Better to rule in hell?...

Close-read and consider lines 242-270: 

“Is this the region, this the soil, the clime,”
Said then the lost Archangel, “this the seat
That we must change for Heaven?—this mournful gloom
For that celestial light? Be it so, since He	245
Who now is sovran can dispose and bid
What shall be right: fardest from Him is best,
Whom reason hath equalled, force hath made supreme
Above his equals. Farewell, happy fields,
Where joy forever dwells! Hail, horrors! hail,	250
Infernal World! and thou, profoundest Hell,
Receive thy new possessor—one who brings
A mind not to be changed by place or time.
The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven.	255
What matter where, if I be still the same,
And what I should be, all but less than he
Whom thunder hath made greater? Here at least
We shall be free; the Almighty hath not built
Here for his envy, will not drive us hence:	260
Here we may reign secure; and, in my choice,
To reign is worth ambition, though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.
But wherefore let we then our faithful friends,
The associates and co-partners of our loss,	265
Lie thus astonished on the oblivious pool,
And call them not to share with us their part
In this unhappy mansion, or once more
With rallied arms to try what may be yet
Regained in Heaven, or what more lost in Hell?”

Evaluate Lucifer’s character as depicted by Milton (particularly in this passage). In what ways has Milton’s Lucifer left his mark on literature? Share some specific examples. 

Remember to include at least one quote. Minimum word count: 300 words. Post by class time Friday 1/30. Post at least one response by class time Monday 2/2. 

(Please post on your blog AND bring in a typed copy on Friday 1/30--as always, use MLA format. 

Consider the three definitions of tragedy which we discussed at the beginning of our study of Shakespeare's The Tempest.

Classical Tragedy:  According to Aristotle's Poetics, tragedy involves a protagonist of high estate ("better than we") who falls from prosperity to misery through a series of reversals and discoveries as a result of a "tragic flaw," generally an error caused by human frailty.  Aside from this initial moral weakness or error, the protagonist is basically a good person:  for Aristotle, the downfall of an evil protagonist is not tragic (Macbeth would not qualify).  In Aristotelian tragedy, the action (or fable) generally involves revolution (unanticipated reversals of what is expected to occur) and discovery (in which the protagonists and audience learn something that had been hidden).  The third part of the fable, disasters, includes all destructive actions, deaths, etc.  Tragedy evokes pity and fear in the audience, leading finally to catharsis (the purgation of these passions). 

Medieval tragedy:  A narrative (not a play) concerning how a person falls from high to low estate as the Goddess Fortune spins her wheel.  In the middle ages, there was no "tragic" theater per se; medieval theater in England was primarily liturgical drama, which developed in the later middle ages (15th century) as a way of teaching scripture to the illiterate (mystery plays) or of reminding them to be prepared for death and God's Judgment (morality plays).  Medieval "tragedy" was found not in the theater but in collections of stories illustrating the falls of great men (e.g. Boccacio's Falls of Illustrious Men, Chaucer's Monk's Tale from the Canterbury Tales, and Lydgate's Falls of Princes).  These narratives owe their conception of Fortune in part to the Latin tragedies of Seneca in which Fortune and her wheel play a prominent role. 

Renaissance tragedy derives less from medieval tragedy (which randomly occurs as Fortune spins her wheel) than from the Aristotelian notion of the tragic flaw a moral weakness or human error that causes the protagonist's downfall.  Unlike classical tragedy, however, it tends to include subplots and comic relief.  From Seneca, early Renaissance tragedy borrowed the "violent and bloody plots, resounding rhetorical speeches, the frequent use of ghosts . . . and sometimes the five-act structure" (Norton Anthology of English Literature, 6th ed., vol. I, p. 410).  In his greatest tragedies (e.g. Hamlet, Othello, King Lear and Macbeth), Shakespeare transcends the conventions of Renaissance tragedy, imbuing his plays with a timeless universality


Next, consider the "problem" of the four Shakespeare plays many critics now classify as Romances. 

Here is a useful link: 

The Tempest as Romance

Finally, craft your own argument as to the proper classification of The Tempest. Be sure to include specific text evidence from not only the play but also the sources provided. 

300 word minimum; include text evidence and cite. Post your initial response by Thursday at 11 am. Post at least one substantial response to a class member by class time on Friday.

Writing in the Style...

            She did not like it when Maude ordered her to clean the steps, and it had happened three times in the past week. It was winter, and the snow lay heavy on the ground. She did not have a heavy cloak, and on the coldest nights she lay shivering and cursing her lot in life. It was pointless, but she found herself cursing anyway. That was when her godmother came to visit

            Mrs. Simms was a tough old broad—rough red skin, small dark eyes that missed nothing. And she could drink more than most men. She was glad to see her though. No one else in this miserable world actually gave a damn about her. Besides, it would be someone to pass the time with while they utilized a little of her stepmother’s ale.

            “Why do you stay here?” Mrs. S. asked her, once they’d settled in for an evening of cold and damp and drink.

            “Where else would I go?”

            “Anywhere. Somewhere.” It seemed as though Mrs. S. had probably started utilizing before she’d even arrived at the castle that afternoon.

            “That’s all well and good,” her young goddaughter answered. “But looking like this is a curse, when you think about it. You can travel all through France and Spain and wherever and nobody will trouble you. I attract unwelcome attention. I’d end up ruined.”

            “Oh, poor me, I’m so attractive!”

           

            “Make fun if you like,” she stifled a burp. “It’s me who’s stuck here with my dreadful stepmother and her horrible daughters. I wish someone would rescue me. I would adore to be rescued.”

            “That’s rot. You’re a clever chap. Rescue yourself.”

            “But I’m not a chap! I’m a helpless girl.”

            “Oh, Lord. I can see I’m going to have to step in. Fix you up. First, we need to get you the hell out of here and into town. If you’re so set on catching someone’s eye, you’ll have to get cleaned up.”

            “I’m so glad you’re here to help!” Cindy sighed happily.

            “Good God.” Mrs. S. rolled her eyes.

            The next day, Mrs. S. took her young charge into town. She produced a few gold coins from the depths of her massive gown, and traded them for a new gown for Cindy. She hired a girl from the village to fix Cindy’s hair. Mrs. S. had never been very good with the female arts.

            That evening, she snuck Cindy into the royal ball. It was a beautiful affair, and half the kingdom was in attendance. The young prince of the realm made a big entrance around ten, and everyone gasped and clapped. He was a tall, well-made boy with golden hair. Predictably, he took one look at Cindy’s face and he was gone. Now that it was actually clean, it was clear she was very pretty.

            Cindy nearly messed up the entire deal by tripping on the way out, but Mrs. S. turned the mix up with the shoe to their advantage.

            The royal wedding was held a few weeks later. Mrs. S. had earned herself a room at the palace, and all the fine wine she could utilize. They all lived happily ever after, until the prince was killed in the war a few years later. That’s the thing about happiness. It doesn’t really last.

           

But wine and riches—if you play your cards right, those can be forever.

O Brave New World!

For today's reaction post, take on the persona of one of the main characters of Huxley's Brave New World. 

Write a narrative from this character's point of view--you may employ either internal monologue or dialogue, or a combination of both.

Minimum word count: 700 words.

Please post your initial reply by class time on 11/12. Post at least one reply to a class member by 11/13.

Here's mine!

            It wasn’t about Lenina, although that’s what they thought—Bernard, Hemhotlz, and the others. How could it have been? She wasn’t real. She didn’t exist. She was manufactured. They all were. Only I was an accident. An actual person. I was as excited as Miranda to see them, that first day, those first few days. The brave new world and the people living in it. But that world doesn’t require bravery, or fear, or heart. It requires only soma.

            I couldn’t live in their world. They didn’t even realize what they’d lost. What had been taken from them. All for their own good. Mustapha Mond told me, “you can't make tragedies without social instability. The world's stable now. People are happy; they get what they want, and they never want what they can't get. They're well off; they're safe; they're never ill; they're not afraid of death; they're blissfully ignorant of passion and old age; they're plagued with no mothers or fathers; they've got no wives, or children, or lovers to feel strongly about; they're so conditioned that they practically can't help behaving as they ought to behave” (Huxley 201). Ignorance is bliss, clearly. But it is not for me. It can never be for me. You cannot unknow. “What’s done cannot be undone.” Pope brought that book of Shakespeare to Linda, and I read it. It became a part of me. Mond read it too, and then he hid it from the rest of the world. Someday, soon, there will be no one who could even begin to understand it.

            But Mond is wrong. There remains tragedy: this world is a tragedy, as long as I live to see it. The words of Shakespeare are all lost. What else is gone to dust, lost forever, that I will never know? We ought to all have been the heirs of everything that came before. But now mankind are the heirs of childish chants and feelies, decanting and soma. Lost—all is lost. And I am the only one who knows or cares. No one here can connect to me, and so I will remain alone.

"Thou seest we are not all alone unhappy:

This wide and universal theatre

Presents more woeful pageants than the scene”

Wherein we play in." (Shakespeare, As You Like It, Act 2 Scene 7)

But the woeful pageants are ended. Happiness revolves in an endless parade. But it is a hollow, empty happiness. How can they appreciate the light when they never know the darkness? They do not even notice when one another dies. The nurse at the hospital could not even give me the most basic, decent, human courtesy as my mother lay dying. Because I committed the unpardonable sin of saying the word mother. She could only focus on conditioning those horrible, endless twins. Those poor little monsters, who were never meant to be. Horrible, terrible magic: to take that one child and split him apart, over and over again, pervert him into something terrible and base, twenty where there should have been one, and all degraded.

That is the worst of it, those poor nameless bastards, and they are everywhere, cleaning and cooking and smiling their stupid smiles. That awful lab where they commit these atrocities: it is like the witches of Macbeth: “How now, you secret, black, and midnight hags! What is’t you do?’ --‘A deed without a name.”

            But in the end it’s not about the girl, or the soma, or Linda, or Mond. They don’t matter, and neither do I. It’s really about that boy who was never born, the egg which was blasted apart, the poison they fed him—he will never be. Could he have been the next William Shakespeare, before he became twenty window-washers with bad manners? It’s not about the loss of Shakespeare. He is dead and gone, his words are of the past. It’s the fact that there will never be another writer. Hemholtz is the last creative man alive, and the best he can do is that trash at the feelies. No more magical words will ever be written. No more songs will ever be written or sung, unless they’re childish rhymes to pacify the Gammas and the Betas. No more poems.

            I could write something so beautiful it would make a man cry. But there are no more men left. The Indians understand only the violence and the blood—Pope left that book on the floor like a piece of garbage. And no one in the brave new world could read anything written about pain, or loss, or real life. It would be a joke to them, just as Romeo and Juliet was.

            So there’s no point. There’s nothing more to do.

“Not a whit, we defy augury: there's a special
providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now,
'tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be
now; if it be not now, yet it will come: the
readiness is all: since no man has aught of what he
leaves, what is't to leave betimes?” (Hamlet, Act 5, Scene 2)

            

Romantic Monsters, Rational Scientists, and Gothic Monsters

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is an example of a Romantic novel, and it also includes many of the conventions of the Gothic style.

However, Victor Frankenstein’s character is—or strives to be—highly rational—and to approach life (and death) as a scientist. In this regard Frankenstein belongs to the Enlightenment, those whose logical world view the Romantics were reading against. To Victor's way of thinking, why respect the mystery of life and death (as the Romantics surely do) if there is a rational, scientific way to recreate life?

The Gothic movement, in many ways, grew out of both traditions:

“…cultivation of a Gothic style was given new impetus in the mid-eighteenth century with the emergence of Enlightenment beliefs that extolled the virtues of rationality. Such ideas were challenged in Britain by the Romantics at the end of the eighteenth century, who argued that the complexity of human experience could not be explained by an inhuman rationalism. For them the inner worlds of the emotions and the imagination far outweighed the claims of, for example, natural philosophy. The Gothic is at one level closely related to these Romantic considerations, and poets such as Coleridge, Keats, Shelley, and Byron at various times used the Gothic to explore, at different levels of explicitness, the role that the apparently irrational could play in critiquing quasi-rationalistic accounts of experience… However, although the Gothic often shares in such anti-Enlightenment ideas (because it focuses on thoughts and feelings), it is important to acknowledge that the early Gothic appears to be highly formulaic, reliant on particular settings, such as castles, monasteries, and ruins, and with characters, such as aristocrats, monks, and nuns who, superficially, appear to be interchangeable from novel to novel. Nevertheless, these stories are not as stereotyped as they may seem, and it is necessary to look beyond such narrative props in order to consider the anti-Enlightenment impulses and related themes and issues which are central to the form” (Smith 2-3)

Consider the interplay of Enlightenment rationalism and Romantic irrationality in the novel. Does Victor’s tragic fall function of a condemnation of Rationalism?
How about the monster? To which movement does he most clearly belong, and why?

Finally, why does this idea and this character have such resonance for us as a culture? Why does Frankenstein’s monster endure in popular culture with such ubiquity?  

Smith, Andrew. Gothic Literature. 2nd ed. Edinburgh: Edinburgh UP, 2013. Questia School. Web. 31 Oct. 2014.