Morning reflection: Kaneil
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BpaRouocBes
WORK ON SHORT STORIES DUE NEXT WEEK!
“You are not you--you have no body, no blood, no bones, you are but a thought. I myself have no existence; I am but a dream--your dream, a creature of your imagination. In a moment you will have realized this, then you will banish me from your visions and I shall dissolve into the nothingness out of which you made me
In a little while you will be alone in shoreless space, to wander its limitless solitudes without friend or comrade forever—for you will remain a thought, the only existent thought, and by your nature inextinguishable, indestructible. But I, your poor servant, have revealed you to yourself and set you free. Dream other dreams, and better!
Strange! that you should not have suspected years ago—centuries, ages, eons, ago!—for you have existed, companionless, through all the eternities.
Strange, indeed, that you should not have suspected that your universe and its contents were only dreams, visions, fiction! Strange, because they are so frankly and hysterically insane—like all dreams: a God who could make good children as easily as bad, yet preferred to make bad ones; who could have made every one of them happy, yet never made a single happy one; who made them prize their bitter life, yet stingily cut it short; who gave his angels eternal happiness unearned, yet required his other children to earn it; who gave his angels painless lives, yet cursed his other children with biting miseries and maladies of mind and body; who mouths justice and invented hell—mouths mercy and invented hell—mouths Golden Rules, and forgiveness multiplied by seventy times seven, and invented hell; who mouths morals to other people and has none himself; who frowns upon crimes, yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, then tries to shuffle the responsibility for man's acts upon man, instead of honorably placing it where it belongs, upon himself; and finally, with altogether divine obtuseness, invites a poor, abused slave to worship him!
You perceive, now, that these things are all impossible except in a dream. You perceive that they are pure and puerile insanities, the silly creations of an imagination that is not conscious of its freaks—in a word, that they are a dream, and you the maker of it. The dream-marks are all present; you should have recognized them earlier.
"It is true, that which I have revealed to you; there is no God, no universe, no human race, no earthly life, no heaven, no hell. It is all a dream—a grotesque and foolish dream. Nothing exists but you. And you are but a thought—a vagrant thought, a useless thought, a homeless thought, wandering forlorn among the empty eternities!”
― Mark Twain, The Mysterious Stranger
In a little while you will be alone in shoreless space, to wander its limitless solitudes without friend or comrade forever—for you will remain a thought, the only existent thought, and by your nature inextinguishable, indestructible. But I, your poor servant, have revealed you to yourself and set you free. Dream other dreams, and better!
Strange! that you should not have suspected years ago—centuries, ages, eons, ago!—for you have existed, companionless, through all the eternities.
Strange, indeed, that you should not have suspected that your universe and its contents were only dreams, visions, fiction! Strange, because they are so frankly and hysterically insane—like all dreams: a God who could make good children as easily as bad, yet preferred to make bad ones; who could have made every one of them happy, yet never made a single happy one; who made them prize their bitter life, yet stingily cut it short; who gave his angels eternal happiness unearned, yet required his other children to earn it; who gave his angels painless lives, yet cursed his other children with biting miseries and maladies of mind and body; who mouths justice and invented hell—mouths mercy and invented hell—mouths Golden Rules, and forgiveness multiplied by seventy times seven, and invented hell; who mouths morals to other people and has none himself; who frowns upon crimes, yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, then tries to shuffle the responsibility for man's acts upon man, instead of honorably placing it where it belongs, upon himself; and finally, with altogether divine obtuseness, invites a poor, abused slave to worship him!
You perceive, now, that these things are all impossible except in a dream. You perceive that they are pure and puerile insanities, the silly creations of an imagination that is not conscious of its freaks—in a word, that they are a dream, and you the maker of it. The dream-marks are all present; you should have recognized them earlier.
"It is true, that which I have revealed to you; there is no God, no universe, no human race, no earthly life, no heaven, no hell. It is all a dream—a grotesque and foolish dream. Nothing exists but you. And you are but a thought—a vagrant thought, a useless thought, a homeless thought, wandering forlorn among the empty eternities!”
― Mark Twain, The Mysterious Stranger
Another contest
Young Arts http://www.youngarts.org/
HMWK: Read Part II in Mudbound for Monday! pg. 212
Never do claymation while on LSD, kids.
ReplyDeleteAll in all, it was nice to have a change from those "inspirational" videos we've had to watch.
DeleteI have never seen a piece in claymation, and never of the devil, which was pretty weird. The way it transformed was a little creepy. Personally, I don't like Mark Twain as a writer that much.
ReplyDeleteWhen he spoke about humans being nothing, it reminded me about the spiritual world and how the devil wants to make everyone feel useless and destroy them with their own hands. Meanwhile, God had created everything for good and for a purpose, but the devil came to steal, kill, and destroy. This is what I was thinking throughout this short video.
DeleteI think it was a little unsettling and it made me feel kind of uncomfortable and it didn't really send a message for me if I am being honest.
ReplyDeleteThe video was different from the others. The whole clay thing was cool but since I haven't read that work by Mark Twain I was confused as to what the video was about.
ReplyDeleteI thought the video was kind of creepy but even though it was creepy it was very interesting. It talked about a lot of things but they mostly talked about life and death.
ReplyDeleteThat was quite a freaky video. The claymation added to the eeriness. It was very odd but also intriguing in an unsettling way...
ReplyDeleteI thought the clay was really creative and it was really cool how it all went along with what was being said.
ReplyDeletethis video was a little weird. i enjoyed that it wasn't what we usually have to watch. for once we didn't have to watch one of those cliche inspiring videos. i'm not familiar with his work so this seems a little different. the clay was pretty cool
ReplyDeletedelimar
This was very interesting to see. The way the "Angel" promised so much, gave the kids all they wanted, and made them feel included but in the end took it all once he felt annoyed or bored with the experience that humans presented. Eventually he ended their lives because of the chaos they formed over things, which showed greed.
ReplyDeleteI'm gonna leave a comment on my own reflection because why not.
ReplyDeleteThe themes of human nature and humanity's greed run deep in this video. Despite the fact that I haven't read The Mysterious Stranger, this animation is one of my favorites that I discovered a few years ago when I was going through my animation obsession phase.
I find the idea of Satan telling a story particularly interesting. I'm not religious at all, so it's not like seeing him portrayed positively makes me go "oh no". Afterall, in one of my books, the main character's girlfriend IS Lucifer.
Satan's sort of childlike innocence is portrayed quite well in the animation. He doesn't know exactly what wrong is, he just does what is within his nature, such as creating the floating island. It actually reminds me of a book I really like, coincidentally named "The Stranger". The protagonist of that book is socially atypical and does not cry when his mother dies. In the end he is arrested for murder and is very confused, crying in anger when no one explains to him exactly what he did wrong. It's sad, really.
The ideas Satan pun into the children was enough to scar them nut his philosophy really speaks to what he was trying to say. "I don't know what's wrong therefore I can do no wrong" I believe that this is his justification to him this isn't wrong, no ones wrong this is just the way things happen. Also it's classically devilish, ask for your desire and you have but he will never care what happens because its abusing their greed their innate sense of being a human to want. Mark twain does a great job pushing fourth his ideas and ideology painted onto the devil.
ReplyDeleteSo if the Devil doesn't know what is wrong, that means he can't intentionally do wrong things. Does that mean Satan isn't actually the bad guy?
DeleteCan I get an amen for not watching another inspiring video. Anyway this video was very intriguing and I found myself not being able to look away.
ReplyDeleteAt first I thought the video was just going to be weird and make no sense. As the video played, it started to make sense. It had a deeper meaning and the "angel" represented Satan which is kind of ironic.
ReplyDeletebecause Satan (Lucifer) was once an angel who betrayed god which god basically swatted to him to hell because he was trying to be god so basically the first thing in hell was an angel (a fallen angel) also known as a demon.
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