The Second History Lesson.

"Dark was coming in early already, and with it arrived a gloomy slanting rain. i find this the most appealing kind of autumn evening, not the most dismal, so i felt only a faint shiver of premonition when my hands, searching for ten minutes reading fell casually on the antique volume i had been avoiding. i had left it tucked among less disturbing items on my desk. i sat down there and opened the book. immediately i became aware of something very strange. a smell rose from its pages that was not merely the delicate scent of aging paper and cracked velum. it was a wreak of decay. a terrible sickening odor. a smell of old meat or corrupted flesh. the little volume seemed alive in my hands, yet it smelled of death."

this passage helps characterize Professor Rossi. it shows that he is not a fearful man, but calm and collected for the most part. the book is a symbol for Dracula and the undead. the scent of decay that is described is the same stench that i would think she come from the undead because they are hundreds of years old, far past simply slight decay.
My questions are...
How could this book smell of decay?
why was he not more scared?
why did he try to hide the book?
what does he mean by "seemed alive"?
something bad is about to happen, isn't it?

The Historian

The way Elizabeth Kostova begins this book is very unique. she begins it as though she wants the reader to believe this piece of fiction is just the opposite. true words spoken written and recorded in a journal format that cause fear for your own survival. The author begins the journal at the very end it seems. she begins by telling the beginning, switching between the accounts of many those involved. Kostova begins by sharing with us the making of this journal and her compiling of all the information gathered. she them goes on to thank those that helped her and tell what got all of the curiosity started. she does all of this to try to convince us that we are reading true accounts of Dracula, and surprisingly, she does this very well. in the midst of reading simply her opening, i was excited to hear real tales of Dracula and his horrible past... and present.


"As a historian i have learned that in fact not everyone who reaches back into history can survive it. and it is not only reaching back that endangers us, sometimes history itself reaches inexorably forward for us with its shadowy claws."

Kostova scares us with this passage. she has just begun to tel us about the focus of her journal, and these two sentences spark a number of questions.

Who doesn't survive?
what happened to her mother?
can history really be that frightening?
does she reach back into history?
what does she mean by history reaching forward?
can history reach forward?

In saying this, she develops her character. she makes aware her fear and love for history and the enjoyment she gets from the danger of it. also this passage foreshadows upcoming events, making it seem as thought history will somehow attack them or put them in some form of danger.

My Last And Final Haunting.

Comment on the perspective from which the book is told and how the
author’s choice affects your relationship with the book’s content.


Chuck Palahniuk write with a unique style and highly significant style. In Haunted, he chooses to write about people who are similar to him. These people are writers, people who have somewhat disturbed minds, and Palahniuk must have a disturbed mind to have written this novel.

throughout the entire book, he writes in the first person. At some points this is perfectly reasonable because at these points a person is telling a story about themselves or their lives. However, in other parts, he uses "we", but never "i."

"Its the greasy ghost of Comrade Snarky, what we'll have to smell every time we use the microwave. we're breathing her spirit. her sweet buttery stink will haunt us"(Palahniuk, 271).

This passage shows us the invisible we that appears on every page and also gives us the origin of the title. the reason palahniuk named this book haunted is not because of something haunting them, but because of the things they did to themselves that haunt them. the majority of the people trapped at the "writers retreat" cut off a number of their fingers and or toes, and just as the smell of comrade snarkeys flesh will haunt them, the absence of their digits.

None of the characters in this book are given names, simply little things to remember them by, whether its lady baglady who was wealthy and pretended to be a baglady because it was "in" and lost her husband, or saint gut-free who simply has very little guts because of an unfortunate accident. i believe these poeple are all just personalities of one very confused person, this invisible we.

Another oddity about Palahniuk's writing is his use of quotation marks. there are things said that indeed about enclosed in quotes, however many things said have no quotes whatsoever. i cannot think of a reason why Palahniuk would be selective about his use of these key punctuation marks.

My First Haunting

All the characters in haunted want to escape, though none of them seem to know exactly why. these hermits escape to a secret writers retreat, alone and only able to bring one suitcase for three months. these people, these writers, seem so eager to alienate themselves from the world, to trap themselves alone with other strangers, under the control of a man they know nothing about. these people seem almost too keen to run away.


"The rest of the disaster wasn't our fault. We had no reason, none whatsoever, to bring a chainsaw. Or a sledgehammer or a stick of dynamite. Or a gun. No, on this dessert island , we'd be completely, completely safe."

This passage is a good example of foreshadowing. it makes me believe that they are not going to be as safe as they seem to think thought they would be. what I'm wondering is why are they not safe? Were they ever actually told that they were going to a dessert island? What were they told? Anything?