Hamlet and Our other texts

     We have read many texts this semester and explored many themes.  As this is the last blog for the semester, it is time to reflect.  Look at all that we have read this year and make a connection between Hamlet and one other text from this semester.  How are they the same and how are they different?

     In doing this comparison, think about the themes, big ideas, characters, struggles, language.  In your post, explain what you want to say about Hamlet in one paragraph, explain the second text in another paragraph, and then explain the connection in the third paragraph.  Use quotes from both to back up your argument.

Hamlet and Beyond

Hamlet is quoted so often in our pop culture.  Just today when I was watching Westworld there were two references: "What dreams may come" and "Brevity is the soul of wit."   I have even written a poem where I merged one of the soliloquies and my own language to try and speak on many levels.  Hamlet transcends time and that is the beauty of any work: the ability to speak for a moment and to speak beyond a single moment.

For this week's blog, I would like for you to pull one of the quotes from the play that resonates with you.  Explain what it means in the context of the play, and then explain how it can transcend the play. Once you have done the other two, apply it to your musical.

Why Poetry?

     We are drawn to certain genres more than others.  Sometimes, it depends on our moods and other times, it is because we are hungry and need to feed our souls.  I read every night.  Some nights, it may be news articles, essays, crazy tweets, FB posts, or movie reviews.  Some nights, it may be short fiction, or a novel.  But when I am feeling like chaos has exploded into my world and I need to find my rhythm, I read poetry.  Poetry speaks to me in a way that is hard to describe.  Perhaps, it is because we speak the same language.  
     This week, I want you to watch this TED Talk: Poetry: Why it is important.   As you listen think about why he thinks poetry is important.  Pull two items that resonate with you and explain why.  Then I want you to post a poem of significance and explain why you have chosen this poem.  Why is it significant to you?  Why do you like it, love it, need it, return to it?  Tell us why.  

These times they are changing...

Last week something very interesting happened.  Bob Dylan has been awarded with the Nobel Prize in Literature.  Over the weekend there were many whose opinions were heard loudly in either concurrence or disagreement. It is a first that a music artist has won this award.  As a result, I want us to discuss this.  We have been reading songs in my classroom as poetry for several years now and analyzing them.  This year, we are looking at Musical Theater.  Is it such a stretch that song lyrics be considered poetry?  

Read this article from the New York Times, "Bob Dylan Wins Nobel Prize, Redefining Boundaries of Literature."  Pull two things from the article that resonate with you and explain why.  Once you have read the article and pulled your two items, listen to one of his songs.  Tell us the title and what you think of the writing.  Then, look at one other post from this week by one of your peers and respond to their thoughts.  (When you do respond to your peer, please be respectful).

Just so you know, this year we have read two others who have won this same award: Toni Morrison and Samuel Beckett.

Dreams

Read this poem by Nikki Giovanni and figure out what you think it means.  What is she saying about dreams?  What is she saying about certain types of dreams?  

Once you have figured out the poem, connect this poem to Waiting for Godot.  What are they saying that is the same?  Explain your analysis using evidence from both texts.

Dreams by Nikki Giovanni

i used to dream militant 

dreams of taking 

over america to show
these white folks how it should be 

done

i used to dream radical dream
of blowing everyone away with my perceptive powers
of correct analysis

i even used to think i'd be the one
to stop the riot and negotiate the peace

then i awoke and dug

that if i dreamed natural
dreams of being a natural
woman doing what a woman
does when she is natural
i would have a revolution.

Waiting...

We have been reading the play, Waiting for Godot.  This week we are trying to figure it out. For this week's blog, read this article that makes the assertion that of the "100 best nonfiction books: Godot by Samuel Beckett would be 29th."  Pull two points made by the article and defend them using the text as your evidence.

Rise Up

I am always reading.  My favorite part of social media is the reading material.  I'm not a super social person, but reading and finding out about the world energizes me.  Martha Southgate in her essay titled "Rise Up" published in American Scholar explains the impact of Lin-Manuel Miranda and his creation Hamilton on her life.  I was drawn to her essay initially because it was about Hamilton, and it would be an understatement to say that I love Hamilton, but she also addresses Lin-Manuel Miranda and how he has affected her.  This was particularly interesting to me.  This is partly because I feel the same way about him.   We read books, watch plays, watch films, and the like but we never feel as though we know the creator.  We see them as the vehicle of production, but with Hamilton, Miranda has changed that.  His persona draws people to the art just as much as the genius of the art.  Because of this, the line between life and art becomes blurred.  We no longer see the musical in isolation.  We see him and the art.  This leads me to our prompt for this week.

Read her essay.  Look at what she says about how art affects us.  Once you have finished reading the piece, think of a piece of art that has affected you deeply.  Think about and explain what brought you to the art in the first place and what you have learned about yourself, the world, and the art as a result.  In your response, pull at least two points that Southgate makes that resonate with you and how the art you selected impacts you.

Responding to others...

Last week we read Sartre, Camus, and the lecture by Banach.  When reading these, the authors may have presented ideas or arguments that you agree with or disagree with.  In looking at these works, I want you to respond to two ideas presented in the collective texts.  

1. Summarize what is presented.
2. Once you have presented the information, respond.  This can be you agreeing or disagreeing.  
3. Explain what you are responding to and why you are responding to it.  Elaborate on your ideas so it is apparent to those observing your post what you are writing about.  

4. Feel free to jump in and comment on the assertions of your peers.

What in the World...

Everyday we are bombarded with messages: music, television shows, commercials, snapchats, etc.  These messages are rooted in the agendas of others and attempt to persuade us to think and feel a certain way.  This week, look at the world around you.  Choose one thing in your world that you want to analyze.  It can be a song, a movie, a commercial, or anything else you think is appropriate. 

Briefly describe it to us and then explain the purpose behind it.  In other words, what message is being communicated?  

For example: The musical Hamilton has the song "My Shot."  Throughout the entire song,  Alexander Hamilton shouts at the world that he is "not throwing away [his] shot."  This has so many connotations: his chance for success, his shot in a duel, his ultimate death in a duel.  In the end, it is about not wasting the life you have been given and always pushing yourself to give your best.  

The next part of your post should entail the following: begin to analyze the piece you have chosen.  Look at rhetorical devices used, images, camera angles, and the like.  Explain it to us.  

This should be about two solid paragraphs.  

Computers and Poetry

The last two weeks we have analyzed poems.  This week, I want you to watch this TED Talk.  It poses the question, can a computer write poetry?  As you watch this, keep in mind what he is saying about what it means to be human and what he is saying about poetry.  Once you have watched the video, pull three things he says that resonate with you and comment on them.  

History Poems

Below you will find two poems. Read through both poems and answer the prompt.


Prompt: In reading both poems, determine what is being said about the way history is taught. Explain how the authors use their poetic devices to examine the way history is taught and understood in society.


Southern History by Natasha Trethewey

Before the war, they were happy, he said.
quoting our textbook. (This was senior-year

history class.) The slaves were clothed, fed,
and better off under a master’s care.

I watched the words blur on the page. No one
raised a hand, disagreed. Not even me.

It was late; we still had Reconstruction
to cover before the test, and — luckily —

three hours of watching Gone with the Wind.
History, the teacher said, of the old South —

a true account of how things were back then.
On screen a slave stood big as life: big mouth,

bucked eyes, our textbook’s grinning proof — a lie
my teacher guarded. Silent, so did I.



The History Teacher by Billy Collins

Trying to protect his students’ innocence
he told them the Ice Age was really just
the Chilly Age, a period of a million years
when everyone had to wear sweaters.

And the Stone Age became the Gravel Age,
named after the long driveways of the time.

The Spanish Inquisition was nothing more
than an outbreak of questions such as
“How far is it from here to Madrid?”
“What do you call the matador’s hat?”

The War of the Roses took place in a garden,
and the Enola Gay dropped one tiny atom on Japan.

The children would leave his classroom
for the playground to torment the weak
and the smart,
mussing up their hair and breaking their glasses,

while he gathered up his notes and walked home
past flower beds and white picket fences,
wondering if they would believe that soldiers
in the Boer War told long, rambling stories
designed to make the enemy nod off.

Poem analysis

Ethics by Linda Pastan (b. 1932)

In ethics class so many years ago

our teacher asked this question every fall:

If there were a fire in a museum,

which would you save, a Rembrandt painting

or an old woman who hadn’t many

years left anyhow? Restless on hard chairs

caring little for pictures or old age

we’d opt one year for life, the next for art

and always half-heartedly. Sometimes

the woman borrowed my grandmother’s face

leaving her usual kitchen to wander

some drafty, half-imagined museum.

One year, feeling clever, I replied

why not let the woman decide herself?

Linda, the teacher would report, eschews

the burdens of responsibility.

This fall in a real museum I stand

before a real Rembrandt, old woman,

or nearly so, myself. The colors

within this frame are darker than autumn,

darker even than winter — the browns of earth,

though earth’s most radiant elements burn

through the canvas. I know now that woman

and painting and season are almost one

and all beyond the saving of children.

Read the above poem and answer the prompt.

Prompt: In reading the above poem, a question is posed.  How does the author answer the question, and what is the author's purpose?  In answering the prompt, be sure to use your literary vocabulary to help you make your point.  

Seeing

     I am being given a room of my own.  It is by definition a room that is for me to do my work, to bring my passions to life, to be me.  This room comes replete with materials to be chosen by me in order to make this place my own.  In looking at the design of the room, I have to place the desk by the window. I am a day dreamer, but for me to write and think I need to see the world.  I enjoy watching how things move, how the trees change, how the birds maneuver, and how nature plays.  I haven't always been this way.  It is about mindfully choosing to watch.  To see.
     Annie Dillard writes in her book Pilgrim at Tinker Creek that "seeing is of course very much  a matter of verbalization.  Unless I call attention to what passes before my eyes, I simply won't see it.  It is, as Ruskin says, 'Not merely unnoticed, but in the full, clear sense of the word, unseen'"(30).  To see this way is what allows us to understand how the world works and how we work within the world.  My children taught me this.  They would crouch down and study bugs that I had learned to step over.  They would watch as the trees moved and call attention to the birds.  My children taught me to slow down.
     For this week's blog, I want you to willfully see.  Go to a window.  Sit and watch.  You can pick your window and your subject.  (If you choose people, be respectful in that this is a public blog.)  Write down what you see.  Then, come up with a poem or descriptive prose passage that captures what you see.  What have you learned from watching this subject, and how can what you learn be applied to your life at the stage in which you currently reside?

As I Lay Dying: Character analysis

We just read As I Lay Dying and I am sure there is a great deal to be said.  Look at our characters.  We have many different voices present and those voices are all unique.  I want you to pick a character whose voice you like and a character you find interesting  (only one).

Pull a passage from the character's chapters that you see as an example or representation of who they are and what they stand for in this text.  Type out the passage (choose a smallish section that is poignant)  and break it down.  Analyze this character and tell us why they matter.  

Making Connections

Making connections to a piece of literature is one of the ways that we can come to understand it at a much deeper level.  Our connections should not just be about characters, or scenes.  They should be about big ideas and how those ideas manifest themselves and transcend time.  Previously, we have connected our ideas to other texts and poetry.  

For this week's blog, I want you to take from Crime and Punishment and connect what you take to a film that you have watched.  Pull a chunk of dialogue from the film.  Explain what you see happening in your selection.  Then, explain how you see Crime and Punishment emerging within your selection.   Once you have done that, tell us why it matters.  

Passage analysis

We have finished reading Crime and Punishment.  Now we are jigsawing:) With such a large text, it can be easy to overlook the way in which the author is able to convey his ideas.  So for this week, I want you to pull a passage that you find to be thought provoking or interestingly constructed.  

Type out the passage and then break it down for us.  Go line by line analyzing how each word, each sentence, and the use of language impacts what is being said. (Choose a small enough passage so that this is possible.)

Making Sense ofThings

We have read many different texts and types of texts this year.  We are only halfway through.  Look at this article, Meaning in Nonsense. Read what is being said about nonsense and how we read and how we write.  Once you have done this, think about sound and how sound affects you when you read a piece of poetry.

In your post, I want you to pull out one part of this article that resonates with you and explain why it speaks to you.  Once you have done that, I want you to explain how one piece we have read this year, either poetry or prose, has impacted you through sound, nonsense, or some other means.  Think about what is said in this article.  Do you feel the same way?

Cultural influences

Every text we read has been influenced by the writer and the time the writer creates within.  Read this brief piece from Brain Pickings.  Look at what is being said about writers, culture, and creativity.  

Apply this to Dorian Gray.  Write a response where you look at what is going on during Wilde's time, his readers, his ideas, his influences.  Use examples from the text and from Brain Pickings.  If you choose to pull additional sources, be sure to cite them.