Hamlet...Hamlet...
Here's my opinion on Shakespeare: I either love it or hate it. I usually like Shakespeare's comedies, simply because no one important dies at the end. And it usually ends well for the main characters. Like our packet on comedy says, I recognize my own shortcomings on the characters and like laughing about it.
Tragedies, however, just frustrate me. Everyone is so melodramatic and tragic and angsty! They take everything so seriously (and I know that's kind of the point of a tragedy, but that's just my personal preference. I'm fairly familiar with the plot of Hamlet, but it's interesting learning about the historical facts that go along with it. I feel like this really helps me understand what's going on. I usually find it challenging comprehending what the characters are saying because I don't know where to begin in the whole mess off illusions and language and tone that is Shakespeare. So I really like being able to stop before/after each scene and having Ms. Holmes explain what's going on.
Being about a week into working from the textbook I think I'm going to see if I can buy/download a copy of the the text, because the whole sticky notes thing isn't really working for me. I'm used to the underlining and difference colored pens!
We've only been working on the new text for a week and my previous Response to Course Material covered all of Death of a Salesman so I can't really think of anything else to write about.
Hey Miriam! I know that it's Christmas break and all, but I thought i'd give blog reviews a head-start. I really like the layout of your blog; it makes the post more appealing (:
ReplyDeleteAnyways, I agree that this course material is pretty much all about Hamlet. Although I did write about our last few discussions on DOS, I don't feel that alone anymore finding out that Hamlet is a struggle for most of us. I feel like having some background knowledge on Hamlet could be very useful. Do you find it helpful, or is it still difficult? to me, I feel like the DOS to Hamlet was such a big shift and we just need time to understand Shakespeare's writings. I'm glad Ms. Holmes is giving us enough time to annotate. I hope you bought your own copy so that you can mark it (:
Considering at the time this post was written, I think it would've been better if you included something about Salesman. I agree that Ms. Holmes was a huge help with Hamlet because without any context Hamlet just doesn't make any sense. Since we hadn't done that much with Hamlet yet I think you did as well as you could reflecting on the material. Good job!
ReplyDeleteI feel this way about these posts too, sometimes I can't muster up enough things to write about. Shakespeare tragedies are most certainly annoying in how depressing they are from the start, and I also definetley agree that sticky notes are a pain. :)
ReplyDeleteI'd like to see you guys looking through notebooks, assignments, and planners, and glancing over the Spruz calendar before you write these so that your memories are fresh and you can be thorough in covering the things we do in the textbook, the in-class assignments and activities, and so on. Also, remember that the primary aim of this assignment is to synthesize old and new material and to synthesize new material with material from other courses and the "real world.
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