Foxfire

Foxfire: Resistance against the unjust world

What do you think of when you think of a girl gang? Thinking back to my Korean schools, I would often see girls with tight uniform skirts, glaring at people from a corner and bullying other students without any reason. Even though Joyce Carol Oates is one of my favorite authors, I hesitated to pick up the book Foxfire because it is about the confessions of a girl gang. The girl gangs in cartoons or movies, like Charlie’s angels, are portrayed as cool, strong women warriors. But in real life, what the gang members do cannot be justified. I was very curious how Oates would bring gang members to life in her writing. After finishing the last page of the book, I felt as if I was a member of the Foxfire gang. Even though their actions cannot be justified, I was attached to Legs, Maddy, Goldie and Lana.
This book is a fictional memoir by Maddy, one of the original members of Foxfire. They are raised in the fictional town of Hammond, New York. Legs is a charismatic figure, with the characteristics of feminine pride and solidarity. On January 1, 1953, the Foxfire ritual is held, and the girls become a gang by getting secret tattoos of the gang’s symbol, a red flame. The process of Foxfire becoming a gang is very interesting and funny in some way. It just seems like a group of teenage girls trying to be “cool” by adding tattoos to their bodies and forming a secret “clique.” However, as Foxfire starts taking action in the real world, readers discover that Foxfire is more than simply a “clique.” The first action Foxfire takes against the community is the public humiliation of their high school teacher, Mr. Buttinger. Mr. Buttinger sexually assaulted Rita by groping her breasts after telling her to stay after for extra help sessions. The first Foxfire adventure was non-violent; they paint graffiti messages on Mr. Buttinger’s car, and he is mocked by the school and quits teaching.
Foxfire takes bolder action after Maddy’s uncle rapes her. Foxfire brutally beats him up. As Foxfire’s actions become bolder, the community gets to know about them, and several girls want to join Foxfire. Most of their crimes are smalltime—vandalism and shoplifting. However, Foxfire also takes an interest in charity. Legs insists that the gang should donate money to those who are needy in the community. As the reader gets to know more about each Foxfire member and what they are doing, the reader gets more immersed in the situations the girls are involved in. These girls are from the working class; it is hard to receive an education, and they often suffer from domestic problems, such as child abuse and alcoholism. The gang seems to be their refuge from the terrible world they are living in, and where they often need to face prejudice and sexual assault.
However, this terrible situation does not mean their actions can be justified. They stole goods from local stores, committed violent crimes, and even kidnapped a wealthy man for ransom. Kidnapping, in particular, is a very serious crime. Whatever goals the girls may have, they need to pay for their crimes. Even for chivalrous robbers like Robin Hood or Hong Gil Dong, their crimes, mainly theft, cannot be justified.

Foxfire was their only way to tell the world about the injustice in their lives. The girls would never have received attention in society and would have been abused physically and mentally if they had lived as normal high school girls. They lived in a harsh world; Foxfire protected them. Under the name of Foxfire, the girls could punish men who did not treat them well. If Foxfire did not protect Rita from Mr. Buttinger or Maddy from her own uncle, these girls would have been abused constantly. Foxfire is the manifestation of their anger towards an unjust society. Even when girls are sexually assaulted by men, they are often not protected by the police. The girls of Foxfire are trying to fight this injustice in their own way.
Foxfire is not just simply a story about a female gang. It is a tribute to brave girls who have the courage to fight against injustice. The end of their journey might not seem to be a clear victory, because they didn’t change the corrupt police or decrease the number of women who were raped, but they inspired a lot of those who did not have the courage to stand up. As Mark Twain said, “Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear—not absence of fear.” The Foxfire girls were probably also scared of the police or the law, but did not give up resisting the world.

A Lesson Before Dying

Book Review of A Lesson Before Dying- How One Man Changed the Lives of Others



America is called the melting pot because of its diverse races, leaving insoluble racial issues. Even now, racism is taken seriously in schools, work environments and other places. Earnest J. Gaines’s novel, A Lesson Before Dying, deals with the issue of race in the 1940s. Jefferson, a young black man, is convicted of murdering a white man. A plantation school teacher, Grant Wiggins, is asked to visit Jefferson before his death. With friendship between the two growing, Wiggins persuades Jefferson to be a hero, and Jefferson accepts Wiggins’ persuasion. The process of Jefferson becoming a hero impacts not only Wiggins, but the entire Cajun community.

Jefferson is convicted as a murderer, and his attorney defends him by insisting that Jefferson is a foolish young boy, incapable of planning a murder. The attorney says he would rather put a hog in the electric chair than execute such a thoughtless individual. However, the court sentences Jefferson to death by electrocution. Jefferson’s Godmother, Miss Emma, asks Grant Wiggins to visit Jefferson until his death. Wiggins is a successful black man, a teacher at a local school; however, he is not satisfied with his life, and is always thinking about whether he should escape to another state. At first, Wiggins refuses to meet Jefferson, and Jefferson is also dissatisfied with meeting Wiggins. However, a transformation begins to occur between the two hurt and confused souls.

When Wiggins first approaches Jefferson, Jefferson calls himself a hog and refuses any sort of communication. Similarly, Wiggins doesn’t seem attached to Jefferson. Jefferson is locked in pain and agony, while Wiggins is hypocritical and depressed. Because Jefferson was raised in a racist society, he does not have faith in himself, his society or his church. He just wants to escape the situation. Innocent, young black Jefferson takes on the insult of being called a hog, and he is just waiting for his death. He is a dark, powerless symbol in the white-dominant society. However, through the communication with Wiggins, Jefferson begins to transform into a symbol of positive change.

Slowly, both Wiggins and Jefferson try to understand each other and talk with sincerity. Wiggins no longer is angry or upset about visiting Jefferson, and Jefferson also accepts Wiggins’ visits. Wiggins advises Jefferson to be a hero. He tells Jefferson, “A hero does for others. He would do anything for people he loves, because he knows it would make their lives better. I am not that kind of person, but I want you to be…They expect it from me, but not from you. The white people out there are saying that you do not have it—that you’re a hog, not a man. But I know they are wrong. You have the potentials; we all have no matter who we are”(191). While Jefferson is hurt by the insults, Wiggins tells him to become a hero by being a good Godson and a good friend, persuading him to prove to the white men that he is not a hog.

Wiggins’ advice works. Jefferson proclaims, “Me. Mr. Wiggins. Me. Me to take the Cross.” Wiggins decides to take on the cross of others and to be the sacrifice. He is dying as a scapegoat of racism, but he makes himself into a brave man rather than a hog. Jefferson says, “But tell them he was the bravest man in the room today. I’m a witness Grant Wiggins, Tell them so.” His heroic death changed both himself and Wiggins. Previously hypocritical, Wiggins begins to learn to take responsibility. The death of Jefferson also impacts his society. This is not delivered in the book, directly, but Gaines shows how the death of one common man can bring change to the society.

Jefferson was an innocent man who never had more than a dollar in his pocket and who wanted a gallon of ice cream for his final dinner. Just because he was black, he was accused of a crime and was sentenced to death. Also, people mock him, calling him a hog. In the beginning, Jefferson is just a symbol of sorrow, but throughout the book, he turns out to be a hero who changes the society. Wiggins, an educated pessimistic black man, also transforms into a new person because he sees the injustice that Jefferson has faced. A Lesson Before Dying is not just a novel, it is a life lesson for all of us, because we all have the potential to change the world.

Reading Lolita in Tehran

Reading Lolita in Tehran: Under the Chador

What do you think reading Lolita means in Tehran? We can easily figure out that reading Lolita in Tehran means something a lot different from reading Lolita in America. In such an open culture where drugs and sex are considered just fun, Lolita may be an interesting but not a shocking novel. However, in an Islamic country where all women need to wear veils or chadors that cover their whole body and men dominate women, Lolita is a shocking new world that Iranians have never experienced. The experience of a new world is always exciting and fun, but there are many risks. The conservative government does not allow students to study with such books, but a professor really wanted to show the world to girls who aspire to come out of their chadors to take a big step toward the new world. Reading Lolita in Tehran is a written description of the courageous and dangerous journey that these women took. Living in an open culture, we should recognize this freedom as a great privilege.

Azar Nafisi, a former professor at Tehran University, decides to open a class for her students to communicate outside the boundaries of the university. Every Thursday morning, about ten girls filled with the desire to learn about the new world and view things in their own way gathered at her house. During class, they took off their chadors and expressed thoughts and experiences that they had hidden behind their veils. When we see women with chadors or veils, it is hard to recognize them as individuals, since we are not really seeing their faces, just the black clothes. However, each girl we get to meet in this book is intelligent, smart and full of astonishing thoughts. Under the chador, all the individual girls with different talents live as if they are all similar to each other.

The way the girls observe Lolita is very interesting. Lolita is a novel about the love between a man and a girl. These readers might get confused if the emotion of the man is love. He does some disgusting things to make the girl remain with him. While reading these books, the girls argue and talk about Lolita’s emotions, harshly criticizing Humbert’s actions. While reading this book, I could not feel that these women were the conservative, Islamic women covered by full-length veils. They sarcastically joked about how depressing their marriages were, how a conservative family drove one girl crazy and her passion and dreams about the future. Their conversation, vividly described in this book, changed my perception of Islamic women. They are the same as we are. They dream of meeting a sweet love, going to university, getting a good job, having girl talk, just walking around the streets in miniskirts and cussing in front of parents and friends who are annoying. However, they are not in a position where they can do what they want to do. That is the difference.

The last and most interesting thing is the desire to learn. In Tehran, students have lots of regulations, and professors are not allowed to teach whatever they want. The government takes cares of what to teach or not. These kinds of classes are unable to quench the thirst for learning. The students are eager to learn the things that they are not supposed to. They are ready to risk their lives to learn something new. Personally, learning was not a big deal in my life. I always had to learn something, and it was always offered to me. In short, learning is always something taken for granted, never a risk. However, learning means lying to parents and maybe even going against the law for these women. I never thought about the privilege that I received in my life because no one stopped me from reading a book. The right to learn, which seemed to be so obvious, was not that obvious and normal for these girls. It was a danger and risk, but they still didn’t give up learning.

Reading Lolita in Tehran takes off the chador from Islamic girls that we didn’t really know about. The love of the professor and the passion of the students make a beautiful class. Even though they met only once a week, they may not speak great English and their classroom is really bad, Reading Lolita is the most beautiful class in which women can be viewed as individual personalities. I saw the tears, anger, and passion hidden under the peaceful and blank black chador.