Sonnet Analysis Part 1

I found a perfect definition of a sonnet right here!! and what i got from that was that there are 14 lines and a shift in the author's tone is seen most of the time after the middle of the sonnet.

Vocabulary Fall List #11

affinity - noun a natural attraction or feeling of kinship; inherent resemblance between persons or things; the force attracting atoms to each other and binding them together in a molecule; (immunology) the attraction between an antigen and an antibody; a close connection marked by community of interests or similarity in nature or character; (biology) state of relationship between organisms or groups of organisms resulting in resemblance in structure or structural parts; (anthropology) kinship by marriage or adoption; not a blood relationship
bilious - adj. suffering from or suggesting a liver disorder or gastric distress; relating to or containing bile; irritable as if suffering from indigestion
cognate - adj. having the same ancestral language; related by blood; related in nature; noun a word is cognate with another if both derive from the same word in an ancestral language; one related by blood or origin; especially on sharing an ancestor with another
corollary - noun (logic) an inference that follows directly from the proof of another proposition; a practical consequence that follows naturally
cul de sac - noun a street with only one way in or out; a passage with access only at one end
derring-do - noun brave and heroic deeds
divination - noun the art or gift of prophecy (or the pretense of prophecy) by supernatural means; successful conjecture by unusual insight or good luck; a prediction uttered under divine inspiration
elixir - noun a substance believed to cure all ills; a sweet flavored liquid (usually containing a small amount of alcohol) used in compounding medicines to be taken by mouth in order to mask an unpleasant taste; a hypothetical substance that the alchemists believed to be capable of changing base metals into gold
folderol - noun nonsensical talk or writing
gamut - noun a complete extent or range: "a face that expressed a gamut of emotions"; the entire scale of musical notes
hoi polli - noun the common people; the masses.
ineffable - adj. too sacred to be uttered; defying expression or description
lucubration - noun laborious cogitation; a solemn literary work that is the product of laborious cogitation
mnemonic - adj. of or relating to or involved the practice of aiding the memory; noun a device (such as a rhyme or acronym) used to aid recall
obloquy - noun state of disgrace resulting from public abuse; a false accusation of an offense or a malicious misrepresentation of someone's words or actions
parameter - noun a constant in the equation of a curve that can be varied to yield a family of similar curves; a quantity (such as the mean or variance) that characterizes a statistical population and that can be estimated by calculations from sample data; any factor that defines a system and determines (or limits) its performance
pundit - noun someone who has been admitted to membership in a scholarly field
risible - adj. arousing or provoking laughter
symptomatic - adj. relating to or according to or affecting a symptom or symptoms; characteristic or indicative of e.g. a disease
volte-face - noun a major change in attitude or principle or point of view

Who Was Shakespeare

I started by google-ing William Shakespeare Biography, clicked on the first site, (here). The website was very helpful by listing tons of questions relating to Shakespeare's life, and underneath an answer button which pops down with a detailed answer.Some of the questions were very helpful and detailed while others were in my opinion pointless. All in All, I learned Shakespeare wrote many plays, was born in Stratford in late April. He was the eldest of his siblings including 3 brothers and 2 sisters. William married Anne Hathaway, but the question on whether he is gay or not still remains unknown. He passed away on April 25, 1616 and was buried in the Stratford parish church.

Growing My PLN

Finding resources for Hamlet was somewhat more difficult than I expected. After some time I was finally able to discover five resources which I could proudly proclaim offered valid information on Hamlet

AP Hamlet PLN

1. http://www.shmoop.com/hamlet/
Reading some of the many explanations the author has for this play, I was able to understand what the author was saying easily which in turn helped understand that specific part of Hamlet. The whole play is up there and it all appears to be accurate.

2. http://www.apstudynotes.org/english/sample-essays/character-analysis-hamlet/
The author of this essay analyzes what Hamlet was thinking when he enacted out his revenge and possible causes of his errors. An interesting view of the whole tragic situation's ending. It really drives home the point of how Hamlet was a real logically character of high intellect  but his emotions clouded his mind and he often over thought things too much.

3. http://2011apenglish.blogspot.com/2010/11/hamlet-test-monday-or-tuesday-or-both.html
This is a class blog exactly like ours, so similar I thought it was. Its interesting to see the conversation the students have and the questions the teacher posts, and will be good to see if I know the answers to them.

4.http://absoluteshakespeare.com/guides/hamlet/summary/hamlet_summary.htm
This site is helpful because it provides a basic summary of the plot, but still contains necessary parts of the play that should be known. A good review to make sure I understand the actual occurrences of the play, because that is something that with Shakespeare's difficult to understand way with words can be lost to someone like me.

5. http://www.enotes.com/hamlet/q-and-a/what-can-we-learn-from-hamlets-soliloguies-161143
Someone crowd sourced the answer to what can we learn from Hamlet's soliloquies  and the answers were intriguing. Hamlet's soliloquies are really important and need to be able to understand their meanings, so hearing answers from several people on their meanings is really helpful.

Tools That Change the Way We Think

I never truly thought about the effect that the internet has made on me. Now that I'm thinking about it I've realized that it's made me more forgetful. I'll research something on my phone that I'm thinking about at that moment then forget the information fairly quick. Knowing that I can research information at any given moment makes me feel that I don't need to remember it because I could just look it up again later if I need to. It shouldn't be that way though, we should want to learn the information that we're researching. Before the internet and smartphones people had to actually process information. I don't think the internet is bad, I just think we need to process information more into our brains.

Literature Analysis #2

The Cather in the Rye By J. D. Salinger

GENERAL
1.Brief summary.
The Catcher in the Rye is a story of a boy named Holden who has many troubled and difficult times in his life. He goes to a prep school which he hates and has many confusing thoughts about the people there. He has very strong for a girl named Jane who his roommate is dating. He becomes furious with his roommate and gets into a huge fight. He then decides to leave the school and live in New York and live his life on his own. He goes to New York and first feels alone and decides to go to gentlemen's clubs where he can pass as an older man because of his gray hair. He runs into many troubles in New York in finding himself and ends of having many confrontations with his family in order to be reaccepted.

2.Describe the theme.
The main theme in the book Catcher in the Rye is the pain in growing up. Holden doesn't want to grow up and shows that in many things he leaves the prep school so that he could try and grow up more. But as he learns the troubles of being a man while growing up in New York he finds that he doesn't want to grow up. He lives and constantly parties which shows how he never wants to grow up.

3.Describe author's tone.
The tone in Catcher in the Rye is very relaxed at times and also very serious. When Holden gets into a heated argument with his roommate and later into a brawl with him to the tone is very serious. It's also serious when he goes to talk to his younger sister he also has a serious tone.

CHARACTERIZATION
1.Direct and Indirect characterization
The author doesn't really use direct characterization, for any of the main characters throughout the book but he does use it when describing minor characters such as the stripper and the pimp and roomates. He uses indirect because the entire story is based around something much bigger than a characters appearance.


2. Diction/Syntax
The story definitely changes as Steinbeck changes his diction and syntax. He just changes character points of view throughout the story.

3.Static/Dynamic
 Holden is a static character throughout the book and never really changes his opinion about how society is messed up and how unfair things are. He wants to become a catcher in the rye which metaphorically means he wants to stop the youth from growing up and getting "brainwashed" by society

4.After reading the book did you come away feeling you'd met a person or character?
I can say that, yes, i feel i got to know Holden. He reminds me of me in a lot of ways and overall i can relate to most of his way of thinking.