{"id":154,"date":"2023-02-06T17:12:32","date_gmt":"2023-02-06T17:12:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/english465sp23\/?p=154"},"modified":"2023-02-06T17:13:20","modified_gmt":"2023-02-06T17:13:20","slug":"for-tuesday-2-7","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/english465sp23\/2023\/02\/06\/for-tuesday-2-7\/","title":{"rendered":"For Tuesday (2\/7)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Cast Away Trailer B\" width=\"840\" height=\"630\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/NDlypsVqXGE?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>For Tuesday&#8217;s class &#8211; &#8211; in our classroom &#8211; &#8211; you&#8217;ll want to read Richard Matheson&#8217;s classic post-apocalyptic narrative:\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">I Am Legend<\/span> (1954). [Try to get to at least the end of Chapter 10.]\u00a0 (Available free online <a href=\"https:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/english465sp23\/richard-matheson-i-am-legend\/\">here<\/a> on the motherbog.) This will be the first version of the &#8220;last man&#8221; narrative that we read.<\/p>\n<p>Though Matheson&#8217;s novella is classified as &#8220;science fiction,&#8221; we might start by considering it as a rewrite of one of the first novels in English &#8211; &#8211; Daniel Defoe&#8217;s <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Robinson_Crusoe\">Robinson Cruso<\/a>e<\/span>, an 18th-century narrative about a shipwrecked sailor who must survive on his own. \u201cFrom this moment I began to conclude in my mind that it was possible for me to be more happy in this forsaken, solitary condition,&#8221; Crusoe reflects at one point, &#8220;than it was possible I should ever have been in any other particular state in the world.&#8221;\u00a0 We can already see the existential themes and questions posed by Defoe and developed (a bit obsessively) by Matheson: what does a &#8220;man alone&#8221; need to survive &#8211; &#8211; both materially and psychologically? what threats does such a survivor face &#8211; &#8211; externally and internally?\u00a0 Can one ever truly exist apart from society? How do memories of and relations with a &#8220;gone-away&#8221; world both sustain and disable us?<\/p>\n<p>This is pretty heady stuff, perhaps, especially for pulp fiction like Matheson&#8217;s.\u00a0 We might start our discussion with a much more specific question: in a kind of Carvana paradise &#8211; &#8211; where Neville can pick and choose from any car he wants to drive, why does he stick with a Willys station wagon &#8211; &#8211; the Toyota Sienna minivan of 1954?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For Tuesday&#8217;s class &#8211; &#8211; in our classroom &#8211; &#8211; you&#8217;ll want to read Richard Matheson&#8217;s classic post-apocalyptic narrative:\u00a0I Am Legend (1954). [Try to get to at least the end of Chapter 10.]\u00a0 (Available free online here on the motherbog.) This will be the first version of the &#8220;last man&#8221; narrative that we read. Though &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/english465sp23\/2023\/02\/06\/for-tuesday-2-7\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;For Tuesday (2\/7)&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-154","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/english465sp23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/english465sp23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/english465sp23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/english465sp23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/english465sp23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=154"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/english465sp23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":156,"href":"https:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/english465sp23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154\/revisions\/156"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/english465sp23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=154"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/english465sp23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=154"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teaching.lfhanley.net\/english465sp23\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=154"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}