They don’t understand, when they give it to you, that they bleed out all the joy. That stars become specks of sand and flowers fade to paper cuts. Magic should never be homework, then it wouldn’t be magic. Homework de-magics things, you see, even if you write it with quill and yellow parchment, it comes out all inkblots. I need to know about ships, and about conjurers and manticores, but I just want to play outside and read my books and sing. Forgetting shoulds and s’posed tos. It never goes away, you know, even when you’re all grown up, they just stop checking up on you. Somehow that makes it harder.
December 21, 2009
58 responses to Homework
Why Princess Skye, is that a Slytherin patch I see? Oh my! You always struck me as a Ravenclaw gal. hehehehe ^.~
Homework can be draining, can’t it?
It’s tiresome yes, but it seems you have to do homework for whatever you want to learn.
I’m definitely a Slytherin, only I think they’re rather misunderstood.
Yes, I have a fondness for Slytherin as well. I really wished Rowling has fleshed them out a tad more… it would have been nice to have had Draco have more character development or else introduce a very sympathetic snake that could have joined HP’s crew of friends. I was always waiting for either of those things to occur.
Good luck with your homework ^.^
But they never did, did they? I just make up clever, proud, wonderful characters in my head instead, and somehow they all end up in Slytherin.
Thank you!
Oh but she did!
never forget Severus Snape.
I understand your troubles about homework. I love learning but school has made it a chore, rather than something I enjoy. And what fun is one of my favorite subjects, history, if I have to write an 8 page essay before Christmas vacation is over?
Also- I can’t believe you’re Slytherin, but I do love your scarf. :)
Essays are the worst. I’ve studied Astrology and Mythology and all sorts of other wonderful ‘ologies but it’s the essays that get you.
Thank you, it’s very warm and wooly.
Essays would be all right without length requirements. What’s wrong with writing down what you have to say, and stopping when you’re done?
Blegh. Homework was always the dragon I had to slay before I could get to the glittering moments it was hoarding from me.
Indeed! I feel not enough value is placed on being concise. Too many books suffer for being too long, and the same goes for essays.
Dragon slaying is the most perfect metaphor I’ve heard.
It always makes me sad when we discuss a story I liked at school, I don’t like all the peeling and skinning. Makes the magic leave the words. I love this post. xxx
P.S.: What a lovely feather quill!
Analysis makes me shudder, why can’t we just love something without having to say why?
p.s. Thank you! It’s actually deep violet coloured, but it looks black here.
Philip Pullman gave a wonderful lecture on how dissecting a text instead of enjoying it is emphasized in school so much now to the detriment of students. It’s called the Isis Lecture and it’s transcribed in its entirety here: http://www.philip-pullman.com/pages/content/index.asp?PageID=108
As a literature-concentrated English major I have come to see that analysis is often useful for discovering new things about a text and allowing people to enjoy it on a new level that they may not have thought about before, but overanalysis has also ruined me for things I might have otherwise liked. I think it’s the difference between examining the fine construction details of a garment to see how it all works together and taking a machine apart into its constituent pieces. It’s not a music box or a clock or an engine anymore, it’s just a bunch of gears and bolts and springs.
Thank you for the wonderful link! I am a big fan of Pullman, when he isn’t bullying C.S Lewis that is.
Thanks for the Pullman link. Until now I had only heard of him as a Lewis-critic, but that lecture says so many right things about teaching and writing and stories.
I am myself quite analytically minded, but I always think of what Gandalf told Saruman: he that breaks a thing to find out what it is has left the path of wisdom. For which reason I have become disillusioned with academia lately; all they do with a story is pull out the skeleton and discard the carcass.
Skylark, lovely post. I dropped in through a friend’s blog and I think I shall stick around.
Homework can be terrible, especially when they take childhood favorites. I don’t see the point. It’s like having to write an essay about The Chronicles of Narnia… It makes you wonder why?
I always fancied myself in Gryffindor but after I read The Deathly Hallows and read Professor Snape’s story, I don’t think Slytherin is bad anymore.
Gryffindor is ok, but Slytherin is interesting. I think it is a bit like Scorpio, dark but also deep, looking for secrets, questioning everything. I have a lot of Scorpio in me too.
It makes me sad when that happens. They can take a favorite book, or film even, and take away the love you once had for it. The assignments that inspire are rare. & I’ve found in college they care less and less about any of these assignments, when they have hundreds of papers to grade.
Love the picture. xx
It makes me sad too, it’s incredible how homework is always work, no matter how much you love the subject.
Thanks xx
Ah! I covet that Slytherin scarf you have! ^__^ I know what you mean! Homework is a mountain of work that never goes away (always haunting you). I hope that you can forget about it for awhile and enjoy your Christmas!
I love my scarf! I’m thinking of taking the patch off though, to make it more like the PoA ones (that’s my favourite movie.) Homework will not be my christmas ghost, thank you!
I think I would have been a Slytherin. ;) But yes, homework can suck the life right out of you. It makes me glad I’m finally done with school.
Hurrah for Slytherin! Homework doesn’t end with school though, it just takes other forms :/
You know I am already in a holiday and things like this reminds me of school..
But I think it will be more interesting to study about manticore than all those -ogys. I myself learn biology and good gracious, I am still amazed so far.
Don’t let the inkblot lose your amazement!
love and hug,,
magnoliaamber
Oh, but Manticores are part of the ologies as well, Cryptozoology and Mythozoology.
Thank you <3
what a magical place to be, your blog.
bisous,
gigi
You are so sweet, merci.
“I’m definitely a Slytherin, only I think they’re rather misunderstood.”
Really? Can you elaborate?
I continue to find your writing, art and thoughts here on the ‘new’ blog enchanting and imaginative, and you have an excellent eye for photography. (The composition of this photo is amazing, with every element in tune.) Even as you change and grow as a person I hope you never lose your youthfulness, or way of finding beauty in the world, or desire for magic.
Hmm, I think J.K Rowling values very different character traits to those I value, such as ambition, cunning, wit and the curiosity to dig a little deeper and learn more than what is handed to you. I don’t think any of these are more evil than the negative aspects of bravado, false loyalty and rashness can be.
Thank you, I am so glad you like my new blog, even though it is very different.
Hmmm, interesting – for some reason, I’d have pegged you for Ravenclaw. I don’t think the characteristics that are seemingly most notable for assigning to the different houses are mutually exclusive, and it bugged me about Rowling’s universe that the most negatively-attributed, most discriminated-against house was also the one least fleshed out, and the one that valued blood purity. Incidentally now I’ll spend days wondering where the Sorting Hat would have placed me.
Have a lovely Christmas, and happy New Year!
i’m a Slytherin as well! i dress up every Saturday in green and silver, with my Prefect badge and my Slytherin socks. It’s my favourite day of the week. (And next year i’m wearing pink everyday, so i need to figure out how to do my Slytherin Saturdays despite that).
i have always been terrible with homework. My thoughts stray and tangent, and then i’m thinking of things a world away and can’t get out of my own imagination and back to studying. But i think i prefer it that way.
That photo is lovely, by the way. It has me so excited for Saturday that i think i might cheat and celebrate my Slytherinness a few days early. Like tomorrow.
Do you like yellow parchment? i always feel like yellowed papers and parchments are a little bit more special.
That is so wonderful. Saturday is quite the perfect choice for it as well. A pleasure to find another Slytherin (I am really surprised at how many there are here.)
I love parchment and quills, but I can’t imagine writing essays with them, you have to be so slow and careful.
I’m a Slytherin too. I find Slytherin so dark and interesting ♥
I never do homework … It’s a bit naughty, I guess. But I find I never need to do it, I do well in school regardless, hehe.
It makes me happy to see so many Slytherins. We certainly stick together.
Oh my, I wish I could get by without homework, you are so lucky.
My my I haven’t viewed or commented on your blog in a while!
Very nice entries, always fun!
Homework is horrible yet necessary for me. And I agree on an earlier comment, essays are the worst.
It’s nice to see a fellow Slytherin :)
I agree they are often put in a negative light, but I see them as ambitious and close-knitted to one another, loyal amongst their own. Which isn’t bad.
Welcome back, I have missed your comments <3
I see them the same way, I also think they are resourceful, cautious and patient. The sort to create elaborate plans and gently achieve their goals while no one is looking.
Hi Princess! >.<
While I do think homework is compulsory to sharpen up your mind and test you on your understanding of the subject, they could've done it better.
Doing assignments are a chore and you're just not looking forward to doing it.
*laughs* You're a Slytherin? I would've thought you're kinda like Luna in a sense.
I'm torn between Slytherin and Ravenclaw, see. So it's SlytherClaw. :D
Happy Holidays!
Luna is my favourite character, even though she is in Ravenclaw. A house that was a little of both would be nice.
Don’t forget, Harry almost became a Slytherin! I think he could have made it a better house.
As for homework, and school in general, I went to a Montessory school for several years, and learning was always fun. I was so surprised to enter public school, where I had to do boring, repetitive worksheets, and memorize dates. For a while, I rebelled by getting angry and smart-alecky in class. I would then get sent to the ‘private room’ to calm down, where I would get out a book and read for as long as I could!
That is true.
I have read a bit about Montessory schools and I think their system of education sounds much more natural.
another beautiful, enchanting post dear miss skylark! also, just to let you know i have changed my blog name from ‘magical whisper’ to ‘the sea ghost’ so i was wondering if you could change the name on the link at the side? thankyou dear, from suzannah :)
Thank you for letting me know, that is a beautiful name, I will change it right away.
Oww!! I love your blog.You are lovely sweet girl ((: By the way i hate homeworks :D
Thank you so much. Homework is the worst, but we never quite escape it.
Your words inspire me a great deal.
You are so sweet, thank you.
I love your quill and wand! :D What is the book?
(Just wondering – if I remember correctly you once mentioned you weren’t that much into Harry Potter, did that change?)
I like Slytherin, too, the only thing that has ever bugged me about HP was that it was too black and white.
The book is an old Bestiary. It is not my favourite series, but I appreciate it a little more now.
Yes, that is my issue with the stories as well.
Oh! Isn’t that the Bestiary book of Nicholas Christopher? Or am I mistaking?…
∼ A.
It is “A Dictionary of Fabulous Beasts” by Barber and Riches
(first of all, i don’t have a good english… )
First time i get into your blog… i feel so identified with your stories, pictures, and you (i think)
I live in a field.. I usually go out to walk (when the sunsets are starting) and take pictures of the sky and trees.. I also love how the sun’s rays filter through the leaves..
Go to a special place far away from the ‘real’ world, but ,at the same time, close to everything, helps me to forget problems and to be anything i want to be.
Where do you live??
P.S.:I’m eager to talk to you
Where you live sounds very beautiful, do you like to take photos as well?
I live in Australia, it is very beautiful in winter, but hot and dry in summer.
yesss i love to take photos.. there are some in my blog..
i’d love to go to australia.. i’m planning to go to study there in 2012 (: or maybe england.. not sure yet
I live in Chile
Slytherin – so am I.
Your blog is beautiful, dear.
Hurrah for Slytherin.
Your blog looks brilliant, such wonderful quotes you have.
all this house discussion has me wondering.
I always thought I’d be ravenclaw, but I think I have stopped valuing intelligence as much as I used to.
though it seems odd to me that you would be a slytherin, I do love your explanation.
i’m not sure if you’ve answered this, but what book is that? is that the magical creatures book j.k. haw published? im soo curious :) thanks in advanced.
nevermind, you answered it :)
enchanting blog, you have here!
beautiful! i am studying magic and it is way more about experience…