For the past few weeks in lit, we have been finishing up Hamlet. It really feels like a never ending play. At first, it took me a while to get down the characters and how they were all related or what their story was, but after going over it a few times, I think I got it down. Aside from actually reading the play and discussing it in class, we have been annotating and watching a few versions of the movie. I have to say, I honestly did not think it would take this long to finish annotating Hamlet. I have spent a good amount of time annotating this play everyday for the last 2-3 weeks, and I just finished today. So that was definitely a challenge. I was really focused on finding all of the themes/motifs in this play while annotating. As for the movies, the first one was a bit boring in my opinion. I didn't like the fact that there wasn't much scenery. I liked the second one better, mainly because of the setting and how much more modern it was. It was much more interesting to watch, and a lot more dramatic, too! We just started watching a third version in class on Friday, so I'm interested to see how that turns out. It is much more modern than the other two, so it should be good.
Other than Hamlet, I'm getting focused on studying the terms from the terms test for the final. I hope I do a lot better on the final than I did on either of the terms tests. I'm a little scared for that. Another new thing that we are doing in class is writing about atmosphere and incorporating tone in the writing. I think that will be really helpful for when we take the AP exam in May!
I like that you covered pretty much everything that we were doing in class, but remember to include connections. You did that briefly with the atmosphere writing activity and the AP exam but try to incorporate a few more.
ReplyDeleteI was amazed at how long the annotations took me as well. I think that since Shakespeare puts so much into the lines of his characters, there is a lot to pick out so it takes a really long time. I also like how you noted the difference in setting with the first movie. The setting was quite boring, but I think that was their goal and probably the most accurate representation of the play because they can't have all the different locations in a play. They just have to work around one spot.
Mehar, I also found that I liked the more modern versions of Hamlet than the first one we watched, which was really kind of boring even though the acting of Hamlet was supposed to be phenomenal. My favorite was the one that Ms. Holmes said was shot in a castle and was set in a more industrial revolution kind of time (wasn't exactly sure when it was). The annotations took forever, but I think it's because I first had to pick apart the literal meaning of the play, which usually is second nature, and then go through and do the harder work of analyzing it.
ReplyDeleteGood job on your post! You didn't just list what we did in class, but wrote about it in a way that forces you to process the information again.