YOG Shooting

The determination of the athletes. The look on their sweaty, exhausted faces at the final, deciding stages of the competition. The shouts that arise from the arena(well, at least for sports like taekwondo and table tennis, in which loud sounds are allowed to express yourself). These expressions will never be forgotten by many people in Singapore.
Whilst this spirit of determination and never-say-die attitude is definitely commendable, there is a topic which I want to raise today. It might seem insignificant to spectators, but to competitors of this sport, the stress that they go through is immense.
The sport in question is the sport which I practice, Shooting. More specifically, the category of air weapons. It is a YOG sport, but one that is not very much publicised. Spectators would much rather go and watch other sports which appear to have a tenser atmosphere. However, in Shooting, the silence of the range is only broken by shots by the weapons of the competitors. The silence is deceiving, and hides the tense, quietly crackly electric atmosphere in the range. Shooters have been trained to maintain their calm in periods of this kind of stress, but occasionally we see that competitors hang their heads and try to control their ragged breathing, which results from the mental stress that the shooter faces. The camera catches these details, but the spectators always seem to fail these little details that are only a subtle sign of the tense atmosphere in the range.
Shooters who sit down and silently get themselves mentally prepared for their next shots are deemed to weak by spectators to even stand for more than 2 minutes to take around 3 shots. However, more often than not, spectators seem to think that 3 shots wouldn't make a difference among the 60 competition shots that make up the score for the competitor. Only at the end of the competition do spectators appreciate how one or two points separate the first and second places in the competition. But by then, most of the spectators have wandered out of the range in boredom because of the lack of what they see as "suspense" in other kinds of sports.
No shouts come from the mouths of the shooters when they finish a shot. Their faces remain impassive when they finish a shot, but internally, turmoil is raised when they make a mistake on the last shot, and the only sign is when they take a break, click open the gun cock, open the gun chamber and take in a few deep breaths. A loud sound made intentionally would disqualify you from the range, hence the deafening silence in the range has a profound meaning in it. It builds up the stress in the shooters, while giving them no way of relieving it, but the same silence also keeps the spectators oblivious to the amount of stress the competitors are under.
Only small smiles light up the winners' faces or looks of disappointment fall across the under performers at the end of the day.
And how do I know all this? Because I go through it in training everyday.

MOV-Parent-Child Relationship

This is also one of the important themes in the MOV text. The theme of Parent-Child relationships are seen in two different situations, one with Portia and her father, the second with Shylock and Jessica. In the play, this theme is considered a sub-theme of love, the other being romance.

So, in the Father-Portia relationship, Portia’s father is a paternalistic and controlling figure. He comes up with the plan of choosing Portia’s bridegroom through the choice of 3 caskets just before he dies. These caskets can be seen as a way to protect his daughter from the greed and duplicity of the world, for the casket which the person chooses depicts his inward nature. It also protects Portia from her innate xenophobia of the outside world, which is obvious as Belmont, her hometown, is an idealistic world in Shakespeare’s play which is removed from the ruthlessness of the outside world. The caskets are also a way to ensure that that Portia’s spouse will value everything about Portia, not just her inherited wealth and beauty. This can also be seen as a subtle way of expressing his doubts about Portia’s choice of a good husband. On Portia’s side, however, she is seen to be a person of integrity, honour, dignity, self-restraint and discipline as although she is very tempted to give hints to Bassanio on the correct casket to choose, she controls herself and respects her father’s last wishes, a sign of filial piety in a way, too.

On the other hand, in the Shylock-Jessica relationship, it is actually a greed-compelled relationship as Shylock treats Jessica as an asset or belonging. He keeps her imprisoned in her house so that she will have no Christian suitors, on account of her exceptional beauty which Lorenzo fell for. He also does not seem to trust Jessica, much less show any love for her as a father. This can be seen because Shylock shows that he cares more for his money than his own flesh and blood which reflects his greedy personality when Jessica elopes with Lorenzo. It is also seen when he takes the perspectives of a moneylender first then a father, as he laments about his lost money, then his lost daughter. He prioritises his wealth before his daughter as can be seen in this quote:” O my ducats! O my daughter!” because he actually mentions the money that his daughter and Lorenzo took away before he laments his missing daughter, which subtly shows his inward priorities. As for Jessica, when she elopes with Lorenzo, she takes it as a fortune to escape her fate as there is no love, and worse, a lack of trust between her and her father.

Comparing between the Father-Portia relationship and the Shylock-Jessica relationship, there is actually quite a bit of juxtaposition. The former has the physical distance of death but spiritual proximity, while the latter has physical proximity but spiritual distance. This is because of the mutual feelings present in the Father-Portia relationship whereas there are only false pretences in the latter, and even that is not present sometimes. In the former, we see respect and trust in the form of Portia’s filial piety while there is only disrespect and distrust in the latter. This might be because Shylock does not endear to his daughter and hence Jessica does not fell love. Without this passionate feeling, Jessica thus does not know how to reciprocate. Furthermore, Shylock treats Jessica as an asset and objectifies her, thus Jessica is also has no obligation to love her father.

Obviously many might think that Shylock here is really cold and is definitely not a father figure. However, this can be disputed because after Jessica elopes, Shylock spends a lot of money in a desperate search for his daughter. The fact that he is willing to spend his wealth, the capital for his business, shows his possibly hidden affection for his daughter, and also a change in his priorities. Then again, Shakespeare might also have been trying to mean that Shylock merely wanted to find Jessica to get his ducats back, which she took when she eloped with Lorenzo. Through this, we can then see that Shakespeare was actually probably trying to discredit Shylock for being a bad father.

MOV-Prejudice

Today I’ll be talking about Prejudice, one of the themes in the book. There are many different kinds of prejudice in the text of MOV, but the most prominent and dominant form that we can see Is religious prejudice. Other kinds of prejudice would be gender prejudice and racial prejudice, which I will touch on later.

So the most dominant religion in England in those times was Protestantism. Why was this so? Basically, it was because Queen Elizabeth I, who was ruling the country at that time, was a Protestant. Since the ruling class was second only to God, thus many people then were also Protestants.

Jews of this Elizabethan era were also associated with the devil as they were believed to worship the devil. A stereotype of them would be swarthy people with hooked noses. They were usually moneylenders or pedlars as their jobs were restricted by law. They even had to outwardly conform to Christians and their religious practices could only be conducted in utmost secrecy. Lastly, they were also depicted as egotistic, evil, cruel and greedy people.

Since the play is set in Venice, I’ll talk more about the Venetians’ attitudes towards Jews. They had to wear red hats for identification purposes when they stepped out of home. This can be seen as a form of segregation. If the Jews did not follow this rule, they would suffer capital punishment.

However, we can also view the Christians from Shylock’s point of view. Seeing that Shylock is the only Jew in the story who takes a major role, we can assume that he represents the Jewish community in this era in England. Shylock discriminates Christians also for their religion, but in the text, Shakespeare portrays him as a devil who wants revenge against Christians. However, there is an explanation for this. Seeing as Jews are the minority in this era, they are most naturally(as people then thought) on the receiving end of the Christians’ prejudice. Thus, we can see that Shylock is on the receiving end of all of this prejudice and therefore he resents the Christians. Also, he hates anyone that prevents him from making money, thus we can see that he is very materialistic. A few examples of how people prevent him from making money is when Antonio brings down the interest rate by lending money at no interest. This is also one of his reasons for revenge, as we can see later. At the end of the book, however, we can see a change in his priorities when he forgoes great monetary gain for Antonio’s pound of flesh, thus we can see that his need for revenge outweighs his greed.

Antonio, on the other hand, a devout and self-respecting Christian, looks down on Jews. He also readily flames Shylock for his practice of usury, which is to lend money at very high interest rates, not unlike loan sharks of today. He is also very arrogant as can be seen from his attitude towards Jews and is noble and proud when it came to accepting the punishment when he broke the bond between him and Shylock.

So, for this theme, the class also discussed whether Shylock’s revenge was justified(even though it never came to pass). From the text, we can see that Shylock hates Antonio because of Antonio’s religion, which we discussed just now and for threatening his livelihood when he brings down the interest rate. So, is his revenge justified? Well, let’s list out the points and see where we get to.

Antonio hates Jews and therefore Shylock, and since we can see the mutual hate here, we can say that Shylock’s revenge is then justified. Also, Antonio is a Christian and Christians discriminated against Jews, thus Shylock also had a justified reason for revenge against Antonio for the Christians’ treatment. Antonio himself even publicly humiliated Shylock before, spitting on his garments and calling him a “dog”, so Shylock also has a reason for revenge in this case. Another point to note is that Antonio lent money without interest and brought down the interest rate in Venice, thus hindering Shylock from earning money and threatening his livelihood. On these grounds, Shylock has justified reasons for wanting revenge on Antonio. However, Shylock himself is also guilty of discrimination against Christians and Antonio, hence this reason that he gives for his revenge when he plans for vengeance is not justified.

Okay, so here we take a break from religious prejudice and turn our attention to gender and racial prejudice. Gender prejudice was very rampant in the Elizabethan era, where men were much greater than women and women were limited on what they could achieve. So we’ll look at a great example of challenging gender prejudice in the play. She is….Portia, Bassanio’s beloved. Although she follows her father’s last wishes like a good daughter and promises to marry the suitor who chooses the right casket containing her portrait, she disguises herself as a man to enter the courthouse to fight the case for Antonio. Here, an analysis on the surface would tell us that she accepts male dominance, but to a deeper level, we can see that she challenges male dominance within the norms as she does not openly enter the court as a woman, but mocks the men for entering the courthouse as a disguised woman, and winning the case!

Racial prejudice is only seen subtly in the text as the only indication of it is that Portia shows her distaste for Moors, who are black-skinned when she hopes that everyone of the same skin as the Prince of Morocco fails to choose the right casket and get to marry her.

After gathering all the evidence, we can actually see that the play is set in such a situation where the majority discriminates against the minority. We can also see the timeless nature of Shakespeare’s play, which makes him such a good playwright, because this discrimination is astoundingly still present in today’s society.

Merchant of Venice

Hello guys! So how did you like my joke? I spent a whole month laughing about it, so I didn't have time to post the next blog post!
Ok, just kidding, it was because of exam preparation that I didn't post another blog post. But I'm back!
So recently we're studying Shakespeare's play, "Merchant of Venice"(in your face Strand 2 people!), and I think that posting what I've collated from the lessons on the text would help with my revision, and of course to let you guys know what "Merchant of Venice"(MOV for short) is about. So look out for my MOV blog posts to know more about the Shakespearean play!
To let you know about the gist of the play, I'll first be posting on the three main plots of the text.

They are the Casket plot, Pound of Flesh plot and the Ring plot.

So, in the casket plot, it starts out in Venice, where Bassanio pours out his heart and says that he wants to marry Portia. The two other suitors to Portia, the Prince of Morocco and Prince of Arragorn also come to Belmont, Portia’s hometown in search of her hand in marriage. Bassanio has to borrow money from Antonio, but Antonio has put all his wealth on 3 ships at sea, thus he offers his credit to Bassanio to borrow money from moneylenders in Venice. This gives rise to the Pound of Flesh plot. After getting the money, we move to Belmont, where these are the conditions:

(1) One of the three caskets, gold, silver and lead, have Portia’s portrait, and whoever chooses the casket that contains Portia’s casket marries Portia.

(2) However those who choose the wrong casket cannot marry again and stay a bachelor.

This plot ends when the Prince of Morocco and Prince of Arragorn choose the gold and silver casket and see a skull and fool in the caskets respectively. Bassanio chooses the lead casket, and of course beholds Portia’s portrait within. Bassanio then marries Portia and Nerissa, Portia’s assistant or handmaid, marries Gratiano who followed Bassanio to woo Portia. Thus ends the Casket plot.

Next comes the Pound of Flesh plot. Here, Shylock, a Jewish moneylender whom Bassanio goes to is willing to lend money to Bassanio. However, his ulterior motive is seen when he does not charge interest but wants a pound of Antonio’s flesh should he not be able to repay the loan by the stipulated time of 3 months. Antonio agrees very willingly as his ships come back to port 2 months before the date, and thus there is ample time to return the money. However, things turn out badly and the ships don’t come back to port. When Shylock refuses Portia’s offer of 12 times the loan, she and Nerissa cross-dress in men’s clothes to enter the courthouse as Antonio’s lawyer and her assistant respectively. The reason for Shylock’s lack of mercy is because his only medium of revenge on Antonio and he is not protected by Christian Protestant mercy. In the end, Portia turns the law around to rear its head at Shylock when Shylock is dumbfounded by her logic of Shylock not being able to shed a drop of blood. Antonio is then saved from a grisly fate, while Shylock is charged with trying to take a Venetian citizen’s life. Shylock is spared the death sentence, but he is forced to give away 1/2 his money and convert to a Christian, an ultimate humiliation for an devout Jew like Shylock. Portia and Nerissa ask for the rings that they gave their husbands (they were present at the courthouse) as fees for the case. Bassanio and Gratiano have no choice but to give them up. Thus ends the Pound of Flesh plot, but this gives rise to the Ring plot.

Portia and Nerissa tease and chide their husbands back in Belmont when it is revealed to them that they were actually the lawyers to Antonio and give back their rings. The rings are a token of respect and companionship and a fusion of friendship and marriage. Portia and Nerissa took their husbands’ rings to teach them the value of marriage and to test them whether they would be faithful to them. It is also Portia’s way of vying for attention of Bassanio from an unknowing Antonio as it seems to her that Bassanio is devoting too much time to Antonio and regards Antonio as a threat or obstacle to their love. Thus then ends the Ring plot, which concludes the play after much festivity in Belmont.