Winesburg, Ohio

I first encountered a story in Winesburg, Ohio when Ms. Graham was absent from
class. Our assignment was to read the Grotesques and answer some of the following questions.
Like most work that are assigned when teachers are absent, I thought
that this task would also be a breeze.
But of course, what on earth was I thinking? It's AP Lit.
Overall, the passage was understandable. Although it wasn't an easy read, most of the
parts made sense. I understood that there was an old man and a carpenter. There were also the grotesques
who were the imperfections of the world. I was dealing alright with the passage until I came to the
questions. After I read the questions, I realized how much analyzing I had to do, and how much
of the actual story I misunderstood. At first, we thought that the old man symbolized "knowledge."
He was the only one who knew the truth and therefore tried to stay away from the corruptness of the world.
However, soon enough, we were able to realize that the old man symbolized "God."
Although he didn't symbolize perfection, he was a God-like figure in that he had the knowledge
to know about the existence of grotesques. The rising of the bed to see outside the window was an
analogy to God rising up to look over his people. The carpenter then, of course represented Jesus.
It said in the short story that the carpenter was the closest thing to truth in the world and
that showed how the carpenter was a separate being from the grotesques.
Because our class has been talking so much about religious analogy, it was a lot easier to
figure out the representations. Especially when the carpenter came out, it made a clearer
point to me that the passage must have some sort of religious analogy that went along with it.
After discussions with fellow students, we were able to conclude that the old man represented God
and the carpenter represented Jesus.
The All the King's Men socratic seminar was a failure for me. For one, i'm not a great speaker; and
to try to find a good point to talk about with other students who probably have so much more
insightful findings than I do was so challenging. I was afraid that my speech would ruin the flow of
a great discussion that would soon hit the climax. After this seminar, I learned that I should prepare
A LOT the day before and be a lot more insightful in my thinking.
Oh, how much I hate socratic seminars!
If there's one positive aspect of the seminar
is that I learned so much more about the book from it. There were comments made by students
that were almost mind-blowing and made me understand the text so much more.
Honestly, I can't wait until we move on to the next novel. Not Winesburg, Ohio because it's
not an actual full story, but one that would make more sense to me as a whole. :P
AH AP Lit is so hard :(