Robert Cormier's Im the Cheese

Novel Title : I’m the Cheese

Author : Robert Cormier

Synopsis

The story is about a young boy whose name was Adam farmer who had psychology problem in his life because of terrorism. The title is taken from the song which Adam’s father always heard when Adam was young, thus Adam’s father called him “the Cheese”.

The story begins when Adam was 14 yeas old. His real name was Paul Delmonte. His mother’s real name was Louise Nolan Delmonte, and his father’s real name was Anthony Delmonte. Delmonte family lived high above the hill, in Monument, Massachusetts. His father was a journalist. At the moment, he smelt a corruption scandal in the government administration. And then, he became a witness to reveal the case.

After the assembly, there was a tragedy; Anthony’s car was exploded. After the tragedy, an agent from government, Mr. Gray, suggested Delmonte family to change their identity and went to other place. And then, they changed their identity became Farmer family and they moved to Ruttenburg.

At the moment, there was a mafia group who killed Farmer family and Adam was the only one who was saved. Adam was taken to the hospital and was interviewed. He was shocked with the tragedy and was depressed.

In his condition, he imagined that he went out his home riding his old cycle to Rutterburg to meet his father. In the fact, that was only his imagination. Actually, his father was died in the tragedy and he did not do cycling from Monument to Rutterburg, but he only did it in the hospital ground.

Personal Response

In my opinion, the story of the novel is good enough. I stressed the plot of the story here. The plot doesn’t just tell the story from the beginning to the ending, but there is a flash-back in the story that attracts me and makes me enjoy reading this novel. It is when the story firstly tells about Adam Farmer who had psychology problem, then secondly tells the reason why he got it, then finally tells about the condition Adam Farmer again thereafter. This kind of plot is the story plot that I like. I, to be honestly, don’t like the story plot that only tells the story from the beginning to the ending; there is no challenge in reading that kind of story plot, because, for me as a college reader level, that is too simple and easy-understood.

The story also, in my opinion, has political message. It is like the tragedy in our country. When someone is trying to reveal corruption scandal in the government, they will get terrorism that, perhaps, comes from the government itself. It is like Udin and Munir case who are, perhaps, trying to reveal corruption scandal in Indonesia several times ago.

Yana Muhammad Fauzi
060751
English Literature B 06

Kembali ke sini rasanya seperti meniti masa lalu

Tempat ini masih sama;
sejuk, hijau, dirimbun dedaunan paku.
Hanya saja,
saat ini saya menikmati sendiri remang senja
tanpa hangat hadirmu yang penuh euforia;
menceriakan rintik hujan, ikan-ikan
bahkan tangis dan sedan.

Lisung Cafe

picture from here

-Monika Paramitha HP-

Langston Hughes's Poems

Vagabonds

by Langston Hughes

We are the desperate
Who do not care,
The hungry
Who have nowhere
To eat,
No place to sleep,
The tearless
Who cannot
Weep.

The text shows us about his suffers from poverty and all happening things that came from living in a stratified community. Beside stratified community, Hughes also learned to endure his prejudice being afro-American without surrendering his dignity.

Share-Croppers

by Langston Hughes

Just a herd of Negroes
Driven to the field,
Plowing, planting, hoeing,
To make the cotton yield.

When the cotton's picked
And the work is done
Boss man takes the money
And we get none,

Leaves us hungry, ragged
As we were before.
Year by year goes by
And we are nothing more

Than a herd of Negroes
Driven to the field--
Plowing life away
To make the cotton yield.

He also had already socialism and he believes that socialism as a solution to capitalism. He wrote:

“If You Would”
You could stop the
factory whistle blowing,
Stop the mine machinery
from going,
Stop the atom bombs
exploding,
Stop the battleships
from loading,
Stop the merchant
ships from sailing,
Stop the jail house keys
from turning
...You could
If you would

His outstanding work is also tells working-class content. Because he grew up in working class family in Jim Crow USA, no wonder if he always wrote about life and culture of the African American people in working-class system. His writing was inspired by and dedicated to the African American people in working class as a whole but his main focus was on Black worker.

In the Soviet Union, which he visited in the 1930s, he wrote, “The daily papers picture the Bolsheviks as the greatest devils on earth, but I couldn’t see how they could be so bad if they had done away with race hatred and landlords – two evils that I knew first hand.” (Author: George Fishman
People's Weekly World Newspaper, 03/30/02 00:00 )

Annisa Mayang Putri (0608231)
English Literature B 2006

The road not taken by Robert Frost (1874-1963)

two roads diverged in a yellow wood
and sorry i couldn't travel both
and be one traveler, long i stood
and looked down one as far as i could
to where it bent in the undergrowth

then took the other, as just as fair
and having perhaps the better claim
because it was grassy and wanted wear
though as far that the passing there
had worn them really about the same

and both that morning equally lay
in leaves no step had trodden black
oh, i kept the first for another day!
yet knowing how way leads on to way
i doubted if i should ever come back

i shall be telling this with a sigh
somewhere ages hence
two roads diverged in a wood, and i
i took the one less traveled by
and that has made all the differences

(respon)
pesan dalam puisi karya Robert frost inibanyak meyakinkan orang-orang yang memiliki keraguan terhadap keputusan hidup yang ia jalani. seperti dua buah jalan yang harus dipilih tetapi hanya satu jalan yang menjadi pilihan yang harus dijalani. the road not taken menguatkan mereka yang ragu akan pilihan hidup mereka. walaupun jalan yhidup yang kita pilih berbeda dengan jalan yang pada umumnya dipilih kebanyakan orang, tapi yakinlah dengan keyakinan, di ujung jalan tersebut kita akan menemukan kejutan terhadap pilihan hidup kita. apapun itu, kita jangan menyesal, karena ini adalah pilihan kita yang tidak dipilih orang lain.

(Septi inggi Wiatni 0608339 english Literature B 2006)

Tuck Everlasting; Between the Novel and Movie

On the fifth semester of my study in UPI, I attended class of Children and Adolescent Literature. The subject was taught by Mr. Ahmad Bukhori, one of my favorite lectures. During the study, I learn about some of children literature like novel, poem, song, movie, and many more. One literary work that I remember until now is Tuck Everlasting
. Tuck Everlasting is a novel by Natalie Babbitt. The story is about Tuck Family who were immortal because they had drank kind of immortal water from a magic springs. One day, the youngest son of the family, Jesse, met a rich and beautiful girl named Winifred Foster at the magic springs which is located on Foster's wood. Winnie was watching Jesse drank from the springs and she was lost
her heart at once. Winnie was falling in love with Jesse and vice versa. When Winnie wants to drank the magic water, Jesse and Miles (Jesse's brother who was suddenly appeared)prevented her and kidnapped her. They bring
Winnie to Tuck's house in order to meet their parents, Angus Tuck and Mae Tuck. Angus Tuck asked Winnie not to tell anybody about the magic springs because if she does, people would do anything to get the water. And that is so terrible. This
story has a villain, the man in the yellow suit (his name was not told until the end of the story). The man in the yellow suit told Foster family that Winnie had been kidnapped by the Tuck family. He said that Winnie was in danger because they were
really bad guy. In the fact, the tuck family was feeling happy of Winnie's visit because they had never have gust before. The tuck family loved Winnie. The man in the yellow suit want to exchange Winnie and the Foster's wood because he want to own the magic srings. Then he came to Tuck's house to get Winnie, but Mae accidentally killed him because he wanted to harm Winnie. So, Mae was put into jail and supposed to be punished in the gallows. Winnie helped Tuck family to saved Mae. After that Tucks leaved the Town. Jesse gave Winnie a bottle of magic water. H
e wanted her to drink it so that they can be together forever. Someday when the situation is right, he would take Winnie with him. The ending of the story is quite surprising, because Winnie was choose not to drink the water and live forever. Winnie
remembers about Angus' explanation when she was living in Tuck's house. Angus said told Winnie that life is a wheel; birth, pain, happiness, oldness, and death are parts of the wheel. There are no good to be immortal, because when people are immortal they have no changes. They would never grow like human, just stay in one condition, like a rock in the road side.
In my opinion, the story is great, because I got many lessons from it.
Mr. Abu also brought the movie to the class so that the student can watch it together. There are some additions in the movie that make it much more interesting than the novel.
One of them is the part when Jesse taught Winnie to swim in the beautiful waterfall, then they were kissing. In the novel there is no kissing scene, of course because the novel was written for kids. In the movie, the story become more emotional because it highlights the romantic relationship between Jesse and Winnie.
It is proved by the ending of the story. In the novel, Angus and Tuck was visiting Winnie's grave and Angus said "good girl" because he glad that Winnie choose not to be immortal and turned into 'the rock on the road side'. While in the movie, Jesse is the one who found Winnie's grave in the town. Both of the novel and the movie are adorable. I found that it is not important how long we life, the important thing is how we spend our (limited) times.

here is the book's cover

and, the movie

This cute girl is Alexis bledel as Winnie Foster

And now, she turns to be a really gorgeous woman. I heart her! X)

-Monika Paramitha HP-

Review of The Text-play Titled The Apple Cart by Darryl Shawn

Title : The Apple Cart
Author : Darryl Shawn
Type : Text-play
Review :


King Magnus is the main character of a drama play titled The Apple Cart by Darryl Shawn. He was the king of the United Kingdom, or the Great Britain as people called it at the time. He wasn’t the kind of king that would only sit and enjoy the wealth of his position while merely watching his citizens idly without doing anything. He was the kind of king that always observed and cared about his people, and would always try to help them as much as he could.
He was someone who appreciated the idea of democratize and liberalism, although he didn’t partially liked the idea of England being a republic because of some reasons. One of his new elected ministers was a democrat that actually supported the idea of Britain as a republic, but they respected each other greatly and acknowledged the other’s ideals and beliefs after their first meeting.

King Magnus was very clever. When the cabinet that led by the prime minister gave him an ultimatum to stop actively voicing out his opinions to public and stop ruling the kingdom because that only made the cabinet looked bad as if they were actually not working, and asked him to be only an icon, a symbol to the kingdom, King Magnus calmly and cleverly tricked them by saying that he would retire from the king position so he could participate in the election and make his way to the parliament, thus he could freely voicing his opinion. Knowing what would happen if a former king participated in such election, the cabinet not-so-willingly cancelled their ultimatum, and once again everything went back to normal.

I would say that King Magnus was really an admirable person. He always faced every situation calmly and answered every challenge logically, and sometimes he joked as to lighten up the situation. He was also someone who could easily break the ice and he always thought every move and every step thoroughly and carefully before doing it, and he certainly wasn’t someone you want to mess with. But he still was a man that could be tempted with women, and although he did have an affair with a woman inside his palace, he still got his priorities straight, and would never sacrifice his kingdom or his dear queen for anything.

All in all, King Magnus was definitely not someone you should underestimate.

Aku Menulis Puisi

Aku menulis puisi
untuk kesenangan ku.
Memberi kenangan pada
perasaan tertentu yang
timbul pada waktu itu.
Pada saat aku menulis puisi.

Aku menulis puisi
untuk mencurahkan segala
isi hati. Yang kadang takkan
timbul kemabli. Yang mungkin
takkan terjadi lagi.
Ketika ilham 'tlah pergi.

Aku menulis puisi
karena aku ingin berbagi.
Ketika dimana tak ada orang
yang dapat aku cerita-i.
Karena aku sendiri. Tak tahu
kemana lagi harus bertepi.

Dan kini,
Aku menulis puisi
dimana kamu telah pergi.



-Ray Sugar (0608263)
-English Literature B '06

Ku tak Suka Membaca Puisi

Aku tak suka membaca puisi
apalagi yang sedih. Yang
Hanya berisikan cinta
dan air mata. Semua terasa
terlalu hiperbola dalam benakku.

Aku tak suka membaca puisi
apalagi yang dengan kiasan
Terlalu mendramatisir keadaan.
Dengan semua kata
yang mereka anggap bermakna.

Aku tak suka membaca puisi
apalagi aku harus menelaahnya.
Hingga se-detail mungkin.
Dengan maksud-maksud tertentu
yang belum tentu bermakna pasti.

Aku tak suka membaca puisi
jangan paksa aku
untuk menyukai
membaca puisi dengan telaahnya
Karena aku tak suka membaca puisi.



-Ray Sugar (0608263)
-English Literature B '06

PUISI 3 ditengah waktu

Disaat aku mulai ingin
mencoba dan berusaha
untuk memperbaiki hal
yang selalu kau singgung
meski itu sudah lalu.
Aku mulai dan terus belajar
untuk menjadi yang terbaik
tapi kenapa tak pernah ada
timbal balik yang selalu
aku inginkan
Kamu. Terdiam
dan hanya berusaha
mengungkit semua
yang lalu. Yang aku
mulai mencoba untuk
memperbaikinya. Perubahan
yang aku harapkan
masing-masing dari
diri kita.


-Ray Sugar (0608263)
-English Literature B "06

PUISI 2 ditengah waktu

Ku bosan dan jengah
untuk menunggu. Berhargakah untuk
Kutunggu. Berapa besarkah penghargaanmu
untuk waktuku. Seberapa berhargakah
untuk kutunggu. Adakah
Kau mengerti kejenuhan ini?
Satu titik kecil dimana aku
meminta untuk dihargai. Dipandang
sedikit untuk dimengerti.
Bukan sekali kamu begini. Tetapi
Slalu. Ya, kau tidak pernah mengerti
walau untuk sedikit kau
membukakan matamu untuk ini.
Ku ingin meneriaki didepan wajahmu.
Aku tak sanggup. Terlalu sayang
Kamu. Atau mungkin ini bodoh
Kebodohan yang aku sendiri
mencoba menutup mata darinya.
Sakit. Muak. Mual aku dengan
keadaan yang terus begini.



-Ray Sugar(0608263)
-English Literature B '06

PUISI 1 ditengah waktu

Tubuhku semakin terkikis
Batinku semakin terikat.
Nafasku kini terengah.Berlari
kencang, namun tetap terasa berjalan.
semakin ku teteskan air mata. Semakin
aku tak mengerti apa yang aku tangisi.
Kata jengah tak tahu lagi kapan aku
Harus mengeluarkannya. Untuk
Kulontarkan disaat apa.
Sendiri,mungkin itu untuk aku
Aku yang sendiri dan pantas
untuk sendiri. Menunggu.
Meski ini sering terjadi.
Aku tak tahu harus
berbuat apa. Meski hati
talah mematung akan waktu.
Waktu?


-Ray Sugar (0608263)
-English Literature B '06

Cat and Mouse

The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus

Softly we tremble tonight,

picture perfect fading smiles are all that's left in sight,

I said I'd never leave you'll never change

I'm not satisfied with where I'm at in life.

Am I supposed to be happy?

With all I ever wanted, it comes with a price.

Am I supposed to be happy?

With all I ever wanted, it comes with a price.

You said, you said that you would die for me...

We made plans to grow old,

believe me there was truth in all those stories that I told.

Lost in a simple game cat and mouse

are we the same people as before this

came to light?

Am I supposed to be happy?

with all I ever wanted, it comes with a price.

Am I supposed to be happy?

with all I ever wanted, it comes with a price.

You said, you said that you would die for me...

You must live for me too'...

For me too...yeah, yeah...

You said that you would die for me...

Am I supposed to be happy?

with all I ever wanted, it comes with a price.

Am I supposed to be happy?

with all I ever wanted, it comes with a price

You said, you said that you would die for me...

Pahrurozi (0608188)

Tuck Everlasting

Novel by Natalie Babbitt and Movie Director by Jay Russell

Comparison between Novel and Movie

Novel	Movie
1. Winnie pours the spring water to toad	1. Winnie doesn’t pour the water spring
2. Winnie is 10 years old	2. Winnie is 15 years old
3. Only Mae who is taken to the jail	3. Mae and Angus who are taken to the jail
4. No dancing	4. Jesse and Mae are dancing
5. Jesse gives Winnie a bottle of water spring	5. Jesse doesn’t give Winnie a bottle of water spring
6. Jesse doesn’t ask Winnie to clime the Eifel tower	6. Jesse asks Winnie to clime the Eifel tower
7. The man in yellow coat	7. The man in yellow suit

When I read the novel, I am anxious to image the continuance of Tuck’s family with living forever from time to time. Live without death, sick or hurt. I think it feels emptiness. No challenge in the life. In fact, living forever doesn’t happen on our real life. If there is water spring to become us living forever, I will think of a million times to drink the water spring, because I don’t want to be a man lasting with life emptiness and so many sins to do along the life.

Most of creative literatures, like novel or movie. I think it is designed to sharpen our imagination in order to be able to create new creative literature. However, writing creative literatures such as novel, comic, and other writings. They are more imaginative than we watch the movie. Therefore, Novel to movie is more interesting than movie to novel. If novel is made from movie, the watchers won’t be anxious to read the novel, because the watchers have knew the contain of the story. On the contrary, if movie is made from the novel, we will be anxious to watch the movie, because we can compare our imagination when we read the novel and watch movie.

Ismatul Luthfi (0607839)
non-dik B 2006

comparing KETIKA CINTA BERTASBIH dan AYAT-AYAT CINTA

film bernuansa Islam baru-baru ini semakin marak. film terakhir yang keluar adalah KETIKA CINTA BERTASBIH (KCB). ini adalah film kedua dari novel karya HABIBURRAHMAN EL FARIZI setelah AYAT-AYAT CINTA (AAC) yang cukup sukses laku dipasaran. AAC dinillail klulranlg mlenlgilnlterpretasilklanl daril nlolvenya. sang penulis novel sendiri kecewa dengan hasil film AAC yang dinilainya jauh dari aspek pandangannya yang menulis novel tersebut.

dengan mengusung tag line ASLI SYUTING DI MESIR, KCB menarik banyak perhatian. disamping jalan cerita KCB yang lebih menarik dari AAC. namun sayang, penggarapan dan pengemasan film KCB tak sebagus AAC. KCB, menurut saya tidak layak disebut sebagai film layar lebar atau layar emas. film ini lebih menonjolkan sinetron dengan pemeran-pemeran perempuannya mengenakan jilbab.

saya sebut sinetron karena film ini terus saja mengenalkan tokoh-tokoh hingga menjelang film sinetron ini habis. tak ada klimaks yang menarik bahkan ending nya KHAS SINETRON INDONESIA -- bersambung ke KCB 2.

aneh rasanya banyak orang bahkan media-media sampai infotainment menyebut ini film sukses dan bagus. darimana mereka menyimpulkan itu? tidak ada bukti dan penjelasan pasti dari para media yang menyebutkan film ini bagus. sukses menyedot perhatian untuk menontonnya iya, tapi untuk dibilang bagus, saya rasa tidak sama sekali.


- Ray Sugar (0608263)
- English Literature B '06

Biarkan Aku Tertimbun Waktu

Jika aku adalah nada
Apakah aku cukup indah untuk kau dengar?
Jika aku adalah cahaya
Apakah aku cukup berkilau dimatamu?
Jika aku adalah aroma
Apakah aku cukup harum untuk kau cium?
Jika aku adalah rasa
Apakah aku cukup manis dilidahmu?
Jika aku adalah permata
Apakah aku cukup menggoda untuk kau sentuh?

Aku hanya ingin tahu,
Sungguh ingin tahu.
Bahwa aku tetap istimewa,
Bahwa aku adalah segalanya.
Setidaknya bagimu, Ibu.

Agar tak ada sesal bagiku.
Untuk pergi darimu.
Untuk tertimbun waktu.
Untuk tetap hidup,
Hanya dalam kenanganmu…


Dedicated: to my lovely mom...

Hijau Ku

Hijauku menangis
Mati, tak terselamatkan.
Hijauku melayang
Terbang, tak kembali.

Pasti karena kamu?
Bukan, pasti mereka?
Mungkinkah Aku?
Tidak, kuyakin, pastilah Kita?

TAK PEDULI SIAPA.

Aku hanya inginkan dia,
Hanya inginkan hutanku.


(My grammar is very terrible, so, I'm afraid to use English T_T )
friends, please leave your comment...
I'll be happy if you also criticize my work, and I'll hear any suggestion...
Coz, it is important to help an amateur like me...
^_^

Cherie Bennet’s novel Life in the Fat Lane, aims to describe the representation of idealized women and to reveal the construction of idealized women in the text. The research employs deconstruction theory to reveal the presence of opposition and close reading strategy to collect and analyze the data. The finding shows that the representation of idealized women in the novel Life in the fat Lane is the women who are thin. Thin means beautiful, popular, adorable, loved and perfect while fat means ugly, not popular, hated, not perfect and undesirable. The construction of beauty is mainly concerned with body or physical appearance. The idealized women are constructed by the institutions of society. The institutions of society in this case are including family, peer group, school, mass media especially advertisements, industries (cosmetic and diet industry), government institutions through its beauty pageants. The size of body gives certain status to someone. The text presents depiction of fat women and thin women successfully. The readers are invited to see how thin and fat women are respected in different ways by the society. However, the text is not deconstructive because at the end of the story, the main character, Lara, accepts her condition as being fat wisely. Lara decides to take an action contradicted to the society. Lara believes that being thin, beautiful and perfect looking do not guarantee the happiness.

This is a good example for feminism theory. We can explore the roles woman in this novel. This novel describes the figure of perfect woman, such as white skin, body slim, and long hair. Body fat is not represented the beauty of woman in this story. I think, it is an irony that describing the figure of woman is viewed from the physic as if the woman should appear beautifully.

Pahrurozi (0608188) non-dik B 2006

The short story entitiled Cat in the Rain tells about the life of a couple of Americans. The story is begun with the American wife who wanted to save a cat from the rain. She really concerned about the cat. The hotel-keeper attempted to ban the American wife to go out side because she must get wet of the hard rain. The American wife would like to seek the cat and the hotel-keeper went with her with an umbrella to save the American wife from the rain.

The cat was lost in her seek. She felt so sad and decided to come back to her room disappointedly. Her husband was still on the bed, reading. The American wife said that she wanted the cat so bad but the husband didn’t care about it.

While the American wife asked her husband about her hair style, he gave a careless response as if it was not his responsibility to care about those things. He kept reading.

A girl knocked at the door and when the American wife opened the door, she saw a girl held a big yellow and brown coloured cat. The girl said that the hotel-keeper asked her to bring the cat for the American wife.

Irwan Pernadi (0607806) nondik B 2006