Question #4

Emotion plays a huge role in Eve's attempt to promote women and fuels her efforts.  Emotion is the key part in changing people's views on women and vaginas.  Throughout all of the monologues Eve uses many different emotions to suck the reader into the story and keep their attention in order to support the cause.  When she includes jokes in the stories it is to relieve some of the discomfort involved with reading some of the plays.  In the story "The Flood" the old women says, "I used to have crazy dreams, crazy dreams. Oh, there dopey. Why? Burt Reynolds."  This quote is a little joke from the monologue used to create a comfortable atmosphere when talking about potentially awkward material.  The story was about an old woman being interviewed about her vagina, which in some people's eyes could be viewed as inappropriate.  Using jokes can make it less of a "big deal" sometimes because laughter can be extremely stress-relieving.  Ensler also uses sadness and embarrassment to motivate the audience.  When people feel sad for the people in the stories it creates a sort of connection between the reader and the character in the story.  She also talks about things such as rape, and other types of violence against women to raise awareness about these topics instead of ignoring them.  She is very open with talking about these kind of taboo things in order to cause people to be aware of what women have to deal with, which could potentially cause some kind of change or at least an increase in awareness.

Vagina Monologues

Personally I think that the video of Eve Ensler was much more captivating and easier to understand than it is to read the monologues.  I feel as if while i am reading the stories, there is no emotion involved because it is up to the reader to interpret what the character is feeling.  It is also harder to follow the plot when there is nothing to watch and nothing to hear except what is in the individual's head.  While performing "The Flood" live, Eve did a very good job at telling the story of the old woman and even changed her voice to give the audience more of a sense of what is happening.  When I read "The Flood" I wasn't able to really get a feel for the way the women sounded, or the tone in which she was speaking.  Once I saw the video I was able to see how she sounded and the way she spoke, this changed my perception of the story and I feel like I understand it better now.  It seems as though Eve uses comedy, and her charisma to captivate her audience and get them to feel more comfortable about the subject matter.  This can only be portrayed in person rather than in a book because of the visual aspect involved.  In "The Flood" for example, The old woman says, "I can't tell you this. I can't do this, talk about down there. You just know it's there."  This is supposed to show the old woman's reluctance to talk about her private parts, but it is shown much more clearly when it is performed because she mimics the voice of the woman and paints a good picture of her attitude.  It is easy to understand the plot in each of the individual monologues, but in order to fully grasp the message and see the emotion involved with the monologues it is necessary to see it performed.

Vagina Monologues Question #1

I believe that Eve Ensler purposefully wrote this as a play and wanted it to be performed because as an audience people would get a lot more out of it than just reading it themselves.  The difference between reading the monologues and watching them be performed is when you are physically there, the play is made up of real people which creates more of an emotional bond to the actors and can reach people more deeply.  Also if the play is performed that means many people are there watching it which promotes more awareness to the subjects being portrayed.  She wants vaginas to be performed not only to promote awareness but also to really draw a picture for the audience.  When people read things the concepts are not quite as vivid because some things are left up to interpretation, but during plays everything is presented in front of the audience causing everyone to be on the same page for the lack of a better word.  The physical performance changes people's views on how they see and think about vaginas in the sense that people will now see them as more of a woman's body part, or something women have to deal with all the time, rather than thinking of them as something that we are forbidden to talk about because it is too personal.  The point is there is no such thing as too personal when a large portion of society has to deal with the same thing.

Vagina Monolouges Question #2

Eve Ensler believes that language is very important when talking about female body parts and she believes that the message being sent relies on the words you choose to describe something.  The words we use to describe body parts are very important because some words are displeasing and the very sound of them makes it hard to talk about specific subjects.  For example, Ensler says herself that the word "vagina" sounds like some kind of disease or just something bad instead of what it actually is referring to.  Many people are uncomfortable talking about vaginas because the sound of the word makes it seem like a very personal and embarrassing subject, when in reality it shouldn't be.  She lists many different words that also mean "vagina" in order to show the reader that it is just a word and if you call it something other than a vagina then the subject becomes less embarrassing.  If people could get past giggling after hearing "vagina" then people could start learning more about the physical nature of a vagina and deal with the issues that women have to face on an everyday basis.  I believe Ensler asked the women in the monologue, "What would your vagina wear?" because she wanted to lessen the awkwardness of having a personal discussion about their private parts.  I also think she wanted these women to get a feel for what they think of their vaginas.  For example, if the person said it would wear jeans then maybe this person is less comfortable with having sex and feels as though she should be covered up.  I believe Ensler's main goal in harping on how language is crucial when describing personal things such as vaginas is to get women to be more open with talking about their bodies and make them more comfortable talking about important issues that pertain to them.

Between the Pool and the Gardenias

This is one of my favorite stories out of the book "Krik? Krak!" because it is different than most in that it includes some sort of a twist at the end.  In the beginning, I thought that the woman found a living baby on the side of the road and was going to keep it and raise it as her own.  It turned out in the end that the baby was actually dead and the woman kept it because it was the closest thing she could get to having her own child.  I think she took the baby because all her life she has wanted to have her own baby and she also wanted a lot more things in her life that she could not have.  When speaking of the house and property that she worked at she said, "I pretended that it was all mine." When she says this it shows how much she wants a better life with better things, which leads me to believe that is why she kept the baby.  She was so used to pretending that she had things in which she actually did not have, it was very simple for her to pretend she had her own child even though it wasn't actually alive.  Once the woman started talking about how the baby was starting to smell really badly is when it is made known that the baby is dead.  I feel as if her decision to bury the baby in the garden really set her up to get caught in the end since many people walk throughout the yard.  When the pool guy saw what she was doing there really was no way to explain her way out of it because the truth was too unbelievable.  I think the ending was ironic because all she wanted was to have her own child and when she finally had one in her mind, she would then be severely punished for "murdering the baby." The significance of the title "Between the Pool and the Gardenias" is that is where she was stuck waiting for her fate to be decided.

Children of the Sea

This story, although the context is different, reminds me of the classic Shakespeare play, "Romeo and Juliet." The two stories are similar in many different aspects even though they are about two completely different cultures and time periods.  The two stories are about two people who are in love, and they both have to deal with the fact that they can never be with each other.  In the play, they cannot be with each other because their families are sworn enemies and the fathers won't stand for it.  In the story, the two lovers cannot be together because the man is an enemy of the country and has to flee, while the girl is forced to stay with her strict father who also does not like the man she loves.  In one of the girl's letters she says, "When we see each other again, it will seem like we lost no time." When she says this she shows that she still has hope that they will again be reuinited which sets up the ending to be a tragedy because they in fact will most likely never see each other again.  In, "Romeo and Juliet," Romeo is exiled thus making it impossible for him to be with Juliet just as the man in the story is basically cast out of Haiti forcing him to never see the girl again.  The ending of the two stories turn out slightly differently but they both end tragically in a sense.  Romeo and Juliet end up killing themselves because they cannot be with each other, while the man from Haiti is not said to be dead or alive but he is gone forever while the girl lives on without him. 

What He Said to His Enemies

When I came across this poem the title immediately caught my attention.  I first thought the poem was going to have something to do with physical enemies with names and faces.  After reading it, I realized that this poem was not about a man's enemies, but it was a poem about the enemies of a whole culture and that you have to stay strong when facing adversity.  I believe the story represents the hateful views that have been bestowed on the Middle East and how if people actually got to know some Arabs, they would see that there is no danger.  When speaking about the enemies it says, "They wanted to get him lost in the world of trees, stand silently forever, holding up his hands." I think this quote is supposed to show how people want everyone from the Middle East to just give up and agree that they are wrong and surrender, and be lost to the world as if they are trapped in the forest with no where to go.  The man in the story seems like he is trying to be resilient and just kind of let people believe what they want because he knows that he is not a bad person.  Also in the poem it says, "What made them think the world's room was so small?" I believe this is supposed to mean, why can't we all live in the world together with our own beliefs rather than hating everyone who disagrees with us?  The man in story seems very wise and loyal to his culture, and it also seems as if he wants his enemies to find him so they can see that there really is nothing there to hate.  He says to his enemies, "Come in, look for me where you think I am. Then when you see there is nothing there, then we can talk." This is a very symbolic quote because it is basically saying he wants his enemies to find him because when they do they will see there is no threat, and then they can begin to talk about there differences in a civilized manner.

Blood

In this poem the father tries to portray what a true Arab is compared to the recent change in culture.  It seems as though the father isn't fully capable of understanding the new way of life, and maybe simply does not want to.  The author writes, "I call my father, we talk around the news.  It is too much for him, neither of his two languages can reach it.  To me this shows that even though the father must be aware of the current problems going on in his land, he is just too old and accustomed to his way of life to try and adapt to the new situation.  Throughout the poem, both father and daughter are conflicted by two different cultures, the new way of life and the old.  According to the father true Arabs live by the old traditions and take pride in the way that they live.  I believe the reason they are sort of "ashamed" of the new culture is due to all of the negativity involved with people's views on it.  When describing a Palestinian boy dangling a toy truck on the front page of the news paper, she says, "Homeless fig, this tragedy with a terrible root is too big for us. What flag can we wave?" This quote shows that since there are bad things happening in their country they do not know who to be loyal to, if anybody at all, because they do not fully believe in either culture anymore.  With all of the trouble of the conflicting cultures, the final question at the end of the poem sums up the moral of the poem which is, "What does a true Arab do now?"