Abe+Gobel+Scribe+Post

Part 4 K+C 10-17-2011 In class today we talked mainly about the letter Joes mother sends him from Prague. We discussed how the letter is a symbol of so many things and ended up settling on it being a physical representation of Joes hope of getting his family to America. We also discussed how Chabon uses dramatic irony by allowing us (the reader) to read what his mother has to say about back home and depriving Joe of that ability. Not only that but we also discussed how just a bit later, Joe loses the letter before ever getting to read it. This happens around the same time he begins to give up hope. Hope that he will see his family again and hope that the comics that he spends so much time writing on make a difference in the war. A topic I wish we had elaborated on a bit more was how towards the beginning of this book we noticed Joe and Sammy blurring the line between reality and their comic book world but in our reading for today, Ebling seemed to be stuck, at least in his mind, as the Saboteur and not himself. This relates back to when we were first introduced to him and how we considered he could possibly be mentally unstable. Oh, and for clarification, the Worlds Fair was a fair that brought together people from all over the world to a center of a city filled with men, women, and kids from all over the world. The World Fair they are talking about is the one that takes place in New York City. Click here for more information.

The last paragraph on page 339 brought up an interesting and overlapping idea behind this entire book. The idea that so much in this book is just an illusion. Joes illusion of having his whole family with him in America, his illusion that beating up the Nazis in his comic books is affecting the war. All of these are illusions or dreams. Illusions and dreams tie this book together, from Luna Moths power of making whatever her dreams be, a reality, to the influential dreams that inspire the pages of //The Escapist//.

At the very end of class Liza brought up an interesting point. During this time in history, being homosexual was worthy of being put in a mental institution. Sammys questioning his sexuality and having feelings for Tracy could be foreshadowed by Tracys name alone. Tracy Bacon. Jews aren't supposed to eat bacon, and men weren't (at the time) supposed to be attracted to men.


 * Pay attention to opening and closing paragraphs**. They tend to hold clues for foreshadowing or past symbols.

__Important Lines:__ Page 323 "They say that ghosts...your own young life" Page 339 Last Paragraph

Next scribe is Grace