Weekly Response 9/24

1a)       “The transformation of Othello, the “Moor of Venice,” from a virtuous lover and Christian soldier to an enraged murder may be read in the context of early modern conversion, or “turning,” with particular attention to the sense of conversion as a sensual, sexual transgression” (Vitkus 154).

1b)        “Ay, let her not rot and perish and be damned tonight, for she shall not live! No, my heart is turned to stone; I strike it, and it hurts my hand.” (Othello 4.1.176-78). 

2)         During the time of Shakespeare, England was extremely worried about the Ottoman Turks and their power to convert people.  How does conversion, religious or otherwise, play a part in Othello’s demise?

3)         Daniel J. Vitkus’ “Turning Turk in Othello” shows how fear was embedded in the audience during the time Othello was written.  The constant threat of Turk attacks and their ability to convert Christians allowed them to make connections between the events in Othello and their notions about Turks and other groups that could harm their Protestant religion.  Vitkus states that Othello’s view of Desmondia from “wife” to “whore” is linked to the racial idea of “turning Turk” (146). 

The idea of “converting” plays a big part in Othello’s demise, mainly due to his “turn” to downfall and his accusations of other characters “turning”.  The fear of “converting” to something much more evil is echoed in the play with Iago pushing Othello to turn due to “sexual transgressions”.  As Desmondia is incorrectly perceived to be a “whore” in Othello’s eyes, his conversion to “murder” can be seen as religious in nature.  Vitkus recants how writers of this era would often include stories of prostitutes and conversion to religious betterment.   As Othello states his heart “turned” to stone due to Desmondia’s “whore” actions, the audience can see the foolishness of him putting the blame on Desmondia.  His murder shows the collapse of a proper conversion and to remind the audience of how preconceived notions of outside forces could affect their ability to understand a greater threat.  The idea of “turning” in this play invokes that once you “turn”, you can never go back.  

Weekly Response 9/17

1) It (evasion from race) is further complicated by the fact that the habit of ignoring race is understood to be a graceful, even generous, liberal gesture.  To notice is to recognize an already discredited difference (Morrison 1008). 

1a) “Haply for I am black, And have not those soft parts of conversation That chamberers have,” (Othello Act 3, Scene 3-265).

2) Does Othello’s ethnicity play a part into his eventual demise and the judgment of the characters around him?

3) The quote “Haply for I am black” is (I could be incorrect) the only time Othello brings up his ethnicity to the audience.  Othello brings his ethnicity up in a “laundry list” of why Desmondia may not love him anymore. Personally, I never saw “race” as playing a big part in Shakespeare’s tragic plot.  Iago seems to have other motivations behind the fall of Othello than simply because he is “black”.  Yet, as I read Toni Morrison’s “Playing in the Dark”, I started to consider if “race” was being kindly  avoided in Othello.

            Toni Morrison believes that our current literary history in America is not giving enough credit to how much of an impact Africans had on the culture.  Instead, literature is mainly influenced from a white males’ perspective.  After reading Toni Morrison’s article, I began to realize how little “race” played a part in the play’s plot.  I tried to remember times in the play where Othello’s ethnicity was brought up, but I only found a few “quibs” from Iago.  I started to ponder the idea that Iago wanted vengeance on Othello because of his race, but could find very little claims to prove it.  This left me somewhat disheartened because I thought I would be able to connect the two texts together for this close reading.  I concluded that Othello’s demise was based on the fact that Shakespeare wanted a “massive” tragedy to occur and maybe ignoring race was, as Morrison called it, “a liberal gesture”.  

Weekly Response 9/10

1a) “To degrade is to bury, to sow, and to kill simultaneously, in order to bring forth something more and better” (Bakhtin 688).

1b) “The Nymph, tho’ in this mangled Phlight, Must ev’ry Morn her Limbs unite.  But how shall I describe her arts To recollect the scatter’d Parts? Or shew the Angush, Toil and Pain, Of gath’ring up herself again?” (Swift, A Young Nymph Goes to Bed 65-70).

2) Does Swift bring on the “degradation” of the female character in the poem or is he trying to “bring forth” an accurate account of her profession?

3)         Mikhail Bakhtin describes “degradation” in Medieval times as not only being a “negative aspect” but also a “regenerating” one, comparing to the reproductive powers of the lower stratum of the body (which strikes me as odd).    He goes on to criticize modern text because it “has a solely negative character and is deprived of regenerating ambivalence.”  The poem “A Beautiful Young Nymph Going to Bed” can be seen in a very degrading light.  The first time I read it, I found it to be somewhat disturbing, especially because Swift goes into such great detail about what the main female character does for her profession.  Swift’s use of word choices and the structure of his repetitious descriptions of the prostitute lifestyle give the poem a negative tone.

 After reading Swift’s analysis on “degradation”, I tried to find a moment of “regeneration” in the poem.  It proved to be quite difficult.  I just assumed that this poem was one of the “negative” modern texts that Bakhtin was talking about.    I then realized the “regeneration” doesn’t have revelatory or “life-changing”.  The “regeneration” of the main character was waking up and “gath’ring up herself again”.  The items she uses to look “proper” (not sure if that’s the best word), allows herself to start new again.  This “regeneration” isn’t a positive one, but it shows how she “kills” herself every night, only to “renew” herself the next morning.

Weekly Response 9/3

1a)       “Art is a way of experiencing the artfulness of an object: the object is not important…” (Shklovsky 16).

1b)       “Confusion, like energy, is neither created nor destroyed.  It never vanishes.  It merely changes forms” (Andrews 28).

2)         How does theoretical analysis of literature cause objects or ideas to be “unfamiliar”?

3)         As being fairly new to the complex nature of “literary theory”, the idea of formalism can be a hard topic to fully comprehend.  When analyzing a text, it is easy to fall back on mundane explanations, such as the author’s motives or the period when the text was written.  These narrow perspectives allow only a very limited view on what the text really means.  Shklovsky describes how “art” can make common objects that are well known to become something “unfamiliar”.  How we perceive art depends on how open we are to “unfamiliarity”. 

            The quote I selected from the Dear Professor poems deals with the comparison of “confusion” and “energy”.  One can perceive that these poems deal with (somewhat) common classroom problems from a student’s perspective.  As a college student, I can easily relate to the “object” of these poems, yet my understanding of the “artfulness” of the object is where the confusion sets in.  After re-reading the poems, I tried searching for the “unfamiliarity” of these poems, or as I saw it, a “double meaning”.  As I analyzed the text further, I moved away from this “double meaning” search and considered how my confusion of the “artfulness” of these poems was affecting my ability to fully understand them.  I then realized that these poems have much more complex meaning than just a student’s troubles; it explains the troubles of everyone.  The poems deal with the “unfamiliarity” of life’s problems, such as gender differences, communication, and “proof”.  As I saw these poems in this context, my confusion shifted over to certain poems and what the “unfamiliarity” was for them.  I learned that “confusion” will always be by your side when you are analyzing a text.  Yet, confusion is not a bad quality; it keeps us searching for the “unfamiliarity” that art throws upon us.