Today we got our results for the January exams, and as it is customary for me to reveal them once and for all (it's more economical than repeating them all the time), here they are:
Note that I'm still waiting for another two marks (Dutch normative grammar and a German test).
This means that I got rid of three courses. There are no less than 8 other courses to take an exam for at the end of the year. That'll be a right kerfuffle.
Now some comments about those exams, as I promised three weeks ago. Today I deal with the first two, and the other three will be discussed tomorrow.
First of all, we had to take a kind of intermediate test in German, consisting of a conversation with our teacher, Mr Bertrand. During the test, we had to provide good forms of declined adjectives, plural of nouns, their genders, forms of verbs, etc. We also had to answer basic questions and tell something about a topic discussed in the workbook. All this was supposed to take just 20 minutes, just like a regular oral exam, but Mr Bertrand was so enthousiastic about talking with me that I talked with him during 35 minutes more or less.
The following exam,
Histoire des littératures et des civilisations anglophones was to take place on 8 January, that's to say three days later. (Exceptionally, our German test had to take place on 4 January or 21 January due to schedule problems.) Before I started studying my course notes, during the two weeks of "holiday", I had already leart and worked on the paraphrases that we came across with Pr. Delabastita. It took me a considerable amount of time to type everything, but in that way I had already made a first approach to the fragments. So I read, re-read, re-re-read the course notes: that's my way of studying. At the same time, I made an outline of the authors and their works, plus their dates of birth and death. After three day's study, I started becoming crazy: I wanted to stop studying, but I couldn't: I felt the urge to study, even if I couldn't assimilate more.
That's maybe why I appeared in front of Pr. Delabastita in a less relaxed state than usual. He asked me: "How are you Simon?" and I answered: "Of course I am", because what I heard was: "Are you Simon?". I admit I have some audition problems when I'm anxious. I picked one of the many exam sheets and I prepared my answers in the nearby classroom. My questions were:
- Identify this fragment and discuss it. [Fowles, The French Lieutenant's Woman, beginning of chapter 55.]
- What are the origins, characteristics, most important authors, etc. of the gothic genre.
So when Benjamin, who preceeded me, had finished his exam, it was my turn to be judged. So I talked about the fragment, situating it, talking about the book, about metafiction, etc. Pr. Delabastita asked me a couple of questions to make my answers more precise or to reframe them — as usual. Then we moved on to the second question. I talked about
The Castle of Otranto, Anna Radcliff's
The Monk, Dickens, the Brontë sisters,
Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde,
Dracula. But at that moment, I felt that my answers were not as satisfying as what I'm used to: I lacked precision, curiously. At the end, he asked me which link there was between Jane Austen and the gothic novel. I had absolutely no idea of such a thing: probably he had told it as a footnote during the class, but the fact was that I didn't remember. (Note that's the first time I couldn't find an answer, even a hypothesis.) This wouldn't affect my marks seriously, but I was sure I wouldn't get 18 like last year. Nevertheless, I was quite confident about a 15 or a 16, and the results prove I was right.
Tomorrow, I'll talk about Dutch normative grammar, Dutch history and literature, and English linguistics.
A rejoicing announcement: the
Star Wars exhibition will come to Tour & Taxis, in Brussels, between 16 February and 1 June 2008. This exciting exhibition was first held in London, then in other famous places such as New York (Brooklin), Lisbon and Paris. I certainly will go and see it — and that will be the third time: I first saw it in London in 2001, then in Paris in 2005. Fortunately, the layout and the artifacts from the saga were quite different in both exhibitions, and we can expect it will again be the case in Brussels. Anyway, I envoy seeing those splendid costumes and miniature spacecraft and other silly things that only
Star Wars freaks would worship.
May the Force be with you!
