Friday, November 16, 2012
"Homework": Annotations
Annotate each page with at least two different kinds of annotation. Present three of your annotations here, one from pages 1-4, one from 5-7 and one from 8-10. Use literary terms in each annotation (setting, characterization, conflict and so on).
Avoid reading anyone else's annotations before posting your comment. This way, we will have a better variety of responses to help us to understand the story well.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
15 comments:
On page four, the mother thinks to herself about how Jacob, George’s friend, would “step onto [his mother’s] death as onto the tines of a garden fork, and the solid shaft of the handle would rear up and hit him in the face.” Here, Helen Simpson uses imagery and metaphor to show how a life changing event may not be evident until long after it happens.
On page seven, in Simpson’s description of her grandmother, she uses the action of a character to paint an interesting (and gross) characterization when she says that her grandmother “cooked with a cigarette in her mouth” and “would stir [ash] in as extra seasoning.”
On page 8, George rejects his mother’s idea that a “little brother can be in because he’s ill” arguing that “If he’s seven or eight or something. That’s against the law.” It is a small conflict between them, but easily fixed by his mother’s new idea: “O.K., you've got an older sister instead.”
—163 words
On page 2, after realizing her son’s homework, the mother really wanted to help him. However, she also understood she have to give him a lesson. “I shouldn’t really help you” and “it’s only this once.” It shows us the internal conflict in her mind. As a mother she shouldn’t pamper him, but she can’t let her child in helpless situation. Finally, she warned him that this is the last time.
On page7, it is very interesting in what happened between the mother and son. “George scribbled away, not happy” and Simpson “felt powerful, like a magician” reveals that the external conflict between them while making the story. The mother tried to persuade him follow her imagination all the time.
Without any choice, George accepted her instruction even he didn’t agree with all. I think George is an obedient child.
On the page 9, even though she created a role of father’s girlfriend, Miranda, she still wanted to consolidate her position of mother. When his son though Miranda can cook, she said “ Not likely.” She also tried to provoke Miranda by “ stick pictures on the fridge so Miranda can see them.” It also reveals the internal conflict in Simpson’s mind. She desired to escape from the family, nevertheless she also wished her son just rely on her.
On page 2, the author presents an interior setting of the mother. After the mother discovers Dylan pads his writing out in order to fill three sides of paper, her instinctive reaction is “Serves Mr. Mottram right.” She further thinks “they can’t know what a life-changing event is at their age.” These thoughts foreshadow that she will create a made-up story to respond the absurd assignment.
“Is it allowed?” George’s questing still has swirled in my head after reading pages 5-7. Throughout these pages, George is in the painful struggle. He is unwilling to believe the story about his parents’ divorce is truth. Moreover, he tries to change the subject with some true things such as “Dad love domestic,” or “Auntie Sharon lives in the nicest place,” but he fails. Every time, he always is drawn back into the suffering story by his mum. We can see a conflict that happens in the mind of George between his nature honesty and the dependence to his mum’s help.
On page 10, the story, “Homework”, concludes with George accepts his mum’s fictional story. I ever tried to look for some dramatic scenes at the end, but I failed. The story didn’t leave any thoughts, viewpoints, emotions, or aftertastes to me. I thought about what is the theme of the story. Is it talking about the relationship between mother and son? Is it referring to the emotions of a middle-age woman? Or, it is how the lies are created and influence the world? I couldn’t find out the answers that satisfied me. Probably, the absurdness just is the theme of “Homework”. Sometimes, the illogic is true to life.
On page 4, Mrs. Helen Simpson talks about how George is "a lovely mild baby, like a dewdrop." Even he was hungry, he "just roared!" These words reveal the mother' love for her son. Her character as a mother is on full display.
On page 5, George "was torn between his natural fantasy-hating honesty and a desire to have someone else do his homework." But after the mother convinces him it's "just being creative", and reminds him the match he wants to watch at night, the son's internal conflict has been solved.
On page 10, George gives great comments on last night's game. "He shook his head in wonder. 'It was unbelievable.' " The settings tell the readers that the protagonist really loves football. And this character also helps him to finish off the paper.
—135 words
On page one, the writer describes a character of thirteen-year-old boy, George. His daily habit after school is making "his way to the television." George is a lazy boy who "groans" about his English homework and "leaves it to the last minute." He hopes that his mother can help him.
On page five, H.Simpson shows an internal conflict of the main character. George does not like an imagination of his mother, but he requests assistance from her at the same time. "He was torn between his natural fantasy-hating honesty and a desire to have someone else do his homework."
On page eight, the author - through the dialogue of George and his mother - demonstrates small conflicts between them. For example, when he complains about starting to cook by himself. "I'm a kid, it's not my job. Kids should be looked after by their parents," he protested. However, his mother smooths this situation over by the agreement "oh well... the dad does the cooking,but..."
- 163words
In the beginning of the story Helen Simpson allows the reader to feel amicable relationships between the mother and son (setting). Thus, on page 3, there is a dialog between them when the mother says George, “I trust you,” emphasizing she understand that he really need help with his assignment. Also, the mother tells George a story about his birth with big tenderness, and the son listens gladly it many times.
During the story, while the mother helps George to create the essay about an event that changes a life, she often refers to her own life. On page 7, the woman remembers her childhood when she lived with her grandmother, and helped with her “cleaning job.” Giving George ideas for his fake story, the mother reflects her own life that allows us better understand her character.
On page 9, the mother develops the divorce story, involving Miranda, father’s new girlfriend. She tries to show possible conflicts between George and Miranda. For instance, she says George, “You could stick them (postcards) on the fridge so Miranda can see them.” This could hurt Miranda’s feelings. However, George doesn’t really understand the all tension and complexity of such situation. The biggest problem he sees is who will cook for him. It shows George’s character, still naive and carefree.
In the second paragraph on page 1, the story is setting in the kitchen beside the table. The working mother puts away her work and comes to help her son’s homework with nutrient snack: “This might be a slice of toast and honey with a peeled Satsuma from which I have removed any stray threads of pith, or perhaps an apple, cored and cut into fine slices, with a few cubes of Cheddar.” The snack which has carefully prepared is ready to serve before her son step in the house. The author, Helen Simpson, creates a character, George’s mother, who is a considerate and supportive mother.
Because of George’s honesty, he does not want to lie to his teacher about his parents’ failure marriage. On page 7, he and his mother have a conflict. His mother insists that his teacher, Mr. Mottram, won’t doubt it and ask for the truth. His mother says, “He won’t. He’s an English teacher, isn’t he, not a psychotherapist. So if he did ask you he’d just be being nosy.” After that, George shrugged helplessly. Honestly, I am sympathetic with George. His mother shouldn’t urge George to accept her unbelievable story.
On the last page (page10), “When a man loses his temper, people say, that’s Irish in him, or the Scottish, or the Viking. Don’t listen to them. Dirty players or terriers are what they call footballers with that anger-stoked edge, but strength without sweetness is no use at all.”Maybe it is the theme of this story. Perhaps, the mother creates an incredible story to distract George from his anger, stimulates his creativities, and leads him to look at a problem in a different way, he would find a solution easier.
On the page three, we know more about George’s characteristics in dialog when his mum says to him, “If I help you, you’ve got to understand it’s only this time,” and in answer he says, “Course,” and “You know I’m not like that, Mum.” That means he does his chore mostly, and this time is unusual, and it is really difficult for him to do it.
On the page six, the conflict between mum and George shows that the mum prefers being with family rather than working and having money. When she says, “The only time they manage to get together as a family is when they go on some expensive safari thousands of miles away.” And she tries to tell him about the life’s valuation.
On page ten, “United! United!” the crowd chant of the Manchester United that the mum relates it smoothly to the story, it is obviously tells the ironic, so there is not unity between mum and dad. George was really in to the story and he got a picture of divorce, and when he heard of united and ironic, he quickly understood.
187 words
on page three George's mother remembered her growing son when he was born.
"than i kept you beside me in a basket". she seen her son grow in front of her and now even getting bigger than her.
on page six George talked about auntie sharon's family "her family goes on the best holidays and they 've got an Audi and a BMW ". he thinks that she has the best family because they get a BMW and Audi,but George's mom tells him it's not worth having those staff if u can't spend time with your family "anyone working those ridiculous hours. they've sold their souls".
on page ten George give a great comment at the end where he says " the mum an dad they're not united " it show me that it was George's story too and not fully his mom work .
On page two, Helen Simpson uses a short paragraph, “I thought; I don’t know what he can be expecting from a class of thirteen-year-olds…. They won’t know till they get there.”, to show her disapproval of the topic given by Mr. Mottram. It’s a setting to let us understand why even the mother thinks she shouldn’t help George (especially he leaves his homework until the last minute), she still helps a lot.
On page six, Simpson talks about Auntie Valerie, “ The only time they all manage to get together as a family is when they go on some expensive safari thousands of miles away.”, and “How could I be jealous of anyone working those ridiculous hours?”. She criticizes this by saying “ They’ve sold their souls.”. All these descriptions give us the sense of her family values and personality (she thinks it’s important to have enough time for family and she isn’t highly-ambitious for work.) that are also reflected on page one (she works from home, so she’s around when George gets in from school and how she prepares George’s snack.).
From page eight to page ten, we could see lots of ideas and details contributed by the mother; she suggests that George put Miranda and football in writing, for example. Instead of helping her son in a quick and rough way, Simpson dedicates herself to the story and she seems more excited than George, (even though she has her own work to do and has to solve the disagreements between them). I wonder Simpson is trying to send a message to readers- a mother should be like this.
---270 words
On page three, as mother said, “Ì am glad I wasn’t born at a time when you had to stay with the father of your children even if he broke your jaw.” A long time ago (setting) we can see how gender inequality affected women. Their husbands could do anything they liked. It shows how gender equality is changing over time.
On page six there is a disagreement between George and his mother (conflict) about Auntie Valerie’s family. He believed they are successful because of their jobs and car, but for her, they couldn’t balance their work life with family life. George disagreed to this idea, and assumed she is jealous. But she said, “How could I be jealous of anyone working those ridiculous hours? They have sold their soul.”
On page ten, even though it takes time to show the way that George writes a story, his mom is a dedicated mother (character) to him. She helped him to see a clear image of the story, and he said lastly, “Now I can do it.”
176- words
On page one, I found that George is quite thoughtful but not lazy. That is obvious when he didn't tell her mother about the hard homework when he had time during the holiday. He would rather do it by himself, but it was hard enough to stuck in. George’s mother is very sympathetic and caring; at the same time, she is very busy. However she loves her child, she wants him to stand on his own feet. In order to have helped him, George’s mother encourages him a lot.
On page five, I totally understand what George thinks about writing something that is not fact. “He was torn between his natural fantasy-hating honesty and a desire to have someone else do his homework,” he is honest to represent or write about things that are real, but the purpose is to become creative and able as long as it doesn't hurt anyone. So, his mother is rich enough in terms of knowledge to persuade him write a successful homework.
On page ten, George finds his way to finish his task. He is full of information; he only needs his ideas collected or mentioned to be written down. It foreshadowed when George expressed his feeling and reaction toward the football game he watched the night before. The ironic part (divorce and united) revived the hardship memory in the mother, but it ended Georges final paragraph. 233 words
On page one, Simpson shows the strong character of the mother, when she says " Why do you do this? Why do you leave it to the last minute?" Though she loves his son very much and cares for his every need,still she scolds him so he could understand the value of time.
On page five , George disagrees with her mother's ideas and is confused; however,he wants to complete his homework,because he has to watch soccer match.Simpson shows the internal conflict of George,when she writes,"O.K.,"he agreed. He was in no position to agreed.
On page ten,the story ends with a happy note," That's all right," he said, smiling up at me."You go. I can do it now." shows the convincing power of the mother.George disagrees with her mother on the ideas,but she convinces him and finally,he agrees to write a topic at his own.
On page one, Simpson shows the strong character of the mother, when she says " Why do you do this?
Why do you leave it to the last minute?" Though she loves his son very much and cares for his every
need, still she scolds him so he could understand the value of time.
On page five , George disagrees with her mother's ideas and is confused; however, he wants to
complete his homework, because he has to watch soccer match. Simpson shows the internal conflict of
George ,when she writes, "O.K.,"he agreed. He was in no position to agreed.
On page ten ,the story ends with a happy note," That's all right," he said, smiling up at me. "You go. I can
do it now." shows the convincing power of the mother. George disagrees with her mother on the ideas,
but she convinces him and finally, he agrees to write a topic at his own.
On page two, George got a terrible assignment “An event that changed your life” to fill in three side of paper. His mother shared some ideas with him and said “If I help you, you’ve got to understand it’s only this once.” That behavior had shown that she is a responsible mother.
On page five, George had to start his homework because he wanted to watch the match, Chelsea versus Liverpool. He expected someone can do his homework for him, but his mother told him that you just need to be creative to finish your homework.
On page eight, George was thinking what should include in his writing. He desired to write about if his mother could swim in the China Sea and then a shark came up. However, mother said that you should make it believable and looked real.
Post a Comment