For this blog post, I went to the event downtown to watch the Measure by Measure play by William Shakespeare with my classmate Joey. During this play, it fantasized a time period decades ago from now where law was strict, and Dukes were present. The characters in this play were very different but started with a brother and sister named Claudio and Isabella who were ordinary citizens. They were interrupted by the absence of the Duke for which Angelo filled his role in vacancy. During this time, laws were strict, but Angelo made sure they were tightly managed and stricter. By doing things out of his power, he made sure that the people of the town would listen to him. There were shenanigans going on with Claudio as he was permitted to have sex with his engaged wife Juliet, but due to the absence of the Duke, Angelo took action and arrested him. While this was going on, Isabella was willing to do everything in her power to free her brother. For which Angelo tried seducing her into having sex with her, so that her brother would be freed. Even though the power-seeking leader at the time, Angelo was doing such wrong deeds currently and before in his life, he was not holding back any of his own sexual needs. Isabella declined this sexual intervention due to the fact of her own virtuous characteristics. While this was on the table, Angelo was still in the mix with his previous engagement with Mariana up until he abandoned her because of money. While lawful issues are going down there are ideas going around that Mariana will take Isabella’s place to have sex with Angelo as well as Claudio being granted pardon. This isn’t granted of course by Angelo, and instead he sends a fake dead head of Claudio to Isabella for which she thinks her brother is deceased. As the play goes on, the Duke finally returns and talks to Isabella as to what has been going on in the time of his absence for which he resolves many problems. He shows his true colors and the truth comes out from him and Angelo. Isabella and the Duke fall in love and get married, while her brother, Claudio is finally set free. Ultimately, this story had a happy ending where most characters were freed from sin and are in good conditions of survival.
While in this play, we have a happy ending, from our previous book we read Date and Time, most of the poems inside of it ended in sad and depressing closures. They had similar plots in a way where they both talked about relationships and how to make them survive. Where in Date & Time it mainly talked about maintaining contact with relationships and how it doesn’t matter the order of a story because it’ll still be a good story to tell. In contrast with Measure by Measure it mainly was the dishonesty of one character endangering the people of his town until the hero Duke returns to save the life of his future wife’s brother. Overall, our previous book had many sad endings, but still made it a good book to read as for the event we went to have a happy ending and was also a good story and plot well put together. To sum everything up from these past few weeks, all books are made to be great, but to the extent of whether it is a happy or sad ending varies.
My final reaction to the play made me realize that visualizing such emotion and actions in person is much more influential than reading words on a paperback. Even though authors can write strong words to portray strong emotions, it doesn’t hit the same as actually seeing someone in person go through the hardships or decisions in person. I look forward to doing more of these events as they have an impact on me and help me understand literature to a greater extent.
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