IN SEARCH OF SHAKESPEARE'S DARK LADY

Here you can read an interesting and informative article about Shakespeare's "dark lady", the seductive and elusive woman who inspired some of his most famous sonnets.

OLIVER TWIST

Oliver Twist is perhaps Charles Dickens’s most famous novel. It first appeared in instalments in 1837 and was later published as a book. The novel fictionalises the economic insecurity and humiliation the novelist  himself experienced when he was a boy.

The novel was the first of the author’s works to realistically depict the impoverished London underworld and to illustrate his belief that poverty leads to crime.

The name Twist, given to the protagonist by accident, represents the disgraceful reversals (=changes) of fortune that he will experience. Oliver Twist is a poor orphan who is brought up in a workhouse in a heartless way,  he is underfed and receives no education.  He is later sold to an undertaker (=funeral director)  as an apprentice, but the cruelty of his new master forces him to run away to London.  There he falls into the hands of a nasty gang of young pickpockets led by Fagin, an old Jew who is one of Dickens’s best characterizations.  They force Oliver to help them in their criminal activities. The boy is temporarily rescued by Mr Brownlow, a benevolent gentleman.  Then Oliver is kidnapped by the gang.  After many incidents,  the gang is  eventually caught by the police.  Mr Brownlow adopts Oliver and shows kindness and affection towards him.

AUGUST

THE MERCHANT OF VENICE

Classified as a comedy, The Merchant of Venice  can be seen as being part of the group of Shakespearean plays which stand on the borderline between comedy and tragedy. It is not a true tragedy as none of the characters actually die, but it is a dark comedy which deals with some very controversial problems and it is best remembered for the character of Shylock, the Jewish moneylender who is portrayed as a greedy, wicked and revengeful individual. Without the Shylock character, however, The Merchant of Venice  might be considered a minor Shakespearean play. No other character (excluding, perhaps, Hamlet) in any of Shakespeare's plays has received as much dispute and commentary about his meaning and interpretation as Shylock.

SHAKESPEARE'S VILLAINS

William Shakespeare created a lot of captivating characters, and most of them are the villains. They show the worst of human characteristics: ambition, jealousy, hatred, resentment, malignity … all of the ugly things that bring out the worst in all of us. In some cases, it is rather disquieting  to think that a fictitious character  can be capable of such horrors. 

COMMEMORATING JANE AUSTEN

Jane Austen died this day in 1817. To remember this incomparable writer I suggest reading the short epistolary novel Lady Susan - an early work of Jane Austen that remained unpublished until 1871, when it was included in A Memoir of Jane Austen by Edward Austen-Leigh, her half-brother. It is the story of Lady Susan, a brilliant and stunningly beautiful widow in her upper thirties who is bad to the bone - she enjoys making men fall in love with her, deceiving their wives and tormenting her own daughter, heartlessly bending her to her will. Unlike the women featured in Jane Austen's other works, Lady Susan is an anti-heroine, in fact she is so cold-hearted in her machinations that she puts her own interests ahead of her daughter’s, or anyone else’s for that matter. It is a superbly crafted novel of Regency manners and mores that will delight you with its wit and elegant expression.

SUMMER READING TIPS

One of the best things about the lazy days of summer is having more time to read. It is wonderful to sit outside on a beautiful day, smelling the grass and feeling the breeze, lost in a good book.  I think summer holidays and books should be  inseparable!

Here are some reading tips for your carefree summer days!

What about downloading  The Canterville Ghost? It is one of the most popular short stories by Oscar Wilde, widely adapted for the screen and the stage. 
Then you could download Kate Chopin's short story Désirée’s Baby as well as William Wilson, which is Edgar Allan Poe’s most famous character study of the doppelganger, or double, a theme explored in a similar way by the film Fight Club. 
I could also suggest reading  Henry James's ghost story The Turn of the Screw  -  this is a novella, which means that it is shorter than a traditional novel but focusing on actions of greater scope than the short story.

PRONUNCIATION TIPS

Pronunciation is one of the most complex problems facing non-native speakers of English. It is the principal obstacle to overcome when trying to achieve fluency. Many non-native speakers have studied grammar for many years, but are unable to speak like native speakers due to their incapability to pronounce the sounds of words correctly.

In point of fact, your pronunciation is the first and most important thing native speakers notice during a conversation. Knowing grammar and vocabulary are important but useless if you are unable to pronounce those structures or words correctly. Also, native speakers are more likely to understand you if you make grammatical mistakes,  rather than if you make mistakes in pronunciation. Mispronunciation  will keep you from effectively communicating with native English speakers. Achieving good pronunciation should be your main goal!

English is a language that has many different accents  which are different from pronunciation. In fact, pronunciation is the way in which a word is pronounced. Accent is a series of pronunciation, rhythm and emphasis that is local to a region or city. It is important to pronounce words correctly so that you are understandable.                                            

Accent isn’t necessarily important, you can speak English with a Spanish accent for example and be totally understandable if you are pronouncing the words correctly. This accent will tell people that you are from Spain and that your first language is probably not English.

Realize that the English spoken in England, Australia or Canada is different than the English spoken in the United States. Even within these countries there is a wide range of accents. People from New York speak different English than people from San Francisco. In any case, if  your pronunciation is good, you will be understood anywhere you go!

HAPPY 4TH OF JULY!

JULY

WHAT IS THE SUMMER SOLSTICE?

The summer solstice marks the peak of summer and takes place on the longest day of the year, that is to say when the Sun is at its highest in the sky. In Britain and other places north of the equator, to be precise the Northern Hemisphere, this takes place on June 21. After the summer solstice the days get shorter until the winter solstice when they start to get longer again.

June 21 is called the summer solstice in the Northern Hemisphere and simultaneously the winter solstice in the Southern Hemisphere. Around December 21 the solstices are reversed and winter begins in the Northern hemisphere.

The summer solstice has been celebrated since ancient times and is still celebrated around the world today. 
Many people gather at Stonehenge which is believed to have been used as an important religious site by early Britons 4,000 years ago.
Here you can read an interesting article about the meaning of the summer solstice. 

II PROVA SCRITTA ESAMI DI STATO

The end of the school year has finally come about and I have been sent to a Technical Institute for the school-leaving examination  as an external teacher  -  the students there have to take tests on specific subjects, including English.

As to my students  of  5^ C Liceo Linguistico, today they had to sit for their II Prova Scritta, a Foreign Language written exam, but they had the opportunity to  decide on the English, Spanish or French language.

As usual, the English test included a text analysis, a summary and a composition, but there was a choice between an article about sealing your love with a Master Lock in Paris, taken from The Wall Street Journal, Europe Edition, and a passage from The Great Gatsby by the American author Francis Scott Fitzgerald, a love story  set in the 1920s  -  a period of jazz and decadence.

Here you can download  both of them,  just in case you are curious!

MISS AUSTEN REGRETS

Miss Austen Regrets is a BBC-produced drama film  that depicts the last years of Jane Austen's life. Approaching her fortieth birthday, Jane Austen appears happily unmarried and displays all the assured wit and charm of her novels' young heroines. Yet when asked to help her young niece, Fanny Knight, find a husband, her confident composure is threatened. She finds herself looking back on her potential suitors and the choices she has made.

Born the daughter of an English Anglican minister in 1775, she died in 1817 at age forty-one, unmarried  and poor; she left us with six completed novels acclaimed by many to be literary perfection.

Traditional views on Jane Austen's love life vary, and little evidence still exists today to support much of a story. What we know survives from her personal letters and family recollections of a quiet 18th century life, spent  in privacy and decorum. Apart from the one known proposal by Harris Bigg-Wither, no other known love affairs were documented. Unfortunately, much of Jane Austen's personal correspondence, that could have supplied more private details, was destroyed after her death by her sister Cassandra. From what we know, the question surrounding Jane Austen's life is how an individual with little personal experience of romance and love could write with such understanding about the nature of the human heart.

In this speculative tale, director Jeremy Lovering and screenwriter Gwyneth Hughes look into the motives why the real Jane Austen never found her own Mr. Darcy.

Now let’s watch the trailer of this beautiful film, graced with an excellent   performance by Olivia Williams. 

60TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE QUEEN'S CORONATION

The Queen has joined 2,000 guests for a service at Westminster Abbey to mark 60 years since her Coronation.

Some of those who took part in the 1953 service were among the congregation. Inside the abbey, several generations of the  royal  family waited: the Queen's son, Prince Charles, now in his 60s, and next in line to the throne, and her grandson, Prince William, second in line, with his pregnant wife Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, who is due to give birth to yet another royal heir next month.

Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron - the 12th to serve under Queen Elizabeth - gave the reading to all the guests gathered at the abbey.

Archbishop of Canterbury the Most Rev Justin Welby said the event honoured "60 years of commitment".

Several key items from the Coronation were placed in Westminster Abbey for the service.

They included the heavy, solid gold St Edward's Crown, displayed on the High Altar – it hasn’t been out of  the Tower of London since 1953. Beside it was the Ampulla, the gold, eagle-shaped bottle from which the holy oil was poured for the Queen's anointing. The Coronation Chair, one of the oldest pieces of English furniture still in use, was also on show.

Here you can watch a beautiful video of the 1953 Coronation ceremony!

JUNE