Lenox Poems

Sydney Bushnell

Blog: Lennox Poems

Lenox Poems I: Longest Sneezing Fit Day 977

            Lenox writes about day 977 of 978 consistent days of sneezing for the Guinness World Record holder. In the beginning of the piece she says essentially: it’s not that I don’t want to stop sneezing over and over, and then ends the poem with: but if I didn’t sneeze constantly every day for three years, and if I stopped, who would be counting each ordinary breath and who would bless me? Yes, sneezing constantly for four years would be AWFUL, but in the other sense, she gets to appreciate literally every breath that she takes and sneezes. And maybe she doesn’t appreciate the sneezing, but she’s appreciating the breath that keeps her living, that also keeps her sneezing. And the fact that she is thinking about this on the second to last day before she stops sneezing. The poem almost read like that was her last day of life. Like after she stopped sneezing and stopped appreciating the breaths, and stopped being blessed, that there was no life. Now, I doubt the woman who this happened to actually died after the three years of sneezing, but it wouldn’t be impossible. I just like the imagery behind appreciating each breath and being blessed for it.

           

Paper Topic: 

            Also, in regards to my paper topic, I hadn’t written out what I wanted to write about because I wasn’t sure if I’d want to write about The Robber Bride, but I decided that I do want to write about The Robber Bride and I want to write about the significance of villains and women in it. That’s not necessarily a thesis. But it would be something like analyzing how Margaret Atwood addresses the ideas of women being the villains and why they aren’t generally but the importance of equality in men and women both in the bad and the good.

Persepolis

              Marji always had a close relationship with her family throughout the story, even when she was in Austria (excluding the time when she was alone on the street for a couple months). No matter how far gone she seemed to be, they always knew how to bring her back. For instance, when she came back from Austria and she was deeply depressed, they always stood by her side reminding her of who she was and why that was important. And all the while she was in Austria, when she was doing things that she knew wouldn’t impress her parents, the thought of them usually grounded her back to her roots. When she told the one man in Austria that she was French, not Iranian, the thought of what her grandmother would think of her saying that made her yell out how she was proud to be Iranian when the girls were making fun of her. She always had her family in her mind. When drinking and parties were outlawed in Iran, her parents continued to have them and to drink alcohol and play games. They said they needed this for their survival. So many things were taken away from them after the war began, they needed something to keep them alive and to keep them happy. Which is why it was worth the risk of getting caught having parties, because if they didn’t have them, they will have given in to just about all of the restrictions that had been put on them, that they wouldn’t hardly have their own identity anymore. Their family did what they needed to do to stay sane.

                  I didn’t understand what the title Persepolis had to do with the novel at first. And I’m still not exactly sure that what I think about the title is correct. I didn’t even know where the name “Persepolis” came from until I was reading the book in the middle school classroom here in Pullman that I am teaching in, one of the students came up to me and asked what I was reading. I showed him, I think the graphic novel part of it interested him, but when he saw the title he said “Oh, Persepolis, that’s like the Old Persian country”. And then I asked him what he meant, because the book took place in Iran and then in Austria. He then explained to me that Persepolis means city of Persians and that it was in part of where Iran is now. He knew a lot about this because his family came from Saudi Arabia so they learned more about there than I had ever learned about it. And then it made sense why in the novel, she said she spoke Persian, which I didn’t really know that was a language in Iran, realizing how little I knew about Iran in general. I thought about the idea of Old Persia. In the novel, Marji and her family are always talking about how restricted they are because of what is new, and how they wish things were as they were before. When their city was probably originally all alike, a city of Persians, now with new government and war bringing in new ideas and new restrictions. They only wanted to go back to how it was for them, with everything was comfortable and normal. I think that is at least part of why the novel is titled Persepolis.

Changes and Ceremonies

Changes and Ceremonies

                  The section of the book holds many new happenings for Del. Some of these changes are good and bad but both help her grow as a person. This section of the book could also be considered in part, her bildungsroman time of her life as well. It is a tie when she is in middle school, which is about the age when young girls and boys begin to go through puberty and start seeing each other as more than friends. Naomi and Del begin talking about boys they have crushes on and daydream ideas about these boys together. This is especially different for Del because up until this point, her main future she sought out in life was a future of schooling and learning as much as she could like her mother wanted her to. But not only her mother, Del wanted this for herself. She saw her future as a scholar and the thought of men being in her future was out of the picture. Until now. When the students begin the operetta and Del offhandedly gets a part, the girls talk about which boys they would choose if they could. Del decides that she actually is interested in Jerry Storey, a boy who is also in the operetta. She imagines him walking her home after the whole show is over, and he even said he would like to if it wasn’t so far away (because he thought she still lived out on Flats road). Just the very fact that Del begins to have these ideas about a boy actually being in her life is a big change for her. She had always been disappointed hearing about her mother’s own trials in her life to become stronger and smarter and improve her education, only to be let down by the fact that she settled for being a wife and mother. I think Del sees how her mother is, too, disappointed, not in the decisions she has made because she loves her family, but that she didn’t expect more out of herself anymore. So her mother is attempting to live that through Del. At this point, I don’t think Del has fully been set on any ideas that her life will go the way of her mother’s, but there is at least the possibility that a man may be in her life one day. Which we see especially in the next section of the book when Del meets Garet French and after her encounter with Mr. Chamberlain. I think this part of her life is what sets her up for the next chapter in her life which includes growing apart from Naomi, having more of an interest in men, choosing to go with Mr. Chamberlain, and giving up her chance at a scholarship by being with Garet French all the time. This section of the novel is her stepping into position before the gun is fired in the race of her growing up. It isn’t quite the taking off, but the leading up to it.