Richard III – Grammar Stage (1st Level) Inquiry

After having breaking down the whole play in several Acts summaries, I am going to post the three stage inquiry required for my WEM Self Project. This is the first one, the grammar stage. The inquiries are slightly different from novels, histories or poems.

Death of the two little Princes

What is the initial question or tension?

The play is opened by the description of peace in England, when the Yorks and Lancasters are having peaceful relationship after war. Only Richard felt unhappy by this situation because of his ambition; he wanted to start another war. So, I guess the initial question is: What would Richard do to fulfill his ambition; can he take over the throne? 

Where is the point of greatest tension?

This play’s greatest tension is when the Major and citizens came to plead Richard to be their king—and Richard accepted it after declining a few times. I think it shows how Richard has calculated everything; he has got rid of any obstacles to the throne, and he even made the citizens plea to him. It is the sign of his genius, and it answers the initial question. Although unwanted and detested by his adversaries, Richard succeeded because he was clever enough to win citizens’ voices. Richard finally became the King of England!

Where does the play’s action reach its climax?

Although I still don’t get the difference between greatest tension and climax (aren’t they just the same?), I guess the point where the characters change (Richard in this case) is the night before the battle, when the ghost of Richard’s victims visited and cursed for his lost in the battle. Before that Richard was so confident that he would win as: 1). his army is bigger than Richmond’s, and 2). Richmond wasn’t well experienced in battle field. However, after the ghosts’ visits, his conscience began to disturbed him, and the prophecies began to lead his spirit down. I believe this had an influence to his defeat (besides his ex-people’s betrayal).

Where is the resolution?

The last scene after Richard was killed in battle, and the others gave the crown to Richmond. Richmond then brought peace once again into England by putting the Yorks’ and Lancasters’ eternal enmity to an end.

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An Ideal Husband

“Every man of ambition has to fight his century with its own weapons. What this century worship is wealth. The God of this century is wealth. To succeed one must have wealth. At all costs one must have wealth.” (Sir Robert Chiltern—An Ideal Husband)

Once again I was amazed by Oscar Wilde—this guy is really cool, isn’t he? After having been impressed by The Picture of Dorian Gray—Wilde’s masterpiece for me—Wilde made me laughing hard at his witty sarcasm in Importance of Being Earnest. After that I was a little worried whether his other plays would be exactly like Importance; very funny but lack of deeper values. I was wrong! This month I picked An Ideal Husband for Let’s Read Plays and, fortunately, The Classics Spin also picked the play from my list by spitting the lucky number 6! So there I was, plunging into the fraudulent scheme, political twist, love story and morality of British society in 19^th century. And, although the beginning is rather flat, An Ideal Husband turns out to be one of the most entertaining plays I’ve ever read so far; and more importantly, it’s much deeper than Importance!

Sir Robert Chiltern is an honorable gentleman in society, and respectable politician in the House of Parliament. He was appraised by so many people, but little do they know that Chiltern had done a shameful deceit in his earlier career, from which he has been building his later career and fortune. Lady Chiltern is also a high reputation ‘flawless’ lady in the society. She adores her husband for being pure and noble. In a party one night, a crafty woman named Mrs. Cheveley blackmailed Sir Chiltern to support a fraudulent scheme that he disapproved in the House, or otherwise she would release an old letter that will prove Chiltern’s deceit in public and will ruin his life.

Lord Goring, a young gentleman who leads an easy going, fashionable and enjoyable life style, is a closest friend of Robert and Gertrude Chiltern. Being sarcastic and indifferent outside, Arthur Goring is actually a kind hearted friend inside. When Robert and Gertrude were on the edge of losing each other’s love following the blackmail, Arthur separately tried to help them. Unfortunately, several trivial accidents put Arthur in a complex situation himself; he almost lost his friends’ trust and, most importantly, the young lady he was in love with.

As always, Wilde’s strength in plays is the combination of intertwining plot, complex failures, sarcasm paradoxes to criticize British society at that time, and his clever wittiness. But particularly in this play, Wilde plunged deeper than merely witty banters. My favorite character here is Lord Goring, he’s as easy going as Lord Henry in Dorian Gray or Algernon in Importance, but he also possessed a wise philosophy beneath his indifferent manner, which was always ready to be presented whenever his friends needed it. Far from being shallow, Goring’s advices to Robert and Gertrude were so genuine and useful at the same time. My favorite scene is when Lord Goring gave his speech to Lady Chiltern after the lady restrained her husband from accepting seat in Parliament. Here’s part of it:

“Women are not meant to judge us, but to forgive us when we need forgiveness. Pardon, not punishment, is their mission. […] A woman who can keep a man’s love, and love him in return, has done all the world wants of women, or should want of them.”

In the end, Wilde wants to criticize how British society has been worshiping wealth and status too much that they neglected the genuine values in life: love and honesty. When Robert Chiltern consulted with Arthur Goring after the blackmail, Goring’s first advice is to confide to his wife; that Lady Chiltern loves him and thus will forgive him. On the other hand, Goring also advised Lady Chiltern to forgive his husband, and instead of blaming him, to accept and support him with her love. From the Chilterns’ conflict, I learn that every family, every person must sometimes have crisis in life; but that crisis often get bigger than it should because we are reluctant to be honest. As soon as the Chilterns opened themselves to each other, one by one the complicated problems were eventually unraveled.

Wilde is also emphasizing women’s role in the society. Instead of expecting their husband to be perfect and worshipping them like gods, they should act as a partner by loving and supporting them. It’s really interesting that the philosophy must come from Lord Goring, who was a bachelor. With that quality of perspective, we should envy whichever girl Arthur Goring picks to marry, for he would certainly be an ideal husband!

Four and a half stars for An Ideal Husband, really entertaining!

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Let’s Read Plays (June) theme: Oscar Wilde

Baca Bareng BBI 2013: (June) European Literature

46^th book for The Classics Club Project

Richard III - Act IV - V Summaries

Read my previous summaries of Act I – II, and Act III before continuing to these last acts of Richard III.

Act IV

Scene I

Duchess of York, Queen Elizabeth and Lady Anne were rejected to meet Prince Edward and Duke of York in the Tower, and the news that Richard would be crowned as King broke. Lady Anne was reluctantly became a queen because she felt that she’s been haunted by her own curse to Richard, that his wife will suffer much. Everybody was leaving, Anne to be queen, Dorset to Richmond (Henry Tudor), Elizabeth back to sanctuary, but not before she, in sadness, bid farewell to the Tower walls that imprisoned her dear sons.

Scene II

From the throne, King Richard saw that Buckingham went softer and thus became untrustable. He then ordered a murderer called Tyller to kill Prince Edward and Duke of York in the Tower. Meanwhile Richard purposely refused to listen to Buckingham’s pleading for his reward, and Buckingham—reminded of Hastings’ faith, fled away to save his life.

Scene III

 It turned out that Tyrrel delegated the murder to his two villains, and they confessed to have wept before finally slaughtered the two innocent boys. After getting rid of his potential rival, now Richard planned to marry Elizabeth, younger daughter of Edward, to protect his throne from Richmond. Meanwhile Buckingham was marching over with his Welsh army, and Richard soon prepared for a battle.

Scene IV

It’s a witty scene when grieving mothers and wives: Duchess of York, Queen Elizabeth and Queen Margaret, sat down and compared their losses and blamed each other. After that Richard intercepted their way, and his mother cursed him of losing the battle because she and his dead enemies will bless for his adversary’s victory in war. Richard then asked Elizabeth to prepare her daughter to take his proposition to be his queen. Elizabeth rejected and after a long and smart debate with Richard, she finally agreed. Meanwhile, Richmond’s army also came to attack, persuaded by Buckingham and Dorset; while armies from different counties were preparing their armies as well. Buckingham was captured and Richard marched to Salisbury to fight the battle!

Scene V

Richard untrusted Stanley and kept his son in hostage. Stanley sent a letter containing his opinion to Richmond, as he could not risk his son’s life by helping Richmond openly.

Act V

Scene I

Buckingham was lamented that what he had wished to God jokingly, has been granted by God; now he was going to be executed, and Richard did not even come to speak to him.

Scene II

Richmond and his allies’ armies were approaching the battle field; Stanley seemed to update them with Richard’s army position. They believed Richard didn’t have many friends who would help him, and even among the less numbers, some would desert him when they needed it.

Scene III

Richard was confident at first because his army was three times their adversary. While he was planning his battle strategy in his tent, so was Richmond. Richmond sent a letter secretly to Stanley; while Richard instructed him (Stanley) to send his regiment if he cared for his son’s life. Stanley came to visit Richmond tent; giving him his silent support. Night before battle, ghosts of all Richard had murdered came and visited Richard—to curse him, and visited Richmond—to bless him. Richard was terrified by it, his conscience was disturbed, and he became more paranoid if his troops were deserting him. He was not well prepared mentally for the battle; while Richmond was in his good state with the ghost blessed him and he believed that God will bless he who fight against the wicked. In the last minute, Stanley sent news to Richard that he refused to send his army to the battle.

Scene IV

Richard fought like no man ever fights. He lost his horse, yet he bravely continued on fighting on foot, seeking Richmond.

Scene V

Richard finally fought Richmond, but he was finally killed. Richmond was crowned as King of England, and he reunited the Lancasters and the Yorks, ended years of their enmity, and began a peaceful era.

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Weekend Quote 20: Richard III

“O momentary grace of mortal men,

Which we more hunt for than the grace of God!

Who builds his hopes in air of your good looks,

Lives like a drunken sailor on a mast,

Ready, with every nod, to tumble down

Into the fatal bowels of the deep.”

It’s Lord Hastings’ lamentation just before he was executed by the order of Richard III. He condemns men who only hunt mortal virtues rather than God’s wisdom; for their lives would be so vulnerable, that very little obstacles or crisis would draw them down.

Do you agree?

Weekend Quote is a meme hosted by by Half-Filled Attic. Feel free to join. You can:

• Give the context of the quote
• Give your opinion whether you agree or disagree with it
• Share your experience related to the quote
• Share similar quotes you remember
• Or anything else. Just have fun with the quote.

How Are You Following Me? – Blog Update

First of all, I would like to thank all of you who have been following my blog, reading my posts, and sometimes commenting it. It might perhaps be a little annoying for us that Google has decided to turn off their Google Reader feature starting July, 2013. You know that Google Reader is a tool enabling us to get updates from blogs we have been following via Google Friend Connect or via RSS feed. It means that starting July 1^st, you who have been following me via GFC would be missing my updates. Something must be done to prevent that, and so, this is what I have prepared for you…

There are some ways for you to follow my blog updates, please feel free to choose one or more that would be most convenient for you:

Bloglovin – click to follow me

This is another blog feeds aggregator; some says it’s one of the best means to replace Google Reader. When you create a bloglovin account, they would automatically offer you to import all blogs that you are following via Google Reader to your bloglovin account. I like bloglovin so far, it looks very neat and simple; but I still haven’t found any way to find the numbers of my followers or who are following me (it’s like Google Reader without GFC). I do hope bloglovin will improve their features very soon—or is it just me who can’t find the way? Is there anyone more familiar with it who can guide me?

Follow by Mail – the widget to subscribe is at the right-outside sidebar 

If you don’t like to deal with too many social media sites and just want to stay conservative, maybe following me by mail would be more convenient. Just don’t forget to check your inbox right after you do the follow, because feedburner will send you an email and requires you to click the confirmation link before you can receive my updates in your e-mail.

Google+ - click to follow me

If you have already set up a Google+ account and check it in regularly, you can also follow me here (or put me into your circle) to get my updates. As I own 3 book blogs, you can get updates of all these 3 blogs in one place (one follow for three blogs).

Those three are my recommendations, but you can also choose one or more from these features too if you like:

Networked Blog – click to follow me

Only if you have Facebook account and open it regularly; my posts updates will appear in your Facebook updates.

RSS Feed – click to follow me

This is operated by Feedburner too, but you will have more choices to subscribe to my updates. If you like to hang around with Yahoo, for example, you can subscribe using My Yahoo.

Blogroll

None of the above? Well…you can still following my updates if you place my blog in your blogroll. Actually, this is my favorite way of following blogs, and I have applied this for my favorite blogs.

That’s my update, and again, thanks for following me and reading my posts… :)

Dante’s Inferno – Final Review

Like Dante, “midway upon the journey of our life/I found myself within a forest dark…”, I too felt like being plunged into darkness when I decided to read a narrative poem of Dante’s The Divine Comedy, end of last month. Being a complete newbie in poems, I just braced myself to read Dante’s Inferno, the first of three parts. At first it seemed like I was going to enjoy the poem, but when I reached the middle, I doubted whether I’d ever finish it. There were many historical persons and events that Italian people in 14^th century—or at least whoever studied Italian history—would have been very familiar with, but it was very annoying for us in modern days to follow Dante’s journeys without having to consult wiki or google almost every each circle! Besides that, the poetic lines were also intriguing me along the reading, that at the second half of the poem, I consulted more often a Dante’s translation site I’ve found on the internet; it’s indeed really helpful!

What intrigued me most of Dante’s journey in Hell is the opening stanza, where Dante confessed that he didn’t know how he could have suddenly arrived in Hell.

Midway upon the journey of our life

I found myself within a forest dark,

For the straightforward pathway had been lost.

Dante warns us (who are in the midway upon our journey of life) to reflect where we are ‘standing’ right now. Perhaps we have done so many wrongs and sins in the past, that if God takes our life this very minute, we would go straight to Hell. And yes, how often it is that we find ourselves suddenly far away from the purity that God had granted us when we were born? Suddenly we find ourselves in the dark forest and could no longer see the straightforward pathway to Him. Here and now, it’s time to pause and resume our past journey to be able to rediscover that straightforward pathway to salvation. Reading The Divine Comedy might be the best choice to help us in our own struggles. Dante is very lucky that Beatrice—the woman he loved—took the initiative to send Virgil to guide him in a dangerous and terrifying journey to Inferno (but we are also lucky that Dante ever published this poem!), so that he could warn many people in the world.

Dante portrayed the Hell as a giant funnel built underground that leads to a narrow pit. It was Lucifer, who, when fallen so heavily from heaven, his body (head first) thrust deep down the earth and created the funnel. The narrowest and deepest pit contained of Lucifer’s head, and it held souls with the most severe sin and received the most savage punishment. From the Hell’s gate to the pit there were nine circles with different grades—of course—the deeper the circle, contained the more severe sinners with more severe punishments.

What makes Inferno more interesting—and in a way fit to bear ‘Comedy’ in the title—is how Dante put a lot of historical and mythical characters into each circles. Here you’d find respectable personages like poets, philosophers, and political leaders, historical and mythical figures (Julius Caesar, Brutus and Cassius, Achilles, etc.) were punished in different circles. In a way, it widened your knowledge, because you will be forced to dig about their stories to understand their sins and how Dante punished them so fittingly. It’s quite comforting, for example, to find that Brutus and Cassius were punished far below Julius Caesar; actually you would be surprised to find with whom Dante kept Brutus and Cassius here!

Dante is very detailed in describing each circle’s condition and the severity of the punishments, that it made me often shuddered just to imagine it; for we might read and imagine it in few minutes, but the souls must bear it ceaselessly and endlessly. You will be cringed only by thinking of it! And Dante ‘punished’ the sinners with the same means as the sins they had performed, how interesting it is!

I learned later from Matthew Pearl’s historical fiction: The Dante Club, that Dante has a military background before writing The Divine Comedy, because he fought with the army at a war (I forgot which war). That’s how he learned how some torments would create such tortures to men; something that either a physician or a soldier who survived a war would have known.

In the end, I think I still owed Dante to delve deeper in his poem. I have been more familiar with it now, and in the future I can use the translation (from poetic to prose) to help me exploring the beauty of Dante’s narrative poem. Until then, four stars for Inferno, and I can’t wait to proceed to Purgatorio!

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I read e-book from Project Gutenberg, translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

This book is counted for:

1^st book for Narrative Poem Reading Challenge

7^th book for New Authors Reading Challenge 2013

7^th book for The Well-Educated Mind Self-Project

45^th book for The Classics Club Project

Richard III - Act III Summaries

Following my summaries of Act I and II, this is the seven scenes of Shakespeare’s Richard III of Act III.

Act III

Scene I

Prince Edward was disappointed for not finding his mother and brother welcoming him. Buckingham persuaded Cardinal to pick up Duke of York from the sanctuary, and the two brothers reunited. Richard insisted they both stayed up in the Tower. Meanwhile, Buckingham and Richard gathered allies to realize their plan; they would hold two councils the next day at the Tower. They sent Catesby to approach Hastings.

Prince Edward and Duke of York in the Tower

Scene II

Lord Derby was scared and sent messenger to Hastings, but Hastings was sure that there’s no danger as Catesby was a double agent for their advantage. Hastings rejected to join Richard, and he heard that Queen’s relatives were going to be headed.

Scene III

Lord Rivers, Grey and Vaughan were executed by Ratcliff at Pomfret.

Scene IV

In the council, Richard trapped Hastings by showing that he has been bewitched by Queen and Mistress Shore (which has been Hastings’ after King’s death). Hastings who naturally defended his mistress, was called traitor by Richard and was finally sent for death.

Scene V

Richard sent for Lord Mayor, accused Hastings for being traitor in front of him, and asked for his protection from citizens’ complaint. Richard then sent Buckingham to spread a good fake story about Prince Edward being a bastard son and lustful man to London citizens. Richard also sent for a priest and a learned bishop, then wrote order to forbid anyone seeing Prince Edward and Clarence’s children.

Scene VI

A scrivener (=professional copier) stated openly that he had an official indictment of Lord Hastings that he would read aloud in public outside St. Paul Cathedral.

Scene VII

Buckingham had spread the story of how bad Edward was and how fit Richard was to be King of England. When Lord Major and citizens came to propose Richard to be King, he pretended to accept it difficultly through such a ‘show’! At the end, it was the citizens who forced Richard to be King, not the other way round. What a clever and sleek game!

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