The Three Hamlets...

After thinking about the three versions of Hamlet we watched today on my rainy walk home, I cant remember the second one we watched at all... obviously not a great hit. So I'll just ramble on about the other two. The first one we watched (the one with the ventriloquist skills) didn't impress me as the one with David Tennant in, but then when we discussed it and I realised that not everyone can be as good a actor as Dave I realised just how clever it was; although he looked like a ghost, being able to hear his thoughts created an even more honest Hamlet. The one with David Tennant in was really good acting, and although I preferred his performance, it was realll different. It made me think that Hamlet is really grieving at his fathers loss, but is also slightly mad. So yeah, not much else to say.

So long, farewell, auf wiedersehn, adieu..

King Claudius...

I must admit, I'm confused about my feelings for Claudius. HA! That sounded wrong. What I meant is, I don't know whether I hate him as much as I did before. And this is because we've watched different interpretations of the play, so really, Mr Francis, this is you're doing. But I still stand by my initial thought that he's sly and manipulative. Plus, he's very patronising and cold hearted, especially when he tells Hamlet to 'grow up' - "'Tis sweet and commendable in your nature, Hamlet, To give these mourning to your father, But you must know your father lost a father...". It seems to me that Claudius is very comfortable accusing others as things such as not commanding god, but fails to take responsibility himself; we have already seen this when he writes a letter to stop young Fortinbras take back his land.

Since last lesson, I've been thinking about first impressions of Claudius (obviously as it was the assignment) but also about the Queen, and I'm beginning to wonder if she's as good as everyone makes her out to be, could anyone be that blind to see what is happening to her family? Hamlet realises that he's a nasty piece of work, so why doesn't she?

p.s. I would like to point out that after I had finished my blog, I went through all of my work and turned every 'i' into an 'I', which took ages. Next year, Sir, please find a blog which will allow auto-correction.

p.p.s This blog is in no way a dig at Mr Francis, merely a co-incidence. I LOVE ENG LIT.

So long, farewell, auf wiedersehn, adieu....

The very first Hamlet blog...

Today in our lesson times two we looked at King Claudius' speech, after looking at Aristotle and other things (which i'm going to have to read more about as I don't really get it yet.)  But hey ho, that's not the blog assignment so it's all good. I do, however, have to blog about Claudius, so, here goes...

My first impression of Claudius isn't a good one. As we said in class, he doesn't exactly paint a nice picture with "mirth in funeral and with dirge in marriage". And his speech gives the impression that the loss of former King Hamlet is recent as people are still grieving, so these remarks seem a tad insensitive, yet the whole audience seem to agree. So yeah, not a fan, not a fan. 

However, we also discussed the different plays performed, and the way things are set out and how the actors perform the line, depend on how the audience are affected. We looked at 3 different versions of the performance, and the King in each of them portrays the speech in different ways. The first one was more intimate with a smaller audience who were very supportive of him and his decisions. The second version gave the impression of a King who only wanted the power, as he gave a very echoey, formal speech with greater distance between him and the Queen. Finally, the third version seems very over dramatised by the King, with what seems to be an acted pause. The impression is that the audience are forced to agree in the awkward atmosphere. 

p.s Now we're in 2011 and i think this is my first blog of the year, i think my sign off needs to a bit better than the now overdone "TOOODLES", so while i ponder on this, for now my sign off shall be a variation on the theme of TOOODLES,

NOOODLES.