So we've read two book so far and we are working on our third and I have to say I'm a little frustrated with our readings. Maybe it's because I haven't connected with the novels or maybe it's because I was thinking we would read more popular works. But, on the contrary I can see the benefit in having a plethora of authors under my belt.

Last week I posted on Joaquin Murieta although I hadn't finished it. Being done, it didn't live up to what I wanted it to be. He wasn't a Robin Hood figure at all much less a hero. He was a self serving bandit who did things to benefit himself. There was no order to how he operated and worse he didn't really have a greater calling and if he did it was that he didn't like white people.

As I was listening to the groups talk about their questions I felt there was a common theme that ran through all the groups and that's the idea that as much as we want to try and sensationalize Murieta as a hero we can't simply because he isn't. In my group we brought up the point that Ridge liked the idea of a Robin Hood like figure but failed to deliver on that idea. Maybe I missed this in class or the readings but how accurate is this story? It seems that we have run into a bit of a problem with the separation of historical recollection and telling a good story. Thus, as much as Ridge would like to make Murieta the modern Robin Hood he can't in the name of historical accuracy.

What I'm really identifying is a bigger question/problem in literature and thats where is the line, or is there a line, between fact and fiction? In most of my English classes we tackle this problem at one point or another and Joaqin Murieta is a good example of this. How would we classify this text? It is my belief that this is a work of fiction and doesn't really educate the audience on who this man was. Wouldn't it be more effective to chose between a biography of Murieta or a story based on "true events"? We still can't escape the overarching problem of removing the authors bias, but it would set the stage in a more clean and precise manner. Ultimately I took away that this book, like many others, falls in the grey area of literature that doesn't allow for real in depth analysis simply because everything we analyze is the authors point of view rather than the things Murieta did. I often ask this question when I am reading something and I can't seem to work through that problem. To me, this is a fundamental flaw in our field. Literature is a subjective medium that doesn't allow itself to be truly analyzed in the sense of historical accuracy because all we really analyze is that which the author feels worth documenting. I may be completely wrong but there does seem to be a disconnect between fact and the authors motivation to put pen to paper.