“”We fat all creatures else to fat us, and we fat ourselves for maggots.”

All of Hamlet revolves around death. It is the reason for the revenge, and it takes the lives of all the characters. The article I read in the New York Times mentions how the whole story revolves around death, that it is what causes and ends everything. Hamlet is concerned with mortality as much as revenge.

            This quote really intrigued me when I first read it. The whole concept that we are all just worm-food sort of gives the feeling that our lives do not matter because we will all just be food one day. The article mentions that as well, how Shakespeare is writing everyone’s future, because everyone is going to die one day. But I don’t think this quote means we should just give up, that nothing matters because we will be gone soon enough. That is too depressing a concept to really fully accept as the only truth. It may be true, but there is more to life, even if it isn’t expressed in Hamlet.

“A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a king, and eat of the fish that hath fed of that worm”. It may be the circle of life, but life isn’t just about surviving long enough to die. Hamlet touches on the purposes of life, mentioning the happier memories of the characters. The play shows that we cannot just exist, as humans we feel and think. No matter how many deaths Hamlet encounters, he does not give up his goal for revenge because it is his love for his dead father that keeps him going. He still feels attachment for a human who is long gone, a body whose only worth was feeding the worms. Even though that may seem to be the only value humans have on earth, food for the worms, it cannot undermine the worth humans place on themselves and each other. Though it angers Hamlet that this is the case, that in the end one’s life and death does not matter, he has to accept it as a truth in the end.

"Were things better than they are now, or were they worse?"

I have just finished part one of 1984 by George Orwell and so far, it is amazing. The amount of detail in the story, the complex future world Orwell created is so elaborate and realistic. It has its own language, government, and countries, but it could all be real. It is based in Earth, in the real world, in London, England, in a future that was entirely possible at the time in which it was written. Therein lies the horror of the story, what makes it truly frightening. This imaginary future Orwell created is not so far fetched and fictional. The basic ideas of the government, of Big Brother, were being implemented in Russia and its revolution at the time. The dystopia that is Oceania draws many parallels to the totalitarian Soviet Union in the 1940s, when 1984 was being written. Orwell was writing what could very well have been the future of not only Russia but England and the rest of Europe as well. It is a scary thought that our world today could be as oppressive and as full of lies as the world in 1984.

The lies are a significant part of Big Brother’s hold on Oceania. He is able to manipulate the past, present, and future, and the citizens not only blindly follow him but actually assist in distortion of the truth. They somewhat-willingly allow themselves to be manipulated and controlled, and contribute to the continuation of misery in their own pitiful lives. This is another thing that makes the story so unnerving. That what one thinks is a fact of the past is probably a complete fabrication, with little or no truth in it. This is slightly like history in the real world, where the same event can be told in very different ways by the different sides. Americans tell the American Revolution as a great victory over a horribly oppressive country that has no right to rule, but the British tell it as a rebellion from one unreasonably unruly colony. Those who rule get to decide how the story is told, and Big Brother makes sure every story is told as a victory for Oceania.

Winston, the protagonist, is constantly trying to figure out what of his knowledge is lies and what is truth. His need for the truth is a need for security in knowing who he is and where he came from. His need for answers is going to end up getting him into trouble and undoubtedly killed. He knows this, but he cannot stop, he cannot let it go, because he lives in a world of lies, and he cannot trust anyone but himself to be able to tell him the truth.  

What Do I Want?

I was always okay at English, not incredibly good or bad, and I had no particular love for it. Sophomore year it was interesting to learn about the American writers in context of the events of the times, since I had never learnt about American history before. But it was my junior year, as I am sure is the case with most everyone else in the class, that I began to truly enjoy literature. We read much more than in my previous classes, more authors and more from each author. But more so, we discussed the work in greater detail, with the style of the author, all the devices, and the historical context, but in more obscure detail, not the well-known facts that any American (besides myself) would already know, like we learnt in American Literature sophomore year. I was hoping to gain from AP Lit even more knowledge of literature, the who/what/when/where/why/how it is written, how they all combine to make the piece a great literary work, and how all these works can be so different and yet comparable. Basically, I really just want to learn more, soak up the knowledge all around me, mostly just to know more, and also to be able to apply what I know to other pieces of literature to understand them better.