Author Archives: shazia.ahmed

Posts: 5 (archived below)
Comments: 2

The Changeling: Falling victim to your own plans

Posted on May 6, 2013 by shazia.ahmed

Before writing this blog I was troubled about whether to elaborate on the class discussion on innocence and women or start a new thought. However after rereading today’s discussed schemes I found a small sub-theme inside the bigger theme of innocence. This theme comes out when De Flores says that Beatrice has lost her own innocence and is the slave of the deed rather than the mastermind behind the deed. I realized that De Flores highlight the sub-theme of victimization. In this case I found it interesting because Beatrice becomes the victim of her own plan.

Although many may argue that others are the victim to Beatrice’s plans, she is rarely alone in making decisions. Along her side is  De Flores who comes up with the idea to burn a part of the house. She tries to save herself to prove her virtue; however, one of her lies leads to another which eventually leads to her death. De Flores mentions that she must think about her reputation above all else,but while thinking about her reputation she becomes lost in the things she does to save herself. She murders and lies and cheats; yet when push comes to shove she cannot take the weight of her own plans. An example of this is when she says she commits murder and deceit because of Alsemero’s love for her.

All her lies leads to her own death. She all along probably felt that she can control and tell people what to do, for example how she made Diaphanta go into bed with Alsemero.  However she could not control the actual truth.

Posted in Love relationships, Psychological detail, The Changeling | 2 Comments

Volpone: Buried Under his own schemes

Posted on April 10, 2013 by shazia.ahmed

This whole play has Volpone dressing himself up to be someone he is not. Starting from the beginning of the play from Act one, Scene one, he has Mosca dress him up as ill and sick and near death. All this is done to make a profit off the people that would visit him. Although he uses different disguises to be the con man he is, all his disguises and plots to gain money have a sick intention.

For example, in the second plot he has to sell people a great potion that cures anything and everything. His audience is the people who are sick or have some form of distress in their lives. Either he plays sick or benefits off the sick. Although this is an obvious analysis of his character I would like to look into how these different “people” he pretends to be just bury his true self deeper and deeper.

I have hard a hard time figuring out who he really is and what he really wants out of his own life. He has Mosca in his life who is described as parasite. In the same way Volpone would become a parasite on the society he is scheming upon.

Posted in Psychological detail, Volpone | 1 Comment

Doctor Faustus: A battle between good and evil, The accepted and The Unaccepted

Posted on March 4, 2013 by shazia.ahmed

As mentioned in class Faustus is sometimes overcome with dual decisions or whether what he is doing is good or bad or whether he should continue his work. I would also like to point out the other phase in the audience perspective. During the time period practicing black magic or any form of magic was considered devilish and against religion. Yet the play allows the audience experience the study of magic, which I am sure many people were surprised by.  However curiosity led them to continue watching.

Beginning with the dual decisions in context Dr. Faustus is visited by the good angel and the bad angel when he decides that he wants to study witchcraft. In scene one act one the good angel says “O Faustus, lay that damned…” and the bad angel says “Go forward Faustus in that famous art.” If you think about it in literal terms an angel will not be on your shoulders telling you right from wrong. The angels can be seen as an inner conflict. One side is trying to convince him not to further his action because he knows that it is looked down upon in society. The other side I would say is his curious side which pushes him to challenge the wrongs.

In scene one act three Faustus himself speaks to himself and says “Then fear not, Faustus but be resolute.”  Then again in Scene two act one he says “Now Faustus must though needs be damned…Despair in God and trust in Beelzebub.” These two lines are him talking to himself trying to convince himself to move forward. But if you think of why people convince themselves it is because there is a part of them that is losing some type of motivation, understanding and even faith. I think these moments play along with the dual action of right and wrong.

To understand how the audience is affected by the good and the evil and the accepted and the unaccepted is based on the context of the historical time period. As mentioned before such practiced were condemned as evil and unacceptable. Many viewers may look down on such practices yet I am sure many stayed to see the outcome of the play. Even the audience has to come to make a decision of whether what they are seeing is right or wrong. Dr. Faustus challenges the norms of his society and now the audience is also faced with that dilemma as well.

Posted in Doctor Faustus, Power struggles, Psychological detail | 1 Comment

Endymion Scene 5.1.10-152

Posted on February 25, 2013 by shazia.ahmed

http://youtu.be/7WboeWJm0vc

As a group we wanted to take advantage of putting a modern twist on the play. Endymion and Eumenides are best friends and Eumenides makes sacrifices for Endymion’s own happiness. As a group we noticed that it is like a wolf pack relationship. Wolves travel together and protect each other, it is a very strong bond. This is the reason for the wolf masks, however there needed to be some distinction between Endymion and Eumenides. At first the plan was to wear the same color clothing to represent a bond, however after realizing that both characters are quite different in the way they think and act we choose black and brown to create the difference between the two men. For Cynthia’s clothes and color choices, after research a moon goddess wears all white to literally represent the moon.

The setting for the scene was at madison park. The scene shows the Endymion is asleep under a tree and after Cynthia kisses him she needs to hide behind him. The park had many trees and benches for Endymion to lay on and it gave us enough room to move around and film freely. Also the park can be seen as a form of wilderness, an area in which wolfs would more or less roam around.

The scene study was definitely a fun and creative assignment but required a great amount of research and work to put a modern twist to the play. Some problems that we can across as a group was reading with a mask on. The mask however was necessary for the interpretation of they play we took as a group. Another problem we came across was having to film in the freezing cold weather. We researched and agreed on the type of setting we wanted but did not take into account how cold it might have been on the day we needed to shoot. The final problem is being able to film with the other people in the park. We had to do many takes because of the noise around us or people walking too close to the camera.

Some must haves for filming would be to plan out who would do the filming. We have three people in the group and three roles to take on but to be better prepared we needed to plan out who could help us actually shoot the whole scene. Also if anyone has an Ipad, it is a great way to film if you don’t have a camera. Our main worry was the sound quality however we were able to capture our voices perfectly with the Ipad despite the amount of sound around us. Overall the recommendations are minor things we overlooked which planning ahead would have taken care of.

Finally a few suggestions would be: rehearse and prepare! Rehearsing at the destination you chose as a group can prepare you on the level of sound and the amount of distractions you can expect. Prepare early in advance so you can avoid any minor mistakes and can have a successful filming session.

-Angelic Rivera, Briana Kaufmann, Shazia Ahmed

Posted in Endymion | 1 Comment

Power and Independence in The Spanish Tragedy

Posted on February 12, 2013 by shazia.ahmed

Although the play cover a range of themes such as revenge and justice, one theme that sticks out to me is that of independence. Although it is quite obvious that Bel Imperia is afraid to lose her freedom if she dedicated herself to Balthazar or even one man in general, I see fear in Lorenzo as well when it comes to securing his independence. Before moving on further to analyze how fear comes from the loss of independence I would like to mention that my definition of independence circulates around the word power, simply for this play. Each character has a pride in the character they carry.

Starting with the obvious character, Bel Imperia openly admits her fear in act three and scene ten. When Lorenzo tries to make Balthazar her new knight in shining armor for trying to protect her she merely replies that she has a fear of losing the independence she has. Even when she meets up with Horatio, she would set the date, time and place as if she ran the relationship. In a way it is as if she does not like to be a woman traded to another man, but would like to keep her power from being able to make her own choices and decisions. She has succeeded in doing so for some time, for example the way she would not marry although it was a concern for the King.

Moving away from the stated actor, Lorenzo also has a great deal of fear. His power comes from the way we characterize him. From class discussions he is seen as manipulative and self interested. He only takes part in activities that would benefit him. He helps the Duke of Portugal, Balthazar but instead kill Horatio. In act two scene one he offers to protect Pedringano in exchange for him giving up his sister’s secrets. All the helps he offers is not with a good heart ot a good intentions. It is a means of control over the people around him. He uses Pedringano as a puppet when he needs information; when Bel Imperia’s servant does not work with him, Lorenzo threatens him with the promise of protection.

The need for power leads to the need to always feel independent from the people around you. This can have a good or bad outcome. In Bel Imperia’s case she did not want to be a trade off from one kingdom to the next, she enjoyed her power because at the time it was limited and with marriage would become even more limited. In Lorenzo’s case the need for power and independence works in an evil way that harms the people around him.

Posted in Power struggles, The Spanish Tragedy | 2 Comments