Hey Nostradamus! and the Capacity for Evil

"I believe that what separates humanity from everything else in this world - spaghetti, binder paper, deep-sea creatures, edelweiss and Mount McKinley - is that humanity alone has the capacity at any given moment to commit all possible sins" (Coupland 3).

The opening sentence of Douglas Coupland's Hey Nostradamus! sets up an important theme: the capacity we all have for evil. Everyone has the ability to commit violence, as we see many times throughout the novel. In the school shooting, a group of students in the cafeteria kill one of the gunmen by laying a table flat on him and jumping up and down, crushing him to death. Jason, who, as Cheryl says, is generally "gentle" and "forgiving" (p.28), throws a rock at the head of one of the gunmen, killing him. Heather gets so frustrated and angry at the psychic, Allison, that she says, "I'm ready for murder" (p.184). Barb wants so badly to have a baby with Jason that, when a man in Las Vegas seems to get in the way, she murders him.

These people are not psychopaths or serial killers; they are average, "normal" people. And yet there is this darkness that comes out of them when they are pushed to the brink. As Cheryl says, "We're all equally on the brink of all sins" (p.34). We all have the potential to commit violent, savage acts at any given moment, because of the underlying darkness that exists within us all.

Coupland, however, is not saying that all of humanity is evil. We must realize that darkness is there, for otherwise we are being naive. But the fact that we all share this trait of always being just one step away from evil, this "capacity for slipping at any moment into great sin and eternal darkness" (p.33), makes us the same. It makes us equal.

This quotation from Chery sums up this topic nicely:

...the sun may burn brightly, and the faces
of children may be plump and achingly sweet,
but in the air we breathe, in the water we
drink and in the food we share, there will
always be darkness in this worl d.

(p. 42)

There will always be darkness in the world, for there will always be this darkness in us.

Is Religion Being Taken Too Literally?

Religion is a big aspect in the lives of many people. Since I was raised a Catholic, and spent nearly 13 years of my life at a Catholic school, religion is definitely a part of my life. But after reading Hey Nostradamus I realised that sometimes people take religion to literally. The view of religion is beginning to become a fundamentalist view. Once someone has this view they start to believe that only their beliefs are the correct ones and that everyone else is bound to hell. They also begin to look down upon people who are not religious. These traits are not good ones to have and they are far from religious. The effect of taking religion to this drastic literal level actually accomplishes the opposite of what is intended.

The character Reg from Hey Nostradamus is a prime example of taking religion to a negative level. Reg wants everyone around him to be religious, not only in the way they are but in the way he wants them to be. He shuns people that do not follow his ideal type of person. Therefore the only person he did not shun is his eldest son Kent, because everyone else does not fit into his ideal mold. He is unbelievably stubborn and close minded. By taking religion to his level, Reg is left alone and hated by everyone. It is not till the end of the book that he realises how wrong he is. In realising this he does not loose his sense of faith he simply develops a deeper understanding of compassion, understanding and forgiveness, which are basically aspects of religion.

Having a character like Reg helps Douglas Coupland inflict more doubt into people because it shows the audience the negative affects of a fundamentalist view. It is very important that Coupland does inflict doubt because religion is not meant to be taken that literally. Religion is ultimately a guideline on how to live our lives as good people. When taken too literally, like with Reg, the outcome is not positive. The more doubt that can be inflicted on people the less fundamentalist views there will be and the world has a potential being filled with more open minded accepting people. Yes, this does sound cheesy, but a chain effect will happen and it could possibly become the case.

Why I don't like Poetry

Poetry, I don’t get it! I don’t get it and really, I don’t think I ever will. I came to this conclusion reading select poems from Margaret Avison’s collection of poems and I’m alright with this. I’m okay with not spending my time delving into the intricacies of one person’s take on a simple yellow hydrant like in her poem “Cement Worker on a Hot Day”. In actuality, that type of poetry goes against what I think language is about. I think that language is a tool, to get meaning across to other people, not an end-point in and of itself; to marvel and confuse other people. There is a place for it in the world, like all art, but just not in my world.

I think that’s what poetry really is, art. It is language that is taken beyond its utilitarian function as a tool and gone beyond that to become its own entity, to become the end instead of the means to an end. I think that to really understand a poem one has to know who is writing it and why they’re writing it; the context. Because we don’t usually have this information readily available this makes poetry a rather inefficient way of communicating.

As long as people keep this in mind, that poetry is a form of art, we can enjoy it for what it is. If one goes too far, however, and takes it too seriously then we have lost the purpose of the art.

like taking diction from a small child

When Ethel Wilson wrote The Innocent Traveller she was old. She was elderly; so far over the hill that she passed through the valley on the other side and was almost over the next hill. Compared to us 'younguns' she was practically ancient... a dinosaur, a relic, a brittle artifact! Okay, maybe not that old... but much older than her main character Topaz Edgeworth, and yet she wrote through children's eyes with flawless accuracy and believability. This became especially noticeable in "The Dark House and Detested Wife" when Topaz is writing a letter home to her parents. This was probably the only time I was fully engaged in the world of the novel, and it was because I really felt the voice of a little girl in that letter. Wilson's regular writing style contrasts like black and white with Topaz's letter as soon as it begins:

"I hope you are very well. Thank you very much for the 2/6 for me and for Hannah. Hannah's cold is still bad so Mrs. Porter kept her in bed. I like it here. Every afternoon we have a walk. The waves are lovely..." and so on.

It continues like that for the whole letter, but you only need two and a half lines to see he difference: instant grammatical errors, short sentences - sentences that don't seem to have any flow or strong connection, and just a youthful vibe. In other parts of the letter there are jumps from subject to subject, but the entire thing is one giant paragraph.
My favourite part is her cute little spelling mistakes; the kind you read in journal entries or on projects from elementary school and think, 'Was I that ridiculous?' Just enough of these gems show up in Topaz's letter, including 'amewsing'(amusing), 'plannets'(planets), and 'cruley'(curly). Wilson doesn't overdo it - after all, Topaz is a bright young lady, and too many or too few deliberate errors would be an actual error on Wilson's part.


Lastly, some of the best child-like elements of this letter are the run-on sentences. I remember doing that a lot when I was younger, just adding countless 'and's to connect my thoughts rather than commas or periods. That's how we talk when we're young, why not write that way as well? The best example of this is on page 38:

"Eliza Pinder said that Topaz Edgeworth was very fond of the sound of her own voice and I said I was thankful indeed that i hadn't a Yorkshire accent to listen to and she said I was a rude cow with no manners from Staffordshire and I said no one should say such a thing to me unscathed and I slapped Eliza Pinder and Mrs. Porter came in."

I think the most amazing part is that she spells something like 'unscathed' properly but can't get 'curly'...

But I digress! The point is that there is an obvious age gap between Ethel Wilson and her character Topaz. Wilson masterfully fills this gap however, using this letter a metaphorical gap-filling device of some sort.

That last part sounded better in my head.

Use of Pathos In Emily Carr's "Sophie"

Aristotle felt that the use of Pathos was a key tool in his “Trivium” of literature. Pathos is the passion within the writing, the feelings and sense of experience fused into the piece. It appeals to the reader’s heart and emotions. Emily Carr’s short story “Sophie” uses this concept of Pathos to build emotive power and manipulate the reader’s emotions to reflect those in the story.

The reader can’t help but empathize with little Sophie, who “chatters like a sparrow” to her trusted friend Emily, but becomes shy and self-conscious around her own husband. This is a woman who endures unimaginable tragedy over the course of this story. The loss of twenty-one children is an unbearable concept, yet this woman, with her “soft little body, and a back as straight as honesty itself” has borne this burden.

Pathos is strongly apparent at the funeral for one of Sophie’s children. The hurt that these women feel comes across explicitly: “torrents of tears burst from their eyes and rolled down their cheeks. Sophie and Sara and Susan did it too. It sounded terrible- like tortured dogs”. The reader feels the torture and pain emanating from these words. He or she doesn’t have to be a mother, father, sibling, or friend of Sophie to empathize with her; Emily Carr has captured and created these emotions in the reader by applying Pathos as a literary tool.

Emily Carr’s utilization of Pathos here is definite. Her own empathy and feeling towards Sophie as a character in the story herself is felt and shared by the reader, a bystander simply watching their story unfold.

Is Topaz Novel Worthy?

A hearty debate came about in class on Monday on whether the character Topaz from Ethel Wilson's The Innocent Traveler is worth an entire novel. Looking at it from one perspective she did not do anything extraordinary. As a matter of fact she was completely ordinary. The novel seemed like it was merely a synopsis of a person's life, just like any other person's. We might as well get our nieces to publish books on our life stories since it would amount to the same thing. All of us have some interesting events that occurred in our lives that can be easily scribbled onto a couple of pages. So why in this case did this rather simple woman deserve a novel?

Just the concept that Topaz did not change from the time she was five to the age of 95 is astonishing. The idea is so surreal and far fetched that its difficult to even grasp. I changed since last year and I have changed countless times since I was five. Most people do not even live till the age of 95 let alone stay the exact same person for all those years. It does not seem possible for someone to never grow up.

This is especially true in today's society because there is such a pressure to grow up, and act mature. That is why Topaz's character seems so unrealistic. Once you are at a certain age, usually around 12, it is no longer appropriate to act childish. Adulthood takes over and it is all about responsibilities, pulling your weight, hardships and a serious nature. This concept of being a child forever is not realistic and does not seem attainable.

Even the idea of being free-spirited is easier said than done. Everything in our world is rush, rush, rush; just about making ends meet. We do not leave time to live and enjoy things anymore. The way most of us live our lives is exactly what Topaz always stood against. So many times I catch myself saying " it would be nice to go back to being a child because everything was easy and happy." It is true I would love to go back to the days where I was a naive little girl and that is where i am jealous of Topaz because even at age 95, she still is that free-spirited, happy, naive girl.

Topaz's personality is very different from what we are used to seeing and in a way the novels shows us what life would be like if we actually could go back to being six again or if we could stay six forever. When looking at it from this perspective I do believe that her life is novel worthy.

What Makes “Forgiveness in Families” Interesting, and “The Innocent Traveller”...Not

Alice Munro’s “Forgiveness in Families” is a short work of only a few pages, but within those pages the main character, Val, goes through more change than does Topaz, the main character in “The Innocent Traveller,” throughout Ethel Wilson’s entire novel. This makes “Forgiveness” interesting and compelling, and “The Innocent Traveller” rather boring.

Topaz is a static character, hardly changing throughout her life. We are not given much insight into what she thinks; there is not enough depth to her to keep us interested for the duration of the novel.

In “Forgiveness,” Val realizes that it is herself, not her brother, that is the cause of her problems. She reflects on the nature of life and death, realizing that the seemingly insignificant things, which “don’t seem that much like life,” are in fact what we yearn for when faced with death. She makes the startling confession that, in some part of her, she was disappointed when her mother did not die.

This revelation is shocking, it is personal, it makes us feel something... These are the things which “The Innocent Traveller” largely fails to do. Characters die in the novel, family dynamics change, Topaz moves to a new city halfway around the world, but none of this is related in a way which makes us feel much excitement, compassion, or emotion in general. We get mostly only the surface of things, and for a work of more than two hundred pages, this is not enough.