Jennifer Wu's learning notes

American Literature Note 13

Santa boy

It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year (Andy Williams)

song

Hark! The Herald Angels Sing song

Advent 點燈

Advent is a season observed in many Western Christian churches as a time of expectant waiting and preparation for the celebration of the Nativity of Jesus at Christmas. The term is an anglicized version of the Latin word adventus, meaning "coming". Advent starts on the fourth Sunday before December 25, which is the Sunday between November 27 and December 3 inclusive.Christians of these denominations observe the season through practices such as keeping an Advent calendar, lighting an Advent wreath, praying an Advent daily devotional, among other ways of preparing for Christmastide, such as setting up Christmas decorations.

*ad- : forward, coming up

* purple stands for royal color

Nativity of Jesus

The Nativity of Jesus, also The Nativity, refers to the accounts of the birth of Jesus, primarily based on the two accounts in the gospels of Luke and Matthew, and secondarily on some apocryphal texts.

Second Coming

The second coming of Jesus Christ is the hope of believers that God is in control of all things, and is faithful to the promises and prophecies in His Word. In His first coming, Jesus Christ came to earth as a baby in a manger in Bethlehem, just as prophesied. Jesus fulfilled many of the prophecies of the Messiah during His birth, life, ministry, death, and resurrection. However, there are some prophecies regarding the Messiah that Jesus has not yet fulfilled. The second coming of Christ will be the return of Christ to fulfill these remaining prophecies. In His first coming, Jesus was the suffering Servant. In His second coming, Jesus will be the conquering King. In His first coming, Jesus arrived in the most humble of circumstances. In His second coming, Jesus will arrive with the armies of heaven at His side.

The Second Coming (William Butler Yeats)

Turning and turning in the widening gyre(氣旋)

The falcon (獵鷹)cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack all conviction, while the worst

Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;

Surely the Second Coming is at hand.

The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out

When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi(當精神宙宇的龐然大形)

Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert

A shape with lion body and the head of a man,

A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,

Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it

Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.

The darkness drops again; but now I know

That twenty centuries of stony sleep

Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,( 已經讓擺動的搖籃盪入夢魘)

And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,

Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

Lost Generation

The "Lost Generation" is a term used to refer to the generation, actually an age cohort, that came of age during World War I. The term was popularized by Ernest Hemingway who used it as one of two contrasting epigraphs for his novel, "The Sun Also Rises." In that volume Hemingway credits the phrase to Gertrude Stein, who was then his mentor and patron.

"That is what you are. That's what you all are...All of you young people who served in the war. You are a lost generation."

 Beat Generation

The Beat Generation was a group of American post-World War II writers who came to prominence in the 1950s, as well as the cultural phenomena that they both documented and inspired. Central elements of "Beat" culture: rejection of received standards, innovations in style, use of illegal drugs, alternative sexualities, an interest in religion, a rejection of materialism, and explicit portrayals of the human condition.

The Tell-Tale Heart

The Tell-Tale Heart is a short story written by Edgar Allan Poe, an American writer (1809-1849) best known for his mystery and horror tales. This story, published in 1843, is told from the point of view of a narrator who is responsible for taking care of an old man with a clouded, "vulture-like" eye. As the story unfolds, themes of innocence, guilt, and sanity—favorites of Poe's—are explored with remarkable power in relatively few words.

Araby (full story)

“An uninhabited house of two stories stood at the blind end, detached from its neighbors in a square ground. The other houses of the street, conscious of decent lives within them, gazed at one ... Air, musty from having been long enclosed, hung in all the rooms,…”

Words Explanation

1. wretch (n.) 亂七八糟 (無名小站就叫做Wretch)

2. feeble (adj.) extremely weak

e.g. She is feeble from sickness.

e.g. A feeble cry came from the next room.

3. without the door = stand beside

4. *fra- : break

fragile (adj.) easily broken or damaged/ weak

e.g. They carefully packed the fragile china into cartons.

e.g. The old man seems very fragile.

frailty (n.) lacking in strength or health

e.g. “Frailty, thy name is woman!” (from William Shakespeare works Hamlet)

Success is counted sweetest (Emily Dickinson)

Success is counted sweetest

By those who ne'er succeed.

To comprehend a nectar

Requires sorest need.

Not one of all the purple Host

Who took the Flag today

Can tell the definition

So clear of victory

As he defeated – dying –

On whose forbidden ear

The distant strains of triumph

Burst agonized and clear!

1. 原本的詩標題，通常以第一句當title來辨別

2. purple host blue blood 貴族象徵

3. 可以送給連勝文先生