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Snippets of Excellent Forum Writing From Your Peer
Snippets of Excellent Forum Writing From Your Peer
Here’s a small sample from a post that links important parts of a text very well:
I argue that the teeth in Poe’s twisted short story “Berenice” symbolizes mortality but
also a sense of purity. Believing that the narrator Egaeus is a man of intellect, fearful of death
and obsessed with knowledge he becomes fixated with the teeth of Berenice, which somehow
manage to escape the grasp of her illness: “Now I shuddered in her presence, and grew pale at
her approach; yet bitterly lamenting her fallen and desolate condition…” (4). The narrator
shows fear of the presence of Berenice who is suffering horribly from her illness, in my
opinion that fear and sorrow stems from the fear of death as he himself were born from death
and sorrow “Here died my mother. Herein was I born” (1). Commented [LM3]: Great Juxtaposition here between
quotations from page 4 and page 1. The two quotes work
together to illuminate not only the character of Egeaus, but
also the theme of death, and how gender interacts with both.
Here’s some language from a post that does great close, imaginative work with the text:
… The word spiritual theologically symbolizes faith, and is represented by the female
characters. Ironically, to put your faith into something is to give up control, which is a
challenge for the male characters because of the affinity to have power and be in control.
Scientific study was another affinity for challenging their woman, defining the male’s
patriarchal characteristics. I think this is a few of the many gender specific symbols with
abstract philosophical binaries associate with patriarchy ideology. A quote I found from
Hawthorne's “The Birthmark” mentioned “spiritual affinity” (5), and it encompasses the irony Commented [LM4]: Watch how carefully, and
presented with language that symbolized gender specific characteristics used to show the imaginatively, this student works with both words in this
important phrase.
paradox of patriarchal ideologies. The Merriam Webster dictionary uses the words kinship and
marriage to define affinity. Ironically, affinity is also defined as an “attraction [a symbol of the
female characters] or force [a symbol of the male characters] between substances [a symbol
relative to science] causing them to enter into and remain in chemical combination” (Merriam
Webster dictionary). I find the latter definition interesting because it has symbols associated
with both male and female, chemically combining. Attraction representing the female
characters because it is the reason they married. Ironically the male characters conflict
between their love for science and love for their woman is to me, a paradoxical challenge to a Commented [LM5]: Note how this student mentions a
standard gender role of the man of the house to uphold… “paradox” in the lines above, but doesn’t stop there—she
goes on to further analyze that paradox.
It was ultimately, the male character that destroyed the naturally beautiful spirit of the female
because both men choose affinity for knowledge instead of natural god-given
beauty. Challenging faith and choosing love of science over their woman is thus symbolically
represented as dangerous and destructive. This reflects negatively on the character and
judgement of man’s humanity. … [It relates to] the attraction Eve had to the apple from the
forbidden tree of knowledge, because Eve chose knowledge over faith. This matters because
the male characters challenge religious ideologies by the affinity to acquire knowledge. I argue Commented [LM6]: This student keeps thinking, and
that each story in its own way ironically subverted gender specific patriarchal ideologies, to keeps building up her argument with both further reference
to the text (the text’s allusion to Eve) and further comments
show the dangers of challenging faith or God’s power with obtaining the scientific wonders of on the philosophical impact of the text. It is very creative,
our creation. Science challenges religious beliefs, questioning everything religion tells us to and the analysis is very sustained—it keeps growing and
just have faith in… building.
Here’s a solid and clear example of how, formally, to work with quotations. Look at the 1-
2-3 structure here: Claim, Quotation, Analysis:
… We know that Georgiana’s mark is deeper than just a mark on the surface of her
face. The mark on her left cheek was “a singular mark, deeply interwoven, as it were, with the
texture and substance of her face” (6). The word “interwoven” tells the reader that the Commented [LM7]: She doesn’t let the quotation speak
birthmark was so much a part of her that it couldn’t be removed because it was entwined into for itself—she zeroes in on a single significant word.
every part of who she was. This scar was not a superficial mark but a much deeper identity
that she carried with her all her life.
I argue that the teeth in “Berenice”, Poe’s short story, represents Egaeus’ longing for freedom
of his own mind and happiness that he seeks which is linked through the text by showing the
“monomania” or obsession and the frequent reference to Berenice’s “overflowing with
energy” (on page 2) flashbacks. The link between the teeth and the symbolism of freedom
begins with the implied jealousy he has for her stating “she roaming carelessly through life
with no thought of shadows in her path” (page 2). This statement would usually imply that she
is a happy and healthy girl, but one must read it in the text that it is being said by Egeaus, who
is very syndical and “buried in gloom” (on page 2 ) and in turn one can sense a back handed
compliment and the rise of jealousy. In this argument the “shadows in her path” is referring to
the fact that Egaeus is scared of his shadows, also known as he is scared of himself, because
the mental illness is slowly taken over his life and he is at the point where his life is solely
consumed with the thoughts of her teeth. Jealously that she can roam the house and land with
no cares while he has to suppress and isolate himself because he is continuously fighting back
all urges to his illness in attempts to being “healthy”. Through the jealousy that is triggered
the obsession to now intensifies. “The eyes were lifeless, and lusterless, and seemingly pupil-
less, and I shrank involuntarily from their glassy stare to the contemplation of the thin and
shrunken lips. They parted; and in a smile a peculiar meaning, the teeth of the changed
Berenice disclosed themselves slowly to my view. Would to God that I had never beheld them,
or that, having done so, I had died!” (on page 4).His investigative and analytical eye for facts
show how ill she now looks but he realizes that even in despair her teeth are a symbol of
happiness because they have not changed, like her other features, linking her youth and
happiness to the teeth. With this realization he begins to think that once he has a chance to
“beheld them” he in return will be cured and be able to feel peace with himself. The thought
that the teeth are the cure is also linked through the text, “It [the box] was of no remarkable
character, and I had see it frequently before, for it was the property of the family physician…”
(on page 6). He subconsciously puts the teeth in a spot that represents good health and
medicine. A location he has seen many times in his life and that not only the physician but he
sees its as a means to fix or attempt to make healthy, also known as a cure. A sign that fighting
the urges of his illness can be solved with procession of the teeth and in turn can free him of
his thoughts and gloom. The teeth meaning good and happiness indicates that although his
whole life has been miserable and full of “gloom” by self inflicted isolation but by now having
the obtaining his obsession it is mentally breaking his chains, by doing so it has been the only
good or happy things that has happened to him in his life. This argument also speaks to the
theme that until you are free to be yourself you will not be happy or healthy. Despite Egaeus
being a male obsessed by a female the ultimate goal for his is to feel happiness and freedom
and he only does so when he is true to himself and allows himself to be “ill”. The text, through
its symbolism, presents that the only medicine or cure to unhappiness is acceptance.