Age is a state of mind...

Anyone who keeps the ability to see beauty never grows old.

- Franz Kafka

 

Write a short discussion of this quotation relating it to the content and themes of Metamorphosis.

 

http://www.famousquotesandauthors.com/authors/franz_kafka_quotes.html

Kafka on Literature

"Books are a narcotic"

How does Kafka's writing style operate on the reader to engage them with the narrative and the thematic content?

How does Kafka make the reader want to read and understand his work?

Is it fair to say that Metamorphosis has a dream-like quality to the writing?

Provide your thoughts on this quotation and these questions.

Contextualising a Text

Metapmorphosis was published in 1915.

Some would say that it is impossible to fully appreciate the text without understanding something of the historical context in which it was written. 

Complete some elementary research into the period.  Look into the year it was written and the preceding few years.  Remember that Kafka lived and worked in Prague.

It may be helpful to consider...

Art
Literature
World Affairs
War
Travel and Transport
Invention and Scientific Progress

Post some findings

Critical Perspectives One

As we have discussed in class, texts can be viewed from many different critical perspectives.  How a text is read will depend on who is reading it, where and when.

To begin with I would like you to complete some research into Sigmund Freud and Karl Gustav Jung.

What do you think a Freudian or Jungian reading of a text would involve?  What angle / perspective would one approach the text from?

Commentarying...which isn't a word!

MACBETH

Bring me no more reports; let them fly all:
Till Birnam wood remove to Dunsinane,
I cannot taint with fear. What's the boy Malcolm?
Was he not born of woman? The spirits that know
All mortal consequences have pronounced me thus:
'Fear not, Macbeth; no man that's born of woman
Shall e'er have power upon thee.' Then fly,
false thanes,
And mingle with the English epicures:
The mind I sway by and the heart I bear
Shall never sag with doubt nor shake with fear.
Enter a Servant
The devil damn thee black, thou cream-faced loon!
Where got'st thou that goose look?

Task

Consider the above passage from 'Macbeth'.

Locate the piece in your copy of the text (Act V Scene III)

Write a few paragraphs making comment on it.

You should include reference to...

It's context within the whole play...contextualise the piece.

Iambic Pentameter

• Does it follow the iambic pentameter pattern?
• Where?
• Why?
• Which words or syllables are highlighted by the verse form?

Dramatic Irony

The Divine Right of Kings

The use of rhetoric (his quotation from the witches is a form of rhetoric.)

Where this extract fits into the model of the tragic hero


Everyone must do this...you have a week.

Anyone who cannot post here must submit a typed copy.

G'luck

When the feeling's gone and you can't go on it's a...

...Tragedy!

It would be nice if you understood how Macbeth sits alongside other Shakespearean tragedies.  It would be excellent if we could develop some basic knowledge and comparative skills between the texts and it would be acecool if we could apply and test the criteria for tragedy to/with these other plays.

Pick a play and post a short summary of events in the play, a few notes on the protagonist and other main characters and a brief comment on the extent to which it is a tragedy.

Hamlet

Othello

King Lear

Macbeth

Anthony and Cleopatra

Coriolanus

The Tempest

Adjectives and Vocabulary

Adjectives and Vocabulary

The range of vocablary you can and do use will be a deciding factor in your grade.

For each of the following characters list 10 good quality adjectives that could be used to describe them.

Don't worry if you find that different adjectives contradict each other because they refer to different parts of the play.

use http://www.thesaurus.com/.  Viit this site. Get to know it.  Bookmark it. It is your friend.
Macbeth
Lady Macbeth
Banquo