Royal Diaries:Anastasia:The Last Grand Duchess

When I first heard the story about Anastasia Romanov it was actually through the animated movie from 1997. I was 9 when it came out and it was one of my favorite movies. Little did I know that Anastasia was a real person and the true story about her is absolutely heartbreaking, unlike the movie; the movie had a happy ending. The author, Carolyn Meyer, agrees that the true story of Anastasia is rather heartbreaking, but while writing her book she decided to embrace the romantic fantasy that there is a possibility that Anastasia escaped from execution. I am a major history buff and always have been! When I was young I always loved reading books like these that intertwined real history with fiction. The fiction bit just enhances the actual historical events a little more. What I love about this book is that it is actually set up like a diary. We are reading Anastasia's journal entries. It reminds me a lot of the Diary of Anne Frank. The book begins with a twelve year old Anastasia. Being a grand duchess of Russia, she seems to have everything. Her life is great until Germany declares war on Russia. From there things just go down hill and her family is eventually forced to move to Siberia where they are held prisoners. Her life is then turned upside down and lives a lot less luxuriously than before. From there she can only wonder what will happen to her and her family but still remains hopeful.

the princess and the goblin

I didn't even know this book existed, much less the movie. But now that I've read the book I fully intend on watching the movie! It looks cute!

Alice in Wonderland

I am so happy that we have finally made it to Alice and Wonderland. And I do not say this because I have read it before. On the contrary, I have never read the whole thing and am excited about doing so. I pretty much already know the story because I watched the movie as a child but I never actually took the time to read it. I thought the story of how the work Alice in Wonderland came to be was quite interesting. It, like a lot of other children's literature, was actually an oral story first and then transferred to paper. Alice in Wonderland is best known for its complete and utter nonsense, but that is what makes it so popular. The tale is filled with allusions to Carroll's friends and enemies, as well as the lessons that British school children were expected to memorize. The crazy and confusing dialogue is what kept me reading it. I'll admit that at times I was utterly confused but yet I couldn't stop reading it! I can't wait to discuss it in class!

The Magician's Nephew

Although this is the first installment of The Chronicles of Narnia series, I actually started off the series by reading the second installment, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. After reading it I decided I wanted to read the rest of the series as well, but I was going to go back to the beginning. I have now read and own all of the books in the series. C.S. Lewis is now one of my favorite authors! I have actually seen The Magician's Nephew performed on stage as well. Peers from high school performed it for One Act Play. The play was just as good as the book so I was very excited to hear that they were also making the series into movies. A major theme throughout this book is Christianity. I myself didn't recognize the parallelism until someone showed it to me. In this book Lewis illustrates themes of creation, original sin, temptation and primal innocence. The Lion Aslan acts as God while the evil Queen Jadis acts as satan. Later in the series readers can notice the parallelism with the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ too.

Poems and Prayers for the Very Young

My mother bought this book for me when I was a very young girl. There was always a strong Christian influence in my home so we would read the prayers included in this book. The following are some of my favorites.

Dear Father, Hear And Bless
Dear Father,
hear and bless
Thy beasts
and singing birds:
And guard
with tenderness
Small things
that have no words.
-Unknown

A Child's Prayer
God, make my life a little light,
Within the world to glow,
A little flame that burneth bright,
Wherever I may go.

God, make my life a little flower,
That giveth joy to all,
Content to bloom in native bower,
Although the place be small.

God, make my life a little song,
That comforteth the sad,
That helpeth others to be strong,
And makes the singer glad.
-M. Betham-Edwards

All For Thee
All for Thee,
Dear God,
Everything I do,
Or think,
Or say,
The whold day long.
Help me to be good.
-Unknown

Table Blessing
God, we thank you for this food,
For rest and home all things good;
For wind and rain and sun above,
But most of all for those we love.
-Maryleona Frost

Bedtime Prayer
Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray Thee, Lord, Thy child to keep:
Thy love guard me through the night
And wake me with the morning light.
-Unknown

The Science of Fairy Tales

I found this article a few days ago on Yahoo News. I thought it was very interesting and insightful.

Chris Gorski
American Institute of Physics
LiveScience.com Mon Feb 11, 4:05 PM ET

Kids of any age love to read fairy tales because the storyline never limits the possibility that anything could happen. Curses, spells, and handsome princes reign in worlds beyond the reader’s imagination.

But are the most magical moments from some of our favorite stories actually possible? Basic physical principles and recent scientific research suggest that what readers might mistake for fantasies and exaggeration could be rooted in reality.

So suspend your imagination for a moment, and look at the following fairy tales as a hard-core scientist might.

Rapunzel

In the Brothers Grimm story of Rapunzel, a witch holds a beautiful young woman captive in a tower. Rapunzel is blessed with a lovely singing voice and long, long blond hair. One day, her voice enchants a prince passing through a nearby forest. They fall in love, and Rapunzel lets down her hair so that the prince may use it to climb the tower to meet her. This chain of events begs readers to ask a question. Can human hair support the weight of another person?

On average one strand of hair can support about three and one-half ounces, or about the weight of two candy bars. Each strand of dark hair is generally thicker, and therefore stronger, than blond hair.

But, alas, Rapunzel must make do with blond locks. Given that blondes generally have about 140,000 hairs on their heads, her hair should easily support the weight of many, many princes. However, there is more to this story.

If Rapunzel simply let down her hair and the prince started climbing immediately, her hair would not break, but it might rip out. Also, the rest of her body might not be able to support the weight. Thankfully, there are strategies that she can use to help reduce the strain on her head and body.

Nathan Harshman, Assistant Professor of Physics at American University in Washington, DC, suggests Rapunzel would be safer and more secure if she tied her hair around something before lowering it. “The whole idea is that you can use the friction of the hair against itself in the knot, and whatever it is tied around will support the weight of the prince.” That is a much better idea than making Rapunzel’s scalp the anchor point.

The Little Mermaid

In the Disney version of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid, Ariel (the mermaid) asks a witch to make her human because she has fallen in love with a human prince. The witch bargains with Ariel and takes her voice in exchange for performing the transformation. For a considerable part of the story Ariel cannot speak, which is a problem because the prince can only recognize her by her incredibly beautiful singing voice. Later, she recovers her voice and wins the love of the prince (sorry to spoil the ending).

In the story, Ariel loses her voice because of a curse. However, a less skilled sorceress could use a different method to silence a singing mermaid. Scientists have figured out a way to bend sound waves around an object and, can even prevent the escape of all sounds created inside a given area (important for keeping a transformed, singing mermaid from being heard).

Recently, Steve Cummer, Associate Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Duke University announced that it is theoretically possible to create such a sound shield. Building on research demonstrating how light waves can be bent around an object to make it appear invisible, Cummer and his collaborators used mathematical analysis to show how to do the same thing with sound. They established that it is possible to create a material that bends sound waves around walls, pillars, or any enclosed area, where the sound waves emerge as if nothing had been in their way. It would be like someone in the bedroom being able to hear what someone in the living room said, but as if there were no wall between them.

A side effect of this discovery is that sound waves generated inside the enclosed area would never escape. If the witch had been extremely clever, she could have built this material, and there would have been no need for a curse. Or maybe she did, and a transparent sound shield based on these principles was what enveloped Ariel until her love for the Prince melted it away, finally releasing her melodious voice for the Prince to hear.

1,001 Arabian Nights

One of the most exciting objects found in fairy tales is the flying carpet. In tales from a wide variety of cultures, including 1,001 Arabian Nights, these tangled tapestries take flight to carry people vast distances. Flying carpets are clearly impossible, right?

Three scientists recently published a paper in the journal Physical Review Letters showing that there are conditions under which a carpet could fly. They used the basic laws of physics to show that a small, thin carpet could fly if the air were vibrating at the right frequency, much like how a piece of tissue paper floats softly to the ground when it is dropped. Their calculations showed that small waves of air in repeated fast pulses could steer a carpet at a speed of around one foot per second.

Don’t expect to see Aladdin flying by anytime soon, but the scientists write that all of their conditions “are within the realm of possibilities in nature and in technology. Making a heavy carpet fly would, of course, require a much more powerful engine, and our
[calculations] suggest it will remain in the magical, mystical, and virtual realm as it has existed for millennia.”

Perhaps some fairy tales are more grounded in reality than others. Or maybe these precious stories are exactly what we thought they were. An idea is fertilized by the imagination and expanded beyond what seems possible. Or maybe science has come so far over the years that scientists are looking beyond the problems of the physical world and into the imaginations of children for their inspiration.

What could be next? Perhaps a scientific debate over the temperature at which porridge is considered “just right.”

A Morbid Youngster

When I was a preteen, I absolutely loved mystery and horror stories. I loved reading the Goosebumps books and whenever I checked books out of the library, it always had to do with ghost stories or famous murders. I was especially fascinated with books based on events that had happened close to my hometown or at least in the state of Texas. Most of it was fiction but some of my readings were also supposed to be somewhat true, which made the stories creepier. But I felt the creepier, the better!

In the spirit of Valentine's Day. . .

Oh My Darling, Valentine

(to the tune of "Clementine")

In a toystore
on a Sunday
with a dollar forty nine
I need something
just a dumb thing
for my brand new
Valentine.

Oh my darling.
Oh my darling.
Oh my darling
Valentine.
I'm uneasy,
kind of queasy,
but you're still my
Valentine.

Yes, it happened
in the classroom
when you said
"Will you be mine?"
I was muddled
and befuddled,
so I answered,
"Yeah, that's fine."

Then you called me
in the lunchroom.
You had saved a
place in line.
And I knew that
it was true that
I was now your
Valentine.

I went shopping
for a present
and I saw this
blinking sign:
"Here's a pleasant
little present
for a brand new
Valentine."

So I bought it
and I brought it
in my backpack
right at nine.
Do you like it?
It's a spy kit
with a flashlight
you can shine.

I could tell you
didn't like it
when you said I
was a swine.
How exciting!
I'm delighting.
I have no more
Valentine.

Till another
person stopped me
and they asked
"Will you be mine?"
This is crushing.
Oh, I'm blushing.
I've another
Valentine.

--Kenn Nesbitt

Critical Reading

I have discovered that I get much more out of the books I read now that I have learned to read critically. I took a college English course in high school and that is really when I began to analyze stories and look at them in different aspects. Of course then I really didn't care; I just wanted to get credit for the class and move on, but in this class it is different. I have thought about and discovered things in our readings that I had never found before. I have read many of these books before, yet look at them in a whole different view now. I find myself analyzing stuff outside of class, and not just readings. I think critical reading helps a person develop skills to be more contemplative about different things in life, or at least for me.

Green Eggs & Ham

One of my favorite books to read when I was a child was Green Eggs & Ham by Dr. Seuss. Whenever I had to go see our family doctor (which was quite a lot because I was sick a lot as a child) there was a corner in the waiting room devoted especially to kids. Books, toys and puzzles were supposed to keep us entertained while waiting to see the doctor. Well, whenever I went to the doctor I always always read this book. I pretty much had it memorized by the time I was in second grade. The interesting thing about this book is that there is no internal dialogue or narrative analysis. It is a very simple book in that there are only two characters, one of which is not even given a name. I interpret it as a story that encourages people to try new things and in turn, gain the benefits from those things.

Dr. Seuss

As silly as it may sound, Dr. Seuss is one of my favorite authors, mainly because his works are so simple but very entertaining for children and adults. His books are particular favorites for beginning readers because they are simple and very entertaining with the rhymes, illustrations and the silly characters.
My favorite of his books include Cat in the Hat, Green Eggs and Ham, and How the Grinch Stole Christmas. His books are so popular that two of my favorites have also been made into film. If you know anything about these films, you know that the main characters were played by very humorous actors such as Jim Carrey and Mike Myers. They were perfect for the roles, if I do say so myself. In my opinion the movies were just as wildly entertaining as the books. Although he wrote in a way that was entertaining to readers, he also wrote so that readers could recognize the morals without feeling as if they were being preached to. If you've ever noticed, his illustrations of his characters all look alike, just with minor adjustments. His landscapes are noted for their creation of distance. His rhyme schemes are simple, but he creates a variety of strange and crazy names and places at the same time. All in all, Dr. Seuss is a talented individual and I dare say that there's not another author out there like him.

Ella Enchanted

I was in the fifth grade when I bought Ella Enchanted at a book fair. It was one of my favorite books! A few years later I heard that an Ella Enchanted movie was in production. I was so excited! Once I saw the movie I was kind of disappointed though because it was a lot different from the book. The movie was still good nonetheless. I think one of the reasons I loved the book so much is because I admired the character of Ella. She is different from the other young maidens in that she is independent, rebellious, intelligent and witty. She is very friendly and is easy to build a relationship with. These are qualities that I myself would like to possess. The story contains characteristics similar to those of Cinderella. For example, the mother is dead and the father is absent, leaving room for an evil and controlling stepmother. And of course there is a fairy godmother and a prince with whom she falls in love with. The biggest difference between this story and the other Cinderella tales is that Ella is cursed, which brings about her weakness.

"Enchanted"

The tale follows the beautiful princess Giselle as she is banished by an evil queen from her magical, musical animated land--and finds herself in the gritty reality of the streets of modern-day Manhattan. Shocked by this
strange new environment that doesn't operate on a "happily ever after" basis, Giselle is now adrift in a chaotic
world badly in need of enchantment. But when Giselle begins to fall in love with a charmingly flawed divorce
lawyer who has come to her aid--even though she is already promised to a perfect fairy tale prince back home
--she has to wonder: can a storybook view of romance survive in the real world?
Yahoo Movies
-http://movies.yahoo.com/movie/1809426456/details

Not too long ago I watched the movie "Enchanted". It was absolutely delightful! Because I am now in the children's literature class, I took the liberty of taking a few notes while watching the movie. The main character is a beautiful young girl named Giselle that finds herself helpless and in need of saving. She also is madly in love with a prince and is to marry him. The antagonist is the prince's stepmother, the evil queen. Conflict occurs when the evil queen is unwilling to give up the throne to Giselle. All of these characteristics make up a classic fairy tale, but the fact that the evil queen sends Giselle to modern-day Manhattan gives it a new-age twist. Giselle is lead to believe that after marrying her prince she will live happily ever after but the evil queen sends her to the "real world" which is believed to be a place with no happily ever afters. During one scene we find out that Robert, the handsome lawyer she ends up falling for, doesn't believe in telling his daughter fairy tales because he thinks by doing so, she won't be prepared for the harsh world ahead. This made me so sad! I believe fairy tales are good for children. It gives them hope. Happy endings may not always go exactly like the fairy tales but I think true happiness can be attained in the real world if we work for it. During the course of the movie, Giselle's character steadily changes from the helpless young girl to a brave heroine who, in the end, attempts to save Robert from the evil queen. Yet, at the very end she becomes helpless again and can only be saved by true love's kiss. Giselle, and most of everybody else gets their happily ever after, just with a real-world twist!