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