Midstream

Here we are, halfway done with the semester, which means it's time to look back on a half-semester with Shakespeare.

A. Learning Outcomes

1. How have I gained Shakespeare literacy?

Each scene I read of Shakespeare is a little easier to understand. More and more I can just read the original text, and for the times that I am lost I have found that Shmoop's summaries work well as a modern translation. And often if I read how Shmoop says it and then read how Shakespeare said it, everything clicks and becomes clear to me.

2. How have I analyzed Shakespeare critically?

I think most of my analysis has come from either class discussion or the live performances. I don't know if most of what I do on this blog counts as analysis. I talk about themes and morals that Shakespeare presents, but I probably don't really analyze his writing. But I do participate in class, and I come up with lots of ideas for analyzing the live plays and their connections to the text.

After The Winter's Tale
After The Tempest

3. How have I engaged Shakespeare creatively?

I think through this blog I have found ways to to connect Shakespeare with more commonplace yet still meaningful ideas. (I think this has helped a little with the Shakespeare literacy as well.) I find ways to have fun with Shakespeare rather than just read or watch it. I have an objective in mind, and it helps me have some fun with the play and also pay more attention to what I'm reading.

Here are some examples:

Live blogging Julius Caesar
Looking for word play in Love's Labour's Lost

4. How have I shared Shakespeare meaningfully?

I think this blog has been my main vehicle for sharing my learning process. I don't just blog for blogging's sake, but I imagine an actual audience I'm communicating with whenever I am writing. For the most part, it seems that audience has only been Professor Burton and my classmates. But my wife reads it, or at least claims to (Hi, Babe! :) ) And occasionally when I am either especially proud of a blog post or I think my friends outside of ENGL 232 would be interested, I share a link on Facebook or Twitter.

Here are some that I've tweeted or posted on Facebook:

El Guillermo Shakespeare
'They seemed unto him but a few days'
George Washington the Zombie Killer

B. Self-directed learning

1. What have I done that demonstrates I have taken charge of my own learning about Shakespeare?

Everything about this blog is me taking charge of Shakespeare. This blog is very much a stream-of-consciousness outlet, where I get to write about what Shakespeare makes me think of and what interests me. I think browsing this blog might be a way to show how my brain works, or at least how my brain handles literature.

A few such personalized posts:

I'm All Ears
Clownin' Around

2. How am I doing at planning my learning, documenting my learning, scheduling and carrying out learning activities, and measuring my learning?

The blogging schedule has really helped me. Although I've been late a couple of times, knowing that I need to have a new blog post every Monday and Wednesday has helped me maintain my semester with Shakespeare. It also helps me to document the whole learning process, instead of just blogging after I finish a play.

I admit that for a lot of my blogging for Julius Caesar, my individual play, I did things last minute. I know I would have gotten more out of it, especially the global sharing assignment, if I had started earlier.

C. Collaborative and Social Learning

1. Which students have aided me the most in my own learning (through help inside or outside of class, through their comments on my blog, or through their blogging, etc.)?

My blogging group has been great. Kelsie, Christa, Lauren, Matt and Anthony have all added so much to my knowledge and appreciation for Shakespeare. We've all gotten the hang of this blogging thing and I think all of us have come up with some awesome stuff. Kelsie provides more of the deep insights, Christa more of the entertaining yet meaningful rants, Lauren the fun, "whaddaya know" posts, Anthony with a sincere desire to understand this area that he admits he is unfamiliar with and Matt has been really good at learning from and responding to all of us. We're a great team. We should be made into a sitcom.

I also enjoyed reading Julius Caesar with Averill. She and I had very different approaches to reading the play, but we were interested enough in each other's interpretations to have some good back-and-forth between our blogs, and in real life too. It was fun having her in the carpool on our way to see The Tempest on Saturday.

Speaking of which, my other carpoolmates for both field trips have been great for bouncing around ideas and thinking of any and every observation we made of the plays. Averill, Chris and Meg contributed especially to the car ride discussion.

2. How is working within the assigned learning groups working? How could this be improved?

I think it works really well, especially compared to the usual working with groups in a classroom. I think in most of my BYU experience, students like to do things on their own and despise group projects. Maybe because we all at least care enough about Shakespeare to take a class, or because literature is just fun and easy to talk about, or because of the added blogging element - I don't know, but for some reason we actually look forward to talking to each other in class.

The one thing that would add more to the discussion would be to have some sort of documentation. We have some really great discussions, but it seems like it all vanishes when class is over, unless one of us happens to remember it for a blog post. I don't think I would want to appoint a secretary to take minutes, but maybe there would be some way to preserve our great ideas.

3. How am I involving others (outside of my group or even our class) in my learning? Or, how am I applying my learning about Shakespeare in social settings beyond class?

This is one area that I am definitely subpar in. Other than the occasional Facebook post or conversation with my wife about my day at school, I haven't shared my Shakespeare experience very much outside of class. And I fulfilled the global sharing requirement, but without spending much time on it and without doing anything special, really. I still haven't seen much response from those efforts, but those efforts weren't very impressive to begin with.

D. Looking Ahead

1. State what your plans are for meeting learning outcomes or personal learning plans that are incomplete. This can include discussion of the final project.

For the future, I want to do better to start assignments earlier so that I can spend more time with them, instead of waiting until just before the deadline and then checking it off my list. Other than that, this class is going well and I am getting more out of it than probably any other class I've ever had.

As for the final project, back when I imagined each of us doing a project according to our personal interests, I was thinking of something that would combine Shakespeare with politics (hence the name of this blog). I thought of looking for instances in which U.S. presidents have quoted Shakespeare in a political speech, or thinking of politicians who would make up cast for some Shakespeare play ...

... Like this infographic from Newsweek that pitted Star Wars/the Bush administration against Star Trek/the Obama administration.

But now that the final projects seem to be more collective, I'm not so sure. All the ideas brought up in class sounded good to me. It would be fun to join Averill's project, and it would also be fun to do more stuff online. I'm pretty much open to anything.

Tempestuous

On Saturday our class went on a second field trip, this time to see The Tempest by the Pioneer Theater Company.

I had a lot of thoughts and reactions to the play, but they're not very cohesive. So I'll just write some down and see how it goes.

The set was very impressive. In a way, it was simple, in that it was plain, wooden platforms. But, the platforms went three stories. And, in what I thought was a great addition to Shakespeare's play, the play began with Prospero and Ariel adding more to the set, as if they were in the workshop getting ready to make a big storm. With theater magic, Prospero lowered lanterns and a windmill, and a few other whimsical contraptions.

Did anyone notice Miranda's "tomboy" tendencies? I noticed at one point in the play she wasn't, as my dad would tell my sisters when they were younger, "sitting like a lady." And there was also the time when she playfully slugged Ferdinand. And, of course, it makes sense that she would act like a tomboy! She's spent the last 12 years as the only human female on the island. I thought that was a nice idea for playing the part of Miranda.

Another thing about Miranda I noticed was that the very first time Caliban showed up in a scene, Miranda began to gather up her skirts, as if she was preparing to make a run for it. Did anyone else notice that? I thought that was another cool idea, that she would just bring her guard up whenever Caliban was around, almost as if by instinct.

Our carpool group stayed after the play for the Q&A session with the actors. And we noticed how similar Prospero and Ariel were to the actors who played them. We could tell that Julia Motyka, who played Ariel, had a background in dance before she said it out loud. Because not only did she move her hands a lot while she talked, but her hands flowed. She said she got married not too long ago, and on her honeymoon in Africa she noticed the way that birds moved, and that became her inspiration for how Ariel would move. And Craig Wroe, who played Prospero, seemed sort of unapproachable in the way that he talked and answered questions, maybe a little arrogant. I know Chris in particular had a question to ask, but decided against it.

I noticed in the program a message from the art director, talking about why he loved The Tempest and what it meant to him. He also mentioned that this was his last play, so I wanted to ask him about the link between Shakespeare using this play as a farewell and himself bidding adieu with this play. But, unfortunately, he wasn't there for the Q&A.

I also would have liked to ask Paul Kiernan, who played Caliban, where he got his inspiration. If Ariel was based on birds, what animals was Caliban based on? But he didn't come out on stage for the Q&A either. Probably because of all the make up he had to take off. (To me, he looked like Shrek with dreadlocks.)

Well, those are a few observations to start out with. I look forward to reading the other blogs in my class* and learning what they thought of the play.

*Look at the links on the right side of the page.

On the Intrawebs, Part #2

When I used Ice Rocket to search for tweets about Julius Caesar, I found some breaking news.

Eddie George, the Tennessee Titans running back who retired in 2004, will be playing Julius Caesar in an upcoming performance in Nashville.

Here's the story: Eddie George to Play Julius Caesar in Nashville Shakespeare Festival Production

That got me to thinking: what other athletes would make up an all-star athlete cast?







I immediately tweeted this:

What other ideas do you have for athletes in Julius Caesar?

On the Intrawebs, Part #1

To fulfill the "sharing globally" requirement, I didn't have much rhyme or reason in the online interactions I had, but I found some interesting stuff.

With Ice Rocket, I found a blog by a woman by the name of Roberta Rood. All I could find out about her was that she used to work in a library, and she loves reading and England. But she wrote a review for a biography on, of all people, James Garfield. In case you don't know - and I wouldn't blame you if you didn't - he was the 20th president of the United States, in the year 1881. A brief look at his Wikipedia page brings up some interesting things: he cleaned up corruption in the postal system, and he appointed African Americans to some high posts in governments.

He is also one of the few presidents who was actually assassinated. He was killed by Charles Giteau, a former government employee who was under the delusion that President Garfield had denied him a post in the U.S. embassy in Paris.

Roberta Rood was especially impressed with President Garfield's reluctance to be president. He once said, "This honor comes to me unsought. I have never had the Presidential fever; not even for a day." And yet, he answered the call to serve and ultimately died for it. Rood ended her review of President Garfield's biography with these lines from Julius Caesar:

"His life was gentle; and the elements

So mix’d in him that Nature might stand up

And say to all the world, This was a man!"

I didn't know all this about James Garfield before. But it reminded me of how I compared Brutus to George Washington. So, I asked her how Garfield and Washington compared to each other. (I'm still waiting for a response.)

El Guillermo Shakespeare

For my "local sharing" requirement, I talked about Julius Caesar with my sister-in-law, Nadia. She is from Lima, Peru, so every once in a while I practice my quickly fading Spanish with her. I thought for this assignment, I'd try something different by trying to discuss Shakespeare, the greatest writer in the English language, in Spanish.

Me, Nadia and my little brother Evan. (Nadia married my other brother, Trent.)

I wondered if students in Peru learned about Shakespeare, or if he was only considered essential to English-speaking schools. Nadia told me that Shakespeare was introduced as the vehicle for teaching plays as one form of language arts. They read Romeo and Juliet, and learned the facts of Shakespeare's life, like when he lived and died.

Then she came to BYU and majored in English. She wanted to avoid taking a Shakespeare class, but a professor convinced her to take it. And she said she really enjoyed it. She read Hamlet, The Tempest and Othello. And she said she really liked Othello.

So then I told Nadia the basic outline of Julius Caesar. Here's a translation of how I summed it up: "Caesar is gaining a lot of power. And one of his enemies, Cassius, wanted to kill him, and he convinced his friend Brutus to kill him. Brutus really thought he was doing the right thing, because by killing Caesar he was protecting Rome. But Cassius really just wanted power. Another friend of Caesar's, Mark Antony, fought on Caesar's side against Brutus and Cassius in a civil war. But Mark Antony just wanted power too. So Brutus was the only one not interested in power, and yet he was the one who killed Caesar."

It was while I gave her that simple plotline that I realized the irony of Brutus killing Caesar.

Something else I brought up with Nadia was that Julius Caesar is known for being a simple play, without anything about sex, which is why it's often read in high schools. And because it's so simple, it might be an easy one for her to try on her own. Not that she needs remedial English - she not only majored in English, she plans on being a novelist.

Maybe she'll be the next William Guillermo Guillermina Shakespeare, who knows?

Figment of Imagination

Did anyone feel like The Tempest ended too quickly?

I think I would have liked to actually see Ferdinand and Miranda get married, or Ariel be freed, or the comeuppance of Caliban, Stephano and Trinculo, or Prospero reinstated as Duke of Milan. But Shakespeare leaves the play open-ended.

Of course, I thought of Act V, Scene II of The Winters Tale, when Shakespeare portrays the cathartic family reunion with a conversation among witnesses, instead of the actual reunion. When I blogged about it, I thought maybe the purpose was to show off Shakespeare's descriptive writing skills, and let the audience imagine what that reunion must have been like.

Is that what Shakespeare is doing here with The Tempest? I think so, but there might be another element to it. I think it plays into the mystique and fantasy of Prospero's island. The whole play takes place on the island, and magic and supernatural powers are in every scene. It makes the whole play seem like a dream sequence.

What if it's all a dream, and Prospero wakes up and he's still on the island and still not the Duke of Milan?

'They seemed unto him but a few days'

What do you guys think of Ferdinand doing all this work for Miranda?

True, a couple who instantly falls in love with each other and pledges to marry one another is a little ridiculous in reality. Sure, dating before engagement is famously brief at BYU. But I think most couples at least know each other's names before they get engaged. (I could be wrong.)

But setting that aside, is Ferdinand compounding the insanity by doing all this senseless work for the one he loves?

I don't think so.

I've been happily married for over two years. And I don't hesitate to say that I would have stacked a thousand logs or a million logs if that's what it took to marry Erin.

A big question on BYU campus is, "Is he/she the 'one'? How do I know?" It's the most important decision of our lives,* and it can be a hard one. But I think one way to know if he/she is "the one" is by how much you are willing to sacrifice. To have a successful marriage, you have to be able to sacrifice everything.

I was lucky to not have to sacrifice too much in order to marry Erin. But being in love with her did affect many decisions I made. She was one of the reasons I changed my career path and decided not to keep trying to get into the BYU animation program. I probably would have switched to communications anyway, but I would have been more willing to take low-pay, high-hours jobs at little newspapers all over the country to work my way up the career ladder. Now, I want to skip all that and go to law school, which I hope will lead to less transitory work. I also had dreams of doing all kinds of travel, like every college student who wants to backpack through Europe or South America. I was lucky enough to travel to Mexico for my honeymoon with Erin, and go to New York City with her and our daughter for my summer internship. But much more exotic travel than that would be way too impractical and expensive now.

Erin and me at Chichen Itza pyramids in Mexico

Erin and me on top of the Empire State Building

I also gave up R-rated movies. I hadn't really made my mind up about whether I was against watching R-rated movies, but after meeting with Erin I decided not to watch any more from that point on.

Erin was telling me about a conversation she had with some friends who talked about how much time their husbands spent playing video games. In one case, a woman said while she was dating her future husband, if she had told him "You have to stop playing so many video games," it would have been a deal-breaker.

That's just sad to me. I just can't imagine liking video games, or anything, that much that it would prevent me from marrying Erin. Just thinking of the words, "Sorry, but I have to have my video games," and saying them out loud, I would listen to myself and realize how dumb it all sounds.

I know our culture often portrays marriage as a drag, and a wife as a ball and chain brandishing a whip. But really, it's like what Neal A. Maxwell said about the kingdom of God: "If you have not chosen the kingdom of God first, it will in the end make no difference what you have chosen instead." I think the same holds true for marriage. If you don't choose marriage, and to be totally devoted to it, then it won't matter if you chose convenience or idleness instead.


*The relevant quote is in the last paragraph of Gordon B. Hinckley's talk.