Each group should post a comment on our class blog for the item it composed an answer for. (See full text for the item on handout, which is also linked on class web page calendar.)
Bonus opportunity: respond individually to another group's statement.
! [exclamation] In her first monologue, Vivian says that, in the play to come
@ [snail] In her initial discussion with Dr. Kelekian, Vivian says
# [pound] Professor Ashford, in her scene with Vivian as a young woman
$ [dollar] In the flashback scene between Dr. Ashford and the young Vivian
% [percentage] In what important ways are Jason and Vivian alike?
^ [caret] As a teacher, Vivian liked to attack Donne’s poetry as though it were “a puzzle,”
& [ampersand] In the classroom scene, Vivian describes “Donne’s agile wit at work
* [asterisk] Jason describes John Donne as suffering from “Salvation Anxiety.”
+ [plus] One of the principal themes of metaphysical poetry is the link
÷ [division] Professor Ashford calls The Runaway Bunny “a little allegory of the soul.”
9 comments:
* “Salvation anxiety” is an uncertainty of the soul’s destination after death. No, Vivian is more concerned with her purpose for life on this earth than in the existence of another. Vivian is personally affected by the sickness and does not address how God and Heaven affect her. She is afraid of death and that what is trying to save her is killing her in a more painful way. In the poem, Donne tries to understand why he is accountably for his sins, just as Vivian questions why someone of power, like her, should be lowered to such a position as experimental data. Mercy, to Donne, means forgiveness of sins, but to Vivian it means care and compassion, and relief from suffering. Being “intellectual” is one of Vivian’s faults because she does not address the issue without analyzing. She is far from overdramatic because as a scholar, she limits her reactions by setting boundaries for herself that she will not cross. --Jenny and Ashley
%%%
Jason and Vivian are alike because of the way they treat the people under them (Vivian’s students and Jason’s patients). Vivian recognizes her faults because of the way Jason treats her. She learns that the way she treats her students is cold and seemingly uncaring. They are unable to become friends because of the type of people they are; Jason is cold towards his patients and Vivian was cold to her students; so it would have been hard for them to become friends. Vivian turned to Susie because she was willing to be her friend and she had the opposite personality from Vivian. Vivian taught and showed Jason that it was OK to be cold and not have emotional connections with your students. He took this with him and applied it with his patients. Jason shows his respect towards Vivian when he is treating her. He discusses her class with Susie even through the class was long ago and he majored in something entirely different. He is also awkward around her which is probably because he doesn’t feel right seeing someone that he respects so vulnerable in the hospital. --Aubry Pullara; Sarah Palmer; Ali Harden
^ [caret] The intellectual puzzle connects both Vivian and Jason's professions. Donne's poetry can be perceived as an infinite dilemma only solved by death. The medical research is supposed to "save lives," but as the doctors get lost in the puzzle they miss the fact that Vivian is simply destined to die. So Vivian sacrifices her life for the sake of research, but ultimately she answers the prevailing theme of both John Donne and medical practice--death. It is the inevitable shadow to which both studies are destined. Ethically, medical practice becomes a statistical solution rather than a personable effort to save a life. This disconnection from emotional interaction with others happens to Kelekian and Vivian as they become blinded by the "intellectual game." The puzzle is simply for the sake of a process, rather than the solution that they are looking for. Getting so caught up in "the game" leaves both unaware of their initial purpose. --Milton R. Geist; John B. Ellison; Devin M. Pullara
# Professor Ashford, in her scene with Vivian, is not saying that scholars should not be sentimental; she is just proclaiming that sentimentality should not rule a scholar. She differentiates between sentimentality and emotion but says they are similar. This is important in discerning the puzzle of John Donne’s poetry.
In this specific scene, Professor Ashford tells Vivian that she needs to stop studying and go find something to be sentimental toward. She did communicate it successfully because Vivian turned put to be an expert on John Donne. This scene shows that Vivian did not use sentimentality in her life which produced a harsher personality.
Professor Ashford does not seem as emotionally limited as Vivian because she understands the full potential of sentimentality. She is more of a human person because of her relationships with her students such as Vivian. Vivian fails to do the same. --Sasha D.; Sean B.; Brian K.
“!”
Irony is the “use of words to convey the opposite of their literal meaning.” (Webster’s dictionary). Our world as well as that of Vivian’s seems to convey ironic circumstances and events daily. Often irony seems to take the form of comedy, and in our world, simple daily actions seem to be highly ironic. For example, is it not ironic that Regis High School could likely afford private plows and yet their not in school and we are? Or even the fact that the elementary schools which already begins an hour later than us gets a delay?
In the movie Wit, irony seems to drive the plot. While Vivian denied her students empathy and understanding in the classroom, she ironically wishes for just that while suffering from ovarian cancer. Also it’s ironic and possibly coincidental that Vivian’s student inversely becomes her doctor. The exchange and conduct Vivian presented Jason and her students as a whole is ironically identical to Jason’s attitude concerning his profession; solving the puzzle becomes more important that those hurt along the way and deprived of human touch.
One would suppose that the movie steers away from the irony at the point at which Vivian passes away. Suddenly the situation moves from comical to dramatic and the exchange between characters is no longer ironic, but rather presents a realization of life lessons.
While irony is often used as a comical tool, it can often undermine the seriousness of a situation. It seems to alter the response of those indirectly involved in the situation as irony moves dramatic events in a more comical direction. --Jessy Marie and Olivia
+
When Vivian is reminiscing about reading with her father in the living room and lecturing in one of her classes, both of which were events of great importance in shaping her life/soul, she can't help but picture herself reading/lecturing in a hospital gown/bald or as a child in the hospital bed, because her body is connected to her soul. Even in her fondest memories, she cannot escape the present state of her body.
Even though body and soul are connected, other people can separate them. The doctors feel strongly for her in their own souls, but they are only attached to her body. They don’t get to know/understand her soul. Susie recognizes Vivian's declining physical state, and instead directs the passion of her soul towards Vivian's soul. The two share popsicles, laugh together, and comfort each other.
Professor Ashford seems to be the only one that does not separate Vivian's body and soul. She helped strengthen Vivian's soul by pushing her in grad school then comes back, in a time of physical turmoil to care for Vivian by reading her a story. The Runaway Bunny represents the connection between body and soul. No matter where the bunny, the body, physically runs to, the mother bunny, the soul, is always there.
While the body and soul are connected during life, death with ultimately separate the two. Vivian recognizes this when she says "death will instantly unjoint my body and soul." --Christine Davenport and Jordan Senior
THE @ [snail] SIGN!
Vivian learned from Donne's poetry that life and death are more complex than the standard meaning. Donne's poetry shows that how you live your life affects your death. Vivian lived her life as a scholar and in that matter very stern. In one scene of WIT Vivian refuses a students request for an extension on a paper when his grandmother died; in this scene she is portrayed as stern, strict, and cold. Vivian being this way causes her to die alone with no one visiting her while she suffers from cancer. She always recites the line "Death shall be no more, death, thou shalt die." This quote from Donne's poetry shows death as not a big deal and nothing to take concern of. No one takes interest in Vivian’s death and her dying is not a big deal to anyone because she has no one.
Vivian's thoughts and morality change towards the end of her cancer because she feels alone. The doctors pay no attention to her as a person just research. She is treated by the doctors the way she treated her students when ironically one of her doctors is a past student. Vivian wishes she would have been more kind so that she would have people there to support her during her steps towards death. Vivian’s studies showed poetry and a piece of research. She did not look into the feeling of the poem. This is symbolic because the doctors do not look into her feelings but into her cancer for research. Her studies did not help her because in her final days she looks for feeling not for structure. Even when Professor Ashford comes to see her, Vivian does not want her to recite poetry and is satisfied with a children’s story. --Shannon Adler; Amanda Dennis; Kyle Newman
÷ ÷ ÷ [the divi she oonn]
Q: Professor Ashford calls The Runaway Bunny “a little allegory of the soul.” What does she mean by this? How does the children’s book, in this light, relate to Donne and Vivian, with their cases of Salvation Anxiety? What sort of comfort does the story give Vivian, assuming she is capable of taking it in? What does Professor Ashford perceive in The Runaway Bunny that is important? Why did the playwright select this book for Professor Ashford to read to Vivian? Why does Professor Ashford say “And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest” as she leaves?
A: When Professor Ashford calls The Runaway Bunny “a little allegory of the soul,” she means that it is symbolic of the soul. Vivian’s soul is running, in a sense, from reality and close personal contact. By being rather harsh and unfeeling, she separates herself from others, including her students. While in the hospital she has only one visitor. If she hadn’t “run” from people before her cancer (as the bunny runs in the story), she might have had more visitors.
In reference to Salvation Anxiety, it seems that Vivian could be afraid that she might not be “saved” (go to heaven after death), and Professor Ashford hopes to calm theses fears by telling her (through the story) that as long as she doesn’t try to run away from death, she will be fine.
When Professor Ashford reads the story to Vivian, Vivian can take pleasure in the fact that it is a children’s book, and it relates to her own childhood experience of reading The Tale of the Flopsy Bunnies with her father.
Professor Ashford perceives that the message in The Runaway Bunny is important because Ashford is trying to tell Vivian to stop running away from people.
The quote “and flights of angels sing thee to thy rest” is representative of Vivian’s impending death. Professor Ashford hopes for the most pleasant journey possible, with the aid of angels in flight. -- Jennifer Weidner; Monique Rodriguez ; Megan Sheidt
$$$ Yes, the punctuation does matter and it does refer to something bigger than "just" punctuation. Death and life are separated by just a single breath. Vivian makes a note to vocalize the punctuation because she doesn't want to accept her death and she's apologizing to Donne in the end for messing up his poetry. That is why she is sorry.
Chris Berghoff; Aaron Walter; Chrissy Homsher
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