Spring 2011 Newsletter - Maidenhill School

6
MAIDENHILL NEWS: SPRING 2011
On Thursday 27th January
2011, 52 Year 7 and 8 students
and 5 adults went on a trip
to the Royal Shakespeare
Courtyard Theatre in Stratfordupon-Avon
to see the musical
“Matilda”.
My personal opinion is that
the “Matilda” musical was fantastic, and I also think that all
the actors were very talented, especially the children.
My favourite characters are Matilda and Miss Trunchbull.
“Matilda” is about a young girl named Matilda who is not
recognised or wanted by her parents but still she has to
suffer and stay with them. Matilda`s head teacher is Miss
Shakespeare
Shakespeare - There aren’t many people who don't
know the name of this brilliant man; extremely
successful, accomplished and a magnificent writer
of some of the world’s most captivating plays. Almost
500 years after his death, his name lives on, as well as
his inspirational works of wonder. He is still, to this
day, commended as one of the greatest poets, and the
world’s greatest writer in the English language.
In my Year 10 English set we study English Literature
as well as English Language. Consequently, we had a
big coursework project entirely focused on some of
Shakespeare's work, working towards a controlled
assessment at the end of the topic.
We had to look at two texts for the topic. These were
Shakespeare's famous 'Romeo and Juliet' and 'To His
Coy Mistress' by Andrew Marvell, for which we had
to analyse the structure and language. Both these are
written in the language of four hundred years ago
which is very different to modern day English language.
This made analysing the language very hard as some
quotations seemed very difficult to comprehend at first.
Trunchbull who is very mean, but her class teacher Miss
Honey is the very opposite to her - kind and understanding.
She realises that Matilda is by far the most intelligent girl
in her class and soon finds out about how she is treated.
She speaks to Miss Trunchbull who is not pleased.
Miss Honey got no sense out of her so went to Matilda’s
parents and asked if she could adopt Matilda. They agreed
and Matilda suffered no more.
The set was bright and colourful and had lots of detail
and the singing and dancing was brilliant. I found that the
play was great from the start and then got even better.
The film and book of Matilda are amazing but the play is
10,000 times better. The play is a lot more interesting when
you watch for yourself.
The theatre staff are very nice, there are plenty of seats
and the theatre is very clean. This play is great and for all
ages. It is very funny and it makes a great day out.
By Caprice McGovern 7ESM
However, once I became used to the style in which
Marvell and Shakespeare wrote, it began to become
easier.
The main point that we had to cover in the topic was
how the language in both texts is used to express and
show people in love. We had to carefully annotate and
analyse both texts trying to spot links and differences
in the language styles. We had to show the feelings
presented in both texts, and how the language expresses
these, and how it can make the reader or viewer feel.
What I enjoyed about the Shakespeare topic was that
it was challenging and had a high level of complexity
throughout the course. I found it very intriguing to get
to study such a masterpiece of English literature, which
was enjoyable to read and work with. It was interesting
to look at the structure of the play and see how
Shakespeare had intricately placed everything perfectly,
manipulating the language and delivering the emotions
with extreme perfection. It was fun to see what other
styles of language were shown in such an old play; it
was engaging and I enjoyed learning and analysing it.
The exam went very well, and I ended up doing better
than I initially thought, as it was a difficult project at first.
Shakespeare's works are magnificent and very deep,
mystical and exciting, I hope very much to work with
some more again.
By Matthew Harwood 10RCR