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.