Thursday, 14 April 2016

Act 1 Scene 2

Line 375 onwards

  • Ferdinand appears vulnerable and alone
  • Ariel's song is eerie, otherworldly and hypnotic
  • F is confused, uncertain and lost
  • Ariel telling F that Alonso is dead increases sympathy and sadness of the scene
  • Emphasis on how differently characters react to vulnerability
  • Miranda - 1st sight of Ferdinand = first sight of another man - naïve and her feelings control her
  • Prospero - wants F and M to get together (he wants her to marry a prince, but their love is not necessarily natural - use of magic?)
  • First meeting F asks M if she is a maid - confident in himself
  • Prospero - "at first sight they have changed eyes"
  • "There's nothing ill that can dwell in such a temple" (Miranda) childlike innocence, emphasis on naivety
  • P prevents their relationship from happening to give it value and make it more likely to happen
  • He is encouraging the relationship by preventing it, more tense and engaging
  • F's speech full hyperbole, exaggerated

Wednesday, 2 March 2016

Definitions of blank verse and prose


Blank verse - a metrical pattern consisting of lines of iambic pentameter without any rhyme

Prose - written or spoken language in its ordinary form, without metrical structure

Wednesday, 24 February 2016

Act 1 Scene 1


  • Chaotic
  • Panicked
  • Overwhelming
  • Dramatic
  • Loud
  • Grabs the audience's attention
  • Power hierarchy switched
  • Transience of power

The Reluctant Fundamentalist

Good things about multiculturalism:
  • Learn about lots of different cultures and experience new things such as food, music and art
  • Diversity
  • More open-minded/accepting
  • Less ignorant and more understanding
  • New perspectives and ideas
  • Religious pluralism
  • Gets rid of stereotypes
  • Positive effect on the economy
  • Unity
Bad things about multiculturalism
  • People believe stereotypes and therefore treat people negatively
  • Religions may clash
  • Negative attitudes (taking jobs etc.)
The immigrant experience:
  • When Changez meets the stranger, he is stereotyped immediately (page 1)
  • Islamic people with beards = assumptions
  • Attraction or fear - reactions to difference
  • Beard = symbolic of his pride
  • Changez is told to shave after 9/11, however he wants to be less American
  • Meeting Erica's family - he wears traditional clothing, Erica wears a Minnie Mouse t shirt - highlighting the difference between America and Pakistan
  • Stereotype that he doesn't drink - Erica's father wants a similarity
  • Drinking is considered a sin/illegal however everyone still does it (opposite of fundamentalist)
  • Conflicting emotions, he is unsure of his identity (he smiles at 9/11)
  • On his first business trip, Changez acts American
  • In the car park, he has a confrontation with an American - this is the first time he sees violence as a solution
  • He is stopped by the police - humiliating and his underwear emphasises his vulnerability
  • Narrative framing device - chooses 1st person and direct address
  • The character takes on the role of the reader
  • The stranger is suspicious of Changez
  • Both characters may think the other one is trying to kill them
  • Changez = fundamentalist?

Wednesday, 20 January 2016

Style choices in The Kite Runner

Style choices


Disappointed - parallelism, repetition
Unwilling to adapt, feels patronised, sarcasm (learning the language)
Anecdote - symbolic of a wider issue
Sees request for ID as disrespectful - lack of trust for immigrants
Shopkeepers are also immigrants - they are two groups of immigrants against each other, adds to the pressure of simulation
They weren't questioned in their home country - loss of status
Triplet - "dust, sweat and gasoline" - manual labour, brutal
"Widower" - love for his home, something missing, simile, analogy, figurative, bereavement

Attitudes and style choices in The Reluctant Fundamentalist

Attitudes


Page 3 - Changez describes Princeton as a "dream come true"
Page 82 - Changez is in a hotel but he is not being treated differently to anyone else, unlike he normally is
Page 62 - 63 - Changez is having a conversation with Erica's father
Page 4 - System to choose candidates
Page 77 - Changez is looking into the Philippino man's car and feels more like him than the people he is in the car with




Style choices




Page 3 - "This is a dream come true", "Everything was possible" - he is making assumptions and preconceptions of Princeton, something which is common with immigration
Page 82 - "Cloaked by his suit", "Invisible" - he is confused as this is probably the first time he has not felt like an outsider.

Tuesday, 19 January 2016

Goblin Market

  • List of exotic, unusual fruit - list emphasises passion of the goblins
  • Encouraging attitudes
  • Dimeter - strong, hypnotic rhythm
  • Similar to a magic spell
  • Aiming their list at the maids (at the time maids were young, virgin women)
  • Sensuous figurative language
  • The sisters contrast each other
  • Laura - more adventurous and tempted by the list
  • Lizzie - frightened
  • Idea of temptation
  • Boundary - something is forbidden
  • Limitations of women are explored
  • Tension all throughout the poem
  • Goblin's are animalistic - not at all human
  • "Come buy, come buy" - attraction of the forbidden
  • Laura - romantic poetry - literary, natural similes and metaphors
  • Described like a ship being launched - got rid of restraints
  • Attempting to find freedom
  • Gives in to temptation, enthused in it
  • Rhyme, rhythm and repetition - enthusiasm
  • Uses hair to buy fruit - magically valuable (wore jewellery with hair on it at the time)
  • "Golden curl" - tension and fear giving them power
  • Gives the goblins control over her
  • Contrast between the two locations - the Glen and their home
  • Lizzie warns Laura - tells her a narrative story about a girl
  • Sense of an addiction
  • Description of domestic setting - no men or parents
  • Females supporting each other
  • Listing of similes - detailed and figurative (sisters together)
  • Draws the reader closer to them
  • List of duties - iambic tetrameter - slower than dimeter
  • Large contrast between duties and fruits
  • Return to the Glen - Laura can't hear goblins cry anymore
  • Increases the conflict
  • Description of Laura's decline - heading towards death
  • Description of the goblins joy - mischevious and evil
  • List of how they act - dimeter, strong rhythm
  • Lizzie wants to help her sister - obstacles and limitations
  • Distressing, violent and intrusive attack - Lizzie laughs as she sees how she can help Laura
  • Climax of the poem - confrontation between good and evil
  • Erotic desciption of the sisters - transgressive
  • Controversial at the time
  • Not intended to be sexual - motive to cure her sister
  • Saves Laura
  • Repetitive and rhythmic ending - shows purpose of the poem
  • Dedicated to her sister
  • Ambiguous poem
  • An analogy - sexual temptation?**
  • Fruit = symbol of sex?**
  • **Parallel with the bible
  • Similar to the "Eve of St Isles"(???)
  • Rape? Possibly warning against male sexual appetite
  • Influenced by fairytales, folktales and dreams
  • Lizzie is Christ-like
  • Drug addiction - opium was a problem at the time
  • Rossetti worked with women with problems
  • About sisterhood