As you review tonight, think about the reading strategies we used in class today: predicting, looking at the form and recalling the key aspects of the form to help you understand this sonnet, the age it was written in, the biography of the author--John Milton's Puritanism, predicting what the problem will be based on the pun in the title: "On His Blindness", predicting the solution, looking for key words or shifts in tone for the volta.
Other key strategies are not just recognizing literary techniques but taking pleasure and pride in knowing how effectively they are used.
Metonymy:
Puns:
Biblical allusions:
Personifying the virtue, Patience, and using dialogue for the entire sestet;
Understanding the power and brevity of metaphor
Making and re-making connections
Taking notes while others are talking and adding in your ideas
Asking questions to your partner, to yourself, to the class, to the teacher helps to clarify
Keeping key images in mind to remember the poem
Writing down key quotes and re-reading those notes weekly will keep the material fresh
Finally, creating an emotional connection to the work is the best way to retain it. We wrote about our own talents and our own faiths.
Read Samuel Pepys' diary. Post-it note vivid imagery. Come to Wednesday's class prepared to write a diary entry that records in vivid, sensory detail, your life!!
Keep studying all the works from first term.
