Gilgamesh is a mixture of the human and divine created by gods that gave him wisdom, physical beauty, and strength. Described as a great ruler over the city of Uruk in Southern Mesopotamia that went through many battles and journeys and never lost any of them. Gilgamesh pictures himself as a strong and immortal creature. Unfortunately, the death of Enkidu makes him vulnerable. Gilgamesh couldn’t accept the fact that his friend is dead. He couldn’t understand how such a strong warrior is vulnerable to death. He says that “the fate of the mankind has overtaken him”(Tablet 10, line 188). The death of Enkidu was a tragedy for Gilgamesh. He describes Enkidu as his friend. He felt like they had a lot in common. Enkidu was Gilgamesh greatest companion as they both went on a journey killing Humbaba.

The death of Enkidu arouses irreversible grief for Gilgamesh. He wants the entire world mourns for Enkidu. He wants “the elders of the teeming city”, “the heights of highland and mountain” to weep for him (Tablet 8, lines 9-16). His sorrorw extends to everything that surrounds him. His reaction to this significant loss is anger. He began to tear and hurl “the locks of his hair” and ripped off and threw away his clothes. Loss of Enkidu is devastating and shattering for him. Gilgamesh lost his closest friend and still denies the truth. He decides to “touch his heart, but it was not beating” (Tablet 8, line 51-52). He feels numb and troubles believing in the fact that Enkidu is dead. Shock and disbelief often accompany the loss of a person. Losing his close friend was very painful for him.

In the Pillow Book, Sei Shonagon includes series of brief essays based on observation of nature, her personal thoughts, and experiences at the imperial court. She is amused by beautiful things such as Japanese nature that in her opinion people do not give enough attention. At the same time, she is not afraid to touch on problems that people are trying to hide.

Sei Shonagon states: ” I have written in this book things I have seen and thought, in the long idle hours spent at home, without ever dreaming that others would see it.” At the end of her work, Shonagon reveals the story of how her private work was accidentally exposed to the word. She was trying to keep her personal notes in secret place, but “it has come to light.” It is obvious that the written work is the property for the reader not a writer. Even though she may allowed herself for a dream she hardly believed that her work would possibly bear comparison with many other magnificent books that exists over the time. She was writing for her own view only and wouldn’t even thought that it would become valuable for modern readers.

Most endings of a story, book, or movie all have a similar ending. It’s cliche when one dies, they all die, but when there is a strategy behind it, thats what makes it a good ending. In the ending of Hamlet all of the characters, or actors in the movie die in a strategic way that makes for a good ending. In Act V, scene II while Hamlet and Claudius are sword fighting Hamlet seems to win quite easily. The strategy behind letting Hamlet win was all for show. When Claudius offers Hamlet the poisoned goblet of wine, but Hamlet declines and keeps fighting. Once Hamlet holds the wine the queen intervenes, takes the wine, toast Hamlet, and drinks the wine, knowing through her facial expression in the movie, and the way the lines are read in the play, that she was going to be poisoned. Throughout the end of this last scene everyone dies in a fashioned order in a way that they are able to keep the play going while getting in their last words. When Hamlet is cut with the poisoned blade first he stays alive longer than Claudius who is cut second. The king too is also poisoned and dies before Hamlet dies himself.

Even though Hamlet dies last, it makes sense for him to die last. Each one of the characters die in an order that tell their own story, Hamlets mothers (The Queen) who feels like she went against Hamlet when Hamlets father died, and she moved on so quickly with Hamlets uncle. Hamlets uncle and Claudius who act out against Hamlet and try to poison him then die next. Than Hamlet who is able to show how he was wronged in the last few minutes of his life, leaving Horatio to explain Hamlets story later on.

People don’t often think of the storyline they just read or watch from start to finish and when everyone dies, everyone dies, but if you look deeper in to the meaning you can see why the author chose to act it out this way. This helps the play to make sense and to show the importance of each character.

For this blog post I decided to explore the importance of the five pillars of Islam and how examples of the five pillars of Islam are illustrated in the text. The five pillars of Islam are the foundation and framework of the lifestyle of a devoted Muslim. These pillars are 1) Shahada (testimony of faith), 2) Salah (prayer), 3) Zakat (giving to those that are less fortunate), 4) Sawm (fasting during the month of Ramadan), and lastly, 5) Hajj (Pilgrimage to Mecca).

The Quran emphasizes on the importance of how there is only ONE God and there is no other, he is above everything and everyone and has no son; this ties into Shahada, in declaring ones faith in Islam, one must understand and believe that there is only one true God. Also, when it comes to Salah, the only way that a Muslims prayer is acknowledged is when they are facing the Kaaba. The Kaaba, the central point of the pilgrimage to Mecca that takes place during “the sacred month” of the hajj, was originally established by Abraham as a place to worship the one true God, and now Muslims always face it when they pray.

In Genesis 6-9 , Noah and the Flood,  it talks about a story about the survival  of Noah from the flood. The Lord saw the evilness in the human race and decides to wipe it out.  The Lord chose Noah among any other human because the Lord favor him.  Lord said “Noah was a righteous man, he was blameless in his time”. The Genesis flood story teaches us about faith, obedience, mercy and depravity.

‘Noah’s Ark’, Franzosischer Meister ‘The French Master’, 1675

The above painting showed Noah with a beard and at a old age. He was 600 years old when the flood came. We can see that he was “all mighty” due to his posture and Noah is sending a message of the natural disaster that is approaching . As you can see some look at him with skepticism and other ignore him on his right. In the background, it shows that many men ( mainly his descendants are helping him build the ark). This always shows the the Lord created us to work with other human beings from the very beginning of life. The sky seems very gloomy as if Noah is telling the truth to his people. After the flood, Noah and the Lord made a covenant that the Lord would not ever be destroy by a flood again.

Hamlet is the main protagonist in the play” Hamlet” and the prince of Denmark. He is the most unusual and dramatic character in the play. From the first moment we see him, he is a sad son mourning in his father death. He is a man with multiple characteristics. He is a reckless, uncivil and ferocious but cautious, courteous and gentle. He is portrayed as a selfish son, who took a great outrage in his fathers’ death but didn’t take a step back to kill other people. Hamlet is full of flaws. Once his negativity took over him, he forgot to see the bright side of having friends and families supporting him.

Hamlet, who came to mourn his fathers’ death wasn’t happy to see his beloved mother getting married within a month of his fathers’ demise. He believed his mother to be loyal to his father and to the kingdom. His behavior changed drastically, when the ghost in his fatherly figure dropped a secret to him.

“ Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder.

            Tis given out that, sleeping un my orchard,

            A serpent stung me; so the whole ear of Denmark

            Is by a forged process of my death

Rankly abused: but know, thou noble youth,

The serpent that did sting thy father’s life

Now wears the crown” (P. 674, Ln35-39)

He lingers around the palace in his pale face, messy hair, and carelessly dressed. He is unable to hold the bitterness of his father’s death. He believes the serpent is his Uncle Claudius, who in lust for power staged the king’s death. Hamlet is seen mostly in black clothes as to generalize that he is till mourning his father’s death. He feels betrayed by his mother, Gertrude, when she married her brother-in-law. He was the next person to the throne. He believes he is the sole person to avenge his father’s death. It is not clear that, Hamlet acted out to revenge his father’s death or he failing to get the throne.

Hamlet becomes a lost soul. He tortures himself, wanders in the palace shouting and ignores his attachment. He even forgets his love, Ophelia and pours his bitter feelings on her. Those bitter words were meant for his mother, who betrayed his father but hamlet wasn’t in the condition to stabilize his feelings. He was grief sicken, dealing his mood swings and his mission to avenge his father’s death.

As there is a saying, if you are looking for revenge, dig two graves at a same time. This is to imply that, the feeling of revenge not only affect the other person but to the person seeking the revenge.  At the end, the act of Hamlet, not only killed Claudius but his mother, Ophelia, Laertes and himself. There was not a single person to hold the kingdom. Fortinbras, the Norwegian prince, was crowned by Hamlet before he died.

Puchner, Martin, ed. The Norton Anthology of World Literature. Vol. C. New York: W.W. Norton, 2013. Print. William Shakespeare, Hamlet

For this blogpost I have decided to answer Professor Millers discussion question of : What is the purpose of Enkidu’s string of curses in Tablet VII? Why, especially, does he curse Shamhat? For what does he blame her? (VII. 58-86 [pp129-30]) along with Gilgamesh’s death realization.

Death is a lesson Gilgamesh learned throughout his journey as it is something he would of never predicted happening to himself or Enkidu (since he is seen as a God and indestructible.) In Tablet IX line 3-14, Gilgamesh is seen to question whether death was something possible for him but death is inevitable unless you’re a God. Gilgamesh realizes this and becomes better aware of this fact when Enkidu warns him about his fight with Humbaba. Gilgamesh couldn’t even fathom death to the point where he was irked and disgusted by Enkidu’s fear of death at the end of Tablet II line 174-189. This changes later on when Enkidu does die and shows Gilgamesh that even the greatest must die one day.

As Enkidu is dying, he strings curses Shamhat the harlot in Tablet VII. He does this since he begins to realize that he as no control or power over what is coming over him. He is in dismay that death has hit him. He specifically curses Shamhat since he also realizes he has no power to harm her or even put a curse on her for her to suffer the same tragedy of death. During a persons low moments in death, they blame everyone else around them and think of the cruel things that have happened to them that have led them to this point in their lives. Enkedu blames her for having her join the human world of sexuality.

 The pillow book was the most personal writing I ever read. Not because I knew the writer was female, the writing style was so feminine and sophisticated. The genre of the pillow book is not easy to determined because the book is the collection of free writings. However, According to the book, it can mainly divided into three genre : “diary-style entries describing datable events at court, catalogues of objects or attributes, and essayistic jottings on general topics”(introduction from Norton book page 1129). Since Shonagon did not know if this writings were going to be published, believe or not, as she mentioned in the end of book, readers can observe her true personality and interact with her pure thoughts personally.  

 Shonagon’s the pillow book represents the japanese Heian literature during eleventh century. Therefore, we can observe the courts life of Heian throughout her own observation. Besides that, I think this book is more interesting because we can find the honest woman’s thoughts during that period. I believe that the woman was not able to be active in society at that time in Japan. She overcame the limitation of social norm and made the movement. In chapter 30, she mention about the appearance of a priest. This is not easy to mention in public even for the contemporary time. However, she wrote honestly “A priest who gives a sermon should be handsome”. Even if she worried about her writing by saying “I may have written glibly enough about sinful matters of this sort in my younger days, but at my age the idea of sin has become quite frightening”(page 1142), she does not hide her own thoughts. This type of her honest writing attracts the readers, despite her personal shortcomings.  The readers are not expecting any rightness or moral lesson from her writing. The undissembled thoughts from woman of the Heian period are interesting enough to grab readers’ attention.   

  Also, her descriptions of things are very sophisticated. When she describe the four season in chapter 1, It’s like a picture. We can imagine the scene of the moment by reading her writing. Especially, the moment of summer night is picturesque. She describe the silent summer night as “it’s beautiful when fireflies are dancing everywhere in a mazy flight. And it’s delightful too to see just one or two fly through the darkness, glowing softly.” It is straightforward without any flowery words but still impressive.

  Overall, I loved her writing skill. To me, She is like a female politician in present who is independent from her husband while express her opinion splendidly. Until now, her writing exercise the influence to many readers.

Throughout the beginning of Hamlet, there are various methods of surveillance that occur in the text.

In Act 1 Scene 1, A watchman Francisco is patrolling  Elsinore Castle in Denmark. The reason behind this patrol is because Horatio was warned by the ghost of King Hamlet that there might be possible misfortune for Denmark, perhaps in the form of a military attack. The ghost tells the story of King Hamlet’s conquest of certain lands that once belonged to Norway and says that Fortinbras, the young Prince of Norway, now wants to regain those lost lands.

In Act 2 Scene 1, Polonius sends Raynaldo to spy on Laertes. He tells Raynaldo to ask leading questions to  Laertes’ acquaintances and how to make the questions seem inconspicuous so it does not look like a spy.

In Act 2 Scene 2, Claudius and Gertrude tell Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, two of Hamlet’s friends to cheer Hamlet out of his sad mood, or at least figure out the cause of it. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern both agree to investigate, but they are quickly found out by Hamlet. Hamlet is suspicious of their actions, and within a few lines of dialogue, he figures out that they were sent by Claudius and Gertrude.

Claudius is the villain in the story of Hamlet. He kills the old Hamlet, and he married his wife, Gertrude, so he is able to get the throne. Even though he might truly love Gertrude , this is still one of his plans to be the king of Denmark. However, when he discovers that the young Hamlet recognizes Claudius steals the throne from him,  he considers a lot of methods to get rid of the young Hamlet. Therefore, he is able to secure his throne. However, he dies at the end because he miscalculates what things will happen in the future.

Claudius is a person who is full of tricks, and he is extremely manipulative. Also, he is the person who catches “opportunities”precisely to fulfill his own desires.. For example, he uses death of Polonius to send Hamlet away, so he is able to use other people’s hand to kill Hamlet. Moreover, He tricks Laertes that Hamlet is responsible for his sister’s death. In other words, Claudius manipulates Laertes’s thinking, so Laertes is going to have revenge for his sister. If he is not full of tricks, he will not be able think of using other’s hands to finish his dirty works.

In the end, Claudius dies because of the poison he makes. This is the most ironic part of this story because he calculates everything, but the future doesn’t process the way he predicts. For example, he expects the King of England will finish Hamlet, but the pirates ruin his plans. Furthermore, he expects Laertes to kill Hamlet by using the poison he makes, but he is killed by his own poison. The moral of the story is that do not plot against other people because future cannot be predicted. And also, the plot you planed, it might be your own grave.