Coach Ghareeb Fan

Hello my name is Horatio, a man of Denmark and good friend of the former Prince of Denmark, Hamlet. What I have just witnessed was unbelievable to my eyes, such a massacre of royalty right in front of me. I feel an attachment to what just happened because I was there on those very first nights that the King’s ghosts was spotted, and that ghost ending up being the catalyst for all the insanity that has happened.

In the more recent moments my dear friend Hamlet has put a lot of faith in me, he has said that I was his one good friend that was loyal and he could trust. I’m certainly proud of myself that he thinks that way because I have been a loyal subject to him; I haven’t been like Rosencrantz and Guildenstern and taken the side of Claudius. In retrospect it’s a mighty good thing that I wasn’t disloyal like everyone else because look what he did to them! Thinking about his insecurities now I realize how truly concerned he was of what other people thought of him, and how dangerous he was. I truly wish that ghost had never stepped foot on our castle grounds, even though his death may have been avenged the chaos it brought will do more harm than the ghosts death ever did.

I understand the betrayal and pain that Hamlet had been feeling these last days and weeks, his problem was that he never came straightforward with his feelings. As a friend I felt he was always indirect with expressing how he felt about the marriage, Ophleia, and things like that. For example instead of saying to Claudius that he knew about the murder he put on that big extravagant play, and he most certainly was never straight forward with Ophelia, always playing with his words when talking to her. Perhaps if he hadn’t been so daring and out there with everything he did nobody would have had to die. I suppose however those things have made the passing days exciting, (and an exciting play too).

I know William Shakespeare would have been the director and writer of these plays when they were first performed, but thinking of Act four as a single play itself Claudius is really directing the whole thing. The whole time he is orchestrating people, telling them “you do this”  and “now you do that”. It didn’t do much to help his status in my book but he has done so many things that have upset me I don’t know if there’s anything he could do to change my opinion of him. Anyways in this post, my summary of act four, I’ll be pointing out the premier examples of how Claudius is “running the show” seemingly all from his bedroom.

To begin with we know he’s been putting together a trip for Hamlet to go to England with his friends to clear his mind, seems like a genuine kind thing to do. But in what is becoming typical Claudius fashion he reveals the true plan is to get Hamlet killed in some way. Could Claudius be anymore protective of his power? He has identified Hamlet as a threat to him and he needs a plan to get rid of him, worst of all he uses all his loyal subjects as his pawns to do things for him.

Secondly when Claudius receives the letters from the sailors that Hamlet is coming back so soon he puts his thinking cap back on and thinks of any way to control the situation. By this point all he is trying to do is silently kill Hamlet and get him out of the way so that he can go on to live out his days as King with out Hamlet being a thorn in his side. But it is becoming so complicated to do so. Nevertheless he throws together a plan “A” and “B” with Laeretes to kill Hamlet. It seems to me that all of Caludius’ orchestrating things comes back to him protecting his power. He is so bent on remaining King that he’ll do anything, and he must be in control, that’s probably why he killed his brother is because he needed to be in control of all of Denmark.

Finally, some smaller instances of Claudius keeping tabs on everyone, and being the man that pulls the strings on all his puppets, he was constantly telling people to “go and follow him/her” he did it with Ophelia and Laeretes I believe. I mean how much more controlling can you be than to follow two people who are emotional wrecks after their fathers death. I realieze that he is trying to play it off like he really cares about them, but I believe he is just so can keep them in play in case he needs them down the line for some plan. He just was plain annoying in Act four. On a side note I’ve realized that Shakespeare does not make out his women characters to be particularly strong minded or strong willed, I don’t think he did that in all his plays. 

I never did like Polonius one bit in this story, running around sharing his little secret meetings with Cladius and devising plans to eves drop on Hamlet really just made me mad. I mean seriously what business did he have getting so involved in figuring out why Hamlet has gone so mad? I thought he just some simpleton. To me he just used his daughters relationship with Hamlet to get closer to the royalty and live above his means and for that I am kinda glad he is gone. Come on even five year old kids playing hide and go seek first look to see if there is the human shaped figure behind the curtain… idiot. Although I do feel bad for Ophelia, having your lover/boyfriend kill your father I don’t even think they have that kind of stuff on Jerry Springer and Maury nowadays.

Anyways after reading Act three and in creating a summary I had a few lingering questions about some of the events. Is there even a point anymore where Hamlet isn’t “acting” insane or has he officially lost it? In the beginning it was much easier to decipher when he was faking it and when he wasn’t, but know that line has become so clouded and it is difficult to tell what he is truly feeling. Obviously the scene for mentioned in his mother’s room would lead to the conclusion that he is undeniable insane. He was hoping to kill Cladius and he killed Plonius on accident andhe shows no remorse for it (pretty sketchy stuff). On the contrary the way he talks about Rosencratz and Guildenstern indicate that he is still operating a cunning mission. Hamlet has realized that the two of them are no longer on his side and they are basically working for Claudius now. He talks about what he plans to do with them in England.

And my two schoolfellows, whom I will trust as I will adders fanged, they bear the mandate; they must sweep me away, and marshal me to knavery. Let it work; for ’tis the sport to have the engineer hoist with his own petar; and ‘t shall go hard but I will delve one yard below their mines and blow them at the moon.

So this statement by Hamlet turns me back to believing that he still is in control of what he is doing and that everything is calculated and planned out. Because if he truly was insane he would be ignorant to any change in his friends actions and they would go unnoticed. But he picks up on it and this passage, along with the earlier part about the recorder, indicate that Hamlet is still in a sane mind. Also another question to bear is, why would he tell his mother what he is going to do? It seems to me that someone who is genuinely insane would be so self conscious and not ready to divulge information like. Thus I believe that further builds a case that Hamlet is still in control and everything is a part of some larger plan. It will be interesting to see how things play out in the rest of the play.

There are so many ways to think about how characters in act two are acting it could tie you up completely in your thoughts. Almost every character that makes an appearance is acting in some way other than how they genuinely feel. Polonius, Hamlet, Reynaldo, Guildenstern, and Rosencrantz are all acting in some way during this part of the play.

Most obviously scene one is kicked of with an outright example of acting within the play by a character. Polonius tells Reynaldo to go to Paris and act like he doesn’t know anything about Laertes to get information about him. It is such an obvious first example. Secondly, and much like the Reynaldo example, the King and Queen send Hamlet’s friends, Guildenstern and Rosencrantz, to act overly concerned about their friend in order to get information to bring back to them. So already at this point a theme of acting out things to get information about someone is a common trend (and it’s basically lying).

 Moving on, questions about when Hamlet is or is not acting have been going on for a while now and it seems the more Hamlet does in the play the more his reality versus acting is blurred. For example the story Ophelia tells about Hamlet calls into question whether Hamlet is being genuine, or acting.

Pale as his shirt, his knees knocking each other, and with a look so piteous in purport as if he had been lossed out of hell

Hamlet appears to be very smart and I believe that he uses his acting to his advantage to make people think about him, and basically to think he’s crazy like he said before.

Finally to top off the tongue twisting acting knot is the whole concept the true players (professional actors) and the show they are to put on. Hamlet has devised a plan to use their acting to decyfer if Claudius is really acting or not about how Hamlet Senior died. Which brings us back to the theme I’m seeing of acting things out to get information. Wow, that’s a lot to handle and it makes for a complicated plot. Not to mention that there are even more examples of acting out there, like the plot for Claudius and Polonius to watch Ophelia flirt with Hamlet, but I don’t want to hog all the fun. 

My relationship with William Shakespeare over my high school years, probably like many of yours, could be described as rocky, wordy, and all to often full of confusion. The common problems of interpreting his vocabulary have frustrated me and often taken me away from the actual happenings in the play. However Hamlet has been good to me so far and I have taken a liking to it greater than I have ever had with another play by Shakespeare before. Perhaps I am starting to catch on to Bill.

Looking at my fellow classmates posts I see many comments about the new King, Claudius. And while those reactions and questions about his motives for killing his brother are entirely valid, I myself have become more intrigued by what Hamlets mother Gertrude has to do with all this. She doesn’t play the typical widower at all and her quickness to marry her dead husbands brother is kind of yummy (revolting). I feel like in moving on so quickly she is sort of hastily sweeping something under the rug in relation to old King Hamlet’s death. She shows her readiness to move on when she speaks with Hamlet in scene 2.

Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted color off, And let thine eye look like a friend of Denmark. Do not for ever with thy vailed lids seek for thy noble father in the dust. Thou know’st ’tis common, all that lives must die, passing through nature to eternity.

This quote troubles me because it has been less than two months after the death and she even married Claudius within a month of the death. That does not sit well with me, and weather Gertrude has something to hide or not I don’t like what she has done.

I’m not trying to dispute that the real conflict and revelations will probably take place between Hamlet and Claudius, but I am looking forward to seeing what happens with Gertrude if anything at all (I sure hope something happens with her or else this post will look real dumb). I want to know why she is so quick to move on? And what role if any did she play in her husbands death? Having never read Hamlet before my honest prediction is that she and her son may clash a little.

The process of creating a poem to look like something that O’Hara would have made was a hard one, and now since it’s on the internet it’s also embarrassing. But here it is.

The Ride Home

As I pass the billboards, the

Lights, and the scattered garbage

That is life. I ask is it all worth

It? I’m alone so I remain just

As confused, I have no answer to my

Question. I try to relax but the passing

Cars and people spark my mind

To ask, when will I know?

Still, I don’t know, but all I do know

Is so much was inspired from the ride home.

I suppose I’ll have a lot of explaining to do in order for this to make sense so here it is. One, I made the poem in a free verse format because that’s how O’Hara writes many of his poems. Along with free verse comes enjambment which we have talked about in class. O’Hara deliberately breaks up his sentences into different lines. For example the poem My Hearthas this which I looked at in my other posts. Another technique of O’Hara’s that I tried to adapt was the “Call and Response” method (as my blogger friend described it) in case you forgot what that looks like here it is.

“Thats not like Frank!”, all to the good! I don’t wear brown and grey suits all the time, do I? No, I wear workshirts to the opera, often. 

You can see exactly the style that I tried to adapt in my own poem. Finally a more general idea I tried to use was the common life like subjects of his poems. As I have said before he never tries to be too wordy or make his subjects to deep. Often they are things from pop culture, and is this case like some of his other poems, Animals, Today, Music, and Call Me just something from life. That was more of a stretch to pull of but I tried to think of something original that he had not done to convey the idea. That’s all I have for my final post, I’m officially on Spring Break. 

This project served as a delight and a source of unsettledness for me in a few ways. Certainly I enjoyed not having to write the traditional structured essay type response. I undoubtedly enjoyed the blogger style of writing much more and it definitely made writing the posts and responses more enjoyable. However the searches of the Internet for blogs talking about my poet and his poems more specifically was difficult. But that is something that cannot be controlled by Mrs. Hazle, only that I wish my poet was a little more popular on the Internet (Only until recently did I get good at it). All in all it was a good project.

For my comments that I made on other bloggers sites I wasn’t sure when they would get through so I included what I wrote with the URL.

Pete\’s Blog

Kevin\’s Blog

Blogger in the Blogosphere

I realize I’m an outsider on this blog however I’m doing an English Project on O’Hara and I’ve been reading his poetry for almost three weeks now so I though I’d give Tania some of my feelings about O’Hara’s writing.First of all I’ve grown to like his somewhat tame vocabulary used in his poems (which is something that makes all high school students much happier) I think it really shows his genius in that he can speak with strong meaning without being grossly over wordy like other poets. Also I like how the subjects of his poems are often things that happen in real life or are drawn from culture, like “Call me” or “Song (I am stuck in traffic)”, it is a nice break from the general poetic standards. Thanks for listening and good luck with your writing.

Another Blogger

Hi, I’m doing an English project on O’Hara myself and I just wanted to say how I agree with the things in your post. Your descriptions of O’Hara’s writing style is much like how I described it in my own post, that is, often written in free verse and rarely divided into short stanzas. Secondly I like the name you gave of Call and Response to the technique when he is talking to some second party that is not defined. I looked at how O’Hara used this tool in his poem My Heart, and I wish i had that name to define it as such (and use your page as my source of course). Thanks for listening.

I searched high and low, and across the vast Internet to find some information on Frank O’Hara and his connection to any one of our seven major masters of poetry. To my dismay the Internet left me thirsting for more than what I found, but I think what little I found is possible to drum up sufficient evidence for some pretty unique connections to one major master. That major master is Walt Whitman, I had no preconceived notions that O’Hara would be influenced by Whitman but I was curious to find out anything I could.

As before mentioned my research online led me to the theory of some intertextuality with Walt Whitman. I wish the site had more to say about possible connections between the two but it was something, and that was more than I was getting from other places. So in only a few lines the similarities the site had to offer are as follows.

The Famous “I do this, I do that” style – a phrase he coined and a form that he arguably pioneered – combined the picaresque ramblings of traditional American poets like Walt Whitman

The significance of this statement is somewhat downplayed with the fact that O’Hara combined these Whitman ideas with other techniques from his favorite European writers. But nevertheless I tracked down a Whitman poem to find any traces of evidence that would support this claim of intertextuality. Here is the poem To a Stranger by Whitman, it is a good poem to demonstrate the “picaresque ramblings” of Whitman that appear in O’Hara’s writing. To begin, even the title has some of the simplistic characteristics that O’Hara has, some of his more notables poems are titled To the Harbormaster and For Grace, After a Party . Much like how the title of Whitman’s work sets the scene for the rest of the poem, so does many of O’Hara’s titles. The titles in O’Hara’s poems don’t aim to confuse the reader, but often times they are the only background information to the poem, and without it nothing would make sense. Much like how withought the title To a Stranger, the poem would make slightly less sense. Furthermore the areas of “picaresque ramblings” begin to appear in lines two through seven were Whitman is sort of rambling on aimlessly about his experiences with this stranger. The connection to O’Hara can be found back at the poem My Heart, down below. In lines eight through eleven O’Hara seemingly gets of on his own tangent as well.

“That’s not like Frank!”, all to the good! I don’t wear brown and gray suits all the time, do I? No. I wear workshirts to the opera, often.

Considering these lines now as an offspring of the Whitman-like rambling mentioned before I look at these lines in a whole new light than I did before. Now instead of thinking O’Hara is talking to a person, or whoever is reading the poem. It simply seems to me that he is just talking to himself in the middle of writing his poem. And what could define more accurately the process of rambling on, than talking to yourself? Nothing, that’s what. That’s all the evidence I have for intertextuality and I hope it wasn’t too much of a stretch to insult either poet.

If one were to read only the first five sentences of Elaine Equi’s \”Frank O\’Hara: Nothing Personal\” piece, it would probably strike them more as something a sixth grade girl would write about a boy she likes, rather than one accomplished poet talking about another poet. The way Equi says he’s everything she is not, and how she admires him from afar only to dread their meeting because she’ll choke on her words has all the makings of middle school drama to be talked about at the lunch table and on Instant Messaging chat rooms for days. And imagine if it were so, that would give poets something to think about when they are on their all expense paid trips to write. (Hello Ricky Ian Gordon)

 Whatever the case may be, beyond these trivial first lines and what I tried to make of them Equi reveals the real profound professional impact O’Hara has had on her writing. She states in her piece that,

“For anyone familiar with my work, O’Hara’s influence is unmistakable. There’s the use of humor and pop culture, and on occasion, there’s his rhythm. Something about that pace, maybe because his poems are often walks or at least feel like walks,”

The impact of this statement speaks for itself as to how much O’Hara’s work has influenced Equi, multiple areas of her writing is molded around some of those mentioned O’Hara essentials. To investigate further into Equi’s crush, I mean professional admiration, of O’Hara I looked into one of her own poems to try to sieve out the similarities from the rift raft.

The Objects in Catalogs

are made of light.
Well-lit or seemingly edible,
butterscotch and hazelnut light.
A bit vulgar, like starlets
the objects pose, pausing
as though in mid-sentence.
But really they are mute
— the story barely there.
Like children they wait to hear us
tell of the great Platonic love
we have for our many selves.
A vast literature reduced here
to a few short phrases: numbers
letters and of course, price.

Looking at this poem of Equi’s there are a few similarities to O’Hara’s poetry that jump out at me. For starters the short concise lines are a staple of O’Hara’s writing, seen by the poems below of My Heart and Song which both have relatively short lines, and that technique is certainly used in this poem. Also, returning to what Equi was quoted before as saying that she tried to duplicate the pace and relaxed style of O’Hara can also be seen in this piece. She does this by using a very tame vocabulary, a style familiar to O’Hara, and the use of metaphors, similes, and personification.

Clearly Frank O’Hara has been and influence on Elaine Equi’s poetic style and career. And aside from all my dimwitted jokes about middle school years gone by Equi will forever be an admirer of my man, Frank O’Hara.

You can find more poems of Equi’s here and even here.

On a side note the best I could do to finding an open blog for Equi was two different, but scholarly, reviews about her book of poems called Ripple Effect. The two reviews are done by Powell Books Company and The New York Times. If anyone is interested in Equi, if you scroll down on the Powell Books link you should find a place to view and leave comments with other fans. I didn’t get a chance to blog on the Powell Books site because you have to sign up for an account with the company. But if anyone likes Equi that much they should go for it. In general, while only reading a few poems from the book I thought both reviews were very good.

 This poem by O’Hara serves as another way for the blogosphere to see the poetry of O’Hara. Clearly this poem is written in a free verse format without any stanzas or line breaks. In fact on first glace it almost looks like a paragraph taken from a book. This is not uncommon of O’Hara’s poetry at all, in fact about half of his poems are formatted in a way similar to this one, while the other half are constructed like Song is, down below.

My Heart

I'm not going to cry all the time

nor shall I laugh all the time,

I don't prefer one "strain" to another.

I'd have the immediacy of a bad movie,

not just a sleeper, but also the big,

overproduced first-run kind. I want to be

at least as alive as the vulgar. And if

some aficionado of my mess says "That's

not like Frank!", all to the good! I

don't wear brown and grey suits all the time,

do I? No. I wear workshirts to the opera,

often. I want my feet to be bare,

I want my face to be shaven, and my heart--

you can't plan on the heart, butt

he better part of it, my poetry, is open.

 You can find this poem and a larger list of O’Hara’s poems here.  

Anyways an investigation of this poem with the guided help of the pink sheet from Mrs. Hazle led me to some conclusions about this poem. In general it appears as though this poem might be an honest expression of what O’Hara is dealing with in his heart. I like to think of it more along the lines of he is trying to tell people through his poetry what kind of a person he is, or what he wants to become. In lines seven through eleven where he says “ And if some aficionado of my mess says “That’s not like Frank!”, all to the good! I don’t wear brown and gray suits all the time, do I? No”. To me this couldn’t be a more clear confession of a person who is trying to break out a rut of the same kind of actions and way of life. And thus I have come to my previously stated conclusion of what I think this poem is about, but I never have been good at that.

In addition I believe that the tone of this poem is certainly not negative but no necessarily positive, rather it is just a spurt of emotional writing by O’Hara, kind of like an impulse reaction. Finally, O’Hara leaves us with a final few lines of “ and my heart- you can’t plan on the heart, but the better part of it, my poetry, is open”(13-15). These final lines give the impression that in O’Hara’s life poetry is synonymous with life itself. He makes a parallel by interjecting “my heart” in the last line to convey the idea that his feelings in his poetry are equal to those of his life and heart.