Up-Hill

I just read a poem titled, Up-Hill, by Christina Rossetti. When I read this poem, it made me think about how some of us feel as graduation is approaching. The poem is basically a person asking a questions and another person answering back. It begins by stating that the journey is long and continues on to talk about if there's a place to rest and when it talks about this place it hints that this place is a place for comfort and help.As we get closer to graduation, we feel excited to finally be done with one chapter in our life, but at the same time we may feel afraid or uncertain of what the future holds for us. The long journey that the poem is talking about can symbolize the long journey that we will have to experience in order to get to where we want to be. The place where the person in the poem can sleep symbolizes that there will be people there to help us get past our struggles and help us feel comfortable as we go through our new journey.

-Jamie N.

The Age of Innocence Book Review

Wharton, Edith. The age of innocence. Charlottesville, Va.: University of Virginia Library, 1996. Print.

Reviewed by Jamie Narimatsu, Los Osos High School, Rancho Cucamonga, CA


The Age of Innocence is a novel that is set in the1870s in upper class New York City. The novel introduces us with the main character, Newland Archer. He is watching an opera and across where he is seated, he sees his fiance, May Welland. He is happy that he is engaged to her and he wants to let everyone know that they will be getting married. After a while he gets up from his seat and walks towards where May is seated. There, he approaches her and she introduces him to her cousin, Ellen Olenska, who Newland knew as a child. After Ellen's arrival, Newland's life is turned around as he begins to realize that May is a girl who acts how society wants her to be, while Ellen is a woman who he is in love with because she is different than society and fights for her freedom.

Wharton made her society seem realistic and created it to be similar to the society in the 1870s. She created certain characters such as the Mingott family to show how upper class society was at the time and she created an outcast like Ellen to show how the upper class judged the people that were different or were not a part of their class.

 The Age of Innocence is a novel that was cleverly created. The setting and theme were interesting choices and the drama filled plot will make readers want to keep on reading the book until the end. This is a book that is worth reading and readers be yearning to find out how the relationship between Ellen and Newland will end up.

-Jamie N.

Tess of the d'Urbervilles Part 2

I recently finished reading Tess of the d'Urbervilles and to me the ending was very unexpected. I found this book to be interesting at first, but as I read more of the book, it became more interesting and exciting. Throughout the novel, Tess demonstrates her loyalty and her love for those she cares about by doing things that will benefit them instead of herself. After Tess leaves Alec's house, sess decides to go back to receive money for her family in order to help them out of poverty. Since she made this decision, her life suddenly takes a turn that changes her fate. Alec falls deeply in love with Tess, but she refuses to marry him because he acts controlling and violent towards her when he doesn't get his way. Her innocence is later taken away and she escapes Alec and decides to go back home. She becomes ashamed of her past and is forced to start a new life in order to hide her past. She falls in love with a man that she once saw at a dance in her village earlier in the novel. However, her past continuously haunts her and eventually leads to her making a decision that will lead to her downfall.

-Jamie N.

Tess of the d'Urbervilles Part 1

Recently, I have started to read Tess of the d'Urbervilles and I am beginning to become very interested in this book. In the first chapter, Tess's dad learns that his ancestor was one of the twelve knights that assisted the Lord of Estremavilla and that branches of his family held manors all over Normandy. To Tess's dad, it meant that if he found his wealthy relatives, then he too could be wealthy. Her dad becomes ecstatic from the news and decides to go to a nearby pub to celebrate. Her dad becomes too drunk to deliver the bee hives the next day and Tess decides to do it for him with her younger brother, Abraham. This eventually leads to Tess accidentally killing her dad's horse which convinces her to go to Alec Stokes-d'Urberville's house to claim her kin because she wants to get some help for her family.
After reading the first few chapters, I think Tess is a very sweet, innocent, and caring girl. For example, she takes care of her younger siblings as if they were her own children and she volunteers to do things that will help her family. She also feels uncomfortable when the subject of her getting married is brought up and when she meets Alec for the first time, she acts very politely and feels slightly embarrassed for telling him that they are related as soon as they meet.
I am interested in finding out how Tess will transform throughout the book and how she will be at the end of the book. Part 2 will come after spring break

-Jamie N.