Month: November 2018

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g17ziHN59tg

 

This video appealed to me most mainly because of the way it was made more so than the context. Out of all the other videos I came across when I searched up “King Lear” I saw a lot of thumbnails that displayed the olden days, which I automatically got the feeling of boring. When I saw this video, the title “Thug notes” it made me curious to click into because I was able to understand the story of King Lear in a less complicated and old fashioned way. Also, the characters in the video were cartoon made with cropped faces of King Lear and his family instead of real actors dressed up in the roles of the characters.

 

The intention of this video was to present a very old story of a father asking his daughters to prove to him which one of them loved him most so he can give his thorn to that daughter. The daughter that actually loved him the most was Cornelia, however, she did not have much to say about her love for her father other than that words cannot express how much she loved him, she was being honest which angered her father and got himself banished from his lack of reasoning.

This story was told in a street way, and informal way for a comical purpose that is very intriguing, which led to the reveal of a bad king leading to a bad civilization.

 

From the way that the narrator in the video I chose talked about King Lear, I can tell that he not only found the story amusing himself, but he also told the story in the exact tone he wanted his audience to feel. He would raise his voice when an unexpected event occurs in the story. He would also use slangs that are popular today to tell the story, which is what I love the most about this video. The creator of this video was able to pass on a famous antique story for people that do not necessarily keep up with stories or people who have trouble understanding the old language use of the original story.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwrKePAgaKI  (2:07-9:10)

 

Out of all the videos that surfaced after I searched “Don Quixote” the Review made by Kalanadi (youtuber) was very appealing after a minute in. I was very surprised to hear that Kalanadi start the video off with how little she knew about Don Quixote but she was able to read the whole book within 7 days and analyze multiple underlying themes, then to formulate a video that talked about the story in depth. Just to see the credibility of the video, I read through a lot of the comments and a lot of the commenters also applauded her for her quick and accurate findings.

Kalanadi introduces the origin of the title and the story then goes into the plot. Although her video does not include any creative cartoons or songs, she interested me with her point of view of the book. She then talks about the parts of the book she did not enjoy, which was the tragedy and repetition.

Kalanadi also uses a lot of imagery in her opinions on Don Quixote, such as chivalric romances, knights, nobles, books and goes into explaining techniques into literature where modern people would not have understood. I also learned that Cervantes used intertextuality, metafiction, metatheater. Intertextuality means the shaping of a text using another text that showed Quixote’s actions. Metafiction is to draw attention to a work as an artifact. Lastly, Metatheater is where a work has both comedy and tragedy.

My thoughts on her video is that I was able to learn Quixote is a mad man in this violent story, he was supposed to be funny by doing pranks but the pranks became physical abuse to both Quixote and Sancho when they were made to do dumb things to get laughs out of it. That was where the cruelty and tragedy came in. the second part mentions the book from Act I, which was a very new idea given the time period of the author.

I was very surprised to hear that Kalanadi start the video off with how little she knew about Don Quixote but she was able to read the whole book within 7 days and analyze multiple underlying themes, then to formulate a video that talked about the story in depth. Just to see the credibility of the video, I read through a lot of the comments and a lot of the commenters also applauded her for her quick findings.

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjkkztJkNfs

Online text: http://moglen.law.columbia.edu/LCS/bartleby.pdf  (page 7)

“In this very attitude did I sit when I called to him, rapidly stating what it was I wanted him to do—namely, to examine a small paper with me. Imagine my surprise, nay, my consternation, when without moving from his privacy, Bartleby in a singularly mild, firm voice, replied, “I would prefer not to.”

“I sat awhile in perfect silence, rallying my stunned faculties. Immediately it occurred to me that my ears had deceived me, or Bartleby had entirely misunder-stood my meaning. I repeated my request in the clearest tone I could assume. But in quite as clear a one came the previous reply, “I would prefer not to.”

“Prefer not to,” echoed I, rising in high excitement, and crossing the room with a stride. “What do you mean? Are you moon-struck? I want you to help me compare this sheet here—take it,” and I thrust it towards him.

“I would prefer not to,” said he.

I looked at him steadfastly. His face was leanly composed; his gray eye dimly calm. Not a wrinkle of agitation rippled him. Had there been the least uneasi-ness, anger, impatience or impertinence in his manner; in other words, had there been any thing ordinarily human about him, doubtless I should have violently dismissed him from the premises. But as it was, I should have as soon thought of turning my pale plaster-of-paris bust of Cicero out of doors. I stood gazing at him awhile, as he went on with his own writing, and then reseated myself at my desk. This is very strange, thought I. What had one best do? But my business hurried me. I concluded to forget the matter for the present, reserving it for my future leisure. So calling Nippers from the other room, the paper was speedily examined.” (page 7)

Instead of deciding the portion I wanted to choose base off the book, I found it more meaningful to find out what videos were made so I can see how differently my interpretation of the text was with other people who read the book. After realizing I had the same opinions and picture as the person who made this video that I came across, the video really stood out to me and so I chose this portion of the text also because it was so early on in the story when the demonstration of the character’s personalities started to show. Although I really appreciate how the book starts off by introducing the setting and characters and their traits, instead of jumping straight into the story and readers had to infer for themselves the story line, the first incident where readers can really make sense of what the introduction meant was when the old advocate needed some help with understanding some documents and he turned to the new Bartleby for help. When he first asked Bartleby to examine the documents, Bartleby replied “ I would prefer not to” and it was shocking to the advocate because Bartleby replied with such a straight face not bothered or distracted from his own work. This part was especially surprising to me how Bartedly had the audacity to reject a favor as soon as he was welcomed into business. I gained respect for him in a way where he knows when to say no when not to be taken advantage of but at the same time he’s very disrespectful given the situation in that he doesn’t have a choice to say no to his advocate. Atlast, the advocate had to ask another character, Nippers, who is another young scrivener to help him look at the papers and Nippers is at his service without any hesitation.

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jLAVT91JHPw

Article: https://iwp.uiowa.edu/whitmanweb/en/writings/song-of-myself/section-16

 

Out of the 52 stanzas in Song of Myself by Walt Whitman, stanza 16 had really caught my attention because it relates to me on a very similar level. “I am of old and young, of the foolish as much as the wise…maternal as well as paternal, a child as well as a man, stuff’d with the stuff that is coarse and stuff’d with the stuff that is fine…” Whitman describes his fittings to a specific group in society, just to mention he also is the opposite. He does this throughout the entire poem, and it makes me realize it isn’t wrong that a person can belong to multiple groups.

As I was reading this poem, the serious mood also reminds me that sometimes I feel as if I were young too, only compared to a group of people more sophisticated and older than I was. I can also appear old or act as a role model to those younger than me. I am feel like I can reason things and chose the better decision compared to someone very unexperienced in a certain field, however my choices may not be the most ideal in the point of view of someone wiser than I am. Who I am, and who I view myself can vary depending on my surroundings, and I think that’s exactly what this poem is trying to portray to readers. Finding your own identity is almost impossible given the constant changes life has to offer you, so it’s crucial that as a human,  we need to learn how to act many different roles in different situations and change our ways, habits, thoughts in order to keep up.

After researching in depth, I realized that this poem can be interpreted in so many ways. Its main focus on plain sense of identity made me question whether if this poem was written to express the author’s feelings about himself, direct it to those that lose themselves, or is talking about someone close to him. In my opinion, this poem was written to describe the author himself in which he feels many can relate to, I am one of them, and that is why I love this poem so much.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_E9aOuf6eI8 (2:35-5:06)

 

The story, The Metamorphosis, written by Franz Kafka is about a family who depends on Gregor, the son and the brother to make money being a business traveler. Gregor is a very pressured and unappreciated person, which forces him to live day by day being miserable. One day, he wakes up to see that he has transformed into an insect. With this new realization, he doesn’t think too much of it and decides to go back to sleep. However, this conflict does not go away, in fact, it made his family disgusted of him, his tenants to move out without paying rent, and his manager to run away at the sight of his form. Gregor’s family no longer counts on him for anything, and soon decides that life would be better is he just disappears.

I can’t believe how Gregor’s family relationships are because even though they stay together, they don’t give each other purpose or love, they only see each other as means for survival. This leads into the theme of alienation. Once Gregor turned into an insect, not even his family was willing to accept him. People are naturally so unaccepting, which can be very relatable to reality where everyone comes from a different background or is not that blessed. This story brought light onto this sad truth where we live in, and the video that I chose gave an insight on the authors actual feelings for why he wrote this story, which made the story stand out more to me to learn about the author’s life through this video.

According to the video, “I have to deal with the problems of traveling, the worries about train connections, irregular bad food, temporary and constantly changing human relationships which never come from the heart. To hell with it all” Kafka said this about himself how his life is on a bad routine most the time with the ever changing poor relationships he has with people. This part of him can be seen in every part of The Metamorphosis when Gregor misses the the train, gets fed food that doesn’t appeal to him by his sister, Grete, and of course the new isolation he developed after becoming an insect.

Overall, it was very interesting to use an insect to send a message of isolation. Perhaps, Gregor did not turn into an insect, his loneliness made him feel like he did not belong and in his head, becoming an insect was made real to him to make him feel better about why everyone has been so cruel to him.