Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Today is Veterans Day, a day on which we honor the men and women who gave their time, talents, energies, and often their lives for our country. If you have a veteran in your family or in your circle of friends, find some time today to thank them for their service, or, better yet, to talk to them about their experiences and see if they have anything they'd like to share. Happy Veterans Day.

Gifted English II: The satire unit officially begins today, with Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal." At least he doesn't provide specific recipes.

APeeps: Hamlet, Act III, explained. Prepare to take notes; the quiz is Thursday.

Thursday, September 18, 2008

Tomorrow is International Talk Like a Pirate Day!!! Avast and ahoy, mateys!!!

You can access the web site at http://www.talklikeapirate.com/ if you are curious about pirate-themed things. Warning: The site isn't purely polite, landlubber. Kinda PG. So. . .aaaarrrgghhh!

I will have eyepatches to distribute on a first-come, first-served basis. I have almost three hundred left, but you never know. Some pirates are greedy, you know.

On to serious academic things:

Gifted English II: Our Author of the Day today is Sophocles, the Greek playwright. Why? Because we're going to start studying some Greek tragedy, that's why! I'm so excited. You will need to bring your textbooks with you for a while; after Antigone, you can retire them to your locker or under your bed until further notice. Final review for vocab quiz; discussion of CMC; introduction to Greek Theater complete with classy cartoon/chart on board. I love me some Sphinxie and once I figure out how to scan my "art" I'll be happy to post it here.

APees: After reviewing the poems from yesterday, we are making a transition into the world of Shakespearean tragedy. I have tons of resources for you; today is mostly lecture material and note-taking before we embark on the Macplay. Life-changing stuff, this. Yup. If you haven't acquired your own copy of the Macplay yet, do so; if you don't want to spend the money, I have a plethora of copies on the shelves for your perusal.

Lecture Notes on Madame Bovary and Flaubert

This lecture is from Thursday, August 21, 2008, bad weather notwithstanding:

Outline on board:

-physiognomy (connecting physical traits to psychological or personality characteristics)

-themes and motifs in the novel

• condemnation of the bourgeoisie
• failure to communicate/connect
• naturalism (heredity and social environment) and its implications with the characters
• powerlessness of women--Emma v. Leon with contrasting outcomes but similar desires
• debunking Romantic ideology/Emma's fantasies
• institution of marriage itself

-Flaubert and Romanticism/Realism

• dared to write the novel to uproot his deep-seated Romanticism
• Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Alexandre Dumas, Victor Hugo
• sentimentalism
• Romantic hero--notably absent from Bovary
• "Imagination is rich; the world is cold and empty"--the persistent belief that rationalism had robbed men of illusions/dreams
• Romantic ideology often espouses that Nature is a healing entity, but Flaubert seems to see rural life as backward and suffocating--not the exalted, idealized life envisioned by the English Romantics

-Transition into Naturalism and Realism

• Balzac, Stendahl, Zola, Guy de Maupassant ("The Necklace")
• often criticized for being too bleak, too despairing
• le mot juste--Flaubert's legendary perfectionism
• avoiding banality--but what do we idealize today? The popular culture quest for instant fame, the current foreclosure crisis--Bovary is as relevant today as ever before
• Memoirs of a Madman--Flaubert's memoirs, with telling evidence of the autobiographical nature of Madame Bovary

Question: Does American popular culture overemphasize romantic (not Romantic--there's a difference) ideals in relationships between lovers? Specifically, between men and women? Think about "The Hills," "Gossip Girl," any typical soap-operatic fantasy, the Twilight books. . .