Reading Response 10/26

The short story, "Ghosts", by Paul Auster is one of my favorite stories we've read so far. I really enjoyed the style of writing Auster used. He is very vivid when he writes which makes it easy to connect with the main character Blue. I felt like I was able to watch the baseball game that Blue was watching because Auster does a great job of giving facts about the game before Blue actually gets there. Auster writes," He rides the subway, rubs shoulders with the crowd, feels himself lunging towards a sense of the moment. As he takes his seat at the ball park, he is struck by the sharp clairty of the colors around him: the green grass, the brown dirt, the white ball, the blue sky above"(189). There is nothing like being at a baseball game on a perfect day and thats exactly what it sounds like. Everything is so crisp in this description that it gives off this picture perfect vibe about the baseball game. But it's really his word choice and use of colors that makes the book an easy read. I also think the constant use of colors plays a big role in how we view each character.

Everybody has a name which just so happens to be a color. But, that being said, every color represents a unique and somewhat juxtaposed personality. Throughout the whole case Blue is questioning himself on a personal level with his future Mrs. Blue but also professionally. He feels that he isn't doing a satisfactory job which I find ironic because normally blue represents confidence or stability in literature. I had similar feelings towards Mr. White and Mr. Black. Mr.White assigns Blue this case without any formal reason which is unlike White. Traditionally in literature the color white represents purity which we don't seem to see in Mr.White. White is portrayed as this honest, hard working guy but in this particular case he is a little bit sketchy. A similar notion is seen in Mr. Black. The color black normally represents power, or even death,  but in this short story it represents a mystery. Perhaps the idea of having all these colors contradict what they normally represent have a greater connection to the grand scheme of the book which to me is essentially, don't go chasing waterfalls.

This whole story keeps the reader turning pages in hopes that some mystery would reveal itself but that never seems to happen. To me, the bigger picture was that sometimes one can search for answers in life but never find them. I felt like this book was about trying to get people to focus on the present as opposed to the future and the past. Blue spends the majority of the book trying to figure out Mr.Black and ends up forgetting who he really is. What I gathered from this book is that self identity is what allows society to progress forward but people seem to forget who they really are because they're so focused on what others are doing.