Author: Jose

Question 10 – June 2015 Higher – Who do you think suffers more in Touching the Void, Joe or Simon? How does Simpson make you feel as you do by the ways he writes?

Touching the Void is a book that explores both of the main types of pain that a human can feel and that is physical and emotional. The events that occur during the book cause both characters to suffer from both of these pains but I believe that each character suffered more of one type of pain than the other; Joe suffered more physical pain than Simon but Simon suffered more emotional pain than Joe. I believe that Simon’s emotional pain was the result of the very difficult decision he had to make between cutting the rope that held Joe and let him fall to his death or keep holding on and eventually fall down with him. Simon decides to cut the rope and this decision invites many unanswerable questions into his mind and many thoughts that trouble him throughout the rest of the trip. He burnt Joe’s clothes as a ritual act to get rid of any threads that may connect to Joe’s spirit and remind him of his unforgivable decision. The parts of the book where Simon is talking are written by Simpson himself which may suggest that the pain Simon went through, lead him to not want to write about his perspective himself but rather let Joe express himself through Simon’s thoughts.

NOT COMPLETE

How do the studied poets and Shakespeare use literary techniques to show how people respond to forces in the world over which they have no control?

Forces that we have no control over are things that we as humans cannot interfere with. The poems that we have studied and the play by Shakespeare, Hamlet, all involve forces that the characters cannot change or that are out of their control. They all address the aftermath of a tragic event because they are all written as a result of a real-life, incident that occurred to each author.

In the poem “Do not go gentle into that good night” by Dylan Thomas, he writes about the force as being something to be fought with, something that humans can defeat and something whose actions can be avoided. In “A song in a storm” by Rudyard Kipling, he portrays the uncontrollable force as being so much greater than humans; “The game is more than the player of the game, And the ship is more than the crew!” he shows the force as something that humans have absolutely no control over. In Ben Jonson’s poem “On my first Sonne” he laments his son’s death and repeatedly refers to the force’s actions as justifiable and unavoidable.

Metaphors are regularly used throughout the poems and help to show how each character reacts towards these forces and the extents of their attitudes towards what has happened to them. Something I noticed that all poems had in common was that death was the main force that they had no control over. A metaphor used in Dylan Thomas’ poem is “Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight”. I believe that this metaphor means that the men close to death in the poem begin to see things that they haven’t seen before and they begin to see with closed eyes. This metaphor helps to portray the supernatural force around them that cannot be understood, like death. Death is a force that everyone encounters and can’t avoid, it’s something that certain people have been very close to. This metaphor helps to show the extreme of being encounter by this force called death, you begin to see what you and others have never seen before.

A metaphor used in Rudyard Kipling’s “A song in a storm” is the line “The game is more than the player of the game, and the ship is more than the crew!”. This metaphor is very effective in showing the nature of life as being a journey on sea and humans as the players of what the force sees is a game. This line presents the force, which in this case is death again, as a controller of this game called life, it can bring people out of the game whenever it wants to and chooses when to give or take opportunities away. This metaphor explores how humans relate to these forces and are brought together by this journey we are all on. This line takes away the weight of the seriousness of life and shows the start and end of this journey as being so insignificant. This metaphor is very effective in its context and really emphasises how the characters in this poem relate to this uncontrollable force.

In the last poem “On my first Sonne” Ben Jonson expresses his sorrow towards the death of his son and with a specific metaphor, “Exacted by thy fate on the just day” shows his reverence to this force, which again is death. This metaphor really shows that there is a mutual respect towards this force and that the character’s attitude towards it is not to fight it or try to change “fate” but to just accept that death had to take his son and fate chose the right day. In Shakespeare’s play, Hamlet, he uses several metaphors and one of them is in Hamlet’s soliloquy when he says “The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune”, this metaphor helps to show that this uncontrollable force doesn’t just place obstacles or fortunes in people’s lives, it fires at them with slings and arrows. These weapons were to be used from a long distance with emphasizes how insignificant Hamlet was to that force, so much that the force could easily fire hardships at him which he refers to as outrageous. This adjective describes Hamlet’s attitude towards this force as unsatisfied and angry which is why throughout his whole soliloquy he contemplates the notion of suicide. This metaphor is extremely effective in revealing how Hamlet felt annoyed with this force and found it unfair.

Another literary technique that is used is personification, this helps to give the uncontrollable force, human-like features that will allow it to relate to the characters in the poems and the play. A use of personification in the poem “Do not gentle into that good night” is when Dylan Thomas says “Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay”. This personification shows the fragile acts of men as something separate from them, perhaps suggesting that they are blameless as their acts are separated more and more as they get closer to this force called death. The line mentions that the men’s deeds might have danced in green bays and this to me means that the men’s acts are somewhere else in a better and nicer place without blame while they are in this storm. This implies that when any human comes close to death, their acts and deeds, good or bad, mean nothing and cannot help you to escape death. From the title of the poem, I can see that Dylan Thomas uses these types of personification to show their attitudes towards death as being rebellious and that they should not give up easily and succumb to the unavoidable force called Death.

In Rudyard Kipling’s “A song in a Storm”, he uses personification several times throughout the poem but one that stood out to me was the line “Then welcome fate’s discourtesy”, this line is very clear and effective in showing that the crew, which would be us humans, see fate as a person and whose actions are rude and that fate is inconsiderate. The crew ‘welcome’ fate’s rudeness because they have that respect for it but still realise that it is very inconsiderate by intervening at the worst times or at times which the characters are not prepared, just like in Hamlet when he is surrounded by the forces of loss, death, grief. This gives death a human persona which can relate to all of us humans. This personification shows how the characters in the poem believe that they have absolutely no control over death and that again, they are very insignificant to this force. Most of the poems all explore the belief that they are insignificant to their own forces.

In the poem “On my First Sonne”, Jonson gives death a human face by saying “Seven years tho’ wert lent to me, and I thee pay,” This line shows how the character in the poem feels that his son wasn’t truly his and was just lent to him perhaps for his good deeds but was now taken away from him. This shows the overwhelming power of this force that has taken back this reward and now makes the father pay the price. I believe that the price that the father pays is the grief and sorrow that he feels as a result of this loss. This personification helps to present the force that gives and takes life as a very selfish but just character. The characters have a very weak opposition to this force, if any, and have a great amount of respect towards it. Similarly to Rudyard Kipling’s poem, in which the characters are insignificant to these forces, The character in Jonson’s poem realises that he can do absolutely nothing about his loss because of the power that this force has and now has to take everything in and accept that death has overpowered him.

Finally, in Shakespeare’s play, Hamlet, he uses a lot of personification and constantly gives it humanistic features when he uses personification like “For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,” and refers to death’s actions as being forceful and severe. This gives death as very fierce image and character which Hamlet believes is true. The whips and scorns of time show how even time can hurt you with whips which were used for slaves or prisoners. This connotation helps to emphasise how Hamlet believes that time and death are the prison keepers and that we are the inmates of this prison called life. This personification, I believe is very useful to describe how death is a force that cares about no one and will always cause us pain no matter how hard we try to fight against it, which is a very different approach to the rest of the other texts.

To conclude, I believe that each of the poets and authors have explored their ideas of forces over which we have no control through similar methods like metaphors and personification but each have their different opinions about those forces and have presented them in their characters of their poems and play. Dylan Thomas has a fierce approach, Rudyard Kipling has an understanding approach, Ben Jonson has a very sorrowful and respecting look towards the force in his poem and Shakespeare presents a very confused and troubled opinion of the several forces that encounter the character Hamlet. All of these texts contain similar themes like death, loss, lament, sorrow, fear, respect and are each effectively supported by the literary devices that each poet and author use.

I knew this was it, all my friends but one had died while being in the front, i wanted to die in style, so i put on my best suit, my dad’s favourite cologne and my brand new shoes and I also wore my grandad’s watch. My mother smoothed down my shirt’s upturned collar and picked away all the little cat hairs on the suit. I smiled because i knew that I wasn’t afraid of death anymore. I smiled at my mother while we both cried, but for different reasons. I hugged her and walked away towards the old jeep, awaiting death.

3 Months Earlier…

“Alright boys, this is your lucky day!”

No it isn’t, don’t lie to me. We were all lined up ready to get picked to go to war, some few number of men would be spared but there were very slim chances of NOT being picked, you just had to be prepared for the worst.

Just as I predicted, the marshal picked me with a smile on his face. I walked towards the shack to get my uniform and dog tag, no longer was I a man anymore… I was a slave to war, which was every man’s worst nightmare.

I could already see my name on a tombstone;

|Here Lies |
| |
|2018-2034 |
|He loved music… |
|(that’s as much as we know) |

It wasn’t that bad, I had to think of something to be known for. Maybe the wimpiest kid, the most stylish or maybe just for liking music.
I collected my things and left, I had nothing else to do but pass time till i was called to go to the war front.

“For who would bear the whips and scorns of time”

“SCORN”
noun
1.
“a feeling and expression of contempt or disdain for someone or something.”

This phrase is extracted from Hamlet’s soliloquy in the play Hamlet by Shakespeare and the definition from an online dictionary.

Whips are a form of torture and are weapons that don’t need much force to have a big impact. By using this word I think that Shakespeare is trying to show that life causes torture without effort and that the pain is not bearable. Whips were also an old fashioned form of discipline which Shakespeare also uses to imply that life disciplines us and we sometimes can’t take it. Within the play I think that the situation that Hamlet is in, causes him to question whether he should take and withstand the blows and the disciplines from his life or just end it all with one simple action.

Scorn is a feature to describe a human action which shows that Shakespeare is personifying Hamlet’s situation and makes it look like a deliberate act of Evil.

This phrase is a metaphor to describe Hamlet’s dilemma as a person rather than a thing.

Another metaphor similar to the previous one that Shakespeare uses in the play is when Hamlet is delivering his soliloquy.

“Or to take arms against a sea of troubles”

This to me means that Shakespeare is referring to life as a journey on sea that sometimes gives is storms and huge waves and to overcome it, we need to take arms and stand firm. This metaphor also implies that in the play, that Hamlet wants help and he wants to tell someone else about his dilemma but he can’t and he is now in a sea of troubles with endless waves of problems that he has to face on his own which will steal him away with it. In the play Shakespeare uses this metaphor to show Hamlet’s situation as him being in the middle of the sea with no help around him leaving him to face it all on his own.

In this scene, two gravediggers argue about wether Ophelia deserves a christian funeral. one of the defends her and the other explains the the gravedigger that it was her choice and that she decided to shorten her life. one of the gravediggers leave and Hamlet and Horatio arrive. They discuss how the gravedigger is throwing around skulls of people who were once important people and skulls that once spoke words and sang. In his digging the gravedigger finds the skull of Yorick, one of Hamlet’s old friends and Hamlet asks if Alexander the Great looked like that once and the gravediggers tells him that he did and he even smelt that bad. Hamlet is surprised at how low humans can go, that even the greatest can fall to the same place. the King, Gertrude, Laertes and a Priest enter with a coffin. The priest tells Laertes that Ophelia should be buried outside the church graveyard and should have stones thrown on her body for taking her own life. Laertes gets angry and tells the priest to perform a proper ceremony just like the other ones. He jumps into the grave and demands to be buried alive with Ophelia and curses the person responsible for her death. Hamlet appears and jumps in the grave with Laertes and they both wrestle. Hamlet proves that he can be as crazy as Laertes, then he leaves.

In this scene, Claudius admits to Laertes that Hamlet murdered his father. Laertes asks Claudius why he let Hamlet get away with such a crime but Claudius tells him that he was holding back but wasn’t planning on letting Hamlet get away with his crime. In the middle of the conversation, the messenger enters with the letter for the king from Hamlet, the King is then assured by the letters that Hamlet is still alive so he and Laertes come up with a plan to kill Hamlet and their plan is to organise a fencing match between the two but Laertes’ sword will not be blunted like Hamlet’s. Laertes will dip his sword into poison and if that doesn’t work the Claudius will have a drink made for Hamlet with poison in it to make sure he dies. Gertrude enters interrupting their plans and tells them about Ophelia drowning and explains her death in detail. Laertes is enraged by this and runs out.

In this scene Horatio receives a letter sent to him by Hamlet and the letter tell him to lead the messenger to the King to hand him letters and tells him to go to Hamlet as fast as he would run from death because Hamlet needed to tell him things about Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.

In this scene, Horatio and a gentleman convince Gertrude to talk to Ophelia as she is crazed and talking nonsense. Ophelia enters and Gertrude talks to her but Ophelia sings about the sad death of her father and after a while King Claudius enters and talks to Ophelia and they hear noises from outside. Laertes enters and is angry but Claudius manages to calm him down and tells Laertes that if he is found guilty of Laertes’ fathers death then he will give Laertes all of his possesions but if Laertes is found guilty then Claudius will try his hardest to get revenge for Polonius’ death.

In this scene, Fortinbras enters and asks for permission to go through Denmark to get to Poland. Hamlet enters and talks with the Captain and discusses what Fortinbras is going to do and the Captain mentions that the land that the Norwegian are going to fight for will bring them no extra income or benefit and isn’t doing much for the Polish either. The Captain exits and Hamlet is left alone and talks to himself. He talks about the pointless battle that is about to occur and that humans were not made to just sleep and eat, they were made to do more. He  thinks about the deed he has to fulfill, which is to kill his uncle.

In this scene, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern return to Claudius saying that they can’t get Hamlet to tell them where they can find the body. Claudius calls Hamlet in and tells him that he is gonna be sent to England. Hamlet refers to Claudius as his mother because he married Hamlet’s mum and they became one flesh. Claudius then ends up alone and talks to the English King as if he were there and describes Hamlet as a fever on his brain that must be killed as soon a she gets to England.