The picture above is dedicated to my English Extension teacher, who fell in love with the classy design of my original website on seeing the symbolic picture of shoes, representing aspects of society and ideas reflected in both 'The Coral Island' and 'Lord of the Flies'. :)

Week 1 - 08/08/2011

This week we were given our third, and final English assignment for year 11. Much to my delight, I found it involved the creation of a website! As I am very technologically adept, I was extremely happy to hear this. 

The first section of this assignment required us to choose two texts, one of which was an original and the other which was an appropriation of the original. I have spent half of this week deciding on what two books could be appropriate and interesting. I eventually decided that it would be interesting to delve into 'Lord of the Flies' by William Golding, having previously read it, and was interested in the messages it contained about the way a society is based and how it can so easily decline into savagery. I then remembered that it was apparently arguing against the ideas and beliefs conveyed in the novel "The Coral Island' by R.M. Ballantyne and thus i decided to research these two texts. 

On deciding this i spent the rest of the week reading 'The Coral Island', and becoming increasingly bored with the book. I did however discover many points, which I took note of, which I am hoping under research of the book, I will be able to develop into strong ideas.

Week 2 - 8/14/2011

This week I finished reading 'The Coral Island' and researched into the book. Unfortunately there was very little analytical information on 'The Coral Island' that was useful, much of it only briefly mentioning it in articles related to Lord of the Flies. On failing to find relevant information, I researched ideas happening in the Victorian era, the time the book was written, in relation to some of the points I had noted while reading the novel. This was a much more effective means of researching and allowed me to format many ideas into legible and logical paragraphs of information. Some of the main ideas I researched were the idea that Britain needed to imperialise other countries, as it considered itself a 'blessed' country and thus needed to help the rest of the world create order. I also investigated Christianity as there was a huge emphasis on that throughout the book. I also researched into technology and science during this period as this is also evident throughout the book. 

Some websites I found information from include: 
http://www.helium.com/items/614582-literary-analysis-testing-and-undermining-values-in-childrens-literature
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Coral_Island
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victorian_era
http://www.erasofelegance.com/history/victorianreligion.html
http://www.victorianweb.org/science/science&religion.html
http://www.atuttascuola.it/risorse/inglese/the_victorian_age.htm

Week 3 - 08/23/2011

This week I put the finishing touches to my essay analysing 'The Coral Island'. I am quite pleased with it considering the lack of analytical information that is available about it. I feel as though I have raised some solid points concerning ideas in the book reflecting the Victorian era. I am now in the midst of researching and writing my essay analysing 'The Lord of the Flies'. Fortunately this book has a wealth of information written about it, including Sparknotes which is very helpful in the construction of my ideas. I have also researched the ideas that were present after World War Two, these mainly being pessimistic ones about the nature of humanity. Golding himself involved with the war was heavily effected by it, as he saw what a person was capable of under the pretence of a just 'cause'. These pessimistic views are heavily evident throughout the whole of the novel, as Golding constantly makes reference to the underlying savagery of human nature through a variety of ways.

Some websites I found information from are:
http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/flies/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord_of_the_Flies
http://www.shmoop.com/lord-of-the-flies/literary-devices.html
http://summarycentral.tripod.com/thelordoftheflies.htm
http://www.angelfire.com/ca2/lordoftheflies/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II

Week 4 - 08/29/2011

Have now finished and handed in my two essays analysing both 'The Coral Island' and the 'Lord of the Flies'. Am quite pleased with both of them. I am now working on a draft version of my appropriation. So far I am incorporating both the characters of Jack and Ralph into my short story, both of whom are versions of the Ralph and Jack from 'Lord of the Flies' reflecting similar views of these characters - Ralph wanting civilisation, and Jack wanting a more anarchical world. The story is taking place in Sydney, and it took me a while to work out a way in which I can make the characters somewhat 'stranded' in Sydney and eventually i decided that if you take adults away from society, leaving only the children, they are effectively stranded in small radius of the area in which they live, as they rely heavily on adults for most tasks. Removing adults from the story also allows society to be redeveloped by children and in my story the children degrade society into a state of lawlessness. 

Week 5 - 08/30/2011

Am now working on fixing my draft and improving it.