The Chosen

"You certainly have a mean way of pitching." [Danny said]
"How about your hitting? Do you always hit like that, straight to the pitcher?" [I (Reuven) said]
"Yes."
"How'd you ever learn to do that?"
"I can't hit any other way. It's got something to do with my eyesight, and with the way I hold the bat. I don't know."
"That's a pretty murderous way to hit a ball. You almost killed me."
"You were supposed to duck," he said.
"I had no chance to duck."
"Yes you did."
"There wasn't enough time. You hit it so fast."
"There was time for you to bring up your glove."
I considered that for a moment.
"You didn't want to duck."
"That's right," I said, after a while.
"You didn't want to duck any ball that I hit. You had to try and stop it."
"That's right." ...
"Well, you stopped it," Danny Saunders said.
I grinned at him.
"No hard feelings anymore?" he asked me.
"No hard feelings," I said.
(This passage was taken from The Chosen, by Chaim Potok, page 75.)

I loved this scene. I liked both characters from the beginning and was really pleased with this scene, when they finally decided they should be friends. Reuven had to forgive Danny for putting him in the hospital, and Danny had to humble himself enough to ask for forgiveness. Then, they became such great friends. They are perfect friends; they connect really well. And they may never have known each other -- even though they lived down the street from each other -- had it not been for that freak accident. I think their relationship is funny, because they go from wanting to kill each other, to being better friends than brothers. Freak accidents will do that though. It is interesting.

The Great Gatsby

Most of the big shore places were closed now and there were hardly any lights except the shadowy, moving glow of a ferryboat across the Sound. And as the moon rose higher the inessential houses began to melt away until gradually I became aware of the old island here that flowered once for Dutch sailors' eyes -- a fresh, green breast of the new world. Its vanished trees, the trees that had made way for Gatsby's house, had once pandered in whispers to the last and greatest of all human dreams; for a transitory enchanted moment man must have held his breath in the presence of this continent, compelled into an aesthetic contemplation he neither understood nor desired, face to face for the last time in history with something commensurate to his capacity for wonder.
And as I sat there brooding on the old, unknown world, I thought of Gatsby's wonder when he first picked out the green light at the end of Daisy's dock. He had come a long way to this blue lawn, and his dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He did not know that it was already behind him, somewhere back in that vast obscurity beyond the city, where the dark fields of the republic rolled on under the night.
(This passage is from the last page in The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald.)

The book ends with the narrator, Nick, staring off at the view which Gatsby had stared at for nights on end. The description is fantastic, though it makes me sad. I dislike the end of the book. Nick is rejected by his friends, who I never like in the first place and knew from the start would desert him. Gatsby is wrongfully murdered, and no-one comes to his funeral. How sad is that? I was depressed when I finished the book, to say the least. It goes to show that even if you have as many riches as you could possibly want, a massive house, and countless friends, that does not make you happy. Gatsby had everything except true friends. He was lonely, often depressed, and always thinking on the past. If you live in the past, then you have no future. He should have moved on, but his past was his undoing. The book is definitely well written, but I don't like it when the hero dies, especially for no good reason. Thus, I can not say it was a good book, but it was not bad either.

Humor

When the kid found out we were going to leave him at home he started up a howl like a calliope and fastened himself as tight as a leech to Bill's leg. His father peeled him away gradually, like a porous plaster.
"How long can you hold him?" asks Bill.
"I'm not as strong as I used to be," says old Dorset, "but I think I can promise you ten minutes."
"Enough," says Bill. "In ten minutes I shall cross the Central, Southern and Middle Western States, and be legging it trippingly for the Canadian border."
And, as dark as it was, and as fat as Bill was, and as good a runner as I am, he was a good mile and a half out of Summit before I could catch up with him.
(This passage is from O. Henry's The Ransom of Red Chief.)


I loved this story. I was laughing so hard through the whole thing. The two kidnappers are so stupid, especially Bill, and the kid is so wild and terrifying. I'm not sure what I would have done in their place. Even though they totally deserved what they got, I feel bad for them all the same. O. Henry did a masterful job of telling the story in a short and sweet way, and though it could have been longer, I think it would not have been any better if ii had been longer. It was a great, humorous story. And definitely deserves its status as one of Henry's best. I recommend this story to anyone who wants a good laugh and has a few minutes to spare. Fabulous story.