Changing single text at this stage

Naikon

Hi, if anyone could shed some light on this I appreciate your contribution.
My story is simple, I am doing higher level english and just cant get my head around shakespeare's Macbeth.
Its driving me mad and I want to know if its a good idea to change my single text to Death of a salesman which is currently part of my comparitive workload.

I have a general understanding of Peter Careys
"true history of the kelly gang"
and since its the proposed elected third comparitive text, would I be able to switch DOS for this and still do ok, considering the third text would have the least comparitive detail.
To be honest I am not expecting an A in English so I would be quite happy with an average result at honours.
Please shed some light on the above:D

Rozabeez

It's probably a bit risky now, what can't you get your head round? Have you tried watching one of the movies of Macbeth?

nedward

Ask your teacher, and he'll say no. 'Cause hees right. Why do you want to change with, oh, seven weeks to your mock? You've spent almost two years doing Macbeth; I'm sure you have enough to answer a single text, because a single text is handy-learn your quotes, HEY PRESTO!

Anyway, ya have to answer on a Shakespearian tragedy, so boo to that.

Naikon

Oh, wasnt aware of that:o
To be honest, I didnt study it last year at all really:(
I will try watching a film production but I doubt it will help much.
At least there's paper one:)

Rozabeez

I'm not too great on Macbeth either but I find it easy to waffle on

Naikon

Ah I see, at least Im not the only one:D
Maybe I should just learn it over in a general sense while focusing on a few select moments.
The skool.ie notes seem good if a little bare, but I reckon I should be okay.......hopefully:)
Does anyone find the single text the hardest or is it just me?

Steve01

Macbeth is one of the best possible single texts there is. There's no limit to what you can write so long as you have some relevant quotes. Honestly at this stage its too late to change the single text. That being said we changed our comparative texts at the start of the year. Turns out the Bible and the Koran aren't on the comparative course...

Naikon

Thanks for the advice so far:)

Rozabeez

I find the comparative the worst, mainly cos I was out and missed a lot of it.

kieranmcg1

i think your a bit late i think macbeth was really good . but if you havnt already done it id say it would b a good idea to watch the film and itl help to get a better understanding of it . it really helped me big time . but dont depend solomly on the film because its the book you are sipposed to alk about

poobum

Naikon wrote:

Does anyone find the single text the hardest or is it just me?

i thought comparative was a bitch! i liked single text! then again i liked the book so that probably helped, and im a big reader, but i for some reason just couldnt get my head around the comparative...hated the bloody film

Selphie

poobum wrote:

i thought comparative was a bitch! i liked single text!

Yeah, I agree with you. No matter what I write on the comparative, it never seems to be good enough, and I find the essays really hard to learn off. Which one do people think is the worst? I'm not too gone on cultural context...

Seeing as we have to write on a Shakespearian play, I think we're pretty lucky that we got Macbeth, it's not too difficult or complex a story. They usually ask both a character and a theme, or something like that, and so that makes it kinda easy to cut down what you need to learn. As in, if you can learn a half-decent essay on both Macbeth and LM, and then say, something on reversal of values or kingship, you could probably write a good essay no matter what comes up.

Corruptedmorals

I love the comparative!! I find cultural context the easiest, as you don't have to learn off the key moments that you do for theme, but I get A's on both of them Had a timed theme comparative essay in friday's double english, managed to get it done in 40 minutes, interested to see what my mark will be.

Macbeth is the hardest essay on Paper 2. But I find it easier that I actually like it. At least we weren't landed with Hamlet or King Lear, they're twice as long. and (in my opinion) not near as..good?

Selphie

Corruptedmorals wrote:

I love the comparative!! I find cultural context the easiest, as you don't have to learn off the key moments that you do for theme, but I get A's on both of them Had a timed theme comparative essay in friday's double english, managed to get it done in 40 minutes, interested to see what my mark will be.

Macbeth is the hardest essay on Paper 2. But I find it easier that I actually like it. At least we weren't landed with Hamlet or King Lear, they're twice as long. and (in my opinion) not near as..good?

Yup, Macbeth's really short! It's great
Lucky you! I can't get higher than a B in comparative and my teacher is the type who just criticises you, but doesn't tell you how to turn it into an A, plus it generally takes me about an hour to write a 5 page essay. What texts are you doing?

Corruptedmorals

Yeah I've heard it criticised because apparently the length of time it takes Lady Macbeth to go insane is too short to be realistic, but I don't gree. We're doing My Left Foot, Juno and the Paycock and Death and Nightingales. Our theme is struggle, and under cultural context we do financial and social position/gender division/politics (there's NO politics in My Left Foot) and religion. Grand enough. One of the other english classes in my year got landed with How Many Miles to Babylon! Burn!

Selphie

Yeah, we're doing Babylon. It's the Irish soldier version of Brokeback Mountain, and it's not exactly the most riveting of stories. We're also doing Pride and Prejudice and A Room With A View. Our theme is love :rolleyes:

AdMMM

On the contrary, there are politics in My Left Foot. Not politics in the traditional sense, moreso the politics of life and relationships.

Corruptedmorals

It has to be just politics though. We mention how Lord Castlewelland and his house are a reminder of colonial times, and that the community would have been affected by the mass emigration to England for jobs.

Gazza22

Try online notes

If you really need a crash course on Macbeth, or another view on things. To be honest online notes are your best freind if you haven't studied properly!

I didn't even read the book for my text Pride & Prejudice [i know, very stupid thing to do, but it bored me]....but i stumbled upon pinkmonkey.com
They have pretty good comprehensive notes. And i ended up with a high result in P&P. Got a B1 overall

These are the links for Macbeth, i'm sure they'll be as good as Pride & Prejudice!

http://pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/barrons/macbeth.asp

http://www.sparknotes.com/shakespeare/macbeth