This evening it rained for the first time since I arrived. There was even some thunder. I sat in the big chair in my apartment and just closed my eyes and listened.
Fitting, I feel, that this mini storm (too short!) should come on the say when the twelfth grade began a dark Jacobean tragedy called The Duchess of Malfi which no one has ever heard of (in general, not just in my class of students) but is the best piece of drama I think I've ever read. It's like the HBO series Deadwood - so compelling that you are rapt, drawn into the story by the nature of the characters, who you also find repulsive and disquieting.
Here, for example, is the way the spy Bosola describes the two brothers for whom he works:
Fitting, I feel, that this mini storm (too short!) should come on the say when the twelfth grade began a dark Jacobean tragedy called The Duchess of Malfi which no one has ever heard of (in general, not just in my class of students) but is the best piece of drama I think I've ever read. It's like the HBO series Deadwood - so compelling that you are rapt, drawn into the story by the nature of the characters, who you also find repulsive and disquieting.
Here, for example, is the way the spy Bosola describes the two brothers for whom he works:
He and his brother are like plum-trees that grow crooked
Over standing-pools; they are rich, and o'erladen with
Fruit, but none but crows, pies, and caterpillars feed
On them. Could I be one of their flattering panders, I
Would hang on their ears like a horseleech, till I were full, and
Then drop off. I pray leave me.
Who would rely upon these miserable dependencies; in expectation to
Be advanced to-morrow? What creature ever fed worse, than hoping Tantalus? nor ever died any man more fearfully, than he that hoped
Fruit, but none but crows, pies, and caterpillars feed
On them. Could I be one of their flattering panders, I
Would hang on their ears like a horseleech, till I were full, and
Then drop off. I pray leave me.
Who would rely upon these miserable dependencies; in expectation to
Be advanced to-morrow? What creature ever fed worse, than hoping Tantalus? nor ever died any man more fearfully, than he that hoped
For a pardon. There are rewards for hawks and dogs,
When they have done us service: but for a soldier that hazards his
Limbs in a battle, nothing but a kind of geometry is his last Supportation.
We spent decent time discussing the simile at the beginning of this speech. These guys have moved on since the days of Langston Hughes's simple similes: a dream compared to a raisin. These are the major leagues. Some students were blindsided by the language, and decided right away they weren't going to try to understand it. The same thing happened last year when we tackled Romeo and Juliet with the tenth grade. I can't wait to watch the twelfth graders gain their sea legs with a text that is probably the hardest thing they've ever read in English. Aside from Spenser's The Faerie Queene, I think this is the hardest thing I've ever read. Monica is a splendid discussion partner and class planner for this book. In fact it's because of her recommendation that we're doing it at all.
I'll be following closely the development of Bosola in the minds of the students. He is a remarkable character - I hope he speaks even to them even somewhat of how much he speaks to me.
When they have done us service: but for a soldier that hazards his
Limbs in a battle, nothing but a kind of geometry is his last Supportation.
We spent decent time discussing the simile at the beginning of this speech. These guys have moved on since the days of Langston Hughes's simple similes: a dream compared to a raisin. These are the major leagues. Some students were blindsided by the language, and decided right away they weren't going to try to understand it. The same thing happened last year when we tackled Romeo and Juliet with the tenth grade. I can't wait to watch the twelfth graders gain their sea legs with a text that is probably the hardest thing they've ever read in English. Aside from Spenser's The Faerie Queene, I think this is the hardest thing I've ever read. Monica is a splendid discussion partner and class planner for this book. In fact it's because of her recommendation that we're doing it at all.
I'll be following closely the development of Bosola in the minds of the students. He is a remarkable character - I hope he speaks even to them even somewhat of how much he speaks to me.
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