Learning Outcomes Revisited

Dr. Burton asked that we provide a summary of our work this semester in connection with the expected course outcomes that were discussed at the beginning of the semester. Here it is.

1. Gain “Shakespeare Literacy.”
   Objective: Demonstrate mastery over fundamental information about Shakespeare’s works, life, and legacy.
• Breadth: This is the area that I feel I fulfilled least this semester. The course required reading some texts that I hadn't before (Love's Labour's Lost, ) so I did expand the breadth of my own Shakespeare Literacy to some extent. But I have to admit that these additional texts were not my focus so I read through them quickly or incompletely and feel like I probably did not fully appreciate them.
• Depth: I focused on The Tempest this semester. I had already read the play before the class but my inclusion of Jungian theory in the study of The Tempest added greatly to my knowledge of the play.
• Performance: I did not fully meet all of the requirements for this learning objective. I did find BYU's performance of Love's Labour's Lost an interesting experience. I had a hard time embracing the change in setting that BYU's adaption used but I particularly enjoyed a couple of the actor's performances. I feel like watching that play introduced me to some ideas about the complicated process of adaption that I had not considered.
• Legacy: I felt like I did learn a lot in this regard, mostly through my own research and discussing my brother's research with him. My research focused on the relevancy of Shakespeare's works in contemporary film and Josh's research focused on Shakespeare's adaptation of works that preceded him.
2. Analyze Shakespeare Critically
   Objective: Interpret Shakespeare’s works critically in their written form, in performance (stage or screen) and in digitally mediated transformations. This includes:
• Textual analysis: My research on archetypes in The Tempest helped me understand how Shakespeare utilized specific formal elements to produce powerful works. I looked specifically and imagery and setting in the play and how the play contains significant archetypal imagery that still resonates with us today.
• Contextual analysis: As noted above in the section on Legacy, I felt like I learned a great deal this semester regarding context. I hadn't considered Shakespeare as an adapter of previous works and that linked directly to my own research on Shakespeare and his relevance in contemporary society.
• Application of literary theories: I focused on the application of C.G Jung's theory to Shakespeare and specifically The Tempest. I found this approach very worthwhile.
• Analysis of digital mediations: Our primary focus this semester was Shakespeare and digital mediums. Our final project dealt with the adaptation of academic works to more digitally appropriate mediums and all of our examples focused on Shakespeare.
3. Engage Shakespeare Creatively
• Performance: In addition to watching Shakespeare adaptions on stage and screen, I also had the chance to create some small projects that may be considered performances. Our 90 second trailers aren't necessarily creative in the same way these other works are but I did feel that creating the 90 second trailer in the TED format did require some level of performance.
• Individual creative work: Josh and I worked together on this project. In addition to finding and bringing together various creative projects by other people we also did some of our own. My favorite was our short xtranormal video in which two characters engage in a discussion on Shakespeare.
• Collaborative creative project: As a class we worked on creating 90 second trailers that could be displayed along with our other larger works all in one Prezi presentation.
4. Share Shakespeare Meaningfully This includes engaging in the following:
• Formal Writing: I really enjoyed the research I did for my paper this semester. My final draft can be accessed here.
• Informal Writing:  While I don't think that I completed 100% of the blog post assignments, I did do a good job of consistently posting about my experience throughout the semester. It was beneficial to have to take the time to write about what I was learning consistently rather than just at the end of the semester.
• Connecting: In addition to my work with Josh I ended up collaborating quite a bit with Ellie. I also feel that as a class we did a good job of sharing our work with each other and I know that I personally received some helpful feedback from other students.
5. Gain Digital Literacy
   Students use their study of Shakespeare as a way of understanding and developing fluency in 21st century learning skills and computer-mediated modes of communication. Those skills are grouped under the following categories.
1. Consume - I spent more time exploring online than I ever have in any other semester. I enjoyed many of the links that classmates found and thought it was really beneficial to better understand additional resources.
2. Create - We created a lot this semester. The best representation of this is our final project that essentially brought all of this little projects together: http://digitalacademia.blogspot.com/
3. Connect - I connected quite a bit with students within our class. I also connected with Dr. Lundquist about my research paper and her help was extremely important to my paper. I had a hard time connecting with those outside of our campus, however. My Tweethis did not yield any meaningful results. I did make a really meaningful connection with a professor at Northwestern University regarding my Video Essay project but because I didn't end up incorporating the video essay directly into my final project for the class, that connection ended up being less relevant to the class.

Repurposed Content

My brother Josh and I worked together on our final project. Both of our research dealt with the adaptation of Shakespeare's works so we decided to focus on adaptation for the repurposed content. We created a new blog that charts much of what we've been doing as a class this semester so far as it relates to adapting elements of the traditional academic process into more audience friendly mediums. You can check that blog out here:

http://digitalacademia.blogspot.com/

New Tweethis

The visual quality of the archetypal symbolism found in Shakespeare's plays offers one reason why Shakespeare is so often adapted into film. There is an extra power when the written text is transformed into the audio and visual medium of film. This process has application to academia as well and early attempts at moving beyond the traditional research paper are proving that the text might not be the ideal end product of academic research.

Final Trailer

Here is the final version of the 90 second trailer. Josh and I decided to do our trailers separately but we stuck to the same format we followed on our last one.

Audience Research

Because both Josh and I wrote papers that dealt with the idea of adaptation, and specifically film adaptation, we've been looking into alternatives to the typical research paper that involve adapting that traditional form into a video medium. Dr. Burton pointed us to one interesting source called "Dance your PhD". Essentially it is a contest for PhD students to produce a video of their science based research as some sort of interpretative dance (the link includes this year's winner and a more thorough explanation of the contest).
Another interesting place we found is simply titled Video Essays. I came across this as part of my work on the video essay project mentioned in an earlier post that involved making short films from personal essays. These video essays are more academic so it is more applicable to our focus but I was unable to find any information about who brought them all together and what their reasoning was.
On a related, but slightly less applicable note, we found a story on NPR that talked about high school seniors that are using video essays to apply to colleges. It doesn't exactly apply to our focus of exploring alternatives to the traditional research paper but I thought it was relevant to our discussion to see another example of the medium of film being applied in new ways.

Second Draft of Paper Intro Video

My brother and I have been discussing a slightly different approach to the "video trailer" for our research papers. We are both big fans of TED and thought it might be interesting to take that approach. TED has become increasingly popular and their tag line, "Ideas Worth Spreading" seemed to apply to what we're doing in our class. Also, just as TED talks are abbreviated versions of people's larger bodies of work (books, extensive studies, etc), our intro videos are abbreviated versions of our 10 page research papers.

This is a pretty rough draft but we think it is an approach that might be worth considering as a class. If each student prepared a 90 second presentation on their paper and presented in an auditorium setting we could place those videos all together on one webpage and then include links to the individual papers.

Love's Labor's Lost Response

We've been studying Love's Labor's Lost as a class and were assigned to attend BYU's production of the play. I am not a regular play goer so my opinions regarding the play aren't really informed by much. In other words, take this all for what it's worth.
The play is an adaptation of Shakespeare's original work, the most fundamental change being the setting. BYU's production set the play in the 1940s at an Allied Forces Canteen. The dialogue, however, was left untouched. Now I realize that this is a fairly common convention with Shakespeare adaptations but for this play it ended up just being distracting to me. Everything we were seeing was 1940's war era but everything we were hearing was Elizabethan English. Maybe I'm just not accustomed to this convention, that's very possible. But it didn't work for me.
That being said, I think most of the acting was really well done. I thought the guy who played Costard was really entertaining. In this adaptation, Costard is a sailor but he is plenty goofy and pretty funny.

Market Research: The Video Essay

As mentioned in previous posts, I have been working on developing the "video essay" for about a year and a half now. Although I always assumed someone else, somewhere else, was trying similar things, I hadn't found anything else out there. Until last week.

Dr. Pat Madden has been working as my mentor on this project and in a conversation with him last week he mentioned knowing something about a guy named John Bresland doing something similar. We looked him up and found that he has a website with a number video essays on it.

In addition to the videos, there was a link to an essay he wrote called, "On the Origin of the Video Essay" that was published in 2010 and explains the new genre. As I read it I couldn't believe how closely his thinking matched my own. Although I will admit I kind of liked the idea of being something of a pioneer with this new genre, I was really excited to see that he had already done so much with the same idea. In his short bio on the page it says that in 2013, the University of Chicago Press will be publishing a book, Crafting the Video Essay, co-authored by Bresland and Marilyn Freeman. The bio also mentions that he has had video essays published through Ninth Letter, Blackbird, and Fourth Genre which is great news because until now I wasn't aware of any literary journals that accepted video essay submissions.

Draft of Collaborative Video

Because my brother Josh and I have decided to work together on our creative project we also decided to work together on the video introduction we are doing as a class. It was a bit of a struggle for us but we at least got a rough draft completed.

A Briefer Explanation of My Idea

I discussed this idea in this post but my explanation became so long that I felt like the heart of it got buried. Plus, I didn't initially include links. So again, very briefly, I am looking at taking my research paper and making a short film from it. In order to do this well I plan on first changing the research paper into a more entertaining medium (a personal essay) and then adapting that into a video essay.

In other words: Academic Essay --> Personal Essay --> Video Essay.

I already have experience going from Step 1 to Step 2 with one essay and from Step 2 to Step 3* with another so now the challenge is going through all 3 steps with a single essay.

*This is a temporary link until it is up on BYU's site

Brainstorming with My Peeps

Josh and Cortnie both wrote on topics that overlapped mine so I read through their papers to not only get some ideas for my own ongoing project but also to hopefully be able to help them with theirs. I left comments on each of their posts (they can be accessed through the links provided above) but have copy and pasted them here as well:

Josh:
I'm thinking we should collaborate on the next phase of this project. As I was reading through your paper I just kept thinking that so much of your argument would back mine up and vice versa. I'm thinking that I'm going to try to go the academic essay --> personal essay --> video essay route that I explained in my post. I think we could do that together by combining ideas from both of our academic essays into one personal essay that could then be turned into a video essay. It will take some work but let's get brainstorming.

Cortnie:

You mentioned that the idea of creating your own piece of fanfiction for Shakespeare was silly and I disagree. To me that seems like a very fitting direction to take this. In your paper you argue for fanfiction's relevance and I can't think of a better way to back up your claims than to create some Shakespeare fanfiction and then maybe include some commentary on the ways that it has opened the original work up to you. It seems you were talking about fanfiction as a sort of stepping stone to professional adaptations and/or academic responses and I think it would be cool to see you go through that process and document it along the way. Maybe you could include a running commentary with your fanfiction piece that explains the new insights you are gaining about the play.

Final Draft and Beyond

I finally completed my research paper (which can be accessed through this link). I met with Dr. Burton to discuss the paper but also to consider potential for adapting this paper into a different medium in order to make an impact on a desired audience. Because my paper dealt directly with the power of film as a narrative medium we brainstormed briefly on ways to incorporate the ideas in my paper into a medium that would utilize some of those same audio and visual components. In a sense you could say we discussed the possibilities of adapting my research paper into some sort of short film or other visual medium. While it may initially seem like a big leap to consider adapting an academic paper into this type of medium (without just putting everyone who might watch it to sleep), I realized that some of my past and current experience may already be narrowing that gap.

Last semester I took a Lit Theory course from Dr. Billy Hall. For my final paper I decided to argue against Hegel's end of art thesis by claiming that the personal essay serves as an example of how art still fulfills the need in society that Hegel claimed we had moved away from. I was struggling to write the paper in a way that I was satisfied with and after some discussion with Dr. Hall he suggested that instead of writing the paper in the traditional academic mode, I instead write a creative nonfiction piece to make my point--in other words, he allowed me to write a personal essay to defend the personal essay against Hegel's argument. In many ways this was more difficult than the traditional approach because he still required that I include the same level of research and analysis of Hegel's theories. It took some work to incorporate such dense subject matter in a conversational and engaging voice (You can read it and decide if I pulled it off). After talking with Dr. Burton I realized that this experience may work as something of a stepping stone to a project I am currently working on.

I am working with Pat Madden (a very accomplished essayist who teaches here at BYU) on taking short creative nonfiction pieces and making short film versions of them. We recently received an ORCA grant to help fund the project and have teamed up with Inscape (BYU's creative writing journal) as a publication venue so I am really excited about it. The basic idea fueling the project is that adding images and music to a narrated version of the essay allows for a more powerful experience than simply reading the text can offer. I have created two of these "video essays" and, as is the case with any experiment, the experience has been interesting, frustrating and extremely educational. (both videos will be published through Inscape in the next couple weeks so I will also include links to those)

I still don't know exactly how it would all work out but I guess the gap between academic essay and short film isn't as big as I originally thought. I plan on looking into ways to first transform my paper into a creative nonfiction piece and then move from there to considering how to make it into a video essay. One of the major things I've learned from making the first two videos is that brevity is crucial. The second video is based on an essay that is about 1700 words long and even after cutting major pieces of text the video is eight minutes long. I'd say the target word range is around 1000 words which equates roughly to four double spaced pages. So getting from a ten page research paper to a four page personal essay without losing essential ideas is going to be a challenge. And then making that into a video essay is when the real challenges start.

Another Round of Social Proof

I had a really hard time figuring how to structure my argument for this paper and ended up writing three completely different versions of the first couple pages. The basic question I was hoping to answer--why is Shakespeare still so relevant in contemporary film?--stayed the same but my approach in answering that question varied quite a bit in each of these drafts.

For my final draft I decided to incorporate a comparison with Christopher Nolan's film Inception. That film deals with many of the same Jungian concepts I was already planning on addressing in my argument so it wasn't as radical a change as it might seem.

I spoke with Ellie and Josh (who are both in our class) about my new approach and proposed outline and they both gave me really good feedback. It was nice to get their opinion because I have discussed my paper from the beginning with each of them so they had a good idea of the full development of my idea.

In addition, I thought it would be helpful to get some feedback from someone who hadn't seen any of my previous attempts. I work at BYU's Writing Center so I brought in my first couple pages and got feedback from a few of my fellow tutors. This was extremely helpful because they all expressed interest in the topic and said they thought it was a great approach. It was nice to get a last vote of confidence from multiple people before I spent hours writing the full draft of the paper.

Tweethis Statement

I sent my thesis out into the Twitter and Facebook universes as a Tweethis statement. It took some work to cut my thesis down to 140 characters and what I came up with was a little vague but I hoped it would at least spark some interest. I think I may have failed because I didn't get a whole lot of helpful feedback. This is what I came up with for my Tweethis:

A Jungian approach to The Tempest explains why Shakespeare still matters in popular culture #Shakespeare #Jung

I received only one response via Twitter, which simply said, "Prove it." So, not very helpful.

I had more success on Facebook. But only in terms of number of responses. Only two of them really even responded to the thesis -- one saying it was vague yet intriguing and another saying essentially the same thing but in a lot more words. All of the other responses fell somewhere between friendly insults, one question as to why I was doing homework on a weekend, and one link to a clip from Billy Madison that features this line: "What you just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I've ever heard... everyone is now dumber for having heard it."

Needless to say, my experience with the Tweethis statement was not an extremely helpful one. In hindsight, I would have expanded my Tweethis for the Facebook post or at least provided more background. My full Facebook post read like this:

One of my professors has asked that we post an abbreviated version of our thesis for the Shakespeare paper we are writing. I know it's Saturday and this is Facebook but if you have any thoughts, let me know. Here it is: A Jungian approach to the The Tempest explains why Shakespeare still matters in popular culture.


Twitter's 140 character limit keeps things pretty restricted but Facebook doesn't have that limit so I probably should have given a little more detail on Jungian theory and some specifics on how I feel Shakespeare is still relevant in popular culture to help encourage discussion.

Draft of Introductory Paragraph and Thesis

Well I still have a long way to go but here's a start to my paper. I usually take a lot longer working on my introduction than on any other aspect of the paper so at least I've moved past that hurdle. I'd be interested to hear any feedback -- is it clear, is it interesting?

Follow this link to take a look.

Phase Two Progress Report

This week I have been working on the second phase of my research paper. This phase consists of four components:

1 - Performance Analysis

2 - Annotated Bibliography

3 - Digital Media and Online Resources

4 - Social Proof

1 - Performance Analysis

Because my research and thesis deals partly with the relevance of The Tempest in contemporary pop culture I decided to view the 2010 film adaptation of the play.

I was planning on watching it this weekend but have had a harder time tracking it down than I thought I would. I thought I would be able to get it through Redbox or Netflix but it looks like I am going to have to purchase a copy so I am going to see if I can't pick it up locally. Otherwise, I'm going to have to buy it through Amazon with express shipping. I will include a performance analysis next week with my phase three report.

2 - Annotated Bibliography

I struggled to find a specific focus to write about so my research process hasn't been very efficient thus far. I knew I wanted to write about The Tempest and incorporate Jungian theory so I have used many of the common resources (Google Scholar, JSTOR, Project Muse, etc.) to see what has already been said. My efforts for social proof, as discussed in this post, have also helped me to narrow my topic. Throughout the process I have arrived at this thesis:

A Jungian approach to Shakespeare's The Tempest not only offers insight into the psyche of Shakespeare himself but also helps to explain why his works continue to maintain relevance in today's popular culture.

Some important sources:

Benzon, William L. "At the Edge of the Modern, or Why is Prospero Shakespeare’s Greatest Creation?” Journal of Social and Evolutionary Systems 21(3): 259-279. 1998.

--Benzon considers The Tempest within the context of Shakespeare's entire body of plays to make connections between Prospero and the playwright's psyche. Although Benzon's specific focus on Prospero varies from my thesis, his argument is closely related to my own and the article has served as a good jumping off point. I found this article through a Google Scholar search and a PDF version can be accessed online.

Driscoll, James P. Identity in Shakespearean Drama. Lewisburg: Bucknell UP, 1983. Print.

--Driscoll uses a Jungian lens to investigate concepts of identity in Shakespeare's works. This will be an important source for my argument as I am trying to investigate similar notions within The Tempest specifically. I came across this book through BYU's library website and then checked out a print copy from the library.

MacLean, Kenneth. "Wild Man and Savage Believer: Caliban in Shakespeare and Browning." Victorian Poetry. 25.1 (1987): 1-16. JSTOR. Web. 17 Feb. 2012.

--MacLean's article provides a Jungian comparison between Shakespeare and Robert Browning by looking at the wildman/savage archetype. While my paper has nothing to do with Robert Browning, MacLean's discussion on Caliban as a Jungian shadow symbol is directly relevant to my paper. I found this article through JSTOR.


Murphy, Andrew. A Concise Companion to Shakespeare and the Text. Malden, MA: Blackwell Pub., 2007. Print.
--This monograph is compromised of eleven articles which are divided into three general categories: histories of the books, theories of editing, and practicalities. The first category will probably be the only helpful one for my specific argument as it will provide me with some context for considering Shakespeare as a person. I found this book in the Harold B. Lee Library here at BYU while I was searching for the Driscoll book listed above.

The Wisdom of the Dream: Vol. 3, A World of Dreams. Dir. Stephen 

Segaller. Public Media Inc. 1989. VHS.

--This video is part three of a documentary on C.G. Jung's theories on dreams. The video is just short of an hour long but the first twenty minutes were the most beneficial for my research. In that first twenty minutes the concepts of imagination and creativity are discussed as well as the role of film. Both of those aspects are relevant to my paper. I obtained this video through Dr. Lundquist (see social proof below), she was kind enough to lend it to me.

3 - Digital Media and Online Resources
Jungian Society for Scholarly Studies, The International Association for Jungian Studies, "Shakespeare" by Another Name, "At the Edge of the Modern, or Why is Prospero Shakespeare's Greatest Creation?"


4 - Social Proof

My attempts at social proof have helped me to narrow my focus as well as leading me to a lot of the research sources I have posted. The first, most basic, form of social proof has come through informal discussion with classmates. My brother Josh is in the class and he and we have spent a decent amount of time bouncing ideas off each other as we've been going about this process. He's given me some good feedback and just the attempt to articulate your ideas to someone else can be very helpful.

I've also gotten a lot of help from Ellie in our class. She is also incorporating Jungian theory into her paper so some of our research has overlapped. She led me to a couple online resources as well as one very helpful book.

In addition to classmates I reached out to Dr. Suzanne Lundquist. She is a professor here at BYU who regularly teaches courses on C. G. Jung. She was nice enough to take about 20 minutes talking through some of my ideas with me. She suggested a few different sources to look into and let me borrow a video about Jung's theories on dreams that has been helpful.

Possible Thesis

I'm to the point now that I've gathered a good amount of research and need to start making sense of it all. The easiest way for me to do that is to establish a thesis statement so that I have a clear focus in mind as I begin wading through all these sources I've accumulated. I'm still open to adjusting my thesis at this point in the process but establishing some sense of clarity helps me overcome that overwhelming feeling that is easy to experience with a research paper.

As of now my thesis is as follows:

A Jungian approach to Shakespeare's The Tempest not only offers insight into the psyche of Shakespeare himself but also helps to explain why his works continue to maintain relevance in today's popular culture.

I would love any feedback. Let me know what you think.

Reminder: Why This All Matters

We're all in up to our eyes in Shakespeare research and it can be easy to wonder if it's worth all the effort. This was a nice reminder of the real reasons we do this.

Keep working hard and one day soon you will be offered ALL THE JOBS!

Image courtesy forlackofabettercomic.com

Phase One Progress Report

As part the Shakespeare research paper for English 382 I am required to document my research and writing process. According to the assignment instructions, here are the components I must include. Any requirements that have been met include a link to a post(s) that document my efforts for that component and any specific plans for components that I have yet to complete are explained:

Phase 1

Exploration - I began my process with this general idea. That idea led me to an interesting article that I mentioned in this post, and that article led me to consider some aspects of Jungian theory, as mentioned in my post, "Jungian Perspective on Prospero/Shakespeare"

Textual Analysis - The bulk of my time has been focused on finding secondary sources and social proof but textual analysis of The Tempest is going to be a crucial aspect of my paper. One example that I have already considered comes from Act V, when Prospero states, "this thing of darkness, I Acknowledge mine.

" Jung expounds the significance of this type of acknowledgment, explaining: "One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious."
 Another element of the text I plan on delving into is the setting of the play. Water, particularly the ocean, is a common symbol of the unconscious in the psyche so Shakespeare's choice of an island is relevant to my analytic approach to the text.

Social Proof (finding) - Because my topic involves Jungian theory and I'm currently taking a class on that subject I decided to begin looking for social proof both through some classmates in that class and the instructor of that class, Dr. Suzanne Lundquist. I still plan on pursuing other sources of social proof outside of BYU.

Phase 2

Performance Analysis - Yet to come

Annotated Bibliography - Yet to come

Digital media and online resources - Jungian Society for Scholarly Studies, The International Association for Jungian Studies, "Shakespeare" by Another Name, "At the Edge of the Modern, or Why is Prospero Shakespeare's Greatest Creation?", and more to come...

Social Proof (contacting) - Ellie is also in Dr. Lundquist's class and is researching Jungian connections with Hamlet.  Speaking with her was very beneficial and led me to a couple of the sources listed above. My conversation with Dr. Lundquist is summarized in this post. And more to come...

Phase 3 (Specifics soon to come)

"Tweethis" statement

Posted draft with peer interaction

Evaluation of a peer's draft

Discussion with Dr. Lundquist

Dr. Suzanne Lundquist was kind enough to spend some time discussing some of my ideas about Jungian connections with The Tempest. My original plan was to analyze Prospero (and specifically his androgynous characteristics) through the Jungian conceptions of gender and individuation in an effort to say something (I'm not sure what specifically I want to say) about Shakespeare himself.

Dr. Lundquist pointed out that, in addition to just Prospero, other elements of the play could be viewed as elements of Shakespeare's psyche. She mentioned briefly that characters like Ariel, Caliban, Miranda or even the setting of the play itself could offer a lot of interesting possibilities for connection to Shakespeare's psyche. I was focusing on equating Prospero with Shakespeare so I hadn't considered these other possibilities. I was glad I met with her because in addition to providing some new avenues to explore she also provided the type of positive reinforcement that I think is a big part of the value of the social proof phase of this paper.

Jungian Perspective on Prospero/Shakespeare

I am currently taking a class on C. G. Jung and Popular Culture from Dr. Suzanne Lundquist and while researching for my Shakespeare paper I realized a connection between Jungian theory and an article I found on The Tempest.

I posted the abstract from an article by William Benzon last week. In that article he argues ways that Shakespeare's works (specifically The Tempest) provide insight into the psyche of William Shakespeare himself. Jung was a psychoanalyst and much of his theory deals with the idea of individuation - or the need to come to wholeness as individuals and as cultures. Jung sees the psyche as a conscious-unconscious whole made up of opposite characteristics with a compensatory relationship. With that in mind I read this in Benzon's article:

“Prospero is a reflection of the fact that, by this time in his life, Shakespeare had, within himself, significantly transcended the division of experience into male and female.  He had, at last, become comfortable with feminine aspects of himself.” (from, “At the Edge of the Modern, or Why is Prospero Shakespeare’s Greatest Creation?” by William L. Benzon, Published in: Journal of Social and Evolutionary Systems 21(3): 259-279., 1998)

 That brought to mind this selection from Jolande Jacobi's book on Jungian theory:

“Only a few of the very greatest artists are able to broaden and develop their personality and their work in equal degree. Only a very few have the strength to carry the work within and the work without to like perfection.” (from, “The Psychology of C. G. Jung,” p. 26, by Jolande Jocobi, Yale University Press, 1973)

You'd have some pretty good ground to stand on in arguing that Shakespeare is one of the "very greatest artists" so I think Benzon's claim lines up pretty nicely with this piece of Jungian theory. Psychoanalysis has kind of become passé in literary criticism but seems to be alive and well within popular culture so I hope to make an interesting connection here with the continuing relevance of Shakespeare's writing.

In an effort to gather "social proof" for this specific idea I want to do a couple things locally. First, I plan on discussing the idea with Dr. Lundquist. Second, a couple of our classmates are also in Lundquist's class with me so I want to bounce the idea off of them as well. After that I intend to reach beyond BYU's campus through some of the options Dr. Burton provided in his post.

Epiphany

It may be dramatic to call this an epiphany but I did realize something about my experience with Shakespeare while discussing some of the pros and cons of the audio versions and graphic novels of Hamlet. One of the pros we discussed is the way in which these two mediums make it easier to distinguish between characters and perhaps more fully experience their development. It is easy, when reading the text alone, to project an identical mood over all the dialogue which makes the characters blend together.
I think that might be one reason I haven't ever really enjoyed Shakespeare. For me, literature is all about characters and I've never really been crazy about any of Shakespeare's characters. I've long recognized that this was probably my fault and not "The Bard's," and this discussion gave me some insight into why I've been having problems. Until now I've only ever read Shakespeare's plays (and seen some pieces of film adaptations or watched one or two amateur theatrical productions) and I think that has kept me from fully understanding or appreciating his characters.
As I said, I realize this is more my problem than Shakespeare's and there are some drawbacks to these mediums as well* so I don't plan on abandoning original texts in the future. Instead, this has gotten me thinking about approaches to an original text that will help me better follow and appreciate Shakespeare's characters. One that came to mind is the character guide at the beginning of the Baron's graphic novel version. It more or less looks like a page from a high school yearbook but with illustrations of the main characters from Hamlet. This reminded me of Mallory's homemade version of the same idea that she used for the Merchant of Venice. I plan on making my own for the next play I read and if it doesn't suck too bad I'll remember to post it on here.

*One of the potential drawbacks we discussed in class is being annoyed by the narrator(s) of an audio version. That brought an episode of Seinfeld to mind -- George loves audiobooks because he doesn't like the sound of his own voice in his head. He has to read a book on Risk Management for work and finally finds an audio version but the narrator's voice sounds exactly like his. Here's a "highlight reel" of the episode.

Audible Version of Hamlet

I've finished listening to Act I of Hamlet and have to admit I've been pleasantly surprised. I was not looking forward to approaching the text this way but I have seen some benefit already. The biggest advantage I have found comes through character development. It is much easier for me to get a "feel" for the characters and distinguish between them when I hear them performed. It usually takes me a while to develop a clear mental picture of a character with the text alone but the audio version allowed me to do that much more quickly. I've been listening to the version through Audible with the commentary and some of that commentary has been helpful but I'm not going to finish the play with it. Not only do I not have 11+ hours to dedicate to listening to the play but I found a lot of the commentary distracting and unnecessary. The positive aspects of the commentary were outweighed by the negative for me. I've also found it helpful to follow along with the text in front of me while listening. Even though it takes longer than just reading silently, I find that I am more engaged and spend larger chunks of time reading/listening than if I have the text alone.

All that Glisters?

I'm assuming we've all heard the phrase, "all that glitters is not gold." At this point I can't say that I was surprised to read it in one of Shakespeare's plays but I was curious if this phrase in The Merchant of Venice (Act II Scene VII) was a Shakespearean original or if he borrowed the phrase. (Especially because the line immediately following the phrase reads, "often have you heard that told.")
According to The Phrase Finder this is one that Shakespeare borrowed. It also says that the original text read, "all that glisters is not gold." It cites a few examples of the idea being expressed in literature pre-dating The Merchant of Venice:

-The 12th century French theologian Alain de Lille wrote "Do not hold everything gold that shines like gold".

-In 1553, we have Thomas Becon, in The relikes of Rome: "All is not golde that glistereth."

-George Turberville, in Tragical tales, (and other poems), 1587, wrote that "All is not gold that glistringly appeere."

I was also interested by the name "Shylock" in the play. In the 2005 movie Be Cool John Travolta plays a mobster-turned-movie producer named Chili Palmer and various times throughout the movie it is questioned whether or not he is/was a shylock. I didn't know what that meant when I saw the movie but I when I started into The Merchant of Venice and found that one of the main characters was named Shylock I was curious. I went to the most legitimate source of knowledge I could think of, Urban Dictionary, and found that "shylock" has come to be used as a term meaning, "a mafia loan money collector."

Shakespeare = Prospero #1

After some initial research I have a nice little list of sources to begin studying more thoroughly. One source seems pretty interesting so far: "At the Edge of the Modern, or Why is Prospero Shakespeare's Greatest Creation," by William Benzon (Journal of Social and Evolutionary Systems, Vol. 21 No. 3, pp. 259-279, 1998) 

Here is a piece of the abstract:

"By looking at his career through modern studies of adult development, we can see that the shift from one genre to another follows the reorganization of Shakespeare's psyche. The ultimate fruit of that development is Shakespeare's final play, The Tempest, whose protagonist, Prospero, has managed to integrate those aspects of himself which had been in conflict in earlier plays. If we then place Shakespeare's career in a broader psycho-historical context we can see how he helped make the modern nuclear family psychologically possible."

It looks like Benzon attempts to chart the development of Shakespeare's psyche throughout his career through an analysis of his characters. The full article is available through the link above. I'm still in search mode so I haven't read the full article yet but it looks like an interesting approach and one that should help me with my focus.

Research Idea

After a healthy dose of procrastination I am now embarking on some real academic research. I was really interested by the idea of Shakespeare writing himself into The Tempest as Prospero and possible connections with JD Salinger and The Catcher in the Rye. (My early posts mentioned this connection) I don't have a definite goal in mind but that's the thread I would like to begin pulling at as I start looking into secondary sources. I am hoping this research will lead into an idea I have for a creative project for later in the semester (it's pretty nebulous right now so I'll wait to unveil it just yet). I will be posting on what I find over the next while but would love any hints, tips, suggestions, ideas along the way if anyone has them.

Once More Unto The Breach

Dr. Burton talked about some of the speeches in Henry V. I recognized the opening line of the "Once more unto the breach..." speech most immediately as being quoted in the movie Good Will Hunting (I was going to post the clip but it includes a few strong words - search for Good Will Hunting Park Bench Scene on YouTube if you want to watch it). I poked around a bit about the speeches in Henry V. First, this clip is supposedly the "most celebrated rendition" of that speech.

I also found that typing in the opening phrase of that speech into Wikipedia brings up an article about the 157th episode of Star Trek which is entitled Once More Unto the Breach.

The St. Crispin's Day speech is another of the most famous of Shakespeare's speeches from Henry V. I was unaware that this was the source of the phrase, "Band of Brothers," which pops up regularly,  especially locally -->  BYU Football

These are just a couple more examples of Shakespearean longevity.

Boring.

I am having a terribly difficult time getting through this play. I am not enjoying it. I am not at all. I've noticed I'm not the only one either. So this post is a very sincere attempt to get something, anything, from any of you to help me enjoy or at least find interest in this play. Please?

Terrific Literary Friends

Dr. Burton said something in class last time that got me thinking. He mentioned, off-handedly, about a list of questions he has for Shakespeare if he gets the chance to talk to him in the afterlife. When he said that, a quote from Catcher in the Rye came to mind (the second consecutive Salinger post is just a coincidence, I promise this isn't the only book I've ever read):

"What really knocks me out is a book, when you're all done reading it, you wished the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it."

I've read a decent amount of Shakespeare but have never wished that he were a "terrific friend" of mine and that I could call him up on the phone whenever I liked. Don't get me wrong, I would certainly answer the phone if he called me (you don't give Bill the no-answer) but I don't think he'd be on my speed dial. Salinger would. Hemingway would, especially if he's really like the way he's portrayed in Midnight in Paris, and especially if I could also get Owen Wilson on the line.

Which writers would be on your speed dial?

Prospero = Holden Caulfield?

I realize this seems like a stretch for those of you familiar with J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye. Let me explain myself.
Someone (I can't remember who) mentioned the website Shmoop. I was curious, partly because that name is so ridiculous, so I looked it up. I read through some of what it has to say about The Tempest and came across this:


"For a lot of audiences and literary scholars, Prospero seems like a stand-in in for Shakespeare, who spent a lifetime dazzling audiences before retiring in 1611, shortly after The Tempest was completed. Not only is the play chock-full of self conscious references to the workings of the theater, its epilogue seems to be a final and fond farewell to the stage."
(for the full section on The Tempest from Shmoop, follow this link:  http://www.shmoop.com/tempest/)

I'm by no means an expert on Salinger but I know enough to see a connection between the excerpt above and Salinger with his character Holden Caulfield. Many scholars read Caulfield as a "stand-in" for Salinger. He left the literary scene shortly after writing the bestselling Catcher and spent the rest of his life in relative isolation in a cabin in the Northeast U.S., which is exactly what Holden suggests doing in the book.

Now it's impossible to say whether Salinger or Shakespeare really intended those characters to be stand-ins for themselves because both writers are dead and, as far as I know, neither ever commented on it. But it is interesting to think about. 

January 6th - Experience and Personal Learning Plan

I'm an English major so my experience with Shakespeare has been largely force-fed. Maybe that's why I'm not exactly enamored with the man's writing. I recognize it's worth and influence but I have never read Shakespeare for fun and something dramatic would have to change in order for me to ever do so in the future. And that seems to place me in the minority within the English program. The approach to this class is unique enough that maybe that will change. I guess we will see.

I'm having a hard time figuring out a learning plan for this course because 1) Although I'm in my final semester as an undergrad I can't remember ever establishing a learning plan for a specific course and 2) This course is unique so I don't know quite what to expect. In some regards I feel like I'm just kind of along for the ride. I do have a couple general principles in mind that I hope will guide me along throughout "the ride" this semester.

The first is to embrace the different approach. Love it or hate it, I'm in the course so I may as well jump in with both feet. And some of this stuff sounds fun too.

The second is to try to find a way to tie course material into my passion for creative writing and specifically film. I plan on pursuing an MFA in Creative Writing after graduation and if I can find a way to incorporate my passion for creative writing within the framework of the course I will be much happier and produce something much better.