Mind map

Character analysis

Ken Keseys book One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is a story about a mental hospital and exercise of power.

Randle McMurphy is a rebel, who comes to the mental hospital. He has lied that he isn’t normal and that he has mental issues, becouse he thinks that in mental hospital will be easyer to survive than in prison. He comes to the hospital and starts to protest against the rules.

McMurphy wants to be seen and heard. He loves attention. McMurphy don’t want to carry his responsibility of his crimes and that makes him just irresponsible. On the other hand, McMurphy is very clever and ultimately a good person. McMurphy wants to help other patients in the hospital and entertain them. McMurphy gets power among the patients and tryes to break a system that has been used in the mental hospital for many years.

McMurphy dont want to spend rest of his life locked up in a mental hospital, so hi makes an escape plan. Hi takes Cheaf, who is narrator of the story, whit him. McMurphy thinks that he and Ceaf are only ones that havent lost their minds in the hospital. McMurphy likes to be independent but at the same time hi wants to be liked. That might be becouse he don’t want to live rest of his life alone as a freak.

Challencing words

Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto is a story of love, loss, the complexity of human relationships, and, not surprisingly, kitchens. I think the book was an easy read and it was nice to concentrate on other peoples’ problems rather than my own for a change.

Character analysis:

The whole book circles around a young Japanese woman in her twenties, Mikage Sakurai, and the story is in a diary-like first person narrative from her point of view. In the beginning of the book she had just lost the last person in her family, her grandmother, which of course makes her depressed. She also has trauma from losing her parents at a young age.

She becomes a tenant at the Tanabe household and creates a close bond with both the mother (former father) Eriko and the son Yuichi. When Eriko dies, she, once again, has to deal with the grief of death in the family.  About her death she says: “When my parents died I was still a child. When my grandfather died, I had a boyfriend. When my grandmother died I was left all alone. But never have I felt so alone as I did now.”

Mikage as a person is a bit clingy, but she has all the reason to considering the rate of people kicking off around her. She’s also rather unsure about herself and her actions, but can also be feisty and impulsive when needed. Remember the way she drives miles, climbs over a fence and through a hotel window and accidentally cuts her leg all because the girl simply felt like having to share some especially delicious take-away katsudon with Yuichi? If that isn’t out of the blue, I sure can’t say what is.

I think she outwards is quite a cheerful, easy-going and open-minded person, who makes friends with the right kind of people for her. The open-mindedness really shows with the transgender mother figure and that strange kitchen… well, not fetish, but rather an obsession. Well, who cares, we all draw our comfort from something.

In the cases of both the Tanabes she goes from friendship to love, for Eriko Mikage goes from depressed to who-cares-I-still-have-the-memories throughout the story. The angst she felt in the beginning did come back during the sad period after Eriko’s death but the young woman learnt to hold her head up high and to take life as it comes. Her route goes via the happy family to the loving relationship with Yuichi. She loves Eriko as a mother figure and Yuichi as a potential (later real) boyfriend.

There sure is character development in the book, mostly because literature in Japan does not emphasize the plot as much as the characters’ inner feelings and mental growth. This may sometimes leave the plots thin but if one is looking for round characters and philosophy, this is the place to look for it.

Bibliography:

Banana Yoshimoto: Kitchen. London 1993.

The book is an excellent and fun.  And l really liked. the main character is crazy, so that is why i said he is schizophrenia.

Character analysis

The bookOne flew over the cuckoo`s nest, narrate a story about some people living in a menal institute. Mc murphy is one of the main character of the novel. Mc murphy is aloud readheaded gambler that does what ever he likes when ever he wantsto. Mr Rachaid is the head nurse in the waid. Mc murphy is kind of the boss of everybody in the ward. M murphy wasn`t happy with way things happened in the ward, so he wanted to make a difference. he tried to and they started to behave like him, wake up late, say i do what ever they felt like change some of the rules. Most of the patients liked him for that. In the begining some of the patients living in the ward thought Mc murphy was kind and thoughtful. They later realized that since Mc murphy came, they have lost alot of money. And also that Mc murphy did most of the things he did becauce he finds itdifficult to obey orders.

Mcmurphy did some stupid things like callenging the head nurse on several occeations during the afrernoon meetings and making fun of her. And he also used lots of curse words on several occations like“Goddammit“. Mc murphy was not actually cazy, he got in to the mental institute because he wanted to had two options go to jail or go to a nuthouse , so he chose the nuthouse. When he found out that the nurse is the one to decide on how long  he gets to stay at the nutehouse. He wanted to change his behaviour but he couldn`t.

mind map

challenging words

brave=rohkea

 basin= lavuaari

fleecy= villainen

chrapper= huussi

vulgar= alatyylinen

scheme= diagrammi

winking= vilkuttaa

pathetic= liikuttava

stunted= kitukasvuinen

encircle= ympäröidä

hostile= vihamielinen

Despite the flat characters, the idea of this novel is quite fascinating, and reading about other’s love and sufferings is always interesting. I’d say this book grabs your interest once you get the idea of the timetraveling. Ô.o : ) : )

Mind Map

The mind map of Henry DeTamble.

Character Analysis

Imagine suddenly finding yourself in a different place, a different time than where you were, clad naked in the middle of a dark alley, on someone’s doorstep, or shivering ankle-deep in snow. Imagine not knowing what to do, how long it will continue, or if you’ll even ever get back home.

This is Henry DeTamble’s life as Audrey Niffenegger portrays it in her novel The Time Traveler’s Wife. Henry is, as later called, a chrono-displaced person, someone who suddenly gets pulled to their past or rarely to their future.

Henry’s time-travelling started when he was only a child, in an accident where his mother died but Henry survived due to his short timetravel to the moment five minutes ago. This incident affects the rest of Henry’s life in different ways, as he himself and even his own father blame him, on some level, for staying alive while his mother had to die. The death of his mother is also one of the turning points in Henry’s life, a painful point where he returns over and over again, intentionally or not.

The death of his mother is one of the reasons for Henry to call his ability to time travel a curse as he sometimes thinks it would have been better if he would have just died alongside his mother, quickly though grotesquely. Appearing naked out of thin air to places from time to time is rather dangerous, as anything might happen; hypothermia, drowning, beating up, getting arrested… This has led Henry to do almost anything he can to survive, stealing and beating people up for clothes, and lying. It seems the only things he hasn’t done is rape and murder. But still, only running is his sole insurance from being caught every time he time travels and also a way for him to try staying in the present.

“If anything ever happens to my feet, you might as well shoot me,” said Henry once, in one sentence describing the value he puts into being able to run.

Another thing keeping him in the present is Clare. Henry and Clare’s relationship isn’t one of the normal ones as they met when he was thirty-six and she six and got married when Henry was thirty and Clare twenty-two. This makes it so that Henry, age twenty-eight, knows nothing of Clare when they meet ‘for real’, whereas Clare knows only of Henry at the age around thirty-six.

This fact causes rather quirky jealousy, as Henry envies his older self for knowing Clare, for being something so much more than he, an alcoholic young man with no destination whatsoever, is. Henry even feels angry at some point at Clare for fancying his older self more than the Henry she has right there right now.

But as the story of Henry and Clare goes on, the jealousy Henry felt towards himself slowly fades away as the two of them want to concentrate on the time they have together. Trying to build up their life together while Henry disappears once in a while is hard, but somehow they manage.

Reading about Henry at almost all possible ages all in one book gives the feeling that he is a complex character, though it is only the illusion of him acting in different ways at different ages. Also, the fact that once in a while he meets himself and the two Henrys act like brothers, or friends, both different in their own ways but just the same once you scratch the surface, makes the reader think about just how bizarre the scene is.

Does Henry experience growth of any sort? That is hard to say. Maybe on some level he does, as before he met Clare he was drowning his troubles in alcohol, sleeping around and having problems in particular with his life. Later on he has cleaned his life style, but when did that happen? The book does not give more detailed information about Henry maturing into the caring husband he is later on, even though the change from Henry to “the me of my future” as he calls it, is its own short chapter by the name Turning Point.

All in all, towards the end Henry’s character gets more interesting as the tragedies he suffers grab the attention and sympathy of the reader, although while reading the loss Henry undergoes, one would love to hit him for losing all interest in life. And the scene in the Meadow, where Henry has accepted his fate, is hard to get on the first read, but once you start to realise what happens you can only feel somewhat sorry for him…

Challenging Words

cripple – vammainen, vammauttaa

domesticity – kesytys

fetus – sikiö

gimp – (halventava, slangi) vammainen

incandescent – hehkuva, valkohehkuinen

indulgence – hemmottelu

insignia – arvomerkki, tunnus

pejorative – halventava

sedate – rauhallinen

mussel – simpukka

Bibliography

Niffenegger, Audrey. 2004. The Timetraveler’s Wife. London : Jonathan Cape

A farewell to Arms is a novel written by Ernest Hemingway. The story is about the war during the World War I and it tells a story of Tenente. I found this book interesting and it describes very pleasantly the war by a soldier’s view. I liked this book very much, although some paragraphs were surprisingly long. The way the author describes things is great, for example, the scenery is portrayed smoothly.

Mind Map

A mind map of Tenente

Character Analysis

Ernest Hemingway has created a fine atmosphere in A Farewell to Arms. It is a story that describes the every day of war from the point-of-view of a man in the middle of it.

The protagonist of the story is a young man called Tenente. The book is also about the love between Tenente and Catherine, an English nurse. Tenente is an American ambulance driver who is in Italy because of the war. His appearance isn’t described very much so I felt that the author didn’t give a clear image of the character.

The character of Tenente seems to be insignificant. He behaves sometimes weirdly and neutrally. I can sense him as a quiet, calm person who likes to think things alone. He also feels comfortable talking with his fellows, which does happen much in the book. Sometimes I can even see some modesty in his attitude. For example, when his friends want him to get a medal for certain reasons but he feels that he doesn’t deserve or need it. He appears not to be worrying much. For example, when his girlfriend announces she’s pregnant Tenente is very calm and understanding. However, in that time people reacted little bit differently for these kinds of things than nowadays.

Mr Henry or Tenente reminds me of an ordinary man. Of course, everybody is different but I don’t feel he has a notable strong personality. He is a man who you can trust but there’s something mysterious about him. I had a feeling that the protagonist might do something shocking just out of the blue. The future of Tenente’s life is completely in shade. The book ends very open-mindedly. Anything is possible but maybe he just continues his life as the way it was at the beginning.

Challenging Words

dusk – hämärä

oar - airo, mela

throb – tykyttää, värähdellä, sykkiä

fallacy – petos, erehdys; harhakuva

deprecate – paheksua

bayonet – pistin

jaundice – keltatauti

scornful – halveksiva, ylimielinen

dismal – synkkä, kurja, ankea

nuisance – vahinko, ilkivalta, vaiva

Bibliography

Hemingway, Ernest. 1929. A Farewell to Arms. London: Arrow.

Good, but a little weird The writing style of this book was a little weird but still quite easy to read. The way some characters spoke was challenging to understand  because they spoke “old English”.

Mind map

Silas

Character analysis

The Graveyard Book is a new novel by the best-selling author Neil Gaiman who has wrote many famous novels such as Coraline and Stardust. The illustrations are by award-winning Chris Ridell.

Nobody “Bod” Owens is not a normal boy. He lives in the graveyard and is raised by the ghosts. There are many exciting adventures in the graveyard, but the real danger is in the world of the living. The man Jack, who has already killed Bod’s family, can’t wait to finish his job – which means killing Bod!

Silas is Bod’s guardian and teacher. He brings food and clothes to Bod and gives him advices. He and Bod have the Freedom of the Graveyard, which allows them to leave and move in the graveyard as they wish. It also gives some special abilities that the dead (ghosts) have. Silas is a minor character, but I think he has the strongest influence on Bod. Silas is quiet, smart and gloomy. He is very protective towards Bod. His behavior towards others is cold and he keeps his distance. His actions are wise and he makes just choises even if sometimes Bod find them hard to accept. The book doesn’t give much clues about his past except that he has been fighting a long time against the evil organization the Jacks of All Trades. Silas is a “flat” character because he doesn’t change or grow from the beginning to the end of the book at all.

It’s not said straight in the book, but I think Silas is a vampire. He sleeps at day in the coffin and lives at night. It’s often said in the book that he is neither alive nor dead. His skin is pale and he has lived a very long time already. Even the illustrations portrays him as a very vampire-looking man. I think  he is kind of fascinating. He resembles a lot Darren Shan’s Crepsley, particularly by his nature. They both want to protect the world from the evil. I think in the future Silas will find some other evil organization and fight against it next 300 years. Silas and Bod will probably meet again and Silas will start to protect Bod from the shadows.

Challenging words

slither= luisua

inscription= kaiverrus

damp= kostea,kosteus, kostuttaa, laimentaa

translucent= läpikuultava

hut= mökki, parakki

ivy= muratti

abide=viipyä, sietää, pysyä, ~by= pitää kiinni jstk

debate= väitellä, väittely

brooch= rintaneula

dusk= hämärä

dismal=synkkä, surkea, kurja

perpetual= alituinen

acquire= hankkia, saavuttaa, oppia

puzzle= pulma, arvoitus, saattaa ymmälleen,~over=  vaivata päätänsä

I found the book Odd Thomas very interesting. It was quite easy to read but sometimes sentences were complicated. Mainly it was easy to keep up with plot and the book was worth to read.  

Mind Map

Character Analysis

The book ‘Odd Thomas’ begings the main character Odd Thomas telling about himself. He’s a twenty-year-old man who lives in a fictional town of Pico Mundo in California.

He describes himself  unusual person but he doesn’t tell straight why he is so ’odd’. Later the reader finds out that Odd can see dead people. When a suspicious-looking and followed by ghosts-guy arrives to the Pico Mundo grill (Odd’s workplace) Odd is convinced that something terrible will happen in town and the inhabitants are in danger including his lover Stormy Lwellyn. Odd has to find a way how to save them.

Odd is  intelligent and inventive person. He is also brave and he have the courage to take risks for example finding out what’s going on with Fungus Man (the guy followed by ghosts). First he gives kind of hard image of himself but there is also a sensitive side in him which comes out when theres Stormy in question. I also found him very humane although he’s able to see dead people and that is like daily stuff to him. He also has ironic comments sometimes which made book funnier from time to time.

I think that in the future Odd’s life will be messed again by ghosts.

Challenging Words

acquaintance =tuttu

lieu = paikka

refrigerator = jääkaappi

perplexity = vaikeus

compartment = vaunuosasto

reincarnation = jälleensyntyminen

sullen = tuittupäinen

inebriation = humalatila

conspiratorial = juonitteleva

immeasurable = mittaamaton

Bibliography

Koontz Dean, 2003, Odd Thomas, Hammersmith, London

The Catcher in the Rye (1951)  is a book written by J.D. Salinger. It’s a story about Holden Caulfield who’s kicked out from Pencey Prep school. It’s already the fourth school he has been kicked out. So, he goes to New York and thinks what to do with his life. 

 Now I’m going to tell you about Ward Stradlater who was Holden’s roommate at Pencey. He’s kind of minor character and Holden doesn’t like him, but you can’t say Stradlater is the antagonist , because Holden doesn’t like nearly anyone.

Stradlater is kind of player. I mean, he plays with girls. Stradlater skinny, but he has broad shoulders. He has very good build, and he admits it himself too. Even Holden admits that! Stradlater looks always right ’cause he likes to fix himself up, and many thinks that he’s very handsome. All most all girls adore him and he gets nearly every girl he wants. Every night he has a different girl. In brief,  Stradlater is gorgeus outside, but inside a real bastard.

Stradlater’s motives to do what he does is that he thinks he’s so good-looking that he has to try all girls because he has a chance to do that. In one episode of the book, Stradlater and Holden are fighting. The reason is that Stradlater Has had a date with Holden’s old friend Jane Gallagher. Holden stocks Stradlater, who of course stocks him back. Holden loses the fight, and thinks Stradlater is bastard. I think that Stradlater stocked just because he wanted to self-defense himself.

 Last thing that books tells about Stradlater is when he stays in Pencey and Holden goes to New York. Story doesn’t tell more but you can guess that maybe he just continued he’s studying at pencey and maybe he get a new roommate.

 In future I see that  Ward Stradlater is little relaxed and he has stopped girls hunting. maybe he has a wife, children? Good profession is quite sure, because altough he’s very interested in girls, he’s hard-studier.

Mindmap of Stradlater

http://www.mindmeister.com/maps/show/34472510

Book review

In my opinion this book was great. First I tought that this book seemed very boring, but when I started to read I couldn’t stop that. Maybe the best thing was that I read it in English, because people in New York speak English with their own slang in it. It could have sound ridiculous when Holden and all have speaked Helsinki’s slang in 50’s New York. And understood nearly all that I read, maybe all TV soap operas have helped me in that.

I think that especially boys should read this. Book speaks about all boys problems and toughs which are topical still although we are not in the 50’s. But book helps girls too. By reading this book, you could learn lot of boys’ complicated mind.

 Okey, book is little depressing and realistic, but sometimes people need to thinks about those kind of questions like “who am I?” and “what should I do now or in future?” that kind of questions book’s main character Holden thinks when he’s kicked out from school. Actually, I liked when Holden didn’t do like nothing but he tought so much that the book should have been longer, if there were more episodes in he’s life.

Challenging words

buzz: kutsua joku paikalle summerilla

dough: raha

halitosis: pahanhajuinen hengitys

lobby: aula, eteinen

lousy: surkea, kurja

phony: teeskentelijä, epärehellinen, teennäinen

pheumonia: keuhkokuume

rubberneck: pysähtyä töllistelemään

shrug: kohauttaa olkapäitään

sonuvabitch: ”hutsun jälkeläinen”

If you want to know more about this book, watch this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Catcher_in_the_Rye

Unfortenately, there is no film made about this book, so I couldn’t put a link of film trailer.

More books written by J.D. Salinger

Nine stories (1953)

Franny and Zooey (1961)

Raise high the Roof-Beam (1955)

Seymour: An Introduction (1959)

This book is very interesting and marvellous

Do you want to know more about this film or book? All you have to do is just read the book or watch the film.

Mind Map

A mind map of Ralph

Character Analysis

The book begins following a plane crash and then a bunch of young British boys starts to live on the tropical Island. The novel’s protagonist is a twelve-year-old British boy Ralph. Ralph is athletic, charismatic, civilized, social. Ralph is a gentleman.

 Ralph is elected as a leader of the survivors on the island. Ralph is a diplomat and a natural leader. He arranges the meeting place, the fire. Ralph is different from the others. He tries to build a comfortable living place on the island with Simon. He gives courage to others when they need. He is very caring person. Ralph enjoys the freedom on the island because there are no grown-ups. Ralph takes some ideas from Piggy when he needs. Ralph loses his leadership to Jack who is the novel’s antagonist. When Jack becomes leader and powerful, piggy leave Ralph’s group. In the last part of this novel, Ralph escapes into the jungle and he sees an officer with his ship.

Ralph might become a President because he likes to be a leader. 

Challenging Words

Humiliation =nöyryytys

Foliage =lehdet

Fiercely=ankara

Impalpable=vaikeaselkoinen

Swirl= pyöriä

Preposterous=järjetöntä

Gripped=tarttui

Whimper= uikuttaa

Brandish=heiluttaa

Menace=uhka

Bibliography:

William Golding, 1954.

Lord of the Flies.

Richard Clay Ltd, Great Britain.

 William Goldings Homepage

Santiago is the main character of the book. He is quite pensive and he thinks a lot of things. Santiago is independent for his age and very brave, because he ventured to go to Afrika alone find some treasure, which may not even be there. Santiagos parents wanted that Santiago would have been a priest, but himself he wanted to be a shepherd and then he came one. One reason to that Santiago went to Afrika could have been that he likes to travel, because he says one time in the book that he like to travel.

The main character, Santiago, did the right choice, when he decide to find the treasure, which he dreamed of.  Santiago behave friendly and quite normal with other characters, but mostly he do everything alone by him self in the book.