week 12 paper question 1

Alright so the question i have been given is perhaps the easiest question one can be asked about Hamlet.  I have been asked to write about wether or not the play promotes revenge.
Okay, before i end my paper with a simple no, lets look at the events of the play.
First Hamlet decides to take revenge on Claudius for killing his father, Hamlet dies.
Second Laerties takes revenge on Hamlet, Laerties dies.
Third and perhaps less obvious, Rosencrance and Gildenstern agree to kill Hamlet because of the way he has treated them so in a way they are trying to get revenge, they both die.
So after looking at the events of the play and taking in all evidence (and studying verbal irony) I shall conclude by giving a simple answer. 
Does this play promote revenge?  Absolutely!

week 12 (I think) Third movies the charm.

I watched the BBC television film adaptation of William Shakespeare's Hamlet produced by Seb Grant and John Wyver,
directed by Gregory Doran and starring David Tenant as Hamlet.
The reason I chose this Movie to watch was because I had seen David Tenant portraying the best incarnation of Doctor who and I was curios to see how good of an actor he was in other movies.
Tenant does not disappoint in this movie, portraying perhaps the best Hamlet on screen thus far.  While his mad scenes are entertaining, I believe his serious speeches outshine them.
His interactions with Horatio are probably the best portrayed out of all the rest of the movies.
The only character I dislike in the movie is Mariah Gale's Ophelia.
This portrayal is lacking both in personality and acting skill in general.

Hamlet lesson 3 review question 4

The way hamlet treats Ophelia in this act is very interesting to say the least.
First of all it is influenced by the fact that Hamlet knows (or at least has a very good guess) that Ophelia is acting as Polonius's tool to find the cause of his madness.
So Hamlet drops some hints of still loving Ophelia while mixing them with utterings of slander and nonsense.  Hamlets interactions with (and perhaps even true feelings for) Ophelia are also influenced by Hamlets mother's actions.  Hamlet is Exceedingly angry at his mother for being so fickle with his recently deceased father, and those events also taint his opinion of women in general.

Hamlet lesson 3 thought question 4

The characters of Brutus (from Julius Caesar) and Prince Hamlet (from Hamlet) are similar in many ways.  For instance, Brutus killing Caesar leads to Brutus's own death while Hamlets plots of revenge lead to his demise as well.  The two characters both see ghosts as well, (Brutus of Caesar and Hamlet of His father) and both are involved with those characters deaths.  Hamlets father is involved because he convinces Hamlet to plot the revenge that leads to the prince's demise.  The ghost of Caesar, because seeing the ghost drives Brutus partially mad, and Brutus finally kills himself in order to escape the accusations of Caesar.

branaugh vs gibson

ok here we have an easy one, Branaugh's Hamlet movie vs Gibsons hamlet movie.
Here i do believe Branaugh's Hamlet movie is the obvious winner.
First its much more true to the play, second it has better acting, better lighting, better sets... just better everything!  Lastly, Branaugh's depiction of hamlet is more accurate, Gibsons hamlet is poorly depicted and is in the wrong emotional state in nearly every scene.

week 9 review question 8

At the beginning of hamlet, prince Hamlet is both distraught by his fathers death,( "How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable seem to me a the uses of this world!")  and he feels betrayed by his mother because of her marriage so soon after his fathers death ("frailty thy name is woman").

Julius Caesar lesson 3 thought question 2

Upon murdering Caesar, Brutus and Cassius say that they have not murdered the emperor of Rome, destroyed the happiness of Calpurnia and thrown Rome into chaos needlessly, but rather, "they have benefited Caesar by cutting short his time of fearing death."

 Now this is a pretty pitiful justification for their actions, especially since they do not do even that much seeing as in Caesars own words, "...Cowards die many times before their deaths ... it seems to me most strange that men should fear death."

But I suppose, it just goes to show that we sinful humans will believe just about anything to relieve ourselves of the pain of guilt.