Except the midterm is open book, open note, open everything. So there's really no need to type up anything.
Except, the great shining pity of my notes is that they're absolutely worthless for open note exams. My notes, aside from being written in scrawl even I find difficult to decipher, are a mess. I make them messy because it seems, despite a love for reading, I'm one of those "kinesthetic" learners. I learn better when I'm doing something to go along with the instruction. I need to doodle and put little side comments in square brackets that I will mean to look up later but never will.
Which is why one of my greatest fears is that someone will ask if they can copy my notes. Nobody needs to see the little sonnets I sometimes write in response to some word the professor just said. Nobody needs to see where I've written, with stars and arrows, my TO DO list, and how every day I seem to rewrite the same TO DO list, but with more stuff added and nothing crossed out. I really will get my driver's license this week, I swear.
My current class is Adv*nt*re in F*lm and L*terat*re. What follows are most of my notes so far, formatting mostly removed or mangled (too much fuss -- sorry -- it will make some parts unclear when I jump around), with no elaboration. (I'll omit the places where I wrote things already written elsewhere just so I would look busy and wouldn't have to make eye contact or be called upon. Such old tricks!)
Maybe it will read like a found poem? Maybe you'll be very smart and not read it at all -- I'm just studying out loud here.
6 June 2005
19th century Colonial period
British, French, Belgian to Asia, Africa, etc.
Several classes
Colonials, strict
Adventurers
Forays called "The Great Game"
How much can you get?
Got vicious, especially Africa
Belgians to the Belgian Congo
rubber
6 million of the native population killed
hands cut off for non-quota
Sir Richard Burton
b. 1821 d. 1890
Q. Victoria
K. Marx -- fellow researcher
32 languages including native dialects
Sometimes spy
Source of Nile -- looked for -- famous for
Ethnologist / anthropologist -- one of first
scholar
1st translation of Arabian Nights
Rubbiyat (sp)
erotica
sexual liberal
men and women enjoy
area of fascination in Victorian times
India -- mainly a spy
Africa -- dearly loved
met Isabella
long villified by historians
burned manuscripts for being a prude?
no, found circa 2000
great love affair/marriage
faithful
adventurous
set cap for him
USA -- west/Utah
South America -- consulate
fought with bureaucrats
Student of World religions
Ordained Sufi (mystic/Islam)
To Mecca in disguise
John Hannings Speke -- partner
liked
barely literate
younger son
great hunter
tremendous liar, especially on sign-on
~140 volumes of his travels
Royal Geographic Society had the money to send
Adjusting to safety?
restlessness
intensity
something new
[looking for truth?]
Where else intensity?
gambling
risk-taking
go to edge
[Bring camera tomorrow]
[Check for Becket on DVD]
Burton not English
[The luggage aspect of adventure?]
[Perhaps something with Michael Palin for class project?]
[I am so hungry. What became of my black Pilot Precise?]
Barter/bargaining spit
First aid / beetle ear candle
[Isolation factor in adventure literature?]
Ability to record well is important
7 June 2005
[Idea for classroom poster: "Can you think? Think about it."]
Did male adventurers live longer?
Is there any more state-sponsored adventure?
grants?
all ethnography?
space program?
[22 hours with only a swig of Sunkist]
[Is Fiona Shaw tall?]
Lake Victoria is the source of the Nile.
Fudged: her bit with the sword. She was an excellent swordswoman.
Speke: abominable in Africa to natives on last expedition
Belgium moved a village to the fair.
8 June 2005
African Queen
1951
set in 1914 (German East Africa)
Colour by Technicolor
Do women sometimes enjoy more access because no one takes them seriously? (Hepburn pushes soldier.)
[No British accents in this movie.]
[How old was Katherine Hepburn in this?]
[Translate or no? Subtitles or no?]
Adventure makes you more disposed to romance? Seizing life? Wanting to intimately share?
[Have these two had sex?]
Is getting out of the unexpected always a factor?
Is adventure better with a companion? Adventure = problem-solving in new ways.
Who is braver -- Kate or Bogey?
Deus ex machina = the rain
The "staying" point
Was the Louisa real?
Why will Bogey help the Brits?
Both are supposed to be English?
Audio out of sync at the end of the confession
[Does "yeah" come from "ja"?]
Should adventure stories always have an end point / resolution?
9 June 2005
Heart of Darkness
1899 -- written (published 1902)
exposé
Marlow -- young, bored, going to sea. Aunts pave the way. Whited sepulchre." One of the "moral gang." (So was Kurtz.) "The white man's burden." Kurtz did believe.
Victorian -- time of uptightness, of course
African dance -- not that it's inhuman, that it's human
Road novel -- so is Don Quixote (USE)
"Always stay British."
Kurtz is so appalled by the Company that he becomes just like them -- hasn't actually "gone native" but has gone extremely imperial.
Horror -- himself, human race
however -- Africans had slaves and were horrible
Victorian era -- greatest rate of prostitution
Is this story "adventure gone wrong"?
Can adventure go wrong? As in be non-adventure?
Marlow never separates himself from his share of the guilt. Twain the same -- "damned human race" (and him leading with a flag in the front).
Marlow straddles truth and not telling the truth -- best and worst of both
middle of darkness (someone else's)
your middle (heart) is darkness
darkness = madness = loss of structure
journey into madness
lack of illumination
can't get answers
no path
blind leading the blind
All the women in Belgium dressed in black (darkness)
the heart because it's where light layers fall off
Achele -- racism
"nigger" problem a la Huck Finn
What does this tell us about adventure?
accountant - fresh air? - where men lie, waiting to die
Journey to the Center of the Earth
Is Africa-Africa the start of the darkness?
[Where to buy ballot boxes for dropping in assignments?]
[Journal checks are unannounced.]
[Lots more notes on teaching plans for next year here.]
"Marlow" not "Willard" in Apocalypse Now because Marlow doesn't kill Kurtz. Adventure with home still there. The Wizard of Oz has all the "elements" (specifically?).
13 June 2005
Arrived late after brief lecture on T. E. Lawrence before movie due to running out of gas.
14 June 2005
[Mulan was real?]
Women preserved because they wrote a lot.
Gertrude Bell and Freya Stark are Lawrence contemps.
What is an adventure without fun called?
Had to get shots right the first time because of tracks.
Look up T.E.L. on Wikipedia.
Again, I am so thirsty!
Is initiative required?
Elaborate vending machine fantasies.
15 June 2005
Lawrence paid someone to beat him each year on the anniversary of his rape.
House motto: "I don't care."
Change?
Burton -- no
Speke -- no
Rosie -- there, brought out
Lawrence -- invincible to ordinary, mortality realized
characteristic of an adventurer
Tragedy: when adventure ends
Mountaineers / rock climbers
arrogant
no dithering
K2: portrait of many climbers
typical: Taylor
climbs for love: Harold
easier to adventure without a family (responsibilities)
K2 -- second highest
through Pakistan or China (recently)
not as hard as it used to be
Uh oh -- no pen?
[What genealogy resources are available here?]
[Is "hellacious" a real word?]
Porters -- government wages, elite, prestigious
16k feet = base camp (150 miles)
3 glaciers (20 years ago) no radios
16 June 2005
Exam
What is an adventure(r)?
How to define?
Which people in film/books are "real" adventurers and which are not?
Characteristics of an adventurer
- impulse to break free
- courage (not scared to leave cage)
- leaving the comfort zone
- leaving the sense of control
- curiosity
- striving for self-definition -- testing one's limits
- mythological heroes bridge the gap between ordinary life and the adventure
"Adventurers, or people who just 'go along'?"
Discussion - K2
pink crepe toilet paper, old oxygen tanks
test for immortality?
need another culture to help define ourselves
In Search p252 -- taco sauce
Julie Tullis
1984(6) -- died on K2
Brit
climbed early age
ran shop with husband
taught blind kids to rock climb
camerawoman / journalist
made docs with older man -- Kurt Dlemburger -- in 60s/walked off
Clouds from Both Sides
K2: "Mountain of mountains"
Different view than men
Men use military nomenclature: "assault," "base camp"
She didn't have "conquering" attitude
[What's inside of K2?]
[Idea for classroom poster: "Thinking improves with practice."]
Adventurers are decisive(? -- ever passive?)
[Find out who will have Harry Potter at midnight.]
[Sun -- puffy faces of skiers?]
1986 - Julie - summit 0 1 week storm - no food - altitude sick
died in her sleep at 26k feet
[Who is Dodge Morgan, the narrator?]
Broad Peak is another mountain. Permits expensive -- more than one mountain.
Glaciers are black/dirty/rocky -- not pristine white.
Silk road littered with cars.
(Back to Lawrence of Arabia.)
Jackson Bentley, journalist
[Adventure brings out the latent]
[Is it safe to go to the Sahara casino at night?]
[Who plays Lawrence's commanding officer, the one who runs out?]
And that's that. Other than the discussion questions I've submitted, I haven't taken any notes on the reading. Hopefully it will all be okay. If nothing else, this entry ought to generate some interesting Google ads and search engine traffic.
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