Lost...

I've been writing sentences,
interpretting characters,
drawing arrows,
marking quotes,
talking to myself,
confronting Doctorow,
and so much more for a few hours now and I'm really just not feeling any draw towards comprehension of a topic for this paper. It just seems as if Doctorow isn't arguing anything except for necessity of good fortune to be a success story in the American dream. But then I have to use different characters.

This is me stream of consciousness typing.

If we look at Tateh and Goldman, their interactions are far from strongly correlated within the book. But we can theorize how their relationship looked. Tateh worked hard, he came believing in these American ideals and set to work for it. Goodman saw the same, but what made her realize that she couldn't succeed? She had seen more, I suppose. So is Doctorow making a statement on ignorance? no that's dumb.

Wait, apparently I just forgot about Chapter 8.
There's tensions between the two characters because of their view on the American Dream's existence. Tateh is a socialist because he sees the potential in the American people to achieve the equality he expected when he came to America, whereas Goldman has given up because of whatever reasons (she has seen more than Tateh has, and she is disheartened by the Patriarchal system and how she can never reach the dream anyway). These two perspectives are based on characteristics randomly "assigned" by fate. There's a ragtime feel in it where accents are unpredicatble, and that shapes your entire outlook and thus whether or not you change classes?

Hmm... i'll take this somewhere. Maybe Coalhouse could play a role too, considering his race prevented him from achieving a self-actualized American dream. But he got as far as he did because he didn't think he was black.

Maybe it's more about perspective.
These characterics shape the perspective on the American dream.
So what?