I know this sounds geeky but…

This year, in my English class we read Macbeth. I knew that the play was about some guy who killed some other guy and couldn’t wash the blood off his hands. Little did I know. I wasn’t very exited. The previous year we didn’t read any Shakespeare because he wasn’t on the AP test. The last play I’d read before Macbeth was Othello: not my favorite literature piece, but I fought through it.

This year when my teacher told us we were going to read Macbeth, I was indifferent: just another play where everyone dies. I was expecting long speeches, blank verse, extended metaphors, etc. I wasn’t expecting to understand or appreciate Macbeth.We finished the first Act quickly. I understood it all. No need for sparknotes or pink money or whatever. For the first time, I could comprehend what the play was about.

I thought maybe I’d gotten lucky. But no, I grasped all five acts easily. Macbeth is my favorite. It became my most annotated play and my most wrinkled,

Two weeks after Macbeth, we began reading Hamlet. I thought I wasn’t going to understand it. But I did. I get it. I was so happy when I finally understood what the famous “To be or not to be” speech was all about.

We’re still not done with Hamlet, but I’m looking forward to reading the end. I know that everyone dies because someone spoiled the ending for me but I still want to know.Now I want to see through Shakespeare’s words, not through the condensed summary written by a sparknotes writer or through the simple words of a classmate.

I know it soudns geeky, but I like Shakespeare. [specially Macbeth xD]

Rachel’s Blue: “How 2 Read Lit Like A Prof”

After my little reflection on Foster’s How to Read Literature Like A Professor, the idea for this comic came to me.

He was right…

A year ago, a little book called How to Read Literature Like a Professor crossed my path. I read it. I was satisfied, the book did live up to its claims to have the keys to the kingdom of the lit world. The patterns Forster (the book’s author) claimed to be in all stories are true. Some of them are pretty apparent, like the quest archetype, or the diseases as metaphors motif. Others are more subtle like the political messages and the eating together scenes.

After reading the book, I agree with Foster on the fact that copyright is apparently violated over and over again in literature whether subconsciously or not.All stories come from each other, there is not one original true work of literature. They are all connected in some way or another. There is not one original hero anymore, they all share the same qualities, and desires. Perhaps their backdrop is different, the princess they are trying to rescue has a different name, perhaps they don’t use a sword but a wand…

I forgot about the book, recalling it’s lessons and commandments only when I sat on my English class. Apply the book’s knowledge to the novel or play we were reading at that time. But I did not realize how right Foster was until yesterday.

I was going over my my NaNo from ‘07, when I realized I had done some of the things Foster says writers do. When A character goes south, some thing’s bad is going to happen. Uh-oh, my main characters travels south towards the desert, a trip that catalyzes a series of disasters. Another character wishes he could fly, paralleling his desire to free himself from his family.

I can’t believe it! I was in such a rush to finish the 50k words in the time alloted that I did not consider giving it those little things that add up at the end and give the story layers.