Category: 11th Grade English

Don Quixote is the main character of a novel written in 1605 by Spanish novelist Miguel de Cervantes. According to Wikipedia, “Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra was an Early Modern Spanish writer widely regarded as the greatest writer in the Spanish language and one of the world’s pre-eminent novelists. He is best known for his novel Don Quixote, a work often cited as both the first modern novel and “the first great novel of world literature”.” Don Quixote was a widely read literary classic. Don Quixote was very popular novel for a long time, but it is not really read today, many people probably would not even read the whole thing unless instructed to.

Here is my short summary of the book:

So basically, this old man named Don Quixote loves to read and he reads a whole lot about knights, and the knighthood, and castles, pretty much a lot about what I like to call the “medieval age”, you may have heard of it or not. Anyway, this man eventually loses his mind and declares that he wants to be a knight just like the ones in his books. So he grabs some old armor that has been in his family for a long time, polishes it up, cleans up a sword, he takes an oath of knighthood, and declares that he is a knight. Throughout most of the rest of the book, he travels the land, looking for trouble that he can fix in a “knightly” way, and since knights and the knighthood are “dead”, people laugh at him, they make fun of him. In many cases, Don Quixote gets himself into trouble. In this one case, he is on his old horse, walking along the road when he comes across these people that he mistakes for magicians. So he charges them, his horse falls trapping him under his horse, and he gets beat up and his sword gets smashed. So this goes on for a long time, until he decides to return home and become a shepherd for a year. People encourage him thinking that he will return to his senses. A little while after he gets home when he wakes up in bed, he says he does not feel good, so a doctor is brought in and tells people that Don Quixote is dying. While on his deathbed, he comes to his senses and takes another oath, an oath of repentance. He dies a few days later.

The two oaths that Don Quixote takes completely contradict each other. In his oath of knighthood, he swears to protect the weak and uphold justice, but he does a lot of questionable things because he lost his sanity. In many cases, he does the opposite of what he swore to do, and becomes, in many cases, dangerous and violent.

In Don Quixote’s oath of repentance, he is on his deathbed, and he comes to his senses. In his oath, he realizes his sins, he repents of his sins, and he dies a very happy, new man.

Was Lady Macbeth correct? ‘What’s done is done.’ This phrase was taken from the tragic play titled Macbeth written by William Shakespeare. According to Wikipedia, “William Shakespeare was an English playwright, poet and actor, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world’s pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England’s national poet and the “Bard of Avon”.” He was a very famous playwright and he wrote several plays, including Macbeth. According to Google books, “Macbeth is one of Shakespeare’s finest plays, and presents a man’s conscience and the effect of guilt on his mind. A dark and bloody play, Macbeth explores reality and illusion; witchcraft and the supernatural; ambition and kingship; the natural order; light and life, darkness and death; blood and dead babies.” This play featured Macbeth being entranced by three witches. They prophesied to Macbeth that he will be king of Scotland, but only if he kills the current king. Macbeth is then encouraged by his wife to kill the king, and Macbeth does so, and kills the king. Then Macbeth becomes the new king. After becoming king, Macbeth then kills even more people out of paranoia. Civil war then ensues in hope to overthrow Macbeth, but this just leads to more death. Eventually, Macbeth was defeated in battle and killed by Malcolm (son of the king of Scotland) at the Battle of Lumphanan with the assistance of the English. This play is one of Shakespeare’s best works, but what makes it so famous? According to Study.com, “Macbeth is still very relevant today as it tells us about the role of jealousy, greed and overarching ambition in the downfall of men and women. Many students read this drama to realize how self-defeating it is to be led by these emotions.” So, people read this play to figure out how to avoid the “emotions” that brought about the downfall of the characters in this play.

The phrase ‘What’s done is done’ said by Lady Macbeth, is located in the second scene of the third act. What happened, was Macbeth was feeling guilty about killing both the king and his friend, and Lady Macbeth was feeling a little guilty herself because of her role in the king’s death. She says ‘What’s done is done’ in act three, scene two, but still her guilt torments her, finally leading up to her suicidal death.

‘What’s done is done.’ Was Lady Macbeth correct in saying this? Well, I think she was correct in saying ‘What’s done is done.’ In other words, ‘What’s done cannot be undone.’ Basically she is saying, you cannot change the past, so deal with the present. She was correct in saying this, but wrong in conspiring to kill the king. She helped conspire to kill the king, and later regretted it. In fact, she felt so much guilt in conspiring to kill the king, that she eventually committed suicide. She felt so much guilt in conspiring to kill the king, that she killed herself. So basically, do not do anything now that you will later regret.

Who should have the authority to set prices, the free market or the state? According to the Dictionary, the free market is “an economic system in which prices are determined by unrestricted competition between privately owned businesses”, and the state is “a nation or territory considered as an organized political community under one government.” Right now, the United States economy is run by the free market (an economic market run by supply and demand) with some government regulation. Politicians and economists are debating over how much government regulation is needed for the United States economy. 

The prices of a product is determined by supply and demand, sellers against sellers, buyers against buyers. The scarcity of one product compared to another product determines the measurement of the price of that product. Also, the person who owns the product that is being sold gets to determine how much of the product to make, how much of it to sell, and the price of the product.

Who should have the authority to set prices, the free market or the state? Why? In my opinion, I think that the free market should have the authority to set prices. Here are my reasons for why I chose the free market to have the authority to set prices. In the free market the prices are set by the business men who own the product that people are buying. These men get to chose the prices of their products according to there scarcity, and how many of  the product that they can make at a time. Plus, the economy is already run by a free market, and I think it is doing quite well. The only thing about this that I disapprove of is the government regulation that most free markets have. Some free markets do not have government regulation, but most do. If the state was in charge of pricing things, I bet that they would try to make everything similar to the same price and try to give everyone an equal share in selling it and buying it, which is not good. Basically that gets rid of competition, which makes companies try to improve in order to get the most customers. If competition goes away, then the companies have no need to improve, and nothing ever gets better. The free market is where the businessmen of different companies price their products according to the scarcity of the product, and how much of the product that they can make at a time. Basically, if people pick the prices of their own products, then that creates competition between companies which forces them to get better. Without competition, then the economy stays the same and never gets better. Therefore, the free market is better at controlling the prices of products than the state is. So, let’s just say that the economy is better off if the free market is in charge of controlling the prices of products, because if the state was in charge, I bet the economy would fall apart eventually.

The theme that is in the title is basically selling your soul to the devil, featured in the play Dr. Faustus. This play features an accomplished scholar who sells his soul to the devil, and in return he gets ‘magical powers’. According to Wikipedia, “Doctor Faustus (play) The Tragical History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus, commonly referred to simply as Doctor Faustus, is an Elizabethan tragedy by Christopher Marlowe, based on German stories about the title character Faust. It was probably written in 1592 or 1593, shortly before Marlowe’s death.”

In this play, Lucifer (Satan), using a demon named Mephistophilis as a messenger, Lucifer and Faustus strike a deal. Faustus says that if Lucifer grants him twenty-four years on earth and Mephistophilis as Faustus’ servant, then Faustus, at the end of the twenty-four years, will give his soul to Lucifer and become one of those trapped in hell. This will explain it better: “Using Mephistophilis as a messenger, Faustus strikes a deal with Lucifer: that he is to be allotted twenty-four years of life on Earth, during which time he will have Mephistophilis as his personal servant, and, at the end of which, he will give his soul over to Lucifer as payment and spend the rest of time as one of the damned in hell. This deal is supposed to be cemented in the form of Faustus’ own blood. Interestingly, at first his blood congeals, leading to second thoughts by Faustus. Mephistophilis brings coals to break the wound open again, and thus Mephistophilis begins his servitude and Faustus his oath.”, taken from Faust.com. After he took this oath, he did crazy stuff for years. He became a rich dude, and lived in a big house. He lived off of whatever the demon stole, food, clothes, whatever the demon could get. When the twenty-four years was almost over, he had a big party with his friends. Then, when he went into his room to sleep, he never came out. Some people investigated, and they found blood and body parts scattered across the room. Faustus had a very tragic death.

This play also has a moral to it. This is to tell people not to go down the wrong path that Dr. Faustus took. It will only lead to death and destruction. I for one, agree completely with this.

According to Enotes.com, “The primary themes of Doctor Faustus are the relationship between knowledge and power and the consequences of attempting to attain knowledge beyond a certain extent.” Why has this theme remained popular since 1587? Well, we as humans are attracted by interest and curiosity to these kinds of things. The sound of selling your soul to the devil makes people feel scared, frightened, thrilled, and we as humans are attracted by this kind of thing. Therefore, this theme has remained popular all the way through the sixteenth century (well, maybe not popular all the way through the sixteenth century, but it was well-known). It is probably still even well-known today.

According to Wikipedia, “Michel Eyquem, Sieur de Montaigne, also known as the Lord of Montaigne, was one of the most significant philosophers of the French Renaissance. He is known for popularizing the essay as a literary genre. His work is noted for its merging of casual anecdotes and autobiography with intellectual insight.” He was born February 28, 1533, and he died September 13, 1592. He had a French nationality. Over time he wrote several different essays in his life. According to Wikipedia, “The Essays of Michel de Montaigne are contained in three books and 107 chapters of varying length. They were originally written in Middle French and were originally published in the Kingdom of France. Montaigne’s stated design in writing, publishing and revising the Essays over the period from approximately 1570 to 1592 was to record ‘some traits of my character and of my humours.’ The Essays were first published in 1580 and cover a wide range of topics.” The essays were originally published in March 1580 and were originally written in Middle French. The book was originally titled Essais and wrote it in the literary genre essay. According to Wikipedia, “Montaigne wrote in a rather crafted rhetoric designed to intrigue and involve the reader, sometimes appearing to move in a stream-of-thought from topic to topic and at other times employing a structured style that gives more emphasis to the didactic nature of his work.” According to Britannica, “Montaigne’s Essays thus incorporate a profound skepticism concerning the human being’s dangerously inflated claims to knowledge and certainty but also assert that there is no greater achievement than the ability to accept one’s being without either contempt or illusion, in the full realization of its limitations and its richness.”

Why did Montaigne write these essays though? According to The Conversation, “Some scholars argued that Montaigne began writing his essays as a want-to-be Stoic, hardening himself against the horrors of the French civil and religious wars, and his grief at the loss of his best friend Étienne de La Boétie through dysentery.“

I am a student of the Ron Paul Curriculum, and I have had the chance to read many of Montaigne’s essays. I found many of them quite fascinating, but others I just was not into. Nevertheless, I really liked them all, and if I had the chance to read them again, I probably would, but it all depends on the essay that I would be reading. Tons of other people enjoyed the essays too, just like I did.

Some of Montaigne’s greatest essays are “Of Profit and Honesty”, “Of Repentance”, “Of Three Commerces”, “Of Diversion”, “Upon Some Verses of Virgil”, “Of Coaches”, “Of the Inconvenience of Greatness”, “Of the Art of Conference”, and many many more. There are three books to hold the one hundred and seven essays. Montaigne also edited his essays at various different points in his life. Sometimes it would be one to a few words, and other times he would edit whole passages! These essays were very influential back then and probably still are today.

According to Wikipedia, “John Foxe, an English historian and martyrologist, was the author of Acts and Monuments, telling of Christian martyrs throughout Western history, but particularly the sufferings of English Protestants and proto-Protestants from the 14th century and in the reign of Mary I.” According to Got Questions, “John Foxe (also spelled Fox, 1516—1587) was an English Puritan preacher and church historian. As a youth, Foxe’s brilliance was recognized, and at Oxford University he earned a master’s degree and a fellowship (similar to a modern scholarship) at Magdalen College. His first literary endeavors were in poetry and Latin comedies. Foxe began researching church history to help him better understand the controversies regarding the Catholic Church and the Reformation. Foxe studied the Scriptures as well as the writings of the early church fathers.” According to Britannica, “John Foxe, (born 1516, Boston, Lincolnshire, Eng.—died April 18, 1587, Cripplegate, London), English Puritan preacher and author of The Book of Martyrs, a graphic and polemic account of those who suffered for the cause of Protestantism. Widely read, often the most valued book beside the Bible in the households of English Puritans, it helped shape popular opinion about Roman Catholicism for at least a century.”

Foxe’s greatest work, his book Acts and Monuments (popularly known as Foxe’s Book of Martyrs), is a work of Protestant history and martyrology. It was first published in the year 1563. According to Wikipedia, “After his death, Foxe’s Acts and Monuments continued to be published and appreciatively read. John Burrow refers to it as, after the Bible, ‘the greatest single influence on English Protestant thinking of the late Tudor and early Stuart period.'” According to Digital Commons, “We assert that Foxe’s Book of Martyrs was published for these purposes: personal reasons, a tribute to Queen Elizabeth, and to gain support for the Protestant faith and belief.” This book was probably one of the most influential books of its time. According to Wikipedia, Acts and Monuments “includes a polemical account of the sufferings of Protestants under the Catholic Church, with particular emphasis on England and Scotland. The book was highly influential in those countries and helped shape lasting popular notions of Catholicism there. The book went through four editions in Foxe’s lifetime and a number of later editions and abridgements, including some that specifically reduced the text to a Book of Martyrs.” According to Christian Today, “The works of church historians rarely influence history itself, but John Foxe’s Acts and Monuments of Matters Happening to the Church—commonly known as Foxe’s Book of Martyrs—is the exception that proves the rule.”

Is the language of Foxe still compelling today? The language of Foxe spoke to a lot of its readers. He also put several memorable images into his book. The language that Foxe used to speak to his readers was very compelling to the sixteenth and seventeenth century people, but due to the type of society and world that we live in today, it might not be as compelling as it was three hundred years ago. So, I think that the language of Foxe can be compelling to some people, but not all people.