Post #9- ISU book

Schindler's List is a book about Oskar Schindler's life in the time of the Holocaust. Oskar was born in Austria were he worked under his father as an engineer of steam powered engines, this is where he discovered his passion for running a business. At the beginning of the war Oskar was offered a job, that he accepted, by the Nazi party to move to Crakow, Poland as an agent. Oskar originally sees the Holocaust as an opportunity to exploit the cheap labour of Jewish people and make large amounts of money. He never hated the Jews like many people and while having conversations with a Jew he talked to them just as respectably as to anyone else. He bought an enamel factory off of a Jewish accountant at the beginning of the war when Jewish people still had the right to own a business although they were not aloud to get paid for working. As a result Oskar employed a lot of Jewish people since the labour was cheap. As the war progressed Jewish people were sent to ghettos and then concentration camps. The labour that Oskar provided saved the Jewish people from being sent to extermination camps where they were killed. The book describes Oskar's journey of saving over 1,100 Jewish lives at the end of the war.

Post #8- A Streetcar Named Desire

There were many symbols in A Streetcar Named Desire one that stood out the most to me was Blanche's lies. In the play she explains that lying to herself and to others makes life what it should be rather then what it really is. Alcohol and light are other symbols which also connect with Blanche's lies. Polka music was a very obvious symbol that symbolizes the tragic night that Blanche's husband dies, the polka music is played throughout the movie leading up to the husband's tragic death. There are other less obvious symbols in the movie that are not as focused on as the other two making lying and polka music the major symbols in the movie.

Post #7: Quotations

“My children were like phantom limbs, lost but still attached to me, gone but still painful.” (Hill 393)

Aminata refers to her children as phantom limbs, this is a metaphor for the feeling she still has for them. Aminata's feelings for her children are painful because she says "gone but still painful", even though there is nothing she can do about the loss of her children, her feelings are still painful.

"At times I still panic when surrounded by big white men with a purpose." (Hill 9)

This is one of the most significant quotes in the book because it shows how much slavery and inequality scarred Aminata into thinking that all white men are evil. Even though at this time Aminata is safe and the white men want to abolish slavery, Aminata's instinct over time has been not to trust white men.

"It excited me to imagine that fifty years later, someone might find an ancestor in the Book Of Negroes and say, 'That was my grandmother.'" (Hill 331)

This quote symbolizes identity, and how the free negroes have gained their identity again through an official document like The Book Of Negroes. This is similar to the first time Aminata writes her signature at the hotel for Soloman Lindo; this is the first time Aminata feels like she is free.

"Got a slave mama, then you is slave. Got a slave daddy, then you is slave. Any nigger in you at all, then is slave as clear as day." (Hill 153)

This quote states that the son or daughter of any slave is automatically a slave. This foreshadows Aminata's child, Mamadu, in being sold because of his status as a slave.

“He did not seem like the sort of man who would press a band of red-hot metal into my chest” (Hill 461)

When Aminata was on Bance Island near the end of the book, she compares the man who branded her to the man who owns the castle. This is significant because it foreshadows the argument she has with him about branding and she shows him her brand.

ISU Proposals

Kite Runner – The Kite Runner is about a young boy who grows up feeling guilt from an action in the past and wants to redeem himself for it in the future. This is similar to The Book of Negroes because the book starts off with Aminata as a young girl with a drastic event that made her want to share her story in the future. I believe these books are suitable for the ISU project because in both books the protagonist starts off young wanting to achieve a goal all their life. Also, this will probably result in similar obstacles in both books such as the violence in The Kite Runner since the setting is in Afghanistan and the violence in The Book Of Negroes because of slavery.

Schindler's Ark (Schindler's List) – This book is about a Nazi party member who saves 1200 Jews from concentration camps. It is a true story with fictional dialogue; this is similar to The Book Of Negroes because even though The Book Of Negroes has a fictional story the events were real. Both books are about discrimination and are based around similar historic events therefore they have very similar themes such as dehumanization in the holocaust and slavery.

Atonement – This book is about a woman’s life in the nineteenth century; similarly to The Book Of Negroes the book is set up into parts. The first part is about the woman’s childhood in England and her talent is writing, which is similar to Aminata’s talent for reading, and writing. The second part is her life during the war, which is also similar to the American Revolution in The Book Of Negroes. The last two parts are about her life as she grows older and writes a book about her life changing the facts and making it more of what she wanted to happen. Since in both books the main themes are education, reading and writing the books will be very comparable.