Weeding the Garden

Shakespeare: The name I cringe at because we all know reading anything from this time period is not exactly easy. I mean I don't exactly remember much of Romeo and Juliet other than watching the old version and the Leonardo DiCaprio one. I vaguely remember reading a few lines, and stopping to translate it to modern English, and then starting again. But as we've gone on reading and gotten farther into Hamlet and I'm having a much easier time understanding what is going on. It's like Spanish class. You just have to try to flip the switch to change what you think like normally. But also watching it and reading it at the same time has helped a lot too. I can hear how each of the characters sounds which helps me to understand the tone a heck of a lot better.

Skipping over the ghost and Claudius address to the Royal court, I want to talk about Hamlet. First of all, I feel terrible for Hamlet. Absolutely terrible. I mean it can't get much worse than your uncle becoming your dad and taking over the throne. He just sounds completely heartbroken. He says, "'tis an unweeded garden/ that grows to seed: things rank and gross in nature" (135-136). He is seeing nothing but death and evil overgrowing in what used to be a beautiful garden. When I think of  garden, I think of my grandmother's garden that is always full of the most beautiful flowers in the spring and butterflies are all around. But I also think of my grandfather's vegetable garden that's just a skip and a jump down from my grandmother's. His garden always is growing something. Whether it be tomatoes, or eggplant, or raspberries which just happen to be my favorite. It's always providing. If we go off of the providing idea, while the King was alive, he was the garden that supplied his kingdom with goodness and nutrients. He was the reason they were able to live so happily and enjoy the butterflies. But now that Claudius has come into the picture, he has taken over that garden that was once able to provide for everyone and all it is now is dead. The evilness has not been taken away from the garden. But who tends the garden?? Is it Gertrude?? Hamlet's mother that has betrayed her late husband and married his brother? Why yes it must be! Behind every happy man is a happy wife! As some say: "Happy wife, happy life!" And this might just be me, but I feel the woman secretly has control over her husband most of the time. Flashback: Nora controlled Torvald with ease. She was manipulative by the way she danced for him or put on shows. She tempted him. Gertrude can be the same way! Hamlet remembers that Gertrude would "hang on him/ As is increase of appetite had grown" (143-144). Gertrude was probably the mastermind behind the thrown. And while we are comparing the two, if Nora had others that she flirted with, Gertrude probably did as well. Claudius perhaps. It's all one big loop between the garden and who tends the garden. But if this little tangent is right, what will become of the kingdom? Will Hamlet take over Gertrude's role of tending the garden since she can't see what has grown right under her nose? Or will he let it collapse as he still mourns the death of his godly father? 

Bilbo Bagginses

Ok, I admit it. I'm a Hobbitee. Not a Whoovian, a Hobbitee. Yes, I know--kind of strange. But I cannot get enough of The Hobbit. Bilbo just cracks me up. And so do all of the dwarves. But what I've never really thought about until recently is their journey--a hero's journey. But what else could it be, I mean c'mon, most journeys can be argued to be hero's journeys. But see The Hobbit is a peculiar case. Can it be divided into three different journeys with the movie or is it just one? Ok, this is where I have a big confession. It's pretty bad too. I haven't even read The Hobbit yet. I'm breaking one of my own rules!!! I am usually very good about reading the book before I see the movie but this time I was dragged into seeing the movie. So I didn't really have much time to prepare. So for now, I am just going to analyze The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. Then I won't spoil it for anyone who hasn't seen the second one (if you haven't, go see it now. it's amazing).

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. Digital image. IMDb. N.p., 11 Dec. 2012. Web. 19 Jan. 2014.

Alright. So, at the beginning, Bilbo meets Gandalf-the wizard- and then dwarves start to show up at Bilbo's cute little Hobbit-hole. While they are there, Bilbo learns of their problem--they need to reclaim their mountain. There we go. The first step already done--he know's their problem. Secondly, he learns why it's an issue. The dwarves don't have a home and they want their gold back because dwarves are greedy and who wouldn't want their gold back?! Third: When Bilbo is asked to go as the "burglar," he reads the contract and is terrified after he realizes he could be burnt to death he passes out right then and there. When he comes to, he backs out of the entire journey because he is scared. But then, he overcomes the fear of leaving his home and going on an adventure and runs after the dwarves. In this he completes step five as well, he cannot go back and commits to the new life he has agreed to. And then of course, with the new life, he has to play around to find where he should be. When he is out in the mountains, he has to get some horses back from some trolls. Because he is nimble, he is able to sneak around the trolls as they prepare for their meal. The old Bilbo would never have done this. Heck, he would have never been in this situation! In the process, the dwarves have to come rescue him and in the end, it's Bilbo that saves them from the trolls. Actually, that can be argued. According to Gandalf, Bilbo saved them, but according to others, Gandalf is the one who split the rock so the trolls would turn to stone. Either way, Bilbo was smart enough to stall. With the trolls out of their way, they move onto where the trolls would have been looking for whatever can be useful. This is one of Bilbo's biggest changes because now he gets a sword. Sweet, little Bilbo that once needed a handkerchief now has a sword. Sounds like a major change, yes? A lot of this stuff can be arguable so I'm going to skip a lot of the good stuff because I don't think it's really necessary. Step Eight: They are captured by trolls!! However the trolls do not see Bilbo. Well one does, and then they tumble into the depths of the cave and we meet Gollum!!! Sorry, I love him and his riddles. I quote him with my step-brother allllll the time. It's precious. ;) And Sméagol of course. How can you not like him.  In the game with Gollum/Sméagol, Bilbo almost dies. However, the reason he lives is because he finds the ring (BUM BUM BUMMMM). He's not really sure what to do with it at first. When he realizes he cannot be seen while he is wearing it, he uses it to his advantage and follows the dwarves and Gandalf out of the cave. One of the dwarves makes a comment about Bilbo going home and Bilbo takes the ring off so he is seen again and says that he is staying. Right after, the Orcs come. So right after Bilbo reestablishes that he wants to say he regrets his decision because he is pretty sure that he is going to die. In the battle with the Orcs, the dwarf who is in charge tries to kill the mighty Orc. In doing so he gets himself knocked out and almost beheaded. Bilbo, being the new Bilbo, goes and defends the head dwarf, completing step eleven--the last minute troubles. He again is able to stall enough for Gandalf to call for help. Now, Bilbo has completed his last step. Or what I'm going to call his last step for now. He has mastered stalling! And fighting with a sword and basically just being the complete opposite of what he was before step one. Bilbo has finished part 1 of three and has more to overcome and more to stall for. Soooo now to see what else he does, you need to go see The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug. Because it's just as amazing. If not better. 

Lips and Eyes

Lips and Eyes
By Thomas Carew

In Celia's face a question did arise,
Which were more beautiful, her lips or eyes?
"We," said the eyes, "send forth those pointed darts
Which pierce the hardest adamantine hearts."
"From us," repli'd the lips, "proceed those blisses
Which lovers reap by the kind words and sweet kisses."
Then wept the eyes, and from their springs did pour
Of liquid oriental pearl a shower:
Whereat the lips, moved with delight and pleasure,
Through a sweet smile unlock'd their pearly treasure
And bad Love judge, whether did add more grace
Weeping or smiling pearls to Celia's face.

Today in class it was suggested that we research a poet from around Shakespeare's time to prepare us for Hamlet. In doing this, I came across Thomas Carew, who was born in 1595 and lived until 1640. He died really young compared to what we see people live to today. However, he grew up around England and became a secretary to Sir Dudley Carleton and became a part of an embassy.
So when I read the first line, I am curious. Who is Celia? Is it Sir Dudley Carleton's wife that Carew made comments about? He clearly cannot decide whether he likes her eyes or her lips more. They seem to satisfy him in different ways. When Carew personifies Celia's eyes, they are fighting a battle. They want to be considered more beautiful than her lips. Same goes for the lips-they want to end up on top. Carew seems to be seduced by both. The eyes break through hearts that are expected to be impenetrable hearts no matter who is it. The fact that Carew compares them to darts makes me think that they can be thrown at anything and anyone and still make a mark. However, when I think of eyes getting called "darts" I think of that look I used to get from my parents when I was serving at church, sitting up front and talking and then I would look over and see my mom in the pew and she just had this look and her eyes were daggers. There is no way a child has never gotten that from his or her mother. I still get it all the time! Mainly when I'm talking at church still but that's not the point. It just seems more negative than positive to me.I guess that also goes back to breaking through any heart. Or the looks Celia gives are just so capturing that the speaker cannot break away from her.The lips on the other hand, excite Carew. Carew apparently had many troubles with certain sexual remarks and mistresses. Going along with that, the talk of lips is very sexual. After the lips give their statement, the eyes cry! They full on cry! They cry because they feel that they have lost the argument. The eyes know that even though they can break through any heart, that the lips ultimately bring the love. And the lips seem to think they have won as well! They dance and frolic over Celia's face. However, the speaker seems to still be having trouble when he/she says "whether did add more grace/ weeping or smiling pearls to Celia's face."  It seems that even when Celia is upset, her eyes are still beautiful and when she smiles it's as if she is full of treasure--pearls. But what can this mean! The only thing I can think of is that it's going to be a continuing battle for the lips and eyes.


Jokinen, Anniina. "Life of Thomas Carew." Luminarium.
        23 March 1997. 8 January 2014.
        <http://www.luminarium.org/sevenlit/carew/carewbio.htm> 

1 Down, 1 to Go

I cannot believe this semester is over already!! And look how far everyone has come!! From Frankenstein to A Doll's House, we have covered how society affects someone, gender differences, and how external forces can affect the internal conflict. My favorites from this semester are Frankenstein, Grendel, and A Doll's House. Very different yet they all seem to have a similar idea of society affecting the internal conflict. In Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, the creature is rejected from society because of his appearance. Through his rejection he is feeling anger and wants to be loved. However, he at first is not a mean and nasty being--he's curious about people. The external forces that caused him pain made him the killing machine that he is in the end. In Grendel by John Gardner, Grendel starts off the same way as the creature--wanting to be loved and curious. But as soon as Hrothgar throws the ax, he knows that the world he was expecting does not exist. After the humans assume he is an awful thing, he again like the creature, turns into an awful being that the external forces influenced. Lastly, A Doll's House by Henrik Ibsen, it's the same idea but in the end there is no murderer. Nora is influenced by society in being that she does what her husband says and that because she is a woman she cannot do anything business like. It's hogwash. But it's how society was. The way she acts is because of the external forces such as Torvald and her dad teacher her to be the puppet while they tell her what to do. It's what we call "learned helplessness" in AP Psych. But she reverses the conditioning by breaking the cycle and leaving Torvald in the end. All three characters in the end are alone. The external factors of society have made them realize that they are not who they officially would be. Creature realizes that no one will ever love him and is alone, Grendel finds out he can be defeated which crushed his spirit BUT HE DOES NOT DIE, and Nora realizes she does not have to be the housewife that cannot do anything related to business. They all are in a way enlightened in the end--another topic that has come up over and over this semester. My favorite thing to relate our books to is Plato's Allegory with the prisoners. One prisoner makes his way out into the world and comes back and tries to tell the others what has happened. It's kind of amazing how the authors seem to have a hidden language that can they can all communicate to each other with. Maybe that's a weird way of looking at it and it's really just a format that is just really common. But I'm going to pretend I'm one of the prisoners still stuck in the cave in my own fantasy believing that all of the authors have their own language.

A Doll's House

A lot was going through my mind after I read A Doll's House by Henrik Ibsen.  I wasn't really sure what to expect when we did out class discussion of what a "doll house" could mean. I didn't know if I should expect a child playing with dolls or if the dolls came to life--I never expected a real house being like a doll house with a puppet master. Never ever. First, I pitied Nora because I thought she was in a rough relationship because she had to hide her "macaroons." Technically, we could say she is in a tough relationship because she can't be fully open with Torvald. LIGHTBULB! The macaroons that she has to hide parallels to Nora and Torvald's relationship!! The macaroons have to be kept secret just like how Nora committed forgery and borrowed money without Torvald's consent is a secret!! Wow. How did I not catch that earlier?? Okay getting off the tangent--second, I had trouble deciding whether or not I like Torvald or not. I feel bad for him because Nora did keep this HUGE secret from him that could have ruined him and his career. However, I totally disliked him after he threw himself a little pitty party because he thought his life was over. No. Think about your wife. Think about what she sacrificed to save YOU you selfish-little-stinker. In the end, I sided with Nora--hmmm I wonder if it has to do with gender.... When we read the second ending Ibsen wrote, I hated it. It completely defeated the entire purpose of the entire play!! Nora is not supposed to give into staying with Torvald to fulfill her motherly and wifely duties. No, she is supposed to go and take care of herself! Ibsen didn't write A Doll's House to talk about how women can be manipulative, and lie, and deceitful and then have them exposed and then they come right back to where they started to fulfill the motherly role. No. That is not at ALL what he was trying to say. When Nora leaves, it's because she has discovered her own independence that she never thought she had. As she grew up, either her father or Torvald always had to take care of her or shoulder the burden for anything. Now she has learned that she can handle things. She does not need a man to always take care of her. On a completely different note, what would have happened if Krogstad had gotten the letter back and Torvald never got to read it? Would Nora claim to be happy still? Or would she realize that she might not have ever been happy and tell Torvald herself to break the chains?? There is an endless amount of possibilities for their situation.

I Carry Your Heart With Me

I Carry Your Heart with Me
E.E Cummings

I carry your heart with me( I carry it
in my heart) I am never without it (anywhere
I go, my dear; and whatever is done by only
me is your doing, my darling) I fear
no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet)
I want no world(for beautiful you are my world,
my true) and it's you are whatever a moon has
always meant and whatever a sun will always sing is you
here is the deepest secret nobody knows ( here is
the root of the root and the bud of the bud and
the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide) and
this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart
i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)


I don't even know where to start for this. I'm having trouble really figuring out how it's supposed to sound because it doesn't rhyme! I've always had the hardest time reading poems that don't rhyme! How do you figure out the rhythm?? Is it supposed to be echoey? Is it supposed to be a song? Is it supposed to sound like a conversation between two lovers? It can really go anyway. However, I am reading it as a conversation between two lovers. Two departing lovers I guess I should say. After doing research on E.E. Cummings, I found that he lived in two places--meaning he must have had someone he loved in one place and he would have to leave her to go back to the opposite place. Through his departure to his other home or whatever you want to call it, Cummings would have a hard time leaving her. Therefore, he wrote this poem to show his hardship of going back and leaving her each time. He starts off "I carry your heart with me" as if he's saying that he's taking her love with him. He's not going to forget about her while he's gone--aka he's not going to have a girlfriend in one place, and then a different one in the other. And then he says "I carry it in my heart." Everyone knows that a heart symbolizes love, so by saying that he is carrying hers in his shows how he will be faithful to her and he will not forget about her. I think my favorite line is when he says "I fear no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet)." Does that not make you happy?? He's not scared of anything because he knows no matter what, he will be back for her to love her and be with her for the rest of their lives. And then he tells her, "you are whatever a moon has always meant." The moon is a mysterious being, people always see it and it's glowing beauty, but what exactly does the moon mean? We see it commonly in love scenes or in mysterious scenes when it adds another beauty. The moon give off a softened light. It lights up the dark showing people what they haven't been able to see. This means that the moon and the woman are the same to the speaker. The speaker has no light without his love in the dark, he has no love, and he has to mystery. And lastly the speaker ultimately says his love is better than life itself by comparing her to, "tree called life; which grows higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide." She's better than life itself. She means more to him than life. If she wasn't in his heart as he went from place to place lighting the way, he would have no reason to live.

Blake and Grendel

When I was reading Grendel, I over looked the short poem at the beginning of the book. Whoops :) But I am actually glad I did. If I had read it in the beginning, I do not think I would have appreciated it and have understood it as much. But it makes me wonder, did Gardner really put it there so that I would not understand it? Did he want me to go back in the end and reread it?? I guess I will never ever know. Now, I'm reading the poem again, and I'm thinking about how weird and disturbing it truly is. "Nails him down upon a rock" and "catches his shrieks in cups of gold?" What?? That doesn't exactly make you want to read it over and over and figure out the true meaning and why Gardner used it, does it? I think Gardner used this poem for that exact twisted reason. It is supposed to be hard to read. It is supposed to twist your mind in ways it does not want to think. I mean that is what Grendel had to do. He had to think about everything in an entirely new way, twice even! Between the shaper and the dragon, Grendel had whiplash!! But that's another blog for another day.....maybe. Ok let's think. Gardner uses this poem because....well...I guess he's trying to say that when the baby is born, he will be given to an old woman who knows everything because of her age, and his shrieks of innocence will be caught in the gold cups?? But why gold cups?? When I think of gold cups, I think of kings and queens having a feast with their beautiful plates and silverware and cups. To continue the thought process, I think of Hrothgar and Beowulf. They were considered royalty, right? So if we make Grendel the baby--because he's brand new into the society of men--then it makes sense! Gardner uses the poem to basically summarize Grendel's beginning at life! Grendel does not know anything! When he was hanging in the tree he had no idea what was going to happen to him. But as soon as that axe was thrown at him, he's "shrieks" stopped, and he is no longer not aware of the humans and their capabilities. His innocence can no longer be served to the kings and queens to feast on. They can no longer rest and dine in peace. They now have no innocence to drink, if you will, and their gold cups are empty. The woman no longer has anything to catch, because the baby isn't shrieking anymore. The baby aka Grendel knows. He knows what's going to happen. He knows that without him, the people will still continue to thrive. He knows that the only way to stay alive and experienced, is to attack them. Feast over.