Thursday, November 4, 2010

Discussion Questions

In response to Ryan's question (#4)

This is not your ordinary book you just come along, it is much more comprehensive. Just when you think you have it figured out, the story finds another way to twist itself. One of the many ways this novel speaks to you is through imagery and visualization. There are numerous pictures, and pages with just one sentences on them which gave that sentence much more impact and made you really think about it. The pictures in book weren't ordinary pictures, they were pictures that made you stop and think and try to find away to connect it to the reading. I think this is Foer's way of making us discover and find out our own way through the novel, just as Oskar is too.

The language of the text is very simple, but extremely complex, Oskar's intelligence level is much higher than your average 9 year old, making it confusing and hard to read his narration without questioning it. Oskar is extremely repetitive, repeating phrase and words that resonate with us. The writing style in the book helps us discover the book by for the first 100 or so pages we are still left in the dark about a lot of things, we never really know who is talking and have to piece together the pages. Once again i think this is one of Foer's ways of helping us to discover the book. He doesn't want us to just read through the pages effortlessly, but to have a journey and discover things along the way, just as Oskar is having his journey through Manhattan.

Throughout the book, Oskar is never one to say it bluntly, he will say it about never 100% straight forward. We have to assume a lot of things or use or imagination to fill in where he leaves us. We are forced to fill in all gaps or confused spots, with our imagination and ideas of what we think is going on. And they are constantly changing. I will admit that this book is one of my favorite read! Not being a huge reading fan myself, i found it very entertaining and captivating. I constantly had my mind thinking and never left me with a dull moment.

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