Surprise of the Century (or the Day):
Lord of the Flies actually ends well. (Before those of you who knows what happens freak out,) I don't mean that it ends happily. Or that it leaves me with that golly-I-learned-a-swell-lesson-about-human-nature! feeling you're supposed to get. No, it left me thinking "Dang... William Golding can actually write a really good couple of pages."
For the record, I hate the book. It is just another lame school book that's written in the most BORING style imaginable (I take that back, it was an action movie compared to Thoreau) that tries and fails to teach us some lesson about life and humanity. But actually, it was more than that. That was
Grapes of Wrath and
Maggie. This was also gross, disturbing, and had some of the most obnoxious characters I've ever met. I
really hated Ralph in the first few chapters. I mean, he takes off his pants and dives around on the beach pretending to be an airplane. Don't boys have any idea what they're going to get sand up?
(Okay, that was a bit uncalled-for. But it's just that kind of book.)
(Actually, I think their disregard for clothing and not-getting-sand-up-your-butt disturbed me more than the killing. I guess after you've rolled around naked on the beach for the heck of it, there's not much you can do to surprise me.)
But, the point, I think the book's crap. Good idea, but
Flight 29 Down did it so much better and more kiddie-friendly. I say we declare LOTF obsolete and watch that for english class instead. Or
Lost would work too, but there goes the fun-for-the-whole-family aspect.
BUT, the REAL point, there were a few pages I really liked. Maybe 5. No, probably 30 to 50 total, but 5 that were really "wow... I would read this even my GPA didn't depend on it..."
They were really good. When a certain someone is running for their life (won't spoil who it was), it just had... adrenaline. Like a
Pendragon book (series by D.J. MacHale, read it, love it, e-mail me so we can obsess over how we're going to murder Bobby after what he did on Ibara). I guess I really respond well to people literally running for their lives. LOTF was half a million times more real and disturbing Pendragon, but either way, the dude's fighting to death (ish). So, yeah... Just wanted to point out that even back in... 1954... people could write good adrenaline-filled fight/flight scenes.
Which means, since the best part of Lord of the Flies is
also the best part of Pendragon... And since they both contain messages & lessons about human nature and logic and Walmart taking over the world (good ol' Quillan)... but Lord of the Flies is old and sucky and Pendragon is shiny, new, and amazing... Are the curriculum-writers reading this?... (no)...
But, yeah... Long post not really about anything. Props to William Golding for almost touching on DJ MacHale's geniusness. And don't read Lord of the Flies, unless you enjoy immature boys murdering each other and 5 minutes of cool running-for-your-life-ness...
Oh, but if anyone ever gives the choice of LOTF vs. Thoreau or Crane or Steinbeck (except
Of Mice and Men, which rocked), take LOTF. And hope you don't barf or anything.
...Wow, now I can't stop thinking about whether my journalism teacher would like my conclusion or not... Gar, I don't wanna think about that. She has bad taste. She likes bitchy people who give a "call to action" but just say FIX IT FREAKS!!!!!! and don't offer advice or anything. I should totally have told her I thought that "perfect editorial" had a really bitchy ending. I wonder if anyone who knows my journalism teacher will ever read this. And why aren't my parents home from Back to School Night yet? I'm not getting off the computer until they make me... Ms. C, you have crap taste and like bitchy calls to action! xP Like I bet you enjoyed the ending of
Nickel and Dimed. That was the worst thing I've ever read. Not the whole book (it still pwned Thoreau). Just the last page. How should you feel, you wonder? Guilty, you ask? No.
SHAME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You should feel
SHAME for fucking up the lives of these poor people with your fucking maids and fucking shopping trips even though I appeared to enjoy working at Walmart but you're still fucking up these peoples' lives, you fucker, so either denounce your life of middle classosity or FUCK OFF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Except Barbara Ehrenreich omitted the curse words, like I should have. I just read them in between the lines... I think she is going to burn me at the stake because I am not a maid like she was for a few weeks. She really freaks me out. I think she's a bit unbalanced. Or else I'm the one with issues, since I'm the girl who cannot stop blogging and just wrote more f-words in that paragraph than she has in her life, and who thinks her hippie classmates will burn her at the stake for having set foot in Texas, and who thinks her parental parents will burn her at the stake for hating all after-school activities, and who thinks her fellow Aly & AJ fangirls will burn her at the stake for liking the Jonas Brothers more, and who thinks her too-cool-to-like-anything-from-after-the-'80's frenemies will burn her at the stake for liking Aly & AJ AND the Jonas Brothers, and who thinks her english and journalism teachers will burn her at the stake for posting this blog, and who may just set herself on fire, since deep down she knows that no one is actually going to read this blog, so what's the point of life anyways if no one reads your blogs?
But of course, if anyone does read this blog, I'll have to set myself on fire so no one will see my body and think "There's that girl who wrote that dumb rant about witch hunts and required reading... What a weirdo..."
So, hopefully you didn't just read this. Hopefully you read the thing about Kalan Porter instead.
