Thursday, January 30, 2020

The main one being superstition Essay Example for Free

The main one being superstition Essay How has Willy Russel portrayed Mrs. Johnstone and Mrs. Lyons in Blood Brothers? How does he shape the audience response to the two women? I think the author has portrayed Mrs. J as a loving, caring person. She always involves her family when she thinks of life and just thinks of the simple things as luxury, this shows she is quite poor, she doesnt seem to have many things and she just wishes she could make her children happy. Shes always trying to support them and give them everything they want, for example in the catalogue she has tried to keep all the things she picked out from it but she doesnt have the money, it shows shes very soft towards her and her childrens needs, she just wants to get them everything they want but cant afford it, I love the bones of every one of them this shows she loves everything about them, every part of them. She seems to always buy things from the catalogue and always getting the consequences in return, this shows she never learns her lesson. Only mine until the time comes around to pay the bill. Then, Im afraid, what cant be paid must be returned. You never, ever learn, that nothings yours, on easy terms. This proves the point, the idea of having everything for her children is so tempting she just keeps on trying to pay, as though she has some hope that one day when it comes around, she will have the money to pay it. Easy terms is used by the narrator, easy terms means that you pay for something over time but the narrator is using easy terms for Mrs. Johnstone as there will be a price to pay, in the end you will have consequences to your actions, in this case she will pay for giving her child away. The writer uses these lyrics so that they can connect or relate to the audience because everyone has to pay for something in their life, it may not be something you want to do but in the end you have to, its showing that Mrs. Johnstone will always have to pay for what she has done. In the easy terms piece I think you could create a tear-rending scene by having Mrs. Johnstone in a apron or a maids dress to show she is very busy and she works a lot even though its probably not a well paid job. You could have her level with the babies to show the connection she has with them, she doesnt want to scare or intimidate them, she wants to mother them and putting her in this position will show what feelings she feels towards them. Then, Im afraid, this shows she is dreading the idea of what is going to happen. She should have a dreading, saddening face on and look as though she is about to burst into tears. I think the lighting should position a spot light on the babies and Mrs. Johnstone, concentrating on them and showing what is important. The volume of the music should move up and down to show her bursts of emotion but the sadness is shown with the quietness now and then. She is also thinking of her child when she swears on a bible; so that he gets all the things hes ever wanted or needed. We have seen Mrs. J as a kind, giving person and we give the response of sympathy. She has no money, no food, no normal, simple necessities, she just wants to have a care-free life and shes showing she is prepared to work hard for it. I think the author has portrayed Mrs. J as a pushy, selfish person. At the beginning we thought of her with sympathy, her husbands away, she has a big house with no family to fill it with and cannot have the joy of children. You start to see her side on how she has never had a child and craves one so badly that she even dreams of a child she never once had but then, the table turns and we she her bad side. We see her desperate side as she says that you have to swear on a bible, then we see that she is very pushy and selfish, when she says to Mrs.J that she wants the baby right now, this could mean that she doesnt want her to get attached to the baby, making it even more hers. Suddenly we see her pushy side when the baby is in the cot, Mrs. Lyons makes it clear that the baby is hers and that she is the mother from now on. Its even worse when we see she is firing her from her job, breaking a promise and even threatening her when she says she is going to tell someone, turning the blame to Mrs. J. We then see that Mrs. Lyons has a very dark side to her as she uses superstition against Mrs.J, knowing that, that is her weakness. In a way I can see her point of view, this is her chance to take what shes always wanted, to make her life perfect and she is never going to let it slip away since its so close to reach for. The response he is trying to get from the audience is a hated view, that she is a very terrible person and that she is doing all she can to get what she wants regardless of other peoples feelings. The play is about a number of things. The main one being superstition. Mrs. J starts the superstition in the play by telling Mrs.L to take the new shoes off the table because it is bad luck.

Wednesday, January 22, 2020

Biography of William Shakespeare :: William Shakespeare Writers Playwrights Essays

Biography of William Shakespeare William Shakespeare (1564-1616) was a playwrite in England. The Merchant of Veniceis one of his many â€Å"comedies.† Some scholars however, have made the argument that the play is one of his tragedies. Other tragedies of Shakespeare include Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet. Shakespeare lived in a time when Jews had been expelled from England for over three centuries. However, as a playwrite, Shakespeare also probably faced much prejudice and hatred—theater was banned from his home town of London during his lifetime and so the theaters had to move outside of the city walls. This situation may have made him sypathetic to the plight of Jews, hence the play as a work of tragedy. Shakespeare married a woman named Anne Whateley, but he may have also had a male lover during his lifetime—a practice not uncommon for men of his era. Many of his sonnets suggest the possibility of this. Shakespeare’s comedies, performed at the Globe theater, were played to an audience which included as many peasants as it did nobles and loyalty, and so the comedy appeals to this lower class as well. Shakespeare’s works are full of political humor, but also run rampant with sexual and scatalogical humor. Shakespeare lived during the reign of Queen Elizabeth who had a man in her service who she cared for deeply (she never married during her reign, but was rumored to have lovers) and who was rumored to be a Jew. If this had been the case, Shakespeare’s play would have to have been sensitive to her favor. Hence, more evidence of the play as a tragedy. In Shakespeare’s time, it was the common practice for men to play the parts of women in most productions.

Tuesday, January 14, 2020

Dramatic function in the play Essay

In the play, â€Å"A View From The Bridge†, we are faced with emotions that we have probably all felt or will feel during our lifetime. However, when these emotions are taken to extremes, it could lead to unimaginable consequences. Covered here are some of the more complex and intriguing relationships that shape the whole play, from beginning to end, from the innocent love of a young woman to the dark sinister workings of a mind driven beyond logic and reason. One of the most interesting and complicated relationships in the play is that of Eddie and Catherine. Catherine is Eddie’s niece through marriage and has been cared and provided for by him ever since her mother died whilst she was still a baby; â€Å"with a sense of her childhood, her babyhood, and the years† and during that time, they have grown very close, Eddie treats her like his own daughter. He likes it when she greets him when he gets home, when she treats him like a father; â€Å"Eddie is pleased and therefore shy about it†¦Ã¢â‚¬  However, as revealed later the play, Catherine thinks of Eddie as more than an uncle or a father, she thinks of him almost as her husband; â€Å"If I was a wife I would†¦ now I’m supposed to turn around a make a stranger out of him?† She was originally talking about Beatrice but towards the end of the sentence, she was talking about herself, putting herself in Beatrice’s place as though she was the wife that was making s stranger out of the husband. Catherine matches Eddie’s love for her perfectly, seeking his approval in everything she does, she is eager to please him and is happy when he is happy; â€Å"You like it?† she asks about her skirt, â€Å"you like it?† she asks about her hair. In fact, when Eddie says â€Å"beautiful† she says â€Å"You like it, huh?†; this is a rhetorical question, she’s seeking more than approval, she’s seeking confirmation, because Eddie’s opinions matter to her and it pleases her tremendously to see that he likes what she’s doing. However, when Eddie says that she’s walking wavy and â€Å"ain’t all the girls† Catherine is very upset; â€Å"†¦almost in tears because he disapproves.† There is a point where Catherine cares too much about Eddie’s views, from the play, we can tell that she has put off a few of her lifetime ambitions to keep him happy; as Beatrice says: â€Å"I don’t understand when this ends. First it was gonna be when she graduated high school, so she graduated high school. Then it was when she learned stenographer, so she learn stenographer. So what are we gonna wait for now?† Eddie has obviously been thinking up all kinds of reasons to keep her at home. He says that he just doesn’t want her working with the wrong people and that she should get a good education and go and meet a nice, well-educated (preferably rich) young man and settle down and get out of the working class world.  Most of this we can believe, not only does Eddie love Catherine, he is also very protective of her; â€Å"I know that neighbourhood, B., I don’t like it.†Ã‚  Maybe Catherine doesn’t realize it but all her fondness is what makes him so overprotective of her, she acts like a little child around him; Catherine: â€Å"He thinks I’m a baby.† Beatrice: â€Å"That’s because you think you’re a baby. I told you fifty times already†¦Ã¢â‚¬  and Eddie is so used to that he just can’t accept the fact that she is growing up. He likes to come home to her childish antics, he likes to have her waiting on him hand and feet. There may be a slight ego problem when he realizes that Catherine’s pay is going to be so high, even higher than his if the estimate he gave Marco is a direct correspondence of his salary; â€Å"But I think you could probably–thirty, forty a week, over the whole twelve months of the year.†Ã‚  Eddie is obviously not ready to give up the job as the man of the house, metaphorically speaking, he’s used to having everyone look up to him. He doesn’t take Beatrice seriously and Catherine has always been so childlike and adoring, â€Å"she sits on her heels beside him.† Suddenly, Eddie feels that someone is threatening his position and that concept scares him, it’s the same fear as when Rodolpho steps into Catherine’s life, he’s becoming the object of Catherine’s affections, not Eddie. Quite a lot has been mentioned on the boyfriend front; Eddie is unwilling for Catherine to show interest in the male populous; Eddie: â€Å"Listen, I could tell you things about Louis which you wouldn’t wave to him no more.† Catherine: â€Å"Eddie, I wish there was one guy you couldn’t tell me things about.† Not only does this show that he discourages any interest Catherine develops, he also does it very often, sometimes when Catherine isn’t even interested in them, just to be on the safe side. Could there be more to this relationship than just parental concern, care and love? Could it be that Eddie is harbouring some secret desire for Catherine that he is too ashamed to act upon but is enough to make him feel better when she only has him and no one else? A father would be glad if his daughter found love, but a boyfriend would be jealous, and Eddie was certainly not glad when Rodolpho wins over Catherine’s heart. In the beginning of Act Two, Eddie was drunk and when he came home, he kissed Catherine on the lips. As the Romans said, in vino veritas, which means there is truth in wine, what is normally hidden is exposed as the person loses sense of inhibition and sometimes even logical thought; in this case, Eddie’s desire for Catherine. Of course, Catherine has already been pretty upset with him already and this was just putting salt to the wound. She didn’t admit straight away to Rodolpho that Eddie’s views were once again affecting her judgement, she asks him the questions that Eddie has been harbouring ever since he arrived and especially after talks about marriage and says that they are her own questions, she even suggests that they go live in Italy because she imagined it would be beautiful but really it’s just covering up her fear of Eddie, even though she did admit to it; â€Å"I’m afraid of Eddie here.† Rodolpho saw right through her, he could see that she was frightened and wanted to get away from Eddie. Rodolpho: â€Å"My heart dies to look at you. Why are you so afraid of him?†Ã‚  At this point, Catherine still feels that Eddie’s change of mood was partially her fault; â€Å"I would — just feel ashamed if I made him sad†. Ever since the beginning of the play, Catherine always seemed to be in constant uncertainty and fear of Eddie, but never of his actions, more of his opinions because it mattered so much to her but since after the kiss, she has developed a physical fear of him, of what he could and would do to her and the people she loved and that includes Eddie himself. â€Å"Wait outside, don’t argue with him† Catherine says, wanting to keep Rodolpho safe from Eddie.