Week 5 Reading Diary, continued: Twenty-Two Goblins

Twenty Two Goblins, Arthur W. Ryder

City on the Ganges

This is one of my favorite pictures, it looks so surreal and I couldn't even imagine actually being there in person!

"Oh beautiful, my darling! Fair as the moon! White as the moonlight! Was the night jealous of your beauty? Did she carry you away?..." -Hariswami when he saw his wife was gone when he awoke. I love the detail of him describing his wife and her beauty and the emotion he had when he couldn't find her, later on they describe him "sobbing" and in "great pain."

"In this city lived a strong armed king named Hero-banner, who protected the world as a wall protects a city.." This was a cool quote because it somewhat described the power of this King... it will be interesting to learn more about the king throughout the next few sections.

^The picture below is a city called Golden City, which was on the bank of the Ganges. It describes the city and says "where a quarter of the old perfect virtue still lingers in these evil days." There was a king named Glorious and was thought to definitely deserve the name because of how brave he was. He "kept the world from being overflowed,  like the shore of the sea."

This section discusses a group of four brothers and what they do after their father dies. They took all the money and felt like they had nothing else to do where they were now and felt they needed to move onto somewhere else and went on long journey only to end up at their grandfathers house. They also brought a lion back to life, who ends up killing them eventually.

There is a city called Beautiful and in this city, people lived as happily as they did in heaven. I thought this section was interesting because earlier in the semester, I basically wrote about a world of happiness and no sin and living in a perfect world, which basically what the city Beautiful was.

"In the morning, the blessed sun arose in the east, stretching out his rays like hands to warn the king not to go in the forest where robbers lived." This was a really cool quote as it referred to the sun as being the one to guide the king where to NOT go. This is an interesting type of writing that I might look into when writing my next story.



"My son, you did well to kill this sham monk who tried by force to become the king of fairies." In the conclusion, Shiva gives his son the sword, passing along the torch in a way, and he goes off with all the gods.

Week 5 Reading Diary: Twenty-Two Goblins

Twenty-Two Gobblins, Arthur W. Ryder

Goblin in the Tree

"And as the monkey ate the fruit, he split it open and priceless, magnificent gem came out."

I think is a good way to start the story because it makes people wanting to keep reading to find out exactly what the gem is and what is going to happen.

(Talking of the mother's kid) "So his mother took him on her arm and angrily threw him into the blazing fire. And being tender, he was reduced to ashes in a moment."

This was a rather shocking turn of events that I was definitely not expecting... Once again, a very good way to keep the readers interested. This section had a lot of emotion in it too such as anger, hostility, shock, etc.

Praying to the Goddess.... "It was not right, for I was always devoted to you! Then, be my refuge when I pray to you..." There is so much death and emotion in this story, that it is kind of depressing... But it also makes the story interesting as well. This is when Lovely found her husband and brother in the condition that they were in and she wanted to kill herself after what she had seen.

"And after long prayer, he heard a voice from heaven, for at last Shiva was pleased with his devotion. "Oh King there shall be born to you a brave son to continue your dynasty, and a daughter more beautiful than the mymphs of heaven."

"One day at the spring festival, the king went to the garden to play with his three wives." I thought this was funny and very different. Its crazy that its completely normal for them to say "the king went to play with his three wives" and the fact that the King has 3 wives. 

Comment Wall

Hye guys! My name is Patrick Schaefer and I am a fifth year senior here at OU, about to graduate here in May. My major is marketing and I plan on going into real estate after I graduate, as I work for a property management company at the moment! I look forward to meeting everyone throughout the semester and reading/critiquing some of you guys' work. Please feel free to comment on anything you want to as far as my writing or anything on my blog really. I would also greatly accept any thoughts/recommendations for any of my blog posts. Thanks! Here is one of my favorite pictures of the University...

University of Oklahoma

This is one of my favorite songs/music videos of all time. Michael Jackson seemed incredible and it is sad all our generation has to go on is music videos instead of being able to see him live. I respect him not only for his ability to write but his unbelievable dancing talent. 

Week 4: Famous Last Words

So far, this class has been a lot different from all my others as I am slowly but surely getting used to this whole blog thing. I am so used to d2L when doing online classes but have always kind of wanted to start my own blog so here we are! As the semester goes along, I look forward to getting to know more people through their blogs. I have already come across some people that I can really relate to in terms of their lifestyles, their interests, their major and future desired job, etc.  I have also noticed a lot of peoples writings and the creative ways they tell their stories and I look forward to implementing some of those tactics in my writing in the next few weeks!

One event that happened this week that was extremely sad was that the wife of an Oklahoma City Thunder assistant coach died in a car accident this past Wednesday and was one of the bigger news stories of this week, and really of the month. Normally I do not like to talk or write about sad events like this but it really taught me a lesson of how to not take anything for granted and tell your family you love them each and every day, at every moment because you never know what could happen. I have always heard that but for some reason, it really meant a lot this week. I think one of the reasons was because there were so many athletes on TV who knew the coach and knew his wife who died and even the athletes you see every night playing basketball, people who you think are the toughest people on the world... were crying. For example, Kevin Durant was asked about it at practice and had to leave his press conference during the middle of it because he was so emotional. You see your parents cry, you see your friends cry, but rarely do you see athletes cry. People you don't look at as normal people were affected by this in a great way and it just goes to show you how special of a person she was and how she impacted everyones life. 

I thought this picture was perfect and the quote was something that was quite fitting for this moment...

Family

Storytelling Week 4: Revenge on Shahrayar

Revenge on Shahrayar

Shahrayar, a man who lived a happy life with a happy wife, a man who thought he had it all. Him and his wife Scheherazade did everything together and were known as the happy couple around town. People always saw them hugging and kissing and holding each others hands while always laughing and always having a smile on each others faces. He THOUGHT he had it all, until one day.

One day, he found out that his wife Scheherazade has been cheating on him and he decides to kill her the next morning because he is so betrayed. That was his way of dealing with betrayal and he decides that from that point on, when he marries a woman, he will kill them the next morning simply in fear of being betrayed by another woman like he was betrayed by Scheherazade.

Shahrayer eventually marries 3 women, all of which he killed the next morning because he thought he would or was being betrayed. He was so jaded from being lied to and betrayed by his former wife that he didn't know how to deal with many things. Almost like he didn't know what to do if he was happy and felt like he needed to make himself mad/sad by killing these innocent women, who thought they were happy with Shahrayer.

Eventually, a woman, also known as the fourth woman to marry Shahrayar despite her knowing what he did to all the previous women. She marries him and goes home with him that night, knowing what Shahrayar was planning on doing that morning. Shahrayar had no clue that she had caught on to his tricks long long ago and was expecting to go through with his plan just like he always does.

During the middle of the night, she decides that she is going to return the favor and murder Shahrayar. Before Shahrayar actually dies, she is able to tell him that this is revenge and justice for all of the women that he had killed before. Shahrayar, before he officially dies, says that he killed all these women out of fear and just wanted to be loved. He also said that he felt less betrayed by his former wife that cheated on him when he killed all of these women. Killing these women was like his therapy. The fourth wife had finally caught onto his tricks and fooled Shahrayar into a plan of her own and that was to KILL him before HE killed HER, just like the previous women who had been killed. Later on, it turns out that the fourth wife of Shahrayar had also previously killed 4 MEN because she was cheated on by her first husband. Turns out, Shahrayar and the fourth wife were living the exact same life, doing the exact same things but Shahrayar had no clue. So, did the fourth wife get pleasure out of this?? Yes, she avoided her own death by killing the man that would have killed her the next morning but what will she do now? Will she keep going on with her plan??

Scheherazade

Author's Note: There are many different stories in the series of Arabian Nights but all stories focus on the sultan, Shahrayar and his wife Scheherazade. Shahrayar finds out that his first wife is unfaithful to him and ends up killing her. He then decides he is going to marry a different woman each night, and then kill them the next morning to prevent any further betrayal. Scheherazade, his vizier's daughter, decides this pattern is absolutely cruel and she makes a plan to end this pattern. She marries Shahrayar, and then begins to tell him a story that night. However, she stops the story in the middle, so that he will be excited to hear the rest the following night. Then the next evening, she finishes the story and then begins another, following the same pattern for 1,001 nights, until Shahrayar has a change of heart and stops his pattern of killing women each and every morning. The picture above shows Scheherazade, the wife of Shahrayar. I chose this image because I like having an image of what the characters look like and in this case, this shows both Shahrayar and Scheherazade. As far as my story goes, I really like to look at ALL of the characters perspectives and think of ways that the story can be turned around and told by another side, which is why I chose to write my story where Shahrayar is the one who is killed instead of the women getting killed. 

Bibliography:
The Arabian Nights Entertainments by Andrew Lang (1898)

Week 4 Reading Diary: Arabian Nights

The Arabian Nights Entertainments by Andrew Lang (1898)

The Fisherman

"And he declared that he was quite sure that at bottom all women were as wicked as the sultana..."
This story started out with a bang to say the least, while describing a woman who deceived the Sultan and the Sultan discovered death and put her to death.


"I have only a year to live" the merchant said as he agreed to return to the genius in a year to be killed.
This part of the story also uses great imagery in describing the merchants journey with his horse.


"During this time she studied magic in order to carry out her wicked scheme" This quote shows how cruel the wife of the Old Man was as she did not want to kids and was creating some sort of wicked scheme while she was asked to take care of them while the Man was gone.
Later when the man returned, he was told that his "slave is dead" and she had not seen the child for months.


"At first I refused, but she begged so hard and promised to be a good wife to me, that at last I consented. I got her some beautiful dresses and after having married her, we embarked and set sail. During the voyage, I discovered so many good qualities in my wife that I began to love her more and more."


"This man is the most faithful and virtuous of men. If he wished to take my life, why did he cure me?"


"The bird replied: my good master, the lightning, thunder and rain disturbed me so much all night long, that I cannot tell you what I have suffered." The reason I liked this quote was because my plan for my storybook style is animal stories I found it interesting reading this right after I decided I might want to tell my story from an animal perspective.


"Take these fish and carry them to the Sultan, who will give you more money for them than you have ever had in your life..."


"Then this wicked enchantress changed the capital, which was a very populous and flourishing city, into the lake and desert plain you saw. The fish of four colors..." I like the style of this writing and will consider adopting it when writing my own story because of the detail.

Storytelling Styles

Topic: My topic will involve the Animal Stories of Jataka. The first story I am thinking about using is The Monkey's Heart  and another story I am thinking about using is The Language of Animals Both of these stories offer up a lot of detailed animal stories that I look forward to reading into even more than I already have. I feel like I can be very creative with these stories and this topic, considering it discusses the previous lives of Buddha in human AND animal form. This two interesting, detailed stories will help me put together a very creative story in my opinion.


Bibliography:
1. The Monkey's Heart  The Jataka, or the stories, of Buddha's former birth, edited by E. B. Cowell, vol. 2 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1895)
2. The Language of Animals The Jataka, or the stories, of Buddha's former birth, edited by E. B. Cowell, vol. 2 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1897)

The Jataka Tales of the Buddha

Possible Styles


OU Campus: I think using OU's campus as a prime setting for my story would be very easy because I am familiar with all the areas of the campus and there are so many different areas you could use for cool settings for all of the animals. This would also give readers a good image of the story, considering most readers would be students of OU who are familiar with campus. Maybe each animal could have a different home such as Dale Hall, Price, The Union, etc.


Story told by the animals: This of course would be story told directly from the animals, which would be very interesting cause I could make into some sort of "animal language" by creating my own language in some sort of way.


Detective Story: I think this would be a really funny way to tell the story. I love any movie or TV show involving detectives so I am familiar with the way they talk and act and could use some of those TV shows and movies to help me write my story.


Neighborhood Gossip: This would also be a funny way of telling the story as this could combine with animal's telling the story. All of the animals could gossip about what is going on and throughout the gossip could be the main story line. I also think this would be a lot more fun to read if it was told in a gossip type way.