Let me get this out of the way: I hate the Republic and Plato. I find Socrates arrogance ridiculous and his inability to be held accountable for his opinions irritating. Despite how much I disliked reading the Republic, and how it scares me to think of how much our society is built off of his ideas, his book did make me think, which is all I really ask from a book.

I found the debate that Plato brings up about opinion versus knowledge really interesting. The idea of true knowledge is something that has motivated both “good and bad” leaders (politicians, religious leaders, etc.) throughout time. I find his idea that knowledge is the greater, true power that only philosopher kings know form curious because who decides what the true form is?  But, how is a conclusion drawn on what the true form of an object is, unless it is taken from peoples opinions and perspectives. And, doesn’t Socrates demote opinions as being merely the power to opine? Socrates and his cohorts/robots, discuss the virtues and education, but how on earth would he be able to decide what the true form of a cat (per say) is? Perhaps I’m looking at this from a simplistic view, but if he is saying that people don’t know what is real in a grand philosophical approach, and that we are all just looking at shadows on a wall, wouldn’t that include a mundane object such as a cat?

I find his allegory of the cave one and book one of the Republic, the most interesting parts to be honest. This is mostly because of how the first few books are supposedly a mistake and I like to think of what the books impact would be without those first few chapters. If Plato was trying to show how he is all knowing (gee, doesn’t that sound familiar to another very popular book in our society?) then why would he demonstrate how he can be challenged? I found the literary style very convincing for the first few chapters, and felt as if “oh, maybe I really don’t know anything about anything, and this guy has all the answers?” And then I realized that the way he wrote his arguments enabled the reader to be slowly convinced that he is completely confident and right in his “knowledge”. I found it interesting how when the characters just started agreeing with him constantly, and didn’t put up any debate (because all of the debate was lead by Socrates) I questioned his ideas more than when other character’s such as Thrasymachus brought up aspects for debate.

Anyway, that was my rant on Plato, I hope it made you think and not just roll your eyes.

Oh Shakespeare, so much controversy over a curious human being. I love some of his work, and roll my eyes at other pieces. “Romeo and Juliet”, “Macbeth”, and the “Taming of the Shrew” are all ones that make me want to hit my head on a desk repeatedly. However, “The Tempest” and “A Mid Summer Night Dream” are plays that I continue to enjoy a second time round. That being said though, I had some issues with the interpretation that we have read, and found some of Orgel’s change of wording silly. But I guess this goes along with the whole history of the play, and the various forms it has been presented in.

On another note, I’m glad that we read this after Columbus because it allowed me to view Caliban, and character’s reactions to Caliban, differently. When Trinculo first stumbles upon Caliban, he states that “this monster would make a man- any strange beast makes a man. When they will not give a doit to a lame beggar, they will will lay out 10 to see a dead indian.” (p.145) This made me realize that this, Caliban, is something completely strange, new and foreign, and is what Columbus was looking for.  And that, while he brought back indigenous people, they were not the savage beast that had been anticipated.

I find the themes of monsters in the Tempest intriguing because, Caliban can be perceived as having the physicality of a monster, while his goals and reasoning is actually very human. The difference between him and the other’s is that he succumbs to his natural instincts, such as greed, lust and anger in a way that is deemed unacceptable by the other characters, and our society. The only difference between him , Sebastian and Antonio, is that Sebastian and Antonio didn’t succeed in killing the Alonso and Gonzalo, and they didn’t get caught. This also goes along with how perception is used, because if we are judging Caliban by his greed, lust and anger, then wouldn’t Prospero be the most monstrous? He ignores his dukedom for his own benefit, is enraged when he is mutinied or whenever he does not have a person’s full attention/submission.

Along with Prospero and his need for people’s submission to him,comes another prominent theme of sleep. I was intrigued by Sebastian saying what “a strange repose, to be asleep with eyes wide open- standing, speaking, moving, and yet so fast asleep.” (p.138) I like this statement because it alludes to the waking of different characters throughout the play. It is almost as if Prospero is acting as fate, dictating what each character shall do to arrive to their destiny. k

Well, I can surely say that I found the argument in Leviathan much more compelling than anything Plato sent out on in The Republic. I am not saying I adored this book or anything, I just thought it went a bit deeper than The Republic did. I did however, find a few comparisons between the texts. One formidable example of this was the discussion of speech. Both show the dangers of arts and specifically language. Plato argued that language was a destructive creation. It allowed for the diluting and destruction of exact meaning. Words, being so subjective and interpreted, were considered bad by Plato’s standards. He hoped to build a world of certain truths, removing all possibilities for mistake from it. Hobbes argues similar ideas, but not to the extreme extent that Plato does. Hobbes says that language is of great importance. He identifies the four effective uses of speech. He points out each idea, stating how they each work to produce “speech” as a whole. this is a difference from Plato’s argument. Hobbes does not banish the art form of speech altogether, he presents a more level-headed and introspective view of his form of communication. He is certain, regardless, to bring forth the negative facets of speech. He points to things such as lies and misinterpreted words as negative aspects of language.

On another note, I really enjoyed and agreed upon the idea of wit. Hobbes states that there are two types of wit, being natural wit and acquired wit. I fully agree that there are two types of wit present in society. One, being the creations which we, as a society, have deemed important, and therefore learned by the individual seeking to acquire wit. However, this is very different from natural wit. This is a type of wit that is biological. It is found present and ingrained in the human at birth. This is what Hobbes would argue, makes one “smart” or “stupid”. This is the same phrase which I heard growing up as “street smarts” or “book smarts”. In my mind, these two notions go hand in hand. Streets smarts is the common sense and logic found naturally in the form of “natural wit”. “Book Smarts” are the opposite, being the type of knowledge which is acquired rather than naturally present.

Instead of taking the secure route that was expected of him in life, as a boy born into a middle-class family, Robinson Crusoe decided to venture out to sea rather taking up law as a profession. This led to a life of loneliness and difficulty, making this a pretty weak book for younger teenagers to read, because it is basically showing that instead of doing what you really want to do, it is better and safer to just do what your parents want you to do. This story solidified my thoughts that I should just go through college and end up at law school instead of going to culinary school, which is what I’ve truly wanted to do my whole life. Thanks Defoe for shutting down my dreams!

Though I find it to be a pretty captivating and interesting story, I don’t necessarily understand what makes certain books considered “classics”. At the time, this story must have been extremely interesting to people around that time who were generally unable to break out from what is expected of people in their social class or even travel more than a few miles away from their homes. But today, I see it as an interesting story, but not necessarily anything that is life-changing or deserves to be considered a “classic”, because in my opinion even the Harry Potter series was much more entertaining. Little bit off topic, but I think that the Harry Potter series will stand the test of time as a classic. I have a feeling that Robinson Crusoe will as well, but I don’t think that it is any more interesting than books that are coming out nowadays. I appreciate that it was one of the first of its kind, but that doesn’t mean that it’s the best.

In general, I find fiction stories to be much less necessary to read. Because in the end, it may have been entertaining, but I always feel like my time could’ve been spent more intelligently reading something that is not false information. Not that I enjoy reading autobiographies, or dry nonfiction very much, but at least after reading it I feel like I picked up some new knowledge along the way.

Still, I thoroughly enjoyed reading this story, and I look forward to our next semester of Arts One!

Every fairy tale and epic adventure looks at fear a different way. However in most cases they believe that fear must be embraced in order for the protagonist (reluctant hero or wannabe Hercules) to fulfill his eventual destiny – involving defeating the “monsters” and getting the princess. Hobbes says that there are no monsters in life but there is fear, a prevailing and corner of the eye living fear of a violent and sudden death. While this idea is interesting and fits in quite well with our society – scientists trying to find the cure to fatal diseases, people spending millions wanting to find immortality, the prevailing themes of books about fantasy worlds is the capability of not dying – its interesting that Hobbes says this fear exists while at the same time saying that monsters don’t. A monster can be anything really, a monster does not have to be a living (subjectively) tangible being but instead fate itself could be a monster. And is it not fate that decides our end, at the end? Hobbes attempts to remove all idea of the fantastical and the imaginative. Hobbes says that demons and the like are merely from our own minds however could it be that people decided to create these demons and monsters in the dark in order to explain the facts of life which mere chance could not? At some point in time, when bad and unexplainable things happen isn’t it easier to create a monster or a being who could take all the blame and make it appear as if what happened was inevitable? Perhaps that’s the basis of all of these monsters in the dark, that we are only afraid of looking in the mirror and realizing that everything bad that has happened, happened because it was meant to happen. Are these monsters our ways of looking away from the mirror and allowing a manifest being to become the reason for all misfortune? With the removal of monsters from society and the acceptance of a underlying fear throughout our lives of sudden and violent death are we left with having to face the mirrors and realize that what we see, and what happens to us, is merely what happens and there is no real reason for some of the terrible things that occur except that some man, somewhere, made a decision and acted upon it? That, that is it – the answer to everything