Core Concept #2: 11/29/10-12/10/10

Ophelia

• Does she love Hamlet?
• She sure wants to get married to him quickly, which makes sense because there is substantial textual evidentce pointing to the fact that she slept with Hamlet and is pregnant
• Ophelia probably committed suicide because she is unmarried, pregnant, and the man who slept with her and promised to marry her had just dumped her and killed her father, who was the only other person she could depend on
• But did she bring about her own demise?
• She did lie to Hamlet when he asked her about the whereabouts of his father, showing just whose side she is on.
• So is Ophelia truly innocent?

King Hamlet the Ghost

• Is he a good ghost?
• He visits people at the dead of night (representing bad), and is forced to leave by dawn (representing good)
• He is clad in war armor
• He is pretty much sending his one son to hell so that he can get his revenge (good parenting?)
• Shakespeare decides to start the play after all the action of King Hamlet getting killed, thus taking away the reader's chance to empathize with the King. Instead, the reader meets King Hamlet as a ghost.
• Personal connection: When I think ghost, I think of Casper the Friendly Ghost, so I think King Hamlet may not be all bad.

Polonius

• Polonius is not the buffon he pretends to be in court
• He is actually a very shrewd and perceptive guy
• Claudius puts immense trust in Polonius

Idea Connection. These nobles in Hamlet usually speak in blank verse, which we learned about earlier in the year. This is an example of Shakespeare using diction to try to differentiate between the different classes of his characters.

Bible Allusions

• "Am I not i' th' right, old Jeptha?" (II.ii. 419) Hamlet asks Polonius.
• Jeptha was a Hebrew judge who sacrificed his daughter, showing that as early as Act II, Hamlet knew about Polonius' plans
• In a play that depends on who knows what and who doesn't know what, little clues like this are important because they let the reader understand the characters more

• "There is special providence in the fall of a sparrow" (V.ii.220-221) Hamlet says.
• Throughout the play, it has been about people defying God (i.e. Claudius killing old Hamlet for the throne)
• Hamlet, before death, comes to terms with the idea that God wills and has a plan for everything, and he is finally at peace
• Relationship to previous notes: since in the original ending of Hamlet, Hamlet survives and becomes king, why does Shakespeare not keep the original ending and make the point that God has a plan and everything will become as they should be in the end? But Elizabethan tragedy is inherited from the Roman seneca, thus Shakespeare needed blood and death.

Existentialism 101

• Definition (sort of): humans make choices based on our experiences, beliefs, and biases, and those choices are unique to us-and made without an objective form of truth. There are no "universal" guidelines for most decisions, existentialists believe.
• Individuals make their own choices, so they are free; but because they freely choose, they are competely responsible for their choices
• Freedom is accompanied by responsibility
• The playwrights loosely grouped under the label of Theater of the Absurd try to convey their sense of bewilderment, anxiety, and wonder in the face of an inexplicable universe
• Common images: fantasy, dream, and nightmare
• They portray the playwright's emotional perception of inner reality
• Connection with other academic subjects: this reminds me of British Literature, when we read an existentialist short story. I can't remember the name of the story, but a quote from it is, "you can't blame anyone for looking black (angry) because I'm sure it's summat in the blood."

Hamlet on the Big Screen

• There are three kinds of Hamlets: wilted flower Hamlet, furious Hamlet, and stoic Hamlet: usually, actors manage to capture only one type of Hamlet.
• In order to reflect the true intent of Shakespeare, the staging would have to be modern and the props would be whatever the producers have lying around
• Various interpretations of Hamlet shown in movies: gay Hamlet, modern Hamlet (with security camera), Kenneth Branagh Hamlet (with mirrors reflecting back on characters and secret passageways)
• Connection with current events: Hamlet is currently playing in Michigan Theater in Jackson

Homework

1. Ophelia forum: post reaction to Rimbaud's poem ("Ophelia"), and respond to two peers' posts
2. "Shakespeare in the Bush" forum: post reaction to the article and respond to two peers' posts
3. Journal evaluations
4. Core Concepts notes
5. "Shakespeare in the Bush" follow-up: find a topic that Ms. Holmes has posted in and join the conversation
6. Read the "Lecture on Stoppard"

Class Notes: November 22nd - November 26th

History of Hamlet

• Halmet is an actual account of a guy named Amleth
• The original ending was that Amleth plots revenge against his uncle and becomes the new and rightful king of Jutland
• Hamlet is based on a Norse legend composed by Saxo Grammaticus in Latin around 1200 A.D.
• Saxo's story was first printed in Paris in 1514 and it was translated into French in 1570
• Saxo's text did not appear in English until 1608
• Shakespeare probably used the earlier play based on this Norse legend by Thomas Kyd, named Ur-Hamlet, of which no copy currently exists
• Hamlet, as told by Shakespeare, is a drama, and thus has the peculiarities and limitations of a play as discussed earlier in my notes
• This story that Hamlet was based on no doubt affected the way Hamlet was written
• This history reminds me of Macbeth, and how we learned in British Literature about the real Macbeth and his family after reading Macbeth by William Shakespeare

Types of Tragedy

• There are 2 kinds of Renaissance tragedy: Continental and England
• The term Renaissance tragedy is typically reserved for Continental tragedy, which was inherited from the Greeks
• Elizabethan tragedy is used to refer to English tragedy, which was inherited from the Romans (seneca)
• Hamlet is an Elizabethan tragedy

Tragedy

• Tragedy is an imitation of a single, unified, action that is serious, complete, and has a certain magnitude
• As defined previously in my notes, "Tragedy: a medieval narrative poem or tale typically describing the downfall of a great man"
• Tragedy deals with the fall of someone whose character is good, believable, and consistant, and whose fall is caused by an error or fraility (hamartia=tragic flaw), rather than a vice or depravity)
• The ups and downs of life are related to the issue of free will (not destiny) in setting the plot
• Revenge tragedy was inspired by Seneca and was made popular in the Elizabethan period by Thomas Kyd's Spanish Tragedy.
• Revenge tragedy usually revolves around a son's revenge for a father's murder (or vice versa). The murder is then revealed and directed to the protagonist by the murdered man's ghost. It is a conscious and forced action.
• Hamlet is a revenge tragedy
• The play plot of a revenge tragedy may include: the hero's hesitation, the hero's insanity (real or pretend), the hero comtemplating suicide, levels of intrigue, an able and scheming villain, many philosophical soliloquies, and sensationalized murder on staged, or dead bodies shown on stage
• An revenge plot may include: the offense can be maximized by repeated injuries and insult, the antagonist is effective & formidable (but can still be vulnerable), clarification of strategy and marshalling of resources, delays, obstacles, diversions, mistakes, and reservations retard momentum, unforeseen development almost thwards scheme, and a final showdown in which revenge is carried out in an answerable style
• Intensified revenge tragedy is tragedy of the blood and includes the theme of revenge and retribution (borrowed from Seneca) through murder, assassination, mutilation, and carnage
• Seneca plays (Latin) satisfy the audience's craving for morbid excitment
• Elizabethan audiences enjoyed Seneca plays for its bear-baiting spectacles and public executions
• Horrific tragedies have a revenge motif and audience expectations

Why did Hamlet accuse Gertrude of incest?

• Upon marriage in the Catholic church, a couple becomes one
• If they are one flesh, then to marry your dead husband's brother is to marry your brother
• Thus in England, for example, marrying your dead husband's brother was considered incest
• This was not just a technicality
• Henry VIII broke from Rome because he wanted a divorce from Catherine, who had earlier been married to his elder brother
• This is important because the 1st marriage with Catherine would be invalid and his 2nd marriage would not be questionable (because Henry broke from the church in order to have it) because Henry was never married to begin with, so he didn't need a divorce!
• Thus, this makes Elizabeth I's reign more legitimate

Hamlet: Highlights from the Discussion

• At first, he pretended to be mad, but later, did Hamlet truly become mad?
• Hamlet was Hamlet 2.0. He was trained and born to be king. When Hamlet was not immediately needed to be king, he was sent to Germany for school. There, he encountered new ideas: he did not need to be Hamlet 2.0, he can be an individual. Yet, Hamlet = Denmark.
• Hamlet is suspicious to begin with. People don't get a 2nd chance to regain his trust.
• Shakespeare used clowns to break the tension and add comic relief. They also added shrewd insights

Homework

• Core Concepts Journal
• Informal essay discussing the atmosphere established by Hamlet's 1st scene and explaining how it relates thematically to the rest of the play. 

“Sister Bernadette's Barking Dog” by Kitty Burns Florey| Published Dec., 2004 | A Reflective Essay Analysis

             In “Sister Bernadette's Barking Dog”, Florey uses a pensive, adoring, and almost secretive tone in order to tell us of his experiences with diagramming sentences. For example, Florey is adoring and seemingly shares a secret with me when she writes, "On a more trivial level, part of the fun was being summoned to the blackboard to show off. There you stood, chalk in hand, while with a glint in her eye, Sister Bernadette read off an especially tricky sentence". The pensive aspect of the essay is shown through words such as, "I have no illusions that diagramming sentences in my youth did anything for me...But in an occasional fit of nostalgia, I like to bring back those golden afternoons...."

           I like Florey's tone in “Sister Bernadette's Barking Dog” because it adds flavor to the essay. The tone does this by taking me back to the author's time and causing me to view the world-past and present-through her eyes.

           Although I really like the tone that Florey adopts in “Sister Bernadette's Barking Dog", I don’t think it’ll work for an AP essay because it's too informal. Throughout many parts of the essay, I felt like the author was either telling me a secret, or sharing some intensely private moment with me, and I'm not sure if essays like that are what AP readers want.

          Through Florey’s use of rhetorical devices in “Sister Bernadette's Barking Dog”, she not only allows the reader to understand better her essay, but also helps it flow better. For example, Florey uses parallelism and tricolon, such as when she says, “...diagramming sentences...memorizing poems and adding long columns of figures without a calculator" to facilitate the flow of the passage and to add power to his recollection of the educational value behind the activities of his youth.

            Florey made a good diction choice with "measles" when she wrote, "it [diagramming sentences] swept through American public schools like the measles". Although the denotation of measles is simply something along the lines of an infectious disease in children, the connotation of measles causes the reader to think about the spread of sentence diagrams as a bad thing, something that may scar childhood innocence like measles does. This clever utilization of a word's connotation adds power to the sentence. Florey's use of diction and alliteration (such as when she says, "saintly script") throughout her essay adds a certain spice, imagery, and flow to her essay that would not have existed otherwise.

         All in all, "Sister Bernadette's Barking Dog" is a enchanting essay that is neatly executed. The only weakness that I perceive in the essay is that various sentences in the essay were diagrammed, so that since I am a younger reader, I had to stop and stare at the sentence diagram for a while before I could understand what was going on, disrupting the flow of the essay for me. But I think this is made up for by the creativity that the author has shown in adding sentence diagrams to the essay in the first place.

Source: http://harpers.org/archive/2004/12/0080308

“Halloween's Afterlife" | Published 11/3/10 | An Editorial Analysis

        In "Halloween's Afterlife", the author takes up a informal and conversational tone in order to describe to us the scene that he imagines will become of the city streets now that Halloween is over.

        The author of "Halloween's Afterlife" uses rhetorical devices to help the reader better understand the argument and to help the argument flow easier. For example, when the author uses repetition when he says, "irreverence toward death, which is much less frightening than death's irreverence". He highlights one of the underlying themes of Halloween: to show that we can have fun despite knowing that death will come for us one day, and to show that death does not scare us. This repetition with the word order switched around makes the reader stop and really think about the how true the statement is. Moreover, the use of repetition just makes this phrase memorable and flow nicely.

            In addition, the author’s use of alliteration, as in "grown fat from feeding on ghouls", and the “rule of three”, as seen in "inflatable rat-20 feet tall, paws raised, incisors exposed-" helps the passages sound smoother, and makes the readers more receptive to what the author has to say.

            Although the author does a really good job with taking advantage of most of the rhetorical devices, I think he could’ve taken more advantage of the natural rhythm of English in order to emphasize his points. He could’ve switched around the word order within sentences a bit so that sentences would end with something memorable. This is because the ends of sentences are normally what the reader would remember most. As it stands, his sentences end with phraes like "a while longer", "come down", "to guess", "any night", etc. Nothing that would particulary stay with me for a long time.

            In “Halloween's Afterlife”, the narrative persona is very informal. At various points, I felt like me and the author had a personal joke going on. For example, at the beginning, the author states, "It's a few days after the e'en of Oct. 31", indicating that this essay is to be informal. Also, the author says things like, "The zombie undead will turn out to be very easily disposed of. What will happen to the Puritan graveyard...we can't begin to guess...Soon it will be back to business for the giant rat...Then Halloween will be over, unless, of course, it isn't truly over til the last piece of candy has been eaten". All these parts of the essay help build up the author's voice, which is both ridiculing and intimate. All this intimacy makes me like this essay so much more because it makes me feel like I'm "in" on everything that's going on, and just makes me feel like I'm involved in the essay.

            If this essay were an AP essay, I don't think the voice would be appropriate because the author is too informal and ridiculing in this editorial.

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/04/opinion/04thu4.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

“The Woman Who Had the World Enthralled” by Michiko Kakutani | Published 11/1/10 | A Book Review Analysis

        In “The Woman Who Had the World Enthralled”, Kakutani weaves together a skillful essay using many rhetorical devices to analyze Cleopatra: A Life by Stacy Schiff. One of those rhetorical devices is parallelism. This is seen when she describes Cleopatra's life as, "epic in scale, mythic in symbolism and operatically over the top" (Kakutani). The above example is also a good example of Kakutani’s use of the “rule of three”, or tricolon to make her essay sound better. Moreover, she helps the flow of her essay and emphasizes her points through repetition, for example, when she says, “Cleopatra would go on to lose it, regain it, nearly lose it again, amass an empire and then lose it all" (Kakutani). Furthermore, Kakutani uses alliteration in her writing. For example, when she says, “a charismatic and capable woman...and highly competent" (Kakutani). Furthermore, Kakutani skillfully used diction to better her writing. A specific diction choice that really struck me is when she says, "when 'two civilizations, passing in different directions, unexpectedly and momentously' touched" (Kakutani). Her word choice of "touched" struck me because as I was reading this sentence, in my mind, I though, "momentously collided", because two civilizations colliding is a cliche image. Kakutani's word choice of "touched" made me stop. go back, and think about the connotations of "touched" v. "collided". "Touched" implies gentle contact. "Collided" implies violent contact. Although I would normally think of Egypt and the Roman empire's contact as more violent than gentle, I can see where Kakutani is coming with this. Overall, Kakutani's use of rhetorical devices in her essay makes it flow easily and helps her convey her point in an easy to understand manner. The only weakness I see in Kakutani's essay is that it reads more like a summary of Cleopatra's life than an analysis of a book about Cleopatra's life.

            In analyzing Nemesis, Kakutani used Formalist criticism with a hint of feminism thrown in. In her book review, Kakutani mostly summarizes Cleopatra: A Life. Kakutani describes Cleopatra's rise and fall and places her deeds in the context of her time. Yet Kakutani also emphasizes the misconception of Cleopatra as a "wanton tempress symbolizing 'insatiable sexuality' and unlawful love", and instead describes her in more manly terms, "she was a resourceful leader: disciplined, self-assured and shrewd" (Kakutani). Kakutani talks extensively about how Cleopatra was not the "whore queen" everyone thought she was: she was an "enterprising politician" similar in many ways to Caesar.

            Kakutani’s description of Cleopatra reminds me of the novel, Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, and I think the title of this novel would be extremly appropriate to Cleopatra's life. Both Cleopatra and Okonkwo are natural leaders who, if they lived at the height of their society's glory, would have gone down in history as one of the greatest leaders to have ever lived. Yet as fate has it, they both were born in the wrong society shortly before a fatal clashing of societies. Finally, when all is lost, rather than submit to the conquering party, they both committed suicide. "'An honorable death, a dignified death, an exemplary death'" (Kakutani).


Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/02/books/02book.html?ref=books&pagewanted=print

“Newark, 1944, When Polio Disrupted the Playground” by Michiko Kakutani | Published 10/4/10 | A Book Review Analysis

            In “Newark, 1944, When Polio Disrupted the Playground”, Kakutani weaves together a skillful essay using many rhetorical devices to analyze Nemesis by Philip Roth . One of those rhetorical devices is parallelism, for example, when she comments, Bucky (the protagonist) “is supervising the neighborhood playground, watching the boys play ball and the girls jump rope”. Moreover, she helps the flow of her essay through her use of repetition, for example, when she says, “how God could allow…wonder how God could have let…how God could be…” The above example is also a good example of Kakutani’s use of the “rule of three”, or tricolon to make her essay sound better. Furthermore, Kakutani uses alliteration in her writing. For example, when she says, “responsibility and transgression, tradition and rebellion”. Kakutani’s use of a question quoted directly from Nemesis, adds a certain personal element to the essay, “Who brought polio here if not me?” asked the protagonist of Nemesis. Finally, Kautani’s utilization of natural emphasis adds the perfect final touch to her essay. Just reading the last couple of words of the paragraphs, “polio…spreading anxiety and suspicion”, “menacing teenagers”, “life-denying consequences…”, “accused of being a carrier”, “God could be so heartless and cruel”, and finally, “’Who brought polio here if not me?’” gives the reader a good idea of what the essay is about, but in memorable words that Kakutani hopes that the reader would take away with him.

           Overall, Kakutani's use of rhetorical devices in her essay makes it flow easily and helps her convey her point in an easy to understand manner. In addition, it helps the reader more easily connect with and understand her essay and the plot of Nemesis, and helps make the reader more receptive to her ideas since they're easy to understand. The only weakness I perceive in this essay is its continuous references to other authors and previous works of Philip Roth that the reader of this essay (like me) would not be familiar with.

            In analyzing Nemesis, Kakutani used New Historicist criticism. She mentions many of Philip Roth’s other works, such as Indignation, and The Plot Against America and compares and contrasts these works with Nemesis. Moreover, Kakutani examines possible purposes behind why Roth wrote Nemesis, for example, to entertain, or to comment on the post-WWII era.

            Kakutani’s analysis of Bucky immediately reminded me of Michael Henchard of The Mayor of Casterbridge. Kakutani describes Bucky as a “one-dimensional character” that “makes for a pallid, predictable story line in which the random workings of fate and the fate of temperament—rather than genuine free choice—are the narrative drivers”. Henchard is definitely a “one-dimensional character” battered by “fate and the fate of temperament”. Michael is an honest man and hard-working man whose fatal flaw is his temper: he sold his wife and daughter on a drunken whim and then proceeded to become mayor of a small town through hard work. The Mayor of Casterbridge is the tale of how the "randomn workings of fate" has brought about Henchard's rise and fall.

Source:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/05/books/05book.html?_r=1     

“My Friend Lodovico” by David Masello | Published 2/8/04 | A Reflective Essay Analysis

           In “My Friend Lodovico”, Masello uses a conversational tone in order to tell us of his relationship with his friend Lodovico, who happens to be a painting. Through Masello’s use of rhetorical devices in “My Friend Lodovico”, he not only allows the reader to understand better his essay, but also helps it flow better.

            Masello’s use of questions in his writing betters his essay. When he asks, “Why do I continue to visit this mute, overdressed, imperious young man?” he mirrors the question that is currently flowing, unspoken, through the reader’s mind. As a result, his subsequent answer to this question allows the reader to settle down and enjoy the essay without wondering if Masello is indeed sane to have such interactions with a painting.

            Furthermore, Masello uses parallelism, such as when he says, “I admired Lodovico’s regal bearing, his unblinking confidence, and his solid ownership of a defined station in life” to facilitate the flow of the passage, and add power to his description of Lodovico. Moreover, the above quote is also an example of tricolon, which adds even more power to Masello’s description of Lodovico.

            In addition, Masello uses repetition, for example, when he says, “he [Lodovico] neither smiles nor frowns, seems judging or indifferent, appears happy or sad” to hammer in the idea of why he likes Lodovico so much.

            The little anecdotes, such as when Masello says, “rather than confront Lodovico in tears, I collected myself beside the waters before presenting myself to him for consolation”, really made me laugh. Such humor made me like the essay better because it helps break up the long descriptive paragraphs about Lodovico into little, digestible, pieces.

            The tone that Masello uses in “My Friend Lodovico” is pensive and adoring. Masello creates a pensive tone when he wonders, “Will his [Lodovico’s] youth eventually intimidate me?” At this point, the author contemplates the course of his life from Lodovico’s perspective. He imagines looking down on himself and watching his transition from youth to man. Masello then proceeds to consider what it would be like if Lodovico were to come alive. The adoring tone in “My Friend Lodovico” shines through in Masello’s description of him. Masello exclaims, “He is simply a young, well-dressed, attractive man”, and “he is an expert creation”.

            Masello’s tone in “My Friend Lodovico” made me like the essay so much more because it adds flavor to the essay to know what Masello thinks of Lodovico, and the pensive-ness that appears at the end of the essay really puts the entire essay in perspective. This is because it allows the reader a glimpse of the true reason why Lodovico is so important to Masello, besides companionship.

            Although I really like the tone that Masello adopted in “My Friend Lodovico”, I don’t think it’ll work for an AP essay because it causes Masello to spend too many words praising and mulling over Lodovico instead of constructing a logical argument on why Lodovico is a good painting and person.

            All in all, "My Friend Lodovico" is a enchanting essay that is neatly executed and has no weaknesses that I can perceive.

 Source: http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B01E0DF1E3BF93BA35751C0A9629C8B63

“Dare to Care: A minister and the politics of poverty” by Lisa Miller | Published 10/11/10 | An Editorial Analysis

                In "Dare to Care", Miller takes up a formal and informative tone in order to persuade us to take up the cause of alleviating domestic poverty. One device that Miller uses to persuade is "logos:, which is indicated by the prevalence of statistics in her writing. Examples of statistics in "Dare to Care" are, "In America, more than a million children were hungry in 2008, a 56% jump from the year before", or "nearly one in four children had experienced 'food insecurity'". The later "logos" argument also bordered on Miller's use of "pathos" to appeal to her readers. By telling us that nearly 25% of children have not had enough to eat at one point, she is appealing to our emotional response to the heart-wrenching plight of these kids.

            Moreover, Miller's use of rhetorical devices helps the reader better understand her argument and helps her argument flow easier. For example, when Miller uses repetition when she says, “hunger is related to poverty and poverty to unemployment”, the connections among hunger, poverty, and unemployment are emphasized and the passage just flows.

            In addition, Miller’s use of alliteration, as in “blue blazer”, and “more money”, and the “rule of three”, as in “disabilities: old age, infirmity, addiction” helps her passages sound smoother, and makes her readers more receptive to what she has to say.

            Although Miller does a really good job with taking advantage of most of the rhetorical devices, I think she could’ve taken more advantage of the natural rhythm of English in order to emphasize her points. In other words, I think she could’ve switched around her word order within sentences a bit so that sentences would begin with every-day knowledge and end with the new or important stuff. This way, her critical points would be more memorable, because the ends of sentences are normally what the reader would remember most.

            In “Dare to Care”, Miller crafts her voice, or narrative persona, into the editorial through her use of 2^ndperson, her recounting of her experiences with a specialist, and her use of dialogue. These elements made me like her piece more because it helped me engage more in the piece. When she said, “it’s easy for a journalist to be cynical—until David Beckmann walks into your office”, for example, her use of 2^ndperson helped draw me into her tirade against the lack of alleviation of domestic poverty more that if she had just used first or third person here.

            If this essay were an AP essay, the voice would be perfectly appropriate because even though Miller seems to be talking directly to me at times, she still manages to maintain an appropriate distance between me (the reader), and her, helping the writing carry on its formal and informative tone.

Source: Newsweek: 10/11/10 Issue

Class Notes : Week 4: October 25th - October 29th

What is the AP exam like?
The Essay:

• The essay almost always asks, how does the author create effects and what does it mean?
• The hidden "so what" question is discuss the meaning or "the effect" of the piece of literature
• Essays ALWAYS talk about the meaning behind the analysis, even when the question isn't explicitly stated.
• There are two types of essays to write: literary analysis and cause & effect
• To analyze is to show how the parts contribute to the functioning of the whole
• "Cause" can be symbols, diction, disjunction, rhetoric, figurative devices, etc. (all the literary devices we've learned about previously in class). "Effect" is the repercussions of these literary devices on the piece of literature
• Be creative in the essay!
• Ex: An example of dramatic irony is seen in M+M music. For example, when one of their lyrics say, "Sometimes I want to take my toaster in the bath", it is not meant literally; M+M is not actually saying that suicide is a good option here.
• As Virginia Woolf once said, "A good essay must have this permanent quality about it; it must draw its curtain round us, but it must be a curtain that shuts us in not out"

Essay-Writing Strategies

• Read the directions, then read it again. This is where the close-reading strategies we've learned come in handy.
• Make sure the directions are followed word for word. The highest score attainable if the directions are not followed is 3/9.
• There are two main ways to format essays: block style and point-by-point
• Block style is used for relative merits (i.e. which teacher is the best?). In block style, you talk about topic #1 in paragraph #1, then topic #2 in paragraph #2. The topics are separated.
• The point-by-point writing style can be used if the points are parallel. For example, paragraph #1 would be comparing and contrasting topics #1 and #2 on a certain point, and paragraph #2 would be comparing and contrasting topics #1 and #2 on a different point.
• A combination of point-by-point and block writing can be used if some parts of the essay can easily be delineated into points and some cannot
• Paragraphs can't be too long (i.e. a full page)
• Bad comparing and contrasting is saying topic A is x, but topic B is not x. Topic B can NOT be a lot of things.
• In my AP U.S. History and AP World History classes, we've had to utilize point-by-point and block essay-writing formats in order to analyze historic events.

Analyzing AP English poems related to Eros

• The two AP English poems about Eros differ in their conception of him. One views him as a "brute", and the other views him as "angelic"
• Some possible starter sentences when comparing and contrasting the two poems are: poem A & poem B share similarities in meaning in that...., BUT poem A really focuses on meaning..., WHILE poem B really focuses on meaning...

AP English Multiple Choice Strategies

• Read the poem, then reread it slower so that a paraphrase of the poem can be heard in the mind
• Read all the questions before answering them
• Vocabulary is very important on the test
• Utilize the MC test-taking strategies we've utilized for any other class, and for standardized tests: pace yourself, trust your instincts, if you can eliminate at least one answer choice, make an educated guess, etc.

Allusions - from Literature, Structure, Sound, and Sense by Perrine

• An allusion is something that references history or previous literature
• They tend to have powerful emotional effects
• Allusions are used to reinforce the emotion of the ideas of one's work with the emotion or ideas of another's work or occasion
• Poets, more than any other type of author, typically assume that their readers share a common foundation of literary experiences, usually of classical mythology, Shakespeare, or the Bible (King James Version)
• Hamilton's Mythology and the parts of the Bible that we've read over the summer are really helpful for this

Meanings in the Poem - from Literature, Structure, Sound, and Sense by Perrine

• The total meaning of a poem is the experience that it communicates (and it can't be communicated in any other way)
• Prose meaning of a poem is the ingredient that can be separated out of the poem in the form of a prose paraphrase. It is NOT the poem itself.
• The idea behind a poem is only a part of the total experience that the poem communicates
• Good readers are receptive to all kinds of experiences.
• The value or worth of a poem is not determined by the truth or nobility of the idea that it conveys. Instead, it is defined by the value of the total experience of the poem
• As readers, we must feel when reading the poem that the idea that the poem conveys is deeply felt by the poet: he's not just moralizing.

Homework

1. Study literary terms!
2. Study for the Critical Approaches test on Monday, October 4th.
3. Critical Approaches wiki due by 8am Sunday, October 3rd.
4. Class Notes and Outside Reading Journals due by 8pm October 10th.

Works Cited:

M+M. "Blink-182." Blink-182. n.d. Web. 10 Oct. 2010.

Perrine, Laurence, Thomas R. Arp, and Greg Johnson. Literature: Structure, Sound, and Sense. 8th ed. Boston: Heinle & Heinle: Thomson Learning, Inc., 2002. 852-69. Print.  

Class Notes : Week 3: September 27th - October 1st

Clarity

• "You don't need to outdo the competition. It's expensive and defensive. Underdo your competition. We need more simplicity and clarity" (Fried).
• Use short active verbs to convey action
• Use subjects that match up with their actors to bring the main action into the sentences
• Use concision to keep the reader focused
• Ideas should flow
• The active voice expresses actions in a straightforward fashion
• The passive voice helps the writer dodge the question of who performed the action
• Nominalizations (actions expressed as nouns) should be used with caution (i.e. the use of "an explanation was provided" instead of "he explained")
• Source: http://nutsandbolts.washcoll.edu/clarity.html

The Plain Style

• Plain-ness in writing is usually good
• Use powerful, yet concise words to replace wordy and less powerful phrases (i.e. use "powerful" instead of "fast-paced, emotionally tense")
• Agency is avoiding the question of who did what (i.e. saying "a terrible thing has happened" instead of "I smashed my mom's china")
• Link: http://nutsandbolts.washcoll.edu/plainstyle.htm

Concision

• "Vigorous writing is concise" (Strunk).
• Padding our writing with unnecessary wordiness is bad
• Empty words should be cut (i.e. "these are the practical contingency management implications" can become "these are the practical implications")
• One way to write better is to replace a weak adverb + verb construct with a stronger verb (i.e. "successfully obtains their support" can be replaced with "wins their support")
• Link: http://nutsandbolts.washcoll.edu/concision.html

Rhetoric

• Rhetoric is the art or science of persuasion by means of stylistic and structural techniques
• As we learned last week, another definition of rhetoric is "the art of communication"
• The first rhetorical choice of a writer is diction
• Plain diction is usually better than fancy diction.
• For more notes on diction: http://apelit-okemos.spruz.com/pt/Wendy-Liu-Class-Notes-Journal-Week-1-September-13th-September-17th/blog.htm
• Parallelism is a useful and flexible rhetorical technique
• Repetition is a useful tool because it can really bring an idea across
• Tenses should be consistent
• Alliteration and tricolon makes writing sound better
• Humor should be avoided in formal writing
• Think before using the first and second persons in writing
• Try not to use an exclamation point when writing
• When writing, remember: the end of the sentence is what the reader remembers the most
• Link: http://nutsandbolts.washcoll.edu/rhetoric.html
• As we learned last week, when writing, the subject, purpose, audience, and speaker need to be considered

A good image that shows the importance of rhetoric: http://argumentation.computing.dundee.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/american.rhetoric.png 

Syntax

• The rules that govern how we put together languages
• SVO (subject, verb, object) is a common way to express ourselves
• If syntax is varied through construction and length, it impacts the reader in several ways, such as pace, tone, and emphasis/attention
• Pace is how fast something seems to be moving
• When writing, think about, what’s the tone? What things should be in the foreground? Which things should be in the background?
• Coordinating conjunction: FANBOYS (for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so)
• Subordinating conjunctions begin the dependent clause that precedes the independent clause. It's more subtle than a coordinating conjunction (i.e. after, because, if, lest, how, since, though, unless, whenever)
• A compound sentence is what happens when there are coordinating conjunctions (i.e. Would you like to swim, or go jogging with me?)
• A complex sentence is what happens when there are subordinating conjunctions (i.e. If I ate your cookie, what would you do?)
• A simple sentence is what happens when there aren’t any conjunctions (i.e. I run.)

A great guide to writing clearly while following the rules of the English language: http://www.crockford.com/wrrrld/style.html 

I try to use the techniques that we learned this week in AP U.S. Government. In AP U.S. Government, concision, clarity, and plain-ness are key. The aim behind essay-writing for that class is simply to get the point across, and the techniques we learned in class this week are really useful for that purpose.

Homework

1. September 28th: edit of two peer papers due by 8 pm
2. September 29th: final draft of poetry analysis due by 8 pm
3. October 3rd: critical approaches wiki due by 8 am

Works Cited

Fried, Jason. SXSW. 2006. Web. Oct. 2010.  
Strunk, William. Elements of Style. N.p.: n.p., 1919. Web. 3 Oct. 2010.



Class Notes : Week 2: September 20th - September 24th

Figurative Language

http://toonlet.com/render/awsomeguy21/panelset/20903-Figurative_Lang-sfull.png 

• Figure of speech is a way of saying something other than the ordinary way. It is saying one thing while meaning another
• Figurative language is language that shouldn’t be taken literally
• There are 4 forms of metaphors
• Both the literal and figurative terms are named; like a simile; ex: “life the hound”
• The literal term is named and the figurative term is implied
• The literal term is implied and the figurative term is named
• Both the literal and figurative terms are implied
• Personification is giving attributes of human beings to animals, objects, or concepts. It is a metaphor where the figurative term is always a person.
• Apostrophe is addressing someone absent or dead or something nonhuman as if they were present and alive and could reply.
• Synecdoche is the use of the part for the whole. For example, when Shakespeare says the “cuckoo’s song is unpleasant to a married ear”, he means a married man’s ear
• Metonymy is the use of something closely related for the thing actually meant. For example, the popular use of tongues in the place of languages
• Figurative language gives us imaginative pleasure, adds more imagery, and adds emotional intensity and concentration (say things in fewer words).
• When reading a poem, one should ask: What use is being made of this language? How does it contribute to the experience of the poem?
• A symbol is something that means more than what it is. For example, in “The Road Not Taken”, the road is a symbol for choice
• A literary symbol functions literally and figuratively at the same time
• An allegory is a narrative of description that has a 2^ndmeaning beneath the surface.
• Paradox is an apparent contradicting that is nevertheless somehow true.
• In a paradoxical statement the contradiction usually stems from one of the words being used figuratively or with more than one denotation.
• Paradoxes shock the reader and by its absurdity underscores the truth of what’s being said.
• In Computational Physics, we learned about the "Twin Paradox", which is the idea that if there are two twins, and one stays on Earth while another blasts off into space at relativistic speeds, the Earth twin would think that the rocket twin's moving, while he's not moving, so the rocket twin would be aging slower, but the rocket twin would think that he's not moving, the Earth twin's moving, so the Earth twin's aging slower. So what if the rocket twin went back to Earth? Who would be older then?
• Overstatement = hyperbole = exaggeration in the service of truth
• Understatement is saying less than one means.
• Verbal irony is saying the opposite of what one means and sometimes even what one means and the opposite of what one means at the same time.
• Sarcasm is colloquial while satire is literary, although they both imply ridicule.
• Sarcasm is almost always cruel, and satire is usually both cruel and kind at the same time.
• Sarcasm and satire may contain irony, which is neither cruel nor kind, it is just a literary device.
• Irony may show a discrepancy between appearance and reality or between expectation and fulfillment.
• Dramatic irony is a discrepancy between what the speaker says and what the poem means.
• Irony of situation is a discrepancy between actual circumstances and those that would seem appropriate or between what one anticipates and what actually comes to pass.
• All of the above literary devices can be used in poetry to make it what it is. Last week, we learned that poetry quickens our senses and deepens our experience, and the above rhetorical devices are part of what makes poetry this way.
• A really good website explaining figurative language with ample examples: http://www.frostfriends.org/figurative.html  

“Barbie Doll” by Marge Piercy

     This poem is about a girl who was born to be bred under society’s rules. She was presented with dolls, stoves, irons, and lipsticks as a child, all representatives of what she was expected to use when she grew up. The problem was, “she was healthy, tested intelligent, possessed strong arms and back, abundant sexual drive and manual dexterity” (Piercy 7-9), all the traits that a man is supposed to possess, not a woman. As a result, “she was advised to play coy” (12), to wheedle her way through life because that is what’s expected of women to do in order to get a husband, which is of course, the ultimate goal of a woman: to snag a husband. Eventually though, “her good nature wore out like a fan belt” (15-16), and she snapped. She offered up herself, her personality, all the things that made her who she was, and married. In this way, she became a lifeless doll.
    The things we learned about diction last week can also be used to analyze this poem because at the last stanza of the poem, the author chooses vagueness over specificity. There, Piercy does not say that the girl died, or she got married, but left the last stanza deliberately vague so that it can be interpreted in either way, or in both ways (meaning she got married and died figuratively speaking). In the last stanza, the evidence for the girl's death is when it mentions "casket" and "undertaker", and the evidence for the girl's marriage shows up in the description of her clothes (pink and white nightie), the cosmetics and satin that is mentioned, and the word "consummation". Consummation's dictionary definition is completion or fulfillment, but in its connotation, it is often used in the case of marriage or love.

 http://www.agendamag.com/Fall2006/images/barbie/barbie.gif 

“Sorting Laundry” by Elisavietta Ritchie

            “Sorting Laundry” is about a woman folding and washing clothes. The objects that she comes across continuously remind her of her husband. She also comes cross a shirt left by a former lover, and since it has been through the wash, this most likely means that it was the woman’s lover, because only a woman would wear her lover’s clothes: a guy would not go around wearing female clothes, while a female might go around wearing guy clothes.

Rhetoric

• Rhetoric is the art of communication
• The “Rhetorical situation” is the context for an act of communication
• It’s the situation in which communication takes place. This analysis will lead to a plan that will lead to more effective communication. Anyone who needs to communicate anything will always try to analyze the rhetorical situation before beginning to compose the message.
• A deeper explanation of the rhetorical situation: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/625/01/
• The “plan”
• Subject: What’s the topic?
• Are you sure it’s what you wanted to communicate?
• What’s the main idea?
• Is the idea too broad or too narrow?
• How can the idea be developed?
• Purpose: What do you want to get out of this?
• Why are you engaged in this communication?
• Are you here to entertain? Reflect on the world? Inform? Persuade?
• Audience: Who, exactly, do you imagine will received this communication?
• Think about the age group and their vocabulary and reading level
• Think about the audience’s cultural base/knowledge
• Think about the audience’s educational background
• What’re the audience’s expectations?
• Speaker (Persona): What kind of a person do you want to seem like as you send this message?
• Do you want to speak as yourself, or as a fictional character?
• What characteristics or attributes do you want to convey?

Argument

• Argument is one way to accomplish the goal of persuasion
• Persuasion is a purpose for communication, while argument is a technique to accomplish the purpose of communication
• There are three types of arguments:
• Ethos: argument of ethics: appeal to our immortality (the sense of right and wrong)
• Logos: logical arguments: constructed according to certain rules and appeal to our intellect (ability to reason)
• Pathos: arguments of emotion: appeal to our feelings (pity, jealous, etc.)
• The Vocabulary of argumentation
• Thesis is the one main point. It’s always an opinion that we’re seeking to prove as correct
• Claim is an assertion. It’s an idea that is not a simple fact. Claims should be used to support the thesis and they make good topic sentences.
• Warrant is an explanation of your reasoning and evidence. It shows how claims are supported and ties the evidence to the claims
• Evidence is a fact that shows that your claims are reasonable
• Necessary elements of an argument are points that can’t be ignored
• Sufficient evidence is the weight of the evidence. Is there enough evidence to make the case?
• Some common types of arguments
• Proposal argument
• Cause & effect argument
• Argument of evaluation
• Argument of fact
• Argument of definition
• When constructing an argument, use the rhetorical situation to guide you
• When writing an argument, put it all on the page

Homework

• Due 9/22/10: finish responding to the "Pink Dog" forum by 8pm
• Due 9/24/10: write the rough draft of an essay that, in 750-1000 words, analyzes the meaning of one of the poems that we have read

Class Notes : Week 1: September 13th - September 17th

Critical Approaches

• Formalism: focuses on the text
• New Historicism: the historical/cultural context in which a text is written affects the said text
• Psychoanalytical Criticism: the unconscious mind affects texts
• Archetypal and Mythological Criticism: Effects of archetypes and mythology on a text
• Feminist Criticism: Effects of gender on a text
• Marxist Criticism: Effects of Marx on a piece of text
• Postcolonial Criticism: Effects of post-colonialism on a text

A good website that introduces some of the above critical approaches: http://www.charlesyoungs.com/english12honors/criticalapproachestoliterature.html

Poetry

 

Poetry quickens our senses and deepens our experience. It is at the heart of literature, figuratively and literally speaking. Pretty much all of the earliest works of literature of the various civilizations are poetry. Think The Epic of Gilgamesh of Mesopotamia, The Illiad and The Odyssey of the Greeks, The Aeneid of the Romans, and Beowulf of the English. Poetry is language condensed to artistic effect. It is, in the words of Wordsworth, “the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings” (Wordsworth). Because poetry is so powerful, yet so condensed, it is intense. All that we have to do for literature, we have to do for poetry, and more. Yet for all that we get from literature, we get from poetry, and more. One definition of poetry is that it takes longer to explain it than read it and is intended to create an artistic effect.

“The Eagle”by Lord Tennyson is a good example of this definition of poetry because it takes longer to explain this poem than it takes to read it, and it also creates an artistic effect by helping us imagine the eagle better. Another poem that we discussed in class was “Winter”. It takes longer to explain than read, and it has an artistic appeal because instead of telling us what winter is like, the poem shows us through different personal perspectives what winter is like, allowing the reader to more easily connect with the text.

Delving deeper into poetry: “Hidden Meanings” by Dabney Stuart

 

            The poem “Hidden Meanings” by Dabney Stuart contains many hidden sexual connotations. For example, when Dabney mentions, “Both Hansel and Jack hated their mothers: / Jack sold the old cow / so she threw his seeds away; / Hansel let his feel his fingers a lot / and then stuffed her in the oven” (1-5), he is saying that Jack didn’t feel sexually attracted to his mom so she tried to castrate his mom, and there was incest going on between Jack and his mom. There are sexual connotations in the poem regarding the fathers too. For example, the poem mentions “Their fathers were troublesome, too: / one was a wimp…the other…had to be cut down, stalk first” (6-9). This is in essence saying that one of the fathers was impotent, and the other had to be castrated. The poem then goes on to mention that Rumpelstiltskin “played by himself” (11), “couldn’t get a baby by proxy” (12), and “stuck his wooden leg through the floor” (13), implying that Rumpelstiltskin performed autoeroticism and was impotent. Then, the poem moves on to its final message, “the two boys finally got rich, like Cinderella” (14), saying that males and females are treated differently in fairy tales. All Cinderella had to do to become rich was to look pretty at a ball. But for the guys, they had to embark on adventures and overcome adversaries to get to their “happy ending”. In essence, Dabney Stuart is saying that women are leeches. In the 1960s, when this poem was written, society was training women to think that they can be like the princesses of fairy tales, sponge off men, and make men their “plaything”, and Stuart is saying here that this is wrong.

            This poem reminds me of a book that I’m currently reading, The Girl Who Played with Fire by Steig Larsson. This book is about two people who get deeply embroiled in a sex trafficking investigation, and I feel like the book is the completely opposite of “Hidden Meanings”. “Hidden Meanings” is talking about women exploiting men for money, while The Girl Who Played with Fire is mostly about men exploiting women for money.

            In reading this poem, we had to apply the techniques of close reading that we learned last week.

Diction

• Diction is powerful and revealing because words are chosen for a reason
• For example thin is a neutral word. Yet if you describe someone as slender, or  svelte, you are being more honorific. On the other end of the spectrum, if you describe someone as skinny or gaunt, you are being more and more pejorative
• If you say a kid is svelte, then you are a pedophile. If you say a kid is gaunt, then you are implying that the kid’s bones are prominent. Word choice matters.
• Connotation v. denotation
• Connotation is the dictionary definition of a word. Denotation is the non-dictionary, cultural definition of a word.
• For example, the word Eden’s definition is the residence of Adam and Even before their Fall. Yet the denotation of Eden is a paradise, a place of perfect bliss.
• Concreteness v. abstraction
• An author’s choice of either depends on what they were looking for
• For example, clothes, pants, jeans, Levis, show an increase in concrete-ness, and one’s word choice of any depends on the context. “She jumped like her pants were on fire” v. “She jumped like her clothes were on fire”. In the first instance, we may think that she’s really excited. But in the second instance, we may think that her clothes are really on fire.
• In AP Government, we’re analyzing the Declaration of Independence, which starts with, “when in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth..." (Jefferson). Here, Jefferson aims for a lot of concreteness because he does not want the English to mistake his, and America’s intent for writing this document.
• In writing, concreteness can be used to convey intimacy whereas abstractness and be used to convey aloofness and distance
• Precision, vagueness, and specificity
• Which one of the above an author decides to use depends on the situation
• For example, if I voice an opinion, the teacher is expected to say, “good!”, not “I am so happy that for once you said something in class!”. Vagueness is valued in this situation because that is the only socially accepted route.
• If an author is vague, it can mean that he’s trying to convey suspense, ambiguity, or imply that there are multiple meanings behind what he’s saying.
• Elevation v. colloquialism
• The most casual form of language is slang (outsiders’ language that they use to bond), then colloquial language (ordinary speech). Then there is elevated language, which is epic language. It’s used in inaugural addresses or Nobel acceptance speeches.
• Dialect, jargon, regionalisms, etc.
• Dialect is the different ways a language is spoken in different geographical areas of a country
• Regionalisms are words unique to a region smaller than a dialect region: for example, the varied use of pop, soda, and coke in the U. S.
• Jargon is technical vocabulary
• In To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee’s characters use the word scuppernong instead of grape to show that her characters have limited knowledge, so they can only speak in this way, instead of changing their diction to fit that of the reader

Homework

1. Class Notes Journal due Monday, September 20^th
2. Comment analytically on “Kitchenette Building” and respond to two peers’ posts due Thursday, September 16^th
3. Comment analytically diction or imagery in “The Widow’s Lament” and “The Naming of Parts” and respond to two peers’ posts due Monday, September 20^th

Works Cited

Jefferson, Thomas. "The Declaration of Independence." U.S. History. The Independence Hall Association (IHA), 4 July 1776. Web. 19 Sept. 2010.

Stuart, Dabney. "Hidden Meanings." Literature: Structure, Sound, and Sense. Ed. Laurence Perrine, Thomas R. Arp, and Greg Johnson. Boston: Heinle & Heinle: Thomson Learning, Inc., 2002. 754-55. Print.

Wordsworth, William, and Samuel T. Coleridge. Lyrical Ballads. N.p.: n.p., 1798. Web. 19 Sept. 2010.