Thursday, February 23, 2012
While reading Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde for English class, I started thinking about curiosity. It is what made humanity great, what made us better than our stronger monkey brethren. Our invention of tools that suited our needs and the beginnigns of agriculture were all the result of curiosity, wondering how we could make our lives easier. From this incredible force, modern life sprung. But in the novel, curiosity is portrayed very differently. Jekyll simply cannot stop himself from drinking the potion he knows will leave him shattered in the end, simply because he would be eaten alive from the inside out by the need to know what would happen if he had drunk the potion. If curiosity brings us to new heights only to push us off the great elevation we stand upon, does this mean humanity was doomed from the start? Is it really possible for us to truly be happy, or will our need for knowledge be greater than our desire for peace? I can only hope we do not have the same tragic fate as the Doctor. I can only hope we were not created with such an inherent flaw. I can only hope we can accept our relative insignificance and stop feeling the corrosive, destructive need to possess the forbidden knowledge.
Monday, February 13, 2012
Pain is all I know as I fall to the earth in sheer, indescribable pain. This small man who I approached in such peace and happiness has, without reason, begun beating me senseless with his staff. I know not why, partially due to my inability to think with a walking stick halfway into my skull, yet I feel as though I know this man. His pure uncurbed bloodlust and rage are almost familiar to me as I lay here being sped to my death. I am quite sure I have seen this exact same emotion in a far nobler specimen of our race. Comprehension has come to me in an instant, and I realize that this is the released soul of all things evil within a good friend of mine, Dr. Jekyll. And in this instant, I have a quite unfortunately late and unshareable lesson literally pounded into my skull. This evil side of us cannot be freed, because when let loose it will be sure to manifest its malicious will at every opportunity. When we bottle it up inside, it may begin a long and painful corruption of our soul, but this is doubtlessly better than the slow painful deaths we would all experience if evil were released in all of us. Whether this end would be the same as my own agonizingly slow one, I leave to find out the poor man who next attempts to seize the achievement of perfection.
Friday, February 3, 2012
Each footfall of mine rumbles ominously through the cavernous basement lab as I advance towards the old lab tables of the famed Dr. Jekyll. I can't help but feel a creeping fear that seems to radiate from about me in the darkness, as though this laboratory has sinister intentions of its own for me. I move onward to a smaller table with several candles about its perimeter, and on it in the center of a semicircle of the candles is a log. The cover is old and faded, suggesting its use throughout Jekyll's long carrer of experimenting. While I page through it, I see that this is inded the case, with experiments from the time he was no older than twenty to the final experiment that is now suspected to have ended his life. Curiosity spurrs me on to look at the final entry, and when I read the title, I can't help but shudder as I realize he was experimenting with dividing the human soul itself. When I finally read to the bottom of the log entries for this experiment, I see that the final entry says no more than this: "My attempts to become perfect have created a monster unlike any other. Perfection is not to be sought, it is to be feared, for in contrast to any perfect good is a shadow of evil of the same potence."
Author's note: This was simply what came to my mind while reading the novel Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Posting it here for some feedback and hopefully constructive criticism.
Author's note: This was simply what came to my mind while reading the novel Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Posting it here for some feedback and hopefully constructive criticism.
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Sorry, posted an old version of the short story. Here is the final draft:
Salvation
The air was thick and hot, and the singed desert gazed nervously up at the sun, which glared menacingly back down upon the desert and all its inhabitants as a snake would at its next kill. Like the rest of the desert, the stranded man looked up at the sky in pleading, praying to whatever deity would listen to allow that cloudless sky to break open, cease the endless tyranny of the sun, and sprinkle upon this forgotten, forsaken land the salvation of rain. The sky, however, carried as much indifference for the man’s predicament as the rest of the desert, obliging him nothing as it floated by far above his head. Wandering aimlessly, the man felt the sand shifting under his feet like the stirrings of a great behemoth beneath the surface of the earth, and began feverishly filtering through everything he had seen that could possibly give him water, without which he had but another 12 hours.
While the sun tortured him, the man wondered why, searched himself for a reason that was important enough to strand himself in the desert for. Then he had the sudden thought; this was not the first time he had found himself doing such a stupid and useless thing because someone had told him he couldn’t.
As he scanned the landscape once and again, he saw nothing save for miles of barren desert and knew the feeling of being pushed into insanity by the heat of the sun. Suddenly, something shifted on the sand, and his head snapped downward to track and observe the movement of the creature near his feet. A tiny lizard zipped across the dunes, gliding with minimal effort and taking no notice of the man staggering behind him. The man, hoping blindly that this lizard, which he would have thought of as miniscule and irrelevant in any other scenario, would lead him to that which he so very much needed, plodded behind it as it scurried up the dune, with each step taking more energy than the last.
When the tiny lizard scurried into a burrow, the man all but despaired, as he now had no more hope of finding water than before. While he despaired, his desperate mind was frantically searching for something to keep itself going, to give itself a goal to achieve, and save itself from the boundless lethality of having no hope of salvation. It snapped at the first opportunity it got.
Atop the magnificent dune the man stood following his pursuit of the lizard, and looking down upon a great, flat valley of sand. Water. There was water in the valley. Upon seeing this, the man half- charged, half- rolled down the dune, and the closer he got to the “water”, the further the illusion slipped away, until he had crossed the entirety of the valley to the other side, where the angle of the light changed as it reflected off this newly sloped surface, and the illusion dissipated along with the last of the man’s hope. Light reflecting about the crystalline grains of sand in the valley had created the illusory image of water, of salvation.
He simply laid down on the hillside, letting the sun char his skin off, not caring any longer if the indifferent environment turned his body into a pile of empty bleached bones. The man laid there because his brain could give him no reason to do otherwise. He thought that if his body were turned into a bleached skeleton, it would match his soul, the most critical component of which, hope, was wrung out and evaporated by the same brutal rays that now left his body in tatters. The man, like all humanity eventually must, accepted his place.
Author's note:
Mimic lines from Poe's "The Black Cat" are bolded. Original phrases are as follows:
found himself committing a vile or a silly action, for no other reason than because he knows he should not
aroused from sleep by the cry of fire
because I felt it had given me no reason of offence
This short story was written for Honors English 10 with the purpose of mimicking and implementing sections of famous author's writing.
Salvation
The air was thick and hot, and the singed desert gazed nervously up at the sun, which glared menacingly back down upon the desert and all its inhabitants as a snake would at its next kill. Like the rest of the desert, the stranded man looked up at the sky in pleading, praying to whatever deity would listen to allow that cloudless sky to break open, cease the endless tyranny of the sun, and sprinkle upon this forgotten, forsaken land the salvation of rain. The sky, however, carried as much indifference for the man’s predicament as the rest of the desert, obliging him nothing as it floated by far above his head. Wandering aimlessly, the man felt the sand shifting under his feet like the stirrings of a great behemoth beneath the surface of the earth, and began feverishly filtering through everything he had seen that could possibly give him water, without which he had but another 12 hours.
While the sun tortured him, the man wondered why, searched himself for a reason that was important enough to strand himself in the desert for. Then he had the sudden thought; this was not the first time he had found himself doing such a stupid and useless thing because someone had told him he couldn’t.
As he scanned the landscape once and again, he saw nothing save for miles of barren desert and knew the feeling of being pushed into insanity by the heat of the sun. Suddenly, something shifted on the sand, and his head snapped downward to track and observe the movement of the creature near his feet. A tiny lizard zipped across the dunes, gliding with minimal effort and taking no notice of the man staggering behind him. The man, hoping blindly that this lizard, which he would have thought of as miniscule and irrelevant in any other scenario, would lead him to that which he so very much needed, plodded behind it as it scurried up the dune, with each step taking more energy than the last.
When the tiny lizard scurried into a burrow, the man all but despaired, as he now had no more hope of finding water than before. While he despaired, his desperate mind was frantically searching for something to keep itself going, to give itself a goal to achieve, and save itself from the boundless lethality of having no hope of salvation. It snapped at the first opportunity it got.
Atop the magnificent dune the man stood following his pursuit of the lizard, and looking down upon a great, flat valley of sand. Water. There was water in the valley. Upon seeing this, the man half- charged, half- rolled down the dune, and the closer he got to the “water”, the further the illusion slipped away, until he had crossed the entirety of the valley to the other side, where the angle of the light changed as it reflected off this newly sloped surface, and the illusion dissipated along with the last of the man’s hope. Light reflecting about the crystalline grains of sand in the valley had created the illusory image of water, of salvation.
He simply laid down on the hillside, letting the sun char his skin off, not caring any longer if the indifferent environment turned his body into a pile of empty bleached bones. The man laid there because his brain could give him no reason to do otherwise. He thought that if his body were turned into a bleached skeleton, it would match his soul, the most critical component of which, hope, was wrung out and evaporated by the same brutal rays that now left his body in tatters. The man, like all humanity eventually must, accepted his place.
Author's note:
Mimic lines from Poe's "The Black Cat" are bolded. Original phrases are as follows:
found himself committing a vile or a silly action, for no other reason than because he knows he should not
aroused from sleep by the cry of fire
because I felt it had given me no reason of offence
This short story was written for Honors English 10 with the purpose of mimicking and implementing sections of famous author's writing.
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Short Story here:
The air was suffocatingly hot, and the singed desert gazed nervously up at the sun, which glared menacingly back down upon the desert and all its inhabitants as a snake would at its next kill. Like the rest of the desert, the stranded man looked up at the sky in pleading, praying to whatever deity would listen to allow that cloudless sky to break open, cease the endless tyranny of the sun, and sprinkle upon this forgotten, forsaken land the salvation of rain. The sky, however, held as much indifference for the man’s predicament as the rest of the desert, obliging him nothing as it floated far above his head. Wandering aimlessly, the man felt the sand shifting under his feet like the stirrings of a great behemoth beneath the surface of the earth, and began feverishly filtering through everything he had seen that could possibly give him water, without which he had but another 12 hours.
As he scanned the landscape once and again, he saw nothing save for miles of barren desert. Suddenly, something from beneath the earth shifted on the sand, and his head snapped downward to track and observe the movement of the creature near his feet. A tiny lizard zipped across the dunes, gliding with minimal effort and taking no notice of the man staggering behind him. The man, hoping blindly that this lizard, which he would have thought of as miniscule and irrelevant in any other scenario, would lead him to that which he so very much needed, plodded behind it as it scurried up the dune, with each step taking more energy than the last.
When the tiny lizard scurried into a burrow, the man all but despaired, as he now had no more hope of finding water than before. While he despaired, his desperate mind was frantically searching for something to keep itself going, to give itself a goal to achieve, and save itself from the endless lethality of having no hope of salvation. It snapped at the first opportunity it got.
Atop a magnificent dune the man stood after his chasing of the lizard, looking down upon a great, flat valley of sand. Water. There was water in the valley. Upon seeing this, the man half- charged, half- rolled down the dune and into the flat area, and the closer he got to the water, the further it slipped away, until he had crossed the entirety of the valley to the other side, where the angle of the light changed as it reflected off this newly sloped surface, and the illusion dissipated along with the last of the man’s hope. Light reflecting about the crystalline grains of sand below him in the valley had created the illusory image of water, salvation.
He simply laid down on the hillside, letting the sun char his skin off, not caring any longer if the indifferent environment turned his body into a pile of empty bleached bones. He thought that if his body were turned into a bleached skeleton, it would match his soul, the most crucial part of which, this being his hope, had been wrung out and evaporated by the same brutal rays that now left his body in tatters. The man, like all humanity eventually shall, accepted his place.
The air was suffocatingly hot, and the singed desert gazed nervously up at the sun, which glared menacingly back down upon the desert and all its inhabitants as a snake would at its next kill. Like the rest of the desert, the stranded man looked up at the sky in pleading, praying to whatever deity would listen to allow that cloudless sky to break open, cease the endless tyranny of the sun, and sprinkle upon this forgotten, forsaken land the salvation of rain. The sky, however, held as much indifference for the man’s predicament as the rest of the desert, obliging him nothing as it floated far above his head. Wandering aimlessly, the man felt the sand shifting under his feet like the stirrings of a great behemoth beneath the surface of the earth, and began feverishly filtering through everything he had seen that could possibly give him water, without which he had but another 12 hours.
As he scanned the landscape once and again, he saw nothing save for miles of barren desert. Suddenly, something from beneath the earth shifted on the sand, and his head snapped downward to track and observe the movement of the creature near his feet. A tiny lizard zipped across the dunes, gliding with minimal effort and taking no notice of the man staggering behind him. The man, hoping blindly that this lizard, which he would have thought of as miniscule and irrelevant in any other scenario, would lead him to that which he so very much needed, plodded behind it as it scurried up the dune, with each step taking more energy than the last.
When the tiny lizard scurried into a burrow, the man all but despaired, as he now had no more hope of finding water than before. While he despaired, his desperate mind was frantically searching for something to keep itself going, to give itself a goal to achieve, and save itself from the endless lethality of having no hope of salvation. It snapped at the first opportunity it got.
Atop a magnificent dune the man stood after his chasing of the lizard, looking down upon a great, flat valley of sand. Water. There was water in the valley. Upon seeing this, the man half- charged, half- rolled down the dune and into the flat area, and the closer he got to the water, the further it slipped away, until he had crossed the entirety of the valley to the other side, where the angle of the light changed as it reflected off this newly sloped surface, and the illusion dissipated along with the last of the man’s hope. Light reflecting about the crystalline grains of sand below him in the valley had created the illusory image of water, salvation.
He simply laid down on the hillside, letting the sun char his skin off, not caring any longer if the indifferent environment turned his body into a pile of empty bleached bones. He thought that if his body were turned into a bleached skeleton, it would match his soul, the most crucial part of which, this being his hope, had been wrung out and evaporated by the same brutal rays that now left his body in tatters. The man, like all humanity eventually shall, accepted his place.
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
I LIIIIIIIIIVE!!!
I am BACK, and now am posting on here for Honors English 10, or as Mrs. Woods would say, HE10!! Anyways, short story I wrote will be going on here soon. First update in quite a while though.
Thursday, June 3, 2010
Brian Skerry reveals ocean's glory -- and horror | Video on TED.com
Brian Skerry reveals ocean's glory -- and horror | Video on TED.com
This is about a marine photographer who is trying to save the sea wiht his images. Very cool.
This is about a marine photographer who is trying to save the sea wiht his images. Very cool.
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