The "challenges" of Times Arrow

Time's Arrow is a remarkable imaginative achievement, and it places special demands on the reader. Disorientation is one's initial response to a world in which time moves in reverse and effect always precedes cause. A simple process like gardening becomes a bizarre ritual of uglification when it takes place in reverse: "all the tulips and roses he patiently drained and crushed, then sealed their exhumed corpses and took them in the paper bag to the store for money. All the weeds and nettles he screwed into the soil--and the earth took this ugliness, snatched at it with a sudden grip" (18-19). Everything in Time's Arrow is narrated backwards: old people become younger and more vigorous, children grow smaller and eventually enter hospitals from which they never return. Eating, drinking, love-making, even an abortion are all described in reverse. Early on, Amis even reverses words and sentences, so that "how are you today?" becomes "Aid ut oo y'rrah?"

From Martin Amis' Website

Time's Arrow and the Concept of Entropy

One of the ideas involved in the concept of entropy is that nature tends from order to disorder in isolated systems.

From: http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/therm/entrop.html

Could you use this article to frame your thoughts about Amis’ work?

From a British review of Times Arrow:

"Every once in a while, there's a prize-winning, well-written novel released to critical acclaim that's also readable. This year, that novel has got to be "Time's Arrow" by British writer Martin Amis. It's the remarkable, intense, imaginative and eminently enjoyable story of Tod T. Friendly, an American doctor working in an unnamed hospital in an unnamed city. The story is told from the point of view of a sort of doppelganger spirit, imprisoned within the body and mind of Friendly, who detects Friendly's emotions, but cannot affect Friendly's actions. Oh, and the doppelganger experiences Friendly's life backwards, starting with his death, and ending with his birth. The novel that emerges from this premise an an incredible feat of storytelling, beautifully easy to read, swimming with visual images and so startling that it can stare unflinchingly at what is certainly the ultimate horror of the twentieth century and still somehow be entertaining."

KONY

For those of you following the Invisible Children situation, here is a good read:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/post/the-controversy-over-kony-2012/2012/03/10/gIQAzc6M3R_blog.html

Prezi

http://prezi.com/b-ync1uetpr4/the-garden-of-love-by-william-blake/

An excellent example of the powers of Prezi...

Word

Is there another word for synonym?

AP Midterm

In lieu of the fact that we have just completed--or nearly so--both a major research project and an essay on Postmodernism, it is more than fitting that we turn our midterm writing time toward a different form of writing. Here is your topic:

Write a formal letter to the school board which accomplishes two goals: a) describes several glaring problems you have faced during your years in public education--especially in high school, and b) offers clear suggestions regarding how to remedy these problems.