DRJ #3: Hamlet Act III

One situation that really stood out to me in this act was the set up of the play. Hamlets plan mirrors that of a modern day interrogation. The way that Hamlet presents the situation and watched Claudius’ reaction is ultimately the same thing as the integration tactic that detectives use to figure out whether or not a suspect is guilty. Of course Hamlets plan was more visual, Claudius actually saw the play, rather than having it described to him as a scenario or question, but ultimately the idea behind it is the same.   

Hamlet is of course the protagonist of the play, but, on a more centralized level, he is an important character in this particular act. It is in Act III that we find the famous “to be or not to be” speech. Having never read Hamlet before, I have to say that I was surprised to find the speech in such an obscure place. It seems almost like a mistake. However upon closer inspection it is easy to see the significance in its supposed randomness. Through the speech we get a clearer understanding of Hamlets inner though process. The speech seems to be about suicide, this is a slightly confusing concept to grasp at first. If Hamlet wanted to avenge his father’s death, then why would he even consider suicide? Both the subject matter of the speech and the placement of it within the act serve as a window into Hamlet’s character. We see just how often Hamlet contemplates death. I think that the obscurity in the placement of the speech is meant to lead the reader to believe that thoughts like this are a normal thing for Hamlet. In my opinion, the nature of the speech does not necessarily mean that Hamlet was suicidal, but rather that his thoughts of death were so deep  and frequent that they travel past murder and revenge to other forms of death such as the self-inflicted.

One theme that I found particularly prominent in this act was revenge/ forgiveness. This is evident in the scene where Claudius is praying. Essentially this scene has two parts to it. Forgiveness is displayed through Claudius. After the play Claudius is stricken with guilt, it is almost as if he realizes the severity of his actions for the very first time. Claudius acknowledges his feelings and tries desperately to get rid of them through prayer. The odd thing about this is Claudius’ attitude. He understands that he feels guilty and what he did wrong, but it seems as if he is not actually sorry. Claudius wants forgiveness, but he wants it not because he is sorry for what he did, but rather because he wants his feelings of guilt to go away. On the other side of the story we have Hamlet. He is the one that is responsible for the play that made Claudius feel guilty. Hamlet walks past as his uncle is praying. Having already witnessed Claudius’ reaction to the play, Hamlet knows that Claudius is guilty of murdering his father. For a brief second Hamlet considers walking over and killing Claudius but quickly dismisses this thought because if killed during prayer Claudius would go to heaven and Hamlet would not have actually taken revenge. The fact that Hamlet put that much thought into it, even if the thoughts only took a few seconds, shows just how serious he now is about taking revenge. Now that he knows for sure that it was Claudius who murdered his father, Hamlet is not only willing to carry out his father’s wish of taking revenge  he wants it to be perfect, true revenge.   The ironic thing about this scene is that through seeking forgiveness, Claudius is saved from death.

DRJ #2: Act II

The thing that really drew a parallel for me with a situation in my own life in this act was the exchange that Claudius and Gertrude had with Guildenstern and Rosencrantz. The way that Claudius and Gertrude ask them to check on Hamlet and try to make him feel better reminded me of situations that you see with middle school and high school students. Often students will gang up on each other and elect people to fix the problem when another student’s behavior is abnormal. As a mentor, I see it happen all the time. It is interesting to see something so similar occur in two entirely different contexts.

Although she is only in Act II for a very brief period of time, Ophelia’s actions in the act still raise questions. In the previous act Ophelia is very quick to defend Hamlet when talking to her father, but in this act her behavior seems to switch. Ophelia goes running to her father after having been scared by Hamlet showing up in her room while she was sewing. The shift in Ophelia’s attitude seems odd. Why would she tell her father? It makes more sense that she would want to protect Hamlet, not turn him in. It could be said that Ophelia is immature. Her actions seem rash and poorly thought out. Ultimately though, through telling her father about Hamlet’s strange behavior Ophelia proves just how strange Hamlet’s behavior was. If she, the one who should be most concerned for Hamlet’s health and should be the most aware of a problem or switch, thinks that Hamlet has gone mad then it seems likely that he actually has. Shakespeare uses Ophelia in this act to paint a picture of Hamlet and his behavior and to show how well that Hamlet is fooling all of the characters.

Deceit is definitely the most obvious theme of this Act II. Even at the very beginning of the act we see deception through the conversation between Polonius and Reynaldo. Polonius, in a sense, asks Reynaldo to spread rumors about the behavior of Laertes so that Polonius can get information about his son’s actual behavior. In some of the cases in this act, the situation is almost confusing because the true feelings, desires and motives of the characters can get lost in the midst of their actions. Hamlet for example, is acting as if he is crazy. He has not told anyone else of his plan and because of this all of the other characters in the play believe that he has gone mad. Hamlet’s behavior is very convincing, at certain points it is easy for the reader to forget the he is not actually crazy, he is deceiving those around him. The odd thing about the interactions between each of the characters is how common they really are. Their plans to deceive one another are in actuality situations that occur in daily life all of the time. In a group of people, be it family members, friends, coworkers, even complete strangers, it is not at all uncommon for people to lie about others, act differently from how they are feeling, or send others to gather information. It happens. Perhaps Shakespeare was using the deceptive characters for a reason. It could be that through these situations of deceit, Shakespeare was making a statement about human behavior in general and our unfortunate tenancy to manipulate situations in order to get what we want out of someone or something.

Walker Extra Credit

As he watches her slowly make her way down the aisle he is overcome by his feelings for her. He loves her, he wants a better life for her. She looked beautiful in her own way as she walked toward him. Beautiful, but not perfect. Staring at her tired face, he is reminded. Reminded of her and all of the work she has done. He wanted to take that work away, to give her a live that she deserved. His only fear was that it would not be what she wanted.

Hemingway Extra Credit

  As a youth mentor, I sometimes go to summer and winter camps in order to be able to form relationships with students so that they can feel comfortable talking to me and other leaders as well. While camps are amazing experiences that I would not trade for the world, it is sometimes difficult to transition back into life with my family one I get home. Life still goes on while I’m away and it is easy to feel misplaced and left out once I get back home. Camp really helps me to understand Krebs’s feelings. Coming home after being gone for a while can make you feel uncomfortable even around those who you are most comfortable with.

SSRJ #4: Carver

In life, one thing that we all have in common is the search for answers. We want to know why things happen. We want to know what to do. We want to know the future. And, most importantly, we want to know why we don’t know. We all want answers, but our methods of finding them are very different. Some people answer a question through research, others would rather just guess. Some people talk through their answers, others keep their thoughts to themselves. Sometimes circumstances will cause us to change the way that we answer a question or solve a problem. I know that through my own experiences that I respond differently to problems and questions when I am under a lot of stress. As I was reading Raymond Carver’s “Popular Mechanics” I took particular note of the way that the characters were behaving. It seemed to me that the main character’s situation was causing him to react differently. If he had really wanted custody of the baby, I would think that the couple would have discussed the matter before he started to pack up his things. In my opinion the main character’s situation, the taunting from his wife, caused him to behave differently than he would have under more normal circumstances.

In my opinion, the literary element that is most crucial to the story “Popular Mechanics” is irony. The story itself is very short, and the reader does not get much insight into the lives of the characters, but the irony found in the last sentence gives the story the same amount of, if not more, power than a longer, more intricate story. Honestly, I am a bit torn by exactly what the author meant to communicate through the irony. On the one hand the entire point of the story could be very simple. The irony could be found in the fact that both parents wanted custody of the child and their struggle to obtain it is what lead to the unfortunate solution to the problem. This is the obvious way to look at the story, two parents, each fighting desperately for their child until their efforts solve the problem by killing him. This was what I had thought that the author wanted to communicate through the story at first. When I read it a second time a thought occurred to me. Maybe the man did not actually want to keep the baby, maybe he wanted to hurt his wife. She was the one taunting him and telling him to leave, could it be that he wanted revenge? There would really be no better way to get back at the woman than to take away her child. If this is the case, then the point that author is trying to communicate is very different. If the irony is simply that the fight kills the child, then both parents would be equally effected. On the other hand if the man wanting custody of the child was a form of revenge, then emotionally both parents might be affected equally but the death of the child would be more of a lesson for the wife. Ultimately it was her behavior that caused the fight that killed her baby.

The thing that I found most intriguing about the story was the man leaving. I constantly wondered why. What do you think happened? Was it a slow steady build of things that finally sent him over the edge or was it a quick reaction to a one-time argument or problem?

SSRJ # 3: Alice Walker

Perspective. Simply put, it means that events in our own lives shape the way that we react to new events, situations or knowledge. We all have a slightly different way of seeing things. In Alice Walker’s “Roselily” the main character is about to be married, she is about to experience a major event in her life, but she is not excited. The main character’s outlook in the story was quite a challenge to my own view of marriage. I have always thought of a wedding as something joyful and exciting, but this was not the case for Roselily.  She was fearful, and she second guessed her decision, emotions that are not surprising to see in someone who is about to be married, but her reasons for these emotions were. Roselily was not marrying out of love but rather out of need. I cannot imagine being in that sort of situation. This is not to say that I thought that every wedding was a happy event, I know that this is not the case. However, to have insight into the feelings of a bride who is marrying out of necessity rather than desire was interesting for me in that is challenges my own perspective, I had to think outside of my own views in order to understand the main character’s emotions.

One of the things that really drew me into this story was the way that Walker placed lines of the wedding ceremony between the paragraphs. At first I had a difficult time understanding exactly what the point of this was. Why? Why bother adding this to the story if it did not really affect what was going on?  After all, it was not difficult to grasp the point of the story by itself, without the lines of the ceremony. It was not until halfway through the story that I began to understand the reasoning behind Walker’s choice. Without the lines from the wedding ceremony, the story is clear, the emotions of the main character are apparent and the information about her past is not difficult to understand. The story could survive all alone, but it would take on a slightly different meaning. I think that Walker’s point in adding these lines was to give the story depth. They make it seem as though all of Roselily’s thoughts and emotions are happening while the ceremony is going on. With the lines, the reader gets the feeling that Roselily is standing, just moments away from being married, doubting her decision.

The main character mentions several times that she feels she is too old. In paragraph eleven it says that she is “finally being married.” The thing is, age is relative. What is considered old for one person is not considered old for another.  Exactly how old do you think Roselily is? Is she really “too old” or are her feelings of insecurity about her age a result of her second-guessing her decision to marry?

SSRJ #2: Oates

Youth is a funny thing. We never really realize how young we are in the moment. Our actions, our thoughts, our desires, at the time we rarely think of ourselves as immature or silly. Reflection however, is a different story. We can look back on our lives and easily see things for what they really were. We can categorize our actions, understand our mistakes and recognize turning points in our lives that may not have been obvious before. In Joyce Carol Oates’s “Three Girls,” reflection on events of the past is what really propels the story. Throughout the story the narrator reflects on an experience that she and a friend had at a used bookstore when they were college students. Through reflecting on her life the narrator really captures the feeling of being a college student.  The narrator strongly identifies herself with being a student and a poet, it is what defined her. Being a college student myself, I found it easy to relate to this form of identification. When you are a full-time student in college it truly does become part of your identity.

The most prominent literary element used in the story is definitely suspense. Throughout the story, the reader is on the edge of their seat wondering what will happen next. Reading this story the first time you would say that the suspense is found in the situation with Marilyn Monroe, through it so many questions are raised. Why is she, Marilyn Monroe, shopping at a used bookstore? Will she be discovered by the other customers in the store? Will she notice the two girls watching her? The suspense finally ends when the narrator purchases Marilyn Monroe’s books for her and the actress leaves the store unnoticed by anyone except the two girls who protected her secret. At the very last sentence of the story another suspenseful situation is made clear. The two girls who appeared to be friends turn out to be something more than that. It is difficult to pick up on the sexual tension between the two girls throughout the story because it is hidden under the suspense of Marilyn Monroe. However, reading it a second time it is easy to see the true meaning behind comments and descriptions that the narrator made. Once you know what to look for, the narrator’s feelings for her friend are obvious.

One thing that I found particularly interesting about this story was the way that it was told. At first it seemed to me like a something out of a journal or diary. As I read on I noticed that the narrator repeatedly referred to her friend as “you.”  To me this gave the impression that the story was a letter to the narrator’s friend. What was the purpose of this? Was it a letter to her friend or was the story told solely for the narrator’s benefit? What do you think happened to the girls after that evening at the used bookstore that would cause the narrator to write such a letter?