The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Ch 1-7

" Seemed like I'd die if I couldn't scratch. Well, I've noticed that thing plenty times since. If you are with the quality, or at a funeral, or trying to go to sleep when you ain't sleepy- if you are anywheres where it don't do for you to scratch, why you will itch all over in upward of a thousand places." - Pg 15

I have wondered about the same thing many times before. When it is time to do my homework or study for a test, all I want to do is play and bother my roomate =p. When I am at a place where I should not be doing homework, homework is all I can think about. When I'm in Korea, I want to be in China. When I'm in China, I want to be in Korea. Sometimes I want to get out of the community of people I see here every single day, just to have the opportunity to meet new people and not stuck in one place. But when I do, I miss the dorm, my friends at school, my teachers, and I want to go back to them. It's like in Yanji, China, when I get some kind of chocolate or candy, say... a hershey's chocolate bar from someone who has just come from the States. It is treasured. However, in Korea, where hershey's chocolate is available in many places, it is not so special. Also, for the first several years I was in China, after moving from America, I missed Taco Bell a lot. However, after going to Taco Bell when, as part of the XC team or soccer team we went to base schools, Taco Bell lost its special- ness. It is like the crystal merchant in The Alchemist who does not go to Mecca, which is his dream, because he is afraid that once he acquires his dream, it will not be special anymore. Why is this?

Maybe there is a solution. The solution is to live in the present, and to be thankful for it- everything about it. Then, if Huck is not itchy, he will not itch. However this does not mean that I will stop wanting things I do not have. I can still want a crispy cream doughnut even if i am thankful without it. Maybe if I was satisfied with everything? But there is nothing wrong with wanting something. But why do we always want things we don't have when we are not even thankful for them when we do have them? If I was thankful that I was in Korea, when I go to China, it does not mean that I will not miss Korea.

So is there a solution?

Not wanting anything would be horrible... it would be like living life in black and white. maybe gray, but no red or yellow or green or blue........................................................

Huckleberry is a smart, care-free kid like Tom. He loves being outside, sleeping under the stars more than living in a nice house in a nice room on a bed. However, he is not as imaginative as Tom, nor as courageous. I am curious to see what kind of adventures Huckleberry will go through as I continue on reading this book =]

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

I really liked this book =)

And I really liked Tom Sawyer =]

He is a character that lives every moment and makes the best of it, something I really want to learn from him.

He takes what he gets and creates something new and imaginative, knowing what he wants, and creating it.

He is a boy, full of mischief and fun & games, but he is also very mature, in the way he took responsibility for the lives of himself and for Becky Thatcher.

He accepts the situation he is in and twists it for the better.

He is always thinking positively. never negative.

He is creative, and he knows it.

He is confident.

He is not a prideful brat like Sid, but is an easy going, content, happy boy.

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer ~ THE END

"Wherever Tom and Huck appeared they were courted, admired, stared at. The boys were not able to remember that their remarks had possessed weight before; but now their sayings were treasured and repeated; everything they did seemed somehow to be regarded as remarkable; they had evidently lost the power of doing and saying commonplace things; moreover, their past history was raked up and discovered to bear marks of conspicuous originality. The village paper published biographical sketches of the boys...

'Tom, I wouldn't ever got into all this trouble if it hadn't a'been for that money; now you just take my sheer of it along with you'n and gimme a ten-center sometimes- not many times, becuz I don't give a dern for a thing 'thout it's tollable hard to git...'" Pg 208

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer- "A Sensation"

"When Tom awaoke in the morning, he wondered where he was. He sat up and rubbed his eyes and looked around.Then he comprehended.

It was the cool gray dawn, and there was a delicious sense of repose and peace in the deep pervaing calm and silence of the woods...

Now, far away in the woods a bird called; another answered; presently the hammering of a woodpecker was heard. Gradually the cool dim gray of the morning whitened, and as gradually sounds multiplied and life manifested itself. the marvel of nature shaking off sleep and going to work unfolded itself to the musing of the boy...

Now a procession of ants appeared, from nowhere in particular, and went about their labors; one struggled manfully by with a dead spider five times as big as itself in its arms, and lugged it straight up a tree trunk...

A tumblebug came next, heaving sturdily at is ball, and Tom touched the creature, to see it shut its legs against its body and pretent to be dead. The birds were farily rioting by this time. A catbird, the northern mocker, lit in a tree over Tom's head, and thrilled out her imitations of her neighbors in a rapture of enjoyment; then a shrill jay swept down, a flash of blue flame, and stopped on a twig almost within the boy's reach, cocked his head to one side and eyed the strangers with a consuming curiosity...

All nature was wide awake and stirring, now; long lances of sunlight pierced down through teh dense foliage far and near, and a few butterflies came fluttering into the scene."

Pg 88,89

I wish i could write like this...

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer ~Ch 13

Tom has a very wild and creative imagination. This imagination is supported by his amazingly high skills in looking at one thing from many different points of view. By using his imagination and by looking at something from a different point of view, he plays with his emotions and controls them very well, according to the way that gives him the advantage. This helps him to get out of trouble with his aunt, who is very sympathetic and worried about him. With these abilities, Tom is a light that attracts many other kids. He cannot sit still for longer than a short moment and is always looking for some way to have fun. Because of this, he has several friends, who are never bored or standing around, thinking of what they can do. Tom is always full of ideas when it comes to having fun, or getting out of work.
This character keeps readers interested in this book because he is always doing interesting things. Tom is so fun to read about!

I wish I had half of Tom Sawyer's imagination...

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer ~CH4

"Tom was literally rolling in wealth. He had... twelve marbles, part of a jew's harp, a piece of blue bottle glass to look through, a spool cannon, a key that wouldn't unlock anything, a fragment of chalk, a glass stopper of a decanter, a tin soldier, a couple of tadpoles, six firecrackers, a kitten with only one eye, a brass doorknob, a dogcollar-but no dog- the handle of a knife, four pieces of orange peel, and a dilapidated old window sash."
-Pg 13

Tom learned that "In order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to attain," and this is how he collected his treasure. He gave the other boys a price for doing a chore and it made them more willing to do it. "Work consists of whatever a body is obliged to do, and that Play consists of whatever a body is not abliged to do." With this concept in mind, Tom turns the Work of painting the fence into a Play, by making other boys who were not obliged to paint the fence, paint the fence.
Tom's treasure box seems to me, like it is full of junk; trash; things i would find in a garbage can. What made these stuff valuable was Tom's depth of creative imagination. What would you do with a handle of a knife or four pieces of orange peel?
Tom had fun turning work into play, but what makes play so much fun? Why is it that people behave when there are no rules to follow, but when rules are set, they are eager to break them? Why is it that when we have to do something, we don't want to, but when we don't have to do it, we want to? Tom's friends had fun doing his work, but could he have had fun painting the fence himself? Does it work to pretend not to be obliged?
With the power to make others do what he wants for a price, what will Tom grow up to be like in the future??

This page (pg13) has lead me to think of many questions.

-

The Good Earth ~ch 34

"It was Wang Lung's marriage day...'Rest assured, our father, rest assured. The land is not to be sold.' But over the old man's head they looked at each other and smiled."

These are the first and three last sentences of this book.

The Good Earth is about the life of a farmer in China who starts out very poor, earns a lot of money and raises himself and his family up to a high social status, and then misses his life as a poor farmer working in the fields when he is about to die. At the end of this book, Wang Lung is all ready to die. He even has his own coffin already. However, the book implies that with his death is the death of an entire generation of farmers. His sons plan to sell the precious land that was the center of Wang Lung's life. None of his three sons desire to become farmers.

This book is a very realistic, but fictional biography of a Chinese farmer named Wang Lung. This book is a story about one man's life. It tells the reader all about this Chinese farmer's from the age of around 18 when he gets married to around 70 when he dies. In this time of about fifty years, Wang Lung simply lives his life. And life, for him, is a search for peace. Sadly, he does not find it, even at the end.

I would not recommend this book to my friends, but i acknowledge that it is a good book and well written.