Wednesday, November 20, 2013

Blog #6

Chris Lane
Understanding Literature
Dr. Juniper Ellis

Identity 
In william Shakespeare’s play twelfth night, he paints us a narrative of a hectic love triangle between a Duke, a woman dressed as a man, and the beautiful Olivia. In the first half of the play, Shakespeare describes how the Duke is in love with Olivia so he sends his squire to tell her the affection he feels for her. Unknown to the Duke, the squire he sends is really Viola, a woman who has lost everything and is is truly in love with the Duke. Because Olivia is in love with the Duke, she puts all of her emotion into convincing Olivia to be with the him, and accidentally makes Olivia fall for her. After a crazy turn of events and a few duels here and there, the truth comes out and Viola explains to the Duke why she did what she did. The Duke understands and admits that he loves her as well, allowing the story to come to a somewhat happy ending.

The theme of identity is one that we talked about in Zen meditation earlier in the semester, and it relates very well with Shakespeare’s story. In meditation we explored who we truly are and that some people don’t know how to express themselves so they act like someone they are not. Although the characters in Twelfth night know who they really are, they cant truly see what they are feeling and it takes a dramatic turn of events to make it clear to them.


 My favorite part about class this year has been going to the zen meditation sessions, and learning how to relax my mind. I plan on going to the sessions for the rest of the year because I don’t know how I will feel not having my hour of relaxation every monday!

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