a goal seems to give off the idea that Walker has some evil in him. Pin pointing exactly what Walker is in his own story proves to be difficult, he seems to be an innocent bystander who got dragged into all of this starting at the party with Born but he also performs some horrible acts himself.

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