Friday, February 22, 2008
Augustus' Death
Is anyone else severely disappointed in Augustus' death? I am. He was such an integral part of the story to me. The one who inspired Gordon, the one who figured out a way to sneak him on, the one who saved his life. Gordon previously stated that he used journal entries to put in information that is not all that important, and yet he discloses the death of his best friend in journal form? I was mad at him for that (Aug. 1, page 1106-07). Just wanted to see if anyone else felt that way.
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4 comments:
I'm with you Libbie. I don't know if I'm mad, but I felt horrible when he died the way he did.(Although I'm glad Arthur Gordon didn't have to eat him.) But it bothered me that the sharks ate him. I don't think they would have- he was dead. I doubt he was bleeding- sharks like to eat people and other fish that are alive and splashing around. That part was not realistic.
That's another thing that bothers me about this story- It's a curious mix of realism and dark romanticism. The "man eat man" theme amid the "Blackwood Article " background shows Poe to angry at the publishing business.
I haven't finished the story yet but I'm starting to get the impression that Arthur Gordon also dies and somehow this "ms" gets back to civilization just to describe his "sensations."
I was rather disappointed that he even died. It's a shame...you would think Poe would have wanted to keep him alive--camaraderie and all that. But ah well.
I felt that Augustus seemed to be a better, more interesting character than Pym. He obviously had an interesting relationship with Peters too which could have been explored. Its weird how Peters didn't seem to care about his death either. They both move on.
Question, do you think that Peters and Pym become friends or not? Poe never really delves into their relationship other than they are always there to save each other.
I thought the journal disclosure was weird too. I mean I guess as long as it's in the narrative somewhere it shouldn't matter just so that we have closure as to what happened. I don't know maybe he thought he was making the death more personal by putting it in the journal, hard to say for sure, huh that seems to be a common theme in this narrative. I also agree with Kevin about their relations not being descriptive enough, because even at the beginning there was confusion of homosexuality versus friendship between them.
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