Brutal Honesty

In reading the first part of Lucy, I was intrigued by her naivete and her bluntness, in both thoughts and actions. Though the old adage says "The truth shall set you free," in some cases, it doesn't need to be quite as harsh as Lucy reacts to her new 'family' in the city. One scene that struck me was the daffodil scene when Mariah takes Lucy to her favorite spot in the spring. Though Lucy is taken aback by the sight before her, when she hears the flowers are daffodils, she is disgusted and offended that Mariah would even think to bring her there. Her frustration stems from her feelings over the poem she had to memorize about the flowers when she was younger. I'm not sure how I would react to that kind of situation, but with my generally optimistic attitude, I would venture a guess that I would not have acted like Lucy. What do you think? Was she justified in her anger? Or was she overreacting? Do you feel it might have reminded her of her past and upset her because she was feeling homesick?

Knickknacks or rubbish?

After reading "Interpreter of Maladies" by Jhumpa Lahiri, I am reminded of all the little knickknacks that have collected over the years on shelves, in drawers, and under my bed that would serve as clues to the person I am. For instance, my square piece of "wall" from my junior year musical signed by my fellow cast mates and the "Break a Leg" teddy bear key chain that I had received from a teacher for a performance of that show. Along with that are miscellaneous others like a tiny 3-D manger scene, a ballerina figurine, a "ring box" which actually contains a wooden ladybug- these all speak to pieces of me and moments in my past. I could tell you stories about each of the objects aforementioned, but I won't get into that here. And though they all have these back stories, they really don't serve any purpose but to be displayed somewhere. When it's all said and done, these are things that will most likely be tossed during spring cleaning or when I finally move out of my parents' house this summer, but I am wondering to myself now- why did I keep them so long in the first place?

Do you have a lot of knickknacks or are you a minimalist? Would you be a Twinkle or a Sanjeev if you were to come across another person's abandoned mementos? I'd be a Sanjeev, though I'd have a little more compassion and understanding- I definitely wouldn't take a hammer to a Buddha statue but I wouldn't put him on my mantle either.

Is it OK to shake up Shakespeare?

If someone were to ask me to name my favorite playwright, I would say Oscar Wilde in a heartbeat. But if that same person were to ask for one of my favorite movies, I'd just as quickly same "10 Things I Hate About You"... and since I watch movies more frequently than I go to the theater, should I give Shakespeare some credit for one of my top ten movies?

There is no doubt that Shakespeare is one of the most influential writers who transcends hundreds of years and is still studied in classrooms worldwide. However, I am not one to cozy up with one of his plays for a long read unless it is for a class- it's just not my style. (More power to those of you who do this!) But I love his stories and the many adaptations of them- like "10 Things I Hate About You" and the musical, "Kiss Me, Kate." For me, it has more to do with the kind of characters and the way they develop over the course of events and less to do with the use of iambic pentameter and rhyme. Unlike this number from "Kiss Me, Kate" suggests, not all girls would be impressed with a guy who brushed up his Shakespeare...

What do you think? Do you feel like modern day adaptations do justice to the timeless work of Shakespeare or not? Do you prefer the classic performances as they looked in his time or the modern performances which take liberties with altering the script?