Sunday, March 25, 2007
Bonus Discussion 5 - A Comedy of Masks
In J. Dover Wilson's What Happens in Hamlet(1935), Wilson states, "The second act of Hamlet is comedy; a comedy of masks." Comment on this statement.
Discussion 5 - Aspects of Hamlet Act 2
There are 5 choices for this weeks blog, therefore there can only be six students per choice.
Please indicate you choice by reserving it in this week's thread.
Topics:
Please indicate you choice by reserving it in this week's thread.
Topics:
- Show that Hamlet is insane Act 2.
- Show that Hamlet is sane in Act 2.
- Discuss the parallelism of Hamlet, Laertes and Forinbras by the end of Act 2.
- Who has the advantage in the play by the end of Act 2, Hamlet or Claudius?
- Explain the significance of Ophelia by the end of Act 2.
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Discussion 4 - Your thoughts on Act 1 of Hamlet
The foundation of Hamlet is laid in Act 1.
I would like to know what you think is the most interesting aspect of Act 1.
Considerations:
This may be a good time to try some of the rhetorical devices I have given you.
This blog cannot exceed 500 words.
The due date has been extended to Wednesday March 28.
I would like to know what you think is the most interesting aspect of Act 1.
Considerations:
- Language
- Plot
- Dramatic devices
- Characterization
- Anything of considerable importance that you've noticed
This may be a good time to try some of the rhetorical devices I have given you.
This blog cannot exceed 500 words.
The due date has been extended to Wednesday March 28.
Sunday, March 04, 2007
Bonus Discussion 3 - Hunting Findley
Follow the instructions for Discussion 3 (March 2007).
Choose any motif and part number not chosen by anyone yet. You can do as many bonus postings as you want. For example, if you would like to track Animals / Animal Imagery in Part 1 for Discussion 3, you may choose to continue this in Part 2 (This would count as one bonus assignment).
However, you do not have to track the same motif that you tracked in Discussion 3. For example, if you tracked Animal / Animal Imagery in Part 1, you may choose as a bonus to look at Photographs / Paintings / Artwork in Part 4 and Part 5 ( Yes, this would count as 2 bonuses).
You must indicate in the Discussion 3 (March 2007) discussion your intention for the bonus. Do not reserve your bonus topic in this posting. Reserve your bonus topic in Discussion 3 (March 2007).
Post only your finished bonus post in this thread.
This bonus is due on the last Sunday of the March Break. That gives you one standard week, and one extra week before warning letters to complete this bonus assignment.
Choose any motif and part number not chosen by anyone yet. You can do as many bonus postings as you want. For example, if you would like to track Animals / Animal Imagery in Part 1 for Discussion 3, you may choose to continue this in Part 2 (This would count as one bonus assignment).
However, you do not have to track the same motif that you tracked in Discussion 3. For example, if you tracked Animal / Animal Imagery in Part 1, you may choose as a bonus to look at Photographs / Paintings / Artwork in Part 4 and Part 5 ( Yes, this would count as 2 bonuses).
You must indicate in the Discussion 3 (March 2007) discussion your intention for the bonus. Do not reserve your bonus topic in this posting. Reserve your bonus topic in Discussion 3 (March 2007).
Post only your finished bonus post in this thread.
This bonus is due on the last Sunday of the March Break. That gives you one standard week, and one extra week before warning letters to complete this bonus assignment.
Discussion 3 - Hunting Findley
Scholarly writings and criticisms of Findley are sparse. Although The Wars is studied perennially across Canada in high schools everywhere, it becomes challenging for students to acquire critical readings of The Wars. This weeks blog assignment will prepare you for your own criticism of Findley reoccurring motifs.
As you know, your Culminating Activity for ENG4U1 is a comparative essay. As you read the texts for this essay, you have been asked to keep a dialectical journal of each novel. If you have questions about your dialectical journal, please see the Culminating Activity package for a detailed explanation.
To help you in your dialectical journal writing, you will writing annotations for The Wars in this weeks blog assignment.
Using the topic list at the end of this posting, I would like you to compile a list (yes, an actual list, nothing else) of textual examples. Analysis in not required.
An example entry would be:
Part 1 Animals / Animal Imagery "In her lap she holds a large white rabbit."(7)
Notes:
The following short excerpts were taken from easily accessible Internet sources. Please read them before you continue, noting the bold text in each excerpt:
1.
"It came as something of a shock, when gathering these stories for collective publication Dinner Along the Amazon (1984)], to discover that for over thirty years of writing my attention has turned again and again to the same unvarying gamut of sounds and images. They not only turn up here in this present book, but in my novels, too. I wish I hadn't noticed this. In fact, it became an embarrassment and I began to wonder if I should file A CATALOGUE OF PERSONAL OBSESSIONS. The sound of screen doors banging; evening lamplight; music held at a distance -- always being played on a gramaphone; letters written on blue-tinted note paper; robins making forays onto summer lawns to murder worms; photographs in cardboard boxes; Colt revolvers hidden in bureau drawers and a chair that is always falling over. What does it mean? Does it mean that here is a writer who is hopelessly uninventive? Appallingly repetitive? Why are the roads always dusty in the man's work -- why is it always so hot -- why can't it RAIN? And my agent was once heard to moan aloud as she was reading through the pages of a television script I had just delivered: "Oh God, Findley -- not more rabbits!"
Library and Archives Canada (http://www.collectionscanada.ca/3/8/t8-2008-e.html)
2.
The Wars remains his most-discussed book. Based partly on the war-time correspondence of his uncle, Thomas Irving Findley, and on family photos, he wrote the novel in guise of a researcher trying to reconstruct the story of Robert Ross, a soldier of the Great War. The book explores many of the obsessions that colour all his writing: violence, loneliness, a concern for animal rights, and the survival of the individual in a world of madness. Findley believes that a writer has a responsibility to speak out about what is wrong with society.
Library and Archives Canada (http://www.collectionscanada.ca/3/8/t8-2008-e.html)
3.
His writing, typical of the Southern Ontario Gothic genre, was heavily influenced by Jungian psychology, and mental illness, gender and sexuality were frequent recurring themes in his work. His characters often carried dark personal secrets, and were often conflicted — sometimes to the point of psychosis — by these burdens.
Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Findley)
4.
Southern Ontario Gothic is a sub-genre of the Gothic novel genre and a feature of Canadian literature that comes from Southern Ontario.
Writers of this sub-genre include Alice Munro, Timothy Findley, Douglas Cooper, Margaret Atwood, Robertson Davies, Jane Urquhart, Marian Engel, James Reaney, Susan Swan, George Elliott, Graeme Gibson and Barbara Gowdy.
Like the Southern Gothic of American writers such as William Faulkner, Flannery O'Connor and Eudora Welty, Southern Ontario Gothic analyzes and critiques social conditions such as race, gender, religion and politics, but in a Southern Ontario context. Actions and people that act against humanity, logic, and morality all are portrayed unfavorably, and one or more characters may be suffering from some form of mental illness.
Some (but not all) writers of Southern Ontario Gothic use supernatural or magic realist elements; a few deviate from realism entirely, in the manner of the fantastical gothic novel. Virtually all dwell to a certain extent upon the grotesque.
Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Ontario_Gothic)
Topic List
Violence
Loneliness / The Journey to Identity
Jungian Psychology
Social / Political Commentary
Animals / Animal Imagery
Mental Illness / Madness
Gender / Sexuality
Photographs / Paintings / Artwork
Any motif from Findley's 'Catalogue of Personal Obsessions'
Any motif's from the Southern Ontario Gothic Mode
This assignment is due on the last Sunday of the March Break. That gives you one standard week, and one extra week before warning letters to complete this assignment.
As you know, your Culminating Activity for ENG4U1 is a comparative essay. As you read the texts for this essay, you have been asked to keep a dialectical journal of each novel. If you have questions about your dialectical journal, please see the Culminating Activity package for a detailed explanation.
To help you in your dialectical journal writing, you will writing annotations for The Wars in this weeks blog assignment.
Using the topic list at the end of this posting, I would like you to compile a list (yes, an actual list, nothing else) of textual examples. Analysis in not required.
An example entry would be:
Part 1 Animals / Animal Imagery "In her lap she holds a large white rabbit."(7)
Notes:
- State which part of the novel your finding comes from.
- Use the motif as I have listed them in the Topic List at the bottom of this post.
- Use quotation marks to encapsulate the actual quote.
- Use parentheses to indicate the page number.
- Everyone must have a unique motif and part number. That is, Part 1 Violence is different than Part 5 Violence.
- You can reserve you motif and part number as soon as you want. Post it here, in this thread.
- When your assignment is ready, just delete your 'reservation' post, and submit your real one.
The following short excerpts were taken from easily accessible Internet sources. Please read them before you continue, noting the bold text in each excerpt:
1.
"It came as something of a shock, when gathering these stories for collective publication Dinner Along the Amazon (1984)], to discover that for over thirty years of writing my attention has turned again and again to the same unvarying gamut of sounds and images. They not only turn up here in this present book, but in my novels, too. I wish I hadn't noticed this. In fact, it became an embarrassment and I began to wonder if I should file A CATALOGUE OF PERSONAL OBSESSIONS. The sound of screen doors banging; evening lamplight; music held at a distance -- always being played on a gramaphone; letters written on blue-tinted note paper; robins making forays onto summer lawns to murder worms; photographs in cardboard boxes; Colt revolvers hidden in bureau drawers and a chair that is always falling over. What does it mean? Does it mean that here is a writer who is hopelessly uninventive? Appallingly repetitive? Why are the roads always dusty in the man's work -- why is it always so hot -- why can't it RAIN? And my agent was once heard to moan aloud as she was reading through the pages of a television script I had just delivered: "Oh God, Findley -- not more rabbits!"
Library and Archives Canada (http://www.collectionscanada.ca/3/8/t8-2008-e.html)
2.
The Wars remains his most-discussed book. Based partly on the war-time correspondence of his uncle, Thomas Irving Findley, and on family photos, he wrote the novel in guise of a researcher trying to reconstruct the story of Robert Ross, a soldier of the Great War. The book explores many of the obsessions that colour all his writing: violence, loneliness, a concern for animal rights, and the survival of the individual in a world of madness. Findley believes that a writer has a responsibility to speak out about what is wrong with society.
Library and Archives Canada (http://www.collectionscanada.ca/3/8/t8-2008-e.html)
3.
His writing, typical of the Southern Ontario Gothic genre, was heavily influenced by Jungian psychology, and mental illness, gender and sexuality were frequent recurring themes in his work. His characters often carried dark personal secrets, and were often conflicted — sometimes to the point of psychosis — by these burdens.
Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Findley)
4.
Southern Ontario Gothic is a sub-genre of the Gothic novel genre and a feature of Canadian literature that comes from Southern Ontario.
Writers of this sub-genre include Alice Munro, Timothy Findley, Douglas Cooper, Margaret Atwood, Robertson Davies, Jane Urquhart, Marian Engel, James Reaney, Susan Swan, George Elliott, Graeme Gibson and Barbara Gowdy.
Like the Southern Gothic of American writers such as William Faulkner, Flannery O'Connor and Eudora Welty, Southern Ontario Gothic analyzes and critiques social conditions such as race, gender, religion and politics, but in a Southern Ontario context. Actions and people that act against humanity, logic, and morality all are portrayed unfavorably, and one or more characters may be suffering from some form of mental illness.
Some (but not all) writers of Southern Ontario Gothic use supernatural or magic realist elements; a few deviate from realism entirely, in the manner of the fantastical gothic novel. Virtually all dwell to a certain extent upon the grotesque.
Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Ontario_Gothic)
Topic List
Violence
Loneliness / The Journey to Identity
Jungian Psychology
Social / Political Commentary
Animals / Animal Imagery
Mental Illness / Madness
Gender / Sexuality
Photographs / Paintings / Artwork
Any motif from Findley's 'Catalogue of Personal Obsessions'
Any motif's from the Southern Ontario Gothic Mode
This assignment is due on the last Sunday of the March Break. That gives you one standard week, and one extra week before warning letters to complete this assignment.
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