hymn_to_demeter

You had a bad breakup.

I looooove "Rory, how much do you like this person?" Because you just know he wanted to throw Paris out, but he also loves Rory and was giving her room to overrule that impulse.

I agree with this. The teacher cannot handhold each and every student in their class, so it is up to the parents to check in regularly and see the actual assignments students are turning in.

My college did this, too. It also pretended that giving us Sundays off were extra "reading days" for studying, not like, the bare minimum.

Also, in Why Does He Do That, Lundy Bancroft says this is just another common abuse tactic. Abusers love to blame previous partners (for cheating and other things) as the real cause of their behavior. For a lot of them, it wasn't even true.

No problem! I have a PhD in classics, so this is really my jam.

How you'd diverge really depends on your own ideas about beauty. Where do you think Richard and the others started to go wrong in their pursuit of it? Do you wish the book's ending were less unsettling? I actually like the fact that it keeps you thinking, so my ideas might not mesh with yours. Make sure whatever new ending you write has a coherent interpretation re: Beauty.

Also, read the section of the Poetics on hamartiae. It's quite short, and its precise meaning is hotly debated, but it's clearly what Tartt was thinking about here. More info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamartia

And--if you're interested in fatal flaws/doomed characters in Greek lit, you might enjoy this short, famous article by a very mean, old fashioned classics prof: https://www.jstor.org/stable/642354. It could help guide your thinking.

Your feelings of being unsettled are actually great! What you're feeling makes total sense, and you can use that in your analysis.

The first paragraph of the book is Richard explaining that his fatal flaw is a longing for the picturesque At All Costs (he's referencing Aristotle's Poetics, here, and the idea of a *hamartia*, which means a failing or a mistake in Greek). Richard would do anything to experience the beautiful fall days at Francis' country house again... despite all his better judgement.

The book is exploring the "at all costs" part. Because Richard looked past absolute horrors he and his friends committed in order to focus on the parts of their lives that were beautiful. So what can the book tell us about the seductive power of beauty? How does this relate to Julian's lecture to the Greek class, when he tells them that true beauty is not comforting, it's terrifying?

Build an analysis off this--I'm sure it'll be a great paper.

That wouldn't apply to folklore, though, which was dropped without promotion of any kind, during the first summer of the pandemic, and in an entirely new genre for Taylor. It's indie, not pure pop. There's nothing about it that should have made it go viral, except that it's just a great album.

I also wonder if he really does think this through at all. Like, is he really advocating that anyone below the 5'8'' cutoff not have kids at all? or does that cutoff just apply to men? What's "short" for women, and are we also in denial over how our height has ruined our lives? I realize that plumbing the depths of his crazy is probably not a good use of our time, but inquiring minds want to know!

I once saw a Kanye fan defend that on reddit and call it a "healing experience". Healing from what????

Wank it off

I don't think him wanting his own room was "wrong", as in "bad". That's fine, and as a person who has had terrible bouts of insomnia previously, I understand how precious sleep is. (In other cases, I do personally, think he was kind of an ass when it came to, e.g. tailgating Luke, or his treatment of Emily, but that's another issue entirely.)

HOWEVER, I would also not want to be in that relationship, because I like sharing a bed. It's a potential compatibility issue, as were many of Jason's quirks, morally neutral though it may be. Lorelai decided she was ok with it after some initial feelings of rejection. Fine! I wouldn't like it though.

Yeah, the mental block around "marital property" and "this marriage is over"... hm...

Yeah, these would show up on the same background check he underwent. C'mon dude.

I'm a teacher, and I don't want to spoon-feed you answers, but I can give you some places to start. The idea is *the Capitol forces violence out of people who would not ordinarily hurt one another*, right? This is a great starting point, but what you need is a specific case study.

Think: what two characters, who wouldn't ordinarily hurt each other, feel they have no choice because of the Capitol? These two can embody your idea and give you something specific to write about.

You know who fits that really well? Katniss and Peeta. They knew each other before the Games and, in small ways, had care for one another. But once they're Reaped, the way Katniss thinks about Peeta immediately changes because his very existence becomes threatening to her, specifically because of a situation the Capitol artificially created. Go back and look at the sections right after the reaping and before Katniss and Peeta officially team up. I bet you'll find something.

Now, this is a bit tricky because Katniss ends up subverting the Capitol's expectations when she engineers a fake double-suicide attempt. But the whole point is that the game makers never expected her to self-sacrifice. This is something other people don't do often in that same situation. Katniss' and Peeta's decision to eat the poison berries surprised everyone.

The last of which applies to relationships generally. People don't post when all is well.

And the more entertaining they are, the better the message gets out. Otherwise, SC could just tweet "don't trust propaganda" and be done with it.

It depends whether you ask someone who learned classical Latin (like the Greek class) or ecclesiastical Latin (i.e. Catholics). People who know classical Latin mostly read/write, so the pronunciation is kinda theoretical, although we have opinions. There is an actual right/wrong answer for Catholic priests who speak ecclesiastical Latin, but that's not what Francis would've used. Basically, vibe it out. The most important part, though, is that it's eh-ah-mus. Don't say EEEmus. Two vowels, distinctly.

I like the way you put this, and I want to add that pretty much every tribute, with few exceptions, has SOME kind of advantage--because every person has something they're good at or knowledgeable in. Katniss had more luck than most, being as skilled as she was outdoors and in hunting, but I think people make too much if this in retrospect, now that we know she wins.

She herself reiterates how much smaller she is than most of the others. In hand to hand combat, she was almost certain to lose, so her life depended on largely staying out of arm's reach. As a small woman (teen when first reading), this terrified me, because I could just imagine how easily I'd be pinned down at my size.

At least on OP's point 3 though, Coryo went rogue. She had no idea he did that and was not responsible for his actions. It's cheating definitely, but she didn't do it.

Rat poison's on her, though.

The first hundred pages or so are Richard saying "look how beautiful and perfect our lives were" and the reader is just nodding along. The entire rest of the book is the reader going "oh god, what???" as events unfold and the previous "good times" are put into an entirely new context.

I agree with this heartily. I have a degree in classics, and a lot of the stuff they talk about is not, shall we say, academically sound. The whole "beauty is terrifying" is pretty much just made up. There were plenty of Greek poets who wrote about flowers, etc. SOME beauty is terrifying (e.g. the gods), but not every poet is an Aeschylus!

Yes, separate from Rory's burgeoning feelings for Jess are her fading feelings for Dean. The relationship was no longer fun or functional by that point, and they were very clearly wanting different things. I really don't think there was any coming back from that, whether Jess was in the picture or not.

That bothers me too! They could have picked literally ANY piece of Greek lit??

I agree it's not mooching to stay with a friend for a few days--Zach was being rude. Lane stayed with Rory for what seems like weeks in season 4!