Looking Back

So looking back (and with a quick e-mail from my professor), I noticed that I had never posted the link to the fellow blog mentioned in a previous post. As a quick reminder, this blog was created as a connection between fellow book club members. This way they have something to record their thoughts and have an online list of the readings for the different months. The way I stumbled upon them was through their recent read of Macbeth and Genevieve's blog post about it. Here's the link for any who are interested on connecting with "Mothers Who Know"

Enjoy, and happy reading!

Final thoughts...

   Engaging Shakespeare ... If you missed it, I'd be rather confident in saying you missed out. It was a great event. I was a little disappointed by the fact that there wasn't much room for the art displays, but I believe that we were at least able to put together a nice display. A lot of people were crowding around and having a hard time seeing it all, but I think that they were able to at least enjoy it. My part of the art was mainly focused on my act by act sketches with my lesson plan theme picture located next to the lesson plan.
   I was quite pleased and somewhat surprised by how much I talked at the event. Not only with others, but about my blog and about my interpretation of a particular art piece. I was glad that people seemed interested to know more about the symbols that I had drawn about and the motivation behind it.

I believe that this project has enabled me to study Hamlet even further and to see some of the different themes as well as some of the different interpretations of each theme. For instance, Mason's theme of death in his lesson plan was very bleak and pessimistic, whereas I took it to be a simple pondering on whether or not death was really all that bad. It was also neat being able to see Averill's performance with three Shakespearean couples and the themes that those characters portrayed. This really helped me to see how Shakespeare was showing examples of problems that everyone can relate to.

   For my final Hamlet piece, I wasn't able to set it up due to a lack of room, but I wanted to portray a symbolic representation of how the further you study Shakespeare, the more you see and the more questions you ask. You begin to see the small complexities that he brings to his characters that makes you wonder how it applies to your life and how you relate to characters such as Ophelia, King Lear, and Miranda. I tried to represent the even greater threads of knowledge that come through the study and further look into Shakespeare.

 

   I hope I have been able to portray all of my learning through this blog and who knows, I may just keep posting. Sometimes its crazy where you find connections to Shakespeare! It has been a great semester and I will never look at Shakespeare the same again. He was truly an amazing writer who was able to capture the essence of human life and character into his plays. There is a reason why his name lives on.

Signing out for now...