The Merchant of Venice Blog 1

The relationship between Antonio and Bassanio is a close friendship. However, Antonio's feelings towards Bassanio are stronger than Bassanio's towards him, to the point where Antonio loves Bassanio. Bassanio has interest in a wealthy woman named Portia who is looking to marry. Bassanio needs money for his voyage so he asks Antonio for a loan. "You know me well, and herein spend but time/ To winnd about my love with circumstance;/ And out of doubt you do me now more wrong/ In making question of my uttermost/ Than if you had made waste of all I have./ Then do but say to me what I should do/ That in your knowledge may by me be done,/ And I am prest unto it" (1.1.160-167). Here Antonio shows his true feelings towards Bassanio. He responses to Bassanio's request by not only agreeing to lend him the money he desire, but also saying that it insults him that Bassanio doubts at all that Antonio would give him the money. So, what Antonio is saying is that he will do anything for Bassanio. This attitude and desire to please Bassanio will later cause Antonio to risk his life in a deal with Shylock so he can pay Bassanio the money he needs. Antonio goes out of his way and puts his life on the line for Bassanio. When someone endangers his/her life, it is for someone they love. This is because they care for their loved one more than they care for their life. They would rather throw their life away in hope of winning over the one they love than watch as the one they love moves on right infront of them. Antonio risks his life in hope of winning over Bassanio.

Blog 3

In chapter 38, Estella made many realizations. These realizations showed when Estella and Pip returned to Miss Havisham's house. There, Estella picked a fight with Miss Havisham. During the fight, Estella spits out this, "I am what you have made me" (304). This is self explanatory, Estella has come to the realization that Miss Havisham has molded her into who she is and controls the way she thinks and acts. Beforehand, Estella was Miss Havisham's blind ginuea pig. Towards the end of the fight Estela says this meaningful passage, "If you had taught her, from the dawn of her intelligence, with your utmost energy and might, tht there was such a thing as daylight, but that it was made to be her enemy and destroyer, and she must always turn against it, for it has blighted you and would else blight her..." (306). In this passage, I intrepted the daylight to be love. Herbert told us earlier in the story that Miss Havisham's love for one man caused her life to crash down on herself. Estella came to this realization, that the pain that love has created for Miss Havisham to feel caused Miss Havisham to raise Estella to be immuned to love. She realized that she could not feel emotions.

In chapter 39, Pip's dreams fell apart when he found out who his benefactor was. The convict, wich he helped in the beginning of the story, comes to his house in England and told Pip that he's Pip's benefactor. This led Pip to discover that Miss Havisham was not his benefactor and that it is not planned that Estella is going to marry him. From this, he realized that he was just a toy for Miss Havisham and Estella to fiddle with and create pain in his life. He also comes to realize that leaving Joe and Biddy to live as a gentleman was a selfish and inconsiderate act, "I would not have gone back to Biddy now, for any consideration: simply, I suppose, because my sense of my own worthless conduct to them was greater than any consideration"(323).

Because Estella realized that she was Miss Havisham's ginuea pig, I feel that she will try to undo what Miss Havisham has done to her and that she will stop listening to her. She will seperate from Miss Havisham, creating freedom for herself from her manipulating, overcontrolling guardian. With this new freddom she will attempt to feel love. Maybe in her attempt to find love, she will focus on Pip and admire him. Pip's world turned upside down. He went from feeling embarassed of being common and dreaming to be a gentleman to unsure on his desires. He does not want to live a guilt filled life accompied by the convict and he does not want to return home because of his guilt. He will become distressed and stuck on the fence between his two options. In which, I think may end in him turning the convict in and returning home. All in all, I feel that Estella and Pip will switch roles, Pip will become a realist and Estella will become an idealist opposed to Pip being an idealist and Estella being a realist.

Assignment 2

Pip's visits to Miss Havisham's caused Pip to changed his ambitions by making him feel insecure about his common life. Pip goes on a walk with Biddy, and opens up his feelings and ambitions to her after keeping his thoughts to himself. He talks about a new life, a life of a gentleman, "If I could have settled down and been but half as fond of the forge as I was when I was little, I know it would have been much better for me. You and I and Joe would have wanted nothing then... see how I am going on. Dissatisfied, and uncomfortable, and- what would it signify to me, being coarse and common, if nobody had told me so!" (128). When Pip was little and prior to his visits to Miss Havisham's, his ambitions were to work along side with Joe in the forge. His whole life he was brought up with the expectation that he would be Joe's apprentice. He planned on working for Joe, someone who has raised him and who he is friends with, because that is what he was brought up to think of as normal. However, Pip's thoughts completely flipped when he started to visit Miss Havisham's. What he was brought up thinking was normal, he was mocked for. Estella teased Pip about his clothes, how rough his hands were, being common, and even how he called knaves, jacks. These constant remarks took a beating on Pip and began to believe and go along with them. Pip started feeling insecure and he started to hate certain qualities about himself. His new ambition started to form, he wanted to fix these problems and live the life of a gentleman. This new life was what he now percieved as being normal, after Estella pointed out specific details of Pip that she considered to be poor and wrong. This caused Pip to feel uncomfortable and dissatisified with his old life because these details were constantly stabbing him from the back of his mind.

Great Expectations Assignment 1

Pip is an innocent boy and regrets his actions. On Pip's way home from visiting his parents' graves, he ran into a man. But he was not just an average man, he was a convict. The convict told Pip to bring him food and a file or else another man will rip out his heart and liver. Both of these, Pip needed to steal from home. Once home, Pip asks Mrs. Joe and Joe general questions regarding what he experienced earlier. Mrs. Joe tells him that all convicts begin by asking questions. This causes Pip to question his future, "…I felt fearfully sensible of the great convenience that the Hulks were handy for me. I was clearly on my way there. I had begun by asking questions, and I was going to rob Mrs. Joe." Pip is greatly influenced by those around him because he trusts others and will follow their words. Just like how he believed Mrs. Joe's statement that all convicts start by asking questions and how he followed the convicts orders to rob Mrs. Joe. Because of this, Pip is just a naive, innocent boy that will be taken adantage by anyone who feels superior to him. Often times, Pip regrets the actions he does that are influenced by those around him. In the quote, Pip talks about fearing his future of what asking questions and robbing from Mrs. Joe will lead to. He starts to see himself as a convict, just like the one that took advantage of him, because Mrs. Joe manipulates him into thinking he is on his way to becoming one by telling him all convicts start by asking questions. And because he fears the outcome of these events, he regrets what he has and is going to do. He hopes that the actions will not change his future or change him as a person.

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