Class responses to essays by Virginia Woolf & George Orwell

On the theme of  Woolf's "Street Haunting"

The connections among all things.  She goes out for a pencil and finds a wealth of inter-connected ideas and thoughts.  A side theme is in its attention to details--and the joys that can be found in that pastime.

The theme seems to be "place."  More especially, the idea of home and the streets that lead up to it.  The characters and situations of the street are observed in great detail.

The walk of life and the things we encounter on this walk.  Woolf's reference to "haunting" gives an idea that things in life sometimes frighten us or they live in our minds haunting us even as we think that we have moved on to another leg of our journey.

Woolf questions the concept of identity by pondering who we are.  At one point she asks if we are more defined by the reality of who we are or the fantasy of our imaginations. 

Seeing, recognizing.

Eventually we must venture out into the "spoils" of society in order to appreciate the order and familiarity of our personal surroundings.
  
On every avenue of life there are opportunities to discover and examine other aspects of life (i.e., dwarf, musician).   All we need is an excuse or reason to go pay a visit (e.g., a pencil).

On the significance of the moth in Woolf's "Death of a Moth"
Life--the universality of it, observed on an extremely small scale--and the finality of death.

She seems to think of the moth as some thing (or someone) living its life.  She saw it in its prime and watched it get old.  Then she watched it die.  All in just a few minutes.  Something may be watching us in the same way.

The moth represents how the tiniest part of life (energy) can have the most intense desire to live (be recognized).

She has a great respect for the life spirit of the moth, as if she identifies it with a human spirit.

The moth represents one small, insignificant life in all its mediocrity and glory, much as the life of most human beings.  Appearance, actions, history go under a sort of microscope, making the seemingly insignificant more grand.

The moth represents life--maybe the life of someone she knows.
On the significance of the title of  Orwell's "Such, such were the joys"

A great ironic title.  He's recollecting his youth as something not completely joyful.  Perhaps he is poking fun at the whole "those were the good old days" mentality.

Sarcasm.  The joys of his younger life were few.

Sarcasm.  he knows he cannot change the way he was treated, so instead he chooses to take it for what it was.

Obviously an ironic title considering the horrors he describes.  But he says being a child is like seeing through alien eyes. 

Sardonic: the good old days are hardly that good when explored with true vision.  The obvious class structure in the school, the punishment of the lower-class boys, and the sense of being trapped and powerless--not very "joyful."

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