First Day of School

So I've been here for a week and a half and I finally started my classes today. I was very excited. Not that I haven't been to school before. It's just that this is so different. The English school system is different and the drama department (I don't like to use the word drama, but that is another story, I'm in England-I have to deal with it) is very relaxed to a point where sometimes you don't know what you are doing.

One class today was Shakespeare and his Contemporaries. This class is supposed to meet on Monday afternoons, and Thursday and Friday mornings. But this is also a postgrad/undergrad class. Mick separates us most of the time, and usually have a one hour lecture with everyone. Today was the one hour lecture. It was interesting. We had to read Dr. Faustus for today. There were some things that are in there that were really cool to have pointed out. For instance, the words "falling to" not only mimics Faustus falling into hell and away from God, but it was also used, in Elizabethean time with food. You would fall to a banquet. Interesting imagery. I think that this class will be tough. We have to read two plays a week. Our other one, which I finished at 2:30am yesterday, is Tamburlaine. That is another story. We, the postgrads, will have presentations and scenes to present every week. Dude!

My other class today was Post-war Shakespeare/Prompt book work stuff. We had to read an article on marxist ideology and Shakespeare. I didn't really get much of it until today when ideology was explained to me. We spent the rest of the class talking about things that didn't really fit into the article topics and about our trip to Stratford-upon-Avon in March. We get to go M-F and used the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust Library which is filled with all kinds of goodies that we get to use. We are going to pick one play and research the prompt books they have there from 1945-present day. I'm very excited. We get to pick whatever play we want to. So I need to think about what I want to do. I think that Titus Andronicus would be very interesting to see what they did with all the blood and hands being cut off in the past. But that also might be one that is hard to find. So I have to think about it.

That was my first day of grad school. This will be an interesting time academically. I don't know what to think of everything yet. But it will get easier, I hope, and hopefully get better. But only God knows what is going on. I think that I'll let it rest there for a long while, it's safer than in my own.