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So I've got this exam tomorrow, about Renaissance Literature. Basically, we've been looking at nine or ten texts over the term. I've written an essay on one of them (Much Ado), and in the exam there's a question for each text, and we answer two of these questions, so I need to have stuff ready to say about two other texts from the course. We don't know what the questions will be, so it's best to get a general overview.
I'm going to do Hamlet and The Alchemist- a tragedy and a comedy. It's a closed-book exam, which means we aren't allowed to have the texts with us. So, I've been memorising the following checklist of stuff to write about, and I was wondering if anyone who noticed anything missing might tell me.
Hamlet: it's a tragedy, his flaw is wanting to damn, not just kill, Claudius; his uncertainty could represent civilisation during the renaissance (new ideas and an uncertain future; the ghost can only exist in purgatory, which only exists in Catholicism, and as Hamlet doubts it, it brings up all those contemporary religious questions- Hamlet might be protestant England doubting the old Catholic past; the play links into the Oedipus myth (Hamlet may desire his mother); the play references the (here we go) human condition viz-a-viz passing of time, changing world around a powerless human being.
The Alchemist: it's a classic comedy, what with the lord going away and letting the servants rule the roost and then returning at the end; the main riff is about alchemy as a possible tool for transformation and evolution/growth, yet at the same time it's something that is corrupting, they use it to trick money out of people and it divides them/makes them argue, and eventually blows up the house- perhaps there are no magic bullets?- it's a social satire on contemporary London, but also on eternal aspects of (chocs away!) the human condition, such as the greed of Epicure Mammon or the Alchemist himself.
So there we go. Do tell if you think I'm missing anything. I'm going to bed early tonight, having read through both texts and eaten a healthy curry. |
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