Assignment #2

http://changethis.com/manifesto/show/51.01.YourHowl

Summary of Story #2

The author describes in this story a fifth grade assignment in which everyone had to write a five-page paper. The author was unable to complete the requirement, but his friend was, describing a recursive story where a tiger tried to escape from a cage but continually jumped into other cages forever. His friend both met the length requirement and discovered a fact of life. Everyone will jump into cages and never escape as long as they keep their fears, but as soon as one learns to face all of them, they will be free and find the true self.

Essay

"Fire and Ice" by Robert Frost

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice. 

Robert Frost analyzes the relative effects of passion and the absence of emotion in this poem through the metaphors of the ways that fire and ice can destroy. At first, Frost acknowledges that fire is a powerful force and makes a concession to those who believe that its heat and intensity can do powerful damage. Then, starting with the fifth line, he makes his own point that an equal amount of hate and destruction can result through a very different way, through the coldness and distance of ice, which is a strong enough force in itself to do an equal amount of damage as fire. In the context of hate, this means that direct methods like violence and threats can sting and cause a great deal of hurt, but the more subtle and natural fashion of doing so through lack of caring and indifference is a far more widespread way of doing so and has brought as much, if not more suffering than passionate hate.

One of the best examples that comes to mind for how this works in real life is from Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "Letter from a Birmingham Jail." In this essay, he reaffirmed the values of the Civil Rights movement and spoke of his belief why the American public had not yet accepted African Americans as true citizens, saying "We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people." He asserted that there were a significant minority who contributed to the consensus of discrimination through direct hateful attacks of violence, who were largely located in the South, but that the real problem was the majority of whites all throughout the U.S. who knew and understood the discrimination but never spoke out against it. These people, through choosing to turn their heads to injustice, had become the real roadblock to African American equality. Relating back to the poem, these people would represent the "ice" that hurt just as much as the "fire" of those who were more visibly racist.

"Fire and Ice" has a lesson to teach to a creative soul. An emotionally intense environment can be created through obvious, measurable means like bombast and technicality, but an arguably more effective way to do so is through indirect and subtle methods. For me, a movie like Cloverfield may impress with its special effects in creating an apocalyptic world, but what I found more striking was the way the camera shook with each scene to create a realistic and engaging feel for the viewer. Momentarily, the complex computer work used to perfect the monster at the very end may have caught my eye, but I can still remember the way the constantly shifting camera formed another layer for the viewer. Rather than using the common method of static camera angles, it focused on certain aspects of the environment in real time, just as someone living out the story would.

From the perspective of a recording engineer, which will hopefully be my career someday, this means that creating intense, dense layers in music may not always be the best method to capture the emotions of the listener. I have often listened to pretentious rock songs that try to make their mark through overbearing elements through adding in an orchestra, or using harsh guitar tones, but my favorites are often the ones that use the common instrumentation of drums, guitar, and keyboards to a more textured and implicit effect. I hope to find my howl by keeping in mind the values of "Fire and Ice" in my later career in this way. It may be tempting to launch a fiery attack on the emotions, but leaving them alone entirely will burn in a far more chilling way.