Shakespeare
Reflection
The overall expectation of this project was to not only show the physical work, such as our play, essays, poetry, and visually appealing sets and costumes, but also to show a deep understanding of much of Shakespeare’s philosophies on certain commonly asked questions, such as, “What is the difference between love and marriage?” A more in depth description of our physical projects would include our Shakespeare essay, for this I chose to do a challenge extension in which I was asked to compare Theseus’s view on reality perception and love, to Bottoms views on the same topics. For my conclusion I wrote, “In conclusion I do not feel that either character is fully correct when it comes to judging reality, perception and love. I think this was Shakespeare's purpose though. He wants the audience to make connections, but never to fully grasp. The idea of love is many things, chemical feelings, imprints on another’s personality, or marriage; but none of these is a full representation of love. The same goes for reality and perception, reality is what you see, but is it not what your friends see, and your teacher and so on until reality is a spider’s chaotic cobweb of blame, fear and confusion. However in my opinion Shakespeare wants the audience to never understand, that way the play stays alive even after the curtains have closed.” During this project we also learned a lot about poetry, and how it is related to Shakespeare’s work through the use of Iambic pentameter, which is the use of a heartbeat, type of rhythm used in poetry. Our final project however was the most important, our very own “Midsummer Nights Dream”,Presented with in depth costumes, sets and actors. Through this portion of the project we were asked to have a production role, (Set Design, Costume Design, Dramaturge, or Stage Manager) as well as a role in the show. Overall the work was challenging but exciting and taught a lot about initiative, collaboration, and imagination and creativity.
I connected to this project because of my love of acting, and my love of the in depth and vast ideas of Shakespeare’s work. I really enjoyed the essay project because I got to express my ideas and communicate what I think that Shakespeare wants people to feel. I also really enjoyed the show, because I got to show the audience what I thought about a certain character and I how I thought a certain character should act. My favorite moment in this Project was the show, because I really felt like our class was having fun and working well together to create something great. Overall the show portion of the project brought our class much closer together to make something fun into something beautiful.
The most difficult for me was memorizing all of the monologues that I had. I especially had trouble on the one right after Bottom wakes from his dream. I spent almost five hours working on three monologues that were really giving me trouble, but through perseverance I found that it became easier when you said the monologue portion by portion and once you knew a certain sections connecting it with another section. What was most challenging though was saying it during the show because I was afraid that I would do it incorrectly, or mess up completely. In the end however, it ended up being an amazing play and I did a great job keeping my lines on track.
During this project I learned that I am really interested in philosophy as a learner. The idea of so many different opinions that people have fascinates me, and that you can compare them with each other to create the web that is Shakespeare’s, “Mid Summer Nights Dream”. I think that the biggest thing this project taught me though, is that no matter how hard things get, its important to keep trying because it can’t get any harder if you try as hard as you can. Persevering through anything can get you amazing things. Personally I think that my whole class did an amazing job at this and we created a fantastic show.
Many people wonder and ask, how could Shakespeare still affect our society so heavily 400 years after his death. If you look around, you’ll see him, in school plays, in poetry, in books, in love stories, his work surrounds us, and most don’t even notice. I think that his biggest influence though was on the people that did notice; they saw the world not as it was, but as it could be. Shakespeare may not have meant for this to happen, but I think that he inspired many people to do great things, that at first they didn’t think they were capable of. Like I said in my conclusion, I think the purpose of his plays was to show that not everything is as it seems; love isn’t always marriage, perception isn’t always what you think, reality isn’t always what you see. I think those are three biggest impacts that Shakespeare made on our society. The fact there is always a story behind a cover.
The overall expectation of this project was to not only show the physical work, such as our play, essays, poetry, and visually appealing sets and costumes, but also to show a deep understanding of much of Shakespeare’s philosophies on certain commonly asked questions, such as, “What is the difference between love and marriage?” A more in depth description of our physical projects would include our Shakespeare essay, for this I chose to do a challenge extension in which I was asked to compare Theseus’s view on reality perception and love, to Bottoms views on the same topics. For my conclusion I wrote, “In conclusion I do not feel that either character is fully correct when it comes to judging reality, perception and love. I think this was Shakespeare's purpose though. He wants the audience to make connections, but never to fully grasp. The idea of love is many things, chemical feelings, imprints on another’s personality, or marriage; but none of these is a full representation of love. The same goes for reality and perception, reality is what you see, but is it not what your friends see, and your teacher and so on until reality is a spider’s chaotic cobweb of blame, fear and confusion. However in my opinion Shakespeare wants the audience to never understand, that way the play stays alive even after the curtains have closed.” During this project we also learned a lot about poetry, and how it is related to Shakespeare’s work through the use of Iambic pentameter, which is the use of a heartbeat, type of rhythm used in poetry. Our final project however was the most important, our very own “Midsummer Nights Dream”,Presented with in depth costumes, sets and actors. Through this portion of the project we were asked to have a production role, (Set Design, Costume Design, Dramaturge, or Stage Manager) as well as a role in the show. Overall the work was challenging but exciting and taught a lot about initiative, collaboration, and imagination and creativity.
I connected to this project because of my love of acting, and my love of the in depth and vast ideas of Shakespeare’s work. I really enjoyed the essay project because I got to express my ideas and communicate what I think that Shakespeare wants people to feel. I also really enjoyed the show, because I got to show the audience what I thought about a certain character and I how I thought a certain character should act. My favorite moment in this Project was the show, because I really felt like our class was having fun and working well together to create something great. Overall the show portion of the project brought our class much closer together to make something fun into something beautiful.
The most difficult for me was memorizing all of the monologues that I had. I especially had trouble on the one right after Bottom wakes from his dream. I spent almost five hours working on three monologues that were really giving me trouble, but through perseverance I found that it became easier when you said the monologue portion by portion and once you knew a certain sections connecting it with another section. What was most challenging though was saying it during the show because I was afraid that I would do it incorrectly, or mess up completely. In the end however, it ended up being an amazing play and I did a great job keeping my lines on track.
During this project I learned that I am really interested in philosophy as a learner. The idea of so many different opinions that people have fascinates me, and that you can compare them with each other to create the web that is Shakespeare’s, “Mid Summer Nights Dream”. I think that the biggest thing this project taught me though, is that no matter how hard things get, its important to keep trying because it can’t get any harder if you try as hard as you can. Persevering through anything can get you amazing things. Personally I think that my whole class did an amazing job at this and we created a fantastic show.
Many people wonder and ask, how could Shakespeare still affect our society so heavily 400 years after his death. If you look around, you’ll see him, in school plays, in poetry, in books, in love stories, his work surrounds us, and most don’t even notice. I think that his biggest influence though was on the people that did notice; they saw the world not as it was, but as it could be. Shakespeare may not have meant for this to happen, but I think that he inspired many people to do great things, that at first they didn’t think they were capable of. Like I said in my conclusion, I think the purpose of his plays was to show that not everything is as it seems; love isn’t always marriage, perception isn’t always what you think, reality isn’t always what you see. I think those are three biggest impacts that Shakespeare made on our society. The fact there is always a story behind a cover.