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The only thing that a student needs to know to succeed in Mrs. Duke’s class is “always do what is assigned.” The majority of class concerns homework. Test are rarer that hurricane holidays. There are so many assignments given. Each one is made to aid the student though. None of them are busy work nore are any of them boring beyond belief. You always have to stay on your toes or you will be bogged down with too much work. In class a student should pay attention to everything. Every class period consist almost always of only class discussions or small group discussions. This way a student has the opportunity to participate and voice his/her opinions and concerns on a subject. You won’t miss a step as long as you participate. At times it may seem that there is too much to handle, but right around the corner is usually a dry spell. It always stays interesting and different. I advise duke students not to compare English classes with friends for various reasons that are not worth mentioning due the fact hat you will soon find out for your self, I’m not one to spoil the future. Also, Mrs. Duke keeps a track record of every student and at some point may maybe perhaps use it as a method of judgment, you’ll hear the term “imperical evidence”.
To summarize, reading is not only imperative but annotations are as well. The work assigned requires an ample amount of note taking so one should never read without making marks. Don’t cheat or come close to breaking the honor code. A lot of learning will take place in ways that most students are not already acquainted with. Stay hungry and happy for homework while always participating and the year will run smooth.
I thought that Hamlet was told to fast. The worlds were never quite pronounced sufficiently, perhaps due to the fact that I was trying to read Hamlet while listening to it. I thought that his rendition was not an interpretation but rather just a reading. It was simply no more or less than the book permitted. I thought the sound effects were nice, they helped me to further understand the actions that were taken. Hearing what actually happened made things more real and aided me in visualizing what is actually taking place. The tape was not boring at all. If I decided to listen it was not hard for me to stay focussed due to the renditions nature of inflection and dramatic pauses. No tone was unnoticed. At times when an emotion was meant to be portrayed, it was never subtle but rather some times over exaggerated which is necessary in a medium of communication where the only sense you have is sound. At parts where Hamlet was supposed to sound stressed it could have been the sound of a heart attack. I liked it but sometimes I could not understand what the characters were saying. Overall the best and first oral rendition of Hamlet that I have ever heard.
This is the first time I have formally critiqued any professional. I felt that your performance of Hamlet was as good as it gets. Although there are many renditions I think that there really is no right or wrong way to interpret words in which the play was originally written. I felt that the way in which Hamlet spoke would be different. The moments of inflection I felt were insufficient and when they did occur, out of place and toned down. The acting though was believable, specifically the facial expressions as well as the way in which Hamlet moved. I like the way that Hamlet was dwindling along the thin line between insanity and genius, due to the fact that a wide range of emotions were exhibited in situations where a standard, stagnant emotion could have been assumed. The directing I thought was impeccable. I love the part where the slideshow took place. It occured during one of many Hamlet soliloquys. In the sideshow there was n picture of the castle, the forest and the graveyard. I believe it took place in act 5 scene one when Hamlet is reminiscing about the jester and such. I feel that this effect brought Hamlet’s soliloquy together and also helped to further explain its significance. I think it would be appropriate for any feature film. Also, the action scenes were legitimate. The clash, after the gentleman’s fencing match gets out of hand, was done well, like a Bourne identity scene. I never noticed when there was an addition or subtraction to the play. It all flowed smoothly through. My favorite addition was the military style funeral for Hamlet amongst th flames and the soldiers, it was a pretty nice scene which gave Hamlet the proper respect he was due. And then to follow the funeral, was the destruction of Claudius’s overbearing, arrogant statue which to me was similar to when during the early parts of the War on Terror, Saddam’s statues were brought down. All in all, this was the second rendition of Hamlet I have sen but it is by far the better. I never knew Kenneth Branagh was more than a man in a wheelchair amongst the Wild Wild West.
Ros and Guil have just found a morsel of the meaning of life. They hypothesized that life is “death followed by eternity”-pg. 72, as in being dead already beats living and then having to die(life). These thoughts leave Ros and Guil more confused and reluctant to do their duty. This reading begins with Ros and Guil deciding whether or not to confront hamlet and carry out their courtly duties. They then get mad at the King and Queen, quietly of course, because they realize how much they ask of them.
Then Hamlet begins speaking to Ophelia. Stoppard writes his rendition as to state that if Ros and Guil were not so scared and scattered they would have taken Ophelia’s place in her conversation with Hamlet. Thus, Hamlet never kills Polonius and so forth, if, if only, Ros and Guil speak to Hamlet instead of watching him from a far in fear. Then the metafiction madness takes over and I didn’t really now what I was reading. The next section of the reading holds the theme of sense of self and reality and more importantly common communication. Pg. 76“Ad for goodness sake, remember what we’re doing. We always use the same costumes more or less, and they forget what they are supposed to be in you see.” Pg. 77 “we are tied down to a language which makes up in obscurity what it lacks in style.” My guess though is that there’s a play in which the players are arranging which is simultaneous to the actions of what is in reality taking place in the same area as the Player’s play. Thus it is as if the Players are only ones telling the story. The player’s have control over the mime. The mime exists to show Ros and Guil what is really happening. Ros and Guil only know what the mime tells them, at least that’s all they understand. This situation is to show and produce the point that Ros and Guil don’t know what is, in reality, occurring, they only know what the mime means, a metaphor for the truth being construed and misunderstood. Throughout the whole Player’s play though, a message I cannot decipher is that off the meaning of dying. I don’t know whether Stoppard is saying that there is more than one way to die, like living in fear and acting out every emotion till one is as senseless and aesthetic as a dead body, or if it had something to do with the government’s relevance to death. Also there is commentary on the level of life and how low it standards are. Pg. 80 “Well really—I mean, people want to be entertained—they don’t come expecting sordid and gratuitous filth.”-Player says in reply “You’re wrong—they do. Murder, seduction, and incest—what do u want—jokes?” Ros says “I want a good story, with a beginning middle and end.” Player says “And you?”-Guil “I’d prefer to mirror life, If its all the same to you.” This shows that Ros and Guil are more aware of life, though the life they now notice is dark, dangerous and disgusting. Then after the play Ros and Guil don’t know what to do becuae for the first time they can tell what’s going on and the self reliance necessary to make a decision on one’s own doesn’t exist. They just don’t know what to think anymore at all, in any area that requires a trust of the truth. Like if you had a map in your hands and all of a sudden it disappeared or fell apart into sand that was then washed away by the wind.
The purpose is now perfectly perceived as post modern. After this reading I feel like Stoppard has stopped wasting time and gotten pretty serious about sorting out the situations. I noticed that there is an ample amount of intense intertextuality. This is a sign of how Thomas has tried harder to get his point across by referencing Hamlet more and highlighting more important parallels which explain the meaning more thoroughly. This reading relates to both realms of reality. A realm exists where people listen to the government and another realm, where people listen to their feelings. At the very end of this reading Ros and Guil finally, literally and metaphorically, find the truth. Guil clearly confesses to feeling senses of life and seeing the light. Pg. 94 “Brown is creeping upon us take my word for it…Ruyssets and tangerine shades of old gold flushing the very outside of the senses…deep shining ochres, burnt umber and parchments of baked earth-r3eflecting itself and through itself, filtering light. At such times, perhaps, coincidentally, the leaves might fall, somewhere, by repute. Yesterday was blue, like smoke.” Stoppard intends to leave us in suspense and in preparation for a huge change. I say that Ros sees the light because he notices that the world around him, at least yesterday, was “blue, like smoke”. The smoke and blue symbolizes obscurity, blurry vision and impossible perception of what can be right in front of you, like fog while you’re driving.
1. Exigence — What needs doing at this point? In other words, what is compelling Hamlet to speak at this moment in the play?
At this moment Hamlet really just decides to speak his mind. We are all aware that a reaction is yet to be had. Thus Hamlet is at a cross roads simply explained by “to be or not to be”. Also he is around Ophelia, the one he cares for most if he cares for anyone at all. The thing that needs to be done is for hamlet to react to all these changes, or at least further express his thoughts on the situation.
2. Audience – The audience is comprised of people who can in some way act on this exigence. Who is Hamlet’s primary audience and how does that influence his choices? Who is Hamlet’s secondary audience and how does that influence his choices? [Hint: they are not on the stage]
Ophelia is the primary recipeint of this confession of conscience. It influeces his choices by requiring a specific tone. While talking to someone who may show symnpathy he can speak passively and come off as weak man longing for compassion. I f he was giving this speech to the two men watching from afar he would not even adress the subject. Ophelia is someone he somewaht trust. He doesn’t have to think twice about what he says because he knows that she is harmless to him, she has not enough power to be feared.
3. purpose What is the purpose of Hamlet’s speech?
To show who ever is listening how hurt he is by the situation. Really it is like he is reciting the thoughts of a team that is down by a lot in the fourth quarter, someone who has been defeated and doesn’t know whether to die and roll over or to fight back, but either way he is emotionally distraught and damaged. If he seeks purpose other than expressing his feelings I would believe that he wanted his listeners to think that he has given up, become to soft to fight back, playing dead to get his enemies to underestimate him to the point that they are unprepared.
4. Appeals: Which appeal(s) does Hamlet use to convince and/or motivate his audience? Reference specific lines.
Ethos: Appeal to the character of the speaker pg. 127 “to die, to sleep, to sleep, perchance a dream.”
Pathos: Appeal to the emotions or interest of the audience
pg. 128-129 lines 76-82 “There’s the respect that makes calamity of so long life. For who could bear the whips and scorns of time, the oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely. The pangs of despised love, the law’s delay, the insolence of office, and the spurns of patient merit of th’ unworthy takes,”
Logos: Appeal to logic pg. 127 lines 65-68 “Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of troubles and, by opposing, end them.”
He reiterates the situation to show that he is aware of all that’s around him so that his reaction and emotion taken towards the situation seems genuine and full force. Also, besides this he just says how distraught and defeated and desperate for sanity he is, while trying to pronounce his vulnerability and harmlessness.
5. Figures of speech, imagery, diction, syntax: What literary devices does Hamlet employ? Where do you see him making comparisons? Which tropes–similes, metaphors, personification, hyperbole, etc. does he use? How do these comparisons relate to his rhetorical purpose? What particularly vivid images stand out? What effect do these images have on Hamlet’s rhetorical purpose?
-He uses metaphors, personification, intense imagery, allusions, rhymes of near and approximate and ofcourse alliteration. The rhetorical would be him reiterating the same things in different ways as to give one subject many meanings and/or definitions. Example being any sentence with two or more commas. pg. 129 lines 80-84 ” The pangs of despised love, the law’s delay, the insolence of office, and the spurns of patient merit of th’ unworthy takes, when he himself might quietus make with a bare boldkin?. ” This example here hold all these aspects the question that is retochical because he is talking to himself, the alliteration between bare and boldking, the metaphor in “spurns of patient merit” menaing how his father’s patience was rejected by his unworthy brother. The purpose was to reiterate and repeat things that he found important, mostly the action of how the throne came to be disgraced. The images tag along with the rhetocial purpose because, the only thing rhetorical was the subject becaue the images shifted and defined the same thing but in differen ways.
6. How do you respond to Hamlet’s soliloquy? In other words, what do you think of him right now?
Right now I think that Hamlet has his head on straight. I believe that this is really just the perfect plan to get his enemies right where he wants them Although it was emotional, the meaning and matter at hand was to show his awareness, not to relieve stress. Hamlet has no focus though because he has shown no sign of direction in this speech only a reason for the reaction. He is ready for anything, not crazed insanity, just commonly concerned.
This reading begins with Ros and Guil having had already explained and conferred with Hamlet on the current situation. We are yet to know what they spoke about but it was said to be similar to what occurred in Act II Scene II of Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Ros and Guil then have another one of those dialogues with three word sentence questions which contradict multiple momments but reveal a theme. In the beginng of Act Two they have a conversation about ”making headway” after going bakc and forth with yes, no, what and mmmm’s. Then they go on to say how Hamlet won the question contest. He blew them out the water and “caught them on the wrong foot”, because he spoke about something of substance and did not run in circles like Ros and Guil usually do, not that Hamlet is a good questionaire. The theme that the world is messed up is shown in Act II because Ros and Guil think that Hamlet is truly sane. Also even if they don’t, Hamlet is never even considered crazy by anyone but the crazy characters themselves unlike in Shakespeare’s version were Hamlet is more bipolar than a chameleon. This shows the ppost modern theme of how the whole world is messed up, Beckett flips Shakespeare’s Hamlet upside down.
This led me to believe that nothing had changed. Ros and Guil let us know what hamlet had spoken to them about by revealing there new found sense of self. It is as if Hamlet was the light to a new path or just really a light in a dark room for Ros and Guil. They go on to make comments like “you seem to have no conception of where you stand” and “I’m trying to establish the direction of the wind”. Thus Ros and Guil are not totally lost anymore but slowly seeing the light. Also what really blew my mind was the Player and how he inpersonated Ros and Guil. Along with the quotes about how everyone is an actor, because you cant be normal with out acting normal. Its an absolute contradiciotn that at the end of the day leaves everyone lost and without any true sense of self. Also the fact that someone is always watching actors. Like the government is always wathcing people acting normal. Also Guil confesses to “losing his grip”, pg. 69.
The most important part of this Act however was when Ros and Guil all by themselves although they had to come to conclusions in the form of questions, explained and analyzan be alive in a box. It is the post modern theme of the living dead, which was my zombie theory. It was called incorrect in class but in this Act they really nver differentiated life in a box from life as a Zobie. In both worlds the man does not know where he is going, has no control and the key point, does not know the difference between death and life. He never knows if he is alive to begin with. Perfect POostmodernsim
Things are beging to be very clear and know that nothing is confusing anymore I feel like some really deep heavy messages are coming soon.
I liked this much more than the first reading due to the difference in dialogoue. I felt as though the first reading had long stanzas and soliloquys which I would get lost in. The second reading had simple sentences in the dialogues. They highlighted the focus by using repetition rather than in-depth description. Change and thus revolution, are the big post modern themes of this reading I think. Throughout those pages Ros and Guil focus on how much Hamlet has changed as well as nelgecting the fact that they have changfed and Hamlet hasn’t at all. This silly situation is relevant to the post modern theme about not trusting your government and people being brainwashed, like in 1984. Claudius and Gertrude are the king and the queen. Also, other reocccuring themes including the truth and how the essence of the truth can put everything else in a different perspective. The truth be linked to memory, something Ros and Guil lack. I believe that the absence of memory symbolizes more of the brainwashing theme. Not knowing who you are and what you stand for. The fact is that truth is a point of reference entity. Nothing matters if you don’t know the truth meaning of anything, it is imposibile to put things in perspective. I think this book is kinda cool and really funny. I wish it wasn’t so hard to read. Important quote “what a fine persecution to be kept intrigued without ever quite being enlightened.” Also, speaking again on the change theme, the quote “I remeber when there were no questions”. Without questioning something, it is not going to be any different than it was before. Questioning is the same as confronting to me, and an unconfrontational society=communism, big postmodern topic of discussion. A great truth qoute is “All your life you live so close to the tgurht, it becomes a permanent blur in the corner of your eye.” I think that this sums up the entire post modern perception of the ”truth”. Also being afraid of the government is a theme. Ros told Guil hes tired of following phantoms,the metaphor for the king. Then Guil says that “we cant afford anything quite so arbitrary”.
I have concurrered that Ros and Guil is really a rendition of Hamlet in a ridiculous way. Everything is sarcastic and overemphasized. Also many contradictions are used to higlight the main points. I believe that R and G represent the guards in the story. Thus the Player/s represents the ghost, Fortinbras. I feel that theyare the ghost because they are treated like fortinbras at certain occassions such as when Ros tries to hurt the player/Alfred and calls them evil and fowl. Ros and Guil is postmodern because the themes are post modern, probability and the thin line seperating reality from fantasy/the supernatural. Really the post modern theme presented here is grey areas and things that no one can truly define. The truth is construed here like it was in Vietnam and when the government was being questioned in the 1970′s, the height of the post modern movement. Even R and G who are the best of freinds dont understand each other. I want to know what time period the story takes place in, which will me help narrow down the range of definitions for all the words I have never seen before. Other post modern mannerisms would be the way that the times are talked about as being so bad. That theese travelers are known to be part of society. Theyre not necessarily accepted but worse theyre stuck in the society, embedded,bad words choice right there.
Second Reading: pg. 36-53 »« Canterbary Tales Newspaper Review
The first presentation presented was that of the Landlord Franklin’s Tale group consisting of Landon Lyons, who was fashionably late, Elliot Boudreax, Edward Collier and NAMELESS. A powwerpoint was used as the primary presentation. Edward spoke the most and didn’t read the power point but touched base on what each of the slides was about. I concur from this explanation of the Story of Franklin the Landlord that the central foci was chivalry, courtly love and knight hood. It is almost a mideival story similar to the likelihoods of Percival. The two were repeatedly compared at contrasted. After the powerpoint was over, the english III class was divided evenly into groups for discussion. I found that theese worked well to present peoples point of view but that would be the only thing. The few conversations were dwindling on the verge of nonsense. I liked however the way in which kids were called on. The questions asked engaged the class and clearly stated the subjects of the question. There were no hints nor nods nor squints after any questions to keep people on track. Its simply difficult to answer a question that has not been asked, thats called predicitng the future. What I learned about the Franklin man was that he told a tale of a courtly romance. Their main focus was how moral and loyal Dorigen’s husband was to the code. This group was the first to present but the second best presentation. I think they touched on alot of subjects to make us aware of them but never did they dwelve deeper into any of them.
Th Miller was next up. They began by presenting facts on the type of story which was called a fablieu. Fablieu’s were said to be stories about a moral. The moral in the Millers tale was relationships and true marriage over love. The group then questioned the class on the classes of the characters, which defines who they were. This however highlighted the act that there was a clash of the classes in the web of love. Inside of this web lies many men foreign to each other. One a carpenter, clerk, religious man and then the woman who is coveted by all. Girl power played a role in the story. Becauseof her beauty, Alison had all the men obeying her and fightiging for her. The story was supposed to show morals by having very immorral situations, ccalled a fabliue. The farts to the face and all those ronchy relations between Allison and Nicholas as well as the clerk of church who stalks a married woman with the intent to sin against God by laying with her. The group asked questions hinting the most major messages, including the ridiculious referencing of religion and how horrible of people religious men can be, Absalom. It was strong but the groups questions did not engage the class as much as the Franklin’s.
The Wife of Bath’s Tale tellers then took the stage. It felt like a woman’s world the entire time. The whole group was made up of girls. The story was really a feminist fantasy in which a woman, married woman, uses her god given body to reap rewwards from her husband like money and power. She also married many times. Thus, as the group illustrated, wore the pants in most relationships. the spoke about true love and how it was only found once out of five times, a statistic that shows an intent by Chaucer to say that true love is hard ot find. It really though, as explained by this group, was about women’s power in the world. They were getting jobs and taking them from men. They said that Chaucer believed in the woman and her potential for power. Also though, the groups acknowledged that for her to come to power she was still subjugated by sex, not an admirable aspect like intellegence or bravery. I felt that this groups presentation was multidimentional from pants to posters to the most quotes collected as well as outside research. It was an allstar englih team though that I think was no accident. This presentation was by far the best.
The next presentation presented was known as the Pardoner’s Tale. This group stayed on one track the entire time, hypocrisy in religion. The spoke about how the Pardoner sold religious relics for money. He says his sole is with God because as a precher u give it to him. But he takes what is God’s and sells it, thus selling his sole. They used a poster a visual which showed how he really looked. They drew him looking like a man woman. Also to let us know more about him, around his full body portrait were quotes describing him and quotes consisting of his hypocrisy. they had a lot of good research but the problem with the story was that it had only one major point and that wasthe hypocrisy in religion so things along got redundant. Other supporting details described by the group include the seven deadly sins and the correlation to Martin Luther Thesis. The gave us brownies and I a proper presentation overall. It lacked diversity but also had a deep description of the main focus.
Right now we have few ideas. One of them is a graphic organizer. We are yet to determine what shape it will be in. There’s is a conflict on whether a peace sign or a love square, a four cornered love triangle, would be best. I am a firm supporter of the peace sign, but thats probably because I made it. Another plan is to use character maps. I think character maps are perfect tools to portray the key components of Chaucer’s CT. In CT, the point is to show the relationship between classes. What makes a class is a profession. What makes the character is the profession, they don’t even have names, just jobs. The character is the carrier of Chaucer’s messages shown by the way that he speaks about them and describes them in deep detail. The final idea we have come up with is a quote chart in which we will take key quotes and elaborate on their full meaning. Also a metapor map is an idea that might be used. Chaucer always puts metaphor in his tals and some are bassed off of allusions or just words that aren’t used much in the world today. The last idea we have is a portrait of the Miller.
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