Metacognition: Jane Eyre Mashup

Let me start off by saying this: the Mashup was different than any assignment I've done in the past. And for that reason, my thought process and the way my mind worked were a new experience as well. When the project was first assigned, I was unsure as to whether I would be able to create a product like the example I had seen. I had no idea how so many different elements could flow and come together to form one developing idea.

I worked with Shea in a duo. We started off by collecting all of our elements. We chose individualism as our topic, so at first, we only searched for sources with individualism in mind. We weren't quite sure which direction we wanted to go in regarding individualism, but we assumed that our elements would fall into place eventually. After finding all of our elements, we began attempting to piece them together, trying to form a new, deeper thought in the process. The first few elements we used fit together surprisingly well; needless to say, we both cheered and danced around when we thought that the project would be easier to complete than we had been expecting. After placing four or five of the elements, however, we got stuck. We started to realize that we needed to clearly define our claim, and once we did that, we discovered that some of the sources that we had found didn't fit well anymore. This was definitely frustrating, since we had to take somewhat of a step backward. But after we added a clear focus, it became much easier to put the pieces together, since we weren't just aimlessly putting random elements into place.

We had to put 37 elements together. That's a lot of elements. After about 20 of those elements, we got stuck again. We worried that we were starting to stray from our focus, and started to question some of earlier work. Every time we tried to add on another piece, it wouldn't feel right, so we would erase it and try again. We went through this process several times until we finally figured out where we wanted to go next. Suddenly the rest of our ideas started to mend together, which felt extremely rewarding. After multiple days of work, countless frustrations, and plenty of spontaneous outbursts of joy, we had finished putting our project together. Both Shea and I let out a huge sigh of relief. We made plenty of edits after that, mostly on our commentary. The commentary was actually one of the more difficult parts of the mashup, because it often felt like it was disrupting the flow of the other elements. We worked hard to prevent these disruptions from happening, and after we finished those edits, we were finally done.

This mashup honestly felt like a final. There were so many different components that went into it, and at some points, it felt impossible to put them all together. Although there were plenty of mind blocks and moments where my brain just wanted to shut down altogether, in the end, it was pretty cool to read the whole mashup, especially at the parts where one part flowed perfectly into the next.  It was fascinating to see how my mind managed to connect so many different elements.

A Midsummer Night's Dream

Let me start off by saying that I thought the Chicago Shakespeare Theater did an amazing job with A Midsummer Night's Dream. I have seen other productions done at the same theatre (most recently, Macbeth and A Comedy of Errors), and this was the first production that I was able to fully understand. When we saw Macbeth as a class last year, I spent half of the show staring intently at the actors to try to figure out what was going on, and the other half gazing aimlessly at the scenery and at my classmates. I walked out of  that theatre knowing no more of Macbeth's plotline than I had known walking in.

When we went to see A Midsummer Night's Dream, I assumed that the experience would unfold in the same way, and that I would end up feeling just as flustered as I had the year before. I had no idea what the plot was about. I heard someone on the bus mention something about fairies, but that was about all I knew. But once the production started, instead of worrying about the language or the confusing plot, I found myself enjoying the story and laughing at 400-year-old jokes. One thing I enjoyed about this show was that it was so different from most of the Shakespearean plays I had read and viewed in the past. Most of the stories that I had had experiences with before ended tragically, with half of the characters either dead or gone completely mad. Several of his plays are pretty heavy, and aren't extremely enjoyable. This story, however, was light and humorous. I laughed at all of the chaos caused by that scheming little fairy, Puck. (Also, I just have to mention that I spent a good amount of time during the first act trying to figure out if Puck was a lady fairy or a man fairy. I honestly wasn't sure until I looked in the playbill and found out that the actor's name was "Elizabeth." It really didn't take away from the story, and she was a great actress, but it did distract me...just a little bit.)

I loved how the last few lines between that man and that woman subtly tied together the whole show. I'm not sure if it's how the story is supposed to end, but the fact that they were the fairies was pretty brilliant, in my opinion. The story could've ended without that being mentioned and it all still would have made perfect sense, but I thought it added another layer into the story, changing the way you thought about the whole story using just a couple of lines.

Altogether, I truly enjoyed the Chicago Shakespeare Theater's production of A Midsummer Night's Dream. The set was subtle but certainly enough for the show, the actors were all great, the costumes were beautiful (I loved Titania's hair), and the story provided a perfect mix of laughs and not-too-sappy romance. I loved seeing one of Shakespeare's plays that contrasted so greatly with what I had seen in the past.