Monday, 1/8 - The Restoration (of the school year)

Shakespeare's prima donna

Welcome back, all ye courtiers! I know you're chomping at the bit to begin reading the historical background for the Restoration and the 18th Century, but before we get there, we need to back up just a bit to John Milton, the last great Renaissance poet and Puritan, and then back up once more to William Shakespeare, the greatest poet . . . all to do a comparison of Milton's "Satan" in his epic Paradise Lost and the villain Don John in Shakespeare's comedy Much Ado About Nothing. So that means we dig into super heavy text for the next couple of days and then begin a sweet cinematic version of Shakespeare's comedy. Hey, it must be a comedy if Keaneu Reeves is attempting Shakespeare! "Uh, yah, Trinity, I mean, Claudio."

So here's what we have for today's agenda:

• P&P (new poetry!) John Donne's "Batter my heart, three-person'd God"

• Copy down new nails, lit terms (use this link for help), and vocab words.
• Epic
• Invocation of the muse
• In medias res
• Epic simile

• Begin this segment from John Milton's Paradise Lost (lines 1-270) but read the following before beginning:

Your job over the next week or so is as follows: observe and record similarities between Satan and Keaneu, I mean, Don John in order to prepare for a THICE. Consider the villains' motives, words, thoughts, attitudes, actions, dwelling-places, victims, and arch-enemies. We don't think you'll find many physical similarities, but you just might surprise us.

HW: Finish copying down all nails and lit terms.