Macbeth's madness

       Well, in English we're still on Macbeth and a lot of stuff has happened since my last post. So picking up where I left off, Macbeth and his wife Lady Macbeth start talking after Macbeth had just killed the king and he brings the murder weapons with him and Lady Macbeth freaks out because he brought the daggers he used to kill King Duncan. She tells him to put the daggers back but he doesn't want to go back to the scene of murder because he feels guilty for committing such an act. So she tells him to clean himself up while she plants the evidence on the guards. Shortly after, Duncan's servants arrive at Macbeth's castle to wake the king up. But on their way to wake the
king up they discover Duncan has been murdered. They also find the guards and their daggers covered with blood. They report the news of Duncan's murder and Macbeth finds the guards to kill them. Why do you think Macbeth thought it was necessary to kill the guards? 
      Later on Duncan's son flee to England and Ireland because they fear the murder might come after them as well. Soon after Macbeth claims the throne but is now filled with paranoia and fears his place as king might be taken away due to the witches prophecy that they gave Banquo. Macbeth then orders his men to go after Banquo and his son Fleance to kill them both. Banquo dies and Fleance manages to escape. Throughout the past few scenes there are occurrences in which Macbeth hallucinates. He sees a ghost and before he decided to kill Duncan, a dagger appears. Why do you believe some in Macbeth's situation would hallucinate?     

       
 Macbeth and the dagger                                        Macbeth sees a ghost

Macbeth

So in English, we recently begun reading one of Shakespeare's well known tragedies Macbeth. It starts off with Macbeth, Thane of Glamis, and his friend Banquo receiving a prophecy from three ugly witches. They tell Macbeth that he is going to gain the title of Thane of Cawdor and that someday he might be King of Scotland as well. Soon after Macbeth's prediction, Duncan, the King of Scotland, has Macbeth take the title Thane of Cawdor as well as Glamis. Afterwards Macbeth sends a letter to his wife telling her what has happened and that the witches prediction came true. Lady Macbeth reads the letter her husband sends her and helps him conspire against King Duncan. They plan to murder him during his visit at their place. But Macbeth has doubts and doesn't want to follow through on their plan. But Lady Macbeth finally convinces her husband and he kill King Duncan. Then they try to plant evidence of the crime on the King's guards.

       Sooo.... last week we read this short story called "The Scarlet Ibis" and it really left me feeling downhearted and a bit crestfallen because the Brother never really appreciated Doodle at all and all Brother saw was disappointment and failure in Doodle. And at the end of the story that Doodle died because of all the strain Brother put on him to be normal and to go beyond his limitations just to be like everyone else, I felt pretty bad for Doodle because of the way Brother treated him. It wasn't Doodle's fault he was unable to to what everyone else could, he was just born that way.  But a couple days before we started learning about ambition and how ambition can blind your judgment. Also how ambition can cause someone to accomplish a goal with no regards for its consequences. We talked a bit about the phrase, "the ends justifies the means", I've heard the phrase before and I knew what it meant because I learned about it in history when we were talking about how many people's ambition caused them to go way to far and do horrible things with no regard for others.
       Well, anyways this Friday I went to a play that was at my school, it was called Viva Africa. It was pretty good but so so very confusing, the only thing i pretty much understood was that the lead male character was in love with Maria who lived across from them. The play was at lot like Romeo and Juliet but it was much more humorous. In the play, there were two families: the Jenkins family and the Santiagos family. They hated each other because one family was black and the other was Latino. But the main reason was since they were different races they treated each badly. They were racist with each other and they had a line that separated them so they wouldn't bother each other or interact with each other in any way. the only con it had was that it moved pretty quick so u had to try and catch on. But overall. it was pretty good. So thats it for today. oh and What do youyu belive are the Pros and Cons of ambition? And how can ambition affect your life?

Is Lord of the Flies just misunderstood?

   
     
         So in English a lot of stuff had happened before the break. We finished Lord of the Flies which was a very great book although it made me cringe at times it was an overall really great book. We had an assignment on whether or not the should've made the banned books list for young readers. I personally believe not for certain reasons but, I can see why it made the list because it had multiple occurrences  that were very violent and gruesome. Such as the incident in which Jack's tribal dance takes a turn for the worst when they mistake little Simon as the beast and viciously rip the poor innocent boy to shreds. The author describes this horrific scene vividly so I understand why a younger audience even an older audience would be emotionally disturbed by scenes so intense. But in my defense, Lord of the Flies is a great book to read if you're trying to teach people what happens when society and social order is in ruins and chaos is on the loose. And the scene in which Simon was unintentionally murdered, that was probably the only really malicious scene in the book. This book could be used to show how fragile the minds of children are and how their minds can change rapidly. This classic novel could be used to teach so much more to people, it has various lessons and standpoints that you can take from it. It really depends on you whether or not you want to focus on in this novel. I honestly this book is misunderstood by people that's why they're quick to judge it because they take pieces from the book to prove what they want to see and they don't see the book as a whole at times.


    

Well, I just want to ask if you guys agree with my reasoning or not and why? And if you would let your children read it and at what age it would seem most appropriate to read this novel?
So until next time, see ya'll later.

The Fight for power

     Well, recently in English we begun to read Lord of the Flies. So far Lord of the Flies has been a very interesting book to read. Well as I kept reading Lord of the Flies, I found a very riveting theme that arose from the beginning of the book and is found throughout various chapters which was the power struggle between both leaders Ralph and Jack. Since Jack was already leading the schoolboy choir, he felt that he should be leading the rest of the boys stranded on the island. But everyone else except for Jack and his choir voted for Ralph as their chief and undoubtedly Ralph won. So there is bit tension between them because Ralph was chosen as chief. Ralph can somewhat sense the tension between them and tries to relieve it by letting Jack become leader of the hunters (choir). There many instances where they have struggle to have more power and to have a stronger clasp on the loyalty of their people. They have fought over what is more important for their survival such as the pig or the fire. This is what mainly sets them apart because they won't agree on what is critical to their survival. Piggy tries to set them straight but they often ignore his rationale. They all represent the three types of psychological personas; Id which is represented by Jack, Ego which is represented by Ralph, and Superego which is ultimately represented through Piggy. Although they balance each other out perfectly, they tend to lose control which could take a turn for the worst, like the fire that happens in chapter 2.

                                                   
       As you get deeper into the book, you can see how their conch begins to have no meaning to the tribe and how Jack's obsession with killing a pig evolves into the making of a savage-like beast spirit that possesses Jack. This book is very disturbing in so way to me personally because you see innocence destroyed and how power can become corrupt if put in the wrong hands.