Friday, April 30, 2010

Act 3, Scene 1!

Tybalt kills Mercutio! Romeo kills Tybalt! Romeo is banished!

Here again is the scene from Franco Zeffirelli's 1968 film.

Act 3, Scene 1 begins immediately following the intermission at the 5 minute point in the "Part 8" video and ends at the 6:30 point in "Part 10".)







And here is the scene Baz Luhrmann's 1996 version.

(Here, Act 3, Scene 1 begins at the 8 minute point in "Part 6". In order to post the last portion of this scene with what exists on youtube, the final video here includes some overlap with part 7.)





Sunday, April 25, 2010

Death of a Salesman Sonnets?!?

This year, we have worked closely with two Shakespearean sonnets (Edna St. Vincent Millay's Sonnet 29 and Boey Kim Cheng's "Report to Wordsworth") and written one of our own (about a classmate). Today, we will work on writing Shakespearean sonnets on a particular topic.

Challenge: Write a Shakespearean sonnet that summarizes the story of Death of a Salesman.

That's right! Understand this challenge any way you like, but it should result in a poem of fourteen lines of ten syllables each with the following rhyme scheme. (You know this already, but a reminder never hurts!)

A
B
A
B
C
D
C
D
E
F
E
F
G
G

Try to finish this in a single period. Come on. I dare you!

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Death of a Salesman - SCASI!

Group 9A began this assignment for 25 minutes in class on Thursday, so need to spend 15 further minutes at home finishing the essay and submitting it as a comment here before the end of the weekend.

Group 9B has not yet begun this essay and has not yet viewed the last several minutes of the play, so will write this essay next week. (It wouldn't be a bad idea for them to start working on it now, though!)

You knew it was coming! Please spend forty focused minutes writing an essay in the "SCASI" form on Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman. Please focus especially on style and ideas and have fun with this. It is understood that this essay only represents forty minutes of writing and that, so far, you have only viewed a filmed production of the play and read one scene closely.

"SCASI" form - Reminder

Paragraph 1 - Introduction
Paragraph 2 - Discussion of Setting
Paragraph 3 - Discussion of Characters
Paragraph 4 - Discussion of Action (Plot)
Paragraph 5 - Discussion of Style
Paragraph 6 - Discussion of Ideas
Paragraph 7 - Conclusion

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Videos of IGCSE Poems!

"Dover Beach" by Matthew Arnold
Video by Valentina

I communicated my ideas in the poetry video by using images of the sea which were not completely fitting with the story of Dover Beach however the sea was a reoccurring image throughout the poem. The language of the poem was very expressive and passionate, I tried to show this by accompanying the words of the poem with a strong and dignified voice, but at the same time with calm accents with in it. The style of the poem was surrounded by greek gods and expressive imagery, I also tried to show this by experimenting with my voice and using astounding images of the sea. The feeling of the poem could be seen predominately throughout the video, the feeling was a sorrowful, dull and calm feeling which was expressed in the timing of the images and the sound of my voice. I chose the images because they fit in with feeling and style but also because they were not images of dover beach but the poem is not as much about Dover Beach but a lot about morning and sorrow, I felt that different seas would represent human's emotions but not just at dover beach but all over the world. As all humans experience emotions for better or for worse and we often identify these emotions with a certain time or place like Matthew Arnold did with Dover Beach. So imagine that the images of the seas were images which other people have associated with a certain emotion, that is what I tried to subtly include in my video.

"Lament" by Gillian Clarke
Video by
Sara

I chose the poem "Lament" by Gillian Clarke. It doesn't have an exact story to it. But describes the main sad parts of the world. It contains many descriptions of wildlife and aquatic animals like turtles, dugongs, dolphins, birds etc. It has very powerful imagery in its words so i thought thats possibly a good reason to make a video out of it. The choices i made for the feeling of the poem was to have a kind of sad, depressive music, but very heartfelt as well. Also to have a soft, moderately fast voice with some drama in the voice time to time. I also tried to find some pictures the describe each image. It was difficult at times but i took pictures that were both very beautiful and fascinating but also represented its line in the poem. I made these choices to show the poems message. Which is really lament, the sadness of the world. To give a very depressing, but clearly instant message to the viewer. I hope all of my choices showed the true meaning of this poem and the extreme sorrow and gloom of it.

"First Love" by John Clare
Video by
Evelina

I chose the poem “First Love” by John Clare. So this poem is basically about a boy meeting a girl, like love at first sight kind of, he is saying that she is good looking, and that when he saw her everything seemed to stop. I chose this poem because I didn’t want to choose a short one, because this way my video would be probably about half a minute long, so I chose a longer one(lol, now it’s 1 minute long), also when I was choosing between the two I liked, I saw that no one so far chose “First Love”, so I chose this one. I thought that the poem would look a bit lesbian since a girl voice is narrating it, but I think it is ok. My main idea was to learn how to include the videos, I used two movies for my video, “Lovely bones” because it has got such amazing graphics which I added in my video which made it look very creative and original, and the second movie is the Russian movie “Мы из будущего” and I chose it because I had it on my computer and the girl from the movie seemed good looking. So I think I accomplished this idea. I also used some pictures that go well with the poem, like bed of snow, I wasn’t sure whether it had to do with flower or bed, so I put both of them in the video. I also used music in order to start and finish the video, I could narrate with the music but this way my voice would not be heard, because I have a mad microphone and the one at school was not available. In general I’m sure that I did a good job on this video, it took me like 7 hours to do it, but I think it is worth it.

"On the Grasshopper and the Cricket" by John Keats
Video by
James

I chose On the Grasshopper and the Cricket by John Keats. I think I will make it slow in the beginning, but faster as it starts to talk about fun and summer. If I can find appropriate music, I might add some but I don’t think I’ll add some if I cannot. Hopefully I can get a relaxed, winterry feeling and a fun, warm summery part. Maybe, If I can find a frost effect, that melts then it would look better.

Unfortunately, I realized how difficult it would be to do those things so I made my video much simpler.


"The Flower Fed Buffaloes" by
Vachel Lindsay
Video by Ryan

I chose Flower-fed Buffaloes as i thought it was an interesting theme of how the once great buffaloes have left the hills because of all the tribes hunting them down and using them as a source of food and materials, i also chose it because i found it to be peaceful since it was placed in the spring time.

I spent a long time on this trying to get every thing in working order, but i took each line and i thought about it very carefully on how i would go about it, so i took a look at Spring time and worked from their. Although finding the right pictures for the buffaloes and the tribes was not as easy as i expected but everything 'meshed' together perfectly.

"Report to Wordsworth" by Boey Kim Cheng
Video by
Caroline

I have chosen the poem Report To Wordsworth. I used many nature pictures - flowers, trees, leaves, forests... But then I also put some pictures of waste and smoke into the video. Then there are those pictures that show the gods - Neptune, Proteus and Triton. To search for the pictures was easy and didn't take too much time.
Then i did the narrations. This was difficult because i had to do them over and over again because i didnt read the lines the right way or read too fast or someone in the background said something.And even now im still not happy with my narrations because they are too quite.
I put some sad music at the beginning and at the end of the video. I wanted to put the music while i was talking, but i didnt manage. The music is from "Eisblume" (german song).
To put the pictures togerthe with the narrations was hard work.

"On the Grasshopper and the Cricket" by John Keats
Video by Luke

I chose On the Grasshopper and Cricket By John Keats as it has a good story and turn. I tried to keep the video simple as the story is relaxed. I also tried to include both video and photos for a more interesting video.

The only issue I had was that I couldn't put a backing audio behind my narration on imovie.

"Report to Wordsworth" by Boey Kim Cheng
Video by
Tatiana

I chose Report To Wordsworth by Boey Kim Cheng. Since i find the feel of the poem very.. depressing, I made sure to add pictures that were dark and sad. But, since there is also the theme of pollution, i added some pictures of environmental problems. The music also makes the video seem very sad. Although i have now idea why my voice turned out that way >.>

"Amends" by Adrienne Rich
Video by
Andrew

I chose the poem 'Amends' as it seemed interesting to me, mentioning something moving throughout everything, and finally at the end, it
"dwells upon the eyelids of the sleepers, as if to make amends." I also chose this poem as it seemed quite a mysterious poem to me.

In my video, I preferred to go for the slide show idea, and i used quite a few pictures, and they change frequently, so as to match the lines. Most of my pictures show night and darkness, incorporating moonlight or the moon, until the end, where it is revealed to make amends, and so i put a picture of the sun rising, showing the end of the night and darkness, as the amends are being made.

"Report to Wordsworth" by Boey Kim Cheng
Video by Polina

I chose "Report to Wordsworth" by Boey Kim Cheng because it’s beautiful and emotional sonnet. I put a lot of pictures of Nature in it like trees, flowers, sky, meadows...because it’s the main theme of this sonnet. Also I added the video to make it more realistic and by giving more movements to make it more interesting. I showed sadness of this sonnet by my voice when I did narration and by polluted Nature like on the line "smothered by the smoke" I put video with the factory which giving out a lot of smoke. The hardest part in my video was the music I just couldn’t find the right one but eventually I found and it was from "Titanic". That music was perfect because it didn’t have words, it was sad and calm which was good because it was style of the sonnet. However, I didn’t put music on the narration because I think you can hear me telling the sonnet better without the music. I spend a lot of time on this video and I hope you all will like it.

"Sonnet 29" by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Video by Evita


I'm keeping it short because it is 3 am in the morning and I would like to sleep. Plus i dont think my brain will last through a long story on my thoughts and choices of the video.

I did Sonnet 29. I tried to show the hidden meaning behind it like even though moon wans it will wax.I used the concept through out the piece even though on some bits it is lost i tried. I also linked it a lot to nature becasue i think the poem has a lot to do with nature( well the poet used nature to express her feelings). Thats it ENJOY !
<3>

"Time" by Allen Curnow
Video by Max

So i chose "Time" by Allen Curnow because it is a very different poem, it deals with life and death, happiness and sadness, and all the opposits. It also deals with time and in a way the poem shows you that. It talks about alllll the things in life and then shows the reader that time is everything. It is not very emotional, but it shows that time is everything and it shows also that time can be beautiful or horrible, sadness or happiness, tears or laughter, and everything else. It is an interesting poem and i hope you liike it... exept the voice!!

"Report to Wordsworth" by Boey Kim Cheng
Video by Onur

I tried to make my video very sad by using music the is quite depressing, and I think it definitely worked. My video was about 'Report to Wordsworth' and since the poem was about how we are destroying the earth with all or pollution and things, I thought I would make the video sad because it would be the right mood for the text anyway.

I used the theme song of 'I am legend' because it is very sad, again. :P
I also tried to speak very dramatically, and I think it worked, because I sound like I'm really into it when I played it back again. I tried speaking really slow and emphasizing some of the words to give a better feeling of the mood of the poem to the people that will be watching it.

I hope you see all these things in my video.

"The Flower Fed Buffaloes" by Vachel Lindsay
Video by Mike

i get the idea that this poem is ABOUT BUFFALOES. I chose pictures that were related to every sentence so it would appeal more to the viewer also because i used odd pictures.
At the end i used some music to finish it off... it wasn't really related but i think it was nice. I wasn't sure if i could have slowed it down abit but then again if it was to slow it would be to boring.
making this video was rather entertaining.

"Full Moon and Little Frieda" by Ted Hughes
Video by Dylan

Full Moon and Little Frieda isn't really a sad poem, but it does have emotion in it. I tried to convey the smooth way the poem reads by using a soft transition between pictures and talking slowly. I also tried to capture the sudden shout of Ted Hughes' Daughter when she cries Moon! with a sudden change and then creating a shocked moon! I also used real images where possible, images of nature such as the spiders web, the cows and the lane to represent the nature portrayed in the poem.

"Full Moon and Little Frieda" by Ted Hughes
Video by Siri

I chose the poem "Full moon and Little Frieda" By Ted Hughes. I am going to sound big headed but I am quite proud of my video. It has sound effects and pictures and I spent quite a bit of time on it. My video has a sort of scary aura I would say. The poem itself is quite a eery poem. My video deals with haunted cows and rivers of blood. Enjoy .


"The Flower Fed Buffaloes" by Vachel Lindsay
Video by Toby

I made my movie so the pictures worked with the lines in the poem, by using certain words that where inside the poem as pictures...
i think this helped as it made it easyer to understand what was going on... e.g. maybe you didnt know what a "pawness" was, so theres a picture of one.


"So We'll Go No More A-Roving" by Lord Byron
Video by Christina

I have chosen the poem "So we'll go no more aroving by Lord Byron" because I found it easy to read and understandable. I believe this poem is very meaningful and strong. It uses words which might seem very down to earth and this makes the poem very affective and strong.

I found the atmosphere of this poem very dark and focused mostly on the pictures to bring them out and then added a picture with color at the end when the morning sunrise showed up. The transitions I used were mostly fading as it blends well with each picture and doesn't create a sharp ending of the previous pictures.

I enjoyed making this video as I enjoy using Movie Maker even though it can be a pain some times, it still gives that great video scene.

"Report to Wordsworth" by Boey Kim Cheng
Video by Kim

I did my poetry video on Report to Wordsworth because i think that us humans need to do something against Global Warming. This poem is about how we are destroying our planet. With the aid of poetry i would like to addrress the people so that they are aware of what we are doing.
I used nature and animals as symbols.
The pictures i used were all from google and everything was from me.
I narrated it myself but the music in the backround was from Madame Butterfly the opera. I wanted to use sad and depressing music because it is so sad and so horrifying what we are doing to our planet.


"Amends" by Adrienne Rich
Video by Rosie

When i first read the poem, i got the impression of the poem being a spirit, or an object, moving around the seashore and the land, and then going into the cabins where the sleepers sleep, and it going into their eyes. I got the idea that the spirit is an object that wants to be with the humans. I tried to make the poem go along with the pictures, so that the watchers could interpret the idea of the poem.
I also added the sound to it, because that particular song gives a sence of freedom. I enjoyed making this video.


"Amends" by Adrienne Rich
Video by Samantha

Amends was written by Adrienne Rich, and is about the relationship between the moonlight and everything that has to do on the earth. The humans, trees, sea, stones, animals etc... The poem uses very descriptive language to describe what the moon is doing to each area or thing and you can easily visualize differnt scenes and settings in your head. When making my video i tried to make sure that everyone could see the moon was the main key in the poem, to show you what it is about so i tried to pick pictures that had the moon in it. It was quite difficult trying to find some of the pictures for the poem, but i think i managed to match the pictures to what the poem was saying.

"On the Grasshopper and the Cricket" by John Keats
Video by
Kalean


When I was deciding on how my video was going to look like, I was thinking of colours relating to nature. The type of pictures I chose were relating more to happiness/joy than sadness.

I made the choices I made because the sonnet I was working on did not show any sadness in it, so I tried using more cheerful pictures in the poetry video.

"Full Moon and Little Frieda" by Ted Hughes
Video by Anne-Mieke



"So We'll Go No More A-Roving" by Lord Byron
Video by Nathan

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Poetry Videos!

By Friday, please upload your poetry video to you tube and then leave a comment here including the following.

1. The URL (web address) of your youtube video.
2. One paragraph (5-10 sentences) describing your video. What choices did you make to communicate the ideas, language, style, feeling, etc. of your poem? Why did you make the choices you made?