WEEK FIVE BLOG ENTRY

Think about or answer any one of the following questions this week:

How do you define nation?

What does language have to do with national identity?

What is the role of schools in inculcating national values?

Should nations require national service(military or civilian)?

U.S. Army recruiters were caught signing up future soldiers at a high school in Tijuana. How do you feel about that?

WEEK FIVE READING

Continue reading The Tortilla Curtain.
Every now and then, as you read, stop, look up and say "ahhh, brilliant." Then go back to reading. Especially do that if you are reading in public.

WEEK FIVE WRITING ABOUT WHAT YOU READ

I am confused as I read through The Tortilla Curtain. Please explain one of the following concepts to me:
The title...what does Boyle mean by a "tortilla" curtain?
Animals as symbols.
Fences and walls.
The American Dream.
Alienation and ethnic division(is alienation key to ethnic identity?).
Gender identity...how are gender roles worked out in this book?
The ending of the book--for goodness sake, someone explain what it means.

Or, if none of that strikes your fancy, choose a theme from the book that you think is important and explain that concept.

TORTILLA CURTAIN ASSIGNMENT SAMPLE/EXAMPLE

TC BOYLE SYNTHESIS “ESSAY”   DUE TO TURNITIN BY MAY 10TH

 

I put "essay" in quotes because this is not an essay, per se. It is more, a synthesis exercise.

As you read TC Boyle, number on a page from 1-10. Write out the ten sentences from the book that catch your eye or make you think. After each sentence, give a brief description of what the sentences means to you or why you included it.

1.    "For a long moment they stood there, examining each other, unwitting perpetrator and unwitting victim, and then the man let the useless bag drop from his fingers with a tinkle of broken glass" Page 8

This sentence caught my eye because of the word unwitting. Why does the author put these people together so early in the book and then say that they are both “unwitting?”

2.    She didn't answer, and he felt the cold seep into his veins, a coldness and a weariness like nothing he'd ever known.   Page 355

Boyle does a good job of describing the emptiness of death in this sentence, both cold and weary and unlike anything Candido, or anyone, can experience.

After those ten sentences comes the more difficult but rewarding part. You are going to write a synthesis. A synthesis is a type of writing where you take various unrelated writings and find some insight drawn from them. It is writing that creates connections between thoughts. You are not comparing the thoughts, but you are using these ten sentences to say one thing. When you examine the ten sentences together, what new insight do you gain that may have been undeveloped just by looking at the individual sentences?

That will be labeled “Synthesis” and will be at the bottom of the numbered ten sentences.

As I said, this is a little weird, but it usually produces good writing. You are simply numbering and writing about ten sentences and then writing about how they are connected. In fact, STRIVE FOR CONNECTEDNESS. GO BEYOND THE OBVIOUS. SYNTHESIS IS ABOUT INFERRING MEANING, NOT ABOUT STATING THE OBVIOUS. I am grading your writing in this section, but more importantly, I am grading your ability to create a unique synthesis, an original claim about the book.

Since it is a bit odd, I wanted to give you one good example of the synthesis part. The length of the synthesis is about a page. The author should have used one or two more examples of his main point of synthesis. But as you can see, the author has located clearly what the one area is that ties his sentences together. By the way, if your key idea only captures five or six of your sentences, that is fine too. You do not have to use all ten. Also, where this one is lacking is in the analysis. It is a bit pedestrian. Strive for depth!

STUDENT SAMPLE: The similar connection between most of the chosen passages would be the racist or hate aspect. The focus on race or between being Mexican or not is a huge factor throughout the book. It seems as though all the characters want to be or think that they are better than the person next to them. “Fucking Beaners. Rip it up man. Destroy it.” (page 64). This is an example of a quote from the book that shows the anger or animosity towards different races. Most of the quotes are also driven with anger or hate. I found that harsh words were spoken when characters were most upset or seemed to be in some type of turmoil. The unique choice of words Boyle uses for these passages is also a connection between the quotes. It seems as though Boyle chooses words that build some type of emotion or fire within the reader, as if he was aiming to provoke emotion within the reader. At the very least these quotes cause the reader to pause and think or feel the anger or pain the characters are feeling at the time. Another link between these quotes would be their context they are almost all referring to someone other than themselves, or trying to pass the blame a different way. Overall this book and these quotes are thought provoking as well as emotion filled passages that allow a person to feel what the characters are feeling.

AGAIN, THIS IS A SAMPLE. YOU MUST FIND YOUR OWN BRILLIANT PIECE OF SYNTHESIS FROM THE BOOK...

Tortilla Curtain Synthesis

1.     “We were all right in America, sure, but it was crazy to think you could detach yourself from the rest of the world, the world of starvation and loss and the steady relentless degradation of the environment.” (Location 622).

This sentence refers to Americans tendency to shut their eyes to the things going on in the rest of the world, yet Delaney tries to keep his altruistic nature intact, despite the moral failings of his neighbors.

2.    “The ones coming in through the Tortilla Curtain down there, those are the ones that are killing us.” (Location 1807).

This quote from Jack is referring to the illegal immigrants that come here and are straining the resources of America, in his opinion.

3.    “This was what mattered. Principles. Right and wrong, an issue as clear-cut as the on/off switch on the TV.” (Location 2660).

This sentence is a bit of foreshadowing by Boyle, because the issue of immigration and basic human rights is not so clear-cut.

4.    “She had a passion for hiking, for solitary rambles, for getting close enough to feel the massive shifting heartbeat of the world.” (Location 2045).

I simply felt the idea of the world having its own heartbeat that we could hear, or feel, or somehow sense, was beautiful to me.

5.    “He stood rooted to the spot for what seemed like hours after she’d ducked into the car, backed out of the lot and vanished, and only then did he open his hand on the two quarters and the dime that clung there as if they’d been seared into the flesh.” (Location 3540).

The idea of begging for money being so shameful that it caused physical pain was intriguing to me.

6.    “The coyotes keep coming, breeding up to fill in the gaps, moving in where the living is easy. They are cunning, versatile, hungry and unstoppable.” (Location 3767).

Boyle is clearly using coyotes as a metaphor for illegal immigrants, albeit in a very negative fashion here.

7.    “It was like that day out on the Cherrystones’ lawn, the same look of contempt and corrosive hate, but this time Delaney didn’t flinch, didn’t feel guilt or pity or even the slightest tug of common humanity.” (Location 4980).

Delaney is changing, and not for the better. This quote illustrates that he is literally losing his sense of humanity and common decency.

8.    “He was starting from scratch, like a shipwrecked sailor, everything they had— clothes, blankets, food, a pair of dented pots and a wooden spoon— consumed in the blaze.” (Location 5179).

I thought this metaphor was very powerful and accurate, although Candido and America had been like “shipwrecked sailors” the whole time.

9.    “Was it wrong, was it a sin, was it morally indefensible to take from a dog? Where in the catechism did it say that?” (Location 5237).

Candido’s brief moral dilemma was heartbreaking. The thought of anyone ever having to make a rationalization such as this is terrible.

10. “But when he saw the white face surge up out of the black swirl of the current and the white hand grasping at the tiles, he reached down and took hold of it.” (Location 6108).

Although I hated that this was the way Boyle chose to end the book, the moral of the story is undeniable: be a good person and always do what you think is right, no matter how bad things may be for you.

Synthesis

 

            One of the major underlying themes of the book is resentment. “The ones coming in through the Tortilla Curtain down there, those are the ones that are killing us,” (Location 1807). This quote from Delaney’s neighbor Jack illustrates a resentment bordering on hatred that he feels toward Mexicans. Although it seems Jack is being
hyperbolic in saying that they are “…killing us,” he seems to mean it quite literally. While Jack is a relatively one dimensional character that is filled with resentment from the start, Delaney and his wife, Kyra start out as relatively likeable, liberal-minded people that care about the environment, with a clear sense of right and wrong. “We were all right in America, sure, but it was crazy to think you could detach yourself from the rest of the world, the world of starvation and loss and the steady relentless degradation of the environment,” (Location 622). This is an example of the way Delaney thought in the beginning of the book, with empathy and compassion. Kyra, although somewhat harder and more distant than Delaney, was portrayed similarly in the beginning of the book. “She had a passion for hiking, for solitary rambles, for getting close enough to feel the massive shifting heartbeat of the world,” (Location 2045). This quote shows a softer side of Kyra, the kind wife and mother with a penchant for hikes. Later in the book, when Kyra witnesses a dog locked in a car with windows up, she is filled with righteous indignation. As this is all happening, Delaney thinks to himself, “This was what mattered. Principles. Right and wrong, an issue as clear-cut as the on/off switch on the TV,” (Location 2660). Although this quote is a bit of foreshadowing of how blurred the moral lines will become for him, it still is a good example of the fact that he is still a good person with benevolent intentions. Another major theme in the book is transformation, especially for the white characters. “The coyotes keep coming, breeding up to fill in the gaps, moving in where the living is easy. They are cunning, versatile, hungry and unstoppable,” (Location 3767). This is a passage from Delaney’s newsletter, and it seems to be a thinly veiled metaphor for the Mexicans that he is beginning to despise. Whether he knows it or not at this point, the narrow-minded attitudes and beliefs of his friends and neighbors have begun to plant the seeds of resentment and set his seemingly inevitable transformation in motion. This transformation is clearly visible when he confronts the Mexican in the baseball cap. “It was like that day out on the Cherrystones’ lawn, the same look of contempt and corrosive hate, but this time Delaney didn’t flinch, didn’t feel guilt or pity or even the slightest tug of common humanity,” (Location 4980). The worst part of this is that Delaney is completely aware of the change within himself, and he relishes it, wallows in it like a pig in slop. Despite the fact that the reader knows that the Mexican in the baseball cap is a horrible person, a rapist and a thief, Delaney is not aware of this, he is simply giving in to the hatred growing inside of him. Candido’s transformation was different. He had a great deal of animosity and resentment toward the rich gringos he would see, in their fancy cars and clothes. Even their pets had more than he did. “Was it wrong, was it a sin, was it morally indefensible to take from a dog? Where in the catechism did it say that?” (Location 5237). This heart-wrenching quote illustrates just how resentful Candido was, that he was even jealous of a dog. Despite the resentment and indignation within Candido, his transformation was positive, as magnanimous as Delaney’s was malevolent. Delaney had hunted Candido and America down like dogs, with murderous intent. “But when he saw the white face surge up out of the black swirl of the current and the white hand grasping at the tiles, he reached down and took hold of it,” (Location 6108). In that moment of life or death, despite the potential danger he was putting himself and his little family in, Candido chose to help his enemy. He chose lend a helping hand to the man that had hurt him when he needed it he most. He chose, in spite of all of his bad luck, to be a good man.