Comedy, Tragedy, and Brick Walls

Hi all!

Sorry my title isn't as pithy as the last one, I'm working on it.

This week has been busy. I've finally got enough source material under my belt to be able to draw connections between my sources. So yay!

After my meeting with Dr. Williams this Monday, I felt like I had kind of been given license to use source material other than just non-fictional reports written by other people. So, I've started digging into some stuff I hadn't thought to use before this week. Namely cinematic and theatrical works.

Right now, I'm in the middle of watching an older animated Japanese film entitled Grave of the Fireflies directed by Isao Takahata. Just the title already makes this film sound slightly melancholy. It is all well rendered, but yeah, it's kind of melancholy.

I've been digging into some older plays as well. This past week, it's been Lysistrata by Aristophanes and Shakespeare's The Tragedy of Coriolanus. Lysistrata examines a women's perspective on the Peloponnesian War and what might happen to those who are left behind during a conflict. Coriolanus deals more with what happens when a war hero comes home and tries to reintegrate into 'normal' society in a big way. Professor Futrell also gave my translations of Livy's histories pertaining to the real, historical Coriolanus.

I got a lot of cool books on Friday, and I'm getting really excited to go more into my topic. I can feel it focusing and clarifying as I go, but that also tends to give me miniature panic attacks when I realize how much needs to be done. (You know, those times where everything tumbles into knots and you're just like 'Oh my goodness. I am never going to finish this, and it's going to be terrible, and I have to much to do!' ? Yeah, those).

I've been spending time, literally, in a hole in the wall at the bookstore. Okay, it's not really a hole, but I found this little niche with a plug next to it that I decided to claim for most of this week while I was at U of A. The one downside seems to be that whoever was in charge of the radio somewhere nearby has changed from who it was last week.

There has been a constant stream of country music coming from somewhere in the ceiling or the nearby Cafe. For those of you who like country, I'm not criticizing exactly. I don't mind a little country once in a while, but constant Country seems a little extreme to me.

So, here's something a little different. This week's song is Daft Punk by Pentatonix. If you haven't heard of Pentatonix before, they're pretty good.

Ciao!