Finally...

Well, it seems that this is my last posting for the time being. I would like to conclude that I really have fun in completing this task as assigned to us in the earlier of this semester. I’ve dream to have my own blog in the internet but I don’t know how to do it. By taking this course (EDU3217 - Teaching the Language of Drama), my dream has come true and I’m happy to share my feelings and knowledge with my classmates through online. We’ve commented on each others’ postings and it’s an enjoyable way to know others’ point of view about drama. With this blog, I have the opportunity to know my friends opinions towards the play and their attitude on certain issues.

Through drama, I’ve been given opportunity to learn the great works by the magnificent playwrights. These people were enable to see the world in the other way round, therefore they can come up with the enormous works. Apart from that, I’ve become familiar with their works such as Antigone, King Lear, Pygmalion, and A Streetcar Named Desire and glad to be one of them who have the opportunity to examine on it. I feel regret that we can’t meet Wong Phui Nam due to our schedule. That’s the only chance we can meet him before the final exam to questionnaire him on his version drama - Anike. Anyway, his drama is the version of Sophocles’ great play- Antigone, I guess we will able to answer it during the final (unless if we don’t revise on it).

As a conclusion, reading drama is not a tedious because sometimes it is enjoyable although its old language becomes a barrier for me to have better understanding of the story. One thing I realized on reading drama, if we keep on reading the lines, we’ll be slowly comprehend the flow of the drama and the conflicts arises. Therefore, I have a new perspective on drama because it can be a pleasure reading for me due to my lack of knowledge on how to read drama. Now, I can start reading my mother’s collections….;)

I would like to say my gratitude towards Assoc. Prof. Dr. Malachi Edwin Vethamani on his interesting lesson for this semester. Since he’s been teaching us for two semesters, I’ve been familiar with his methods in teaching literature in English. I hope I will manage to teach my future students to love literature as I feel right now. Adios amigos!

The Homecoming...?!

This is my second time to go to KLPac to watch theatre. At this time, I have the opportunity to watch a play at night due to its schedule. The play is played at night on weekdays and we have no other options since we refuse to watch it on weekend. We also have chance to use the facility in UPM that is free trip to KLPac by a coaster.

I have no idea about this play and lack of prior knowledge on Harold Pinter’s work. Looking at the title suggests to me that the play is about a person who has finally goes back to his/her hometown. Guess what? My interpretation is correct…but the conflicts do surprised me. The first conflict is about a treatment of an abusive father-Max, towards his three sons; Teddy, Lenny and Joey. Regarding on the issue, Max have misuses his authority as a father and fails in raising up his sons to be a good person. They ignore him whenever he tries to communicate with him. Besides that, he himself always discourages his sons on whatever their doings. He does not support them as he supposed to as a father. He also looks down on his brother’s job – Sam is a chauffer. The second conflict is about an immoral act between a daughter-in-law – Ruth, with her both brother-in-laws. In addition, her father-in-law also craves for her…! Oh, my GOD!

I really don’t like the second part of the play where Max and Lenny have plan to use her in order to gain some money. She has to be a prostitute and at the same time, she must fulfill their sexual desire. What kind of family they are? The dialogue irritates my feelings where the male characters are looking down on women as if they have no price at all! In my opinion, Pinter must have had bitter experience with women or have had seen the similar events through out his life. Therefore, he decided to expose these issues to the public, which I think is not relevant in our context.

I’m not really enjoy watching the play due to its serious issues but I do admires the actors’ talent. To me, they have done their best and now it depends on the audience to judge their performance. Max- plays by Thor Kah Hoong has shows a confident act as an abusives father (instead of his skinny looks…oops, please don’t get mad). Loo Jia-Wei- plays the role of Ruth, is brave and an open-minded person, therefore she performs well even though she has to kiss Lenny lively due to the script. Patrick Teoh plays the role as Sam and he is the one who does not agree with the immoral act that happens in the house. His character shows various facial expressions and he succeeds.

Overall, the play has reminds me that the conflicts do exists in our society and it scares me. I hope that our society will gain self-awareness in this matter in order to be a proper society with appropriate manner.

Why...?

Why everybody must die? Why? I kept thinking in my mind that it shouldn’t happen especially to Cordelia. Shakespeare should write his play in the other way round – Cordelia must be the ruler of the kingdom instead of Edgar. Why I brought up this issue? It is because I used to read stories, which have ‘happy ending’ at the end of it and always think that ‘good people will have good life’ and vice versa.

Later, I realized that this is a ‘tragic play’ so I have to switch my point of view that this would happen in the story. Shakespeare had written such a fine play and successfully presented conflicts which might happened those days and probably at the present. The play is about human life so it must have conflicts…if there are no conflicts then life is boring! We are human and we need conflicts in our life thus we can experience and learn from it.

In this play, the old king – Lear – faces a major tragedy in his life when he decided to let his three daughters to rule their country and already divided the land into three parts. As human being, Goneril and Regan didn’t want to rule the country for the sake of their father because they didn’t want to be slaves. Therefore, they planned to get rid of him after he has disowned Cordelia. The conflict becomes worst and leads to the murderer of Regan before Goneril killed herself. Cordelia was killed with their order and that causes Lear’s death, which brings Edgar, becomes the new king.

So bloggers, I believe that each of us has experienced several of conflicts – whether major or minor conflicts – and we do learn from it…am I right? Whether we like it or not, want it or not, we should face it and try to solve it as best as we can. Thus, we can be prepared for other future conflicts…hopefully no and don’t think I’m crazy okay!

Finally, I started to read variety of genre and it gives me a lot of new experience. It does help me in finding answers of what happens in the stories I’ve read and events around me…;)

Pygmalion...

After watching the movie, I had more understanding on the play and on the characters involved especially Eliza and Higgins. Eliza represents a strong lady that wants to achieve her desire to sell flowers in a flower shop. Therefore, she asks Prof. Higgins to help her in her pronunciation, so that she can speak Standard English as wanted by the shop owner. Eliza tries hard in completing her education with the arrogant language professor but actually, it has been out of her track. This is because Higgins wants to make her as a fine lady that could marry a prince but Eliza’s wish is simple – to have better pronunciation and can be the flower girl in the shop, thus able to change her way of life. I admired her due to her strong will in going through all the mocking by Higgins.

The professor is a bully person and he takes her for granted. He uses the poor girl in his experiment on pronunciation and treats her badly. Higgins always looks down on her, not encouraging her emotionally. I pity her for the suffering that she goes through the lesson.

I admired Pickering due to his gentleman attitude. He always on Eliza’s side and encourages her through the lesson. He educates Eliza to be a fine lady through her inner self therefore Eliza respects him rather than Higgins.

In my opinion, Higgins successes in educates Eliza to have better pronunciation and speak Standard English and acts as a high society class. Compared to Pickering, he is successfully educates Eliza without realizing it until Eliza told him about it. And it does tell me Pickering is the right person to change Eliza at the first place….. :)

Shakespeare Wallah...

We were given an opportunity to watch Shakespeare Wallah. Wallah? What does it mean? Well, wallah means ‘the one who is’ and according to the producer Ismail Merchant, he defines wallah as ‘traders’. The film is based on a true story about the Kendall’s family who performed Shakespeare’s play in India. In this film, they played as ‘The Buckingham Players’. I was inspired to watch the film because the main actor is Shashi Kapoor (plays the role of Sanju)! I’m a big fan of him and never missed watching all his Hindustan movies and for the first time, I watch him acting in an English film.

Actually, I don’t really understand the story in the earlier stage. Later, I slowly comprehend the plot of the story (but not all...so sad). The Buckingham’s was performing Shakespeare all over India during the colonist era. The Indians especially the educated were supporting the play but they lose their attention on the play when a famous Bollywood’s actress, Manjula (Madhur) appeared in the middle of the play. Both parties didn’t respect the play, it made Mr. Buckingham became mad, and he stopped the play for a moment. He then asked the audience to be silent and continue their performing. In other incidents, the young men teased the beautiful Lizzie (Felicity Kendall) who is Sanju’s girlfriend. He can’t accept it and had a fight with them. He loves her so much...

I think the English players were sincere in performing the play but the audience should be educate how to watch play. They show no respect and it shouldn’t happen when we are watching a play. Manjula should be professional as a famous actress. Although she admires Sanju, she must accept the fact that they are cousin and he is in love with Lizzie. Lastly, Lizzie was sent back home and their love was not a successful…. :(

Traditional Dance

Negeri Sembilan is the only state in Malaysia practices Adat Perpatih - the traditional custom inherited from Minangkabau, Indonesia. It includes all aspects of life; marriage, the traditional dance, the properties etc. As the new generation of Adat Perpatih, I admit that I’m not practicing all the custom especially the traditional dance such as Endang and Tari Piring.

Both are different in movement and music. During my school days, I had the opportunity to watch the Endang dance. It was perform on the Teachers’ Day when I was twelve. The dance involves the body and hands movements and the dancers need to sit on the floor. The movements become faster when it comes to the end, so does the music. Its tempo grows faster. It was an enjoyable performance by the teachers.


Tari Piring is difficult from Endang because it involves the whole body movements. The dancers have to hold two saucers on their palms and dance. It usually performed on the wedding occasion in front of the bride and bridegroom when they sit next to each other. The dancers for this occasion are males. The musical instruments used are Rebana and Gong. The sound from the Gong is important it leads the dancers’ steps. Nowadays, the dance is no longer performed on wedding occasion and it has been replaced by the silat show.

Something needs to be done in order to make the traditional dances still exist even though we live in the new era. In addition, the state government could instruct all schools in Negeri Sembilan to have a 'Traditional Dance Club' so that the new generation could learn and retain it from become extinct.

God’s Desire…

I read some review about Tiresias, a blind prophet who appears in Antigone. It creates my curiosity why Sophocles created this character. Tiresias has transformed into a woman and later turned back into a man. I then realized it is God’s wish and has the power to do anything He wanted to. Although Tiresias was blind, Zeus gave him the gift of prophecy as compensation. He can predict what will happen and in Antigone, his prediction has come true. He warns Creon that the Gods side with Antigone and tells the king he will lose one child for the crimes of leaving Polyneices unburied and putting Antigone to death.

The role of prophet in human’s life is important because as the messenger of the God, he will lead and guides the human being to live in harmony. Besides that, the prophet should be as a reference to human in order not to break the God’s rules.

In Antigone, Creon never refer to Tiresias of his action especially towards Polyneices burial and the punishment on Antigone, therefore, he breaks Zeus’s law. In addition, Creon becomes selfish and thinks he has the power to give such orders. In return, he is not only losing his son but also his wife who committed suicide.

The phrases “what you give, you get back” are the common words I always bear in my mind. I believe no matter what l did whether right or wrong will get proper in return from the God. In Antigone, Creon gets the proper penalty of his wrong decisions and causes the death of his family…:(

Antigone...What a sad play

Antigone – looking at the spelling puzzled me of it pronunciation. Most of us pronounced it wrongly till corrected by Dr. Edwin. Actually, we were asked to read the Antigone written by Sophocles after our last semester final examination. My classmate had e-mail me the play but I kept delaying to read it due to the holiday fever.

I only start reading on the last week of holiday and find it hard to understand due to the classic language used. So, I stop reading and downloaded the synopsis of Antigone. I found the play is a sad and tragic story because of the event happened to the heroin and her family. Reading the synopsis is much easier to understand compared to the play but to get the real feeling I must read the play and waited for a version copy given by our lecturer.

Once we got the copy, I read it in one evening and I realized that I can understand the flow of the story. Although there are weird words and difficult to understand, I kept on reading till half of the story.

During the lecturer hour, Dr. Edwin has discussed about the play for an hour because he need to go for outstation. He drew my attention on the element of fate in the play. The main character – Antigone believed in fate and because of that, she wanted to bury his brother Polyneices although she knew the king Creon, her uncle - forbid it. She said she done it according to Zeus’s law that every dead body should have proper burial rather than leave it in disgraced. She was caught and sentenced to death but she did not regret because she has fulfil her responsibility to the God and as a sister towards a brother.

In addition, the phrase ‘fate’ is repeatedly used in the lines and build up my understanding the importance of if in the play and gives impact to Antigone’s act. As for Creon, he refused to cancel the punishment on Antigone because he did not believe in fate consequences the death of his own son and his wife. It’s too late for him and he has to run his life due to the curse by their Gods.

Fate or destiny is to be believed by everybody for the reason that our life is being control by the God although one admits that he does not believe in God. As for me, I believe the Almighty is controlling my life therefore if something went wrong it is because of my act has conflicting His order. I believed Antigone realized God’s law is more powerful that human’s and as a result, she breaks Creon's rules and at the end God helped her in giving back the penalty to Creon.

I’m thinking to use this tragic play for my first assignment. Due to that, I must read the play again and examine the right lines for the assignment. I hope further discussion during the lecture hour with my lecture will give me clear view in analyzing the literary aspects of the play.

Time for a Sketch

We were given a short and simple open text dialogue by Edward Bond Bingo. In pairs, we were to discuss the setting, the characters and their relationship followed by perform it to the class. We have to think what is the setting, how many characters involve and have to act out and imagined the setting is really exist in our mind. A few pairs selected randomly by our lecturer, Dr. Edwin while the rest need to guess the three aspects mentioned earlier. I have the opportunity to watch their hidden talent again and it was really fun.

I then realized this activity can be use in teaching drama in classroom and it carter to all students especially the weaker group. Due to the simplicity of the dialogue, the weaker students will gain their gut to perform the sketch and at the same time practicing English. It is important for teachers to encourage them to learn English by heart and role-play is one of the way to accomplish the objectives.

Moreover, it develops students' thinking skills to guess the relationship between the characters based on their prior knowledge. By using the open text dialogue, students are not restricted to the script and perform the authentic action, just like what my classmates did. Fun and hillarious! At the same time, students will learn how to make correct guessing and prediction.

In addition, there are three levels of help the teachers can give to their students, both the advanced and the weaker. For the advanced students, (those who are accurate) they can have very little or none help script where they can think and produce the sketch precisely whereas for the weaker students, they can be pairs with the advanced students and provide them with some help in the script. This is to encourage and convince them and to gain confidence in practicing the langugage. As a language teacher, it is my duty to help and guide them to improve their knowledge in English........... :)