Genre memo

GENRE MEMO



To: Franny Howes
From: Suyang Tan
Date: 2-27-2009

Re: Genre Memo for [Novel, Music drama, photo]

Franny:

A novel is defined by a combination of its substance, its scope, its style, and that it can be located along a certain arc of the history of literature. A novel is always a description of a society the trying to reveal the negative parts in it. Different methods that author uses on novels to figure personae endow audience huge space to image the stories in his view and this is always the reason that novel is attractive. My text for genre novel is a brief description and introduction of a famous novel. I hope my text can help introduce novel to you.

The second genre I writing about is Music drama. Music drama is description of a story through a stage-performance form. One of most important characteristics is the use of music during the performance. Actors use their singing to express the emotion and feeling in the story. Watching music drama is considered to be an elegant behavior however music drama are still not that popular as other genres forms like film and novel. People who are interested at music should be likely to be audience to music drama. My text is a description of one of the most famous music drama which is “Phantom of the Opera”, however the best way to know the charm of music drama is to buy a ticket in a theater and enjoy a drama.

The last genre I wrote about is photo. By comparing with the other two genres I mentioned, photo is using a more visual way to express feelings and substances. By using a still and catch of picture, photographer are trying to record something beautiful and meaningful or remind and reveal something that may not easily be noticed in daily life. Photo is suitable for everyone so that it becomes the most common and convenient media in current life. In my text, I am describing a meaningful photo that reveals the poverty problem in the world. Through looking at the photo, we can perceive more than just on the picture, use your imagination to perceive the world.

Sincerely,



Suyang Tan

Genre

1.Novel

To regain the nature of goodness—Review of “Oliver twist”

Oliver Twist, one of the most famous works of Charles Dickens, is a novel reflecting the tragic fact of people’s life in Britain in 18^th century.

The author, who was born in a poor family, wrote this novel in his twenties to reveal the ugly mask of those cruel criminals and to expose the horror and violence hidden under the narrow and dirty streets in London. The hero of this novel is Oliver Twist who is an orphan. He was abandoned into a world that full of crimes and poverties. While reading the tragic experiences of the litter Oliver, I was shocked by his sufferings. I felt bad for the poor boy, but at the same time I detested the evil Fagin and the brutal Bill. As what was written in most stories, the goodness eventually conquered devil and Oliver lived a happy life at the end. One of the plots that attracted me most is that after the theft, little Oliver was allowed to recover in the kind care of Mrs. Maylie and Rose and began his new life. He wandered with them, or Rose read to them, and he worked hard at his lessons. He felt as if he had left behind forever the world of crime and hardship and poverty.

How can such a little boy who had already suffered oppressive affliction remain pure in mind? The reason I think is the nature of goodness, which is the most important information implied in the novel by Dickens. He believed that goodness could conquer every difficulty. Although I do not believe in god, yet I do believe that those who are kind-hearted live more happily that those who are evil-minded.

For me, the nature of goodness is one of the most necessary lessons for a person. However, to my disappointment, nowadays some people seem to doubt the existence of the goodness in humanity. They rarely believe in people’s honesty and kindness. They thought they were smart; however they have not noticed yet that the most beautiful thing in the world which is “Trust between hearts” is gradually gone. In their opinions, money and authority are everything. It is fearful when you find yourself become a slave for evils.

Francis Bacon said in his essay that “Goodness, of all virtues and dignities of the mind, is the greatest, being the character of the deity, and without it, man is busy, mischievous, wretched thing, no better that a kind of vermin.” It shows that a person without goodness is destined to lose everything. Therefore, I really wish those “vermin-to-be” to learn from the lovely Oliver and regain the nature of goodness.

The novel form of is the original view of the author, which endows audiences a biggest space for imagination to build up their own understanding of what the author trying to express.

Link: http://www.woyouxian.com/b07/b0701/Oliver_Twist_enindex.html

2. Music Drama

Phantom of the opera is one of the most famous music drama is the world. It describes a love story happened in the French Paris opera house in 19^th century. In 1882, there is an ugly guy, who is also with a mask and has brilliant endowment in music, live in the cave deep place of the opera house. Throughout years, he used his frequent mysteriously appears and disappears to avoid vision which common people alarmed and afraid despises. That is the reason that he is being called “The demon shade”. He frequently makes each kind of posture of by the ghosts and demons, drives those singers that he does not like away, even influencing the authority of the lead candidate in the opera house. By accident, he found a singer named Gram Li Silk, who has an uncommon talent beautiful sound. He decided to train the young lady to be the chief soprano no count all prices. However, actually he gradually found himself transforming the feeling towards Gram Li Silk from music to external desire. He tried to remove every possible potential element that may pull her down, by even using extreme artifices and methods. Afterwards, theater investor Lowell recognized the Gram Li Silk was his childhood plays partner, two people fell deeply in love. This accident love almost made “the Demon shade” crazy and bad tempered. His crazy behavior and desire to destroy things gradually transferred the fear to his sentiment from love. After half years, Lowell had secret engagement with Gram Li Silk, demon shade suddenly appear in the opera house masked ball, then he forced opera house to perform the his opera “the Tang Semi-annular jade pendant”, this crazy actions drove Lowell realize that a duel is the only way the end demon shade’s annoyance. On the date that “the Tang Semi-annular Jade pendant” first performed, the demon shade secretly replaced the actor by killing in order to perform with Gram Li Silk. Unexpectedly, she took off his mask in the performance during the play, which made Demon shade extremely angry. He was ashamed and forced Gram Li silk to his secret room underground. Lowell traced to the room and announced a duel with demon shade. However, he could not beat demon shade at all. In order to protect Lowell, the gram Li silk agreed to lean her body resolutely by kissing demon shade. The demon shade left the two lovers in the room and stepped to the prison, the mask left on the ground annotated the deplorable feeling in the heart of demon shade.

The theatric and stage effects endow the music drama a direct vision to express the meaning of it. Using songs to express sentiment is the most important characteristic in music drama, audiences can perceive the feeling through watching actors’ emotional and fantastic performances. The scenario of music drama is always not as complicate as novels or other forms of literacy, however, the special stage effects is making music dramas more and more popular.

3. Photo

On the photo, we can see two hands grasping closely, however we are not saying something like friendship and cooperation, what we are concerning about is poverty and hunger. A big white hand stands for those people who are having normal living condition, we do not need to worry that if one day we are going to die because of the lack of food. We study, we work, we eat, we drink sometimes we even travel, and we are enjoying our lives. We live in heaven, don’t we? However there are always some people that do not even have the ability for even just surviving in the world. They do not have house, they do not have a chance to go to school, they do not have enough food, and they do even have pure water to drink. When looking at the black and dry hand in the photo, we should have imaged what kind of life those poverty people are suffering. Fortunately, more and more people start to realize the problem which is an unfair distribution of the world’s welfare. They go to Africa, in where the most poverty people are considered to be. They donate clothes, foods and money with every possible ways. Schools and hospitals are set up by organizations to solve education and health care problems. What they are trying to do is to let those people who are poverty know we are caring about them. High criminal rate and unstable society are becoming a symbol of these areas. By struggling for survivals, people in these areas try to go to an outside world. They don’t care about becoming a slave, what they aim to is to get rid of poverty and hunger or say what they are trying to do is searching for foods and survivals. When looking at the photo, my tear can not stand falling down. I feel shame about my luxury behaviors and waste in daily life. I start to realize how good the life I am having. How come I still complaining about some unfair experiences which sounds stupid in front of this picture. We should try our best to help those people with poverty, not only donating things and moneys, but also to build up the confidence in their deep heart of struggle for goodliness. As if one day the world is fulfilled of love, we would not see poverty anymore.

Photo is such an amazing media that remind people of something by a visual way. Through a still of menu and picture, people can perceive things that may not be noticed and observed in daily life. This is the reason that photo is becoming one of the most frequent use media in current life.

Photo

This photo is about the celebration of Eduardo after scoring in the game facing Cardiff. Exactly 358 days before that night, Eduardo had left the pitch with his soccer career in doubt. His leg had been fractured, his ankle had been dislocated and on one in the world could promise he would be back to pitch even after one year round. The career for a soccer player is pretty short that one year absence from pitch would nearly destroy the future of the player. Doctors and team physios struggle great efforts to help him returning back to soccer world. The effort that he paid and the tears and sweats that he felt off behind the sight of the fans’ view emotionally causes a celebration with huge enthusiasms, to which the soccer fans of the whole world pray. Look into his eyes, what we see is the eager towards scoring, wining and proving himself. He used his fantastic performance announcing his backing, with a shake of everyone’s heart. It is not only a miracle in medical and physical area, but also an incredible reflects of the adamancy of human’s heart and soul. Eduardo is backing with twice scored in his first match after injure, we can believe a stronger and braver man is returning to Emirate Stadium.

I've been tagged...Here we go

25 Random things about myself

1. Next Friday is my 20th birthday
2. I am a crazy fan of soccer, supporting Arsenal
3. Favorite soccer star: Thierry Henry and Raul Gonzales
4. I have a younger sister who is just 5 years old now, she is so lovely.. lol
5. 178cm height (with shoe..hah)
6. my driving skill is perfect
7. I am learning how to play piano by myself
8. I used to play guitar
9. I am kind of single now cuz my girlfriend is not in US..wakaka
10. I prefer Asian girls more than white chicks
11. I am nearly a semi-pro of DOTA (which is one kind of RPG game of Warcraft 3)...hah
12. I like traveling around, with girls
13. I never go to the cinema with a friend who is not even a girl.
14. I work-out twice a week
15. My singing is ok
16. I enjoy luxury life in the future. huhu
17. I think western food is just like a piece of shit
18. I wanna have a car before Fall 09 semester
19. I am a good boy
20. I am a good student
21. I grew up in Shenzhen
22. I bought a I-Pod classical instead of I-touch, I am a little bit regretting doing that..lol
23. I like playing pull
24. I hate papers with those topic that sucks like malaria or something
25. I love my family

video text

Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgP2UbWgi-o&NR=1

This nike soccer commercial is about how is Thierry Henry, who is a famous France football star, praticing his football skill at home. He enjoys playing football with his little dog, when he playing with it, he mindly considers it as a player from Manchester United which is a a main competitor of his team. He keeps praticing hard and using his beautiful skills of soccer to overcome every possible difficulties. Just as the most famous Nike's commercial words which is "Impossible is nothing", keep praticing and you are going to strong. Pratice, Pratice, pratice makes perfect.

Vedio form is one of general media forms that used to express and narrate something. Compare with the original or tranditional forms like novel and artcile, vedio is a form that with fascinations and attractions. The topic that the editor willing to express is easier to be understood by audience as it is using a virsual form. Nowadays, vedio text is widely used in commercials and media, the huge power it provides can not count by gold.

Vote for me

Once Barrack Obama became the 44th president in American's history, a thought came into my mind. Everyone knows that Obama is an African American and his winning in the electioneeging is the first time for a color people reach the highest power towards political issue in this land. This means a release and liberation for black people who was considered once to be prejudiced and discriminated throughout the history. While watching black people's celebration for Obama's victory, I was wondering when is the time for a person with yellow skin to own the country that still be considered to be the strongest economy in the world even under the financial crisis. I will try my best to improve myself so that a few years later the one standing on the stage of election would be me. Don't be supprised about my crazy throught which indicates the real democrazy in my view, try to understand and preceive the view of world I have with showing respects and graces to me as what you did toward Obama. So, Vote for me...lol
(It still needs a long time for Asian people to be a majority of American society, not in population but for the influence, Don't be political sensitive when reading my point of view, just have fun)

homework due on Feb 6th

Five ways of interpreting a text
1. The social perspective
2. The emotional perspective
3. Rhetorical perspective
4. The logical perspective
5. The ethical perspective


Link: http://topics.nytimes.com/topics/reference/timestopics/people/o/barack_obama/index.html

In response for the article, I would like to use both “the social perspective” and “the ethical perspective”. Barrack Obama is the first color president in American history, which can be considered to be breaking point to the racial discrimination problem that widely concerned by the whole society. Racial discrimination is a problem that exists in the world that people show prejudice and discrimination towards color people especially black people. Barack Hussein Obama was sworn in as the 44th president of the United States on Jan. 20, 2009. The son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas, he was the first African-American to ascend to the highest office in the United State. I still remember how crazy those black people in my dorm building were, even happier than getting one million dollars for free however that was truly worth celebrating as it is such a historical event. Obama has run a successful campaign in the way of electioneering, however one of his behaviors that is considered to be a method of gaining votes is controversial, which is that he is supporter of “Pro-choice” as his background of christen. “Pro-choice” problem, which is named abortion in medical and biological issues, is a controversial ethical problem that influencing the society.
The election of president, especially the electioneering period, is a well reveal of problems existing in the society. The final winner should be the person that may more likely to solve these problems. So, good luck, Obama.