TOW #28: Documentary Rhetorical Analysis

     "Everything is good and bad. I look at the good side," says Alice Sommer in The Lady in Number 6: Music Saved My Life. This 2013 documentary captures the life of Sommer, then a 109-year-old Holocaust survivor whose life was continually saved by music. Set in an interview format, the documentary begins with Sommer describing her life leading up to the Holocaust. She began playing the piano from a young age, and her family was close friends with musicians like Mahler and Kafka. These childhood experiences allowed her love of music to grow, and Sommer became a concert pianist as an adult. However, in 1943, Sommer and her son were sent to Theresienstadt, a concentration camp for Jewish celebrities and musicians that was used for Nazi propaganda. There, she remained happy by playing in concerts and spreading her love of music, and in 1945, Theresienstadt was liberated by the Soviets, and Sommer moved to Israel to be with her family. In 1986, she moved to London where she played the piano for hours each day, bringing joy to herself and all those around her, until she passed away on February 23, 2014, at 110.
     The purpose of The Lady in Number 6 was to tell the story of Alice Sommer and, through her, to demonstrate the amazing power of music. To achieve this, the documentary juxtaposed the horrors of the Holocaust with Sommer's stories of the restorative power of music and presented everything in Sommer's own extremely positive and optimistic tone.
     As Sommer's story progresses, she begins to describe how during the German invasion of Czechoslovakia, her concert grand piano was confiscated by the Nazis, and she was forbidden to perform – to do what she loved. This crushing announcement is then directly juxtaposed with Sommer's story about the situation. She says that she managed to hide a piccolo piano from the Nazis, and would play it in her spare time. However, this brought joy to not only Sommer and her son, but also to Mr. Herman, a Nazi who lived in her building. Through this juxtaposition, the audience is able to understand the power of music – for Sommer, playing the piano was able to keep her happy even when her husband was deported and the source of her livelihood was taken away, and this power of music stretched even to someone who was supposed to hate her.
     Throughout the documentary, Sommer remains positive, no matter what she is discussing. When describing her time in Theresienstadt, Sommer says that she managed to laugh even while she was there because it kept her and those around her happy. Later in life, when her son died at 64 (he didn't wake up from anesthesia), Sommer recounts the experience in a positive light, saying that dying the way he did (peacefully and without pain) is the best way to go. Sommer's continuously positive perception of events in her life gives the documentary a positive and optimistic tone, which truly convinces watchers of the strength of music.

She Never Stopped Playing:

Pictured here at 109, Sommer never stopped playing the piano and doing what she loved. Because of this, she was a constant inspiration to her friends, family, and neighbors.

TOW #27: TOW Reflection

1. What progression or change do you notice in your TOWs?
     My earlier TOWs often contain too much summary of the text (or too-lengthy quotes) and less analysis than needed. However, as time goes on, the summary decreases and the analysis of rhetorical devices increases. The ties back to the thesis in particular get stronger in my later TOWs.

2. What do you think you mastered?
     I think I mastered connecting my rhetorical devices to each other and to my thesis. In September, my TOWs often contained body paragraphs that connected back to the thesis, but rarely (if ever) drew connections between those body paragraphs and the rhetorical devices identified within them. However, in my March TOWs, there are clear connections between the various rhetorical devices, and the transitions are clear and effective.

3. What could you still strive to improve?
     Recently, I've been working with my TOWs to try to make the introduction and SOAPS part more interesting. I've been trying to incorporate that information in a less formulaic way, but I still think this could be improved.

4. How did you or did you not benefit from these assignments given their overall purpose?
     I think I definitely did benefit from writing TOWs. When reading through past assignments, I can see a distinct change in my ability to analyze and especially to connect back to my thesis. I believe that weekly TOWs provided the repetition and practice needed to reinforce and improve upon these skills, and I think, overall, my analysis essays were better because of these TOWs.

TOW #26: Musicophilia by Oliver Sacks (IRB)

     In Musicophilia, Oliver Sacks, a physician with a focus in neurology, chronicles the enormous range of ways music reacts with our brains. He writes to an audience of high schoolers or older, and though he does often slip in medical terms that the average teenager won't recognize, they don't detract from a reader's understanding. Through Musicophilia, Sacks hopes to share his interest in the brain and music with the world, and he does so by recounting the stories of his many patients in very personal ways, often including direct quotes from the patients themselves.
     Sacks provides detailed profiles of his patients and their disorder or ability in order to truly show his audience the effects of that patient's condition. In the section about musical hallucinations, he writes: "Michael B. has very clear musical hallucinations. [...] Michael first complained of this when he was seven, saying, 'I'm hearing music in my head. ... I have to check the radio to see if it's really on.' [... At times he] seems to be in what his mother calls 'acoustic agony.' He cries, 'Take it out of my head. Take it away!' [...] 'Last evening, Michael was very happy because his internal music stopped for about fifteen seconds. This has never happened before.'" (68-69). Through these stories, Sacks effectively introduces the condition and then goes on to describe its true effects through direct quotes from the patients or people close to them. This gives readers a personal understanding of the disorder, since they hear it directly from the person who is experiencing it. This story in particular gives readers a new perspective on the severity of musical hallucinations in the final quote, when Michael B.'s mother says that "about fifteen seconds" without music was something that had never occurred in Michael's life. Often, Sacks follows up his explanation of the condition and its effects with a section (usually a footnote) on how the patient is doing today. Here, he quotes Michael's mother: "Michael, who is now twelve and in seventh grade, continues to hear nonstop music. He seems to be better able to cope with it [...] He loves to compose his own music, and he has perfect pitch." (69). Through this, Sacks gives readers resolution. Many of the other stories about musical hallucinations end differently (the patients' hallucinations often go away with the help of medicine), and the contrast between the stories piques the audience's interest by exposing them to the diversity of musical disorders.
     Through much of Musicophilia, Oliver Sacks provides readers with detailed stories about his patients by spanning their struggles with the disease, the treatments they tried, and how they are doing today. These personal stories and their seamless integration of direct patient quotes are intriguing to the audience, and effectively convey Sacks' interest in the brain and music. Surely, it will even inspire some readers to pursue the topics Sacks covers even further.

Musical Hallucinations:

 For people with musical hallucinations, music constantly runs through their minds, and it is often impossible to turn off.

(Source: http://hearinginstitute.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/notesandneurons.png)