HUST is a pilgrimage to the shrine of knowledge (or something like that)

To summarize:

• In the Canterburry Tales & the Decameron the specifics of the journeys (destination, places along the way) are important but the experience is the focus and the most important.
• Chaucer & Boccaccio call attention to different issues and social norms ----> they create reader awareness
• Awareness is the first step to change
• Let us make our own judgments
• Let us come to our own conclusions
  
• HUST (or school in general) is like a journey we are the travelers
  
• It's the journey that matters!
  

In Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, the travelers on a specific journey (a pilgrimage) to a specific site (Thomas Becket shrine in Canterbury) with a specific "goal" or purpose in mind (thanking the saint for his intercession or securing his aid in the future). In Boccaccio's Decameron, the storytellers have no set agenda and are merely running away from the death and destruction of the plague that was ravaging Florence. In both instances, while the impetus for the travel does influence the characters' behavior and our interpretation of their behavior (and their stories) it does not entirely define their works.

The interaction of characters, the stories they tell and the interface between the author (of the work) and the characters/social settings/stories are what make these works interesting. To me, these works are the most interesting because they do not presume to tell the reader what he or she should take away from the reading. Instead, these authors challenge the reader to take what they will. The idea that there is not one single way of viewing the world and life is starting to permeate popular thinking. Often times we see what we want to see.

That being said, the authors do have certain ideas of which they want to make the reader aware. It is important to note that I think these two authors are striving for awareness and not to definitively sway the reader to their way of thinking. Trying to change a person's mind or worldview in the space of a few hundred pages is rather difficult, if not impossible. I think that they don't make that mistake. They recognize that perhaps awareness is all that can be achieved, but that awareness can be a step in the right direction. They cleverly devise their stories in such a way that certain points or issues are brought to the fore. They use twists and turns in order to engage the reader and simply question societal and religious norms.

–The ambiguity of the text and the frustration the reader feels in trying to pin down the author's point of view makes the reader all the more engaged in the work and thoughtful of the issues it raises. Because we are not fully satisfied with definitive answers, we keep going back to the text and rethinking the issues. It goes to show you that there are many ways to argue a point and that the most obvious and forceful may not be the most effective or enduring method.–

This brings me back to the title of my blog. In HUST the destination does not really matter. We will probably all go on to do many different things with our lives. The extent to which we directly employ our HUST knowledge will vary from person to person, but we will all have a solid foundation of knowledge at our disposal. I think the important thing is that we are asking the questions. We may not ever reach a satisfactory answer, but like Boccaccio and Chaucer have shown us, that may not be the point. If we can remember to ask the questions, we won't run the risk of becoming blind to the world in which we live and the type of people we become. It may be cliché, but the journey seems to be much more important than the destination. I think we learn a lot more about ourselves from the journey than we do from just making it to the destination.

Have fun with all the work we have coming up! I am personally very excited to our medieval spring break! We HUSTers really know how to party, medieval style! Enjoy!

So the important thing to remember is that frustration can be good because:

• it makes you think more
• it makes you think harder
• it engages you more
• it forces you think in different ways
  
• allows you to explore new perspectives