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Anil's Ghost (1 Viewer)

monique66

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Anybody doing Anil's Ghost? I'm pretty sure its new this year but if you so happen to have notes on it then feel free to post them...
 

ishq

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We are going to be doing it in Term 2.

I tried to read it these holidays - fell asleep each time. I thought it might be good because I liked The English Patient - I was wrong! :)
 

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We're doing it sometime this year.. and oh man am i gonna dread it... i read half of it and it was an abosolute chore to read
 

monique66

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Yeah, the first time i read it i didn't even fully get it...i'm re-reading it now, i think the best way to read through it is a chapter at a time so you don't bore yourself to death...hey does anyone know if this text is new this year? Like i mean, has the year before us done this text as well?
 

tennille

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damnation said:
Anybody doing Anil's Ghost? I'm pretty sure its new this year but if you so happen to have notes on it then feel free to post them...
Actually, it's not new this year. It was new last year, so you mihgt be able to get notes from the 2004 year 12 students. I read it last year and I couldn't see much of a connection to crime fiction. My teacher read it and thought it was crap, so we did The Real Inspector Hound instead.
 

ishq

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It came in last year.

Our school chose it this year, for the first time because Snow Falling on Cedars was removed from the syllabus. Our EE1 teacher hasnt even read it yet....

But yeah...the book itself goes heaps further than Crime Fiction alone..Its based on true circumstances in Sri Lanka...so...its got to be sappy/slow/boring...

I think the author (cant spell his name) tried to recreate the English Patient...
 

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We did Snow Falling on Cedars last year - it was crap haha we did it from a romance genre point of view though....

Yeah, im dreading having to read Anil's Ghost.. it just doesnt appeal to me.. i guess im just a gory book likerer...
 

mewcou

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I did it for Ext1 last year. I never actually finished it though. I would like to finish it at some point though. While it is quite slow at times, it really is an awesome book in my opinion. I especially like Ondaatje's view of nature and Sri Lankan (?) sprirtuality. It's based on the civil war in Sri Lanka, but the actual events and characters of the book are fictional as far as I know.

Also, Anil's ghost gets pretty nasty. Murdered babies, torture, a guy stabbing himself in the neck etc. Don't think it's boring all the way through.

Snow Falling on Cedars was a great movie in my opinion. Never read the book though.

P.S. I hate crime fiction. It is an evil genre.
 

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mewcou said:
I did it for Ext1 last year. I never actually finished it though. I would like to finish it at some point though. While it is quite slow at times, it really is an awesome book in my opinion. I especially like Ondaatje's view of nature and Sri Lankan (?) sprirtuality. It's based on the civil war in Sri Lanka, but the actual events and characters of the book are fictional as far as I know.

Also, Anil's ghost gets pretty nasty. Murdered babies, torture, a guy stabbing himself in the neck etc. Don't think it's boring all the way through.

Snow Falling on Cedars was a great movie in my opinion. Never read the book though.

P.S. I hate crime fiction. It is an evil genre.
:eek: SPOILERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 

monique66

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Haha...its not that good, i've already read it once, just reading it again to get some quotes...but i have no idea what i am looking for...
 

Jennibeans

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Remember that all of extension english is based around the same core principles: values, attitudes, characters and CONTEXT. Take Anil's Ghost, garbage on about forensics, the conventions of crime fiction shown in the novel, go to town on the subversions there is SO much you can say for that bit but don't forget that you need to include stuff about the context of the author and of the novel itself. Mention that its from a Sri Lankan perspective which it totally different to the other texts on the list.

Here's some of what I had for Anil's Ghost.
Values & attitudes give the responder a certain perspective. Ondaatje's values lay not only in depicting the darkness of the world which AG describes but also in celebrating the beauty of such a world and the richness of the culture of its people. (shown in elements like the recreation of the Buddha). the values of Ondaate's stunningly unique characters are shaped by the world in which they live (how are Anil's values as an ex-patriot different from Sarath or Gamini's). thus, while the story is a quest for truth, it is also the story of three main characters & their struggle for survival, a struggle that is representative of the population of Sri Lanka. So Ondaatje used Anil, Sarath & Gamini to represent crime on a large scale as compared to the small scale crimes in the other texts.
Still reconstructing an identity after the end of colonisation, a postcolonial perspective of the text highlights how this imposition of Westernized values upon an ancient Sri Lankan culture impacted upon the way the story is told.
Context of civil war - challenges the perception of war as a crime. It is implied that there are murders on all sides, have the leaders committed war crimes? "Every side was killing and hiding the evidence"

Anils' Ghost reflects a chaotic power structure where there is no peace. This is reflected in Gamini's insomnia & the death of traditional culture.
Anil's search for answers in skeletons reflects her own search for identity and the people's search for missing loved ones. (link to mystery as key element) the mystery is more than just who killed Sailor.
use of anthropologist as sleuth reflects modern era - who could be more rational than an anthropologist. (solution by rationality)
Accretion of evidence is anthropological, at least for the central crime. But we are also gathering evidence as responders. AG renders the responder a foreigner in a land they don't understand. therefore the novels lends clues that assist with our understanding.
AG is a mixed genre novel which uses conventuons to drive a complex novel. it employs a profound meditation on the nature of truth and varying perceptions of it
* Is a fictionalised account of some of the most violent episodes of contemporary history.
* Focuses of elucidation of particular crime chosen to typify many thousands of others. "One victim speaks for many victims, one village can speak for many villages."
* more than one voice, shifting time frames and locations, fragments of memories all contribute to greater sense of mystery.
* Narrative method is marked not only by great fluidity of time, place and point of view but also by a variety of materials (intertextuality - poem at beginning of novel, incorporates the Amnesty International List which is factual materical)
* Anil is our eyes we see through her perspective, her context & her values and this adds to the mystery as she is as much a foreigner as a native.
* by not naming warring factiosn Ondaatje universalises the issues he presents. E.g. the suicide bomber is named R___
* Challenges perception of what crime is. "There was a casual sense of massacre."
" We are often criminals in the eyes of the earth not for having committed crime but for knowing crime has been committed" (link to religious values)
"I wanted to find one law to govern all being...I found fear."

I don't have time to put up any more at the moment but if anyone wants the rest of my crime fiction notes (and there is a little bit more on Anil's Ghost) PM me
 

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ha only one person in my class is willing to approach anil's ghost and learn it... so the others have given up :) amen to that
 

tennille

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_muse_ said:
ha only one person in my class is willing to approach anil's ghost and learn it... so the others have given up :) amen to that
It's good to be eager. :)

If you're eager you're likely to go well.
 

_muse_

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Tennille said:
It's good to be eager. :)

If you're eager you're likely to go well.
oh im not the one thats eager to learn it... noooo way haha

im just glad i dont have to do it, because i wouldve flunked in that bit of it for sure
 

tennille

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_muse_ said:
oh im not the one thats eager to learn it... noooo way haha

im just glad i dont have to do it, because i wouldve flunked in that bit of it for sure
My bad. I mis-read your post. I thought you were eager to read it. Lucky you don't have to, lol. :p
 

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