Making memes out of quotation from Adrienne Rich poems and Toni Morrison novels: An assignment in my courses

For the final sessions of my two seminars this term (one on Adrienne Rich; one on Toni Morrison's Early Novels), I have asked the students to find one quotation from the works we have read that they feel stands for something about the work, the author, or the world. I did this in my Contemporary Poetry seminar in Spring Semester 2022, with each student writing their quotations from poems onto poster-sized paper and hanging them on the wall of the seminar room. This time around I'm asking them to design memes with their quotations—but unlike most memes, I want them to say what poem or novel the quotation comes from. (Andrew Shields, #111Words, 15 May 2025)

Here’s my Adrienne Rich meme:

A course discussing Sarfraz Manzoor’s memoir “Greetings from Bury Park”, Gurinder Chadha’s film “Blinded by the Light”, and three Bruce Springsteen songs

In a course at the Fachhochschule Nordwestschweiz, we first discussed Sarfraz Manzoor's 2007 memoir "Greetings from Bury Park: Race, Religion and Rock 'n' Roll" and then turned to Gurinder Chadha's 2019 film "Blinded by the Light", whose script was inspired by Manzoor's life and written by Manzoor, Chadha, and Paul Mayeda Berges. (Chadha and Berges co-wrote Chadha's 2002 film "Bend It Like Beckham".) In both "Greetings from Bury Park" and "Blinded by the Light", Manzoor presents his love of Bruce Springsteen, so for our final session, we will discuss Springsteen songs featured in the movie that the students voted on: "Born To Run", "The Promised Land", and "Blinded By The Light". (Andrew Shields, #111Words, 14 May 2025)

“I know you are reading this poem”: The repeated phrase in Adrienne Rich’s poem “Dedications"

In Adrienne Rich's poem "Dedications", the final section of the title sequence of her 1991 book "An Atlas of the Difficult World", each of the twelve sentences begins with the phrase "I know you are reading this poem" and then a scene in which the context of someone's encounter with the poem is described. In the course of our discussion of the poem in class today, one student observed that the phrase is "a philosophical truism": when you read it, it describes what you are doing. Another noted that "this" points to that moment of reading, and a third added that the present continuous verb "are reading" does so as well. Andrew Shields, #111Words, 13 May 2025)

Goethe’s character Serlo (from “Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship”) on hearing a song, reading a poem, seeing a painting, and saying reasonable things — every day

A friend posted a meme with a quotation from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe: "Every day we should hear at least one little song, read one good poem, see one exquisite picture, and, if possible, speak a few sensible words." As always with memes, there was no further source, but I did manage find it rather quickly. It comes from Goethe's novel "Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship" (1795-1796). Specifically, it's said by Serlo, a theater director who is Wilhelm Meister's mentor. Here is the original German: "Man sollte alle Tage wenigstens ein kleines Lied hören, ein gutes Gedicht lesen, ein treffliches Gemälde sehen und, wenn es möglich zu machen wäre, einige vernünftige Worte sprechen." (Andrew Shields, #111Words, 12 May2025)

 

Musicians I’ve seen most: members of The Grateful Dead and Hildegard Lernt Fliegen—and my friend Stefan Strittmatter

The list of musicians I've seen most begins with Jerry Garcia (over 100 times) and the other members of The Grateful Dead (over 80 times). Then comes Andreas Schärer (34 times, with the 35th this evening) and the other members of Hildegard Lernt Fliegen (all at least 14 times, with the 15th this evening). Other jazz musicians I've seen more than ten times include Larry Grenadier, and I'll be seeing him again tomorrow night. But last night at the Nicole Bernegger concertat Barfüsserplatz in Basel, I realized I have also seen my friend and former English student, Basel guitarist Stefan Strittmatter, about twenty times, in at least seven different bands. (Andrew Shields, #111Words, 11 May 2025)

My Kelty backpack, which is over 40 years old now

In the fall of 1984, my father took me to REI in Berkeley to buy a Kelty backpack for my forthcoming trip to Germany. He said, "We're going to get you a really good backpack that will last for decades." And it has. It's one of my oldest possessions. I don't remember how I picked it out—I assume I just followed my Dad's suggestions. I travelled with it in Germany in 1984-1985, to Toronto to visit my father there for Christmas in 1985, all over the United States in the summer of 1988, to Paris in summer 1989, and on many trips in Europe after I moved here in 1991. (Andrew Shields, #111Words, 10 May 2025) 

Late nights in Paris in summer 1989

When I lived in Paris with my friend Erik Hagestad in summer 1989, we often stayed out quite late, and the moment of decision would come: do we take the last metro, or do we wait for the first metro a few hours later? If we waited for the first, then it would have a few others like us, who had been out all night, and a few people on their way to early jobs—but everyone was bleary-eyed. Sometimes, we would just start walking home, and if we ended up on the route of a night bus, and one showed up, we'd get on and ride it for a while. (Andrew Shields, #111Words, 9 May 2025)