So you pay the price.
It’s kind of interesting when the only three plays that I’ve learnt thoroughly so far were all about relationship between God and human beings. No doubt, it had changed my personal point of view towards this world, since all these while I’m the pagan believer, and these plays had make me believed the existence and the power from the “above”.
“King Lear” by Shakespeare was a total tragedy. However this tragedy, in my opinion, was not worth to be sympathized with. Every catastrophe that Lear experienced in the play, it was all stemmed from his own foolish actions and decisions. If he did not ideal of a care-free life to spend his old age and step down from his throne, he would not caused the two daughters’ greed for the kingly power. If he did not insist on the stupid game on professing love through words, he would not lose his dearest daughter and built his own path to his madness and doom. It was all because of his own actions, he had nothing to be sympathized on.
The Elizabethan world view in this play was, although a cruel one, but also a bloody truth that showed to us that men can never outwit the power from the above. Once you broke the covenant, once your action diverts from the law of nature, you have no place to hide and no place to run. That proved the old-time saying right, pay for your own actions. Sadly no man in Earth seemed to realize that this golden rule of nature was always around them, they continue to sin, they continue to live their lives in shadow, they continue to live the way they want without thinking of consequences. And more sadly, I used to be one of them.
I now believe in retribution. I now believe in karma. I hate being so cautious in my life at so young a age, but I like being informed that when I was doing something, someone would be watching me, at least I behave much better.
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Singapura Dilanggar Todak !!! LARI ~
This play seemed easy to read but trust me; it is definitely not as easy when I was trying to interpret its underlying meaning. Unlike Oedipus Rex, this play is an intellectual play where it provokes our thoughts about the local political scenario which I am not familiar with, and therefore, I am having a much harder time to digest this compared to Oedipus Rex.
The prologue of the play is about a covenant between God and human. Although the characters in prologue do no reappear in the rest of the play, they are actually significant characters that influence the development of the entire play. It is because the breaking of this covenant, the kingdom was destroyed. This reminds me of Shakespeare’s “King Lear” when Lear forfeited his responsibilities as a King to rule on Earth (he broke the covenant with God) and in the end, he became a mad man as his own retribution. Again, my insights on power from the above deepen because play after play, it had proven to me that God’s power is unchallengeable and human can never outwit God.
Besides this, there is nothing that surprised me in the storyline as I am quite familiar with it, since I had read “Sejarah Melayu” when I was in secondary school. The only surprising element I found in here was the character of Ris Kaw and Logod. These two characters seemed to act like outsiders that view the development of this play in a different perspective. This had ringed a bell in me of a Chinese proverb that says that “an outsider can see a matter more clearly than those who are involved in that matter”. I see Ris Kaw and Logod playing that role because, as discussed in previous lectures, they are the contemporary voices that alert us. They let us see between the lines of what is happening and they are our own voice of conscience.
Lastly, I liked the way Kee Thuan Chye wrote this play because it is rather humorous. It seemed easy to read, but for literature students like me who have to always read between the lines, it had really given me a headache. Many of us tend to forget what we as a literature students should do (interpret underlying meaning and the message in the play) when reading this play because the entire play is funny and the language is rather easy. Therefore it had definitely increased the difficulty level of this play, and in my opinion, more difficult than the text “Oedipus Rex”.
The prologue of the play is about a covenant between God and human. Although the characters in prologue do no reappear in the rest of the play, they are actually significant characters that influence the development of the entire play. It is because the breaking of this covenant, the kingdom was destroyed. This reminds me of Shakespeare’s “King Lear” when Lear forfeited his responsibilities as a King to rule on Earth (he broke the covenant with God) and in the end, he became a mad man as his own retribution. Again, my insights on power from the above deepen because play after play, it had proven to me that God’s power is unchallengeable and human can never outwit God.
Besides this, there is nothing that surprised me in the storyline as I am quite familiar with it, since I had read “Sejarah Melayu” when I was in secondary school. The only surprising element I found in here was the character of Ris Kaw and Logod. These two characters seemed to act like outsiders that view the development of this play in a different perspective. This had ringed a bell in me of a Chinese proverb that says that “an outsider can see a matter more clearly than those who are involved in that matter”. I see Ris Kaw and Logod playing that role because, as discussed in previous lectures, they are the contemporary voices that alert us. They let us see between the lines of what is happening and they are our own voice of conscience.
Lastly, I liked the way Kee Thuan Chye wrote this play because it is rather humorous. It seemed easy to read, but for literature students like me who have to always read between the lines, it had really given me a headache. Many of us tend to forget what we as a literature students should do (interpret underlying meaning and the message in the play) when reading this play because the entire play is funny and the language is rather easy. Therefore it had definitely increased the difficulty level of this play, and in my opinion, more difficult than the text “Oedipus Rex”.
The Experience of Simulated Teaching - Set Induction
In my set induction I had chosen to work on the story “Soul Gone Home” by Langston Hughes. The reason why I chose this play to work on is because I noticed that most of my classmates had chosen plays like “The Ring Doesn’t Fit” and also “The Ring”, which I think will be rather repetitive if I also pick these plays for my simulated teaching.
I was among the middle of the group to present where all of us had been through a few hours of looking at our friends presenting their teachings. I believe most of us had become quite bored at that time because for the whole session, the class was exceptionally quiet with little responses. So when I was presenting my set induction, I was having a hard time to elicit responses from my “students”. I spent some of my time trying to rephrase the limited responses that I had, hopefully my “students” would understand what my set induction is about.
I felt that I was quite nervous that day, so I stammered a little and maybe some slip of tongues and some grammatical mistakes in my speech. However, I did not get any positive or negative response from my tutor Mr. Harold, since he would sometimes comment on the good ones and the bad ones at the end of every session. So I guess I was on the right track for my set induction.
I had used a song named “Family Portrait” by Pink to portray the theme of mother-son relationship in the play “Soul Gone Home”. From my observance, none of my classmates had used song’s video clip but there are some who had used songs as their set induction. Most of them had opted for pictures and also video clips from movies. Thus, I think I had done something different from my classmates that do not bore my students even more, apart from the topic that I have chosen.
Overall, I would grade myself moderately because of the flaws that I had. I would definitely work on these flaws when I present my pre-reading and also while-reading activities.
I was among the middle of the group to present where all of us had been through a few hours of looking at our friends presenting their teachings. I believe most of us had become quite bored at that time because for the whole session, the class was exceptionally quiet with little responses. So when I was presenting my set induction, I was having a hard time to elicit responses from my “students”. I spent some of my time trying to rephrase the limited responses that I had, hopefully my “students” would understand what my set induction is about.
I felt that I was quite nervous that day, so I stammered a little and maybe some slip of tongues and some grammatical mistakes in my speech. However, I did not get any positive or negative response from my tutor Mr. Harold, since he would sometimes comment on the good ones and the bad ones at the end of every session. So I guess I was on the right track for my set induction.
I had used a song named “Family Portrait” by Pink to portray the theme of mother-son relationship in the play “Soul Gone Home”. From my observance, none of my classmates had used song’s video clip but there are some who had used songs as their set induction. Most of them had opted for pictures and also video clips from movies. Thus, I think I had done something different from my classmates that do not bore my students even more, apart from the topic that I have chosen.
Overall, I would grade myself moderately because of the flaws that I had. I would definitely work on these flaws when I present my pre-reading and also while-reading activities.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Tribute the Elizabeth
Elizabeth reminded me of a rather famous critic on Jane Austen’s books.
Women in Jane Austen’s novel will never fail to surrender in a civil marriage.
As powerful as Elizabeth, she too succumbed to the basic need of a typical woman – the desire to be loved by a man. As strong as Elizabeth as the Queen of England, she had to admit, indirectly, that she is a woman who longed to have a man and a child.
The character of Bess or the other Elizabeth as her favourite maid had hinted us some of Elizabeth’s thoughts. One, Elizabeth saw Bess as the ordinary her, the other her that can do things that she cannot do as a Queen, but at the same time imposed rules on her that indicated the limitations of living in a royal family. For instance, Elizabeth was furious when Bess secretly married a man without her royal permission.
Second, Elizabeth used Bess to show her true affection towards the man that she liked – a pirate named Sir Walter Raleigh. As mentioned there were a lot of limitations when you lived in a royal family, what more Queen Elizabeth herself as the role model of all. The scene where she insisted Bess to dance with Sir Walter had indicated this to us rather vividly.
However, although being a woman, Elizabeth had at the same time portrayed courage and determination greater than a man. She stood still when Spain declared war with England, even though she knew that England was weak against Spain. She planned well, and with her wit she freed Sir Walter, who was at that time imprisoned because he had married Bess, to fight against the marine troupe of Spain and eventually won the war.
Elizabeth was a tough woman, and woman like her if lived in this era, might be even greater than any presidents in the world. I felt sorry when she had to bear the name of a virgin queen, and I am sad that the society could not see her sacrifices of being one virgin queen is for the sake of England. Elizabeth, who sacrificed her love and her happiness as a woman, and being the last in Tudors line, built the golden age of England.
Tribute to Queen Elizabeth. All hail Queen Elizabeth.
Women in Jane Austen’s novel will never fail to surrender in a civil marriage.
As powerful as Elizabeth, she too succumbed to the basic need of a typical woman – the desire to be loved by a man. As strong as Elizabeth as the Queen of England, she had to admit, indirectly, that she is a woman who longed to have a man and a child.
The character of Bess or the other Elizabeth as her favourite maid had hinted us some of Elizabeth’s thoughts. One, Elizabeth saw Bess as the ordinary her, the other her that can do things that she cannot do as a Queen, but at the same time imposed rules on her that indicated the limitations of living in a royal family. For instance, Elizabeth was furious when Bess secretly married a man without her royal permission.
Second, Elizabeth used Bess to show her true affection towards the man that she liked – a pirate named Sir Walter Raleigh. As mentioned there were a lot of limitations when you lived in a royal family, what more Queen Elizabeth herself as the role model of all. The scene where she insisted Bess to dance with Sir Walter had indicated this to us rather vividly.
However, although being a woman, Elizabeth had at the same time portrayed courage and determination greater than a man. She stood still when Spain declared war with England, even though she knew that England was weak against Spain. She planned well, and with her wit she freed Sir Walter, who was at that time imprisoned because he had married Bess, to fight against the marine troupe of Spain and eventually won the war.
Elizabeth was a tough woman, and woman like her if lived in this era, might be even greater than any presidents in the world. I felt sorry when she had to bear the name of a virgin queen, and I am sad that the society could not see her sacrifices of being one virgin queen is for the sake of England. Elizabeth, who sacrificed her love and her happiness as a woman, and being the last in Tudors line, built the golden age of England.
Tribute to Queen Elizabeth. All hail Queen Elizabeth.
Oedipus Rex - Foolish but Wise
The process of studying the whole text was a long winding road. The fact that it was a translated version of Latin text had complicated the situations, where some of vocabulary used was hard to pronounce and not to the level of my understanding. Honestly I had quite a hard time digesting the text on my own, but thankfully it was explained in detailed in class, and that really helped me a lot in the process of comprehending the class.
The thing that I had learnt the most when studying this text would be the elements of fate or moira in humans’ life. All this while I understand that men could not challenge God’s power, but I’ve always believe that if we work hard on something, we can pursue the things that we want and it is very possible to change our fate. But studying this text had made me realized that men, although had control over actions, but can never divert away from the course of their own fate and destiny set still but God. This was vividly portrayed when every step that Oedipus take to uphold his name as the ruler of Thebes and his determination in finding out the truth had dragged him to his eternal doom.
The conflicts within Oedipus too had been an interesting to study. Was Oedipus a wise king? Or is he a foolish man? When every action that Oedipus decided to take to help find the murderer of Laios and the process of revealing the truth behind his identity, he had caused himself to fall badly in his face. Personally I pitied Oedipus, I see him as a wise king and a victim of fate where he had no control on it. I believe, if fate had found its way on you, no matter how you wish to avoid it, you can never runaway from it. One way or another, you would have to fulfill your fate. It is a road that God had laid for us, and we, as earthlings under their feet had no choice but to take it.
The elements of dramatic ironies also had attracted me to continue reading this text attentively despite of the hard time I’m having with the understanding of the text. Again, it stressed on Oedipus as being a wise king or a fool man. The notion of physically blind but having great insights of morality and spiritually portrayed by Teiresias was also an emphasis on dramatic ironies where it was greatly contrasted with Oedipus as having normal eye sight but blind to see the truth, and eventually end up as a blind beggar.
“The greatest griefs are those we cause ourselves”. Are we the cause of our own actions? Or is it really fated for us to walk into our own fall? This question is a good question for us to ponder on. Are we supposed to play our cards around God’s will, or should we write our own destiny. No one knows, because none of us know our own future. Oedipus Rex had taught me to uphold Carpedium. I do not know what will happen to me tomorrow, just like the reversal of fortune that had fallen on Oedipus. I will treasure each and every moment that I have now, which I had now considered as bliss.
The thing that I had learnt the most when studying this text would be the elements of fate or moira in humans’ life. All this while I understand that men could not challenge God’s power, but I’ve always believe that if we work hard on something, we can pursue the things that we want and it is very possible to change our fate. But studying this text had made me realized that men, although had control over actions, but can never divert away from the course of their own fate and destiny set still but God. This was vividly portrayed when every step that Oedipus take to uphold his name as the ruler of Thebes and his determination in finding out the truth had dragged him to his eternal doom.
The conflicts within Oedipus too had been an interesting to study. Was Oedipus a wise king? Or is he a foolish man? When every action that Oedipus decided to take to help find the murderer of Laios and the process of revealing the truth behind his identity, he had caused himself to fall badly in his face. Personally I pitied Oedipus, I see him as a wise king and a victim of fate where he had no control on it. I believe, if fate had found its way on you, no matter how you wish to avoid it, you can never runaway from it. One way or another, you would have to fulfill your fate. It is a road that God had laid for us, and we, as earthlings under their feet had no choice but to take it.
The elements of dramatic ironies also had attracted me to continue reading this text attentively despite of the hard time I’m having with the understanding of the text. Again, it stressed on Oedipus as being a wise king or a fool man. The notion of physically blind but having great insights of morality and spiritually portrayed by Teiresias was also an emphasis on dramatic ironies where it was greatly contrasted with Oedipus as having normal eye sight but blind to see the truth, and eventually end up as a blind beggar.
“The greatest griefs are those we cause ourselves”. Are we the cause of our own actions? Or is it really fated for us to walk into our own fall? This question is a good question for us to ponder on. Are we supposed to play our cards around God’s will, or should we write our own destiny. No one knows, because none of us know our own future. Oedipus Rex had taught me to uphold Carpedium. I do not know what will happen to me tomorrow, just like the reversal of fortune that had fallen on Oedipus. I will treasure each and every moment that I have now, which I had now considered as bliss.
Teiresias The She-Male Prophet
Teiresias is a man I “know” when I read the text of “Oedipus Rex”. He was known as a man who was blind physically but had a great spiritual or moral insight, as opposed to Oedipus in that particular text. At first I had absolutely no interest in knowing more in-depth about this man, since he was just a character in one of my must-read plays, until my lecturer had assigned us to do a research on him.
It was an eye-opening again after I had went through the introduction of plays earlier these days. I was amazed by Teiresias’s background and what he had been through. My knowledge in Greek history was all this while rather limited, until the research of Teiresias had made me gain more insight on Greek’s mythical world. The experience that Teiresias had gone through was incomparable to any other man in this world. Imagine a man that can experienced both sex in his lifetime, had children and had live for approximately seven generations, I could never had imagined that would ever happened in our time and space.
In the research of Teiresias, the thing that attracted my interest the most would definitely be the reason why he got blind and how he get his ability to foresee the future. There are quite a number of versions but the two most popular versions would be, either he got punished by the Goddess of Athena because he had accidentally saw her bathing naked, or Hera, the wife of Zeus, who had cursed him for answering honestly that women enjoyed ten times more than men in bed. I remained skeptical for the first theory and chose to applaud for the later; judging from the experience that Teiresias had went through as both men and women, and also the limited power of Athena as only the goddess of wisdom and war compared to Zeus as the King of all Gods to give him the ability to foresee.
Teiresias ability to foresee the future had casted some impacts on me. Firstly, never judge a book by its cover that although a man may be physically impaired but he may have some ability that is greater than any other normal beings in the society. Secondly, believe in the greater power of God as mankind has no strong grip on their own destiny where they can only decide on their own actions, but never their fates. Lastly, never be too confident on ourselves as we may not know what will happen next to our future; this moment we may be at the height, but the next thing that we may find out is that we are falling to the lowest point of our lives.
Thanks to Teiresias, I had become more interested to continue reading the text of “Oedipus Rex” and also gained greater knowledge on the mythical side of Greek history.
It was an eye-opening again after I had went through the introduction of plays earlier these days. I was amazed by Teiresias’s background and what he had been through. My knowledge in Greek history was all this while rather limited, until the research of Teiresias had made me gain more insight on Greek’s mythical world. The experience that Teiresias had gone through was incomparable to any other man in this world. Imagine a man that can experienced both sex in his lifetime, had children and had live for approximately seven generations, I could never had imagined that would ever happened in our time and space.
In the research of Teiresias, the thing that attracted my interest the most would definitely be the reason why he got blind and how he get his ability to foresee the future. There are quite a number of versions but the two most popular versions would be, either he got punished by the Goddess of Athena because he had accidentally saw her bathing naked, or Hera, the wife of Zeus, who had cursed him for answering honestly that women enjoyed ten times more than men in bed. I remained skeptical for the first theory and chose to applaud for the later; judging from the experience that Teiresias had went through as both men and women, and also the limited power of Athena as only the goddess of wisdom and war compared to Zeus as the King of all Gods to give him the ability to foresee.
Teiresias ability to foresee the future had casted some impacts on me. Firstly, never judge a book by its cover that although a man may be physically impaired but he may have some ability that is greater than any other normal beings in the society. Secondly, believe in the greater power of God as mankind has no strong grip on their own destiny where they can only decide on their own actions, but never their fates. Lastly, never be too confident on ourselves as we may not know what will happen next to our future; this moment we may be at the height, but the next thing that we may find out is that we are falling to the lowest point of our lives.
Thanks to Teiresias, I had become more interested to continue reading the text of “Oedipus Rex” and also gained greater knowledge on the mythical side of Greek history.
Writing Play - "A Fat Soul"
The experience of writing a play script was an unusual one as this is not something that we will write in our leisure. Often we will opt for a short story or a more compact product like poetry, but writing a plays had never crossed my mind.
The last experience of me writing a play was back at my foundation years which I have to adapt from the original text of “Pygmalion” by Bernard Shaw. I was in charged in the second act and I could remember vividly that all I did was summarizing the whole act to a shorter version without even paraphrasing the lines in the play. Now then I thought of it I am laughing at my own naïve-ness at that time, I was a newbie in literature, what more on plays as one of the oldest history in literature.
However, writing this recent play was a fun experience as well. I really enjoy myself when I had brainstorming sessions with my group members to come out with the main theme of the play, what kind of characters to put in and what kind of words should we put in. When writing this one act play, we had divided 3 parts of our first rough draft into 6 scenes, and each of us was to write 2 scenes each. After that, we compiled our writings and do revision and editing together.
The whole process had been a successful one as everything worked out really well. We managed to finish draft one in a week time, and getting it back from our tutor with a good feedback. Therefore I am very happy to announce that we had the play done and it was a really interesting experience to have in this class as well as a good experience of having a successful collaborative work with my friends.
The play that we had written was entitled “A Fat Soul” which was about a fat girl who had lost her loved one because of her weight problem. Being heartbroken, she sorted the extreme way to lose weight to gain back her confidence. At the end of the play, she successfully lost weight and gain a man who truly loved her for who she is. This play was written based on the issue of weight problem because it is something that youngsters nowadays are familiar with and we hope, when they are reading the play, could bring them realizations that beauty comes from within but not from the appearance.
We really hope that this one act play will work out well. After all, three of us do deserve beginner’s luck! Special thanks to Hui Nee and also Jia Yiing. =)
The last experience of me writing a play was back at my foundation years which I have to adapt from the original text of “Pygmalion” by Bernard Shaw. I was in charged in the second act and I could remember vividly that all I did was summarizing the whole act to a shorter version without even paraphrasing the lines in the play. Now then I thought of it I am laughing at my own naïve-ness at that time, I was a newbie in literature, what more on plays as one of the oldest history in literature.
However, writing this recent play was a fun experience as well. I really enjoy myself when I had brainstorming sessions with my group members to come out with the main theme of the play, what kind of characters to put in and what kind of words should we put in. When writing this one act play, we had divided 3 parts of our first rough draft into 6 scenes, and each of us was to write 2 scenes each. After that, we compiled our writings and do revision and editing together.
The whole process had been a successful one as everything worked out really well. We managed to finish draft one in a week time, and getting it back from our tutor with a good feedback. Therefore I am very happy to announce that we had the play done and it was a really interesting experience to have in this class as well as a good experience of having a successful collaborative work with my friends.
The play that we had written was entitled “A Fat Soul” which was about a fat girl who had lost her loved one because of her weight problem. Being heartbroken, she sorted the extreme way to lose weight to gain back her confidence. At the end of the play, she successfully lost weight and gain a man who truly loved her for who she is. This play was written based on the issue of weight problem because it is something that youngsters nowadays are familiar with and we hope, when they are reading the play, could bring them realizations that beauty comes from within but not from the appearance.
We really hope that this one act play will work out well. After all, three of us do deserve beginner’s luck! Special thanks to Hui Nee and also Jia Yiing. =)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)