The Good-Morrow

In John Donne's poem, "The Good-Morrow," Donne uses conceit to convey the image that love is a "new world." He compares his life to an endless sleeper, who when awoken, is shown a bright new world of love and happiness. This imagery is evident throughout the poem.
In the first stanza, Donne tells of his engagement to his lover. Further on, he explains how his life was "childish," how all lovers previuos to his current were because of his immaturity, and how his entire love-life before finding "true love" was simply a long slumber.
In stanze two, Donne explains how his love with his lover is like a sunrise in the morning; fresh, new, and invigorating. He uses the visual imagery of sea-men, maps, and treasures to show his great feelings of love and compassion. Not only does he experience great love, but he wishes this love unto other in line 13, hoping others may find "maps" tleading to great "treasures," love. At the end of this stanza, reference is given to the belief that every human being is their own little "world." This, taken into context with the previous few lines, suggest that the aforementioned maps and treasures lie within, and like a navigator, one must discover the true feelings of love.
In the final stanza, Donne explains how the combination of the love from himself and the love from his lover are mixed equally together, suggesting that their love will never die for each other.
In conclusion, the use of heavenly body imagery produces a "sweet" effect, which causes the reader to recognize that love in life is important; and hope that they may find the compass to someone's heart.

Act of Resistance!

For my act of resistence I completely sacrificed using modern forms of communication, no cell phone, facebook, email, etc (on thanksgiving). I decided to resist againts these forms of communication because they really take out the human element of communication, typing away on the internet is so void of emotion, and I figured I'd rid myself of the whole practice the entire day to spend more quality communication time with my family. It was difficult giving up something I take for granted, the instant gratification of being able to talk to anyone at any moment, pin-pointing their exact location, the nearly invasive practice of communicating with anyone at the push of a button or the strike of an enter key. It's insane how non-personal communication has become now that it's easier to "communicate." Anyway, it was very difficult to pull off, I wanted to go check me email quite a bit that day, but the lesson I learned was valuable and I recommend performing your own act of resistance.

Lysistrata - Final Thoughts

Lysistrata was amazing in comparison to HoBA and Hedda Gabbler. I think the main reason I liked it was because it had a happy ending, and I knew quite a bit about Greek life and history before even reading it. Lysistrata was clean-cut, it was very simple to understand (at least for me, I've heard differently from others). Although I did like certain aspects of HoBA and Hedda Gabbler (Hedda is still my favorite character with whom we've been acquainted thus far), I found Lysistrata to be the most enjoyable. I found it interesting how even though it was a totally different type of literature, some of the themes from the three texts we've read so far over-lap, such as gender roles/ the role of women, who maintains the power, etc. And last but not least, I really like saying the name "Kleonike," it's so genuinly Greek.

Lysistrata - Comedy

I really enjoyed thsi play because of its comedic value (and underlying themes of course). There were so many quotes from this book containg sexual innuendos that made the immaturity in all of us leap out a bit. Most of the references in this play were puns, suggestive puns, I often found myself laughing when others weren't (when reading in class), either because I had caught a pun and nobody else did, or because my mind was in the gutter and I thought something to be a pun when in reality it wasn't meant to be (slightly embarassing, it's almost like a "thats what she said joke," addicting in that whenever someone makes this type of joke, everything said during the next 10 minutes becomes a sexual innuendo). But on a more serious note, why did Arostophanes make Lysistrata a comedy rather than something more serious (talking about how bad the war was or something)? I'm think I might know the answer to my own question, I think Aristohpanes made this into a comedy in order to make the play memorable. By making it funny and applicable to everyday life, the play instantly becomes more memorable because its easy to reference and easy to understand. Thank You Aristophanes.

Lysistrata - Unity II

Not only does the theme of "togetherness" involve the uniting of Greek city-states, but also the uniting of the women and men of Greece. Throughout this play, male and female stereotypes reign supreme, clearly showing the division between man and woman in the text, outlining how the man's job is to be outside, tending his war, while the women remain indoors, tending the home (ring any bells, sounds a lot like Bernarda's view of gender roles in "The House of Bernarda Alba"). This seperation in everyday life lacks the unity necessary to ensure peace. The most ironic thing about the lack of unity in everyday life between the men and women, is that the women in society try to re-unite men and women by seperating themselves from men. By taking abstinences, they further seperate themselves in order to to further unite themselves in the end, nearly an "ends justify the means" thing going on. It's funny that things have to get worse before they get better, with the worse coming through abstinence and the better coming through national peace.

Lysistrata - Unity

In the United States we find unity to be the single most important thing (maybe next to freedom), evident in the motto written on our currency "E pluribus unum," out of many one. In Greece, the people struggle for unity, or at least in Ancient Greece during the time period Lysistrata takes place. During this time in Greece, civil war was upon the country, a battle primarily between the Athenians and Spartans, The Peloponesian War. "The worst kind of war is civil war," somebody said this... I don't know who exactly, but I agree with it. There's nothing worse than fighting with your neighbor and fellow citizen. This is primarily what Lysistrata was saying in Aristophanes' play bearing her name, made most evident in her quote on page 102 - "But now, when the Persians sit by and wait, in the very presence of your enemies, you fight each other, destroy Greek men, destroy Greek cities!" This very concisely summarizes how the lack of unity and togetherness destroys an entire culture, while the true enemy, Persia (Graeco-Persian War ended right before the Peloponesian War, and Persia still remained a dangerous threat to Greek affairs).

Lysistrata - Moral Chaos Ensue When Women are Missing

"Moral chaos ensue when women are missing" is a relevent theme within Lysistrata. I think this is true, but not with the opposite being true too. I believe moral chaos would ensue if men were missing too, neither men nor women can do it alone (pun not intended). The quote by the Koryphaios of Men sums this up nicely, "Life with women is hell. Life without women is hell too." Although it should probably be expanded to - "Life with men is hell. Life without men is hell too." We know life without the opposite sex is tough, but what justifies the hell between the coexistence between the two sexes? I think it comes from the inability for men and women to communicate in a proper way; men and women are different and sometimes its hard to completely understand the opposite sex, this is frustrating, and is ultimately why I feel the Koryphaios of men said that life with women was hell.