Tail of the Blue Bird Post Pages 36-80

Sorry that this post is belated! I had it saved on a word document when my browser was not working.

This section of Tail of the Blue Bird particularly follows the forensic expert Kayo and his interactions with Sergeant Ofosu and Garba. Kayo is arrested for his attempts to "destabilize the government". When Kayo calls his lab, they pretend to not know him. This chapter in particular deals with the corrupt nature of the government and Kayo's lack of options. It introduces one of the key themes in the novel: the notion of justice. The inspector, with his corrupt nature represents the lack of justice in the current system.  As said by Kayo "As much as he sought justice, he understood the sytem. AN average jury wouldn't take a prostitute seriously: it would be a waste of public money and would probably destroy whatever chance the girl had to swithc on to a more conventional life." The justice that Kayo sees in the system is unquestionably flawed.

1.     Presentation reflection

In my presentation, there were a few things that I wished that I had done a little bit better. The first aspect of my presentation that I wished I had done differently was that I would have chosen a different topic. While I did enjoy the Democratic Republic of the Congo's poetry, I found the poems hard to analyze in a ten-minute session. For the most part, the poems did not deal as heavily with poetic devices such as similes, personification, and Voltas as the other poems we saw in class. I did my best to discuss everything that I read in the poems, however I felt that the limited collection of poems did not work well in the ten minute lecture setting. In my presentation, I could have spoken with more confidence as well, which would have helped. In terms of what I did well, I think that my analysis of “Incantations of the Sea: Moando Coast” by Makula Kadima-Nzuji was effective. I was also happy with my recitation of the poem and how that went. One thing that I enjoyed about the assignment was how specific we were able to get relative to a single country or poet. I found the process of making connections amongst a work of poetry both informative and effective. One thing that I did not like was the style of the presentation: I found the time constraint to be counter-productive, and I wish the assignment was more of a lead-discussion than a presentation. In my opinion, this would have enhanced the experience for both the listeners and the presenter.

2.     Fully Develop Thesis

My conclusion on the poem I read essentially was that in the poem, Kadima-Nzuji uses no punctuation, and the flow is relatively choppy and unrefined. This coupled with the themes of the ocean, dread and depression form for me a sort of stream of consciousness type narrative. I view the speaker of the poem as being someone suffering from sever depression, using the “savage cries of the sea” as a metaphor for his unhappy mood. I then extrapolated this conclusion of the singular poem to the greater collective work of the Democratic Republic of the Congo to conclude that I find that these poems largely deal with the similar themes of loneliness and depression. Certainly none of these poems are positive. Through the same devices, most of these poems form into a stream of consciousness dealing with depression and loneliness. Upon further reflection of my conclusion, I can specifically sight certain tones and words directly from the text that continue to support my thesis. Looking at the diction from each poem specifically, one can see the darkness that accompanies these poems. These are some significant words from the collection:

            “Portrait” by Antione-Roger Bolamba: “Limbs” (5), “heart” (6), “silence” (9), “shipwreck” (13), “nothingness” (15), “follies” (17), “villains” (21), “anger” (24), “mask” (25), and “blood” (25). “A Fistful of News” by Antione-Roger Bolamba: “Treason” (5), “swords” (6), “blood” (8), “monsters” (11), “night” (13), “bats” (14), “stone” (16), “horror” (17), “galleys” (21), “quarrels” (23), “fangs” (25), “fire” (25), “lightening” (26), “scorn” (27), “flesh” (27), and “vengeance” (28). “Love in the Plural”: “Ocean” (1), “ vapor” (3), “flood” (5), “shadow” (6), “solitude” (8), “seaweeds” (9), “mirrors” (15).

            It is clear from this collection of words from the poems that the poems deal largely with unpleasant themes and motifs. This, along with the choppy flow and lack of punctuation continue to lead me to believe that the connection between my poems is that they all are “stream of consciousness” poems. This could possibly be a result of the "civil war" going on at the time in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. One of the more interesting things about my collection, however, was that my two poets were both relatively involved in the government. This is very different from most of the other poets who tended to be at odds with their respective governments. This didn't seem to affect the negative tone, so I'm not sure how much it actually affected it.

3.     Comparison

I would like to compare the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s poetry with that of the Cameroonian poet Mbella Sonne Dipoko. Similar to many of the poems in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Dipoko makes frequent reference to nature. In the poem “Our Life”, he uses “bird” (1), “desert” (1), “air” (2), “oasis” (3), “water” (4), and “winged” (6). The focus on nature is a commonality between both works. Secondly, both poets rely heavily on a negative, pessimistic diction. Again in “Our Life” Dipoko uses words such as “ailing” (1), “agony” (1), “black hood” (7), “same prayers” (8), “frustration” (10), “morality” (10), and “flattering” (12). The combination of nature with the harsh, sharp, angry words is a significant connection between the two sets of works.

In contrast, there are some differences. Dipoko makes use of poetic devices such as personification and metaphors. I had trouble finding any of these in the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s collection. Dipoko also makes use of repetition in his poems. Dipko also frequently uses voltas in his poem, changing the tone or mood part of the way through. This contrasts with the poems in my work, as they always stay in one tone or mood throughout.

            As demonstrated, there are many similarities between the two collections of works. This could possibly be a result of the similarities of the two poets positions. Both were relatively famous in their respective countries and shared similar positions and almost the exact same time. The differences that arise, however, show the two different styles that were developing simultaneously in both Cameroon and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Tati-Loutard Poetry Reflection

Our assignment for this class was to read a collection of poems by Jean-Baptiste Tati-Loutard. I found his anthology and the poems to have a lot in common with one another. For the most part, all of his poems dealt in some way with nature. They all used adjectives and nouns that highlighted both the power and beauty of the natural world. He particularly had an interest with the sea, as evidenced by poems such as End of Flight, Letter to Edouard Maunick, and Submarine Tombs. Every one of these poems, and several other in the anthology deal with the beauty and the power of the sea. Tati-Loutard also heavily uses personification in his poem, giving human like qualities to inhuman objects. For example, he uses lines like "fields opened themselves", "baobab took aim", and "footsteps which sang"in his poem News of My Mother. None of his poems used rhyme as a literary technique, and I failed to notice any poetic types such as sonnets or haikus which his poems deal with. His poems also have a large amount of pronouns and don't have a large number of similes. He mainly writes in metaphors as a literary devise.
     Tati-Loutard is very effective in his use of imagery. Through his words, he is able to paint a vivid picture of what he is intending to describe. Phrases such as "camps of death flowered with cotton" and "The sea still describes infinity" in Pilgramage to Loango Strand demonstrate the poets effectiveness in imagery. Finally, the poets diction largely deals with harsh adjectives and dark nouns. The topics of his poetry tend to be fairly morbid. Several of these poems deal with death, and the majority of his poems have dark pessimistic undertones. Poems such as Pilgrimage to Loango Strand, Submarine Tombs, and End of Flight show the poets fascination with death.

Poetry Norms

Similies: Comparison using like or as
Metaphor: Comparison not using like or as
Hyperbole: Exageration for dramatic purposes
Alteration: words that follow one another and begin with the same consonant
Consonance/Assonance
Meter: Where the emphasis is on the poetry
Denotation: What it says
Connotation: What it implies
Allusion: A reference
Poet/Speaker: Poet = author, speaker = narrator
Vulta: A shift in energy in the poetry
Repition: Repeating for effect
Rhyme: Two words that rhyme
Personification: Giving human like qualities to a non-human object
Onomatopoeia: A sound that sounds like the word
Stanza: A collection of lines of poetry
Hiku: Three lined poem
Limerick:i.e. there once
Sonnet:
Prose:

Nii Parkes Reflection

A few classes ago, we had author Nii Parkes come into our class to give a lecture/discussion on his book Tail of the Blue Bird. Before he came, we as a class had read and discussed his book over the period of a few weeks. I thought having the author come in to discuss a book we had studied during our class was an extremely informative and cool experience. It is an incredible thing to be able to hear from the actual author why he wrote what he wrote and his own interpretation of his work. I can't remember ever having an experience like the one with Mr. Parkes, and I hope I will be able to do it again in the future. While for obvious reasons most authors cannot come to discuss their books, I thought it was great to have. Details like his scientific background and his interpretation of Kayo's choice completely altered the way that I viewed the text. I found the experience similar to last year when I read Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury. After reading the novel, we as a class read a long interview of Faulkner himself, part of which described his interpretation of the text. In the interview, he said that the novel was based on a singular mental image of three brothers looking at their sister's "muddy drawers" while she was up in a tree. From that image, he was able to construct the complicated, four part novel. Before reading the interview, I did not fully appreciate the importance of that scene. After, I was able to re-read the text with a greater level of understanding. Knowing why an author wrote something can be very useful.
     On another note, in relation to our discussion last class, I think that how Faulkner wrote The Sound and the Fury is how many authors write short stories. Before writing anything, the author gets a picture of a single event or scene in their mind, and the rest of the story is fleshing out that one image by providing background and possibly a conclusion. For example, A Conversation From the Third Floor is the image of a women with a baby talking to her husband in prison. The Coffee-Cart Girl is the image of a women selling coffee during a labor strike. Papa, Snake & I is the image of a boy watching a snake bite two dogs. I believe that most short stories are essentially responses to the prompt of a mental image. With the image of a boy watching the snake, one will ask who is the boy? Why doesn't he do anything? Who are the dogs? By answering these questions, the author fleshes out the story and the characters. As with the Papa, Snake & I the image can lead to a conclusion, or as with A Conversation From the Third Floor, the story can exist entirely within the image. This does not work for all short stories, but it is how I view most of them.

Short Stories Reflection

The story that I have enjoyed the most so far in our reading has been B.L Honwana's Papa, Snake & I. The plot revolves around an unnamed male son and his day on his families farm. The stories primary characters are the boy, Sartina (a female worker for the family), the mother, the father, a snake, Toto (the family dog), and Wolf (another dog). There are several reasons why this story was the one that I have enjoyed the most, the first being the complexity. Even though the story is relatively short, there are many interesting plot devices being used by the author. The relationship between Sartina and the protagonist, the jealousy when the other man arrives and flirts with her, the dynamic between the two dogs, the relationship between the dogs and the snake, the lack of action from our protagonist, the dynamic between the father and son, the role of the mother, and the neighbor and fathers interaction all provide a deep and interesting text. This story did a great job of fleshing out all of these relationships and plot points in a relatively small window. For example, the line "For some unknown reason the war sensation of Sartina's body flowed through my senses. I managed to cling to her almost physical presence for a few minutes, and I wanted to fall asleep with her so as not to dream of dogs and snakes," (114). Those few lines completely change the readers perception of the narrator and the role of Sartina in the story. Because of its position at the end of the story, I can't help but wonder if the writer intended the dog and snake as the primary plot point at all.
      Another interesting dynamic is between the father and the neighbor. Contrary to the relationship between the two dogs, the two masters seem to have a different power shift. The father seemed more submissive, while conversely Toto was by far the more aggressive of the two dogs. The dog vs dog relationship compared to the master vs master creates for an interesting literary dynamic.
      The final literary technique that I liked was using one character to convey the message. In the dialogue between the father and the son, the father gives a speech about hope, saying "My son, one must have a hope. When one comes to the end of a day, and one knows that tomorrow will be another day just like it, and that things will always be the same, we have got to find the strength to keep on smiling, and keep on saying 'That is not important'" (113). With this speech, the author is able to bring his point across to the reader via one of the characters.
      The story does a great job of fleshing out many characters, introducing a complex plot, and conveying the message of the story all in a very short time period. It is because of the authors effectiveness in these areas that I enjoyed his story the most

Other Voice

Hiya, I'll give you a quick lesson on cooking Blognese pasta. It's pretty easy. Here are the steps:

1.  Go out and buy the needed ingredients
2.  Get out the food (Easy enough)
3.  Preheat the pan and make your sauce
3.  Start cooking.

Now its time to start talking about raking leaves . . . Don't ask me, I just do what I'm told. It seems like a pretty self explanatory thing: When you have leaves on your lawn, you rake them. I don't really know how I'm going to elaborate on this, but I still have a few minutes left. A rake is a long piece of wood attached to a plastic shape with prongs on the end. You pull it towards you, creating piles of leaves which you then put into garbage bags. Then you throw out the garbage bags? I'm kind of at a loss here. Just follow these steps and you'll be alright. Got it? Have fun!