Eye Can See!

After researching in the Oxford Encyclopedia of British Literature I was not able to find anything that supported my last post comparing King Lear and King Leontes, but I did find more about the motif that things are not as they always appear, another theme Shakespeare stretches across his vast variety of plays.
While talking with a student from another Shakespeare class, we discussed how many of Shakespeare's plays involve sight. She explained how many of the major sonnets, speeches and scenes in Shakespeare often involve eyes, sight or something of the like. The point of this post is to begin developing the theme of seeing things as they really are.
In this play, King Lear's foil, Gloucester loses his eyes, and "learns to see." So what does it mean to see?
According to this play and other Shakespeare plays, people and their circumstances are more than meet the eye. When Gloucester loses his eyes, he has to rely on feeling, smelling, tasting and touching in order to understand. It is in the use of these senses that we can accurately see the world around us, not just our eyes.
In a theme analysis by Michael Cummings, he states the common theme that things are not always as they appear is found in other plays such as Macbeth or Othello. This is one of the prominent critical statements made by Shakespeare throughout his works and I'm sure we will see it further develop in King Lear.

King Lear vs. Winter's Tale

In the opening of King Lear, it is almost a mirror image of the Winter's Tale.

King Lear	Winter’s Tale
Starts out with King Lear going about business, nothing unusual	Starts out with King Leontes going about business, nothing unusual
Other characters come in, King Lear makes rash decision about his daughter	After some interaction, King Leontes makes rash decision about his wife
Kent tries to be the voice of reason and is cast out	Leontes confides in Camillo, who eventually flees with Polixenes

In both plays, the stage is set for a King to recognize his faults, change, and seek forgiveness. I'm curious to see what role "accepting someone back into society" will play in King Lear versus the Winter's Tale.

Setting the Stage

Shakespeare really shows some talent in his writing of the first scene, in particular, when the three daughters speak to their father. William is tasked here with presenting characters in the light they will be seen throughout the whole play and I wanted to focus on how he sets Cordelia to be pure.

First, when the 2 daughters are speaking, she speaks aside to herself. Looking at this factor to develop Cordelia's character. Shakespeare uses the element of self speech because a character's words are more believable when they are speaking to their self.
Second, look at what she is saying she is worried about motive and accurately expressing

What shall Cordelia speak? Love, and be silent. Line 63

Then poor Cordelia!
And yet not so; since I am sure my love's
More richer than my tongue. Line 80

She is worried about motive and accurately expressing her feelings for her father, both things deal with honesty. Shakespeare could have written many things for her to say, but in these lines he developed Cordelia's integrity, setting the stage for her role in the play.

She then speaks giving him her word and without exaggeration. "I love my Majesty according to my bond; no more no less." Line 95

These hints fall on to the sub conscience of the audience and the play moves on with the viewers trusting more in Cordelia because of Shakespeare's use of words and stage direction.

As a side note, I love the reaction King Lear has to her first response. I think directors could make it a comical dialogue during this serious situation. When she first says "nothing," to his inquiry about her love for him, he responds "Nothing?" To which she confirms and the King says, "Nothing can come of nothing. Speak again." If he were to change his voice to a higher pitch and make his line a little commanding I think it could turn out comical. Remind me and I'll explain in our group.

Checking My Shakespearean Temperature

Midterm Post

1. How have I gained Shakespeare literacy?

Looking back on our first day of class, my literacy of Shakespeare has increased ten fold. This has mainly come from reading the plays, watching the performances, and listening in class. Every play we have read has been new to me, and although I still feel inadequate when discussing them, my knowledge is much deeper than before. The deepest things I have learned are the ones I have spent the most time researching on the Internet. Thus in my posts about Henry V I felt the most confident because I read professional commentary on the subject. Breadth however, has come from reading classmates posts about their place and especially discussing them in the car on the way up to Salt Lake. The performance I saw there, along with others I have watched (including Henry V and Winter’s Tale) have also attributed to my Shakespeare literacy. Hearing Brother Burton say, “You have some Shakespeare literacy now" made me feel good not because I was flattered, but because I felt there was truth in it.

2. How have I analyzed Shakespeare critically?

I think reading through my blog posts, which are beginning to focus on how Shakespeare comments on society’s ethics show how I have critically analyzed Shakespeare. Two posts that come to mind link Winter’s Tale and the Tempest together talking about honesty and loyalty. Theme analysis is an important part of the learning outcomes as well as analyzing through language and formal devices, which I explore in my post For Entertainment’s Sake regarding Love’s Labours Lost. Reading opinions from other authors and taking time to understand what Shakespeare is saying is the most effective way I have found to analyze his work. This can be best seen in my post about war from Henry V (see section titled "A Little History") where I consider the historical events taking place compared to what Shakespeare wrote about England and war.

3. How have I engaged Shakespeare creatively?

This is a great question. I love creativity. One creative suggestion Brother Burton gave that I took the time to do during my personal play was writing summaries for individual scenes. This helped me to remember a lot more and was a commodity when I went back in search for a particular aspect. Another thing that has helped with going back is my use of highlighting. I have four different colors I have used to highlight themes and different parts of the text that jump out at me. You can see this being used in my post about rhyming from Love’s Labours Lost. Another thing I plan on doing is looking up Youtube videos that correlate with a topic from class to see what others voice about the subject. It would help me to learn because I am a visual person.

4. How have I shared Shakespeare meaningfully?

The best way I have shared Shakespeare is definitely through blogging. Not writing on my personal blog, but reading other’s and replying to people’s comments has been effective to keep the topic on my mind daily. I have tried to read more than one person’s blog every day to have a better understanding of what is going on in the group. I try to leave meaningful comments as found on Christa’s blog about Ariel and Prospero's being puppet and puppeteer, or J.J.’s blog about Figment of Imagination to develop insights pointed out by them or that I recognized in light of their post. Further, many conversations have led to Shakespeare, including with my mom, an alumni and English major from BYU, and the girl I have been dating. We have talked about the Tempest, watched Henry V (nice cheap date), and discussed the festival that her family attends yearly down in Cedar City ;).

B. Self-directed Learning

The two most influential things in my self-directed learning have been the use of highlighting, and talking with other students substantially about their assigned plays. By using highlighting in my writing I have been more alert when I read, looking for different themes, word use and important lines. This has enhanced my depth. From reading other student’s blogs, to channeling a conversation on the drive to Salt Lake, I have learned about many of Shakespeare’s plays. These include Macbeth, Measure for Measure and Much Ado About Nothing, and other plays. Doing this has built my breadth of learning. Hearing other’s opinions and listening in class has taught me what to look for, for example poetry in a play or lighting on a stage. As I continue to meet with my group, my thinking evolves, mostly because they are far ahead of me in critical analysis. I plan to document a lot of my learning in my final project which I am thinking will consist of YouTube videos, or some way of teaching Shakespeare.

C. Collaborative and Social Learning

Many students have helped me become more literate in my Shakespearean knowledge. J.J. has blogged and commented effectively, while Christa and Kelsie have given unique insights during group discussion. Talking to Kara about her individual play and others we read has also helped form my opinion about Shakespeare and his writing. While working in our assigned groups, I have enjoyed reading each other’s blogs and discussing what we analyz

ed from the text, but I feel the discussion can be improved. One way it could be more interesting is if each group was given a theme to focus on in their discussion. After that, each group could summarize what they found. Doing this would help us get to know our classmates more and talk with them more about our plays. I have been able to talk extensively outside of class (especially in our car rides) to other people about their experience in the class. Beyond this, I have discussed with friends what we have read as I boldly admit that yes, I am in a Shakespeare class. Interestingly enough I have found that many BYU students know a lot about Shakespeare.

D. Looking Ahead

I plan to continue to learn on my current course. By doing the blogs and reading assignments I have found that my literacy has increased significantly. Also, participating in class discussion is important to me, as well as group and outside personal discussions. Looking toward the final project, I plan to teach others about Shakespeare. In doing this, I know I will learn more about him and his writings along the way. Through videos, presentations, or writing I plan to document my learning and put the documentation to use for my final project.

I Feel Like a Parent with Teenagers

Well what could that mean? Although it may be an exaggeration, I'm alluding to the time in life when parents work hard to get something out of their kids only to find one word answers. Don't let this alarm you, the results are satisfactory.
I first wanted to discuss my experience reaching "outside the Utah bubble." I jumped onto Icerocket and Google blog search and looked for a few posts to comment on. After searching, I commented on one called Our Shakespearean Blog and another, the League of Dead Films. Responses still pending on those. Further, I opened up an account on Goodreads, offering people a chance to read my review on Henry V. Nothing. I will get an email and update my blog as soon as they respond.
In conclusion, my experience reaching out into the outside world has been a lot harder than I expected. Nonetheless, I will try harder, like Brother Burton said.

Now, talking to another person about Shakespeare turned out better. I did not want to force it on anyone, or give the "I'm doing this for a class approach," so it turned out to be different. I first called my little brother Spencer (he's the one at the bottom in the picture). He is in eighth grade, an avid reader, and the youngest of seven.

Me: "Spenny what's up?!"

Spencer: "Hey Matt!"

Me: "How is school going?"

Spencer: "Which subject?"

Me: "Uh... English."

Spencer: "It's good." Typical teenage response.

Me: "Are you reading any books?"

After a thorough description of an intense eighth grade book I turned the topic to Shakespeare. We talked about the Tempest, and he actually said he has heard of it, but didn't know what it's about.

Me: "Well there is this man who gets stranded on an island with all these people and he uses magic."

Spencer: "Like Harry Potter?"

Me: "Kind of. This guy used to be like a King, but when he was studying, he got overthrown and cast out to this island." I then pointed out how he was gaining knowledge but he lost power. I asked him what he thought about that, but he did not say much. Finally, the conversation led to other things and I let him off the hook.

I think this assignment helped me to learn how little I know. Reading all of the different blogs about Henry V and trying to explain it to my little brother in eighth grade terms was eye-opening.

I will be posting as I hear responses from other people on my comments.

Follow Up on Trust

Well I appreciated your guys' comments so much from the last post that I thought I would blog in response to them. To catch up anyone who missed it, you can read the post here, scroll down if you're on my main blog, or keep reading until the end of this paragraph for a summary. In Acts 3 and 4 we read about many different story lines. In one of them, Caliban swears loyalty to Stephano, when he already has a master, Prospero. My comment to that was, "if he can't keep his loyalty to Prospero, he can't keep his loyalty to Stephano." By the end of the play, if the principle stands true, Caliban again would have flip-flopped.

Reading Act V, I will be honest, I was kind of struggling following what Prospero was saying. I knew already what was going to happen, but the details were hard to catch. However, when Caliban came on stage, his line hit me like a sack of bricks. He transferred his loyalty again! Caliban says he was mistaken to "worship this dull fool!" Line 2373.
If someone cannot be trusted with another's secret, fail to trust them with yours. I'm not saying to go around not trusting people. In fact, like my high school English teacher emphasized, "you have my trust until you prove you can't be trusted" is a good way to live. There are so many elements of trust in Shakespeare's plays.
Lastly I wanted to touch again on the value of trust. Two people I have a lot of trust in are my mission president and my professor who took a group of students (including me) to Asia. One day after meeting with my professor, I reflected on our relationship. He is one of the few people I could honestly trust with my life. He and my mission president are people I know will do what they say. That is something to strive for.

Trusting the Untrustworthy

Loyalty and trust. Ah we see it again. If you think back two or three weeks ago, we had a good discussion about trusting others. Both Hamlet and the Winter's Tale deal with trust. Now, here in Acts 2 and 3 of the "Tempest", Caliban and Stephano's relationship is set up to tell a similar ironic story. Shakespeare loves to do this.
Caliban says in Act 2 that he will be loyal to Stephano...




Caliban:

"I'll swear upon that bottle to be thy true subject; for the liquor is not earthly." Lines 1213/1214
"I'll kiss thy foot; I'll swear myself thy subject" Line 1239

Here he is swearing loyalty to someone when he has another master, Prospero. In the next act (Act 3) they plot together against Prospero, Caliban's master. As I mentioned in an old post about loyalty, there is a principle of integrity that if someone does not uphold (a) s/he will not be trustworthy themselves and (b) s/he will usually not trust others. Here, after swearing loyalty to Stephano, Caliban goes against any loyalty he had to Prospero. This is just like telling someone a secret you "promised not to tell" and in return they trust you with a secret you "promise" not to tell. It doesn't make sense! Nor does it make sense to tell someone a secret you want to keep secret when they just proved they could not do so.

I bet Caliban will betray Stephano by the end of the play, it's in his character. Get him in an intense situation and he becomes self-interested. What do you think?

See if you can connect Atlas with this post. Who knows their Greek mythology?