Metacognition: Jane Eyre Mash Up

            I wasn’t looking forward to this project.

            Admittedly, after reading the instructional page about the definition of a “mash-up”, I just wasn’t impressed. It was this vague concept that I didn’t understand and that I’d never heard of before. All I knew is that it seemed like a very complicated and time-consuming endeavor, and that I wasn’t excited to create one at all. What would I have gained after it was over? Even after it was fully explained to me and I was exposed to few example mash-ups I remained skeptical of its usefulness.

            Remember doing those cut-up magazine picture collages in kindergarten? Mash-ups are like the grown up version of that; except with less pictures and much more writing. Organized around a central theme, the goal is to pull different “elements” from as many different sources and influences as possible, before finally arranging them together so they flow like they were created by the same consciousness. Our assignment was to create one of these mash-ups focused around a concept in Jane Eyre; so my partner and I chose to investigate emotional and rational love. All my life I had been fully convinced that true love has nothing to do with rationality or reason. My opinion was that love is supposed to be senseless, because that’s what makes it so powerful. The idea of a rational type of love held no bearing with me, I would never fall in love based on logic, but it did present and interesting idea to explore.

            My partner and I were required to use at least eleven sources from within Jane Eyre to connect to our concepts. At first, I thought this was going to be a burdensome ordeal, and that any useful passages would be imprecise or difficult to connect to our concept; especially since working as a duo meant we needed even more evidence from within Jane Eyre than a single person would need. My partner was thought that we would find a lot of interesting ideas about the value of logical love; but I remained unconvinced. I thought it was a cute idea to find parts of Jane Eyre that talked about her love for different people, but I was by no means expecting to be influenced by it. This was a fictional story, not a scientific study or a testimonial, so how could it possibly convince me to change my mind about logical love? However, it wasn’t long before the pieces began to fall together.

            It was easy to find sections of Jane Eyre that related to rational and ones that related to logical love; in fact it wasn’t that hard to find passages that referred to BOTH. It was this observation that enlightened me to the possibility that rational and emotional love acted together, instead of as opposing forces. This was a revolutionary idea to me, as I had always been a believer in passionate true love that had nothing to do with logic. I went from being 100% convinced that love was irrational to actually seeing what a huge amount of influence logic had on even the most passionate of loves. I was surprised how easily I accepted this new revelation; and looking back, I think it’s because the mash-up was the perfect platform to provide the evidence that convinced me.

            Not only was I being shown the connection of logic and emotion through Jane Eyre, but I was also scouring the internet looking for more real-life connections, which were plentiful and convincing. For example, I found a picture of a mother tiger raising baby piglets. My initial thought was that this perfectly illustrated how irrational love was; how could a bloodthirsty, predatory tigress have motherly love for a defenseless piglet? However, upon further research, I discovered that the reason the mother tiger even had a chance to feel love for the piglets was because the piglets’ real mother had died and the zoo needed a replacement to raise the piglets. The mother tiger was actually fulfilling a very rational and necessary role in this situation as a mother to orphaned piglets. The real-life connection of logical and emotional loves had me stunned.

           At the end of this project, I realized that I have a critical flaw that I haven’t realized: I am stubborn. This was a surprise to me: I’ve never considered myself a stubborn person. I'm usually able to put my own convictions aside to look at things with an open mind, but I realize this is only when I am actively attempting to do so. When someone tells me to keep and open mind about an idea, I can usually do it; but what about all the times I never thought to do so? I've never considered that without thinking about it, I've developed and maintained certain stubborn viewpoints, but it can’t be denied that I went into this project fully convinced of logical love’s unimportance and left the project feeling the opposite. Not only that, but thinking back to it, before I even started the project I had been convinced that a mash-up was a confusing and useless assignment. I can guarantee now that I feel the exact opposite. This mash-up took me through an incredible thought process that managed to shift my convictions about one of the most important concepts on Earth: love. Next time I’ll remember this and how little I actually know about even the most important things around me, and I won’t need so much convincing next time to keep my mind open to controversial ideas.

A Midsummer Nights Dream: Thoughts

            Never in a million years would I have ever believed that a Shakespearean play would be able make me laugh. It’s not easy to amuse me, and I don’t laugh unless I’m genuinely amused by something. Usually, it takes something pretty witty, clever, and well delivered to  make me relinquish even a giggle.  

            My favorite kind of humor is the kind that’s relatable or extremely relevant. I’m always impressed by people who can observe what’s going on around them, and point out the things that everyone can connect with. My favorite comedians and entertainers are always able to point out experiences or moments around them that people don’t even notice day-to-day, like how everyone mumbles 90% of the lyrics to the “Ayyy Macarena” song, or how headphone cords always manage to tie themselves into the most complicated knots ever conceived as soon as you put them down. Otherwise, they comment on what’s current. Jokes about relevant celebrities or top news stories usually manage to get a laugh out of me.

            That’s why I had a hard time believing it when I started to chuckle in the middle of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream was told it was a comedy, I was unconvinced. Honestly, it just went against everything I believed in terms of comedy. How could I, who just explained how much I like relevant and relatable humor, possibly enjoy a play written in the 1500’s? What did Shakespeare have to say that was even remotely relevant to my life? Surprisingly, a lot.

            This play didn’t discuss current events or a shared experience (I’ve never been part of a love triangle), but kept my interest in a way that I can only explain by crediting the actors and directors of the play. This definitely wasn’t the play that Shakespeare originally had in mind; with the play troop dressed in a wardrobe from the 1920’s, and the fairies dressed in bright, tribal looking attire, the theme of the play was shifted. However, the script was not changed, and I believe the play captured the same essence that Shakespeare intended, which is thanks to the actors. If I had witnessed this play performed in the 1500’s by the first performers, I doubt I would have laughed nearly as hard as I had watching the one I did. Without altering the script, these actors and actresses managed to make a century’s old play feel familiar and current.

            The actor who gave a short introduction to the play beforehand advised the audience to pay close attention to the performers’ body language and facial expressions if we were ever confused by the dialogue. He was right; something about their facial expressions, their timing, and their delivery communicated Shakespeare’s message and intentions to me so clearly that it was almost like I had been transported to through time and learned to speak the language of Shakespeare. The words that usually confused me suddenly sounded like plain English and I was enjoying this play like I would a modern day performance, and actually maybe more so.  I’ll never doubt a Shakespeare play again, nor will I underestimate the value of talented and passionate performers.