Sarah Powell

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The world’s largest telescope made with data Look up on a starry night and consider this: in our lifetime we just might find the answers to one of life’s biggest mysteries. Dutch research institute, Astron and its international partners are building the world’s largest radio telescope, aka The Square Kilometer Array. This big telescope will be made up of thousands of interconnected smaller telescopes, arranged in fractal patterns, to let us glimpse back in time more than 13 billion years ago—mere seconds after the universe was created. How on Earth is this possible? 

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[spowelleng400]

I just think this is amazing!

[spowelleng400]

...we crowded together in the three rooms of a traditional thatched farmstead and lived a kind of den-life which was more or less emotionally and intellectually proofed against the outside world. It was an intimate, physical, creaturely existence in which the night sounds of the horse in the stable beyond one bedroom wall mingled with the sounds of adult conversation from the kitchen beyond the other. We took in everything that was going on, of course - rain in the trees, mice on the ceiling, a steam train rumbling along the railway line one field back from the house - but we took it in as if we were in the doze of hibernation... But it was not only the earth that shook for us: the air around and above us was alive and signalling too. When a wind stirred in the beeches, it also stirred an aerial wire attached to the topmost branch of the chestnut tree. Down it swept, in through a hole bored in the corner of the kitchen window, right on into the innards of our wireless set where a little pandemonium of burbles and squeaks would suddenly give way to the voice of a BBC newsreader speaking out of the unexpected like a deus ex machina. And that voice too we could hear in our bedroom, transmitting from beyond and behind the voices of the adults in the kitchen; just as we could often hear, behind and beyond every voice, the frantic, piercing signalling of morse code.

-Nobel Lecture 1995-Seamus Heaney

I thought his description of the railroad, the telegraph, and the radio is very impressive.  It obviously made an impression on him as a child that he could still recall years later as a poet.  Luckily for my paper, he talks about these inventions and the impact they had on his childhood in depth.  While I wasn't expecting to find so much from him personally on the subject, I am very happy that I did find something.  Hopefully it will be helpful when I actually start the writing process. Just thought I would share this breif part of his speech because it seems very fitting.  

[spowelleng400]

The feelings of every man in the party were ardently excited by the approach to the city once the light of the world's civilization. The great French writer, Volney, exclaimed when first his eyes beheld the sight, "How are we astonished when we reflect that to the race of the Negroes, the object of our extreme contempt, we owe our arts, sciences, and even the use of speech!"

-Of One Blood Ch. XIII

I missed our last class meeting because I had the flu, for the first time ever, so I'm not sure exactly where are discussions of this book are headed.  But this quote fascinated me.  The use of the word light is used a lot in this book.  We have had many discussions on light and dark in past class meetings.  But when you look at in correlation with the ideas of race in this book, it becomes even more useful.  This quote also points out that sight and eyes are important in the relation of race and this city.  I simply wish to point out how interesting the idea of last sentence is.  Although this is a work of fiction, it makes me think about my history, as a Caucasian, and the history of all my fellow members of mankind.  I think it is important to remember that we are a young society and that we have much to learn in many areas.  This novel puts in perspective the ideas we have about science and technology.  Although we seem to be progressing at an very fast pace, we are indeed just catching up to what our ancestors have done already.  The key in thinking about these concepts is to note that no human lives forever.  While our ancestors were very advanced, and could have been more so, they died early and their ideas were sometimes lost with their physical bodies.  Although we live longer, we still need records of our accomplishments, questions, and answers in order for future generations to continue our quests.  

[spowelleng400]

The most marvelous thing to watch is the death of a person. At that moment the opposite takes place to that which took place when life entered the first unit, after nature had prepared it for the inception of life. How the vigorous life watches the passage of the liberated life out of its earthly environment...Here is shown the setting free of a disciplined spirit giving up its mortality for immortaliy, --the condition necessary to know God. Death! There is no death...

-Of One Blood Ch. 4

Hmmm.  What is this passage about?  Well, yes it is about death.  It is about Reuel's philosophy of death.  And his philosophy is quite concise and interesting.  The first few lines are understandable.  It is the lines, "How the vigorous life watches the passage of the liberated life out of its earthly enironment" and "Here is shown the setting free of a disciplined spirit giving up its mortality for immortality" that are most intriguing to me.  I don't quite know what to take from them.  Why does she use the descriptors that she uses?  Vigorous life?  Liberated life?  Disciplined spirit?  I don't know.  Maybe our class discussion will shed some light on these things for me.  The idea of suspended animation is really intriguing.  I really like that desription of a coma.  

[spowelleng400]

A Paper Proposal: Seamus Heaney's "The Railway Children"

          I would like to discuss the poem “The Railway Children,” by Seamus Heaney.  In the poem, Heaney discusses children playing near the railroad tracks and the telepgraph poles.  The poem is set between two technologies, the railroad and the telegraph.  I would like to focus on how the children think about the telegraph and how it makes them feel in their world. 

            By focusing on the children and their view of the world, how does the telegraph play a role in the relationship between their views and the reality of the world around them?  What is the relationship between the children’s world and the larger, more expansive world around them?  Why are they “infinitesimally small?”  Do they feel a change in the world caused by technology that the adults do not?  Is this poem focusing on the idea that the world around the children has changed drastically and that they are the only ones that possess that knowledge?

            Unfortunately, some of the resources I previously glanced at turned out to be useless.  I may have to work hard to find some useful resources for this paper.  There appears to be a lot of info on Seamus Heaney’s views on childhood.  Hopefully that will lead to some interesting discussion.  I also need to focus on both the railway and telegraph in Ireland during his childhood and also during his writing career.  For instance, the poem was published in 1939.  At the time it was written, there was a telegraph censorship happening in Ireland.  Did this have an effect on what and how Seamus Heaney wrote?  Surely it did.  So with that in mind, there may be enough to flesh out my paper.  Thus far, I simply need some input.

[spowelleng400]

Seamus Heaney and the "White Cups"

[spowelleng400]

What poem did you find?  I’m curious.  We’ll be talking a bit more about the telegraph on Tuesday, so stay tuned.

"The Railway Children" by Seamus Heaney.  I read about his death on NPR's app in August and read the poem there.  I thought his description about the poles was interesting so I did some research about why he described them as "white cups."  I knew a little about the way they looked but researching it was absolutely fascinating.  I ended up with a google book and one from our library that might be useful.  I also found some great pics that made this poem really come to life for me.  But as it was very early in the semester, I didn't focus on this poem much after the first few weeks of school.  So I'm not sure if I have much to go on or not.  Maybe I'll get some clarity in the next day or so.

The picture above is a replica.

The two pictures above are insulators from the late 1890s and early 1900s.  

[spowelleng400]

Her interlocutress had, in the cage, sounded depths, but there was a suggestion here somehow of an abyss quite measureless.

In the Cage, pg 205

I couldn't help myself when I found this quote.  Holy crap, Henry James!  In the cage, the telegraph girl is overwhelmed by the knowledge that surrounds her.  She also enjoys having this knowledge.  She likes the control this false knowledge, these "snippets" of knowledge, give her.  Outside the cage, she realizes this information is even more vast than she assumes.  The knowledge that Mrs. Jordan gives her about Captain Everard solidifies this.  But what is Henry James doing here? His sentence structure and diction is amazing.  He seems to give us a look into the telegraph girl's deepest thoughts.  We discussed this at length in our last class, but I still can't grasp what his intentions are for the reader.  I mean, I get it.  And I get it on a deeper level than just surface level but, geez.  This quote has me somewhat baffled at his genius.  There is something about the cage that he wants us to focus on.  And yes, he specifies that by the commas.  But there is so much more to this quote than meets the eye.    I don't know. 

In the end, I walk away from this novel with only a slight understanding.  That is why I am definitely considering working on my paper with this novel.  I had previously decided to work with the telegraph and found some fairly interesting research that deals with this. I also originally found a poem I wanted to focus on but I've decided it may not give enough flesh for a paper.  I've been thinking about a working thesis but I'm not ready to put it down in print just yet.  More on that later.  In the meantime, Henry James has clouded my mind.  And I'm excited about the opportunity to play with his work a little more.

[spowelleng400]

I have never read The Count of Monte Cristo.  I'm almost ashamed to claim to be an English major and not have read a classic novel such as this one.  But, in all reality, who has time to read them all? 

Looking at the word cloud I created on Wordle, there isn't much that surprises me.  All the big words are there. Villefort, Danglars, Vallentine, Morrel, Monte, and Cristo are all names of the major characters.  But if you look more closely at the other words in the word cloud, you find things such as house, man, eyes, alone, etc.  Using Wordle, the data is pretty simple and doesn't reveal much.

Voyant, on the other hand, tells a different story entirely.  The most frequent usage is that of the word said.  It is used 3,476 times.  Now obviously this isn't very intriguing.  It merely shows that there is a lot of dialogue in the novel.  Next in line is count.  Again, this isn't surprising because it is a word in the title and the title of a main character.  The next word most frequently used is man.  Here's where the interest level picks up, but only a tiny bit.  Man is used 1,301 times.  Woman is only used 156 times.  I'm not exactly sure what, if anything that can tell me about the novel in general but I thought it was an interesting fact to point out.  According to Google ngram, the use of the word woman between 1800 and 2000 peaked around 1900 and then again around 2000.  On a side note, usage of the word woman dipped around the 1960s.  That's odd considering the rise of feminism.    This novel was completed in 1844.  Dumas was obviously right in line with the current trend of the usage of woman.  

The next findings are also pretty usual considering the plot.  The use of escape (98 times), secret (107 times), disappeared (109 times), stranger (78 times), cried (339 times), death (270 times), and prisoner (88 times) are descriptions for what happens within the plot.  The focus of the plot is that of Edmond Dantes being arrested, imprisoned, and then escaping from jail.  All of these words are easily placed in this text. At this point in the project, I was struggling to find anything truly intriguing about what the software found.  However, as I continued to look through the list of the frequency of words and the graph that goes along with it, I began finding some things to talk about.  

For instance, I noticed the color white was used 109 times and black was used 117 times but not many other colors were in the most frequent column.  Later on I found blue with a total of 67 times.  Again, I'm not sure what this really tells me but the colors each appear on the graph in a rollercoaster fashion.  

Paragraph was used 11 times.  Paper, on the other hand, was used 119 times and variences of paper include: newspaper, litmus-paper, and music-paper. The use of litmus-paper is intriguing when I found out that litmus paper was discovered in 1300 AD.  Who knew?  In this text, litmus-paper is used twice in the discussion of the poisoning of Barrois.  

Several body parts were mentioned in the text.  Body itself is mentioned 82 times. Teeth, oddly enough, is used 40 times.  I have no explanation for this word but somehow it fits into the text many times. Tongue was used 24 times.  The most odd occurance has to be forehead.  It is used 59 times.  Why is Dumas highlighting this part of the body?  Hand was used 504 times.  I can't even begin to surmise what this symbolizes without having read the novel.  Although this software is rather fascinating, I'm not sure exactly what it can tell you about a novel other than the obvious data.

Most intresting was the pattern I found among certain words and their related words.  Some related words were mentioned in the text the same number of times.  For instance, laugh and laughing both appeared 43 times.  Confound and confounded occured 4 times a piece.  Blush and blushed, 7 times.  Traced and traces happened 18 times.  Protestations and protested were used 3 times and whitened and whitewash were used twice each.  I don't know that we can say this was purposefully but it is a very odd occurance that I kept finding.  Also interesting was the relationship between two words and how many times they occured.  Moon and nights both appeared 15 times.  While these aren't variatons of each other they are obviously related and occur the same amount in the text.  Food and hunger are another instance of this coincidence.  They each appear 25 times.  This is where the word trends graph comes into play.  According to the graph, food appears the most at the beginning of the book and hunger appears more at the end.  Apparently where there is more mention of food, we can assume people were not hungry.  And vice-versa.  Without reading the novel, this is only an assumption.  As for moon and nights, they seem to occur simultaneously.

Since we are discussing the telegraph in class currently, I thought it was interesting to note that telegraph was used 27 times.  Also a really odd occurance was that of lemonade 19 times.  Lemonade? Really? I couldn't find out when lemonade first started being ingested but it was obviously before 1844.

Now, all of this information doesn't really strike me as super uncommon other then the relation between words and their relatives and the number of times they occur.  However, there are several words that stand out to me.  Confetti appears 7 times in the text.  Hmmmm. Heliotropes occurs 3 times.  I looked at the keywords in context portion of Voyant to try and figure out what the word meant.  It was used to discuss flowers and mostly in conjunction with roses.  Boon was another instance when I had to use the keywords in context to decide what this word might represent.  All I learned is that the word is used to describe boon conciousness and vision.  I am not really sure about that word.  But it is a cool word.  The word genii is used 3 times.  According to the graph, it only occurs in section 2 and section 6.  The OED defines genii as: "a tutelary spirit."  In other words, a genie.  Knowing that it refers to ghosts or spirits, my last note about ghosts is interesting.  Ghosts and giants, both odd beings, occur 3 times each.  Human is mentioned 64 times.

Overall, this assignment was interesting.  It was fun to play around with the word trends graph and the keywords in context portion of Voyant.  The word cloud was similar to the one I created with Wordle.  Once, I started looking at all the frequencies, it was hard not to browse through them all.  There were 358 pages of frequently used words.  After about page 11, the numbers drastically dropped.  Pages 156-204 were consumed by words that were used only twice.  The last pages were examples of words used only once.  Neither of these really piqued my interest.  However, the word jottings did jump out at me and was used only once.  The concept of this project is awesome!  I really enjoyed spending time with it.  Hopefully my findings aren't as boring as they seem.

[h-archer]

The telegraph changed the way people identified with themselves and with the world. When the telegraph was born, communication was no longer limited to physical delivery of messages or face-to-face interaction; previous methods of communication were reincarnated as fast-paced snippets and coded transmissions—“whiffs and glimpses.” The characters show the nature of the telegraph’s effect on human relationships: people are simultaneously more connected to each other and more distanced from their inner selves. They are operating, at least in part, according to those individuals with whom they interact.

I absolutely agree.  The telegraph changed everything about how people communicated then and now.  I love the description James gave of telegraphs as "whiffs and glimpses."  It shows how fleeting our lives have become.  Nothing seems very concrete as far as communication goes.  Even now, our conversations and the way we interact are fluid.  Does this also mean that we too are fluid?  Your final thought on the fact that people are "operating according to those individuals with whom they interact" is precisely how I see the effect of both the telepgraph and all technology since then on people's relationships with one another.  James was a genius to not only study this relationship but to try to explain it to his audience.  Many authors in today's society follow this example.  Not only are there books that describe this situation, we now have movies and internet conversations that play on this theme as well.  I couldn't help but relate our social media sites to the discussions on the telegraph.  All the ideas James had about the telegraph could be used to discuss our relationships with each other via facebook and other sites.  

[spowelleng400]

This was neither more nor less than the queer extension of her experience, the double life that, in the cage, she grew at last to lead... It was a prodigious view as the pressure heightened, a panorama fed with facts and figures, flushed with a torrent of colour and accompanied with wondrous world-music.

-In the Cage by Henry James Chapter V

This mention of "double life" absolutely makes me think of social networking.  And perhaps we totally lead double lives online.  So, this book describing the telegraph and all it encompassed, is a precursor to how we live with the internet in our daily lives.  Yesterday in class we discussed the tapping sound the sounder made.  How many of us have some sort of noise that invades our minds and ears as we live in this digital world?  That is associated with all things digital?  Just a thought. 

I also see similarities in the next line between that of the view of this girl and the views we see in today's world.  The "pressure heightened, panorama fed with facts and figures" describes us all to well.  We exist in a "pressure heightened" society and all around us are "facts and figures" right?  We all complain at some time or the other, especially in the past ten or fifteen years of experiencing a type of "information overload."  Was this girl, working in James' fictional telegraph office feeling exactly our sentiments of the digital realm? Perhaps.  Perhaps the way people felt about the invasive technology of the telegraph age is how we feel about the digital age.  We are both excited and inundated with this new technology.  It not only allows us a new complete freedom in our actions, but a new complete freedom to move about quite quickly in our society.  Although not to the extent that the internet allows this freedom, so did the telegraph.  What an amazing invention! And how similar is the association between society and the telegraph to the association between society and the internet? 

[spowelleng400]

We were betrayed into this brief extravagance by the quiver of the moonbeams; they dance hand-in-hand with shadows, and are reflected in the looking-glass, which, you are aware, is always a kind of window or door-way into the spiritual world.

-The House of the Seven Gables Ch. 18

I found this quote to be the epitome of what we have discussed in class to date.  Not only do the moonlight and shadows play a part in what we see or think we see in this novel, but the mirror is also a huge component in Hawthorne's creepy tale of family and fortune.  Hawthorne sums up the novel in this quote.  We, as readers, were betrayed by the look of certain things, and then were shown the truth in certain lights.  Such as Colonel Pyncheon's Death.  We know he is dead as soon as Hepzibah re-enters the room.  But it isn't until the light of the day, the next day, that we are actually told that he is dead. As far as the mirror is involved, it seemed to play into the spiritual realm that Hawthorne created all along.  The mirror is only a reflection of these shadows and glimmers of light.

[spowelleng400]

Supernatural Death in The House of Seven Gables

One of the major themes of this novel that seems to reappear time and time again is that of supernatural death.  The death of Colonel Pyncheon, among others, is a great example of what Hawthorne is doing with supernaturality.  What does he want us to believe about these deaths?  How does Hepzibah escape the family curse?  Or does she?  I think it could be said that she hasn't escaped at all.  Although she doesn't die a most terrible death, her sadness and hopelessness seem to pervade her thoughts and life so much so that she is unable to be happy.  So perhaps this is another way the curse manifests itself on the family. 

Hawthorne seems to have many questions he intends for the readers to grapple with in order to understand the novel.  I am not entirely sure what all of them are.  Nor may I ever truly understand what he is doing in this novel.  But I think the way we have framed our discussions in class are very helpful in attempting to figure out Hawthorne's intentions.   

[spowelleng400]

Reading is the True Magnetism

When I read the letter that Hawthorne wrote to his wife, I started thinking about his feelings toward mesmerism and magnetism and why he felt that way.  Perhaps he was just responding to an experimental treatment in a way that even our society tends to respond to an unknown or misunderstood science, with fear and criticism.  The interesting thing to note is that Hawthorne seems to be very interested in mesmerism himself.  Thus far in the novel, we are shown many ideas of witchcraft and new technologies and yes, even the mesmerism of at least one character.  In thinking about this clear hypocrisy on his part, I started thinking of the whole novel as mesmerism.  Isn't that the point of an author, to mesmerize his readers?  To lull them into a state that he has created? Hawthorne states in the letter to his wife: "I am unwilling that a power should be exercised on thee, of which we know neither the origin nor the consequence...If I possessed such a power over thee, I should not dare to exercise it; nor can I consent to its being exercised by another."  I fully understand and nearly agree with Hawthorne in his fear.  But why then, would he not understand that as a writer, he holds almost that exact power over not just one, but many people? Does he indeed see it that way and is that why he would so adamantly oppose the idea of mesmerism or magnetism?  Who knows?  I just couldn't get past the thought that he is a mesmerist in his own right.   

[shellieanne92]

[spowelleng400]

shellieanne92:

The photo at the bottom, I would guess, is one of his first daguerreotypes, and displays him as a strong, stately young gentleman. His arms are crossed behind his back—why? Does this make his shoulders stick out, so that he looks more statuesque and confident?

The other two daguerreotypes I think are kind of humorous. They are essentially the same photo—both taken when Hawthorne is a much older man and has more of the scowl of Hepzibah—but it almost looks as though he could not make up his mind: “Do I want the hat on the book, or beside it? Do I want my coat buttoned, or unbuttoned?” The heavy tome clearly implies his literary genius and vast intelligence. As for the hat and the coat, I suppose one implies that he is staying for a while, and the other that he is leaving soon. Is Hawthorne a man always looking for an adventure, or one who is content to stay where he is? Good thing he has a daguerreotype for whatever mood he seems to be in! :)

I would be curious to hear what everyone else thinks of these!

Michelle,

I think it was very interesting to post these.  Your observations are great! The third one seems to me to represent the conversation we had Thursday in class about all of Hawthorne's characters being ghosts.  In the first two images you posted, he seems to know his place and position in life.  He is obviously an older gentleman which definitely changes his appearance and the mood of the images.  Maybe they are post-success pictures and that is the difference.  In the third, and possibly older one, the image makes him appear ghostly.  As a young man, he resembles how I picture Clifford in the novel.  He is both refined and mysterious, at least to the point in the novel I have reached.  You mentioned his hands being placed behind his back.  That reminds me of another class meeting discussion.  To me, that makes this image all the more haunting.  He almost seems to be a spirit only.  Without hands, all we really have to focus on are his facial features and expression.  They also speak to the fact that this image portrays him as ghostly.  His eyes are piercing and his scowl makes him appear to be forlorn.  What does this older image represent? Anger? Curiosity? Perhaps simply a young genius trying to find his station in life? 

[spowelleng400]

She... gazed through the dusty side-lights of the portal at the young, blooming, and very cheerful face, which presented itself for admittance into the gloomy old mansion. It was a face to which almost any door would have opened of its own accord. The sordid and ugly luxuriance of gigantic weeds...and the heavy projection that overshadowed her, and the time-worn frame-work of the door; -none of these things belonged to her sphere. But-even as a ray of sunshine, fall into what dismal place it may...-so did it seem altogether fit that the girl should be standing at the threshold. It was no less evidently proper, that the door should swing open to admit her.

The House of Seven Gables -Chapter 4

The first passage I wanted to highlight is when Hepzibah sees Pheobe get out of the carriage and approach the House of Seven Gables.  This starts a very interesting conversation on the contrast of Hepzibah and Pheobe.  We are told for a while that Hepzibah is nothing spectacular to look at.  And now we see that this young, beautiful creature is coming into play in the book.  As is the norm, the door and windows play a very important role here.  In the first passage I highlighted, the door seems to be given a life and mind of its own.

Again in the second passage, there are a lot of contrasts at work.  All the things that surround this girl at her arrival to the house are ragged and battered and don't seem to belong anywhere near her.  However, Hawthorne flips his assertion in the final parts of the passage by stating that it is appropriate that she should be standing amongst such ugly and delapitated surroundings.  And it is also appropriate that the door, by its own accord, "should swing open to admit her." Hawthorne is evidently playing with the idea of contrasting beauty and ugliness and even light and dark maybe.  I'm not sure what his plans are or even what his point about Pheobe and the door is but there is evidently something to pay attention to in these passages in regards to doors, portals, and what is on the outside and what is on the inside.

[spowelleng400]

Project Reflection: Willa Cather

In the beginning, I was mortified by the idea of the screencast.  I am a terrible public speaker and absolutely hate to hear my voice recorded so this was kind of a double whammy! However, once I started navigating the database, even before Tessa and I started discussing the project, I found so much that seemed to fit into the description of what we were to do.  In the end, I really enjoyed the opportunity to create something pretty incredible with one of my classmates. It not only gave me the chance to learn the database and all it included, it gave me a chance to get to know Tessa outside of class.  

The database is extensive, as we proved in the screencast.  I really enjoyed digging around looking for things to point out to our classmates. When Tessa and I met to actually record the screencast, I was excited to show her some aspects as I'm sure she was too.  It was fun.  And as a long-time student of English, I have used online databases a lot.  But this was an entirely different approach.  I was able to stand back and look at it as both a scholar and public user and found that for both audiences, this database was a success. I had to write a paper on Cather a couple of years ago and this database would have definitely been an option I wish I had had. 

Overall, this experience was a very positive one.  I found it be a useful tool in order to organize and structure what could have easily been an oral assignment but was instead much more enjoyable.  I learned that databases don't have to be stuffy and boring.  I also liked the fact that it made me dig through all aspects of the site in order to realize the exact desgin and purpose of the database.  

[spowelleng400]

A Door to Maturity or Simply a Threshold?

“You are a young woman yet. Why, I hardly thought myself younger than I am now, it seems so little while ago since I used to see you playing about the door of the old house, quite a small child! Oftener, though, you used to be sitting at the threshold, and looking gravely into the street; for you had always a grave kind of way with you..."

We have formerly discussed that windows, doors, and portals are found throughout this novel.  In reading chapter four, I found this passage that I couldn't get out of my mind.  Uncle Venner makes a point to discuss the fact that Hepzibah, as a child, was always playing in front of the door.  More importantly is the statement he makes about her "sitting at the threshold, and looking gravely into the street...", which he seems to make the most importance out of.  Though he discusses how "grave" she seemed, he is really discussing how old she seemed as she peered out on the street, even as a young child.  So what does that say about the importance of doors?  Do they not only let people and spirits in and out but are also a passage to maturity and contemplation? I'm not sure what Hawthorn's point is in this passage and he doesn't dwell on it long, but it seems important.  To note how a small child can seem "grave" and "grown-up" while playing in front of a door and sitting on the threshold is interesting.  Why is it she seemed so "grave" to him? Why was her countenance so intriguing to him? The most simple explanation is that she can see many things from this position.  Not only can she see what is going on outside and on the porch, but she can see what happens inside as well.  And maybe she was internalizing events and feelings that she sensed while sitting in this position.  In any case, it was an important enough fact for Uncle Venner to focus on and discuss years later with Hepzibah.