Mightbe the Be-all and the end-all --- here!: Personal Analysis of my Blog

 Macbeth:
If it were done, when 'tis done, then 'twere well
It were done quickly. If th' assassination
Could trammel up the consequence, and catch
With his surcease, success: that but this blow
Might be the be-all and the end-all—here,
But here, upon this bank and shoal of time,
We'd jump the life to come.

Macbeth act 1 scene 7

How appropriate the words of Macbeth are for this blog post. At the MIGHT end all be all of my Shakespeare class this blog is a personal evaluation of my blog and a reflection of my effort and success.  

Style Changes:Figures of Speech

Figures Of Speech

          As shown in in the earlier in the blog under “The Stage is Set” section “Style” it was depicted how Shakespeare uses figures of speech for decoration and amplification for entertainment. Over time Shakespeare gradually learned to use the figures to present the theme, subject, and individual character. He increasingly used his metaphors and images to the needs of the drama itself as opposed to simply just including a simile. (Wright) Prospero in the play The Tempest, is perhaps the best example of this idea in regards to the topic of this blog. Shakespeare uses the figure of Prospero and his magic to present the theme of Renaissance humanism and to say His last good byes.

Style Changes: Blank Verse

- Feminine Line Endings and Non-stopped Blank Verse

                 Perhaps the best way to recognize the evolution of Shakespeare’s style and progression to freer versus is by looking at His use of feminine line endings and non-stopped blank verse in his plays. The term “feminine line endings” is the “addition of an unaccented syllable at the end of a line.” A non-stopped blank verse is a verse that “runs on past the end of the line with non-stop punctuation.”  In the play The Tempest we can easily identify these two principles. As you read the stanza below notice how its one sentence. The long sentence is a perfect example of non-stop blank verse.

Style Changes:Rhythm

Rhythm  
One example is how once Shakespeare mastered traditional blank verse, He began to interrupt and vary its flow. This technique releases the new power and flexibility of the poetry in plays. Shakespeare uses the technique in the play Hamlet to convey the turmoil in Hamlet's mind for the reader. (Wright) In the video below, the reader emphasizes the turmoil in the style. While you watch the video read along with the text below it and watch for what Shakespeare does to very the flow that creates the feeling from adjusting the Rhythm. Also compare the video of the reading and flow of the play Henry IV from Shakespeares early plays.

3. Style Changes: Intro

Style Changes

Shakespeare’s writing style in His early work was heavily influenced by what was popular in His day as was shown in the section “style” under the heading “The Stage Is Set”. In Shakespeare's later work He adapted the traditional styles to His own purposes create more natural poetry, that was enjoyed throughout his career and became part of the bases for his legacy. (Clemons)

Style Similarity's: Blank Verse

 Blank Verse

The next example of Shakespeare using the popular style of writing in His plays is the most obvious. Shakespeare used the poetic form called blank verse. About Three-quarters of all English poetry is done in blank verse (Paul) and Shakespeare's writing was similar in that the majority of it was in blank verse. Blank verse is describe as “verse without rhyme esp. iambic pentameter.” (OED, Blank Verse) The first lines of the first play that Shakespeare wrote begin with it. In the video below from Henry IV part 2 you can hear the unstressed iambic syllable followed by a stressed syllable and the pentameter or five stressed syllable in a ten syllable line. In the video below I strum the strings of my guitar with each syllable.  When I strum down on my guitar that means it is a stressed syllable and I strum up when its unstressed.

Style Similaritys: Elaborate Metaphors; Conceits

Elaborate Metaphors:Conceits
 
Another part of the style that Shakespeare conformed to in his early plays and changed in his later work is the use of elaborate metaphors and conceits. From the video in the section "Retorical Language" we can see the retorical language from the acting. By explicating the King's lines from the play we can see the retorical language as well as the metaphors that match the language. As the first eight lines from the Kings speech are explicated in scene 1 of act three, watch how the figures of speech become too complicated and the excesive detail detracts from the work but could be more entertaining for audiences.

KING

O God, that one might read the book of fate

And see the revolution of the times

Make mountains level, and the continent,

Weary of solid firmness, melt itself

Into the sea, and other times to see

The beachy girdle of the ocean

Too wide for Neptune’s hips;

Style Similarity: Rhetorical Language

Rhetorical Language

The first conventional style Wolfgang lists is: the rhetorical language -written for the actors to declaim rather than speak used in that time. In the video below watch how a conversation erupts into a lengthy speech symbolized by the King (my sister Emily taking a drink) and exciting diction.

From the over dramatic acting, we can see that the characters were having a conversation that was establishing the focus and concern of the characters. The King was showing his compassion for his Kingdom and the Earl of Surrey was showing his love and support for the King, when the King bursts into a interrupting, loud, and formal speech. He uses grandious words such as Revolution, solid firmness, neptune, parels, and ensue that diction matches his title as a King. Just as Wolfgang states in his article "the language does not spring naturally from the needs of the character." The speech might be exciting and more entertaining than the boring form of the conversation but the King seems bipolar and pompous when they randomly start speeches between friends. The speech holds up the important actions of the King and his two Earls to stop the downward slope of Kingdom in the coming scene. A closer look at the diction Shakspeare used in his early plays is found under the section diction.  

3. Style: Intro

Style: Intro
        Shakespeare used the type of writing styles because they were the “conventional style” of His time and thus gave His work more appeal to popular audiences of the stage. While reading the plays Henry IV parts 1-3 you can identify the “conventional” yet well liked style that He used. The article “Shakespeare’s Dramatic Art: Collection of Essays” by Clemen Wolfgang lists the principles of the conventional style of Shakespeare’s time that art the clearest in his early plays such the play Henry IV. Wolfgang states that the conventional style of that time was that:

1. The language is Rhetorical - written to declaim
2. The poetry depends on extended, sometimes elaborate metaphors and conceits
3. Blank Verse

5. Later Subjects

Subject

        Perhaps the Bards personality is most evident from looking at the subject of His later work. In Shakespeare’s play’s there many different subject topics according to the many different depths of His play. Threw the subject of His plays you can see that He included more than ever, self and artistic expression as well as to appeal to popular audiences as was shown in the subject heading “genre” and “diction”.  

One great example of Shakespeare’s self-expression is in the play Hamlet. In Greenblatts book, He draws a very close connection between Shakespeare’s life and feeling and the character Hamlet in His play called Hamlet. In the quote below Greenblatt makes the connection between the name of the play and the name of his deceased son.

Even if the decision to do Hamlet had come

to Shakespeare from strictly commercial considerations, the coincidence

of the names may well have re-opened a deep wound,

a wound that had never properly healed. If the tragedy swelled

up from Shakespeare’s own life—if it can be traced back to the

death of Hamlet—something must have made the playwright tormented sense that something is missing

4. Diction

Diction  
         Shakespeare began and ended His career trying to appeal to the popular audience but towards the end He cared more about the expression of that art. Over the course of eleven years as a play write Shakespeare constantly was learning His audience and what they liked. Naturally the diction in His plays represented what appealed to them as well as His genius twist on conventions. As mentioned beforehand in the section “Genre” under “The Closing Act", in 1610 Shakespeare had a more sophisticated popular audience interested more in the artistic forms of expression of society and Tragicomedy, Pastoral Romance, and Modern English. But it can also be contrasty seen that "Shakespeare never really shook his middle-class roots, He never showed signs of boredom at the small talk, trivial pursuits, and foolish games of ordinary people"(Greenblatt) and including what appealed to both the wealthy and poor in His plays shows that. Previously in this post it was established that Shakespeare did try to appeal to popular conventions of his day. The genre's that appealed in His later years had fairly strict conventions. Tragicomedy’s are serious plays with a happy ending or enough jokes to keep the mood light. (Encyclopedia Britannica)

2. genre

Genre

        The Tempest, Hamlet, and A Winters Tale all fit into different genres, unlike Henry IV parts 1-3. Just from the contrast in genres between H
is very first and very last of His work we can see the tip of the iceberg of Shakespeare shaking up the conventions of the style of his day for His own evolved poetic artistic expression. However, He could never fully get away from those conventions. In fact the pressures of Shakespeare's popular audience to conform to the new genre's were a cattiest to his greatest work and retirement. 

1. 1610

1610

The year 1610 is a completely different for Shakespeare than 1590. The reason 1610 is significant is because that is around the time He wrote his last few plays that we will be reviewing in contrast to Henry IV parts 1-3 which are The Tempest, Hamlet, and A Winters Tale. At this time Shakespeare had achieved everything that He ever desired. He enjoyed more wealth and fame than He could dream of and was given the prestigious title of a ‘gentleman” by the King which carried with it the right to carry a gun. He became the most sot after poet and playwright in England. Twenty of His then thirty plays that He wrote had been performed and loved for the most part. With the wealth and fame He had acquired He was able to provide extremely well for His family. He and His family lived in the second largest home in England and He invested his money in purchasing other homes in London too. He enjoyed being a co-owner of a newly built playhouse and had the new Kings royal patent. Shakespeare also continued acting in the plays that he wrote even though He made more than enough from writing plays. Yet He had written less plays that what later prove to be less popular in England the last 4 years. What appealed to His contemporary popular audience had changed once again and He had to change with them as he always did, yet he didn’t have the drive to learn to conform as He did when he was younger. Shakespeare's plays that he wrote earlier were still wildly famous and being preformed in the Kings court and other playhouses throughout England. However His new plays that He wrote were not as well received as His earlier ones when they were written and produced. The university educated rival poets were young and ambitious and had there target on Shakespeare's contemporary audience. Today's contemporary's see Shakespeare's final work as his greatest but Shakespeare's audience  at that time didn't. (Bevington) Only a few years after He wrote His last few plays by himself He retired and moved from London to the city of his home of youth in Stratford. There He could be free from the pressures, politics and pain of the life of a entertainer and why not? He had everything he ever wanted. There in Stratford he would die four years after he moved home in 1616 and be buried there. By the end of his career, virtually every aspect of his early style had been transformed from one of formal and rhetorical regularity to one of vast flexibility and range. (Schoenbaum)

6. The Success! & responce to any Cronology, Commissioned, and Success Qualms

Success! 

Even though the popular conventions were very strict that Shakespeare adhered to, His early work was still a “huge early success”. (Bevington) When the first history plays were performed He was catapulted to the wealth and fame that he was after. Today “Shakespeare is given more credit for pioneering in the genre of the English history play than he once was”. The text book then goes on to say that the character of Lord Talbot in 1Henry VI was well liked and “by the time Richard Duke of Gloucester had emerged from Henry VI plays to become King Richard III Shakespeare’s fame as a dramatist was assured.” The text book also says that “Shakespeare genius manifests itself in his early work”.  The text book then goes on to say how His genius is manifest by what he learned from his predecessors and from the diversity depicted in his early plays. What He learned from his “predecessors” is seen by looking at how he copied that which is popular (which this blog already did), among other things. However, the biography quoted below called “Will and the World" by Stephen Greenblatt, argues that Shakespeare was more than just a guy writing to make a money.

“This is interesting to remember when you hear people glibly saying that Shakespeare was "merely" the Stephen King of his times. Usually, what they mean is he wasn't an intellectual giant, just a guy writing prolific quantities of popular fiction, as if there are scores of Governor General and Nobel-worthy geniuses lost in time. Shakespeare, in this view, is just a man who gives the masses the slop that they want so that he can make a buck. Its an attempt to diminish his work, to lower him to the status of a hack.” 

5. Subject

Subject

Shakespeare wrote His play on a popular subject too so it would be purchased by the theater and be performed. The three plays are considered to be Tudor propaganda. The house of Tudor was a European royal house that allied themselves with the house of Lancaster. After the fall of the house of Lancaster the Tudor family rose to power because of their discontented supporters of the House of York.  Elizabeth I was the queen of England in 1590 and she was also the last monarch in the house of Tudor. (Encyclopedia Britannica, house of Tudor) In the plays it shows the danger of civil wars and celebrates the leaders within the Tudor dynasty.  The plays show the dangers of civil war on many different levels. We can see many different levels of showing civil war in a bad light.  One level is showing how Prince Harry’s rebellion to his father is contrary to how royalty should act. When Prince Hal finally comes to power he has to imprison all the thieves and rouges because they think Prince Hal is the King of thieves which is not becoming of a King.

4. Diction

Diction

           The text book states that “the history plays (were written) for the socially diversified, though generally intelligent and well to-do-, audience”. Shakespeare’s plays easily transition between scenes of nobility and scenes of commoners which creates variety of different diction between the two castes. Shakespeare wanted His plays to appeal to rich and poor because both the rich and poor came to his plays. Shakespeare's use of words that would appeal to the rich and the poor, the learned and the unlearned proves that He was less interested in the art of His work than for it to be entertaining, well liked, and purchased by the theater. In the example below we identify how Shakespeare’s diction might have appealed to upper class in the play. In the two examples taken we see one person rebuking another. The first one is King Henry IV rebuking his son Prince Hal for being disrespectful in act4 scene 3. The second example is the rebuke of Mistress Quickly to Pistol for being disrespectful in act 2 scene 4.  Notice the vocabulary choice and the style in which it is expressed.

2. Genre

 Genre

         In 1588 the Spanish Armada sailed against England. Early attacks on the Spanish Armada by Queen Elizabeth lead to the defeat of it. During the “patriotic aftermath of the war” history plays or plays based on English history became the favorite genre. In 1590, Shakespeare’s audience “knew” and loved the genre well. As an actor, Shakespeare identified the popularity of the History plays so He adopted this genre for His first plays. (Bevington) Because of Shakespeare’s lack of influence and need for success, He used the most popular and established genre to offset his weaknesses and give His play the best opportunity for success, just as mentioned in the above introduction. Shakespeare also used a popular style of that time to gain more appeal for his play.

1. 1510

1510
        Henry IV part’s 1-3 were Shakespeare’s first three plays that he wrote. The plays were written in 1590 but not preformed until four to six years later. Shakespeare was 26 when he wrote the plays, had a wife and three kids that He left in his home town of Stratford while He worked in London as an actor. Actors of that time period did not make much money, they were not trusted, they were Rogues, and Vagabonds. Shakespeare was so poor that He lived with friends and at a parish. Shakespeare couldn’t look to his parents for financial help because his parents were doing nearly as bad as He was. His father lost his government job as a result of persecution for his catholic faith and had to sell everything he owned except for his house on Henley Street just to live. Even though Shakespeare’s parents were not much better off, they were able to let Anne and His three kids live with them while He was away. From Shakespeare biographies, it appears that around 1590 were tumultuous times for Shakespeare and His family. (Bevington) (Schoenbaum)

Love goes by haps: Peer Evaluation of Johnny Allred's Blog

This Post is my peer evaluation of Johnny Allreds Blog labeled: Blog-O-Shakespeare. Johnny’s blog shows an interest in Shakespearean vernacular. Johnny’s thesis for his hub post is in regards to the "dynamicism" that Shakespeare introduced to English that is spurred on by popular media but contemporary views of these changes are not optimistic. 

E. Conclusion:The Lonely Watchmen

The Final Years

Shakespeare had experienced the lowest of lows and the highest of highs in His lifetime. He had accomplished everything He had wanted and dreamed, however it had come at a cost. We know from the section “subject” in this blog that Shakespeare was an entertainer at heart. The movie “The Prestige” shows an interesting fact about the complexity's of an entertainer. The movie is about the life of two competing magicians. The two main characters are obsessed with becoming the greatest Magicians and will stop at nothing to achieve that goal. One of the main characters named Bordon figures out a Chinese magician's trick that relies entirely on the man living his entire life as though he's a cripple. He's actually incredible strong, but the only way his trick works is if he's appears to his audience that he is physically unable to do it both in the performance and everyday life. Bordon understands this, because he's been doing the same thing for as long as we know him in this film to create the act that out does his rival, Alfred (the other main character). The moral of the movie is that great entertainment requires sacrificing yourself to your act and that it comes at a great cost. In the movie both the main characters (There is only main characters in the movie, no protagonists) lose those they love because their drive to be the greatest entertainer and it ends with Alfred losing his own life. We see evidence to the truth of the moral of that movie in American society. Movie stars can’t go anywhere or do anything (including gaining or losing weight) they want after they become famous. Anything they do or say becomes part of the news and entertainment. They are forced to surrender their lives to entertainment. This is also true for all forms of entertainers. Sports stars, movie stars, singers, and Collage Professors surrender themselves to their audience and are no longer free to do as they like. The rapper Eminem has made many songs about that fact including the song called "When I’m Gone." From what we know of Shakespeare he was no different.                     

D. Why we Read?: The Mind of the Bard

In the Introduction and seed blog two reasons were listed as to the focus of my self-directed learning for class this semester. The first was to come to know the Bard through biographies. The second was to understand why we read Shakespeare.  My objective for this "final blog" is to show the reader how to learn to see Shakespeare from his work. What I hope to convey from this section is that why we read Shakespeare is because of who He is. The two different questions of why we read Shakespeare and what kind of person is Shakespeare has the same answer.What many of the most renowned biographies and studies of Shakespeare conclude is that Shakespeare’s passion was for entertaining. Later in this section we will show how He truly was a entertainer at heart. By understanding the mind of the entertainer we can come to understand Shakespeare. However He was not just any entertainer, he was born with the attributes, passion, and misfortune that gave him the ability to be the world’s greatest poet/author/entertainer/playwright and hence why we read him.     

Index of this section
A. Why do we Read Shakespeare?

B. Science of the Mind: Shakespeare's Depth
C.Shakespeare's Vicissitudes: The Breadth
D. Validation & Understanding

C. The Closing Act: Gleaming the Personality and Character of Shakespeare

By using the similar comparisons to the section "The Stage is Set" in this blog and comparing them to Shakespeare's later plays called Hamlet, A Winters Tale, The Tempest, and Shakespeare's life in 1610; It will be proven that you can identify Shakespeare's personality and character from His later works the most, compared to the plays he first wrote.  In 1610 Shakespeare was at the pinnacle of His artistic genius and fame in England. He had achieved more than he could ever dream he would. Shakespeare's final works were his greatest, He had developed over time a freer blank verse that allowed more artistic expression for the characters in his plays which was revolutionary and allowed more self expression for him. He learned how to make his figures of speech add to the natural flow of the play and build/present the theme, subject, and individual characters. From the differences between Shakespeare's first work and his last, we see a freedom from the regular conventions of his day, which depicts more self expression. We also see from comparing the genre, diction, and subjects from his earlier plays, that he maintained his natural inclination to conform his plays to the desires of popular audience. But in His later years He put more of His own unique creative intelligence into his work.  However, the problem with reaching your pinnacle is that you can only go down from there. In 1610 Shakespeare was nearing retirement and His thoughts turned to his home of youth in Stratford where he began to spend a lot of time later in his life. All his thoughts were not on entertaining his popular audience, as they where when he first began to write. Shakespeare wanted self expression from inputting his likes, dislike, and values in his plays. Another distraction from focusing on writing for the desires of his popular audience was his desire to create his greatest work of art. The distractions from the minds of his popular audience allowed Shakespeare to make his greatest work but at the cost of him not being the most appealing play writer in England as he was before and eventual retirement. 


A quick Index for "The Closing Act"
1.1610
2. Genre
3. Style Changes
   -Rhythm
   -Blank verse
   -Figures of Speech
4. Diction
5. Subject

B. The Stage is Set: he gave the masses their muck to make a buck

By understanding the factual circumstances of Shakespeare’s life around 1590 and from explicating the appeal of Shakespeare’s plays to his audience in regards to subject, genre, language, and overall style of his first three plays it is clear that Shakespeare’s primary motivation for writing was not for his own personal expression, love of poetry, or plays but more so to simply make a buck and try to establish himself.

The Stage is Set: Quick Index
   1. 1590
   2. Genre
   3. Style Similarity’s
   -Rhetorical Language
   -Elaborate Metaphors:Conceit
   -Blank Verse
   4. Diction
   5. Subject
   6. The Success! & Response to any Chronology, Commissioned, and Success Qualms









1. 1590 
        Henry IV part’s 1-3 were Shakespeare’s first three plays that he wrote. The plays were written in 1590 but not preformed until four to six years later. Shakespeare was 26 when he wrote the plays, had a wife and three kids that He left in his home town of Stratford while He worked in London as an actor. Actors of that time period did not make much money, they were not trusted, they were Rogues, and Vagabonds. Shakespeare was so poor that He lived with friends and at a parish. Shakespeare couldn’t look to his parents for financial help because his parents were doing nearly as bad as He was. His father lost his government job as a result of persecution for his catholic faith and had to sell everything he owned except for his house on Henley Street just to live. Even though Shakespeare’s parents were not much better off, they were able to let Anne and His three kids live with them while He was away. From Shakespeare biographies, it appears that around 1590 were tumultuous times for Shakespeare and His family. (Bevington) (Schoenbaum) (Encyclopedia Britannica) But necessity is the mother of invention and at that time anyone could write a play and sell it to a theater. Theaters called the un-commissioned purchase of one play from a person a “one-off” (OED). These “one-off” plays were perfect for making extra money on the side. Naturally, an actor with talent in and experience with writing and acting such as Shakespeare began to look at how contemporary plays of His time were written and wrote plays to be sold to theaters. There are no primary documents from Shakespeare stating why He began writing but we do know where He worked and lived and where His family lived and how bad they were doing so the picture of what was going on with Shakespeare around the time Henry IV parts 1-3 is clear. Shakespeare’s family situation wasn’t great and He needed to make extra money for his family. Because Shakespeare was an actor He learned what people liked, He could use His natural talent and extensive education with English verse, previous experience with writing, education, and experience with acting to write a play that would entertain that He could sell and make extra money to support Himself and His family. In 1590, Shakespeare had not received the status of a world’s greatest poet and playwright yet. At this time Shakespeare’s status was that of an actor which hurt his chances of being recognized because the poor reputation of actors. Shakespeare relied on a popular genre, style, diction, and subjects to gain appeal for his plays from his audience. He was trying to piggy back on the popularity of rhetorical devices so people would look less at who wrote it and more on content. Many authors of that time used their already good reputation, wealth, or power to get noticed. Shakespeare had none of that so He had to rely on other conventions that were well liked for people to overlook the author and enjoy the work. By picking popular conventions Shakespeare was trying to appeal to as many as He could and give his plays the best opportunity for success. The genre Shakespeare selected for His first plays is also evidence that His goal was to make a buck and establish himself and not self-expression or for the beauty of it.  

Seed Blog: THE MIND OF THE GREAT BARD

The Story of Lifetime in Semester's Learning

This seed blog is the narration of my process of discovery throughout the semester of class up to the thesis of this blog. I begin this blog with  a little history about myself
            Before my LDS mission I had never enjoyed reading. While on my mission I learned to enjoy reading and have always had a book with me sense. Because I have only enjoyed reading the last four years I have not had a chance to read much Shakespeare up to the start of this class. I was intimidated the first day of class by how much everyone else knew compared to me. I established that I needed to work from the ground up and learn Who Shakespeare was and Why we read him and the majority of my research has been in those regards as you can tell from my learning out comes. From my research I learned that we know little about Shakespeare and that I would need to be careful with my sources and it payed off but It took a lot of diligents. The structure of the reading for this class was first the history plays. I learned with them that Shakespeare's focus was to appeal to his audience and that he was good at it.  Then the class was on to Shakespeare comedies which weren't appealing to me so I focused on reading biographies more during this time. However,  In my frustration I received help from my Dad on how to enjoy Shakespeare which benefited me greatly. Then it was on to the tragedies, were I learned to incorporate more social learning by including more digital mediation and my friends outside and inside of class in my learning. After midterms I talked to my Professor and established how I would focus my learning the rest of the class. My focus along with what I learned about the Bard naturally lead me to the topic Psychoanalytical Literary Criticism because to understand the Bard you must understand the human mind and because so many of the biographies use psychoanalytical type of literary critique.  The direction I went didn't come with out a lot of revision  as I read and learned more and received help from scholars and classmates blogs, such as the research of how women effected Shakespeare by Joanna Barker, exploring contemporary of Shakespeare's time from John Kendrick, the phone interview with a scholar by Brian, and the research of business tactics Shakespeare used by  Max O.  What I have learned from this class I have put in this last research post(and corresponding links) in a very lengthy but accurate picture of how to come to know Shakespeare for any person coming from my Shakespearean back ground and beyond. This blog factually proves the thesis statement below.

Thesis 

The point of this blog was to support the claim that you can learn the personality and character of Shakespeare better when His early life and rhetorical devices in His plays are compared to His later life and rhetorical devices in His texts, thus showing the reader how to see the Bard from His work.

A. Introduction: Welcome to Shakespeare 

               Welcome to Shakespeare and a closer look at why the discovery of Shakespeare is so popular and important.The introduction establishes the focus for the rest of the blog which is: to support the claim that you can see the personality and Character of Shakespeare better when his early life and rhetorical devices in his plays are compared to His later life and rhetorical devices in his text, thus showing the reader how to see the Bard from his work as is necessary. As we learn about Shakespeare we can learn what makes his work so great. Shakespeare has such a big influence in popular culture that its crutial to understand Him and His work if you want to be involved in popular culture and the big buisness of Shakespeare.    

B. The Stage is Set!: He gave the mass there muck to make a buck

                 By understanding the factual circumstances of Shakespeare’s life around 1590 and from explicating the appeal of Shakespeare’s plays to his audience in regards to subject, genre, language, and overall style of his first three plays it is clear that Shakespeare’s primary motivation for writing was not for his own personal expression, love of literature or acting as it is in his last plays but simply to make a buck and try to establish himself.

C. Closing Act: Gleaming The Personality and Character of Shakespeare

                  By using similar comparisons to the section "The Stage is Set" and comparing them to Hamlet, A Winters Tale, and The Tempest and his later life we can understand how to identify Shakespeare's personality and character in greater light.  In 1610 Shakespeare was at the pinnacle of his artistic genius and fame in England. He had achieved more than he ever thought He could. However when you reach your pinnacle all you can do is go down from there.  Shakespeare's final works were his greatest, He had developed over time a freer verse that allowed more artistic expression for both the characters and author. He learned how to make his figures of speech add to the natural flow of the play and build/present the theme, subject, and individual characters. From the differences between Shakespeare's older work and his late see see a freedom from the regular conventions of his day, which depicts more self expression. However from the genre, diction, and subject we also see that he did try to appeal to the changes in those years to the popular audience. However Shakespeare was nearing retirement and death and his thoughts turned to home. He no longer thought completely about entertaining when he wrote but self expression and his original home in Stratford. The distractions allowed Shakespeare to make his greatest art but at the cost of him not being the most appealing writer as he was before.  

D. Why We Read Shakespeare: The Validation

               In the introduction and seed blog I listed two reasons as to the focus of this blog. The first was to come to know the Bard through comparing biographies and his work. The second was to understand why we read Shakespeare. This section is what I learned about why we read him.  A major part of understanding why we read Shakespeare is also coming to understand Him. Shakespeare's passion was entertainment but he was not just any entertainer, he was born with the attributes, passion, and misfortune that gave him the ability to be the world’s greatest author/entertainer/playwright. We read Shakespeare for his poetic works of art and his ability to give us the breadth and depth of are human experience. The psychoanalytical skills Shakespeare acquired to understand people from his life as an entertainer  allowed him to write plays that include the depth of the human experience and appeal to many cultures for centuries. The more we understand the science regarding society's motivations the more we learn about Shakespeare because of His major influence on that science. His personal life experience, along with his study of people in pubs and books allow him to include the breadth of are human experience in his plays.  By showing how Shakespeare used psychoanalysis it also gives creditability to this bog's thesis. I am arguing a psychoanalysis of Shakespeare using his work and text. Validating psychoanalysis also gives creditability as well to countless biographies as well. 

F. Conclusion: The Lonely Watchman

             Shakespeare gave his life to entertainment and entertainment gave Him everything he wanted in return, until He broke the agreement with it. In His later years the challenges of maintaining His identity became too tiring for a man who had everything He could want. Shakespeare retired to the home of his youth in Stratford where he could live free of the tiring challenges of London and having to constantly entertain. However retirement was not what he had expected. His mind and His true love of entertaining drew him back to London to do a few more plays before his death a year later, or so is speculated. While this blog wanted to dispel speculation the fact is Shakespeare is a man of mystery and speculation is his biography. Shakespeare's reputation was a skin flint and so that's what his biographies reflect that. The mystery of the man only elevates his work. Only through diligent study of His work and comparing them to the facts of his life can you come to know Him.The point of this blog was to support the claim that that you can see Shakespeare better when his early life and rhetorical devices in His plays are compared to His latter life and rhetorical devices in his texts.  The point was to teach how to see him because few facts of his personal life remain and so anything that is said about it can only be speculation and this blog tried to correct misinformation not contribute however unsuccessful it probably is. The reality is the only way to know the personality and character of Shakespeare for sure, is to talk with him in heaven.    

A. Introduction: Welcome to Shakespeare

William Shakespeare was born around 1564 and died April 1616. He was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world’s pre-eminent dramatist. (Greenblatt) His surviving works consist of 38 plays, 154 sonnets, two long narrative poems, and several other poems. His plays have been translated into every major language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright.  "He gave England a new sense of identity and characters that everyone has loved ever sense (and hated). He is one of the most famous writers of all time yet a lot of mystery shrouds his life". (Woods) The mix of popularity and mystery has caused a hailstorm of writings about the Bard that can cause more misunderstanding than education and edification. Michael Blair, the educational Director for the Shakespearean festival explains why the hailstorm of writing causes a problem in the example below.

Romeo and Juliet and Shakespeare: Speculation of the Facts

This blog is a continuation of my research into how the bard put himself into his work and how we identify it using what little information we have about him. 

In Search of Shakespeare

Over the weekend I had my wisdom teeth removed so I didn't do much of anything. I did watched the PBS documentary "In Search Of Shakespeare". This blog post is my thoughts and review of the documentary.

Final thesis outline & a BIG favor to ask from y'all

The majority of my time this week has been spent working on my final argument. Because of new research and understanding I have had to revamp my outline from the original. My new outline is listed below starting just after the page brake but before I start I have a favor to ask of y'all.

the BIG favor
While researching I have had some questions that I NEED help with from readers because I cant seem to figure them out on my own, so please comment. The class has been very helpful thus far and I just need one more little help and I should be perfect.

Questions for the Class
1. Sonnets?
-Where do I look to find when they were written? and help with understand what they are about?
-If you know anything about the sonnets please tell me because I am TOTALLY at a loss with them.


2. Those of you that know Shakespeare biography: can you offer any more insights into identifying Shakespeare's personality/motives through his plays; preferably from the plays I am reviewing but I welcome any good insight?
-The plays I am reviewing are Henry VI part 1-3 and Hamlet, the Tempest, and A Winters Tale. 

3. Idea's for memorizing?
- I am having a hard time memorizing the Saint Crispins day monologue in Henry V so I was wondering if anyone has any idea's on how to memorize speeches such as that or should I just cut it down?

Works cited page and What I learned from it

Just as we were told to do in class I created I works cited page. I did it grudgingly because I feel that I need to spend every ounce of time on my final thesis and performance. The works cited page actually helped my end thesis in a small way.

The works cited page compilation helped my end thesis by helping me identify that I need more scholarly articles. While I was going through my blog I found that I had used information that wasn't scholarly. I did use information that was legitimate that I could be proven but it wasnt highly acclaimed. I am now looking for articles that back the articles that I have that are more highly acclaimed. If I would have not done the works cited page I would have never understood I need more scholarly information to create a stranger argument and thesis.

A personal reminder for class needs
(TO DO LIST)

1. Engage Shakespeare Meaningfully

-Last week in Feb. I plan to act out a scene I have read or maybe film it and put it on my Blog.
-In March I will randomly recite Shakespeare in a public setting to determine if his writing is appealing or identifiable to people on the street

                              or

-See blog I did on this for other idea

2. Digital Meditations
- a few more blogs on this

3. Do final thesis

I Heard Back!: Some Good Response from a Scholar

Recently I sent a few emails to Shakespeare scholars asking for idea's for research. The first email that I sent took the person I sent it to a while to email me back and was worthless. He referred me to a book that suggested that the name Shakespeare was an alias for another person. Dr. Burton said that sort of research was "a black hole" and not to go that route. However I sent another email to Michael Bahr the Education Director for the Shakespeare Festival. What he emailed me back was helpful and inspiring for me and could be for others .. check it out!    

Update:Focused Study

I am a little sad to report that the majority of research is finished for my final thesis. What I am writting in my

My final thesis is on what kind of person Shakespeare was/is and how we can see more of his personality and character in his later writings than his earlier ones. The first part of my final thesis paper is on how Shakespeare originally wrote his play's for the money. The first part of my focus correlates with Max O's so I have been stealing some of his ideas. However, reading the text book has also given me some great ideas that I listed below.

Performance/Digital Mediation/ :(

Recently I have been on a role with my Shakespeare study. So excitedly I decided this 

 weekend that I was going to do my performance for class. I had the idea to do a comical reenactment of Shakespeare’s famous speech by king Henry in the play King Henry V before the final battle against the French where the English are out numbered 5 to 1, it’s called The Saint Crispin’s Day speech. This would count as a performance/ my exploration into digital mediation. I was really excited however the speech turns out to be a lot longer and a TON harder to memorize than I had expected. I spent an hour Friday and much more time Saturday but the old English and LONG quotation is making it very difficult. I think I’m going to give it a little bit of attention each day tell I have it memorized but it’s taking a lot of time out of the time I should be doing research.  I am open for any ideas if anyone knows a good way to memorize a long speech or maybe I’ll just cut the speech down. I thought it would be just like memorizing information for school but it is definitely different

                                           The speech done below is the one I want to memorize.

Psychoanalytic Literary Criticism (cont):Many Examples From Dr. Burton's Class!?

I started a blog campaign to get others to comment on my blog in regards to my subject topic which is, Psychoanalytic Literary Criticism: Showing just what kind of person Shakespeare is and how we can see more of his personality and character in his later writings than his earlier ones. This blog is a continuation of that campaign to encourage fellow bloggers to contribute the new found knowledge from this semester on this topic. I have had some GREAT response so keep it coming!

What is the purpose of Psychoanalytic Literary Criticism?

Psychoanalytic Literary Criticism: What kind of person are you and how do you perceive the world of books and the world around you?

For easy skimming of this blog post please see the index and the descriptions that is located directly below the introductory paragraph labeled INDEX.

The questions I would like blog readers to possibly answer is what blog post they have done and seen that can help with my Psychoanalytic research of Shakespeare to discover what kind of man he is and how we can identify his personality from his writings because we have very little primary documents from or about him.  Some specific questions I plan to address are

Why Shakespeare wrote Henry v, Hamlet, and A Winters Tale?
How people have responded to Henry v, Hamlet, and A Winters Tale?
How the later plays reflect more of Shakespeare's personality?
Why do people read Shakespeare?
What kind of man was Shakespeare?
Why did Shakespeare write what he did?
Why this information is important? 

For those of you that don't know too much about Psychoanalytic Literary criticism this blog post is to educate and build your confidence to comment and contribute a part of the classes extensive new found Shakespeare knowledge, with regards to my topic or to understand what questions about your topics that I could help with. The information in this blog was taken from Wikipedia.com under Psychoanalysis Literary Criticism and the article Psychoanalysis in Literature by Norman N. Holland.

For easy skimming please see the index of the three subject headings in this blog and description of the sections that is located directly below this sentence.

Subject Topic: Psychoanalysis of Shakespeare

After FINALLY being able to meet with Dr. Burton I have locked down what it is that I plan to do for my final subject topic. I plan on doing a Psychoanalysis of Shakespeare by using my own research and what little primary research that is out there on him to show how as he got older he put more of his personality in his plays and was less interested in entertaining. For those of you who think that they could mutually benefit with me from each others research PLEASE comment on this post! even if its simply just one word.

To Whatever End ... Devloping Purpose

A Frustrated Researcher
 
My emphasis for my Shakespearean research has been to find primary sources on Shakespeare so we can learn about who He was and what His desires for His plays might have been. This information could be used as part of a foundation for future Shakespearean play adaptation research so actors and producers can understand even more how they might have been preformed and what the authors moral of the story was. But just as I mentioned before in my blog, we have very little documentation about Shakespeare.

A New Hope
In an effort to really get to know the Bard I have decided to look at the sources for his play's and see what he added to them to try and understand the mysterious man.