More Finals Info

See previous post for final exam description and breakdown.

Semester 1 Reading List

Poetry

Essays:

Modest Proposal
Living Like Weasels
Battle of the Ants
“Cub” Wants to be a Pilot
Once More to the Lake

Short Stories

Yellow Wallpaper
Young Goodman Brown
Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber
A Rose for Emily
Metamorphosis
Good Country People
Araby
Very Old Man with Enormous Wings

Plays:

Oedipus
Hamlet

Hamlet Reread and Semester Final Info

For Friday,

1. Perform a level 1 review of Act IV through scene 4.

2. Perform a level 2 review of the Hamlet's speech Act IV scene 4 line 35 "How all occasions do inform against me..."

3. No marking the text required.

Your final will consist of a passage analysis essay (Shakespearean passage) and an objective, fill in the blank component. Study guide available here.

Due Wednesday

1. Perform a level one review of plot and main events of Act III scenes 1-2.

2. Perform a leve two close review of Ophelia's conversation with Hamlet immediately following the "To be speech"

3. Perform a level three review (marking the text) of Act III, scene 1, Hamlet's speech "To be or not to be..."

To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.--Soft you now!
The fair Ophelia! Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remember'd.

Due Tuesday

1. Do a level one re-read of the remainder of Act II.

2. None required.


3. Do a level three analysis of Hamlet's speech, Act II, scene 2, line 555, "Oh what a rogue and peasant slave am I..." Please mark the text, and be prepared to turn in.

Now I am alone.
O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!
Is it not monstrous that this player here,
But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,
Could force his soul so to his own conceit
That from her working all his visage wann'd,
Tears in his eyes, distraction in's aspect,
A broken voice, and his whole function suiting
With forms to his conceit? and all for nothing!
For Hecuba!
What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,
That he should weep for her? What would he do,
Had he the motive and the cue for passion
That I have? He would drown the stage with tears
And cleave the general ear with horrid speech,
Make mad the guilty and appal the free,
Confound the ignorant, and amaze indeed
The very faculties of eyes and ears. Yet I,
A dull and muddy-mettled rascal, peak,
Like John-a-dreams, unpregnant of my cause,
And can say nothing; no, not for a king,
Upon whose property and most dear life
A damn'd defeat was made. Am I a coward?
Who calls me villain? breaks my pate across?
Plucks off my beard, and blows it in my face?
Tweaks me by the nose? gives me the lie i' the throat,
As deep as to the lungs? who does me this?
Ha!
'Swounds, I should take it: for it cannot be
But I am pigeon-liver'd and lack gall
To make oppression bitter, or ere this
I should have fatted all the region kites
With this slave's offal: bloody, bawdy villain!
Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain!
O, vengeance!
Why, what an ass am I! This is most brave,
That I, the son of a dear father murder'd,
Prompted to my revenge by heaven and hell,
Must, like a whore, unpack my heart with words,
And fall a-cursing, like a very drab,
A scullion!
Fie upon't! foh! About, my brain! I have heard
That guilty creatures sitting at a play
Have by the very cunning of the scene
Been struck so to the soul that presently
They have proclaim'd their malefactions;
For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak
With most miraculous organ. I'll have these players
Play something like the murder of my father
Before mine uncle: I'll observe his looks;
I'll tent him to the quick: if he but blench,
I know my course. The spirit that I have seen
May be the devil: and the devil hath power
To assume a pleasing shape; yea, and perhaps
Out of my weakness and my melancholy,
As he is very potent with such spirits,
Abuses me to damn me: I'll have grounds
More relative than this: the play 's the thing
Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king.

Due Monday, 1/14

1. Do a level one review of plot events of Act II, scenes 1 and 2, stopping before the players enter.(around line 380).

2. Do a level two reading (think carefully about literal and analytical ideas) of Act II, scene 2, Hamlet's speech beginning with "I will tell you what, so shall my anticipation prevent your discovery", but focusing on the "Oh what a piece of work is man..." portion.

What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason!
how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how
express and admirable! in action how like an angel!
in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the
world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me,
what is this quintessence of dust? man delights not
me: no, nor woman neither, though by your smiling
you seem to say so.

3. No marking the text required.

Due 1/11

1. Review plot events for scenes 3, 4, and 5 of Act I.

2. Review the following speeches, practicing our close text (literal summary and analysis techniques) in your head. You do not need to write anything down, but can if you choose.

- Act I, scene 3, Laertes' speech "Think it no more/For nature crescent does not grow alone"

3. No marking the text required.

Also, since I'm actually remembering to post information:

Hamlet Research Paper Information

(Due January 25th)

You must find and read 1 critical essays written about Hamlet. Your essays can come from the internet, a literary journal, the back of a copy the play (if included) or the introduction to the play if long enough. JSTOR would be an excellent resource for this assignment; please ask if you need login or other JSTOR information.

If you choose to use an essay from the internet, it must be from a reputable, academic source. This excludes essays from Sparknotes, Echeats, Purple monkey, Debbie’s Book Report Grade 8, etc.

Then you must write a 2-3 page evaluation of the essay. Your evaluation should include a summary of the thesis/argument of the essay you read (use quotations to refer to this) as well as your personal reaction to the validity of these points. Your summary portion should not exceed half of your total length. Please be sure to maintain a 3rd person formal voice even though you are expressing your opinion. You will also want to make sure you support your reaction/opinion with quotations from Hamlet.

Pay special attention to the language used by the authors of the critical essay. This is a chance for you to experience the language of literary analysis and learn from it stylistically. It is also a chance for you to research an aspect of Hamlet that you find personally interesting: gender relationships, minor characters, etc.

Please use MLA formatting and include a works cited. (You will not, however, lose any points for formatting errors). Hallelujah!

Due Thursday, 1/10

There are three levels of review that you will be performing, listed in order of most basic to most complicated. Only on the third listed below, do you have to write anything down, although you are welcome to mark close text reading for those speeches listed under step 2 below if you want to go the extra mile.

1. Review plot events for scenes 1 and 2 of Act I.

2. Review the following speeches, practicing our close text (literal summary and analysis techniques) in your head. You do not need to write anything down, but can if you choose. (This is similar to what we practiced on the Henry V speech before break.)

- Act I, scene ii beginning speech by King Claudius: "Though yet our memory..."
- Act I, scene ii, speech by Hamlet: "Seems madam? Nay, it is"

3. Mark close text observations on the following speech, using your left margin for literal summary and your right for analytical analysis and associative thinking. If you are using an etext (or don't want to write in your book), I'll include the passage below so you can copy and paste and print it for ease of marking the text.

- Act I, scene ii, speech by King Claudius: "'Tis sweet and commendable in your nature Hamlet..."

KING CLAUDIUS
'Tis sweet and co
mmendable in your nature, Hamlet,
To give these mourning duties to your father:
But, you must know, your father lost a father;
That father lost, lost his, and the survivor bound
In filial obligation for some term
To do obsequious sorrow: but to persever
In obstinate condolement is a course
Of impious stubbornness; 'tis unmanly grief;
It shows a will most incorrect to heaven,
A heart unfortified, a mind impatient,
An understanding simple and unschool'd:
For what we know must be and is as common
As any the most vulgar thing to sense,
Why should we in our peevish opposition
Take it to heart? Fie! 'tis a fault to heaven,
A fault against the dead, a fault to nature,
To reason most absurd: whose common theme
Is death of fathers, and who still hath cried,
From the first corse till he that died to-day,
'This must be so.' We pray you, throw to earth
This unprevailing woe, and think of us
As of a father: for let the world take note,
You are the most immediate to our throne;
And with no less nobility of love
Than that which dearest father bears his son,
Do I impart toward you. For your intent
In going back to school in Wittenberg,
It is most retrograde to our desire:
And we beseech you, bend you to remain
Here, in the cheer and comfort of our eye,
Our chiefest courtier, cousin, and our son.