Post 6

I haven't read anything this week, and the week off has been great, but now I need to get back to the reading. I'm going to pick up Shadow of the Giant, which follows Bean's story after his time in battle school. I've been thinking about the books over the week and I've been contemplating the author's overall view of nature. In finishing Speaker for the Dead, I uncovered some very powerful and deep quotes from the book that an entire paper could be structured around. One of those included:

"For he loved her, as you could only love someone who is an echo of yourself at your time of your deepest sorrow."

From quotes like this which there are enough of to compile, I could form a thesis covering these quotes and how they give a deeper insight in to the characters and their motivations than other pieces of literature.

That's the kind of stuff I'm dealing with here. A lot of material.

Post 5

I've finished my second book quite early so I'm going to take a week off from reading. I've started to notice the difference in illustration of mental processes between the two series' of books. From Bean's stories, the thoughts are colder and more logical. From Ender's perspective, the thoughts are more empathetic and emotional. I could compare the two sets of books and characters for a paper. I'll have to read my third book for sure.

Possible thesie:

"The difference between Ender's and Bean's psyche force Card to adopt a different writing style for each book and show his versatility as a writer and storyteller."

I have finished Ender's Shadow and am now moving on to my second book, Speaker for the Dead.

Bean has helped Ender to destroy the evil alien race and is now contemplating the imminent war that is soon to follow on earth when the "Buggers" are no longer a threat.

Orson Scott Card doesn't use symbolism. Plain and simple. All those flashy descriptions and mental pictures of visual perception are nonexistent. Instead, he fills that large spacial gap in writing with detailed maps of the human mental processes. These processes, given the extreme intelligence of the majority of characters in these books, point to future plot development more directly without the use of symbols, just by illustrating the power of deductive reasoning. This in itself, the power of the mind, could be a great theme for a paper if it continues in the second book.

I could definitely see writing a paper with this thesis: "Card's lack of symbolism in his work opens up a large amount of open space in his writing which he chooses to fill with elements of characters that are more important to the plot and contribute more to the story than symbolism ever could."

I hate symbolism and the lack of it is refreshing.