English Renaissance Drama Essay

A central preoccupation of English Renaissance Drama is the tension between individual free will and the workings of fate. Compare the treatment of this theme in Dr Faustus and Hamlet respectively. In the Elizabethan period in which both Dr Faustus and Hamlet were written ambition and greed was a big element of society as people tried to gain favour and power with Elizabeth and her court, often resorting to murder in order to move further up the social ladder and gain more status, or in some cases, to stay at the status they had managed to achieve for themselves. The Tudor monarchies had made some progress in controlling lawlessness but Robert Watson claims that there must have been some basis for the â€Å"persistent jokes about incompetent constables and watchers in Elizabethan comedies† (ed. McEachern, 2002, pg.160). With so many crimes committed by un-punishable criminals and many crimes against women, the poor and even different religious minorities, not even considered to be crimes there is little wonder why people developed such an appetite for revenge stories such as Hamlet which was written after Thomas Kyd had such a huge commercial success with The Spanish Tragedy around 1587, whose plot looks very similar to that of the plot in Hamlet as the main character feigns madness in order to get revenge on the people who had killed his son and were socially higher up than him. The themes of fate and freewill within the story of Hamlet are based around the idea as to whether or not he was fated to kill his uncle in revenge for his father’s death or if he is culpable for his actions and the many deaths he is responsible for within the play as he tries to gain revenge and if he was acting of his own free will or whether or not it is fate that Ophelia kills herself within the play or again she was acting of her own free will and could have changed her fate . In contrast, Dr Faustus written by Christopher Marlowe is a tragedy with an end that the main character had the chance to change as the question of fate and free will is based around whether or not he is destined to go to hell because of his pact with the devil and his actions, as well as ambition. Highly reflecting the mood in Elizabethan society ambition was seen as a â€Å"particularly alluring and dangerous sin† (ed. McEachern, 2002, pg. 160) with people reflectively ridiculing opportunists and people trying to gain more than what is rightfully theirs. However the over side of the argument, which people tend to lean more on when analysing the actions of Dr Faustus is the opinion that he was acting of his own free will and that it was because of his pride in refusing to repent and ask forgiveness and mercy from God that led him to eternal damnation. Dr Faustus as a story pokes fun and ridicules the Catholic idea of heaven and hell and tries to reflect the feelings of the state at the time as Protestantism was, if not a little shakily, the dominant religion in England in 1600 when the play was written. Within the play, Faustus, a great scholar, who is the embodiment of the Renaissance man who came from humble beginnings to become a renowned intellectual individual who is highly respected in his field. However it is because of this climb from his humble beginnings that seem to have led him to develop his excessive hubris, which is ultimately his greatest flaw when he wants to become as mighty as God, not realising he is being tricked by Lucifer’s servant, Mephastophillis and does not have the powers he thinks he has, haven agreed to only another twenty-four years on earth before eternal life in hell in return for ‘God-like’ powers. Is Faustus fated to eternity in hell because of his deal with the personified devil, Lucifer or is it is hubris and own feelings of greed and ambition that stop him from repenting to God and asking for mercy, actions of his own free will, the reason why he ends up serving Lucifer forever. Within the prologue of the play itself, Marlowe does not seem to see any question as to whether it was fate or the actions of Faustus himself that led him to eternity in hell as he states â€Å"falling to a devilish exercise, and glutted more with learning’s golden gifts, he surfeits upon cursed necromancy† (Prologue, lines 24-28) in which the use of the words ‘falling’ and also the fact that he was ‘glutted’ taken to mean greedy for riches, have led to his downfall, he could have chosen to change the ending if he had not been so blinded by greed and not fallen for the trickery of the devil. Unlike Dr Faustus, Hamlet is about a more conventional romantic hero who is Prince of Denmark and has just lost his father, who we later find out was killed by Hamlet’s uncle Claudius. Within the play we see Hamlet struggle with the burden he has had placed on his shoulders by the ghost of his father who wants him to avenge his death, something that the Elizabethan audience watching would enjoy as it mirrored society at the time of the play as people tried to get revenge on people who had wronged them but could not be punished due to their higher status within society, especially concerning crimes against the poor by the aristocracy. Although he does not call upon the ghost as Faustus does with Lucifer, he does of his own free will decide to investigate the accusations that his father puts to him concerning his brother, Hamlet’s uncle, killing him so that he could marry his wife and become King of Denmark. This murder for the rising within society is a common theme within Shakespeare’s plays as they again cleverly mirror the actions of the aristocracy at court that were continuously stabbing each other in the back and in some cases killing each other in order to ain favours with the Tudor Queen Elizabeth. Hamlet deliberately feigns madness in order to find out the truth about the death of his father and the reason why his uncle so hastily and irreverently married his mother after his brother’s death. The deliberateness of his actions forces us to question whether or not it was fate that led to Hamlet killing Claudius and many others through the play, his indecisiveness and inability to act is his greatest flaw and gives credibility to the argument that he was in complete control of his actions and therefore fate had little to do with the outcome of the actions in which most of the characters are dead on stage at the end of the play. In contrast to this it could be commented that the actions of Faustus in Christopher Marlowe’s Dr Faustus was the work of fate and that he had no control over how he was going to end up at the end of the play. If he was meant to go to Hell and serve Lucifer for eternity, as what happens at the end of the play, then Faustus repenting and asking for mercy and forgiveness from God would have no impact whatsoever on his impending death. Within the epilogue of the play it is observed â€Å"Faustus is gone. Regard his hellish fall† (line 4) which could be interpreted by the audience who have watched the play to mean that he was tricked by the devil and by God and he fell for their tricks and failed to repent for something which never actually materialised in terms of gaining the powers of God and becoming his equal. The fall of Faustus is interpretedb y Marxists to be his punishment for trying to rise above his station in life as they believe the position you are born into is he position you should hold for the rest of your life and people should be punished for trying to change the natural order of things. This belief was also upheld within Elizabethan society as England had been through turmoil with the changing of the official religion for the last twenty years because of the current queen’s father King Henry VIII who created the Church of England so that he could marry his mistress, Elizabeth’s mother, who’s uncle and father, the Dukes of Norfolk and Suffolk, became very important men in the English court as they were the relatives of the King Henry’s wife, for the limited time she held the title and rose above their natural stations in life, only to be exiled and executed when they made a fatal error and crossed the King. Dr Faustus quite cleverly mirrors society and their feelings of ambition and greed and so Marlowe has made his ending fit into the climate that his play would be performed in. The element of fate with Dr Faustus does not seem to be as prevalent as it does in some other plays as free will has more control and it is ultimately his actions that condemn him. Within Hamlet, as a contrast to Dr Faustus there are many elements that can be questioned as to whether Hamlet was asking of his own free will or whether or not the events that occur were apart of fate and her plan for Hamlet. Was he destined to die at the hands of his uncle Claudius due to his failure to act on numerous occasions to gain revenge for the murder of his father. In addition there is also the question of the deaths of both Gertrude and Ophelia as they are both extremely close to Hamlet, the former being his mother and the latter being his love interest within the play. Gertrude dies at the end of the play when she drinks from the up containing the poison that Claudius has placed in it meant to kill Hamlet, was she destined to die because of her ‘unfaithfulness’ in the eyes of her son by marrying so soon after the death of her husband, or is it because she chose of her own free will to save her son as she knew of the plot that Claudius had to murder his nephe w, just as he had his brother. The incident in which Ophelia is found in the fountain shows her death to be suicide after she fails to cope after being rejected by Hamlet and also the death of her father, unknowing to her killed by Hamlet himself when he thought he was stabbing his uncle Claudius. Did she commit suicide after being unable to cope emotionally or is it more of a matter of fate that she was meant to die and that the fact that she is found in a fountain is a smoke screen as fate was never going to let her live and see the end of the play as she could have cottoned n to what Hamlet was doing and ruined the ending that fate had planned for the characters within the play. The themes of fate and free will are prevalent within both Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Christopher Marlowe’s Dr Faustus which means that the actions of both protagonists are greatly debated by scholars today and in the past centuries since they were first written. Both plays are very reflective of the society in which they were written and first performed, with the antagonists being killed for trying to change the social order within their society. As discussed within this essay the author as come to some sort decision that in the play of Dr Faustus the theme of fate, while apparent, did not have a big contributing factor to the outcome of the play and it was mainly through actions and decisions that Faustus made with his own free will that led him to spending eternity in Hell and serving Lucifer. In contradiction, in Hamlet, the author has come to the decision that is almost impossible to determine whether or not the protagonist was acting of his own free will or was just acting as fate decided and the deaths that Hamlet directly or indirectly causes were nothing other than collateral damage as fate tries to right the order and balance out the in-balance that Claudius created when he killed his brother, with the tension between both fate and free will being so strong that any other move could create more instability than anyone could predict.

Journal on Hamlet’s quote Essay

Hamlet is one of Shakespeares most discussed plays. The drama has a lot of figurative language to be interpreted in various meanings. Among the famous quotes taken from Hamlet, perhaps the one bringing a wide range of different opinions is the line Hamlet said to his friends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Why, then, tis none to you; for there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so: to me it is a prison. (Shakespeare, Hamlet, II, ii, 249.) There is a deep concept in this saying, which perfectly represents the reality and the values of right and wrong. In the context, despite Hamlet saying this line does not refer to the moral values in the society; it does reflect the theme of the play. In this scene when Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, his old friends directed by King Claudius to come and check on his madness, Hamlet simply is mocking his fake friends naiveness. However, this quote does not only have this joking effect, but also foretells the theme of the play. Hamlet is the play of revenge, of finding the truth, of defining what is right and what is wrong. The way the prince thinks about life is going to help him deciding on his actions. . . . for there is nothing either good or bad implies in this world, nothing being is given a low or high value, a righteous or foul reason to exist. The way people look at it, react to it, and perceive it make it good, or bad. For instance, killing is always considered a horrible crime, but in the play Hamlet has to decide to murder his own uncle. However in that situation it is not completely a crime. It may either be right or wrong, depends on each persons view on what is more meaningful, a life, or the elimination of bad deeds. The decision to defy something as right or wrong also depends on a lot of different background like historical, cultural and other aspects. Hamlet considers the marriage between his mom and his uncle two months after King Hamlets death is unethical. The truth is in other nations, relatives do get royal marriage right after death of a family member to remain the stability within the royal clan, which is considered great wisdom and of great moral. In each persons view, an event has various personal relations to his belief and moral conception; therefore the definitions of right and wrong, good and bad vary among people. The argument of right and wrong, or good and bad, perhaps is the main theme  of the play. Is revenge a good excuse for murder? Is Hamlet not doing the same thing as Claudius did to his father? The answers lay upon each audience and his own opinion, as the truth lays in thinking makes it so Work Cited Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. Rpt. in Compact Literature Reading Reacting Writing. By Kirszner and Mandell. 6th ed. 2007.

Herland As A Feminist Work

Feminism is the advocating for social, political, and all other rights of women equal to those of men (Random House College Dictionary). This story depicts just that. It is about a society made entirely of women with no need for men. We see the perspective of men through the eyes of our narrator. He gives us the point of view from three different men about women. Herland takes the traditional stereotypes about women and reverses them entirely. Everything that was once regarded by feminine and masculine standards was taken away. The women had short hair and athletic bodies. Their clothing was not provocative but built for comfort and convenience. They were not coy and flirtatious. They did not need men. Their daily living and whole lives did not depend on a man in any way shape or form. They were builders, farmers, scholars, and most importantly mothers. They lived together, harmoniously. The women of the land do not understand the gender biases of the world because they simply do not make sense. â€Å"There was no accepted standard of what was â€Å"manly† and what was â€Å"womanly†Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. Jeff said, ‘a woman should not carry anything,’ Celis asked ‘Why? ’ with the frankest amazement†(93). And why shouldn’t a woman carry anything. To her it was the funniest idea. If none of them carried anything, nothing would get done! The men who â€Å"invade† Herland are filled with typical boyish fantasies of wild maidens in waiting. Their ideals about this place are comical. They expect to find a collection of wild women that are waiting to be tamed by men. They imagine a world of pure, untainted women. They cannot imagine a civilized world without the presence of men. â€Å" They would fight amongst themselves, Women always do. We mustn’t look for any sort of order and organization† (10). This statement was made by Terry, as we come to know him. He is the most â€Å"manly† of the three men. His ideals are the most Victorian and chauvinistic. Jeff’s ideas about the women they would come to find were different than Terry’s. He believed that women should be sheltered and protected without a care in the world. â€Å"Jeff idealized women in the most Southern style. He was full of chivalry and sentiment, and all that. And he was a good boy; he lived up to his ideals† (11). Van’s ideals about their venture were the most practical in nature. He looked over every detail and tried to make the most sensible explanations. I believe he was the voice of reason. We could also compare the three to Freud’s Id (Terry), Ego (Jeff), and Superego (Van). But that is another paper. Perhaps one of the most forthcoming feminist aspects is the fact that the women of Herland reproduce without the assistance of men. This feature of the novel helps to create a truly self -supporting society of women that our narrators cannot seem to grasp. This makes these women superhuman in a sense. The male race is unnecessary to their existence. I believe that this story was told with the purpose of making the gender roles of most of the world look like children’s games. It is clear that this story was intended to show that women were and are self-supporting human beings and not objects to be possessed and kept.

Food Borne Illness Essay

Food that is mishandled can lead to foodborne illness. While the United States has one of the safest food supplies in the world, preventing foodborne illness remains a major public health challenge. Often when you purchase foods from the grocery store or the food market, you have to check all the expiration dates. When a food is expired, they tend to give you a sign that the food is no good. For example, when you go to the store and shop for bread, you have to check the expiration date. If you purchase bread when the date on the bread is expired, the bread will mold within in the next three days or so. The same situation with the expiration dates is for meat as well. According to â€Å"Food Borne Illnesses & Disease† (2012), as pertaining to storage, for example meat, you can store meat in the freeze for a specific amount of time and it will still be as good as it was when you bought it from the store. * * If you store meat over the amount of time that is listed in this chart, the meat is no longer good. The presentation of the products in the store tend to look good when they might not be. Some foods are advertised as being healthy and clean but they could be bad as well. * Listeria, salmonella, E. Coli, Botulism, are some food borne illnesses that America try to avoid everyday. To prevent the food borne illness Listeria, you must set your refrigerator to 40  °F or lower, and the freezer 0  °F or lower. Use a refrigerator thermometer to check your refrigerator’s inside temperature. When you check in your refrigerator and you see juice from hot dogs or any type of meat leaking, you have to clean the inside thoroughly to avoid catching this illness. Clean the inside walls and shelves of your refrigerator with hot water and liquid soap, then rinse. Use precooked or ready-to-eat food as soon as you can. Do not store the precooked or ready-to-eat food in the refrigerator too long. Wash your hands after you touch hot dogs, raw meat, chicken, turkey, or seafood or their juices. Readers might search for more information on the food safety and inspection service website. They can and will inform you about the many illnesses that are out and how you can and can not prevent them. They will also give you many charts on how to take care of your meat and how to store your meat so you will prevent catching any food borne illness. * To determine if the research is credible, you have to search for the same information through other websites as well. Never just go along with one website and say that it is credible. It is very important to use this criteria when searching for information on nutrition and health because on some sources, they might give you information on telling you what to do with your raw foods and you end up getting sick. To avoid all of the confusion and the illnesses, make sure that the sources are credible. References: Food Borne Illnesses & Disease. (2012). Retrieved from http://www.fsis.usda.gov/fact_sheets/Foodborne_Illness_&_Disease_Fact_She

Research Proposal Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 3

Research Proposal - Essay Example To quit smoking is almost synonymous with ensuring a greener earth to our society, a healthy life for the future generations and a much more peaceful and trouble-free life for the smokers. It has often been found that people smoke out of frustration or a number of other concocted reasons. But the truth is that the addiction increases our vulnerability to all those factors – it exposes us to health as well as mental illness. In fact, it is not only the active smokers who are susceptible to the harms, but the passive smokers too, especially the children who have relatively a much lower immunity power. Smoking seems to be worth quitting from a political aspect as well. Most domestic governments have levy heavy duties on tobacco products. People, who find smoking irresistible, often ignore these facts, when the truth is that they could actually save a lumpsum amount of their money through getting rid of the habit – on the other hand, tobacco tax is considered to be one of the most important sources of government revenues. Dr. Damien De Walque in 2004 found that education had a great impact among the educated youth of the American society about their smoking behaviours. He statistically tested the hypothesis about the effect that education had on the smoking habits of people, on the basis of sample data collected since 1950 and found that the effect to be statistically significant (De Walque, 2004).1 Layte and Whelan in 2006 found that the people belonging to the lower strata of the society, viz., the blue-collar class in North America, were found to be more prone to smoking habits than those belonging to the professional or managerial class. One of the reasons cited behind this behaviour was the impact of education.2 Keeler and Hu in 1998 also found out that formal education had a statistically significant impact on the awareness of the people

The Batek of Malaysia Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

The Batek of Malaysia - Research Paper Example They are one of the groups of Malayan aborigines (Orang Asli) and from historic times they have always been gathering food by hunting and gathering natural resources (Bisht and Bankoti, 2004, p.100). This paper will focus on forage as primary mode of subsistence of the Batek population and its impact on some aspects of their culture. The Batek have maintained their primitive lifestyles but with time they might be facing challenging with respect to upholding their beliefs and traditions. There is a population of 133,000 Orang Asli in Malaysia and they are divided into 3 groups which again has 18 ethnic sub-groups. Each group has an identity of their and differ in language, culture and also architecture. In the age of urbanization they have adopted modern lifestyles and have come to live in urban areas. However, the Batek still maintain their traditional nomadic lifestyle (Beswick, 2010). The Batek people claim to have a strong and positive relationship with the forest. They hunt for food in the forests and also take refuge in the forests. In spite of their dependence on forests, their everyday life can be in danger. As with other nomadic groups, the Batek too suffer from this fear. The major factor that contributes to their fear of life is falling of trees. The Batek have an inherently practical approach to this problem. They cut down a tree if they think it has the possibility of falling over their camp. If cutting down of a tree does not seem possible then they escape from the way of the tree. As the best and hassle free solution they build their camps in place where there are no old trees so that they are saved from the threat of potential falling trees. In general term, this fear of the Batek of falling trees is a fitting environmental behaviour and can be considered normal for people living among trees. The Batek people believe that the world will cease to exist if no people live in the forests and so according to their belief they are holding up the world by remaining attached to the forests. Administrative boundaries do not restrict the Batak and they move freely in and out of Taman Negar a Park. Based on their political and sexually democratic structure, there exist no boundaries among groups. The main characteristic of their daily camp life is fluctuation. The Batek people always look for new zones for resource and so their encampments are always fresh and in established sites (Tuck-Po, 2005, pp.250-251). A camp group has an average of 38 people and in general does not remain in one place for more than two weeks. They move from one rive valley to another in three to four months. Their movement is not random through the forest. They follow a definite walking trail and other pathways including rivers and streams (Tuck-Po, 2005, pp.250-251). The Batek do not have ownership of lands and they only look after lands. This makes them easier to move every five months so that the forest can replenish (Beswick, 2010). In Batek society leadership is not ascribed. It is based on situation and activity. Although individuals make decisions, still group decisions act as the best c ompromise between peaceful agreements and chaotic conflicts. Dominating behaviour is not favorably accepted and even the children have the right to object and refuse obedience. The nuclear family is the primary unit for production and consumption. An important social performance is the practice of sharing of food between households. The largest share of food that they gather goes to the family members of the hunter and their closest kin and the remaining portion of the food is distributed among the other members of the

Abraham Lincoln, the President of America Research Paper - 1

Abraham Lincoln, the President of America - Research Paper Example Although the list of Lincoln’s achievements is too long to narrate in few words but the greatest act he did for America as the president was closing the civil war that was about to split the country apart. When Lincoln took the presidential charge, the civil war between North and the Southern slave states was turning to a hazardous brink. The slave states formulated the Confederate States of America claiming secession. But Lincoln took a powerful position in the civil war with the unspeakable leadership skills and preserved the Union from decay. He surely endured unexpected pressures not only from the generals who did not want to fight but he also faces bickering from his own cabinet members for supporting the war. Thousands of soldiers died on the battlefield and he received many assassination threats to his life for continuing the war. But, he was truly determined to end up the war and defeat the Confederacy (Abraham Lincoln Research Site, 1996). Lincoln’s greatest speech ever was Gettysburg Address in 1863. In the address, he clearly defined that the civil war was a contest to achieve liberty for the slaves and to secure and preserve the United Nations from splitting apart. He said: â€Å"Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived, and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting-place for those who here gave their lives, that that nation might live† (Quoted from Ronald, 2008, p. 52). Although Lincoln was vehemently criticized for his decision for compromising the lives of about 8000 soldiers just in 3 days, he had a belief that his job was to preserve the country from disintegration into two parts. With fighting this civil war, he kept the nation save from other external threats.