"Much ado about Nothing" by William Shakespeare

Words... back... or something. The thing is that now, this is supposed to talk about... nothing! Nothing what? Oh, right. Much ado, much to do, about... no-thing. Even though the title of this story, play, movie, etc., originally by William Shakespeare, can have many meanings and connotations, like the one which has a sexual menaing, or the one where nothing (notting) means to spy someone, I will focus on the "no-thing" thing about this "nothing" play. 

What is this supposed to mean? That nothing happened in the end? That every event just happened and it was just for nothing because everything would have run its course without all the drama? Is it that Shakeaspeare considered all the muttering and love and relationships a really huge "nothing"? Maybe, but that is not up to me to interpret.  

What I think is that in the end, what counted was inside the characters, and sooner or later, it would have appeared, through one means or the others.  Beatrice and Benedick, they both loved each other so secretly, that one day, maybe, without others' "help", their love would have ocme out to surface for them and everyone to see. Claudio and Hero, well, what a pair of confused and tender-lovings! 

Maybe the end as we know it would not have ended that way if no one would have interferred. I mean, it would have ended with Claudio's death, with Don Pedro's one by his evil brother, with all the "loving couples" being together in the end, wether in life or death (as in R & J, in the case of Claudio and Hero), or nothing could have happened, just the prince and everyone else arriving to Messina, doing whatever they went to do, and bye-bye. Nothing, nothing could have happened, and nothing happened, so, there was too much doing about just nothing. 

"Taxi" by Amy Lowell

When I go away from you 

The world beats dead

Like a slackened drum. 

I call out for you against the jutted stars

And shout into the ridges of the wind. 

Streets coming fast, 

One after the other,

Wedge you away from me,

And the lamps of the city prick my eyes

So that I can no longer see your face.

Why should I leave you

To wound myself upon the sharp edges of the night?

So, taxi, a taxi that could take you far away, a taxi that you hope to be arrriving somewhere, but you cannot know for sure, a taxi that you just want to take you away from the pain. Yes, I like the sound of it, the sound of the Inception quote I changed in order to fit it to the poem, but those words can sound silly, too. The poem tells us about this girl who maybe broke up with her boyfriend or just left him for the night because either she or he had something else to do. And then she is suffering like hell, either way. But is that my interpretation or what the poem really wants to say? But even though someone tells me what the poem "really wants to say", I would interpret it. So my interpretation is that, and I find it really silly. And I can say that because of the interpretation I gave to it, it is not a good poem. But people have taught me that poems should be judged not from the topic, but by the way they are written. So yes, I like that there are metaphors (but kind of simple, though) and the images (like the 3d neon lights coming right into your eyes full of tears, hurting them). I like those, but not the poem itself, maybe there is a good arrangement of the verses, but that I cannot be sure of, even though that I can actually say I like. So to me, it is not a poem I can put in the category of "Poems I consider to be good". 


And I would have liked for the title to be more of a metaphor.

"Exile" by Julia Alvarez

This was kind of a mixture of what I like about poetry and what I do not. To start with, I like the set of metaphors the author used, as I really like metaphors. But on the other hand, I do not really like narrative poetry. I mean, it is nice and I think it can be very good, but I still cannot find a way to look at the verses and not want to put them all together as in prose, because my mind thinks that either way, they continue being the exact same thing. My mind considers that there can be more "poetic" phrases or paragraphs, also full of metaphors in a novel, but that is interpretation, as everything.

But aside all of that, I think Exile is a very well done image of what the title wants to say. To imagine this girl plunging into the sea, going away from the land she knows and into the unknown, but still with faith, is a very clear image for me. And the way she puts her point of view as a child, a child who could just follow his dad to his "holiday in the beach", can bring us many thoughts, like what if she was older and had the possibility to choose? Or, what if she had fought to stay and not only go away? What will she do in the new and unknown place?

I believe this poem really makes us project ourselves in it, asking and answering ourselves, to what could happen to the mirror we see in this girl.

William Shakespeare

I could start by saying when our dear friend Will was born, or everything he did and did not, but I think there is one important thing: what if Shakespeare had never existed?

We all know (as the world in general) about Romeo and Juliet, maybe about Hamlet's quote "to be or not to be", or about the Globe... and everything ends up relating to dear Willy. But what if this great playwright had never put the stereotypes and famous quotes in history? Maybe nothing would have happened: we could have had another typical model to stand for the well-known "Romeo", or tragedies would not be represented with a skull because of the play Hamlet, but maybe with a knife stabbing a heart, or swords crossed (or swords crossed with a skull haha) But anyway, I cannot buy the fact that Shakespeare was that important. Yes, I like his work, I've seen a thousand representations of Romeo and Juliet and like to know about him, his times, etc. But besides all that, I think of William Shakespeare as a very good playwright that was able to become popular by accident. Then, his work started spreading like smoke and everyone soon knew about this guy, or about his work. Only by accident was that the stereotypes we have today are what they are, and the sound to his name is known by most of the people, even though they might not know a thing about him. 

He was born as everyone else, wrote as anyone else could have, and reached fame as everyone else could have. Destiny? I cannot say, but he is a guy that should be very credited for many of the "lettered" world we have today, and after about 400 years after his death, he is still part of our world. So yes, nothing could have happened, but after all, he left his print and is present somehow. 

"Revolting Rhymes (Snow White)" by Roald Dahl

Snow white ended up with the seven dwarves because they made a fortune at the racetrack. Not the usual "Oh, and she lived happily ever after with lovely Prince Charming, and the rainbow shone, and the birds sang and everything was just so annoyingly perfect..." No, this is something that can be both more linked to our everyday life, but on the other hand, way more farther from it. Now it was like "Oh, and then she stole the mirror just because and the dwarves made a fortune and she fell in love with them (or their money, either way) and then the lights fade out..." Yes, very funny because of the way it turns a childish story into a double sense and with balck humor story. But even though it can have the double sense, (and the images contribute a lot to this) and it might be "less fantastic" or "less childish", one does not go listening to stories about a woman who slept with seven little guys at the same time because they were rich. I mean, everything can happen, the rainbowish ending, or the... lovely alternative ending. 

That is what I consider great about everything, you can mock about everything you want, and the way Roald Dahl arranges the stories in his Revolting Rhymes, and puts them together in a very "poetic" way, makes them even funnier. It is a very good joke. 

Roald Dahl has a very particular ability to put words together to tell elegant rhyming jokes without having to speak them. That is what I can see from Revolting Rhymes.

Image from: http://www.liquorsnob.com/pictures/ho-white.jpg

"Night" by Elie Weisel [Part II]

I cannot speak about Night. I talked to a friend trying to find the words, but it wass impossible. We spent the night talking, and still it did not happen. It is so hard to say something that does not sound stupid. We probably think too much. I mean, what is war? What is peace?  What is to be mentally sane? Not knowing? And to be mad? Is being mad perceiving what others do not?

When was the last time you saw yourself in the mirror and looked at a normal person there?
I would like for you to give me a definition of a weird person, please. 
Everybody lives a Night. But I gues that some people that could seem to understand that, just won't.


And now, go here and watch: http://vimeo.com/1965247

"Phenomenal Woman" by Maya Angelou

I was listenig to a song, and I listened to a part that says:

What a feeling.

Bein's believin'.

I can have it all, now I'm dancing for my life.

Take your passion

and make it happen.

Pictures come alive, you can dance right through your life.

Now I hear the music,

close my eyes, I am rhythm.

In a flash it takes hold

of my heart.

       (Flashdace, what a feeling - Irene Cara)

I know it might not sound anything related to the Phenomenal woman poem, but as I listened to it, it caught my attention for the way I instantly realted it to the poem. This is like the explanation I could give to the poem with another one. What Maya Angelou is proud about is for the fact of being herself, the feeling she gets about her. 

There is still so much discrimination against women all over the world. They are not taken into account in political decisions, they are used as means of pleasure, according to a misinterpretation of religion. Ancestral traditions, even since primitive people, women stay at home, men go to work.   Having made so much progress in human thinking, in human perspective, there are still many things to be aware of. Like these. Women's situation in the world. This song is what every woman should think, want to think and still want to be. 

It is achieving a high position with ourselves, defeating what others think and having all at the palm of our hands. It is fighting for the right to be free: "Take your passion and make it happen. Pictures come alive, you can dance right through your life". It's a matter of being proud of what we are, not taking into account what we must be. Women and men are not the same, but it is that special characteristics, that "secret that lies inside us" that make us so special, but not so "discriminable". Human beings after all. "Close my eyes I am rhythm. In a flash it takes hold of my heart." I believe that is a beautiful image. A woman closing her eyes feeling the pride emerging, knowing that she is worth it, and then she feels it all over her heart. 

I believe Maya Angelou is quite right about feeling proud of being a woman, and to feel everything that define us as our identity, as our common factor that make us indispensable in the world. But what is more, is that she feels very deeply great for her being African American, which was difficult to bear in those times. She was a very brave woman that clearly shows us that definitely, a world without women would not be the same.