Dear literary kinds--
Here's the plan for Thursday's performances. We appear to have 8 groups; since class is 80 minutes long, each group should plan to take no more than 10 minutes (if some take less that's fine). I'll be monitoring the time, and cut you off when yours is up, so you should practice ahead of time re: the time you'll take.
At this point the schedule is
jrlewis, aseidman
jrf, ShaynaS, spleenfiend
mkarol, xhan
rmeyers, teal, sbg90
Herbie, sweetp
nk0825, TPB1988
skindeep, aybala50, rachelr

Can't wait!
Anne

I think it is very interesting that we started out the class talking about genre as a form of labeling and now we are talking about framing not only in genres, but in the world. Framing has come up as almost a necessity...this is how we see the world not only in literary work, but also in reality as well as dreams? Similar arguments were also brought up for labeling...is it a necessity? It makes life easier? 

There's been some commentary about the formulaic nature of the House television show.

I'm reasonably certain (and this is backed up by a comment made by the creator of House, MD) that the House and Wilson relationship is based on the Holmes/Watson relationship from Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories.

Those stories were extremely formulaic, and there's a great deal of literary speculation that Conan Doyle didn't care too much about the plots of his mysteries. The formulaic nature of the stories was (theoretically) meant to highlight the nuances of the character development, and to takethe distracting nature of the plot away so that more focus could be placed on the characters.

My problem with the "House's Brain/Wilson's Heart" 2-part episode is thus: not a single one of those doctors recused him or herself from that case.  In the real world, I'm pretty sure that's called "malpractice."  I know that Amber was unconscious, and I'm sure she trusted all of them implicitly.  However, there's a saying in law that a lawyer who represents himself has a fool for a client.  In medicine, where it is often much more emotional, it is absolutely unexcuseable that none of those doctors took themselves off the case, especially as each of them at one point or another realized they shouldn't be working on it.

 Watching House has been quite the experience. I think the thing that keeps me coming back as an avid viewer is that every case is different, even though the formula for most of the episodes is the same. I guess this shows that I like formulaic things, it makes me feel comfortable because I [sort of] know what to expect. After watching the episode "9-5" a few weeks back when it aired I felt jipped. It didn't follow the formula, it didn't even follow Dr. House! I felt like an addict who had finally realized her what her addiction was: a fascination with Gregory House [and the realization that I feel lost without the series formula!] I'm not so sure that my fixation is because I want him to change--I actually find him refreshing.

I have been watching House for many years but once I sat down to view the show for the class rather than pleasure I noticed a pattern in the episodes that is also seen in the series. Roughly every show begins with the patient performing a mundane everyday task and then suddenly some sort of seizure or abnormal activity occurs that leads the rest of the show to take place in the hospital.