Reflections

As the semester ends, we have been asked by our Shakespeare professor to reflect upon our end of semester activities, our Engaging Shakespeare event, and our projects. This post will serve as those reflections for me.

Reality in King Lear

A few weeks ago, I wrote a post detailing my observations about Reality and Illusion in Shakespeare's works. I hadn't  yet finished King Lear at the time, so I am now taking the opportunity to look at the same theme in that play.

Engaging Shakespeare: The Website

As we have been working on our final projects for my Shakespeare class, I have been asked to build a website on which we can document the final projects of my classmates and present them to the world. The site is called 'Engaging Shakespeare.'

Engaging Shakespeare: The Event

In anticipation of our upcoming Engaging Shakespeare Event, J.J. and I have put together a basic agenda for how things will go. Here it is!

The Reply

A couple of weeks ago, I posted about an email that I sent to Stephan Thiel about visualizing Shakespeare and the arts. I recently received his reply. Here are his answers to my questions.

Illusion versus Reality

Last week, I had an interview with my Shakespeare professor, Dr. Burton. As I was preparing to meet with him, I went through each of the plays I had read and studied thus far this semester and made a short list of themes in each of them that I could then discuss if Dr. Burton asked. Well, I didn't end up using it; however, I made a rather interesting discovery as I was creating it. The common theme of Shakespeare: Illusion versus Reality.

Measuring Up

My assessment of myself: this post has the main purpose of evaluating myself according to the learning outcomes and expectations of my Shakespeare class and my personal expectations for this blog. 

Final Project Thoughts

I have written a couple of posts now discussing the visualization of Shakespeare. While I was examining the work of Stephan Thiel, I came across this excellent example of helping others engage in the arts. It led me to think about our final projects in my Shakespeare class.

Call Me from Stephan Thiel on Vimeo.

Sharing Shakespeare

A part of Stephan Thiel's Visual Music project.

I recently sent an email to Stephan Thiel, creator of understanding-shakespeare.com as well as numerous other projects focusing on visualizing literature, music, and other arts. I discussed in a previous post my fascination with the Understanding Shakespeare project and created some visuals of my own in my analysis of A Midsummer Night's Dream. In an effort to understand more of Thiel's thoughts on the concept of visualizing the arts, I included the following questions in my email:

Balance: The Athenian Lovers

As I discussed in a previous post, Shakespearean comedies most often revolve around a conflict that needs to be resolved, usually manifest in some sort of disorder needing to come to order. A Midsummer Night's Dream is no exception, with several examples of this disorder being displayed in the different characters. One of these is the story of the Athenian lovers.

The Production

In retrospect, I should have done this differently.

My intention for my analysis of A Midsummer Night's Dream was to complete it and post it all in one big post. I think that was a bad idea for two reasons: 1) it was a little too much to chew, and think that it would be all ready to go by last Friday, and 2) it would have, in some ways, defeated the usefulness of the blog format. I have been working to illustrate some of my ideas with the play, but it has been more time consuming than I had expected and I have had some frustration with the effectiveness of my approach (I will discuss this later). On top of that, I now think that using the blogging platform to my advantage would have been the best way to go. Blogs are iterative—they allow you to write and formulate ideas and analyses, then update and change them as you work. We were told to blog our process, but I guess I didn't fully understand what that meant or how to do it. I think I do now.

In somewhat of a penitent attitude, I have decided to complete my assignment in iterations. The vast majority of these will be completed and posted today, with some other additions coming throughout the week as follow-ups to today's posts. By doing things this way, I hope to take better advantage of my blog and use it as a way to develop my thoughts rather than simply present them. I hope, too, that I can make better use of feedback and comments to further develop my ideas. Thus, three days late, so begins my analysis.

An Update

I continue to work on my analysis. I realize that it is now Saturday, but I hope that my finished work will be worth the wait!

A Picture of the Picture

Today is Friday, 21 October, 2011. Today, my more full analysis of A Midsummer Night's Dream is due to be posted. I am working on it. While I do, I want to share a resource that I have found that fits in nicely with my analytical approach to the play.

The Tempest

tem-pest |ˈtempist|

nouna violent windy storm.
That is how my Mac defines "tempest." A violent, windy storm. Today, I am beginning to read Shakespeare's play by the same name, The Tempest.

A Midsummer Night's Dream

The night has ended and the dream is over.

This week I finished reading A Midsummer Night's Dream. It was great—it really was. I thoroughly enjoyed my reading of the play and read it faster than I have any Shakespeare work before (unless you count his sonnets, but that wouldn't be very fair). These are some of my initial thoughts on it.

Dear Hamlet: Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Sweet Smoke of Rhetoric!

I just finished reading Act III of Love's Labour's Lost. The use of wordplay in this particular play is excessive and takes a central role in the play itself. Often, the characters spend more time bantering and discussing their use of language than they do actually living life itself or moving the plot forward. But, this in and of itself becomes an important part of the story. I found particularly interesting in this act Shakespeare's use of language to contrast the fool of Armado and the passion of Biron.

The Abstraction of a Dream

Dreams are strange things. They are often inexplicable, random, and unexpected. On top of that, they are rather uncontrollable. Interestingly enough, I believe that this same description could be applied to love. This seems to be a theme in the play that I have been assigned to read and study in my Shakespeare class, A Midsummer Night's Dream.

The Heart versus the Head

I am beginning to read Love's Labour's Lost by William Shakespeare. I have never read this play and, though I have heard the title, know little about it. In preparation for my reading, I have read a synopsis of the play and its general storyline. These are my thoughts in anticipation of the play.

The Missing Post

Well, it has come to my attention that I completely forgot to post on Friday. Whoops. The reason is simply that I had a paper due on Friday that I focused my attention on and thus pushed the need to write a post out of my mind. I will have to do better in the future. But this is a blog about Shakespeare. So what can I learn about Shakespeare from this experience?