Tuesday, November 8, 2022

Paper 2 again

NB! See also my 21 Feb 2022 blog post.
Generally, Paper 2 exam essay questions seem to be concentrating on the following:
* Form and Structure
* Personal judgement, often can ask about a “lens” - cultural - feminist - etc.
* Themes or characterization - maybe conflict
* Broad Concept - beliefs - home - etc.

NB! See my 16 May 2022 blog post on assessment of essays.

What makes a text timeless and literary???
timeless = not affected by the passage of time or changes in fashion.
literary = having a marked style intended to create a particular emotional effect
Some sample Paper 2 questions:
1) Literature is often said to be timeless. To what extent is this true of two works you have studied?
2) How can we explain the continued interest in a particular work in different contexts and at different times?

The following could all be significant. Put them in the order of importance for you:
* an original, interesting plot
* well-rounded characters that are not perfect but easy to relate to
* a good conflict to build the story around, a good climax and resolution
* a well-done ending
* interesting use of language
* good use of literary devices and techniques
* being set in an interesting world
* themes of major importance and universal interest discussed
* aesthetic value

Possible reasons brought out by some earlier students (not a definitive list):
* reader being able to relate to the themes (real-life history, human struggle, epic fight good vs evil, existential questions)
* the characters have distinctive voices (characteristic of the time and place)
* life-like characters develop throughout the story (round and dynamic vs flat and static, see: https://prezi.com/c7kkzijg2-fa/characters-round-and-flat-static-vs-dynamic/)
* different elements work together (plot, character development, writing technique, etc)
* the text
               includes several different viewpoints
               is easily readable but not simplistic
               allows multiple interpretations
               gives a good overview of the world the story is set in
               caters for the reader's intellectual, emotional, ethical, and
                                                                       spiritual development
               makes the reader question sth, ask questions
                                                                  and search for answers
               makes the reader think about themselves, their times,
                                                                          their society, etc (familiarity)

Literary criticism
15 types: https://www.masterclass.com/articles/literary-theory-explained
Feminist criticism:  https://www.thoughtco.com/feminist-literary-criticism-3528960#:~:text
Marxist criticism: https://writingcommons.org/section/research/research-methods/textual-methods/literary-criticism/marxist-criticism/#:~:text
Queer theory: https://literariness.org/2019/03/04/queer-theory/
Gay/lesbian studieshttps://literariness.org/2018/11/15/gay-lesbian-studies/

NB! See Literary criticism generic questions (on Tera)

Saturday, October 29, 2022

Abstract issues as possible themes

Two possible Paper 2 questions:
If beauty is a relative term, how do two of the works you have studied explore this idea?
How does a particular term or concept, such as childhood, change in the way it is represented in the texts you have studied?

The following list of abstract issues that might appear in literature was coined by some previous IB students. 

Discuss which of them are present in  Carol Ann Duffy's (CAD) poetry, which in Kate Chopin's (KC) short stories, which in the play "A Doll's House" (ADH), which in "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich" (1D)? How?

Which would you pair for a specific theme in Paper 2? 
NB! If you choose poetry, you have to discuss THREE poems. (IB seems to think 2 is too little.)

Later on we'll be also discussing their occurrence in the other literary texts you can use in Paper 2 (in which you can use literary texts that we have dealt with in class, but not the ones you used for your IO or HLE).
  • (un)employment ADH
  • (un)happiness ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • adolescence CAD, ADH
  • adultery CAD, KC
  • atonement ADH, KC, 1D
  • belief ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • bereavement 
  • betrayal ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • challenge ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • childhood ADH?
  • civilisation  ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • comedy 1D?
  • correspondence 1D. ADH
  • crime KC, ADH
  • devotion ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • discrimination ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • education CAD, ADH, KC
  • experience ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • family ADH, KC, 1D
  • feminism ADH, CAD, KC
  • freedom  ADH, KC, 1D
  • friendship ADH, 1D
  • guilt ADH, KC, 1D
  • hatred ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • help ADH, KC, 1D
  • hope  ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • humour ADH, CAD, KC, 1D?
  • imagination CAD
  • influence ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • intelligence ADH, 1D
  • loss ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • love  ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • loyalty ADH, KC, 1D
  • magic CAD
  • manhood 1D, CAD
  • marriage ADH, KC, CAD
  • mystery ADH, CAD, KC, 1D?
  • obsession ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • pain ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • passion KC, 1D, ADH
  • peace CAD
  • politeness KC
  • politics CAD, 1D
  • power ADH, KC, 1D
  • property KC
  • punishment 1D 
  • race KC
  • regret KC
  • relationships ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • religion 1D
  • rumours / gossip KC
  • satisfaction ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • self-expression CAD, ADH
  • silence 
  • slavery KC, 1D
  • social class KC, 1D
  • social standards ADH, KC
  • stubbornness ADH, CAD, KC, 1D
  • the supernatural
  • torture 1D
  • tradition(s) 
  • war CAD, 1D
  • wealth ADH, KC
  • witchcraft
  • womanhood ADH, CAD, KC
Is there anything you would like to add?

One Day in the Life of I.D. (work in progress)

Quoting Wikipedia: One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (Russian: Один день Ивана Денисовича) is a short novel by the Russian writer and Nobel laureate Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, first published in November 1962 in the Soviet literary magazine Novy Mir (New World). The story is set in a Soviet labor camp in the early 1950s and describes a single day in the life of ordinary prisoner, Ivan Denisovich Shukhov.


Task: Make a list of background issues you need to research to be able to comment on the different contexts of this story.

Writing in second person:
https://examples.yourdictionary.com/examples-of-writing-in-second-person.html
Deportations from Estonia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_deportations_from_Estonia
Map of Gulag camps:
https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/4269mb/map_of_gulag_camps_in_the_ussr_which_existed_from/
Gulag history: https://gulaghistory.org/nps/onlineexhibit/stalin/living.php.html

In Detailed study questions (on Tera, the doc with "ideas" as the last word, beginning on p6), which one question from each section is the most promising from the viewpoint of discussion rather than just finding facts from the text?

Socialist realism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist_realism
https://www.encyclopedia.com/literature-and-arts/literature-other-modern-languages/russian-and-eastern-european-literature/socialist-realism
https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/socialist_realism

Revision of tone and mood
Differences and examples: https://www.masterclass.com/articles/tone-vs-mood#what-is-tone-in-literature
https://examples.yourdictionary.com/difference-between-tone-and-mood-in-literature.html
Tone and mood words doc on Tera
Slides: https://www.slideshare.net/ewaszolek/mood-and-tone-27156461

Novels that take place in a single day: 
https://electricliterature.com/15-novels-that-take-place-in-a-single-day/

Stalag 17: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalag_17
Stalag 17 film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKc2GJk2OLQ (2 hrs)

Symbols / Imagery / Allegory in One Day: numbers as new identities; medical ward (cleanliness)
https://www.shmoop.com/ivan-denisovich/symbolism-imagery.html (light; food (esp bread); symbols of religion and polite manners (sharing is caring?); snow, ice, cold; Shukhov's possessions; throat cutting...)

Task: Discuss this list of abstract issues as themes (see relevant blog post)

Task: What makes a text timeless and literary???
timeless = not affected by the passage of time or changes in fashion
literary = having a marked style intended to create a particular emotional effect

1970 film on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YqG1uwhTX2o (1:45:48)
How to analyse a film: https://writingcenter.unc.edu/tips-and-tools/film-analysis/

NB! Do not go on before the whole novel has been discussed in detail
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich: One Book, One Chicago Spring 2006 (includes quite a lot of background info + some discussion questions): 
https://www.chipublib.org/one-day-in-the-life-of-ivan-denisovich-one-book-one-chicago-spring-2006/
Sparknotes: https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/denisovich/

Creative task: Day in the life of ...

Monday, October 3, 2022

My Paper 2

 https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Iq7QKBxXEwnWOPl2hjeo6ZUXiZ6JX7iOt4zomb6mUVw/edit?usp=drivesdk

u can leave notes in the file




BOW Robert Capa

Here are some of the collected works of Robert Capa, war and other photgrapher. 

https://www.icp.org/browse/archive/constituents/robert-capa?all/all/all/all/0

Wednesday, September 14, 2022

Some BOW-related possibilities

Add the Banksy works at this address to your Banksy street art BOW:
https://matadornetwork.com/change/15-coolest-pieces-environmentalist-street-art-youll-ever-see/

Mona Caron "Weeds": https://monacaron.com/

Tuesday, September 6, 2022

A Doll's House

How big a part of the following is relevant to A Doll's House and Ibsen?
http://www.playwriting101.com/
Can Ibsen be said to have followed the advice given in the source below?
http://www.creative-writing-now.com/how-to-write-a-play.html

Sources gleaned following links from Wikipedia to some place and onwards:
Ibsen: http://www.biography.com/people/henrik-ibsen-37014
http://www.britannica.com/biography/Henrik-Ibsen
http://theatredatabase.com/19th_century/henrik_ibsen_001.html
http://www.city-journal.org/html/15_3_urbanities-isben.html
Ibsen and Hitler: http://langblog.englishplus.com/?p=1337
The Quintessence of Ibsenism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quintessence_of_Ibsenism
Nora as a doll:
http://www.studentpulse.com/articles/220/nora-as-a-doll-in-henrik-ibsens-a-dolls-home
Contemporary stagings of the play:
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/03/10/the-marrying-kind
http://www.theguardian.com/stage/2013/aug/10/dolls-house-henrik-ibsen-relevant
Article to commemorate 100 years since Ibsen's death:
http://english.pravda.ru/news/world/22-05-2006/80777-ibsen-0/
The Social Significance of the Modern Drama by Emma Goldman:
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/goldman/pdfs/TheSocialSignificanceoftheModernDrama_SCANDINAVIAN-Ibsen-ADOLLSHOUSE.pdf
Some study materials: http://www.shmoop.com/dolls-house/

You will have a chance to conduct a seminar on A Doll's House so we could learn more about the play and its reception.
You'll do this in pairs. Lots will be drawn, and the pairs and the seminars they'll have to conduct are the following:
Topic 1: Anastasia & Timo
Topic 2: Pradnya & Neel
Topic 3: Enes & Fred
Topic 4: Sithil & Steven
Your seminar must be research-based, i.e. that you are not to give your opinion but are instead to research the play and find out what others have said about it. Give the class a summary of some of the popular academic theories about the play. Your opinion should be of marginal importance.
Use the following links to guide your research + any other that you find useful + the text of the play.
Details:
1: Context
Who was Henrik Ibsen? Where was the play written and under what circumstances? Are there any indications that we have about why Ibsen wrote the play and what he thought about it? Was the play well-received? Tell the class about the environment surrounding the writing and subsequent staging of the play. Do you think that Ibsen’s life had a part to play in his writing this piece? 
http://www.britannica.com/biography/Henrik-Ibsen
http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/anarchist_archives/goldman/aando/drama.html
2: Characters
Nora, it has been said, is perhaps the first feminist ever to be written. Give the class a discussion of the character Nora in the play and a little bit about the background in which she was written. The idea of marriage would also be a good topic to discuss as well as the relationship between men and women. 
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/goldman/index.html
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/43490/43490-h/43490-h.htm
http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/anarchist_archives/goldman/aando/drama.html
https://www.regjeringen.no/en/aktuelt/three-dimensional-ibsen-politics-feminis/id420879/
3: Reception of the play
It seems that Norway, and even the rest of Europe was not thrilled with A Doll’s House. Why? 
http://www.nndb.com/people/829/000024757/
http://www.theatredatabase.com/19th_century/henrik_ibsen_001.html
http://www.imagi-nation.com/moonstruck/clsc5w2.htm
http://department.monm.edu/classics/Speel_Festschrift/urban.htm
http://academics.triton.edu/uc/files/dollshse.html#intro
4: The play as a whole
As the play was written so long ago, there have since been reinterpretations of it. Use the links below as starting points on how the play has been changed and re-appropriated for modern-day audiences and provide textual evidence when appropriate. It will be your job to tie together the three other presentations and add to them what you will. 
http://exeuntmagazine.com/features/adollshouserevisted/
https://www.huntingtontheatre.org/articles/dolls-house-articles/gallery/ibsens-audience/
https://londonist.com/2015/06/a-stripped-back-interpretation-of-ibsens-a-dolls-house
https://www.artshub.com.au/2017/07/25/a-dolls-house-254128/
https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/tv-radio/2020/02/nora-doll-s-house-explores-ibsens-classic-three-different-contexts
https://searchingfornora.com/other-sequels-to-ibsens-a-dolls-house/
A Doll's House Part 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Doll%27s_House,_Part_2

(Credit for a considerable part of this webquest must go to the blogger at
http://dollshousewebquest.blogspot.com.ee/)

Full play: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kg0Ll77GZhk&t=4036s (2:14:09)
A little weekend fun just in case: A Lego House (A Doll's House reenacted with the help of Lego figures): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0uMV8CsiG0
And some quizzes: http://www.shmoop.com/dolls-house/quizzes.html

Revision for Paper 1 - some useful links

Political cartoons: https://www.ncpedia.org/anchor/analyzing-political-cartoons# https://www.blitznotes.org/ib/eng-langlit-sl/cartoon_conven...