Literary Overload

This is an aside, a vent, an escape…
I can’t accomplish anything because there are too many things going on at once.
Abrogation, appropriation, mimicry, code-switching, gender politics, stereotypes, nihilism, death, love, lust, Shakespeare, drama, Socialism, post-colonialism, post-modernism, feminism etc…
I am in the middle of three essays right now and I have not had time to write a post. This post doesn’t exactly fit my original intent for this blog site. I guess we all need our outlets.
This morning I spent four hours researching for an essay on language as power in post-colonial drama. Then, I accompanied my flat mate to the museum to help her in her project on Queensland icons. And now I should be writing that essay on Language, but I just can’t focus. I have a half finished essay on Shakespeare waiting for me, and a yet to be started essay on gender relations in socialist writing that keeps nagging at me. Not to mention the exams I should be studying for.
Over the last week I have found myself, numerous times, sitting in front of the computer watching the cursor flash in front of me. This goes on for hours on end. How can I ever have an opinion on anything when thousands of more highly qualified people have already formulated their own ideas about a text? Sure I can quote them, but what about the rest? It is hard to have confidence in your own thoughts as an undergrad especially when your superiors have often published something on the matter at hand. How can you disagree with the person who marks your paper?
My biggest complaint at the end of a semester is that despite the desperate need for sleep one can never actually accomplish it. There are too many theories and social issues, themes and ideas running through my head and I can’t turn them off. Have you ever tried writing a 3000 word essay while suffering from sleep deprivation?
My heart goes out to all of my fellow students in the world who drink four cups of coffee to stay awake and cram for an exam; spend more time in the library then in their own home; have retinal damage from staring at a computer screen all day; have developed a tick whenever they hear the word “reference” “footnote” or “bibliography” and have the complexion of a Seattleite despite living in the sunniest part of the world.
We all deserve our moments of complete incoherence – the result of literary overload.

Shakespeare the Honest Lover

Many people are familiar with this sonnet, but it has always been my favourite so as it was brought up in class this week I thought I would post it.

Sonnet 130

My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips’ red.
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damasked, read and white,
But no such roses se I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to her her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound.
I grant I never saw a goddess go:
My mistress when she walks treads on the ground.
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare.

This sonnet is one of his more famous because it so obviously rejects the tradition of Petrachian sonnets which flatter women by comparing them to the sun and moon and other brilliant things. It speaks to me personally because this is how I want to be loved. To have a man tell you that he loves you in spite of, or, because of your flaws and all those things you loathe in yourself would certainly be incredible.
We are not all supermodels. We don’t come in perfect sizes and shapes or colors. We can’t always look glamorous. We know that we aren’t divine goddesses who say the right things and do the right things all the time. To have a man acknowledge that and love us for our imperfections would truly be amazing.

On a side note, if you do enjoy poetry you should read Pablo Neruda. His poetry is very earthy and real. He wrote 101 love sonnets to his wife. They are much like the one above in that they speak about the real things he loves her for instead of vain flattery.

My Australian Education

Since beginning my studies in this country I have had the privilege of learning things from a new and different perspective…the Australian Perspective. At a time when most of the world finds it easy to hate Americans I have decided to put myself out there and accept the blows. However, I don’t turn the other cheek. There is something to be said for defending your country, and on top of that defending yourself.

This semester I am taking a course titled; Literature, Struggle, and Revolution. The course focuses largely on socialist literature as well as a few texts that are more about racial inequality. The make-up of the classroom is largely Australian with a handful of people of different nationalities. I haven’t heard the other American speak more than once in that class and I think she might have the right idea.

Here we are, studying texts by Gordimer (a famous South African novelist) and Zola (you must know this French revolutionary author) and a number of other people striving towards equality and understanding and the students in my course who claim to follow the same set of beliefs can’t even bend to make an American feel included. To them I am a symbol of capitalism, a symbol of the global corporation, a symbol of the oppressor.
In class we discuss many different theories relative to socialism, post-colonialism, and several other isms. One example is Edward Said’s theory of Orientalism. In his text called Orientalism he discusses the wrongly developed idea of the Orient, as the Other. I want to focus on this broader idea of the Other. The Other, is simply any person, usually a group of persons, who are pointed out as somehow different from the self (the dominant culture). Generally it is a negative distinction through essentialism, although, sometimes it can be a positive aspect such as suggesting that a certain group of people are smarter. Whatever the case may be this essential view limits the “Others” mobility in a different culture. It also isolates and diminishes them.

I feel like the Other. Traditionally this doesn’t appear possible because I am white and English speaking. You don’t have to be of a different race to feel isolated in my Literature, Struggle, and Revolution class, you only have to be American. The fact that I am taking that course should persuade them at least a little in my favour, but it doesn’t. The fact that they are supposed to be against marginalising a group of people should deter them, but it doesn’t. Instead they tell me what I can and can’t say, how I should or should not feel, refuse to listen to my ideas, pass dirty looks to each other when I speak, and ignore my existence outside of the classroom. The more I fight them and try to be the self which seems to offend them the more they loath me. University is supposed to be a place where you can speak your mind, where you can have a different opinion, where others will accept you because you are different. I have found no acceptance from my peers. They are taking out their country’s anger for the politics of my country on me and treating it as a cultural matter instead of what it is. Politics.

Aesthetic Delivery of Hamlet

Who knew that Hamlet, after 400 years of theorizing and pulling it apart, could still be so fascinating? Maybe it was the fact that today we had the greatest guest lecturer of all time!! With his wavy brown hair and a pair of silver rimmed spectacles he melted hearts. His smile was also to die for! He wore a collared shirt with the sleeves rolled up exposing his muscular forearms. It was slightly wrinkled suggesting his relaxed nature despite his position. He wore khaki coloured pants, but these were not your normal slacks, they were baggier and had a few more pockets than what might be acceptable. His shoes were marvellous works of worn in brown leather with a flat fronted toe. They had definately seen better days, but they proved he was not pretentious. And, the crème de la crème, he had the most gorgeous, sweet, boy next door, English accent. I think I heard every woman in that room sigh when he started speaking. And despite my unavailability I did note the lack of something on the third finger of his left hand.

Vanity aside, he also proved to be highly entertaining and intelligent. For the first time this semester we discussed the performance aspects of the play. The lecturer, who I will leave unnamed to stave off stocker types, pointed out several instances in the play where Hamlet addresses the audience directly acknowledging that he is simply performing in a play. Shakespeare uses meta-theatre throughout the entire play to confuse and toy with the audience. There are players within the play performing for the king, and Hamlet himself seems to be doing some acting as his “madness” is questionable. This style of playing leaves audience members feeling that their questions were never answered. By the end of the play they are even more confused as to who or what the ghost was, whether Hamlet was really mad or not, and if he ever really did make a decision about his life, and the life of his step-father the king.

The lecture gave me a much better perspective on Hamlet then I had from my own reading. One notable feature in the play is Hamlet’s semi-nihilistic ideas. Hamlet reveals his belief that he is the creator of his own suffering, and that he is also the creator of his own joy. In his words we see an expression of life as meaningless, having no clear path of good or evil: “For there is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so.” This line stuck with me because I have seen how popular it is to believe this in our contemporary world. Surely Shakespeare is timeless. Though Hamlet offers much more for a reader, or viewer, including clever humour, tragic moments, insanity, analysis of relationships, religion, and so forth, it was the nihilism which really caught my attention. It is a truly tragic way of living and looking at life.