blog post #3

My family is definitely one-of-a-kind when it comes to basic home life. Therefore it was a challenge to relate to the family in Housework. To me, the language in Housework was reflective of their social class and work standings. When I began to read it, I definitely categorized them as lower class. Their means of communicating involved as little actual communication as necessary. They spoke in short, demanding phrases, paying barely any attention to proper grammar or appropriateness. Willy constantly seemed to be doing manual labor, while Martha was working with the children and Monica was doing chores. This made me think that the family was not very wealthy, for almost every “Image” occurred while working.

Then I started to compare their family, standings, and language to my own life. I live in a fairly average, middle-class household. If our family’s dialogue was recorded for a day, though, I don’t know how we would appear. We almost have our own language; we swear, enjoy crude humor, and talk in incomplete sentences. On the other hand, my dad, brother, and I love engaging in intellectual conversations late at night. Our language is all over the place, but we know how to communicate with each other. The jobs in my family are barely reflective of our “class” either. My dad performs beach shows at Kindercare, my brother plays in his band with him in the summer, I work at Noodles & Company, and my mom works for customer service at the airport. If someone received a description of our family on paper, or read a forty minute dialogue between the four of us…I don’t know how our language, work, and class could be fully understood.

My point is that these three characteristics can help define someone or something, but I needed to think back and relate the situation to my own life to make sure I wasn’t too quick to stereotype. I could somewhat relate to the work of Odysseus because he was in charge of making drastic decisions that would affect his entire crew. I’ve encountered many experiences with my friends where I’ve had to take that lead and be the decision-maker. One time specifically is when I planned a trip for my friends to go cliff-diving. I set it up with a specific schedule and items for people to bring. I had to make executive decisions about times and other planning issues, even to the dismay of some of my friends. It was a struggle to please everyone and I hated bossing people around, but like Odysseus, I was just looking out for the entire group. This may not help represent my class or language, but it does express my culture. Growing up in a creative family always motivated me to be a leader, which definitely shows through my work.

blog assignment 3

I am very lucky to have the opportunity to be a full time student and not work because my parents are supporting me. Not many people have the chance to focus all their energy on school without worrying about putting in hours at work. Although I cannot relate work, class and language, the fact that I don’t have a job says a lot about my social/economic class. It means that my family has the means to support an adult child who isn’t working.
One moment in my life that has showed me the difference in my family’s class and the class of other family’s was when my family was eating dinner with my boyfriend’s family. The difference in language use was so strikingly obvious! My boyfriend and his dad used lots of slang words and I could tell they were holding back swear words. My mom, dad and I don’t usually use slang words and we tend to use bigger or more sophisticated words. It’s not that we are trying to be snobby or superior, it’s just how we both grew up and what we are used to. Lots of people on both sides of my family went to college, while I’m not sure if anyone on my boyfriend’s side has been to college.
I noticed that in the story, the language used was simple and short. It reminded me a little bit of my boyfriend’s language, but his wasn’t that extreme. When I was reading the story, I felt for little Monica because I have been in a similar situation. When I was younger, my mom used to go away on business trips, and my dad wasn’t used to doing all the things she usually does around the house, so that responsibility fell on to me. As the years went on and my mom and dad both got different jobs, things changed. My dad now works from home and my mom is gone all day, so my dad has taken on all the responsibilities she and I used to take care of. So I can relate to young Monica, but as my life went on, my family is actually very different from hers.

When thinking about how language, work, and class all interact with each other I started to think about my own experiences and the jobs I have had.

In regards to my job--language has a really important role. As I am sure we all agree, the art of language is much deeper than simply being able to have a verbal exchange. I am a nanny and work for several different families. Each time I go in to meet a new family, there is a bond that is either made through communication or it is not. We can all probably recall times that we were conversationally on the same page with someone and when we really weren't. It could be as basic as humour or lead to more personal aspects in which you are able to communicate your thoughts and relate to the other individual on a deeper level.--While most meetings have ended well, with me recieving the job and I go on to have a wonderful relationship with the family--a few meetings have not, one sticking out in my mind. I met with a family and right away the mother was critical of my dress--a personal choice, which is fine--though a little odd to bring up right away. But, the main issue that arose was that she would not allow me to talk to the child--she yelled at her and told her to continue playing in the other room until we were done. Any connection we would have made through language/communication was broken.

While I was reading the Housework piece, I was horrified at the actions of the characters. While it obviously escalades to Willy drowning the baby at the end of the piece, the initial actions of neglect really stuck with me. For instance, in Image 10, they are leaving the house and Willy refused to go if the baby is going with them--and they end up leaving the baby in the house alone by the window. They are in no real rush to get back to it either only saying, 'Let's go home. He's at the window. If he came out of his blanket he gets cold, then he gets sick.' WHAT? They are mildly thinking about their baby at home getting sick? This goes against everything in me as a human--and in my job, working with children. It goes with out saying that I would never leave an infant unattended at home--an obvious difference between my view of life and work and Willy and Martha's.

Posting Assignment #3 (due Sunday 10/4, 11:59 P.M.)

One of the central issues in both Housework and Book XII of The Odyssey, as I think (or at least hope!) is clear to see, is the close relation between the kind of WORK a person does, that person's social and economic CLASS, and the way that person uses LANGUAGE (spoken and written) -- and how these three things, taken together, go a long way toward making people who they are.

(Think, for instance, about how work, class, and language plays out in the characters of Odysseus, Eurylochus, the other crewmen, Willy, Martha, and Monica.)

In this post, I invite you to reflect upon how work, class, and language interrelate in your own life. How do your work, your social/economic class, and your way of using language relate -- and how do they all combine to make you who you are? As part of your response, please make reference to (1) at least one specific event or moment in your life, and (2) at least one character from Housework or Book XII of The Odyssey, by way either of comparison (similarities) or contrast (differences) with your own experiences.

On a side note

Not sure if my interest in this was piqued by this class or if something else is at play here, but in a recent text reply about my week to an acquaintance of mine I wrote

"The drama train that is KHK has been fun to watch and ride, so pretty much snafu in its most litteral sense"

This answer came off the top of my head and after sending if I thought, where the hell did that just come from, and if this were ben's class, what would we all have to say about it.

Just thought I would throw it out there in response to our recent discussion of poetry and its value/importance today. I think texting in its radical limitations has made the importance of succinct writing (communication based more on implications and imigary than explanations) brutally clear.

Pg. 12

"Belle says we are in hell right now and there isn't a God who would make men and women wanting what they want and then stick them in a hell after they've done it."

I think that Le Sueur is trying to get across the idea that that the people in her story are living an extremely hard life. The context of this sentance has Belle talking about how rough her life is:

["Belle says this is a rotten stinking world and for women it is worse, and with your insides rotting out of you and men at you day and night and the welfare workers following you and people having to live off each other like rats. It's covered with slime, she says."]

and how fearfull she is of how her lifestyle is a reflection of her "bad" morality. I think that what Le Sueur is really trying to get across here is that the women of her story are really struggling. They are having to deal with very hard lives, and society is frowning on them for doing things that they need to do to get by. All of this speaks to the reader because I think that anyone who has contemplated religion has had a similar thought. Is it wrong to do whatever it takes to get by? Haven't most of us done things that are not technically acceptable according to the tennets of a given faith? Why would we be given these desires to do things and then be told that we will be punished for having them? I think that most readers can relate to all of these questions.

The Importance of Knowledge

“why sure Clara says, knowledge is power, the early bird gets the worm.” Pg. 3
This quote is very important because it is stressing the importance of knowledge. Especially because it is something that cannot be taken away from you..Or so it was thought to be that way. It was made very important by the many things that Clara always tells the Girl how to do things. Since the girl is meek and mild Clara helps her learn the tricks of the trade to get her acclimated into this society, a society that the girl’s mother most definitely does not approve of. Which is another thing that I find interesting, Clara I feel like sees herself in this girl. She left home when she was young and came to the big city. She feels that it is almost necessary to help the girl out. Another quote that goes along with this is “Something was in her so sure as if she knew everything I would never know.” (2) This goes along more with knowledge and the importance that it has.
Knowledge is a very powerful thing. Without this key tool it would be very difficult to succeed in life. The girl is realizing that although she had much knowledge about where she came from she no longer has this same luxury. She is forced to become something else and change the ways she once was if she wants to succeed. Clara on the other hand seems to have it all figured out, and the reason she does is because she has lived through enough and has had to figure it all out on her own. Without the knowledge that she has today she wouldn’t be in the place she is now. I felt that LeSueuer did a good job of stressing the importance of Clara and the built up knowledge that she has compared to the girl.

Three Cheers for Language

“Hurray, three cheers and down the hatch for birth, Bill and Butch poured out the moon into the whiskey glasses, held up and downed and held again.” pg 8, The Girl
Language is very particular in Le Sueur’s The Girl. There is an abundance of punctuation, stop and go paragraphs, and sentences that mend and meld together, as well as dialogue. I think this helps to make the thoughts and actions of The Girl interact with the dialogue in way that presents the text as one long inner monologue. It’s interesting because of the way that you might not know when the actual dialogue beings and the narration ends. It makes you pay attention to the text more than if you know who is talking and when.
I also think that an especially important factor in Le Sueur’s writing, represented in this quote, is the type of slang and the very unorthodox vernacular she uses often. Sometimes it is even difficult to keep up with the words used by each character when talking. It can be almost compared to “teen speak” which has parents and teachers confused on a daily basis. But to teens, and the characters in The Girl, the language makes complete sense to them. They know what moon is, what the birth symbolizes to them: a bet to be made, money to be won. It may seem stupid to us, but it makes entirely too much sense to them. And to us, the reader, we want to understand what they’re saying and tend to pay particular attention to words and phrases that we have no sense of. It makes the text, like Aristotle says, something distinct and stylish that can be separated for normal dialect.
The language by Le Sueur also brings about this feeling of rush or hurriedness. The text is replete with run-ons and has very few pauses where the reader can get there bearing on what the timeline is or how fast paced the story actually is. Most of the events take place very quickly, and with no introduction or explanation. The girl’s relationship with Buck, her work at the bar; everything is very quickly formed and executed. Without realizing it, we as readers, have become fully engrossed in her day to day dealings without ever being told these are actual day to day events.

Give and Receive- p.11

“He just beat us because he saw what we wanted and couldn’t give (11).”

This quote occurs in the story as the narrator is describing her family to Clara. In terms of content, it serves as a way to highlight the power relationship that exists between her father and the other members of her family. The father is seen as the breadwinner, and his inability to provide for his family is used as justification for his actions.

While providing a specific example of familial relations and traditional male roles in one instance, it is likely that Le Sueur intended to also use the narrator’s father as an example of male-female relations in society. That is, to use the specific situation to shed light on what appears to be an extremely patriarchal society.

Structurally, the sentence reinforces this power relationship by including only two subjects: he and us. The narrator never elaborates on who the other members of the family are, and it does not matter because there is only the father and everyone else.

In addition, Le Sueur does not include the word ‘us’ at the end of the sentence, which serves as a further illustration of the role of the father in the family. By not including ‘us,’ the author seeks to make the point that it does not matter who the recipient (or if there is a recipient) of the father’s giving is, but only that he is able to give. When he is unable, he cannot fulfill his social role, and takes this humiliation out on his family by beating them in an effort to maintain his dominance.

The usage of the word ‘just’ also serves as a way to naturalize the father’s actions against the family. That is, he beat them because he could not fulfill his natural role as a provider, which elicited a natural, physical response.

You did it on purpose...

She didn't mean anything! he said to the sky, Godalmighty, here I been hot as a hound for a week and trying to act nice to you because you are such a nice girl and then all of the sudden you egg me on.

Quote from the second page of chapter 8. Butch has just chased the girl down after she away from him tauntingly. She is trying to explain that her intentions were innocent and sorry as she was, she wouldn't lose her virginity in that field. The girl is terrified that her inexperience will scare Butch off and this sentence paints a vivid picture of the guilt Butch piles onto her fears of inadequacy.

Trying to act nice and being nice are two very different things. The word trying implies either that someone has failed or simply not yet succeeded in doing something. Use of the word act hints the behavior requires significant effort as it goes against natural inclinations. Butch is telling the girl in no uncertain terms that her actions are causing him serious discomfort. He is trying to be nice while she is purposefully being a tease, at least this is the impression Butch wants to give the girl.

In mid sentence Butch switches from yelling at God, to directly addressing the girl. He wants the girl to know that her naiveté is driving him to insanity, to the point that he would yell at the sky in the middle of a field. The exclamation point used in mid sentence after anything highlights the anger he uses to frighten the girl into submission. The combination of guilt and fear solidify Butch's hold over the girl.

Lastly Butch compares himself to a hound invoking images of canine nature. He uses the word egg to describe the girls behavior. These two images in combination allude to the stories of the fox/wolf and the chicken playing to primal ideas of predator and prey. Butch is the archetypal wolf in a sheep's fur.

Quote from pg. 1

"She made the hollowness of my flesh fill with people and she believed in love and everything comes to those who wait, kid - you would get anything you hankered for, she said, if you'd believe and keep it in the mind's eye"

This quote stuck out of the ordinary to me for quite a few different reasons. In the beginning of the chapter we are shown how much Clara means to her and how everything Clara says she's motivated by. With this quote it seems to show that Clara has experienced so much in life and knows that there is so much more to life then the bootleg bar they are working in and that she just needs to keep her eyes open for the opportunity to come along.

This quote specifically stuck out to me because of how she states what Clara does for her and how what she said is so important to her not only for the importance behind the saying, but because it is coming from Clara. I like how she states how she filled the "hollowness of her flesh with people," which to me means that Clara made her feel warmed, loved, and cared for not only by herself but from other random people also.

And then I liked how she states that Clara "believes in love and everything comes to those who wait." It made me think that there is this girl who is doing this grungy job that she probably does not want to do at all and has this amazing attitude of not only making other people keep there head's up, but also showing that she still believes in life's little miracles and that eventually, if someone works hard and waits patientally, something great will come to them. This girl makes not only everyone around her, but the reader's (such as myself) think that we do honestly get what we deserve and that we just have to keep our eyes open and keep believing (as corny as that might sound), it is completely true and I think we get frustrated and forget that so often.

And finally, it goes along with everything I have been stating as the quote comes to an end by saying "you would get anything you hankered for... if you'd believe and keep it in the mind's eye." Basically saying to me that, honestly, anything you long for will eventually come to you, if you just believe and keep thinking that it will come true (by keeping it in the mind's eye (which is a very creative way of saying it)).

page 33...

"i looked at him and saw how they both looked alike with those lean narrow heads, and that sharp nose like on a scent, and the high bones. I was afraid and started to go out and he followed and we got in the car and began to drive fast to the country and it was early Autumn"

As i was reading this passage I thought about the way that Meridel Le Sueur was describing the similarities between Bill (who had just been killed) and Butch. The way she describes the look about the two fascinated me. "narrow heads, and that sharp nose like on a scent, and the high bones." The words she uses are almost like she is comparing two people who are still alive.

I read this and i was picturing this scene in my head and for a second, i saw Le Sueur's face and had a brief feeling of what she must have been feeling at that point. and i pictured the way Butch looked and pictured myself looking at him while he was looking down at Bill. To me it seems like Le Sueur almost wants Butch to be the man Bill was because of the way she was describing them.

i also think the way she describes Bill and Butch together is very important in that she sees them as the same person or sees the same person coming out in Butch. With Le Sueurs' words here, she creates almost a new character and makes the reader see that Butch is almost a different person or will become a different person as the book continues....

page 33....

page 62

"I wouldn't see us a flat anymore but great burning balls of fire turning into eachother, piercing, breaking, howling, singing, melting together and tearing apart."

I feel like I've read enough books where two of the characters have sex, but I've never read one where the author uses such descriptive words and metaphors to describe a character's emotions like in Chapter 14. I think this sentence is full of directly related language and content.

The first part, "I wouldn't see us a flat anymore", is so simple but I think it really means a lot to the girl's relationship with Butch. Flat, is such an easy concept, and I think that's where they were in their relationship. The feelings and the want were there and that was the "flat" part, but once they acted on those feelings things became more complex.

I find the part where she references them as "great burning balls of fire" to be so intense. Then the descriptive words after that definitely confirm that feeling. I think that Meridel Le Suer used commas in between the words piercing, breaking, howling, and singing to describe all of the emotions she was feeling simutaneously while together with butch. Adjoing that with the phrase "melting and tearing apart" shows that each of those words represent different emotions the girl feels at different times towards Butch, but when she is with him they all are welded together.

After I had read this line, I thought about it for a little bit. I picture these burning balls of fire that Le Suer references to and I think about stars, since they literally are burning balls of fire. I feel like by saying they crash together it's like saying the stars are alligning, like maybe the girl had realized she's in love with Butch.

Crippled and hurt society

“It seems like my family was crippled and hurt as much as if their flesh had been riddled by bullets and their limbs were apart.
Meridel Le Sueur uses this specific type of figurative speech for several different reasons. Her (Le Sueur’s) “girl” came from the poor working class, where people had to make many difficult and most of the time dangerous choices in order to support their living. There were no job security, choices for poor people in regards to jobs were limited, and the jobs that they (poor people) could get were dangerous, which means people could get killed or crippled for the rest of their lives.
Besides, they were all living in violent society, where most poor people would get drunk, get involved in a fight, and get shot. And their flesh can get riddled by bullets and their limbs can be torn apart.
So, in her language, she (Le Sueur) not just trying to deliver the pain of parents “loosing the children one way or another”, which telling us about fate of children of most poor families of that time, she is also trying to deliver to a reader pain, struggle, and vulnerability of poor people of that time.
I find Le Sueur’s language somewhat revolutionary. “No he was good. Something was against him, all his working didn’t make no difference”. From this I can understand that opportunities for people of that time were very limited regardless of how hard they worked, and how hard they tried. They all had common fate awaiting for all of them – getting crippled, hurt, and riddled by bullets.
When she uses this sentence about this very family she is also compares it with a human body. When people lose some organs of their bodies they become crippled and nothing ever would make their bodies whole and complete. In this very sentence we can understand that every member of that family is needed, loved, and necessary, and losing any member of the family would feel like losing a part of the body. Without having all members of the family together this family is destined to be crippled and hurt.

"He only had to look at me..." (36)

“He only had to look at me to want to hit me good and plenty.” (36)

This quote comes from the beginning of chapter nine where the narrator first introduces the father as a character. Meridel Le Sueur makes it pretty clear in the few lines before that there is an uneasy relationship between the narrator’s family and the father, yet this quote is still used to show just how poor their relationship is. Her father mentions in his letter that he had sacrificed the best years of his life for the family and that he feels left behind. This quote on page 36 also seems to exemplify his feelings of betrayal from the family.

Later on in the same chapter, the narrator also mentions different ways in which she and her mother look down upon the father. An example of this includes the last few lines on page 38 where the narrator mocks her father’s intelligence and says, “He never went beyond sixth grade. He could yell at you like a terrible oath.” Another example of this is when the narrator looks back on the time when her father trades their nice home in the city for a farm in Wisconsin they know nothing about. The quote I have chosen on page 36 seems to fit into all of this because it shows that the uneasy feelings are mutual between the narrator and her father. The condescending attitude is not one sided as the narrator and her father both have some issues against each other.

Page 61 "Strange in the city..."

“Strange in the city to lie prone as if in a meadow along a line of sky, and feel each other near just as flesh as warmth as some kind of reaching into each other, on the other side of accidents and tearing apart and beating and collision and running into each other and blaming.”

I chose this quote because it created such a vivid image in my head. Along with that, I didn’t fully understand what every part of the sentence was trying to portray. I hadn’t experienced that before, such a strange combination of clarity and confusion.

Typically, sentences begin with words like “the,” “then,” or a pronoun. Meridel Le Sueur instantly intrigues the reader with an adjective. It wasn’t just another sentence in a novel; I immediately wanted to know “what is strange?”

The addition of the phrase “in the city” is necessary to prepare for the metaphor Le Sueur is about to reveal. It helps the reader recognize the drastic opposition between what she usually feels and what she is feeling at that moment.

“Meadow along a line of sky” creates an incredible image of relaxation. With this description and the use of the word "prone," I was able to imagine the main character lying almost in parallel with the sky. Also, there is nothing more calming than a clear image of nature. Instead of saying something like “a sunset on the horizon” she uses generalized terms so the reader can create their own soothing getaway.

Le Sueur continues on to explain the feeling of lying with a lover. Her descriptive words of “flesh,” “warmth,” and “reaching” make the reader feel those emotions, something simple, but so miraculous. “Reaching into each other” makes the reader feel connected with her lover.

She then explains the stress that she usually feels, from the bustle of the city. Her list format makes the reader feel more sympathy with every adjective or verb addition, splitting each one up with the repetition of "and." The city becomes more dirty, crowded, and ugly as she goes on. By placing “blaming” at the end, the reader can relate to the previous stories of her father blaming her and her family, leaving a strong image. This encompasses one of the main themes in the book, of incorrect blame and accusations being placed on females simply because of gender.

In the end, Le Sueur manages to present a glimmer of light and happiness beneath her cruel description of the city. Her impressive diction leads to a descriptive contrast.

Abusive Father

This quote comes from the narrator/main character of Meridel Le Sueur’s The Girl. “You never forget your father, I said, he is like dead eye sockets looking at you” (37).

I chose this quote because it captures many of the themes that are present throughout Le Sueur’s The Girl. First, this quote shows the male domination over females throughout the story. This male dominance is shown through multiple stories of verbal and physical violence towards women, including the relationship between the narrator and her father.

Second, the poor relationship between the father and the daughter might explain the narrator’s fearfulness, shyness, and innocence towards both men and the world around her. This helps Le Sueur tell the story in a very unique and creative way. The Girl takes place with a group of rough and rowdy patrons spending much of their time raising some sort of havoc in the legal and illegal nature. The author’s bullied, apprehensive state allows for the reader to explore the characters and the storyline from an interesting angle. The story would be much different if was told by someone such as Ganz, the brute, aggressive muscle of the book.
Lastly, this quote is important because the narrator’s relationship with her father is very much a product of the turbulent times she is living in. The story takes place in the middle of the depression. Jobs are scarce, people are on edge and angry. There is a desperation and meanness in the air. The story is filled with characters fighting off their pasts, attempting to deal with the present, while hoping for the future. It is clear that the main character, the relationships she builds, are a by-product of her environment.

One more important thing about this quote is that it is exemplifies another abusive relationships that has begun to show up in many of our readings in this class. In A Report to an Academy it is Red Peter and his abusive supervisor/trainer. In Theatre of the Oppressed there is the story of the illiterate woman realizing she was holding onto love letters from her husband’s mistress instead of important documents. Conflict and abuse seem to be a major part of most of the stories we have read and this offers another example from a new perspective.

chickenhamporkcoffeemilkbuttermilklettucetomatohotbeef

"I read all the sandwich signs, american cheese, chickenham-porkcoffeemilkbuttermilklettucetomatohotbeef....They looked like signs like lovehatejealousymarriage" (Le Sueur, 58).

Preceding this quote, Butch flirts with The Girl and tells her (again) about the service station he wants to own. Once he's made something of himself then they can get married, but for now can they just get a room? The Girl protests, which launches Butch on a loud, public rant about the difficulty of women, how The Girl has her eye on every man in the bar, and that they should end their relationship here and now.

The author's artistic choices allow the reader to have a greater connection with The Girl. Sometimes her character is quiet and seems agreeable, but this text shows that she is capable of producing original thoughts. This fictional character becomes a little more human, and perhaps a little more trustworthy. After all, she is the narrator, and how reliable could an agreeable narrator be?

Specifically, by combining all the menu items into one monstrous word, Le Sueur shows that The Girl's attention is wandering from what Butch is saying. The Girl already knows Butch desires her and that he wants to make something of his life. She's honestly not trying to be difficult, nor is she pursuing other men! She's crazy about him, but hesitant to love him. He's overreacting! Just as Le Sueur's words blur on the page, so too do The Girl's thoughts. She thinks in run-on sentences, mixing emotionally charged words (lovehatejealousymarriage) with inanimate objects (chickenhamporkcoffeemilkbuttermilklettucetomatohotbeef). She's just trying to kill time until Butch stops talking!

I read this quote and thought, "This is so EXACTLY what happens to me!" I get stuck listening to someone rant on a topic I've heard many times before, and this is how I deal with it: 1) Find a random object (anything, like a sandwich sign) to occupy my mind with. 2) Study it as if my life depends on it (because believe me, my life depends on surviving that monologue). 3) Let the person's words blur and mix with my astute observations of said object. 4) Continue this thought process until the rant is over, at which point I'm left with a mumble jumble of key words from their monologue, softened by pleasant thoughts of...sandwiches.

Last sentence on page 27

“And I heard Belle and Hoinck shouting and making love and crying all night.” 

In this sentence, Le Sueur describes the relationship between Belle and Hoinck.  It is a random relationship with emotions flying high and from all different directions.  I also got the feeling that it was obvious and many people knew the relationship between Belle and Hoinck was unstable.  She blended the sentence in with the entire page 27 although there is very little resemblance and relevance among the sentences.  Page 27 describes and tells the reader all the confusion and thoughts that are running through her head while she is lying on the couch.  How Le Sueur places that sentence tells me, the reader, that it is obvious that Belle and Hoinck have a very confusing yet intriguing relationship.  Le Sueur mentions three big emotions that are on different ends of the spectrum.  By doing that it gives me a sense that there relationship is going to play a role later in the story.  

How Le Sueur words and structures this sentence is also interesting.  Rather than naming the three different emotions and feelings off using commas in a list form, she uses “and” after the brief description of each emotion.  By doing that it compelled me to believe that although those three emotions are woven together, they still are not combined.  By using “and” twice instead of commas tells me that when Belle and Hoinck are happy they are only happy, when they are sad, they are only sad and when they are angry they are only angry.  Just by using “and” instead of a comma can change the meaning of that sentence. When I first read the sentence I assumed they just had a complex relationship but after thinking about it, there relationship is not complex, it is simple.