Wicked: Nanny and her perception of life.

[Ophelia]

Tammy wrote:

"Woe is the natural end of life, yet we go on having babies. No, said Nanny...We don't go on having babies, that's quite apparent. We only have babies when we're young enough not to know how grim life turns out. Once we really get the full measure of it...we dry up in disgust and sensibly halt production."

What do you think of Nanny's perception of life? Is it unfairly grim? Do you think anyone would have a legitimate reason to feel this way? What about your own life: Have you experienced more good than bad? Would you choose to be here if you were given a choice?

[Ophelia]

Nanny is a character who deserves analyzing.

She amuses me.
She is a useful and colorful tool in what I see as the author's general enterprise of criticizing almost everything and everybody in the book.

She is grumpy (we are told she is old), she is direct and down to earth.
She knows exactly how the social class system works, and who belongs where.

She has no illusions about life or morals: for example we learn from her (becauses she guesses about the past) about Melena's extra-marital affairs.
She's extremely practical about Melena's affairs, and does not preach morality and fidelity, as one might expect a nanny to do.

When she speaks, she often uses maxims, such as in the paragraph Tammy quoted "Woe is the natural end of life".
Those maxims have a way of ending on a pessimistic note and bring in some dark wit, as in:

"Woe is the natural end of life, yet we go on having babies...halt production."

What words would you use to describe such speech?

Would you say Nanny is a cynic?


By the way, what would you say about the speeches some of the characters (usually Elphaba) give?

They remind me of Oscar Wilde's theatre plays, except that the tirades and witticisms are longer.
For example, Elphaba is very quiet at first at Shiz, but when she starts talking, p125, this is intricate quasi-monologue.

I certainly wish I had conversation like this!

To return to Nanny, she usually is the one to point at weaknesses around her, but the narrator also shows her stealing from Melena, and she is laughable in the episode of the garter.

[Constance963]

Nanny simply doesn't sugar coat anything - Life is what it is and she doesn't make excuses for it. She seems to be the kind of person who just pushes on no matter what happens. I think she's cynical but life probably hasn't always been kind to Nanny.

[tlpounds]

Though Nanny did not say the below quote, I thought I would post this discussion question under this thread anyway because it does have "perception on life" in the label

"All our lives are activity without meaning: we burrow ratlike into life and we squirm ratlike through it and ratlike we are flung into our graves at the end."


This passage calls to mind, for me, the phrase "rat race," which is often used to describe a strenuous, wearisome, and usually competitive lifestyle. Do you think you are living in a rat race? Do you like it? (The phrase has a negative connotation, but for some people, they love such a life. Even with the occasional "beatings," don't such challenges/hurdles/trials make one...capable? After all, change/evolution requires a catalyst, often being competition or survival...

[Ophelia]

Tammy wrote:

Though Nanny did not say the below quote, I thought I would post this discussion question under this thread anyway because it does have "perception on life" in the label .

"All our lives are activity without meaning: we burrow ratlike into life and we squirm ratlike through it and ratlike we are flung into our graves at the end."

I remember seeing this quote, who says this and where, if you've got the reference handy?

"perception on life" is an allusion to...?
I thought you meant this is what I had written, but then I couldn't find it.
Or is it what you should say?

This passage calls to mind, for me, the phrase "rat race," which is often used to describe a strenuous, wearisome, and usually competitive lifestyle. Do you think you are living in a rat race? Do you like it? (The phrase has a negative connotation, but for some people, they love such a life. Even with the occasional "beatings," don't such challenges/hurdles/trials make one...capable? After all, change/evolution requires a catalyst, often being competition or survival...

Tammy, when reading the questions you have prepared for your group, I've been trying to imagine what sort of group this is. What sort of questions do they respond to best?

First I must say I admire your imagination, I would never be able to think of so many related questions.

Also, your questions relate to what we language teachers call "exploitation" in French, I don't know if "extrapolation" would be a good word in English.
In the field of pedagogy, I was reminded when I taught secondary school in California that we were supposed to do this "exploitation", but when I did my teacher training they only said one sentence about it so I had no idea what it was, and forgot that we often didn't do it.
But in the US it seemed to be the key to language teaching from what I saw when visiting classes.

These are just remarks on my part, not criticism.

With a quote like ""All our lives are activity without meaning: we burrow ratlike into life and we squirm ratlike through it and ratlike we are flung into our graves at the end."
I'd discuss the quote in the book first. Who says it, whether it's in passing or something important about the novel...
I don't have an answer for the moment, but I'd like to discuss this (in the BT forum I mean)

Now this would be a difficult thing to throw at a group, asking them what they think it means in the context of the novel, but the teacher in me says something is missing if you go directly to the questions you asked.

[tlpounds]

Hi Ophelia!
I took the quote from page 23 of the book. A dwarf said it during his welcome speech to the crowd that gathered to see the Time Dragon in Rush Margins. Do you remember this event in the beginning of the book? The dwarf finished his speech by saying, "Now and then, why shouldn't we hear a voice of prophecy, or see a miracle play? Beneath the apparent sham and indignity of our rat-like lives, a humble pattern and meaning still applies! Come nearer, my good people, and watch what a little extra knowledge augurs for your lives! The Time Dragon sees before and beyond and within the truth of your sorry span of years here! Look at what it shows you!"
I used "perception on life" from the name of the thread you gave for Wicked: Nanny and Her Perception on Life. Perception can also mean "grasp; understanding," so I figured instead of making a new thread for this discussion question, I would post it under Wicked: Nanny and Her Perception on Life because, even though Nanny didn't say the quoted passage, it is simply another perception (idea/understanding/grasp) on life I wanted to explore with everyone. Basically, I was just trying to justify my reason for posting this discussion question under this thread!
My reading group is simply made up of a couple of people from my work and my two roommates. We are all from different walks of life (e.g. education level, age, geography), but I somehow managed to inspire enough interest in the book to get them on a schedule to read it with me. It really helped when I made a reading schedule for us that included breaking the book into small chunks of readable parts. They were more willing to read a 500 page book when you tell them, "But we'll only be reading less than a 100 pages a week!?"
I am really not sure how or why they pick the discussion questions that inspire them and make them want to respond. Each question really does something different for each person, and sometimes I don't receive a response for any of them. It's just a crapshoot to find out what interests people. I just try to think of different questions that come to mind while I'm reading the book, put it out there for the group, and see what happens.
I think finding so many questions to ask has just been a result of my formal training these past two years. I just finished my Masters in Education, and pretty much all we did was learn various teaching techniques/skills, apply them in the classroom, and discuss our success and failure through group discourse and/or writing formal papers. (I have written so many these past couple of years that thinking of things to ask about Wicked is a welcomed break!)
I try to form my questions using Bloom's Taxonomy. http://www.officeport.com/edu/blooms.htm
I start by asking questions that demand a simple cognitive function (i.e. recalling information and understanding meaning/translating) to ones that demand a more complex intellectual task (i.e. analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating/making judgments). Is this what you were asking about my questioning techniques?

[Ophelia]

I used "perception on life" from the name of the thread you gave for Wicked: Nanny and Her Perception on Life.

Tammy, my question was about the preposition: can you say both perception on life and of life?

I took the quote from page 23 of the book. A dwarf said it during his welcome speech to the crowd that gathered to see the Time Dragon in Rush Margins. Do you remember this event in the beginning of the book?

"All our lives are activity without meaning: we burrow ratlike into life and we squirm ratlike through it and ratlike we are flung into our graves at the end."

The dwarf finished his speech by saying, "Now and then, why shouldn't we hear a voice of prophecy, or see a miracle play? Beneath the apparent sham and indignity of our rat-like lives, a humble pattern and meaning still applies! Come nearer, my good people, and watch what a little extra knowledge augurs for your lives! The Time Dragon sees before and beyond and within the truth of your sorry span of years here! Look at what it shows you!"

Thanks for giving the reference, I had forgotten about the dwarf.
Once again I like the style and the inventiveness.
Otherwise this is mainly about the opposition between unitarianism and the Pleasure Faith.
The way the dwarf is drawing Munchkinlanders from the one to the other is quite clever I think.

Since I haven't finished the book, I wonder whether this clash isn't one of those issues the author drops as the book goes-- one of the elements that seem to be typical of Wicked.


Something else I find typical in the part I am reading now, "City of Emeralds" is that Maguire, having laid the basis for a potentially attractive love story and a potentially good story fighting the Wizard doesn't seem to want to really have a go at this, and we're back to some of the distance of the first part.
This would explain whay so many people/ reviewers seem to find the book uneven or puzzling.

Tammy:
I think finding so many questions to ask has just been a result of my formal training these past two years. I just finished my Masters in Education, and pretty much all we did was learn various teaching techniques/skills, apply them in the classroom, and discuss our success and failure through group discourse and/or writing formal papers. (I have written so many these past couple of years that thinking of things to ask about Wicked is a welcomed break!)
I try to form my questions using Bloom's Taxonomy. http://www.officeport.com/edu/blooms.htm
I start by asking questions that demand a simple cognitive function (i.e. recalling information and understanding meaning/translating) to ones that demand a more complex intellectual task (i.e. analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating/making judgments). Is this what you were asking about my questioning techniques?

Yes, thanks for your answer, I've had a look at the site you mentioned.

[tlpounds]

"...If you don't give her the weapons and armor with which she can defend herself against scorn, she'll make your life miserable as hers will be miserable."

What do you think of Nanny's parenting skills, taking Elphaba into town to play with the children? Her intentions were to expose Elphaba to taunting and various abuses at an early age. Was it a good lesson for her to learn, or was it too harsh? If your child had some sort of birth defect or disability, would you expose him or her to ridicule at such an age, or would you shelter him or her as much as you could throughout life?

[Ophelia]

Which page was this?

[tlpounds]

Which page was this?

page 62