ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST Part 2

In Part 2 of Ken Kesey's, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest I noticed a major change in McMurphy's attitude and the change in the hospital.  It seems as if everything has gone back to the way it was before McMurphy came.  The big nurse is in control again and everyone else just seems to blend in.  I think now the hospital became somewhat boring as well.  On page 181 it says, "whatever it was went haywire in the mechanism, they've just about got it fixed again.  The clean, calculated arcade movement is coming back: six-thirty out of bed, seven into the mess hall, eight the puzzles come out for the Chronics and the cards for the Acutes... in the Nurses' Station i can see the white hands of the Big Nurse float over the controls.  After reading this short chapter it basically confirmed all of my assumptions about the changes that were taking place.  Chief Broom used to see McMurphy as the person who would stand up to the big nurse and change the way the hospital was being operated.  I also felt like that chapter was about machinery as well.  The hospital is called the mechanism and at the end it says the controls are being operated by the big nurse.  This shows her power and control over her patients.  Since McMurphy is afraid of being moved up to disturbed he changed his attitude and no longers stands up to the big nurse.  This however causes other characters to become upset.  After the nurse limits the patients to one pack of cigarettes a day they become mad and want to do something about it.  On page 172, it says, "and that afternoon in the meeting when Cheswick said that everybody'd agreed that there should be some kind of showdown on the cigarette situation, saying, "I ain't no little kid to have cigarettes kept from me like cookies!  We want something done about it, aint that right, Mack?" and waited for McMurphy to back him up, but all he got was silence."  Cheswick contined to yell that he wanted something done about the situation but McMurphy still didn't respond to his screams so the big nurse carried out her plan for the cigarette's.  Then at the pool Cheswick drowned himself because he knew nothing was going to change at the hospital and he couldn't deal with it.  This shows McMurphy's effect on the other characters and how his behavior changed the hospital in general.  Overall, I enjoyed Part 2 of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and am looking forward to see if McMurphy changes his attitude back to how he acted when he first came into the hospital.

HAMLET at the Lantern Theatre

A few weeks ago when we went to the Lantern Theatre to see their production of Hamlet I was very surprised.  When we first walked in the space was very small and the set was basic as well.  I was unsure if the production was going to be good, boring, or just bad in general.  I was also concerned that I wasn't going to get the full effect because of the way the stage was set up.  However, when the actors began performing everything came together.  The stage that was very basic became different in some way after every scene.  The lighting was very good and the different color lights changed the effect of the set.  The actors were also very good at their jobs on stage.  They knew all of their lines and made the play much more easy to understand.  The actor who played Hamlet did a great job and he brought a lot to the character's personality.  He was sarcastic, and also made the audience understand how he felt about what was going on with the other characters especially his mother and uncle.  The play kept me entertained and also was easy to follow.  I did think it was a little long but it didn't change my opinion of the production in any way.  After seeing the play I understood the play better and it made me think about it more then if I hadn't seen it at all.  Overall, I believe that the Lantern Theatre surprised the audience and did an excellent job with their production of Shakespeare's, Hamlet.   

CUCKOO'S NEST , part one .

Discuss what effects Kesey has achieved through his use of stream of consciousness as a rhetorical technique.

So far while reading Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest I noticed that Kesey shares information with the reader by using stream of consciousness.  According to dictionary.com stream of consciousness is defined as pertaining to, or characterized by a manner of writing in which a character's thoughts or perceptions are presented as occurring in random form, without regard for logical sequences, syntactic structure, distinctions between various levels of reality.  I think that Kesey achieves a lot by using this technique to give background information or important information needed to understand or learn more about characters.

On page 11 of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, after hearing McMurphy say, "mighty nice fine day" Chief Broom thinks about his father.  He says, "he talks a little the way Papa used to, loud voice and full of hell, but he doesn't look like Papa; Papa was a fullblood Columbia Indian - a chief - and hard and shiny as a gunstock.  This guy is redheaded with long red sideburns and a tangle of curls out from under his cap, been needing cut a long time, and he's broad as Papa was tall, broad across the jaw and shoulders and chest, a broad white devilish grin, and he's hard in a different kind of way from Papa, kind of the way a baseball is hard under the scuffed leather..."

After reading this part of the story I knew about Chief Broom's father and the connection he made between someone familiar, his father and someone new, McMurphy.  I think by writing this way Kesey will make the book more interesting and easy to read.  So far I am enjoying the book and want to see how many different ways Kesey uses this technique to give more information to the reader.

HAMLET ACT II

When reading Act II of Hamlet, I liked the whole idea of a play inside a play.  Hamlet creates the play to basically catch his uncle, the new king in his lies and secret.  Deep down I believe Hamlet truly was unsure of what the ghost had told him.  He wasn't sure if he was crazy or if he was told the truth.  I also feel as if Hamlet didn't want to confront his Uncle Claudius and be wrong.  If he was wrong then more people would think he was crazy and his uncle would be mad at him for thinking like that in the first place.  I believe that Shakespeare creates suspense in the story by adding this into the plot.

I also noticed how all of the characters are hiding something or going behind each others backs to find our information.  In the beginning of Act II King Claudius and Queen Gertrude want to find out what's wrong with Hamlet.  Instead of confronting him themselves and trying to help him they basically hire his friends to find out for them.  I think this is strange because I feel like today most parents would just talk to their children.  The fact that Hamlet is also trying to find the truth about his father's death by putting on a play shows another way the characters are hiding things or trying to gain information.

Overall I think that Act II was very suspenseful and insightful.  Shakespeare creates many different stories going on inside the basic story.  He adds to the plot and shows some of the characters true colors.  By ending the act with Hamlet's soliloquy he set's the reader up for Act III.  I also feel as if at that point in the story you don't know what to believe.  When Hamlet starts screaming he really does seem crazy but is their a method to his maddness?

  

ACT 1 HAMLET

In Act 1 of Hamlet, things I noticed the most as a reader were the ways the characters are introduced and portrayed. The three characters that stuck out the most to me as a reader are: King CLaudius, Queen Gertrud, and of course Hamlet. I believe that Shakespeare starts the play by showing you these characters true colors but in a way that you have to think about to understand. King Claudius for example, acts like he is truly concerned about Hamlet's well-being. However, when thinking about Claudius from the reader's point of view I feel as if he's trying to watch his own back instead. Seeing this character trait about King Claudius from the very beginning of the story shows that maybe he isn't as innocent as he claims to be. He has such a concern of Hamlet because he doesn't want to loose his throne, or possibly even be killed by Hamlet. Queen Gertrud confuses me as a reader. I'm not sure if she had anything to do with her late husband's death or if she really is a concerned mother. When I first read about Queen Gertrud speaking to Guildenstern and Rosencrantz I took it as she was sincerely worried for her son, Hamlet's safety since he's been acting strangely after his father's death. The second time through the reading I paid more attention to Gertrud's words. Gertrud says, "for the supply and profit of our hope" (page 48) and that gave me a different outlook on Gertrud as a mother. I believe that if she was truly concerned with Hamlet's sanity she would help him herself instead of hiring his friends to do the job. Another factor I thought about was the fact that she remarried her late husbands brother so quickly. Does this mean she knew she had to move on instead of being depressed or that she was a conspirator in Hamlet's fathers death? Hamlet is another character I read multiple ways. When Hamlet is first introduced into the play he is called crazy. I believed that Hamlet truly couldn't deal with the death of his father and it sent him off the deep end. I thought about how I would feel if i was put into the situation Hamlet faced and I think I'd of acted different then usual too, I feel like it's just normal. Then after Hamlet met the ghost I felt differently. I do believe he was having a hard time dealing with the death but after gaining information from the ghost I think he used it to benefit him. If Hamlet acts like he is crazy but is really completely sane he can easily deceive people. Overall, these three characters actions got me engaged in the play and I am looking forward to seeing what sides of them come out by the end of the play.

Kubla Khan & Ozymandias

1) The power of the imagination is often exalted in Romantic poetry. In your opinion, does “Kubla Khan” celebrate the imagination or caution against its indulgence? To whom might Coleridge be writing and for what purpose(s)?

2) Even in the brief space of a sonnet, Shelley suggests a number of narrative frames. How many speakers do you hear in "Ozymandias"? What does each of these voices seem to say to you (or to others) as listeners?

1. I think that "Kubla Khan" celebrates the imagination but also cautions against indulging in it. On page 758, it says that Coleridge wrote "Kubla Khan" after he had taken an opium. Coleridge also added a prose introduction which he called, "a rational account of the poem's origins." When originally writing the poem I think it was completely about both the writer and readers imagination. The original poem was inspired by a dream. Dreams to me as a reader are entirely about a person's imagination. Coleridge's imagination allowed him to have the dream which inspired the poem he created.

2. While reading "Ozymandias" I believe that there was three speakers. The speakers were the Ozymandias, the narrator, and the traveler. The Ozymandias to me tell a negative story. I think they explain the way their city took a turn for the worse. The narrator begins the sonnet and speaks of an "antique land." The narrator to me tells the opposite story of the Ozymandias. Lastly, the traveler explains what he saw. According to him he saw the Ozymandias under harsh rule due to their king. Overall, I believe that the narrator starts the story in a positive way describing the city and by the end the Ozymandias are painting a different picture describing their ruined city.

BLAKE

1) Do you agree with the editors of your textbook that Blake's poetry had the power to enact social change by appealing to the imagination of the reader?

2) Why might the editors have included the Parliament transcript as a primary source document? How did it affect your reading of Blake's work?

1. I do agree with the editors of our English textbook that Blake's poetry had the power to enact social change. However, I also feel as if Blake didn't only appeal to the imagination of the reader. Besides imagination I think Blake also wants to his readers to sympathy for the child in both poems. In The Chimney Sweeper from Songs of Innocence , after I read it I felt bad for the child because he had to endure child labor but also hopeful because he believed he would go to heaven. Seeing the child have hope that one day he was be rewarded for his hard work on Earth in heaven gave me a feeling of optimism. In the Chimney Sweeper from Songs of Experience, I felt bad for the child because he had nothing to look forward too. Instead of thinking his next life would be wonderful he was negative, and depressed because of what he had to go through. His childhood was wasted and he had to live with the fact that his parents sold him into his fate. I imagined if I was this child who had to sweep chimneys would I be optimistic or would I be pessimistic?

2. I think including the Parliament transcript as a primary source document was very beneficial for the reader. When I read a poem most times I just think the writer makes it up. After reading the poems I was able to read the primary source document and see that child labor really did happen. It was an issue back then and I think writing the poem is a way to express that. I also think the primary source document draws more attention to the poem. It backs up Blake's poetry with actual evidence. Overall, I think without the Parliament transcript the poem wouldn't make as much of an impact as it did with the background information.