Final Thoughts

Ahhh... the last blog post. I'm not going to lie... I am not sad to see the end of this assignment. I really liked reading what other people had to say about the course material, it was just difficult to force myself to blog/comment every week (which is probably why I am so far behind on my commenting... woops!) Anyways, as this is the last week we will have to post, I figured I would just end with some of my overall thoughts about the semester. This course was challenging for me. It forced me to think about things I hadn't before and sometimes our class discussions made my head spin. The theory was, in a word, terrifying but I got through it and I feel more informed because of it. I really enjoyed most of the novels we read. Favorites?: Fruit and Zami. I liked that both of these novels (or novel and biomythography, I guess) blurred the lines between what is real and what is not. Fruit managed to take us inside the head of a 13 year old, sexually confused boy who thinks his nipples are talking to him. The scene in the basement with Billy Archer where Peter is drunk really blurred the line between fantasy and reality: as a side affect of the alcohol, Peter reverts into one of his bedtime fantasies (I just had to look up how to spell "fantasy" in plural form...it's going to be a long week) even though he is very much awake and still in the presence of other people. Zami is a biomythography. As we discussed in class this is kind of a complicated genre; reading it, you're not sure if this is her life as it really took place, if this is her life as she imagined it happened, if this is fiction and if it's a combination which parts are which. I think my favorite lecture of the semester was the Brian Francis visit (I am sure I am not alone in this...) He was personable, well spoken and interesting, and it was nice to end an often confusing, frustrating semester on a really positive note. Anyways, I am off to get to work on my assignment-pile-of-doom. Good luck to everyone on finals, papers, assignments, etc...