Terrorists

Rubiyat

I have to say that there wasn't much in the Rubiyat that I understood, and at the time I didn't even think of searching Wikipedia for any translations, so I was thoroughly confused. But there were some poems I did like.

	With them the seed of Wisdom did I sow,
	And with mine own hand wrought to make it grow;
	And this was all the Harvest that I reap'd--
	I came like Water, and like Wind I go.

I thought that one was pretty interesting, the wording is very nice. I did try to write my own, although I don't know how good they are in comparison to Rumi's but at least I tried.

How cruel is fate to keep one from another
each wishing for nothing more than eachother
but time has taken its toll
till now they are separate for the better

To me she is the most beautiful story
the little girl who's name is Zoe
this next year she'll age some more
and then she'll be the most beautiful poetry

Her eyes are large and brown
hair so beautiful it is her crown
no woman's style could ever match hers
all she does is beauty, even her frown

So those were my attempts at writing poetry, I hope you liked them.

My Paper

So at first my plan was to write about what honor, respect, discipline, and dominance in men stems from. The only problem I had was that I didn't know exactly know what I wanted to write about, so basically I began to list everything about men in Muslim culture. I noticed though that whenever I tried to give an example of how men felt that their manhood was most important to them, I found that the best examples involved women. So now I've decided to focus more on the relationship between men and women in the Middle East and how it affects each sex's role in society. If I'm correct I think this was what Dr. Webb was talking about today in class.

When writing my rough draft I found some pretty interesting sites on the Koran and other things in Muslim culture based around men and women. This site here has some translations of the Koran on the role of the man to the woman, it's pretty interesting.

Sindbad The Seaman

For my reading, I chose to read some of the Sindbad voyages. I read up to the fourth voyage, and to anybody else who read the Sindbad voyages, is it just me or is Sindbad an idiot for going on these voyages even though each one nearly cost his life. Sindbad is one lucky sailor, it seems as though he gets left behind alot. Not only that,but he gets left in the most horrible places. For instance in the third voyage he gets left on an island inhabited by giant ogres, one of which cooks and eats some of Sindbad's crew three nights in a row. After escaping that island he gets stuck on an island inhabited by a dragon like creature who eats more of his crew. He eventually escaped that island, but seeing as it was only his third voyage, I don't think he learned his lesson. The story is pretty entertaining though, filled with strange creatures and horrific monsters, I really look forward to reading all of the voyages.

1001 Nights

*
I chose Tale of the Bull and the Ass, and The Fisherman and the Jinni for the stories we needed to read for Wednesdays class. The first story was pretty entertaining, and focused on a man who could understand the language that animals spoke. This story is being told by the Wazir and is basically a long and drawn out way of saying to his daughter, he will beat her if she keeps talking nonsense. The second story I read was about a fisherman who finds a lamp containing a Jinni, and I thought it was very interesting that instead of offering three wishes to this man he offers the man a choice in how the jinni will kill him. In the end the Fisherman outwits the jinni and traps him in his lamp. One very funny line from the story is what the jinni says after the fisherman has tricked him was, “I did but jest with thee.”

Over all I really enjoyed the reading, and I like how the story flows from one to another while the larger main story stays intact.

*(Robin Williams definitely had nothing to do with the genie in this story.)

Saladin

I never heard of Saladin in my life before now, but I have to say I'm really glad that I know who he is now. He sounded kind of ruthless in the wikipedia article, with the decapitations and all, but other than that he seemed like a very interesting guy. I really like the way he was portrayed in Decameron and I thought it was really cool that he was so nice to Messer Torello after all that time. I really liked the story as well, at first I just wanted to get it read but once it took off I found myself enjoying the reading. I read the lawyers tale my senior year in highschool and I can't say I enjoyed it as much as the Miller's tale.

Over all I enjoyed reading most about Saladin in Decameron, and I am happy to have read this story. I really liked how Torello made his presence known to his wife Madonna, that was pretty slick. I have to say though, that my favorite part of the story was this, ""Oh," quoth the abbot, "thou art no longer a child, nor yet so new to this church, that thou shouldst so lightly be appalled: go we now, and see who it is that has given thee this childish fright."So, with a blaze of torches, the abbot, attended by his monks, entered the church," ... ", the efficacy of the potion being exhausted, Messer Torello awoke and heaved a great sigh. Whereat the monks and the abbot quaking and crying out: "Lord, help us!" one and all took to flight."

Othello

I must say that Othello isn't my favorite play, but I do admire it none the less. I first heard of Othello a few years ago when I watched the movie "O", a modern remake of the play. On the DVD version of this movie was the original play in black and white, which I thought was very interesting and worth watching. In case anyones interested here is a link to imdb.com on the movie. "O"
I don't think I've ever been more disturbed by a play in my life.

I'm really glad that I read the article though, it shed alot of light on the context of the play and I think I would hate Othello if I hadn't of read it. I didn't know much about the time period that Othello was written in, but now that I do, I understand much more about the play's story and the characters within it. For instance, I was pretty confused about where exactly Othello had come from and why he was in Cyprus, I had assumed that I had misunderstood the part of the play that explains that but thanks to the article I know that the play never really reveals this information. I really liked that the article explained Othello's reasoning when he gave his speech after murdering Desdemona, this was actually my favorite part.