TROLL

 

 "There it is! There it is! There's a troll alove in you as well. Just as in me. For it's the troll in one, you see--that calls to the powers outside us. And then we must submit--whether we want to or no."

 (Quote--Master Builder)

He sweeps out a stone

It is morning. DR. STOCKMAN, in a dressing gown, slippers, and a smoking cap, is bent down, raking under one of the cabinets with an umbrella; after some effort, he sweeps out a stone.

DR.STOCKMAN: Katherine, I found another one.

MRS. STOCKMAN: Oh, I’m sure you’ll fins a lot more yet.

DR. STOCKMAN: (adding the stone to a pile of others on the table). I’m going to preserve these stones as holy relics. Eilif and Morten have got to see them every day; and when they’re grown, they’ll inherit them from me. (SCENE 5)

__________________________________________________________________________

 Reading Breanna’s blog and seeing how she adorned one of her stones (Shanely) with eyes and a handsomely painted mustache, reminded me of a stone of my own many years ago that I also coveted and defiled with a sharpie marker.

It was during a trip to the coast of Maine, my family visited a beach called ‘bouncy rock beach’. (I don’t know if that’s formally its name or if we named it that ourselves. In any case, the name is an obvious choice). This beach is comprised entirely of rocks, most of which are the perfect size and round shape for tossing into the ocean or against one another to create a bouncy, ricochet effect—that is astoundingly dangerous and completely irresistible. At one point, tiring of rock throwing and rock fort building, I decided to try and pick out the roundest stone I could find.

The outcome, was a stone sized slightly larger than my hand, but still comfortable to hold. I figured that was a perfectly acceptable size for a pet rock. After enduring comments from my mom as to me “actually taking that rock home with us”, I sat down with a sharpie and drew, what else, but a pig face, on the side of my rock. I guess the logic was that the stone was round, and so are pigs. I don’t know. But by the end of the trip I’d become quite attached and had begun calling it ‘the wild pig’.

There was a brief spot of trouble on our flight back home, when the TSA agents suspected that a ten-year-old girl was carrying a round bomb in her backpack (because as we all know, all bombs are of the black, round, cartoonish type). I’m fairly certain I resented them for subsequently pulling it out and laughing that it was simply a rock with a pig face painted on it (since of course, it meant worlds more to me than that).  

Sadly, I don’t know that I still have this rock. Rock? Stone? As I am writing this I googled to find what the difference is, and stumbled upon this answer out of many: ‘While the rock is sitting undisturbed on the ground, it's a rock; once you pick it up to use it, it's a stone’.

Of course. The object that was sitting out on the sidewalk before Sarah picked it up was nothing more than a rock, suddenly transformed into a stone at the touch of one hand, and then those of the entire class. Does it still seem silly to give so much attention to a silent, static piece of matter?

In Teaching a Stone to Talk, Annie Dillard writes:

“We are here to witness. There is nothing else to do with those mute materials we do not need. Until Larry teaches his stone to talk, until God changes his mind, or until the pagan gods slip back to their hilltop groves, all we can do with the whole inhuman array is watch it. We can stage our own act on the planet—build our cities on its plains, dam its rivers, plant its topsoils—but out meaningful activity scarcely covers the terrain”.

Though at a glance this excerpt seemed in opposition to Stevens’ poem, I believe it actually supports it, as the poem speaks that we surpass nature in the ordering of its effects through our own re-creation and interpretation of it.

Perhaps this is what Larry (the man that is trying to teach the stone to talk) is attempting to do, to put his own words into something that is unspeakable, and therefore to turn the stone into something greater than it already is. Or maybe by teaching the stone to talk man is trying to regain something divine, something that is lost, yet still tangible for our having known it once.

There’s a reason that pet rocks and sacred rocks are universal; that the rock-turned-stone Sarah picked up last Thursday has become a cog in our conversation. I’ll admit I’m just not quite sure yet.

Along the same lines, I like that Biz brings up the marbles of S DS that Vera become so enthralled in. It reminded me (how could it not) of another man that obsessed over the counting, ordering, fondling, and sucking of stones—Samuel Beckett’s Molloy.

For those of you who aren’t familiar, I’ve attached a YouTube video that parodies the passage. 

Directions for adding a "Blog List"

Hi all!


If you've found this post, then we're already one step in the right direction! Below I've listed step-by-step instructions as to how to add a "Blog List" to your blog homepages. As you'll notice on my blog, that is the list of links to everyone's blogs located on the right sidebar. If everyone adds this, it makes it super easy to cruise around to all the recent posts of your classmates without having to backtrack to a bookmark or to your own blogsite.


Also, in case some of you are still having trouble recieving emails from Dr. Sexson, I've included the URL's to all the blogs I have bookmarked so far, so you can cut and paste from there if you need to.


DIRECTIONS


1. Go to the homepage of your blog.
2. Once there, you should see a link in the top, left-hand corner that says DESIGN. Click on that.
3. That should take you to a page that allows you to arrange and add to page elements on your blog. Click "Add a Gadget" in any of the designated spaces where you'd like to see your "Blog List" appear.
4. A window should pop-up, listing a bunch of gadgets you can add. NOTE: make sure you're looking under the "Basics" tab of gadgets, indicated at the top.
5. Scroll down, about halfway, until you see the gadget titled "Blog List". Click the 'Add" button (indicated by a + sign, just in case that wasn't obvious)
    NOTE: Though you may be tempted, don't instead add a "Link List" (listed directly below) because though it allows you to input a URL, it doesn't give you the option to organize the links by the most frequently updated.
6. A new window should pop-up that says "Configure Blog List". A few things are important here before you begin to add to your blog list:
     -Make sure you "Sort" your blogs by "Most recently updated"
     -For "Show" you might as well choose "All Blogs". And make sure that you click/check to include at least the 'Title of most recent item" and "Date of last update". It's up to you whether to include a snippet or thumbnail of the posts in addition (though Dr. Sexson might have a preference on this, I don't know).
7. OK, GETTING THERE! Now you're ready to add blogs. Click "Add to List" at the bottom of the window.
8. Another window will pop-up that allows you to type in or paste a URL. Do so, then click "Add".
9. The title of the blog you just added should now appear in the previous "Configure Blog List" window.
10. Continue to "Add" the rest of the blog URL's to the list. Once you are done, make sure to click "Save" at the bottom of the window.
11. This will take you back to your page element design page. If you wish to edit or add to your "Blog List" again, simply click "Edit" on the gadget and it will take you back to the pop-up window.


UH 400 Blog List
http://shelbysoulemything400.blogspot.com/
http://jlawsonmythingthepoint.blogspot.com/
http://imilkovich.blogspot.com/
http://madeleinepike.blogspot.com/
http://mythingthepoint-jamesmauch.blogspot.com/
 http://breanna-holmes.blogspot.com/
http://nelsgerstnermythingthepoint.blogspot.com/
http://bizzmythpoint.blogspot.com/
http://morganmbigskymagpie.blogspot.com/
http://mythingthepoint400.blogspot.com/
http://dlduh400.blogspot.com/
http://sarahgermaine-mythingthepoint.blogspot.com/




Hope that helps!