Postmodernism was one of those concepts I had heard about from time to time, but never bothered probe into. I have always had this vague association between postmodernism and hippies and super stuffy high-class art galleries. The readings (and especially the video shown in class) were extremely instructive in giving me some more concrete ideas about what postmodernism is. I still don't quite have the understanding to fully grasp the full analysis of postmodernism (which didn't do anything to change my view on the stuffy aspect of it given the style of the writing and vocabulary used), but it was an interesting and rather different subject to look into.
Addressing historical fiction, and one of my main differences between history and fiction (beyond the most mentioned characteristics in class): There’s no shock value when something strange happens in reading fiction like there is reading history, because anything flies in that type of writing. For example, if one read about the Holocaust knowing it was fiction, the likely thoughts would be more along the lines of "the author's sick mind" rather than true horror or something along those lines.
Ragtime has been an excellent starting book for the class. It blends the historical facts and fictional narrative in believable ways that fit the historical figures. Doctorow does this technique in which he speaks at length just spewing pure historical facts, but seems to me to clearly be pushing an idea. He does this while describing the state of America at the time, with all of statistics of death and disease and the grim adjectives obviously portraying a dire situation. The same technique was applied to his description of Ford, especially with how Doctorow described how poorly Ford viewed workers, a statement that doesn't inspire many positive feelings.
Devoting a section to the actual plot of Ragtime, Evelyn Nesbit and Emma Goldman's interaction was particularly interesting. The pair seemed to have very differing personalities and levels of experience, and confidence (with Goldman having vastly higher quantities in the last two categories).
Nesbit seems naive, innocent, almost like a student to Goldman’s teacher, as Goldman instructs and talks to her. This more passive nature seems to gel with the historical accounts of Nesbit painted by her Wikipedia article (portraying her as a unlucky woman shafted by the dominant men in her life).
