Martin's Blog

I've heard several people talk in and outside of class on their opinions of whether or not Rochester and/or Antoinette deserve sympathy. For one, I think it's very important to look at their past to explain their actions in the present. For both of them, they clearly had family issues, with Rochester feeling undervalued/disowned because of his father giving everything to his first son according to their family tradition. For Antoinette, we can clearly see that her mother doesn't seem to care about her, not even knowing or caring where she is or who she's with. In addition, Antoinette unlike Rochester doesn't actually have her real father, instead she gets Mr. Mason, who only seems to cause more problems upon his arrival. I think that this similarity in their past is crucial to even start comparing how bad their actions are later in their life. When it comes to deciding who is worthy of my sympathy, the past can be used to explain the reasoning for why it was done,...

Meursault has a very iconic nonchalant response to just about everything he is presented with. As much as I'd like to believe Meursault is the most chill person ever known to man, I don't think that's the case. For someone to think nothing matters and be indifferent on such heavy topics like extreme violence and love shows some kind of mental problems. Most "normal" people would agree that murder is a terrible thing and should never be an option, however, for Meursault, he seems to see it as an acceptable choice, saying you either shoot or don't shoot. The fact that Meursault fired four extra shots into the Arab confidently in comparison to the first one truly shows some When asked by Marie if he loves her and wants to marry her, he replies "I don't think so, but that doesn't mean anything." Such lack/difference of understanding of human feelings and humanity in general is a key aspect of mental disorders. So where did this mental disorder ...