Blogging

What I like most about the blogging assignments is that they create a space in which we get to express ideas that we aren’t always able to get to in our class discussions. It’s a valuable tool: I kind of use it as a way to gradually tease out ideas that aren’t fully formulated, but that keep popping up in my head as I read each play. What I like most about it, however, is that I get to read about what other people think of the plays. From others’ posts I’ve come across questions that I would never have thought of asking and arguments that supplement my understanding of our readings.
In my blogs I mostly focus on Shakespeare’s depiction of women, how he creates his characters’ identities, and how he represents power relations. When writing the posts I don’t remember feeling that they were particularly political, but reading them all in succession makes me realize that my writing comes from a particular standpoint: it’s mostly influenced by a feminist focus on women, but it is also concerned with the character’s positions within the societies they inhabit. This is a little surprising to me because I usually focus on more methodological aspects of writing and not so much on broader themes; it also makes me realize how much my education has influenced my stance on a variety of subjects. I don’t think 3 blogs is enough for me to recognize a change in my writing, though. Perhaps by the end of the semester I’ll focus more on other aspects of Shakespeare’s writing.
There are two things I think are worth revisiting: the first is the examination of cycles and progress in the second tetralogy. By the end of Henry IV I began to see a recurrence of a central powerful character being surrounded by a group of people who try to influence his actions. In Richard II the king was surrounded by older advisors who didn’t really want to give up the power they had accumulated while Richard had been young; In Henry IV Hal surrounds himself with thieves and liars and members of the lower classes; in Henry V we find that Hal now surrounds himself with religious men. In each case the group determines the identity of the individual: when Hal surrounded himself with rogues, he was seen as a rogue. When he surrounds himself with gentlemen and seeks counsel from an archbishop, he’s a great religious leader. A contrasting example of progress would be how Hal casts Falstaff out in order to assume his role as a serious King. I also notice that each instance of progress is actually an act of manipulation and violence, which makes me question whether the “progress” is really worth it. The second is that I see a parallel between themes in Shakespeare’s comedies and these history plays. In both the characters in power try to make it seem as if they don’t have as much power as they actually do by siphoning responsibilities off to others: the Duke makes Isabella decide not to kill Angelo, and Henry V makes the Archbishop decide to go to war. Also, both Measure for Measure and Richard II illustrate a historical shift in methods of social control: both plays move from punishing through spectacle (Angelo wanting to execute Isabella’s brother; Bolingbroke killing Richard’s associates) to disciplining through surveillance (the Duke disguising himself as a friar in order to effectively manipulate and “direct” Angelo & maybe even his marriage proposal; York insisting on telling the technically illegitimate king that his son is a traitor, which is a kind of internalization of the surveillance.) Hal exemplifies this idea: he goes from using spectacle to legitimate his king-ness (killing Hotspur) to using surveillance (making sure people know that he’s cut himself off from Falstaff.) … Random, but I think I may like the comedies more than the histories.