Results of Ruminations

By the time it became apparent that graduation from high school would actually happen to me, I was convinced that English education would be my career. I loved to read and write, and I liked the idea of interacting with students. I enjoyed teaching people about things--usually video game, Spider-Man, or Mormonism related--and so I felt it a good fit to plan on being an English major. I had to finish my senior year, however, and in order to do that, I had to pass my AP English class. Miss Bodily, our venerated teacher, would lean on her podium/desk, put one end of her glasses in her mouth, and ask us questions that forced us to truly consider, for the first time (or so it seemed) what a poem was actually saying. I remember going home with my back-breaking AP Lit text book, Perrine's Literature Sixth Edition and cracking it open on my cluttered desk in my basement room. Highlighters in one hand and a blue fountain pen in the other, I would double check my assignment, then read ...

Tenth grade introduced me to a new school, a new English teacher, and a real appreciation for the Bard. It was while in Mrs. White's class that I finally connected with the stories that were hidden in the mishmash of iambic pentameter and reputation. In large part, I finally understood the story. The first play we attempted that year was The Merchant of Venice . Perhaps it is because of this comprehension that I still, to this day, consider it one of Shakespeare's most fertile and ambiguous of plays. Perhaps it is because my friends and I, whilst adapting the story into a children's book (per the requirements of the class), I had a lot of fun drawing Nerissa and Portia in a faux-anime style that gives me nostalgic feelings toward it. Or maybe it's the fact that I still think of the Prince of Aragon as a red-faced smiley sticker with spikey shoulder pads and an afro--as we depicted him in our book--that makes me think that Merchant of Venice deserves a lot more atte...