she [y]eats the apple.

In Modern Poetry, we're a-reading some Yeats.

Coincidentally, my brother is reading Yeats in his Irish Literature class. Brother dear dislikes Yeats dear immensely. But I'm kind of in love with Yeats.

I hadn't read any of his poems before. Literally, nothing. My poetry reading is pretty strictly limited to school assignments and a passionate, unrequited love of Auden, Eliot and Heaney.

But in Modern Poetry, I've fallen in love with Yeats.

The Lake Isle of Innisfree

I WILL arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;
Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honey bee,
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.
And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,	5
Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet's wings.
I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;	10
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray,
I hear it in the deep heart's core.

I really love how the images of community "hive for the honey bee" and "on the roadway" are contrasted with the idea of escaping to a world of solitude.

to read list

I've review a few movies on here, with plans for more.

But in my soul I am a literature person. So in 2010, I'm going to read/write a review for a book twice a month. 24 books! goals! I love goals, no matter how unattainable they may be.

I've come up with a preliminary list, welcome to suggestions. These are all books that I've never read, or want a second look at for a different perspective.

1. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close-Jonathan Safran Coer
2. Women in Love-D.H. Lawrence
3. A Good Man in Hard to Find-Flannery O'Connor
4. Selected Poems 1965-1975-Seamus Heaney
   
5. Middlemarch-George Eliot
6. Brooklyn-Colm Toibin
7. On the Road-Jack Kerouac
8. Atonement-Ian McEwan
9. Madame Bovary-Gustave Flaubert
10. Age of Anxiety-W.H. Auden
11. The Age of Innocence-Edith Wharton
12. The Golden Notebook-Doris Lessing
13. Brideshead Revisited-Evelyn Waugh
14. The Adventures of Augie March-Saul Bellow
15. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay-Michel Chabon
16. Mrs. Dalloway-Virginia Woolf (a reread)
17. The Hours-Michael Cunningham
18. Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror-John Ashbery
19. Shade of Grey-Jasper Fforde
20. The House of the Spirits-Isabel Allende
21. Don Quixote-Miguel de Cervantes
22. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland-Lewis Carroll
23. The Way We Live Now-Anthony Trollope
24. A Movable Feast-Ernest Hemingway

GOALS. any suggestions/substitutions?

Official, no changes, last change, Schedule for Next Semester

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Monday:
9-9:50-Eng-322, Women Question in Victorian Lit, Cozzens
1-1:50-Lat 202, MacEwan
4-5:15-Eng-350, Modern Poetry, Trousdale
5-8:30-Rel-233, Tibet Through Film and Lit, Zablocki

Tuesday
2-3:15-Art-150, Art History, Sadler
5:30-6:45-Rel-233, Tibet Through Film and Lit, Zablocki

Wednesday
9-9:50-Eng-322, Women Question in Victorian Lit, Cozzens
1-1:50-Lat 202, MacEwan
4-5:15-Eng-350, Modern Poetry, Trousdale

Thursday
2-3:15-Art-150, Art History, Sadler

Friday
9-9:50-Eng-322, Women Question in Victorian Lit, Cozzens
1-1:50-Lat 202, MacEwan

I'm more stressed then every third syllable in Dactylic Hexameter.

And did you know Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds-written in heroic hexameter.

Picture your self in a boat on a river with

tangerine tree-ees and marmalade skii-ii-es.

Ah Wikipedia.

by the way. George is the best Beatle. no way around it.

Nevertheless. This week has made my brain explode. Postmodern poetry in English. Cicero Criticism is Latin. Floor Work in Modern. Thucydides in Greek Civ. And Mindfulness is always stressful [irony?]

But I am suffering through. Still enjoying my classes throughly. I just wish everything wasn't due/hard at the same time.

Plus I'm having trouble deciding between taking 2 English classes next semester/ 2 Classics classes/ or one of each plus Art History.

This weekend is going to be enjoyable, however. I'm seeing Ethan and John, my adorable, lovely, little brothers, at Ethan's concert. And i'm brunching with Christy "TT" Keyser, the best friend who gave me my nickname, flippee.!

Morocco: Where I plan on becoming like any other woman, only more so.

Casablanca reference. Catch it.

[that building is a minaret apart of the largest mosque in the world outside of Mecca]

Meknes, Morocco. Hopefully my location for 6-12 weeks this summer!

This is a mausoleum in Meknes.

But I've always loved Morocco culture. I did a project on it in 7th grade. I had to make a "float" on like a wagon and it smelled like a kebab. Will did Algeria I think? Which is cute because they are right next each other.

But it had music. and obviously I chose...

back to this trip and Meknes.

I'm so excited. Even at the prospect of it. I have so much to do; before I can even apply I need to get a passport. So even if I don't do it, I'll get a passport.

I'd be staying with a host family, so I don't think I would take Arabic, at least I went for 6 weeks, because Moroccan Arabic is so different from Formal Arabic.

I would take the first three if I go 6 weeks, and all five if I go 12 weeks:

• Gender Studies: A Case Study of Morocco
• Exploration of Culture and History
• Archeology in Morocco
• Islamic Civilization and Artistic Expression
• Beginning Arabic I

But what I am really excited about is: planning my soundtrack.

Kearney family tradition states that you HAVE to have a soundtrack of sorts for any trip. Whether it is planned meticulously on a series of mixtapes or if it is because you let Julianna pick out the music and she only picked one CD that every one likes.

And since I spent the greater part of senior year and this semester feeling like Zooey Deschanel in Almost Famous when she sneaks Bookends into her house under her coat by listening to Simon and Garfunkel by the gallon, and since Kate Hudson goes to Morocco at the end of the film, my soundtrack is going to be a lot of Simon & Garfunkel, Led Zeppelin, Joni Mitchell, The Who, The Allman Brothers and David Bowie.

That would probably be my soundtrack of my life anyway. Anyways Taylor Swift doesn't really fit a) in that group or b) in Morocco.

Updates will continue to come on all Morocco plans, but I can't really do anything until I get a passport, which I am planning to get over the Thanksgiving Break!

Happy Halloween everyone! Pictures of Peacock Flapper tonight!

A Tale of Two Majors—English and Classical Languages

When asked what he looks for in a woman by the Proust Questionnaire at the back of Vanity Fair, Garrison Keillor said

High-spiritedness, wit, a love of repartee and wordplay and allusion and jokes—in other words,

an English major.

Well put, Mr. Keillor, who I actually had the oppurtunity to meet and chat with about golfcarts* at the Decatur Writing Festival this fall. And English Major [plus Classics] I will be. But here goes the rest of my academic plans that all point towards...becoming an academic.

Next semester I am planning on taking the following schedule (I'm registering in a week or so I believe)

Monday-Wednesday-Friday

Eng 322, The Woman Question in Victorian literature with [babuhdabum] Professor Cozzens! I've been waiting so long to have a class with her! My mom had her when she was at Agnes Scott for the M.A.T. program and I work with a lot of her current students in the Writing Center.

Lat 202, Intermediate Second Semester with Professor Jim Abbot!‡ I had Abbot this semester for History of Greek Civilization and I love him. This is the guy who makes me want to double major. I've never seen anyone get so excited by a 1/30th of a pediment.

Ant 101, I'm taking this in preparation for MOROCCO. [see next blog post] Plus it fulfills two graduation requirements. whoa. This class only meets on MW

Rel 232, Tibet in Film and Literature with Professor Zablocki. So everyone knows I love China. But the only country I love more than China, culturally, is Tibet! We just had a group of Tibetan monks on campus doing a sand painting. And it was very moving. Plus I love disenfranchised people. Could the Dalai Lama get cuter? And this class only meets twice a week from 5:30 to 8:30 on Mondays and 5:30-6:30 on Wednesday.

Tuesday-Thursday

CLL 212, Greek and Roman Heroes with Professor MacEwan, and I will have gotten the flush of Classics Professors! This is my only class on Tuesday-Thursday.

_________________________________________________________________

*Why is this my default topic of conversation? I love golfcarts and I love Peachtree City. I suppose it was appropriate to mention to Mr. Keillor the quirk of my small-town life. But golfcarts? C'mon Emma, this guy is one of your favorite Apples to Apples† cards

†A favorite game among Kearneys. I hope to meet someday my other favorite living Apples to Apples card—Sean Connery. Our other automatic win card is Carl Sagan. But unfortunately the Great One has passed on.

‡ I like to exclaim a lot. Especially about English and Latin!

Black Cat Formal

dancing
the girls

the dresses

ASC 101 girls-Lamest Class Ever, but super sweet girls
Max was there! Middle School buddies reunited.

Black Cat was so much fun, I feel supremely sorry for anyone who does not attend Agnes Scott.

ToDoWhooHoo

I set goals a lot. and one of my surprisingly good qualities is that I usually obtain them. just my goals are usually oddly arbitrarily selected, not necessarily improving myself, just giving me a sense of accomplishment, which I suppose does improve my self-esteem. but example: becoming a vegetarian-just to see if I could do it. for 8 years. I love causes, but that is not a cause; that is stubborn eight-year being contrary. Well these are my goals, silly or not.



1. Clean my room on saturday. Small room, lots of stuff, equals big mess in college dorm room.

2. Go running. once my toe recovers from its massive splinter. that I got from a toothpick.

3. Finish Middlemarch

4. Watch Love Story

5. Get my costume ready for Halloween. still up in the air about what I'm going to be exactly. Mrs. Dalloway or Miss Woodhouse are front runners for Friday and peacock if I can find the stuff for Saturday.

And life wouldn't be very Emma-like if I didn't have a far fetched goal.

6. I'm going to run a marathon.

Like Homecoming, but with less sobriety and more fun

Love me some Black Cat '09

Yellow Class-Valkyries '13

We ain't got no marching band
We ain't got a foot ball team
We ain't got a lot of things
Thank god that we've got Gold and Green!!!!

Work Study!

Last night was my first official job as a Writing Center Student Aide. and surprisingly it is a lot like what I did at the High when I volunteered there. Making sure people sign in, and avoiding conflict. At least so far. I work again tonight. Yay!

And my first American Lit. paper is due tomorrow. omg. it is going to be awesome.

First Week in Review

So

I love it here. Agnes is absolutely amazing. I won't bore everyone with orientation overview because it was boring. But I will tell you some highlights!

The Food-Omg, best college food ever. Alice, my adorable roommate, has heard me rave about it. But they have these phenomenal soups. And one day foccacia, mozzarella, and arugela sandwichs! amazing

The people-I love the people I've met so much. They are all so different and quirky.

Frozen Yogurt-I forget what the place is called. But there is a delicious froyo place downtown that if I knew about before coming, Agnes would have number 1 a lot sooner.

Classes-Latin 201, American Lit Post 1700, History of Greek Civ, Modern Dance and Mindfulness 101, crazy hard, but crazy fun.

This week we'll be volunteering tomorrow together as a class. I'm starting my work study job as a Writing Center aide and my first paper on D.H. Lawrence's opinion of Benjamin Franklin is due on Wednesday!

I feel so collegiate. Like Ali McGraw in Love Story. Except without the unnamed fatal disease.

First Two Days: Report

So I officially love Agnes Scott, but hate orientation. I want to go to class!

My roommate is like a cooler version of me. Alice is so sweet and nice and super smart. I haven't really met anyone else who I'm super close with, but I think that will change once classes start. I just hate the act of mingling, learning someone's name only to forget it.

The room is all decorated with polka dots and blues and green. My classes seem to be locking themselves into place. Latin 201 and Mindfulness 101 for sure still. Possibly American Lit survey, because I have to get it over with sometime or Lyric Poetry. and I really want this Greek Civ. class now after meeting the wonderful Classics Department.

I haven't had an official meal yet, only like continental breakfast and special meals for the orientation. That starts tomorrow if I manage to not sleep through breakfast. And tomorrow I am going to Tech! To see Megan, Christy and Katelyn, and possibly Jamie Wingo.

All About Agnes

My future alma mater, Agnes Scott College, is a women's college in Decatur, GA. I'm planning on majoring in English Lit., and if I can swing it, Classic Languages, but my schedule may be too hard to fit another major in, so I may just minor in it.

I'm so excited about being in Decatur, right near Eddie's Attic, and near enough to Georgia Tech to be able to visit Christy, Megan and Katelyn. And anyone, please feel free to visit me; I love Decatur already and would love to adventure around with someone. Anyway, the above picture is of the library at Agnes Scott, one of the main reasons I picked Agnes. The lamps are so gorgeous! Even on a completely superficial level Agnes is perfect for me. I cannot imagine going anywhere else.