body paragraph 2

i feel like these posts should be in the "working on" tab. Whatever, I'm doing them so that should be enough.

Mel Gibson, in the 1990 film version of Hamlet, speaks in a slow and deliberate monotone, explains his sorrow to his mother, and allows her to grope him; this delivery brings to foray Hamlet’s sadness, but downplays his revulsion and anger. Gibson’s very first line, “a little more than kin and less than kind” illustrates this point perfectly. Gibson elongates, spaces-out, and enunciates the words in this first line to such an extent that the viewer stops thinking about the meanings of the words. Instead, one thinks of how morose he must be to be so dilatory, how well he enunciates in a fake British accent, and of when the scene will move on. This shift of focus detracts from the sarcasm, rage, repugnance, sass, and emotion Hamlet’s lines would otherwise express. Later in the scene, when Hamlet and Gertrude are left alone, Hamlet explains to Gertrude how his depression is not just an act, and in doing so shows viewers his seething emotions regarding his father’s murder and his mother’s hasty and incestuous marriage (and his sorrow, of course). But this is not present in the Gibson version. He speaks slowly, deliberately, and genuinely attempts to explain his emotions to his mother as an equal. Though it illuminates Hamlet’s anguish and argument, this delivery submerges the angry sarcasm and moral outrage in a sea of sorrow, sloth, explanations, and mutual respect (sibilance intentional). And, throughout the scene, Gertrude (actor) essentially feels Gibson up (need a less colloquial way of saying that), and Gibson allows it. Although Shakespeare never says it, it is just nonsensical for hamlet to be okay with his incestuous and betraying mother to fondle him, especially while he is so dejected and mournful. Maybe he accepts her touching because he is too sad to refuse, but that does not make up for the fury and moral repulsion his acting lacks. Mel Gibson’s portrayal of Hamlet (in Act I Scene II) brings Hamlet’s sorrow to life. But, in doing so, Gibson ignored Hamlet’s outrage (both moral and vengeful) with his mother and his new father.

this method of posting each paragraph is very good because if something goes wrong and you lose your essay on your computer, its still safe on the internet.

first body paragraph

In the 1980 BBC version of Hamlet, Derek Jacobi directs his Hamlet (I need to look up the actor’s name) to be sarcastic and speak cacophonously, but this distracts from Hamlet’s sorrow and moral disgust. The line that illustrates this most is one that wakes up the viewer and provides the scene with some humor. Hamlet says “seems, Madame? Nay it is: I know not seems.” Hamlet (actor), in this line shouts “seems,” changes tones wildly, emphasizes the repetition of the s, n, and t sounds, and uses all possible sarcasm. Although funny, this interpretation of the line allows the viewer to see only Hamlet’s anger, and distracts (via humor) from Hamlet’s sorrow about his father’s death and his outrage over his mother’s marriage of his uncle. Not to mention, his hyperbolic sarcasm makes the point he conveys regarding his sorrow less valid. Later, Hamlet says “Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother, nor customary suits of solemn black.” Hamlet (actor)’s delivery of this line fills the ear with a cacophonous whirlwind of k’s, s’s, m’s, and n’s, as well as an overdose of sarcasm. But this is not the point of the quote. This line is meant to show Gertrude and the viewers that Hamlet’s behavior is not just an act, rather a by-product of his abject sorrow and revulsion with his uncle (and mother). Instead, all the viewer hears is Hamlet’s anger. Similarly, Hamlet (actor) turns his back to his parents, makes ADJECTIVE faces, and gives the king and queen almost no respect throughout their conversation. While it does effectively show his anger and a portion of his repugnance (as shown by his disrespect), this delivery makes the scene less about Hamlet’s grief and troubles, and more about his almost teen-like anger towards his parents. These deliveries change the meaning of act I scene II dramatically. Instead of introducing viewers to a solemn, disgusted, and angry protagonist, Jacobi provides a comically sarcastic, and vehemently angry boy.

intro paragraph (with thesis)

In making film versions of Hamlet, directors have a tricky decision to make: how to interpret the lines. This is very apparent in Act I Scene II, when Hamlet delivers consonant lines that reveal his anger, moral disgust, and sorrow. Derek Jacobi, in the 1980 BBC version of Hamlet, had Hamlet deliver his lines in an entirely sarcastic way and emphasize the consonance, which distracts viewers from Hamlet’s sorrow and disgust. In the Mel Gibson version (1990), Hamlet delivers his lines in a slow, deliberate, solemn and dejected manner; this delivery highlighted Hamlet’s sorrow and disgust, while diminishing the prevalence anger. The delivery of Hamlet’s lines in Act I Scene II directly affect the viewers’ perception of Hamlet’s anger, moral disgust, and sorrow, and thus change the meaning of the scene.

Act five

Act five was interesting. It wasn't great, but it wasn't horrible. I was wrong in my prediction, but not very wrong. I think the best part of the Act was seeing my ex-character-to-follow, Horatio, rise to the occasion and become the hero of the play. After taking in all of the stories and plots of the other characters and seeing them all kill each other in front of him, he has the composure to know how to respond to the ambassadors. And, to make it even better, he makes a good decision. He decides to carry hamlet's body out in front of the palace (as a martyred hero) and explain what happened in full detail to the ambassadors and the people of Denmark. I don't know who was next in line to become king after all of those people died, but I think it should be Horatio because he acts in a responsible, adult, and kingly manner. When Hamlet dies (before seeing the ambassadors come in) Horatio says "Now cracks a noble heart.—Good night, sweet prince,
And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!—" I thought that was awesome. I know I will be analyzing the meaning, syntax, and sounds of that sentence some time soon.
This act wasn't all sorrow and death, there was some comedy in it too. The part with Osric was funny because of the hat conversation and their exaggerated praise of Laertes. The part with the gravedigger (Kno calls him a clown) was funny too because of the singing, throwing skulls, deep assessments of life delivered by a gravedigger, and stupid sentimentality by Hamlet for the skulls.
I had one big problem with reading this act though: Kno. It glitched so much! every time I tried to turn the page it went white and then flipped back to the page I had just read. When i highlighted it often highlighted random lines in the text, and when i want to delete them Kno didnt register them as being highlighted. There are so many differences in the Kno version too! almost all of the stage directions have question marks, the lines are often cut down, and names are different which, to me, means that the Kno people don't know how to research one of the most famous plays ever. And, to make it all worse, i cant follow the links to see what the blue writing means or look up the meaning of words.
But Hamlet was great.

Thanksgiving

I assume there is no blog due tomorrow because tomorrow is thanksgiving. So, happy thanksgiving!

Post

Because I have finished act four and because I want to get the post due Wednesday out of the way and because I don't have to start reading act five until Thursday and because my character is dead I am going to blog about my predictions for the final act. Putting aside all that i know about the play, here's what I think will go down.
The king and Laertes will call hamlet to a grand hall in order to carry out their plan. Hamlet, the vengeful guy he is, will bring his sword so that he can kill the king. Hamlet, while talking with the king, will start alluding to killing his uncle in a dramatic irony sort of way (because that's what he does). He will swing at the king and miss (because that's how Shakespeare and tragedies work: the tragic hero never accomplishes his task directly). Laertes will swoop in and duel with hamlet. Meanwhile Horatio, who has been watching all along will come in and stab the king in the chest (because he's a good friend) the dying king will kill Horatio for a dose of irony. But, even more ironically, hamlet won't see this. Keep in mind, there will be eloquent conversation throughout all of this. Whole dueling, hamlet and Laertes' swords will dramatically fly away and that will switch swords. Then, hamlet will scratch Laertes with the sword that he himself poisoned (because Shakespeare loves irony and everybody has to die for this to be a true tragedy). Oh yeah, and before Laertes dies the captain guy will come in, see the dead king and be like "holy crap, that means we have the kingdom, I'm going to take his crown" but then hamlet will walk in and see all of these dead people and be sad. And then he's going to say "oh no you don't" and kill the captain and take the crown, which I think he wanted the whole time. He will then see the poison and be thirsty, drink it, and die ironically. Then Gertrude will walk in, see everybody dead, and pick up the kings sword and kill herself. This was based on the notion that shakespeare loves irony, everybody dies, and the setup provided in act four, hope this was long enough :)

Act IV

I read Act IV today. It was so good! Because my character died in the previous act, I will just summarize my favorite parts of the act. First of all, Ophelia goes nuts and says hilarious but somewhat true statements. Then, she jumps into a swamp (singing), gets tangled in the weeds (still singing), sinks, then floats up again, sings some more, and then sinks once more and drowns. I don't know why, but i found that hilarious! Laertes and the king plot a plan to kill hamlet and make it look like an accident, have laertes duel hamlet with a poison-tipped sword, and have a goblet of poison ready for hamlet to drink and have Laertes become king. Meanwhile, hamlet was sent to england but was stopped and turned around (and taken prisoner) by these soldiers who are going to meet with the king to have their promise of marching across the king's land fulfilled. Hamlet writes letters to a bunch of people saying whats going on and, in one of them, tries to set up a meeting with the king and himself (alone, or naked) so that he can kill him. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are still on their way to england, and probably won't come back. The queen is distraught but emotionally stable. She, i think, is either completely oblivious to all of the plans that have been set in motion or knows all of them and is playing naiive to protect her innocence in the matter. The whole act was a nice set up for Shakespeare to tear it all down, have everyone kill each other, and give the reader an overdose of irony.

Act three

I tried to blog this last night, but it wouldn't work.

In act three, polonius dies!!!! My character dies! Oh no!
Throughout the act he tries to intrude and keep her daughter from hamlet. When hiding in ophelias room with the queen he tries to get her to be mean to hamlet. That jerk. Polonius, the rat (hhahahahah, I'm so funny) calls for help when hamlet creates a hullabaloo, so hamlet stabs him because he thinks he's the king.  Hamlet calls dead polonius an intruding fool, and he's right. He was sort of innocent, which sucks, but he was an intruding old fool and he was only ever associated with evil and idiotic actions.

Essay

I noticed the way that the different actors tackled amd enunciated and intimated the lines. That can reveal the different meanings of each line. I like the Mel Gibson and the Laurence Olivier versions because the tones were not over the top but also revealing. I think it would be fun to analyze the different manners that the characters spoke in this scene in the different movies connotes the multiple meanings and implications of the scene, the emotions, and the motivations of the characters to use those emotions. So really, I will be analyzing the audio for deeper meaning.

Significant thing I noticed in the reading

I know it's kind of lame, but I want to talk about the first conversation of act 3. The king, rosencrantz and guildenstern have a conversation about their spying on hamlet and whether or not he seems distracted and whether he knows about the murder (the latter wasn't said, but its very possible). What's interesting about it, besides the sound devices and brilliant wording, is the dramatic irony of the situation. "Nor do we find him forward to be sounded. But with a crafty madness keeps aloof. When we would bring him on to some confession Of his true state." This is just like hamlet trying to tell for sure if the murmur occurred and get out a confession from uncle-dad. Later on they talk about schemes for getting hamlet to spill the beans of what's distracting him, which I think is hilarious because we are reminded literally the next paragraph about how hamlet plans to get a confession out of the incest king. Even though it was the first passage, it was very important.

Character in act ii of hamlet

Although I would like to write about Horatio or Marcellus, they didn't say or do anything important in act ii.

The really important character in this act was polonius. His intelligence went way up in my mind. He understood most of the meanings in what hamlet says ("how pregnant sometimes his replies are"), he came up with his own evil scheme to spy on his son and get him back home, he goes and tries to make hamlet stop loving his daughter, he has the uncle and Gertrude watch hamlet to see if he's going to do anything wild with regards to Gertrude, and he says things that aren't completely daft. On the other hand, he still rambles on randomly, he makes fun of his aging brain, others make fun of his mental incontinence, and he does things (though intelligently) that most would consider stupid. Like trying to prevent his daughter from falling in love, whet his son kicked out of school, lock his daughter up in a room, tries to get hamlet to talk to Ophelia, sets hamlet up to say dark and gloomy things, and acts in an overly-friendly way that is not to his own self true. These two sides of polonius are a foreshadow to the reader because they tell us that polonius is two-faced, we can't trust him or his morals, and his is smart when doing bad things and stupid when not. Polonius, in this act, becomes more of a character to watch, because Shakespeare is setting him up to do something bad.

Blog about one character in act I scene ii

Right from his first line, hamlet is a depressed, sarcastic, smart kinder who sees the world for what it really is and who hates his uncle-vader. He gives sass to the king and his mom, tells them that he's not just pretending to be depressed, attacks everyone he hates, und says how he wishes he would die. Then, his friends get there and he tells them the truth of his messed up life. Their conversation ist so quick and funny (for example: the whole "the king my father" dialogue). Shakespeare sets us up to like hamlet because hamlet is the man of truth, sarcasm, and humor. He is the only normal respite from all of the hyperbolic characters around him. Plus he has a funny name. In the act, hamlet doesnt do anything, he is just set up for action. this continues through most of act ii. all of this buildup is shakespeare trying to get us excited about hamlet and support him (he is the protagonist, after all). You'll notice that there some Deutsch sprinkled in and my background is now the German flag. This is because I have German viewership and am trying to increase it.

In later acts and scenes, hamlet transforms. He becomes a determined, principled man who seeks to honor his father and stop the grossness going on in his family. He becomes Amman of passionate love. And he shows his health, funny relationships with his friends. Hamlets transformation makes him more of a relatable, realistic character in whom the reader can invest. We gettinsee hamlet as a man with passion, morals, and truth; and we love him for that.

Hamlet Act 1

In act 1, there was a lot of set up. We find out that Claudius killed the king with ear poison while he was taking a nap in his garden, people think it was a snake that killed him, hamlet is called on to talk to the ghost who makes him want revenge, he makes his friends swear secrecy to what they have seen, hamlet is depressed and angry and wants to go back to school, Claudius married his sister in law a month after his brother died, Laertes and Polonius tell Ophelia not to love or talk to Hamlet, and everybody gives great speeches/ soliloquies.What i notices was the way it was written. Shakespeare managed to say what he wanted to say with the words of the characters and the tone, sound, and flow of those words. He had such control over the emotions and flow and attention, and all the while he managed to say what he needed to say. During Hamlet's parlay with the ghost, Shakespeare slowed the flow down, introduced sibilance and cacophony, and used emphatic words that made me sympathize with the king. On the next page, Hamlet's back and forth with Horatio and the other guy made me laugh because of their words, the emphasized words, and their quick, witty flow. Shakespeare had complete control over his words, and he used it well