Mr_Shank

LAST POST!!!!!!!

Honestly, this was the hardest part of the story to connect to real life. Thankfully, after talking to my sister who works on an army base, I have decided to connect this last part of the book to an anxiety disorder associated with soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan: Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, or PTSD.

PTSD occurs after someone undergoes extreme traumatic stress and causes  psycohlogical and sometimes physical damage. In the case of sodiers returning from war, they have gone through being shot at or being wounded, they’ve witnessed people dying around them, and they have possibly killed people themselves. When they return home, back to a “normal life”, little things that used to seem trivial can remind them of those moments when they’re own traumatic stress was at its peak. This can make them feel alienated from their friends and family, make them want to be alone most of their time, and depending on the magnitude of their disorder, can make them suicidal.

To me, John Grady has some form of PTSD. He’s gone through the same traumatic events as sodiers; he’s witnessed murders, been wounded, killed someone else, and he’s gone through the emotional pain of losing Alejandra. He also tells the judge that he’s being tormented by the fact that he killed the assassin in the jail where he and Rawlins were held. Finally, after being home for a while and talking to Rawlins, he realizes that he can’t stay in San Angelo anymore; he feels alienated and leaves alone on horseback, not sure himself of where he’s going.

What is going to happen to John Grady now? Is he going to go the way of some soldiers, become suicidal and all that? Or will he somehow find peace during his time alone? Do you think he will ever find his true home and gain the happiness his life once had? Feel free to throw in your own ideas!!

So, I think we can all agree that this part of the book is extremely negative after the previous chapter. With that said, I would like to connect this section of the story to a previous book that we all read, Night by Elie Wiesel. Night is a memoir of the Holocaust and follows the author’s struggle for survival with his father in the various labor camps they were held captive in. Jews were seen as lowlifes to the Nazis; they were held captive in the worst conditions and many were shot just for the heck of being shot. Many turned on each other and fought over as little as a crumb of bread.  But with promises to stay alive for each other, the author and his father survived some of the harshest conditions of the war. Sadly at the closing of their captivity, his father died.

John Grady and Rawlins seem to have the same relationship during their imprisonment as Elie Wiesel and his father had during theirs. Like the Wiesels they are imprisoned for being considered lowlifes, in this case horse thieves. They are held in disgusting conditions, Blevins is shot without a fair trial, and their own fellow prisoners fight constantly; they themselves ar ewounded a lot during these fights. However they always promise each other that they will stick together no matter what. Just like Elie Wiesel and his father.

At the end of their captivity their promise to stay together is forgotten as Rawlins decides that he wants to go back home and John Grady decides he wants to find Alejandra. This is similar to how Elie Wiesels father dies and he is left to survive; they go their seperate ways. Would you have stuck to your friend if you were in the same predicament as John Grady and Rawlins or would you have gone for the whole ‘every man for himself’ kind of approach? Also, after everything they’ve been through, do you think it’s a good idea that the friends split up now? And did their split take you by surprise? Because it did for me.

After reading this section of the book, it is clear John Grady’s life has taken a dramatic turn. He’s now a prized employee to a wealthy rancher. He has also fallen for a girl named Alejandra. They’re very first encounter is, from John Grady’s point of view, love at first sight. Their love is jeopardized by the fact that she is his boss’ daughter and he is one of her father’s most prized employee. If the boss ever found out John Grady was dating his daughter, he would fire him and Rawlins and the two would lose the good lives they’ve gained. This is made clear by Alejandra’s aunt, who vaguely tells John Grady that it would be a bad idea for him to date her niece.

Despite the warnings and the dangers, John Grady and Alejandra engage in a secret relationship. This is very connected to Romeo and Juliet. In Shakespeare’s play, the star-crossed lovers are forbidden to even like each other because of the feud between their two families. However, just like in this book, Romeo falls for Juliet on sight and they are secretly married secretly. As everyone knows, the play ends in a tragedy with Romeo and Juliet dying.

Do you think John Grady and Alejandra’s romance will end in tragedy like Romeo and Juliet’s, or do you think they will end up living happily ever after? Do you think their relationship had something to do with John Grady and Rawlins being taken away at the end of the section?

Ok, so I’d like to connect what has happened so far in the book to a real-life crisis that America is facing right now: illegal immigration. Mexicans are crossing the U.S./Mexican border so they can start a new and better life in the United States. In the story, the same thing has happened, only the other way around. John Grady, Rawlins, and Blevins are Americans who cross the border illegally.

The U.S. is known as the land of opportunity. That is why Mexicans are trying to sneek across the border. They want to start better lives. Those illegal immigrants who are caught are usually deported back to their own country, whether it be Mexico or somewhere else, unless they get some sort of special permission.

In the book, the reason the three Americans cross the border isn’t really made clear. It’s assumed Blevins has had a hard life at home with his stepfather, but with John Grady and Rawlins the reason they left is sketchy. Rawlin’s seems to be sick beyond the help of medicine and John Grady doesn’t want to leave the home he’s always known to go live in some city where he’d have to start all over again. Did these three characters cross the border for the same reason illegal immigrants are now? To start a better life? Or did they just want to “get away from it all”? Also, what do you think will happen to them if the Mexican government finds them? The people they’ve met so far don’t really care if they are illegal immigrants, but the government may think differently. Do you think they’ll be deported, or killed, or…. what?

After being stuck alone in a house with the crazy curate for so many days, the author begins to lose his patience with him.  The man has lost his sanity, his will to live, and is becoming a serious threat to both of them.  This situation can be related to, yes, the Lord of the Flies.  In Lord of the Flies, the boys turn to savagery when there is now one to control them and keep them from committing crimes.  This is shown in two different ways in War of the Worlds.

The curate goes crazy when he is thrown into the chaos of the Martian attack because there is no longer anyone to tell him what to do or keep him in control.  And after being with him for so many days, the narrator does something he would have never done in normal society; he kills the man.

On a much larger scale, the rest of England is also going insane.  With the government out of the picture, there is no one to control the rest of them. This throws people into chaos.  Crimes and other horrible deeds are committed by people who would have never done anything like that when there was something keeping them in line.  Both of these classic books have this similar concept in them.

However, desperate times call for desperate measures, right? Or should people still try to be good citizens and work together?  Considering both these perspectives, do you think that the narraor made the right decision when he killed the curate? Was there any other way, or was more death the only option?

-Shaun Ditzler

I feel that the book can still be connected to the movie Independence Day.  In the movie the aliens are destroying cities everywhere.  In the book the same thing is happening.  Oddly enough in both the book and the movie they use Heat Rays.  However, in the movie the aliens were in aircraft hovering over the ground, while in the book the martians were on the ground.  The Heat Rays were also different but they still destroy everything in site.  There is one big difference between the two though.  In Independence Day the airships had shields that stopped anything from damaging them, but in The War of the Worlds if the robots get hit with any kind of gun round it can do damage.  But if you miss your target your dead.

I have one question-What do you think the military would do if martians did attack earth, and they had both the airships AND the robots?

Kody Bell

I believe that War of the Worldscan be connected to the movie Independence Day. In the movie, aliens come and attack earth. However, in the movie the battle is in the air, where as in the book the attack is on the ground. In both the movie and the book the people are intrigued by what is going on. They all run out of their houses to see what is going on. In both cases the people are being sucked into the trap. In their minds they know that it is dangerous, but yet they have this drunkenness to them where they need to see it. Kind of like in the Lord of the Flies. The boys on the island get in this stage of mind where they can’t control themselves. It is a very scary thing.

I leave you with a question: If extraterrestrial landed in the United States (for real) how do you think we would really react?