Mid-term Blogging Assignment

When I knew that we had to blog in this class I was a little nervous because I never blogged before and wasn’t exactly sure in what direction to go with each blog. After reading and commenting on various peoples blogs I not only gained a better understanding that you could really go anywhere with these blogs but I also gained a better understanding about each play. I was able to see what each member in the class thought about each play, and aspects of the play they picked up on that I didn’t even notice. The blogging process really allows me to pick one aspect of the play and develop and elaborate on a specific topic, one that I wouldn’t put much thought into after leaving class. It has thought me that there is so much more meaning to the plays than the play itself. That the characters, the language they use, the social class in which they stand, the gender they have are all important aspects that make up the bigger picture and depicting one aspect as more of an effect on the play than I realized. When reading and learning about the characteristics that the different characters have you can easily relate them to one another and see the connections between them even if they are in different plays.
I noticed in my blogs I tend to talk about the uneasiness that Shakespeare leaves us in the ending of his plays. For example in A Midsummer Night’s Dream we aren’t exactly sure with how Hermia’s father feels about her betrayal in the beginning of the play but she still proceeds to marry the one she loves, Lyslander. We don’t truly understand how Egeus feels about the whole situation and as readers we are left with a bit of uncertainty at the end of the play that we will never know the answer too. We experience this same lingering feeling of uneasiness in Othello when Iago tells us at the end of the play that from this moment on he won’t speak another word. Is Iago at a loss of words or he is withholding his language purposely which shows that he still has power? This is another question that we will never know the answer too. Reading over the blogs I have posted I have realized I am left with a lot of unanswered questions at the conclusion of the plays, questions that I want answers too but will never get so I am left with assuming how the characters feel or the purposes behind their actions.
The blogging also helped me focus on the play of language Shakespeare presents us in the plays we read. This is something I don’t think I would have picked up on otherwise, I don’t think I would read looked so deep into it. From my own posts and the posts of other I realized that language is a big part of the different characters personalities Shakespeare presents us with. That a lot of the time the characters class position has a lot to do with how they present language. For the characters of the lower class they use different language than those who are in the upper class. I also realized that the characters who are in the lower class always dream of climbing the social class. An example of this can be seen in all of the plays we read; I the end of A Midsummer Night’s Dream Puck’s final words are him dreaming of moving up the social class, Malvolio in Twelfth Night is a social climber.