Westby Caspersen January 25, 2016
Hamlet Personal Essay
“Alexander died, Alexander was buried, Alexander returneth to dust; the dust is earth; of earth we make loam; and why of that loam whereto he was converted might they not stop a beer barrel? Imperious Caesar, dead and turned to clay, might stop a hole to keep wind away. O, that earth which kept the world in awe should patch a wall t’expel the winter’s flaw!” (5.1.216-223) What is the meaning of life? Awkwardly hunched over my heavy black laptop and fighting to stay awake, I realized that I had been intensely pondering this question. Instead of planting new words and ideas on the page, my cursor rhythmically blinked against a white background, below a forest of words. I had been …show more content…
I had hammered in the last nail of my construction project, but it was not a victory, rather the opposite. My house of words and sentences was decrepit and looked as if it could crumble from a soft tap. I did not feel like a triumphant engineer marveling at his masterpiece. Instead, I just felt some relief that I could try to go to bed if my nagging questions would allow me to. I angrily slammed my laptop shut, and, after some difficulty, hoisted my tired body up and out of the red chair which seemed to be glued to my back. My books felt like weights beneath my left arm. I sluggishly made my way over to the door, put my hand on a cold silver handle, and deserted the solace of the common room. I was already halfway up the flight of stairs owing to the common room’s elevation, but I didn’t want to finish journey. Each step represented a new obstacle: a hard test, a bad day, or a tough loss. I had already climbed my way through third form and most of fourth, but the metaphorical steps ahead looked too imposing for me. I was already so worn out, and the notion that there more than a flight of challenges remained was too much for me to bear. I plodded up the steel steps, yet the figurative step ahead of me seemed more like an endless wall. There was no way around it, and, no matter how hard I looked, I could not see the
Hamlet Personal Essay
“Alexander died, Alexander was buried, Alexander returneth to dust; the dust is earth; of earth we make loam; and why of that loam whereto he was converted might they not stop a beer barrel? Imperious Caesar, dead and turned to clay, might stop a hole to keep wind away. O, that earth which kept the world in awe should patch a wall t’expel the winter’s flaw!” (5.1.216-223) What is the meaning of life? Awkwardly hunched over my heavy black laptop and fighting to stay awake, I realized that I had been intensely pondering this question. Instead of planting new words and ideas on the page, my cursor rhythmically blinked against a white background, below a forest of words. I had been …show more content…
I had hammered in the last nail of my construction project, but it was not a victory, rather the opposite. My house of words and sentences was decrepit and looked as if it could crumble from a soft tap. I did not feel like a triumphant engineer marveling at his masterpiece. Instead, I just felt some relief that I could try to go to bed if my nagging questions would allow me to. I angrily slammed my laptop shut, and, after some difficulty, hoisted my tired body up and out of the red chair which seemed to be glued to my back. My books felt like weights beneath my left arm. I sluggishly made my way over to the door, put my hand on a cold silver handle, and deserted the solace of the common room. I was already halfway up the flight of stairs owing to the common room’s elevation, but I didn’t want to finish journey. Each step represented a new obstacle: a hard test, a bad day, or a tough loss. I had already climbed my way through third form and most of fourth, but the metaphorical steps ahead looked too imposing for me. I was already so worn out, and the notion that there more than a flight of challenges remained was too much for me to bear. I plodded up the steel steps, yet the figurative step ahead of me seemed more like an endless wall. There was no way around it, and, no matter how hard I looked, I could not see the