Posts by Logan Lambert

Hello! Nothing important to read here, if you are reading this. All I can say is I am a smart young person, who likes to read and talk! Otherwise, I am just another teenager, who is slightly crazy( Isn't everyone?), and kind of logical. So yeah, I am a bit curious as to why you are reading this, but read away. I'm not stopping you!

Portfolio written text essay “The Book Thief”

“The Book Thief” by Markus Zusak, is about Liesel, a little girl living in Nazi Germany during World War 2, and Death’s view of her life. Death speaks to the reader about Liesel, and while doing so, describes his own situation as well. This essay will explain how Death can’t be blamed for everyone’s deaths, then Liesel’s life, and how she is constantly around death, and then how life is important in every situation. This is all to describe the following point.

World War 2 was an absolute nightmare. It was full of death and destruction, and got everyone trying to survive, with plenty failing. With this novel, we can use the life of Liesel, and the narration of death to describe how important life is, and how unfortunate it is that World war 2 happened for everyone involved.

“As I’ve suggested, my one saving grace is distraction. It keeps me sane.” As this quote suggests, Death requires distraction to save himself mentally. The things that are causing him to go crazy are the fact that he has seen the death of everyone, ever. Very, very few people could say that they could get through that and remain sane. To actually get affected though, you have to be able to care about people. We know Death cares because of this quote: “I carried him softly through the broken street, with one salty eye and a heavy, deathly heart.” “He makes me cry.” He was saddened by the death of Rudy, and Rudy’s family. The words ‘broken’, ‘salty’, ‘heavy’, ‘deathly’, ‘cry’, all prove that he can care about people, and feel something for them that is more powerful than a bit of pity. This all once again proves that Death needs saving mentally. Which also means, that if Death is affected so much, he can’t possibly be blamed for being the cause of all the death in the book, since no sane person would continue to do something that will drive them crazy unless they have no choice. That is why distraction is the one saving grace from World War 2, and why it is the one thing protecting the idea of life from death.

“Rudy Steiner slept. Mama and Papa slept. Frau Holtzapfel, Frau Diller. Tommy Müller. All sleeping. All dying.” This quote explains Liesel’s childhood life to us in a simple enough way. Everyone she knows, dies at some point while they sleep. The reason this is important is that it shows us an example of what happens to a person when they lose everyone they ever cared about because of World War 2, and how they think of life afterwards. Liesel never knew her father, her brother died in front of her, every person she knew, like Papa and Mama died while they slept, and Max’s very life is constantly at stake since everyone is against him being a Jew. After all of that, what would Liesel think about death? I personally think that she would never forget them, however, she would still move on. This is because Liesel isn’t mentally weak enough to stop living from that. She is young, so it did serverally damage her ability to trust others, and make friends(She became like that from her brother and mother leaving, so it will become even worse after the people who saved her from her previous trust issues also die). She still isn’t going to die even if all of that happens though, she will ‘move on’, and live her life. There is evidence she did that from the quote “There was no recovery from what had happened. That would take decades. It would take a long life.” This quote demonstrates how the only way to save her mind is to live a long life, and let all of the new experiences, and all of that time, heal over the damage caused during her childhood. Liesel’s life is full of death, all because of Nazi Germany, which leads to our main point. That is, World War 2 ruined many lives, and caused many, many nightmares. However, it also strongly shows how Liesel viewed life, and how even after all of the crap she has been through, she can still appreciate life for what it is.

To properly understand why life is important, we need to understand why it matters if we die, and so the final question is: “What does it mean to die?” My own belief(A part of it, anyway), is that if something dies, that is the end of its existence on this world. Everything it did has been in affect, and there is nothing left it can do. In its life, it will of caused the death of many other lifeforms in an attempt to survive for their own life, so when you die, it signifies the end of a life that has caused the death of many others. It becomes quite an important death, at least for a few other lifeforms that were affected when they were alive. What this shows is that death only matters when life matters. And life matters because of the effects it has on everyone else, the same as death. What does this have to do with “The Book Thief” then? It is the fact that Death at least recognises how when people die, every one of their deaths matters, and when people kill other people, it really sucks to watch it happen. It leads to this kind of thought: “I am haunted by humans.” Because he knows how important life is, and how bad it is that people caused World War 2 to happen, and started the death of so many people.

“The Book Thief” by Markus Zusak, is about Liesel, a little girl living in Nazi Germany during World War 2, and Death’s view of her life. Death speaks to the reader about Liesel, and while doing so, describes his own situation as well. Above I have described how Death can’t be blamed for death as he is being forced into it, Liesel’s life and how even though it is full of death, she can still handle it, and then how life matters because death matters. All to describe how important life is, and how the nightmare that is World War 2 is so important to everyone.

Portfolio re-written speech

One of the most confusing things there is, is that of the human brain, and the emotions that it enables. In this writing, the emotions of happiness and sadness shall be used to explain how confusing emotions in general can be, and how we need to sort them out since they are so important. There will also be a story of a person who got these emotions confused, as proof that it is indeed possible to stuff up as much as has been described. The goal of all this is to convince the reader to look into what an emotion is, and realise that emotions are not simple.

To begin, here is the story of a person who stuffed up their emotions to a rather bad degree. This person somehow got this idea into their head when they were young: “I should smile constantly, then I will look better”, which lead to them always smiling. Then they encountered a few mental problems, leading to something like depression, where they forgot what all of their emotions felt like, and then there is the fact that they forgot why they always smiled. They thought this: “Since I’m always smiling for some unknown reason, I should be feeling happy right now, yeah? Great to know I am always happy, 100% of the time!” They weren’t happy. Took a few years for them to realise from the moment they first started thinking they were happy; a slightly sad experience where they knew they should be sad; and the decision that they were smiling far too much; to realise this: “This feeling I am constantly experiencing, isn’t it very similar to when I was sad just now? Wait, doesn’t that mean I’m always sad?!” They learnt that they were experiencing something like sadness constantly, and as they had forgotten what all their emotions felt like, they had no choice but to start trying to guess and experiment with their emotions in an attempt to figure them out. This person’s story proves that it is in fact possible to forget how to define and understand each emotion.

The emotions happiness and sadness are very useful as they are quite important to a person’s well being. However even if they are quite important, they still have their problems, for instance: If you’re too often happy you could be considered a maniac, if you’re too often sad then you could possibly be depressed, and if you switch back and forth between these two, you might be considered bipolar. Below I will describe what these emotions actually feel like.

The definition for happiness when it is searched up is: “happiness is a mental or emotional state of well-being which can be defined by, among others, positive or pleasant emotions ranging from contentment to intense joy.”  That would mean that happiness can be felt in a number of different ways, and in differing intensities. Simply put, happiness is a good feeling, one that clears up your head, puts spring in your step, and then gives you a fresh outlook on life, so that you can best enjoy it.
Then sadness can be described as this: “Sadness is an emotional pain associated with, or characterized by, feelings of disadvantage, loss, despair, grief, helplessness, disappointment and sorrow.” Which is all of the different names for different types of sadness one can feel. Simply put, it is a constant smothering feeling, which stops thoughts from working, makes you rather lethargic, and to the extreme point of sadness, it can even feel like a large spike is being twisted around inside of your head. Basically, sadness sucks. However, sadness is still important, as it can help to remove stress, clear up your judgements of people, and even help with social interactions. And without it, how are you ever going to enjoy the difference of being happy and sad?

In short, the emotions happiness and sadness are important, as are any other emotions. Happiness itself has been found to lower the heart rate and lower the blood pressure, while also combating stress and helping the immune system protect you from disease. While sadness as said before can help with stress and different social interactions with others. This is why they need to be defined in our head. It is because everyone should be capable of feeling them, in a fair, even amount, as they can help with life in amazing ways. And if someone is no able to understand what they are feeling, or are incapable of feeling, then we need to change this so that they can feel, and understand what they are feeling.

Book Report 6: Tag

“Tag”, a movie that follows 5 different friends who decided that they want to stay friends even when grown up. And to do this, they will play the game ‘tag’ every May. That means they try and find each other and then try and tag each other during this time. And so comes the start of the movie, where we have an average person, a rich CEO, a drug addict, a not-mentally-sound person, and a sports star who runs multiple fitness campaigns. And the main plot, tag the fitness star because he has never been tagged.

The point of this movie is about how friendship will last through many different things, all you have to do is put in a bit of effort. Perhaps it’s always hanging out with them every weekend, or having an end of year meet-up so that you stay connected, or in this case, playing the game tag where you jobs, relationships, and even your life are at stake. 

At the beginning of the movie, we see the the average guy, Hogan “Hoagie” , begin his plan. First, quit his job as a veterinarian. Second, get hired as a janitor at Bob Callahan business. Third, get into his office and tag him. Fourth find and tag Randy “Chilli” Cilliano the drug addict, while trapping him with his really enthusiastic wife Anna. After tagging him, tag Kevin Sable, then, finally, tell everyone the plan of tagging the fitness sport star Jerry Pierce, who is retiring after this year due to him getting married. And so they try multiple times to trap and catch Jerry. During this time they pick up Rebecca Crosby, a wall street journalist as well. And so begins their many attempts to trap and tag Jerry, and like every year, they all lead to failure. In fact, the very degree that Jerry has planned out that year is insane. Like, he has many different body doubles, traps, practised out fighting abilities, a copy of Hogan’s room in his basement, and in general, just an over the top amount of gear to not be it. And so of course, with all these preparations,a Hogan’s plan completely fails. Jerry ended up having to many different tricks, and with an amendment so that there is no tagging during the wedding, Jerry just can’t be tagged. Well, until the end when the fact that Hogan has a tumour on his liver and the fact that his life is going to last for about 3 more weeks after may ends. Which also finally leads to Jerry being tagged, and their friendship being healed.

During the movie, we discover that everyone has their private lives and secrets that no one else knows. For instance, Jerry is going to alcoholics anonymous. And Bob carries around thousands of dollars like it’s nothing. Or Kevin and the fact that he has trust issues, and a bunch of other issues. Or Randy and the fact that he is actually the only really ‘normal’ person there. Oh and Hogan and the fact that he will die really soon but won’t tell his friends because he doesn’t want to ruin the game. What this showed me is how different people can be, and yet still be close friends. And it also showed me an example of people keeping secrets from others and it not really leading to all that much trouble. And so we learn that as friends; you can only be so close. There will always be something that keeps you apart. Which just proves the point, that even if your apart, with the effort you putt in, you can all remain friends, even if the secrets are rather bad.

Another thing I realised from this movie is how damn important friends are. Like, I knew they were important, but these people took it to a whole new level. They decided, as said before, to play the game tag even started the cost of, well, a lot of different things. This shows how they knew staying as friends was important, and that they had to put the effort in. In particular, Hogan definitely knew this. The reason being he kept on saying how “this game of tag isn’t just a game, it is a show of friendship, working together, and knowing each other”. He knew, as the quote says, that the game tag isn’t just a game, it is the effort they put into staying friends. Without it, their friendship will die. So, by playing the game, and putting some effort into it, they are basically saving them selves from loneliness, and keeping themselves happy. That is why Hogan wants everyone to put in so much effort, and created his plan. He knew, they had to do this so as to not only stay as friends, but as to make sure the stayed happy in life.

“Tag”, a movie about 5 friends with many secrets who play tag every may in an attempt to stay close teaches us this: No matter how close you might be able to get, there will still be many secrets between friends. And that even if there are secrets, you can still remain as friends. Then it also taught us how important friends are, and that people want to be together, along with how being with your friends is a great way to stay happy in life. And so from this, remember, put in a bit of effort and you will be friends for a life time. Put in no effort at all, and the friendship will die. And finally, I would recommend this movie to anyone who wants to see a pretty cool friendship in action. 

Book report 5: One Punch Man

“One Punch Man”, by ‘ONE’, is an anime about a depressed superhero who can’t enjoy the only thing he enjoys doing, which is fighting. He lives in a world where monsters are everywhere, and these monsters are constantly increasing, with more and more tough fights appearing for everyone. So why would Saitama(The main character) end up not enjoying all these fights? Read on to discover more about how becoming the best at what you at the thing you enjoy, can actually remove all of the thrill that you can get from it.

The point I am trying to say is that if you’re the best at something, then you might not enjoy it anymore. It depends on what you enjoy about what your doing though. For instance, say you enjoy skydiving, and it’s a thing you can easily do in any airspace. At first, this would be amazing. You would find it so much fun! But then comes the problem, is it fun to skydive when it is easy? Where’s the adrenaline rush from falling out of a plane, and rushing to the ground? Where’s all of the awesome scenery, others will never see? Where are all of the people who are impressed by your career? It’s all gone, or at least, you don’t notice it anymore, ever since you got used to it all. This is the same feeling Saitama has towards fighting monsters. He enjoyed it at first, to the point where he decided he must train to a very large degree so as to enjoy it even more. But then, he encounters a problem. He ends up being ‘perfect’ at defeating his opponent. No one can even give him a fight, so, just like the skydiver, he doesn’t enjoy what he does anymore. And as he doesn’t enjoy the only thing he does in his life, he ended up depressed because he can’t see a reason in what he does. Simply put, being great at something doesn’t mean a sound mind, but someone who is going to miss becoming the best and regret being the best.

During the episode, many things happen, for instance, he goes to the shop. He buys food. The shop is crushed, while he counts out some money. He kills a giant in one punch, after of course having a discussion with him about how much it sucks to be the strongest in the world. Then he goes back home and relaxes. Watches the news. Falls asleep. Basically, his life sucks. Sure, being as strong as he is would be great, but then again, that’s from an observers point of view. As far as he is concerned, life sucks. There is nothing to do, and it seems like there is no exciting future in store for him. All this proves the point, that being the best at something, doesn’t mean being the happiest. Your still just another person, that lives just another life. Saitama being Saitama however, can still be happy and feel all those other emotions, but, well, that doesn’t mean he enjoys life all that much. He just lives it. 

At the end of the episode, Saitama has a slightly prophetic dream. He dreams of a group of monsters, entering the world who plan to kill all of humanity and take over the world. And so through this dream we learn the inner feelings of Saitama. Not that he wants to end the world or anything like that. No, instead it is more like he believes the enemy at least needs to be on the level where humanity is doomed to actually be a threat to him. We also learn that as much as he is a hero, he doesn’t really care if everyone dies. And add the fact that he always says that he is a just being a hero for the fun of it, and you will realize one important fact. Saitama, a being with the body of a God, doesn’t really care about much at all. As far as he is concerned, a good fight, even if the world is doomed, is worth it. Oh, and when he woke up, and saw the fact that his dream was coming true, he was excited for the potential fight. Too ‘bad’ that his brain completely over exaggerated their power. He ended up experiencing a great sadness and annoyance when his opponents weren’t in fact extremely dangerous, but really just weaklings who couldn’t excited him at all.

“One Punch Man” by One, is a anime about a depressed, but stupidly powerful hero. Saitama lives a life he views as boring, and the best thing to happen was that one time he got to talk to someone about how boring being the strongest is. Then he experiences a dream, where he finally realises what is missing in his life, which is the adrenaline rush he gets from fighting, and pushing his body to the limits. All this teaches us the point, that being the greatest, can honestly suck. And finally, I would recommend this anime as a starter to 

2.5 A “Perspectives” Speech Exam.

The most confusing thing I have ever encountered has got to be the emotional part of our brain. Hello everyone, I am Logan Lambert and today I shall be explaining to you all how easy it is to stuff up your emotions, and get confused over all of them. In particular, I shall be describing to you all the perspectives of happiness and sadness. 

To begin, let me tell you a story of a person I know, who stuffed up their emotions to a rather bad degree. This person somehow got this idea into their head when they were young: “I should smile constantly, then I will look better”, which lead to them always smiling. Then they encountered a few mental problems, leading to something like depression, where they forgot what all of their emotions felt like, and add to the fact that they forgot why they always smiled, they thought this: “Since I’m always smiling for some unknown reason, I should be feeling happy right now, yeah? Great to know I am always happy, 100% of the time!” They weren’t happy. Took a few years for him to realise from the moment he first started thinking he was happy; a slightly sad experience where they knew they should be sad; and the decision that they were smiling far too much; to realise this: “This feeling I am constantly experiencing, isn’t it very similar to when I was sad just now? Wait, doesn’t that mean I’m always sad?!” So they learnt that they were experiencing something like sadness constantly. However, here’s the annoying thing that you might of forgotten, they forgot what every single emotion felt like. Because of this, they don’t know how to fix their emotional state. And so they have to guess and experiment with their emotions to try and figure them out. And this is why this speech will be written, because this person I know shouldn’t be the only one that has forgotten what all their emotions feel like. Others will most likely need help to figure out what each one feels like, and I need to get you all to realise this. I also realise that you too might not even of noticed how stuffed up your emotional well being is. None of us will know until you bother to check.

I will now talk about emotions from the perspectives of  happiness and sadness. These two emotions are very important to our well being, and each emphasize the other, following the expression: “You have to experience sadness to know happiness”, which in turn means that you must experience happiness to know sadness. And even though they are so important, they still have problems, for instance: If you’re too often happy you’re a maniac, if you’re too often sad then you’re depressed, and if you switch back and forth between these two, you are bipolar. These emotions can even be confused for each other if your not aware of what each one feels like and no one ever properly explains; which is why today I shall be explaining what they feel like in your head, and hopefully remove a bit of the confusion. 


The definition for happiness when you search it up is: “happiness is a mental or emotional state of well-being which can be defined by, among others, positive or pleasant emotions ranging from contentment to intense joy.”  So that would mean that happiness can be felt in a number of different ways, and in differing intensities. I guess, simply put, happiness is a good feeling, one that clears up your head, and lets you enjoy life(Puts a spring in your step, and a fresh outlook on life). If you don’t know what it is like to enjoy something, then I’m sorry, but I can’t come up with any other explanation. There is no other way to explain happiness besides this.


Sadness when searched up is this: “Sadness is an emotional pain associated with, or characterized by, feelings of disadvantage, loss, despair, grief, helplessness, disappointment and sorrow.” Which is all of the different names for different types of sadness one can feel. What do these feel like? Easy! It is a constant smothering feeling, which stops thoughts from working, makes you rather lethargic, and it seems like a large spike is being twisted around inside of your head(The spike in the heart is guilt, or possibly a feeling of loneliness since no one cares about you. Could also be something just wrong with your heart in general too.). Basically, sadness/depression sucks. Not to say that it isn’t an important feeling, but that doesn’t change how bad it feels. However, sadness is still important, as it can help to remove stress, clear up your judgements of people, and even help with social interactions. And without it, how are you ever going to enjoy being happy?

Please keep in mind that everyones brains work differently. This means that I don’t know what a emotion might feel like for you, no one can. In fact because of this, the only way for everyone to figure out what an emotion feels like is to experiment with them. See what you feel like when you are supposed to feel sad; see what you feel like when your supposed to feel happy. Do this for as many emotions as possible, and learn just how your emotions work. Who knows, you might just discover you have emotional problems. It might also get you wondering a few things about your emotions, like whether or not you can even trust these emotions of yours. And you might even discover that you can actually trust your own brain to make correct judgements when it comes to emotions, which really shows how lucky your are. And if you can’t trust your brain, then it really shouldn’t come as a surprize. If it does come as a surprise, then that truly shows how damaged our idea-of-what-emotions-feel-like is.

“Perspectives” 2.5A Plan

To construct and deliver an oral presentation on a topic, issue, idea, conflict, situation that is thought-provoking/controversial this year.
*You must present at least 2 different perspectives/interpretations/viewpoints on this topic, issue, idea, conflict or situation.
The topic I might do could be: Depression; that emotions are a mess, and we need to learn how to fix them; kids should be taught how their brains work from primary to year 10, just so that they know why they think the things that they do.

Depression perspectives, what is it like to experience depression first-hand. And what it is like for people who are watching it happen. It should provoke thoughts in the listener to look at their own mental state, and just check that they aren’t depressed. The reason being, it is easy to make a mistake their.

Emotions are a mess perspectives, the most easy to identify emotions, and what they are actually like; the reason why we feel them; and what it means if you can’t feel them. The reason because EMOTIONS ARE A MESS AND I WANT TO HELP PEOPLE NOT SUFFER ANY MORE FROM THESE EMOTIONS.

Convincing people about how their brains work, from the perspective of the kid whose brain doesn’t work, but hasn’t noticed and so is suffering without even noticing it(It can happen, trust me here, okay), and for the people whose brains are perfectly fine but who should be taught so that they can help others in a more effective way. The reason being that this would of been so useful for me a few years ago, might of saved myself a lot of problems.  

These 3 topics are all pretty good in their own way, and they all have multiple perspectives, and all that. But which would be best? Depression is the one I am least interested in, so ignore that. And the other two could be combined, by having it so that I teach everyone how easy it is to stuff up the concept of emotions, and lead it to getting everyone to try and add in a class that teaches us how they work. 

Speech:
Introduction(My topic, who I am, a question like, “Who here has a perfect grasp on their emotions?” If all are yes, then “Then you are all very lucky”, and if all are no, “To be expected, emotions are a mess”, or mix, “So a few of you are lucky, and a few need help understanding their emotions, no surprize there”.)

Explain backstory behind point(Talk about a guy I know who got really confused when it came to emotions, but never sought help for reason unknown, and who still dislikes how confused they got(You, talk about yourself))

First point about how emotions actually work(Well, like happiness is a nice feeling, angriness is a maddening feeling, stuff you will have to interview others to figure out. Disclaimer “I don’t know for sure, but from my limited research, this is what these emotions feel like.”) 

Second point(“And how do we make sure no one gets confused about what emotions are like anymore? Simple! Let’s make an extra class that starts in year 7, and goes to year 10 that tells us how brains work.” Then try to convince everyone that this is a great idea, and isn’t just going to waste kids time. Trust me, we waste enough of it already, we can spare a bit.)

Conclusion(Wrap up your point about how confusing emotions are, introduce some places people can go to when they do suffer from mental problems, not that we went, but you know they exist, and, yeah, wait for the applause! I hope)

Book report number 5: plan

For the 5th book report that will be a movie, we can go with one of these movies:

gay computer guy who won world war 2(Dude won world war 2[pretty much anyway], but was drugged until he commited suicide. They only said sorry a few years ago); one where someone nearly died while climbing on a mountain, touching the void?; the genre of eastern novels I currently am reading(I’m sure I can find something, I mean I have read at least a hundred of them now); futurama(Literally watched it all, and it has a lot of interesting ideas within it, like how morals are forever changing between different groups and different times).

So, what will we do? we have 2 reports left to do. One needs to be in tomorrow, the other about 3 weeks later. So we need something to be done by tonight.

Eastern novels then? which ones? perhaps a mix, where I name different ones and use them as an example for some point of view. O perhaps I present it as an opportunity for a whole new selection of books for people to read that you can’t find in a library in this part of the world. Or I name different books and use the ‘meaning’ behind those books to prove the point:(If a person has absolute power, then only problems can happen. Which is why it isn’t possible, or at least shouldn’t be allowed). How? Basically every single one of those books has an overpowered main character, who ends up facing the moral dilemma of “I can do anything, but should I?” where the majority of people end up going: “Who cares, lets just ignore everything else and enjoy myself”, and a few, better people, who go: “I will protect the people I care about, and ignore everyone else.” There’s been like, 2 people out of hundreds who decided to dedicate there power to protecting others and not being psychopathic or sociopathic. Oh, and another thing to talk about with these novels is murder. The amount of killing sprees some of these people get into is just amazing. Seriously, some novels have to increase the amount of people just so they can sustain it. So what do these people think about death? Well, generally, if it is someone they care about, then they will do anything for them, but for everyone else, they will kill them just for a little more power, or it might even end up being because they are bored.
Basically, these novels could be used to try and convince the readers to think about death and how your morals work in a new light. And it will be effective because they destroyed mine. I went from hurting no one and caring about everyone, to only caring about those close to me, and ignoring everyone else.

So it appears I want to do that one huh. What novels then? Oh, and it has to be one with at least 70 chapters, as every chapter is 2 to 3 pages long. How about this one: “Dark net”. Which is about something really stupid sounding now that I think of it; a kid with no power gets lucky and gets the ability to neutralize all powers , then trains a lot, gets really powerful, all in a attempt to kill off the universe sized insect eating everything. His helpers is an army of robots that are literally uncountable by the end of the story, and some plants, a few other humans with cool powers, and dragons. The reason this is a good choice is that it is one of two books where the main character decided to put everything into helping others, I mean he kills his enemies, but those guys where literally trying to wipe out the human race, so, you know, that’s fair. But anyway, he decided to dedicate his life towards making sure some part of the universe survives.

Or how about “Library of heaven’s path”, which is about a extremely arrogant, oddly powerful, rather good acting, teacher. I have read so far 700 chapters worth of a guy being picked, getting powerful, proving the guys who picked on him wrong, and then moving onto the next group of people who pick on him. There are now 900 chapters worth of this, and there will be more. Anyway, the reason this is any good is because it is funny for people who like this kind of thing. This book will allow me to prove two things to other people, to not be arrogant, and that often there can be way too much humor in a book compared to the amount of seriousness that is in it. Like, I like a bit of humour, but some books just get stupid when the plot is humour, and the subplot is a little story line for why the main character does anything.

Then there is the next book, “rattlings” or something. About a guy who enjoys annoying others being killed by some deity, then as a sorry(And so said deity doesn’t get into trouble for killing another deities person) she reincarnated him with a power that allows him to gain more power the more he kills(To put it simply, actually he can level up like a game character). This leads to said deity bringing him into a new world as a rat. So begins the absolute massacre of species and gods as he starts trying to gain as much power as possible, for the fun of it. A good book for it teaches us how having morals can be really useful, because otherwise EVERYTHING DIES. Seriously, he said that, he intends to kill everything on the world he ended up on. So another deity who he was working with actually got scared, and keep in mind that this deity was a god of demons or something. Anyway, learn what it means to slaughter and not feel anything.

Other books, how about “The universe system”, one of the few novels out there where the main character is sane. She (Yes, it is also about a girl, another rare thing), is a universe builder. Or at least that is her new job, as far as I can tell. It can teach us about…

honestly, I have no idea what to do, so I wanted to use the books I am constantly reading, but…they are fun reads, that is all. They don’t have a hidden meaning, they don’t teach you much beyond what it would be like to have a massive amount of power, and the feeling of corruption that you get. So, I need to find something else. It should be a movie, and it should be a good one.  I have to watch the movie, and analyze different parts of it. or perhaps I can do something else, I don’t really know.

Old books and movies I could use:

Can’t think of any. They were all watched or read for the pure fun of it.

So we shall go with the gay computer guy then?  What would be the point behind it? Not that even gay people can save the world, people aren’t that simple minded in NZ. So, what else? That we really should congratulate people who deserve it while they are alive?

So, I don’t know. I can’t think of anything. For all of the books I have read, I can’t think of a meaning. And the few I can think of, I can’t remember the name of the book or movie. So, what am I supposed to do?

IDEA!!!!! One punch man first episode, that is the most meaningful episode. It introduces the man who can beat anyone in one punch. Not a strong punch, just a weak one as far as he is concerned. So, he ends up depressed. He can’t do what he enjoys anymore, which is fighting, so he becomes depressed. You know, the one thing he enjoyed in his life, he can’t enjoy anymore. So let’s use that episode to talk about the point: Find multiple ways to enjoy yourself, don’t just leave it to only one thing. Otherwise you won’t enjoy life anymore, and no one wants that.

Okay, there is no problem with this. The episode is alright, and has no actual issues like the other ones until later episodes. And it includes quite a bit of all of the points I said before.

Oh, and it is very different to all of the other ones so far done. This will be fun just for that one reason.

2.1 written text essay “The Book Thief” by Markus Zusak.

  1. Analyse how language features were used to reinforce or challenge a point of view.

“The Book Thief” by Markus Zusak, is about Death’s view of a little girl living in Nazi Germany during world war 2. Death uses an autobiography that the little girl (Liesel) wrote to describe her life in Nazi Germany, and his own view of what happened based on the memories of everyone involved, and their deaths. This allows us to see Liesel’s life from a unique point of view, a mix of Death’s and Liesel’s. Liesel’s life being: A train ride, a new amazing Papa, a Jewish fistfighter, a lot of fanatics, quite a few books, a bit of thievery, and a lot of death and misery. All of this leads to a book that is great at describing a certain point.

World war 2 was an absolute nightmare. However, from whose point of view can we possibly describe it all? With this novel, we can use the concept of Death to describe the horribleness of World war 2 and in particular, what it means to die.

“As I’ve suggested, my one saving grace is distraction. It keeps me sane.” As this quote suggests, Death requires distraction to save himself mentally. But what could he possibly need to save himself mentally from? Well, lets see. How about every single death of every single human ever. That should be about enough to drive anyone absolutely insane, including the representation of Death in a book who was only supposed to narrate the book to us. And as proof for why Death really does care about all this death, we have this emotive language: “I carried him softly through the broken street, with one salty eye and a heavy, deathly heart.” “He makes me cry.” He was saddened by the death of Rudy, and Rudy’s family. The words ‘broken’; ‘salty’; heavy, deathly heart’; ‘cry’; all prove that he can care about people, and feel something for them that is more powerful than a bit of pity. And so, with this realisation that Death from “The Book Thief” has a human like mind, with human like abilities and emotions; we learn that dying sucks for everyone involved. Seriously, if the very being that represents death doesn’t like seeing people die, then clearly death isn’t a good thing. Death doesn’t like having to watch people suffer or die, and so when he describes other people dying and what the meaning behind certain people dying is later on, remember that Death isn’t to blame for all these people dying. He is just helping to make sure everyone’s souls properly move on.

“Rudy Steiner slept. Mama and Papa slept. Frau Holtzapfel, Frau Diller. Tommy Müller. All sleeping. All dying.” This paragraph is to demonstrate a person’s view on death, by using what Liesel ended up doing after experiencing a lot of death. This is to reinforce the idea that death isn’t normal, while challenging the idea that death is the end of everything.
The quote used to start this paragraph is the line used to break it to the reader about all of those people dying, which is important since this statement completely changed people’s mood. This emotive language got these characters we had been reading about for ages, and killed them all in a single sentence. Which led to most people being rather sad. Liesel never knew her father; her brother died in front of her; every person she knew, like Papa and Mama have backgrounds that include death; Max’s very life is constantly at stake since everyone is against him being a Jew; and then pretty much everyone died while they slept. So after all of that, what would Liesel think about death? I personally think that she would never forget them, however, she will still move on. Why? Because Liesel isn’t mentally weak enough to stop living from that. I mean, she is young, so it did serverally damage her ability to trust others, and make friends(She became like that from her brother and mother leaving, so it will become even worse after the people who saved her leave as well, besides the serious depression). But she still isn’t going to die; she will ‘move on’, and live her life. There is evidence she did that from the quote “There was no recovery from what had happened. That would take decades. It would take a long life.” This quote demonstrates how the only way to save her mind is to live a long life, and let all of the new experiences, and all of that time, to heal over the damage caused during her childhood. Liesel reacted to death by grieving over it, but she still lived a life. So sure, add enough enough death, then a person’s life will become extremely damaged. But, it is still possible to survive afterwards. This proves that death is really effective and not something to be ignored, but it also proves that even after so much death, life continues.

So far we have learnt that Death isn’t to blame for everyone dying, as he is just there at the time for another reason entirely, in fact we should probably be more concerned about his mental health. And that Liesel as a person can survive even if everyone around her dies, proving it is possible for people to do something like that. Now, the final question: What does it mean to die? My own belief(A part of it, anyway), is that if something dies, that is the end of its existence on this world. Everything it did has been in affect, and there is nothing left it can do. In its life, it will of caused the death of many other lifeforms in an attempt to survive for their life. So when you die, it signifies the end of a life that has caused the death of many others, and this is for every life form on this planet. Basically, I believe dying sucks, and every single death matters since every single life form has caused quite a lot of stuff to happen to other lifeforms. Now then, what does this have to do with “The Book Thief”? Well, it is the fact that Death at least recognises how when people die, every one of their deaths matters, and when people kill other people, it really sucks to watch it happen. It leads to this kind of thought: “I am haunted by humans.” Which just goes to show how messed up humanity is, if the representation of death is scared by how humans treat each other. Every life matters, and some evidence of how this is how Death has developed a fear towards humans dying, which shows just how effective and important people are, and a bit on how stuffed up humanity is.

“The Book Thief” by Markus Zusak, was an amazing book, that can get pretty much anyone to cry. From beginning to end, we get to see plenty of death and misery. There are a few things that are nice and happy, but in general, the fact that the book is rather depressing can’t be forgotten. There is so much to learn and realize within this book, that it is honestly quite amazing. So far I have only analysed what Death thinks of death; whether a person can handle having everyone they care about repeatedly die; and then what it actually means to die. But there is so much more to this book than just that. For instance, what do the colours in the book mean, or the effect of words, or even just a simple, why does Rudy matter in the book. The point of what I writ today was to get you to realize how much dying sucks; it isn’t just a number, but a complete and utter destruction of a huge amount of work and effort. And so, from all of this, I hope you all have a new view on what it means to die, and to have other people around you die.

Book report 4:

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/53364/i-allow-myself

“I allow myself” by Dorothea Grossman. “I allow myself” is about her breakfast every morning, and how good it is, for instance “the eye-opening properties of eggs,” which is a sentence that brings to mind eggs. Perhaps fried ones, or diced ones, or even boiled eggs. It does this for every part of her breakfast, all to describe a point. This point being ‘Everyday you choose whether or not you do the thing you want to do, and if you stuff up the selection, the world will burn.’

The point of the poem is that everyday you must make the decision about what you will do each day. You could end up deciding to do nothing about what you enjoy and become depressed for the rest of the day, or you could do what you want to do, but then you get to watch your life crash down all around you. In any case, I will now analyse every part of the poem to see what each bit means, and how it connects to this overall point. And I will also mention multiple solutions to the problem of not being able to do what you enjoy because it is too destructive.

“I allow myself
the luxury of breakfast ”
This is the first line of the poem, and also the title. The first line is talking about the person allowing themselves to do something, which can get rather difficult depending on what we are talking about. For instance, it could just be what you are going to eat for breakfast, and allowing yourself to choose something new, or it could be allowing yourself to go to sleep early, and not stay up late reading and stuff up your sleep schedule even more. These simple ,small decisions, are easy to make and won’t really cause anyone any kind of trouble, so they are easy to allow. But then there are the more difficult ones. For instance, perhaps you are depressed, and you just don’t want to care about anything anymore. However, it would be difficult to allow yourself to do that, since you’re supposed to care about things. So allowing yourself to stop caring and just accept that your mind is as it is, is difficult. Another one that would be seriously difficult for anyone would be enjoying something you enjoy, without holding back at all. Particularly when there are multiple small things in the way normally. I mean, everyday you will do the same thing, and always just ignore that one amazing thing you want to do because it is: too expensive, not possible, a treat for when you do something good, something you just aren’t allowed to do. And so, you allowing you to do that one thing would be difficult, even if you truly enjoy doing it. And let’s not even get into the whole ‘not allowed to express my enjoyment over doing something because it isn’t cool to do so.’
In short, the first line is describing how allowing yourself to do something is a conscious decision you have to make, and it is not always going to be an easy decision. And the second line is talking about how for the author of this poem has something she won’t let herself enjoy, which is, she won’t allow herself to enjoy a good breakfast. I can’t claim to know why she wouldn’t let herself enjoy breakfast, but that is how it is(Might have to do with religion, since she said the line “(I am no nun, for Christ’s sake)” which makes it seem like she use to be, which stopped her from having a good breakfast for whatever reason.)

“Charmed as I am
by the sputter of bacon,
and the eye-opening properties
of eggs,
it’s the coffee
that’s really sacramental.”
Just read all of those lines, imagine the breakfast in your head! Clearly, it is a good, no, a great one, something anyone can enjoy. And every part of it is important(Although she clearly likes her coffee more than the others), no part of her breakfast can be missed out.
This is what it means to be doing your favourite thing, truly enjoying yourself over the whole thing. And you can tell that she was, seeing as she was “charmed” by bacon, had her eyes opened by “the eye-opening properties of eggs”, and even thought that coffee is sacramental. All this is something that can only happen over something amazing to yourself, something you have to let yourself enjoy. And the important thing to notice here is that she is letting herself enjoy breakfast. She is doing the thing she enjoys, and she isn’t stopping herself from enjoying every bit of it. I wonder if you can do the same thing?
Basically, this part of the poem is describing what it is like to actually enjoy something in your life. My point from it is that I wanted to make sure that you as a reader knew what I meant when I talked about enjoying yourself. Without this, you might end up with the idea that just doing what you enjoy means that you are enjoying yourself. This isn’t the case. You have to actually ‘enjoy’ yourself, focus on every bit of it like the author did for her breakfast. That is what it means to enjoy yourself, so keep it in mind.

“In the old days,
I spread fires and floods and pestilence
on my toast.”
This quote is describing what it is like for those who think that the thing they enjoy is only a destructive past time, something they can’t do because it would damage everything. Perhaps they even did it anyway. And because of this, you can’t allow yourself to enjoy the thing you want to do since it would ruin your life, or perhaps it even has been already. This is a problem that is difficult to solve, I mean, how can you? Lets say, just as an example, that you as a person are fascinated with the idea of killing another person. You’re just so darn curious as to what it would be like. But you know that it would be a terrible idea, I mean, you would feel so guilty, or even if you didn’t, all of the legal problems! You can’t allow yourself to do something like that, what do you do afterwards? And then the next problem is figuring out what to do with your life, when the thing you really enjoy, is something you can never experience.
From the authors point of view, all this bad stuff is in the past, something that doesn’t need to be thought about anymore, and really, is all just a bad memory. We can see this when they say “In the old days,” which makes it seem like that this rather bad sounding piece of toast was only made before this poem was written. Which is a good way of thinking, as it allows you to stop caring about it and develop your own point of view.
Then there is my point of view on this quote, or at least, the idea of how to get past that feeling of not allowing yourself to do what you really want to do. The way I deal with it is to endure it. If you wait long enough, it has to disappear at some point, right?
Another solution is in the next paragraph and it appears to be a lot more constructive than my solution. You should probably go with that one. It would certainly have more of an effect than my one, and in a good way too.

“Nowadays, I’m more selective,
I only read my horoscope
by the quiet glow of the marmalade.”
And this quote describes the other solution I have come up with for this problem. And it follows the first line of the quote, “I’m more selective,” which is to say, she selects some parts of what she enjoys and focuses on that. Like with her breakfast. Instead of having all of that “I spread fires and floods and pestilence”, she’ll just have “by the quiet glow of the marmalade.” Which is still breakfast, just without the bad bits(If you like marmalade, and if you don’t, I would prefer a piece of food over a flood). And you can do this with other things too, like with the one I mentioned earlier. Just play a video game or something, it has plenty of killing in it and you don’t need to worry about the consequences. Basically, if you can’t let yourself enjoy something in life, find a different way to enjoy it.
Oh, and another thing I need to mention is how when she says selective, she is saying that she selects what to eat for breakfast each morning. There is a wide range of options to pick from, and she decides what it will be from all of them. So when you decide on how to divide up what you enjoy into something different that you can do, you can pick different parts of that for each day. Like, play a different video game each day or something. Basically, everyday you choose whether or not you will do the thing you want to do, or not. And now, everyday you can decide what part of what you enjoy to do. Like, for that person who just wants to kill something, well, they can play a different video game each day, and enjoy each one of them.

“I allow myself” by Dorothea Grossman is a interesting poem that describes the luxury of breakfast, and how it can often be difficult to enjoy something in life. We talked about how it can be difficult to always let yourself enjoy what you want to do. Then we talked about how the author could actually manage to enjoy what she did, in all of its full glory, which is something that doesn’t happen all that often these days. After that it was about different problems that could come up if you enjoy yourself, and a ‘solution’ to that problem. And finally, it was the solution the author came up, to select what you can enjoy, and enjoy it to the fullest, which sounds really helpful and like something I should start doing.
Thank you for reading this, and I guess I will recommend this poem to all people who have something in their lives that they refuse to let themselves enjoy, but are yet to even realize(Yeah, you might not of even noticed the fact that your holding yourself back from truly enjoying some things in your life. Honestly, you should have more fun in your life!)

Essay: “The Book Thief” Planning

I can’t remember what I was planning from last term, and that plan is really messy, so…lets do something new!

  1. Analyse how language features were used to reinforce or challenge a point of view.

Analyse how the narration of Death was used to challenge our idea of what Death is like.

World war 2 was an absolute nightmare. However, from whose point of view can we possibly describe it all? With this novel, we can use the concept of Death to describe the horribleness of World war 2, and in particular how terrible it is to have the people around you die.

We start off with an introduction that explains what happens in the book thief, then move onto a paragraph that introduces our well written point. Then a paragraph to explain one aspect of our point(lets say how Death views the death of people), then another paragraph(All of the deaths that Liesel has to deal with), and another paragraph(What Death thinks of world war 2 and Liesel) before putting everything into the conclusion that will sum up the meaning of the last 3 paragraphs before this.

“The point is that as World war 2 is full of death, we need to figure out what it means in the book thief to die, and the only one we can use to figure this out is Death and his job of narration.”

By the way, this is a good point, unlike the other one that needed to have so many words to convince others that it had worth.

 

So my plan is to convince everyone that dying isn’t good, in an effort to convince everyone to live a little longer than others.

 

 

4. Analyse how language features revealed the writer’s purpose in the written text(s).

Characterisation

personification of death

symbolism of colours, books, nazi flag, hunger, words, characters

imagery of weather, colours, events (Jesse Owens incident)

Planning for this question:

This question basically allows me to use any particular symbol(language features) to talk about anything Liesel might of been trying to do, or whatever I say the authors aim was. This means I could use any symbol to talk about anything. Like an event(World war 2, the situation of the Jews), or the character Liesel(Why is Liesel important, how does she affect the story, what does her life mean to us, the reader), or perhaps any other character, as long as it is talked about in a way to change the readers view, and that it is written like that was the author’s purpose. And since this is the book thief, it might be possible to talk about what people meant to Liesel since she did write a book that the book we read originates from.

Let me just say this again, characters are a symbol, they symbolise all of the things that happened in Nazi Germany. As long as I focus there, all is good.

How the narration from Death gives us a view of Liesel’s life that no other point of view could give. (The point to achieve is how important Death is to the text; how irreplaceable he is; the importance of Liesel to Death; how any other point of view could of changed the text completely.)

How the books that Liesel sees and reads changed Liesel into a completely different path on life, which changed what the book could of ended up being like. (The point is how each book is very important to both Liesel and the story; how if any one book wasn’t there, the story would of been quite different; the point behind the book thief is to tell us what it might be like to live in Germany during world war 2 from the eyes of a little girl, and that the books that this girl reads is just one symbol to tell us what it was like.)

How the purpose of the book is to showcase how all problems that people face was caused by humans, and how the proof for that is with how people were written into the story. (The point is simple, that all our problems are caused by humans. The important part to take note of is that to prove this point, we shall be using how each person lives their life, and how all the problems in that life, or the problems they caused in their life; will be used to prove how all the problems we face originate from humans. Like how Tommy Muller is bullied by people, his ear infections started from being left out to freeze by people, he was beat up by Liesel because he was smiling for her victory in a fight that was started by people. Or how Death wouldn’t have to work seriously hard between 1938 and 1945 if it wasn’t for people. That kind of thing.) (I know that thinking all problems were caused by people is a bit of a tunnel vision of the whole thing, but still. Most of our problems exist in some part due to people.)

How colours in this book is used to describe the world of “The Book Thief”. (The point of this is how Death usually sees a different colour in the sky every time he picks up a soul, and how each of these colours mean something different. And because these colours are repeatedly used throughout the story, we can use them to explain the story, and in turn, our own world.)

 

Now to talk about the exact point I want to make and why. Personally, I have used the ‘Humans cause all our problems’ in the book report for the book thief. And even if it is a pretty good point, I have done it before…which is something the markers probably won’t know. And because of that, lets do that! All of the other points are fairly good, but I personally think the best is that one. Or at least, I can write the most for it, and with a different proof than to my book report.

Structure:

Introduction/overview of story, point I want to make stated, first person/group of people, second person/group of people, third person/group of people, conclusion based off of all this/reverse introduction.

People I could use:
Rudy, Hans, Rosa, Liesel, Tommy muller, Adolf, the thief’s group, the school teachers, the people who tried to take away Rudy, the bullys, Death, Max.

Point: Symbolism – How characters represent various problems in Nazi Germany in 1939-1945

Rudy: Hitler Youth and bullying from Franz Deutscher only could happen in that way in Nazi Germany.. Jesse Owens Incident and how that would only happen in Nazi Germany.

Problems are caused because Rudy rebels against Nazi control.

Lets see, Rudy has problems caused to him through the bully, and through Germany/Hitler, and then there is how he caused problems for others by stealing from people (Nazi Germany), cutting line, that kind of thing.

Hans: Painting over the rude words on the Jews window. Saving the Jew being pushed over on the street. All problems only in Nazi Germany.

Problems are caused because Hans rebels against Nazi control.

Hans life is just full of different problems that he endures somehow, although it is better than what either Liesel or Max went through(Arguable); he never causes a problem besides when helping other people out, causing him to get in trouble with the Nazi’s.

Max: Jews being persecuted, him rebelling against this. Hiding away to stay alive while everyone else hunts him down. All only possible in nazi Germany.

Problems are caused because Max rebels against the persecution of Nazi control.

Rosa is nice and never really causes problems, although she can shout and swear all she likes, she is still too nice to cause problems; her own problems are the same as everyone else’s. Liesel’s life is full of problems that we all know, and she causes problems through her stealing and being nice to others. Tommy has problems from constant twitching and not being able to hear, caused by being left in the freezing cold too long as a kid, he causes no actual problems. Adolf Hitler did some bad stuff; not talked about if any problems were done to him, but clearly something must of went wrong to dislike everyone but his own race that much, I guess it would be his heritage from his ancestors which caused this. The thief’s group stole food from farms; there were no problems caused to them besides not having enough food. The school teaches were pretty darn rude to Liesel, and so caused some kids to end up getting beaten up(Although they probably didn’t realize that would happen); their problems are the same as everyone else.The people who tried to take away Rudy caused problems in the way that were they nearly got Rudy to go too was pretty much a death sentence; problems to themselves is having to do that kind of job. The bully’s that I forgot the name of is pretty darn mean, and causes problems for Rudy and Tommy again and again; problems to him is having to live in Nazi Germany where they suffered from food shortage(Not to say other countries weren’t like that, but they were all problems caused by humans).

Death: Having to watch on as Nazi germany causes massive amounts of suffering across the world and within the country itself. Having to pick up the souls of EVERY SINGLE PERSON who died because of Nazi Germany. All of the mental trauma’s caused by this is because of Nazi Germany.

Death has problems in the way that humans are dying constantly, and he has to pick up their souls, and this is in the millions(A self named, but completely correct, miracle worker); he causes no problems, he just watches as humans stuff up everything, and cleans up afterwards. Max is the representation of all the problems Jews faced(Besides the whole dying part); the only problems he causes is imposing on the Hubermann family, which they were fine with.

So, now that I have written the basics of each of these people, let’s choose 3, with 1 back up in case I need an extra point, or one of them becomes unusable due to not having enough information. (Have to remember I am describing how each character was written into the text, not what kind of character they are, although I will include that too). So: Death(I did a lot on Death, somebody who can showcase all of humanity’s problems from outside of humanity, so a great point of view to prove my point), Hans(Hans suffers a lot, but still deals with it, and even goes so far as to solve other people’s problems; in general, he is written as an amazing person in a terrible situation), and Liesel(Yeah, I know that everything is about Liesel, however she is the main character who we know the most about, and she is written with plenty of problems already). The back up character is Max(Great guy, made 2 pretty interesting books, but mainly is the fact that him being written into the story was done in the sort of way that his very existence is caused by other people’s problems, and that him ending up in Himmel Street for such a long time was a mistake too, and also him leaving).

So, Hans is first, to showcase how a normal person leaving their life, could in fact have many problems. Then Liesel to show another person with their own problems too. Or Max instead, so as to show how his entire race had a problem caused by Hitler; although I need to make sure I stay on point. Then Death, as the final to prove everything once and for all(And like they say, leave the best to last).

So, shall we begin? No, we shall not.

P.s Quotes will be done during the writing since at the time I will know what quote is needed the most.

 

Oh yeah, there were different methods to fix, and cause problems. Like words, or the usage of paint. Perhaps even the colours of the night sky can be included? I just have to make sure I keep to the point.