Big Brother is Watching!!!!!!!!!!!!

Big Brother is Watching!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wednesday, December 26, 2012

Mitch Albom Revisited: For One More Day

I'm sorry I didn't post this earlier.  I finished up with For One More Day a month or two ago, but it was so good that I remember finishing it like it was yesterday.  For those of you in Ingram's engaging death and dying class, this should be read after Tuesdays With Morrie.  Both are amazing reads and contain life-changing morals relating to death and dying (and life and living according to Mr. Ingram!).  That's not to say that both works are at the low level of fable.  For One More Day is a work of fiction, but in my opinion certain aspects of the story could be true of many professional athletes.  

Similar to Tuesdays With Morrie in that it is about one major character, the novel is about a professional baseball player who has a very unique form of near-death experience in which he spends time with his recently dead mother who acts as if she never died.  The washed up MLB player gets much-needed guidance from his mother as he searches for a purpose to live after losing everything dear to him.  For inquisitive Ingram students, the clinical death occurred after Charles "Chick" Benetto, the protagonist, threw himself from the top of a water tower in an attempt to commit suicide.  

I will say no more on plot!

It is a very quick read and contains just as important a central meaning as the longest masterwork.  Clearly quality over quantity, which for contemporary authors is very important because many people now do not seem to have as much time on their hands to read a work as long as Crime and Punishment or The Count of Monte Cristo or It.  All of Mitch Albom's works have been short, but sweet.  I am about to start reading another of his works, The Five People You Meet in Heaven.  I saw the movie based off of it with veteran actor Jon Voight (he was in National Treasure) as the lead character a few years ago and loved it.  It's a shame the movie was only made for TV.  I would recommend reading all of Albom's books instead of just reading Tuesdays With Morrie.  If one reads his three major works and gets his fourth book which just came out, that's four easy blog posts.               

Thursday, December 13, 2012

Hamlet and The Lion King. Parallels?

Hi everyone!  These posts are way overdue, but I will start with the hot topic in A.P. Hamlit:  Hamlet.  When I was finished reading the play and when my class was discussing it I could not get the musical numbers from The Lion King out of my head.  It's sad to think that in grade school when I first encountered Hamlet i did not immediately pick up on how similar the Disney film and Shakespeare tragedy are.  Here is a list of the parallel characters with the Shakespearean characters matched up to their Disney counterparts.

Prince Hamlet= Simba

Claudius= Scar

King Hamlet = Mufasa (say his name several times)

The Ghost= Rafiki

Queen Gertrude= Sarabi (Simba's mother)

Ophelia= Nala

Horatio= Timon and Pumbaa

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern= the hyenas Shenzi, Banzai, and Ed (gotta love Ed!)

Polonius= Zazu

Before the comments go out about some of these parallels being wrong, I am leaving out the differences in plot.  For example, Simba does not die, but Disney does not usually kill off the good guys.  They leave it to Pixar (Up comes to mind).  Also, even though Zazu could not father a lion, I saw him as an adviser just like Polonius was.

Another point to note is that I had Hamlet's father and the Ghost be different characters because Hamlet doubts whether he actually encountered his father or the devil, and Rafiki was the one who allowed the adult Simba to hear Mufasa's message telling him to defeat Scar.

You should notice that I did not list a parallel for Laertes.  Please post your thoughts!