black cherry + animal burger = STOCKYARDS.

Hey there Gluttonous Torontonians! If you haven't checked out Stockyards on St Clair yet, then go! Right now!

They have a multitude of delicious things from slow cooked, smoked ribs to apple hickory smoked pulled pork sandwiches, to donuts dipped in chopped, deep-fried bacon. They also have a grilled cheese (for all you veggies out there)

I had the Animal Burger, on special. It was the fatkid, homestyle version of a Big Mac. Two fresh ground beef patties, cheese, sauteed onions, pickle, special sauce, fresh boston lettuce, and fresh buns. Served in a cast-iron skillet, it looks rustic and intense. Melt-in-your-mouth awesomeness. Case in point, I was too entranced to take a picture before eating, so you'll just have to check it out yourselves!

www.thestockyards.ca/NEWHOME.html

ACADEMIC WRITING SAMPLE: Reconstructing gender, Elizabethan Theatre

"RECONTEXTUALIZING MODERN NOTIONS OF GENDER IN SHAKESPEARE'S TAMING OF THE SHREW"
by Blair Kay, 2009

Mounting a modern interpretation of any of Shakespeare’s plays is almost impossible without an informed investigation of the cultural-historical world that Shakespeare was writing in and performing to. Like Shakespeare’s other “problem plays” that modern ‘-ism’s have assaulted (anti-Semitism in The Merchant of Venice and racism in The Tempest) the strong waves of feminism have tainted any attempt to read The Taming of the Shrew outside of its gender politics (Pearson 229). The original socio-cultural framework of the relationship between Shakespeare’s Petruchio and Katherine in The Taming of the Shrew is nearly impossible to translate. By approaching the text in its historical context, The Taming of the Shrew can be read not as a misogynist play that solely enforces patriarchal structures, but rather one that also reconstructs gender roles through rhetoric and physical performance.

Perhaps the most important and impressive facts to consider when contextualizing The Taming of the Shrew are the sixteenth and seventeenth century socially-accepted methods of controlling “shrews” or “scolds”. Lynda Boose sheds light on the various common methods of punishments that “scolds” (defined as “troublesome and angry women”) would receive for “break[ing] the publick Peace” (Boose 186). The most common method of punishment was "ducking" , which required the shrew / scold to sit on a chair attached to a lever, and then subsequently be dunked into the river (187). A common form of controlling a woman was with a bridle: a gag made of iron between 1½-3 inches would firmly suppress the unruly female’s tongue (209). The gag was attached to a headpiece and a long chain, with which her husband could control her movement. Some bridles had nails protruding from the top and bottom, thus any swift movement would cause lacerations (209).

17th century drawing of a woman being subjected to the ducking stool.

Although Petruchio employs shaming techniques by publicly humiliating Katherine throughout the text, his greatest lengths to physically abuse or punish her are merely depriving her of food and rest; acts which are pale in comparison to other forms of punishment during the Elizabethan period. It is important to note that although brutal punishment was acceptable in Elizabethan culture (however only administered within the public sphere) Shakespeare’s text excludes physical torture, and purports a non-violent solution (Detmer 275). Petruchio even invokes the audience to challenge his taming method at the end of 4.1 as he asks: “He that knows better how to tame a shrew, / Now let him speak” (4.1.204-05). The lines purport Petruchio’s rightness for using rhetorical shaming and non-violent means, while asserting his power within the Elizabethan social hierarchy.

Although the script enforces the patriarchal power structure, it simultaneously critiques traditional gender roles through its theatricality. Katherine is given the last substantial speech of the play. Although she adopts a new doctrine by receding into marital subservience, she is given the opportunity to articulate an argument, specifically, the closing argument. Before the speech, Katherine has responded rashly as the stereotypical shrew; however, the Elizabethan audience may revel in her final speech, because her submission represents the restoration of the highly valued patriarchal order (Khan 88). Moreover, the text serves to positively transform the stereotypical image of the shrew from an “old, usually poor woman or a nagging wife”, to “the newly romanticized vision of a beautiful, rich, and spirited young woman” (Boose 198).

Petruchio’s previously mentioned invocation to the audience and Katherine’s final speech both serve to incorporate the audience into a discourse of gender. Katherine uses various arguments to sway both men and women in the audience to accept her new fate. Katherine appeals to the audience in different ways. Her multiple references to submitting to a ruling “lord” appeal to the universally accepted relationship between individual, God and monarch (5.2.138, 146, 160). The repetition emphasizes how her transformation from shrew to wife extends outside of the husband-wife relationship, and by using direct address and examples with which the Elizabethan audience would identify, she includes the audience in a gendered discourse. However, her references to governing bodies are all masculine, which is troublesome as it denies the presence of Elizabeth I as reigning monarch. There is an interesting parallel between Katherine’s speech and the rhetorical structure that Elizabeth I uses in her “Golden Speech” (Elizabeth I 1093). As Queen Elizabeth I often did with her male members of parliament, Katherine employs a conventionally acceptable gender argument, purporting the physical and emotional “weak”ness of females, so as to not jeopardize the patriarchy (5.2.166).

Unlike modern realistic portrayals of Shakespeare's plays, the Elizabethan actor “did not strive to be a fictitious person, but himself under fictitious circumstances” (Kelly 82). As the original actor, Alexander Cooke, gave Katherine’s final speech, he must have injected his own intentions into the lines. By referring to his male body which portrays the “soft” female, the speech discreetly touches on the powerless position that boy actors held in Elizabethan society, as well as the fact that a male dressing as a female transgresses socially accepted gender boundaries (165). Thus Katherine’s political references to her “lord” also become that of the marginalized boy actor, and is not restricted to the female gender. Moreover, the argument that shrewishness jeopardizes one’s “fame” may refer to the male actor's reception by various authorities: the public, the patriarchal elite, or Queen Elizabeth I (136 - 140).

The physical translation from text to stage creates problems for feminist readings of the play. Katherine implores her fellow females to “place your hands below your husband’s foot”, and although there is no stage direction, it is implied (5.2.157). However degrading it may seem to a modern audience, prostrating was common practice the sixteenth century; the new wife would seal the marriage and a dowry of land by kissing her husband’s foot (Kelly 182). The act of Katherine physically lowering herself to the floor while onstage is symbolic of publicly resigning herself to the hierarchy; moreover, by rising up from that position, it marks her final transition into maturation, from shrewish girl to obedient woman (182).

The Taming of A Shrew, a similar but wholly different version of The Taming of the Shrew presents elements which are interesting within both feminist and gender discourses of the play. Although one might argue that Katherine has been tamed and has little power at the end of the play, by having the last large speech (the lasting word), she is structurally the most powerful character in the play. However, in A Shrew, the play ends with a drunken Christopher Sly getting his due from his untamable wife. A Shrew’s ending turns the play into a comedy, thereby negating the triumph for the Petruchio and the patriarchy, as well the urgency of Katherine’s final address to her female audience (Alexander 111).

When explored in both its historical and performative contexts, The Taming of the Shrew can be read as a script which establishes the necessary patriarchal structures of the Elizabethan period, while simultaneously reconstructing notions of gender. It is difficult to aptly mount and interpret The Taming of the Shrew in a contemporary context, because of how much has changed over the past fifty years, let alone four centuries. However, with a more informed reading, the play can be appreciated as a historical and dramatic document.

Works Cited

Alexander, Peter. “The Original Ending of The Taming of the Shrew.” Shakespeare Quarterly. 20.2 (1969): 111-116.

Boose, Lynda E. “Scolding Brides and Bridling Scolds: Taming the Woman's Unruly Member.” Shakespeare Quarterly. 42.2 (1991): 179-213.

Detmer, Emily. “Civilizing Subordination: Domestic Violence and The Taming of the Shrew.” Shakespeare Quarterly. 48.3 (1997): 273-29.

Elizabeth I. “Elizabeth I, 1533-1603”. Longman Anthology of British Literature. Vol 1B, 2nd Edition. Addison-Wesley Educational Publishers. 2003.

Kelly, Katherine E. “The Queen's Two Bodies: Shakespeare's Boy Actress in Breeches.” Theatre Journal. 42.1 (1990): 81-93.

Kahn, Coppélia. “"The Taming of the Shrew": Shakespeare's Mirror of Marriage.” Modern Language Studies. 5.1 (1975): 88-102.

Pearson, Velvet D. “In Search of a Liberated Kate in ‘The Taming of the Shrew.’” Rocky Mountain Review of Language and Literature. 44.4 (1990): 229-242.

Shakespeare, William. The Taming of the Shrew. Signet Classic: New York, 1998.

(Close reading for ENGL*3170, Elizabethan Literary Culture, for Marianne Micros, written March 2009.)

Voice Demo Reel!

Know anyone who needs a voiceover actor? Just, just call me. Or email, I'm not picky. Either way, I love creating character voices, so if you just want someone to entertain you over coffee or an evening, I can do that too ^_^

3.6.5. the second time round

Well internet, it's been a while. I thought I'd share with you some of what's been happening recently - creative self portraiture in the world of Blair. Check out the latest postings of my daily photo project http://www.flickr.com/photos/15930470@N03/ 

  Enjoy!

ACADEMIC WRITING: Death and the King's Horseman

"UNIVERSALITY, AUDIENCE AND AUTHOR
IN DEATH AND THE KING’S HORSEMAN"
by Blair Kay, 2008

Death and the King’s Horseman is a play based on actual events in 1946 Nigeria under British occupation. The story chronicles an interrupted act of ritual suicide in the Yoruba tribe in Nigeria. The structure of the play indicates the author, Wole Soyinka’s desire to centre the play on indigenous characters and mourning; not to be interpreted solely in a colonial context, as stated in the author’s note. By preceding the play with the author’s note, Soyinka frames his work in his own terms and simultaneously addresses the problematic postcolonial discourse of universality, readership and authorship in literature.

Soyinka cautions the reader that the story should not be classified as a “clash of cultures”, a label he deems as “prejudicial” but from a “reductionist tendency” (Soyinka 5). He asserts that this label “presupposes a potential equality in every given situation of the alien culture and the indigenous” (italics given 5). Postcolonial theorist and teacher of literature, Charles Larson, expands on this idea of pejorative categorization of texts in his essay, “Heroic Ethnocentrism”. Larson presents and denies the validity of the term ‘universality’ when concerned with literature read by a foreign audience (specifically African literature read by a Western audience), as he attests that “culture shapes our interpretations of literature” (Larson 78). He asserts that because “each of us was born into an ethnocentrically sealed world”, we cannot understand slight or dramatic cultural nuances that lie outside of our own culture and experience (79). For example, in the final act of Death and the King’s Horseman, the dialogue between the British officer, Simon Pilkings, and the indigenous “mother of the market”, Iyaloja, aptly illustrates the cultural divide:

PILKINGS: Alright. I am trying to make things easy
but if you must bring in politics we’ll have to do it the hard way . . .
IYALOJA: How boldly the lizard struts before the pigeon
when it was the eagle itself he promised us he would confront (Soyinka 67)

In Larson’s universal view, a Western reader might identify and empathize with the British character, Pilkings, because he speaks literally and rationally in his Western cultural idiom, whereas the indigenous character, Iyaloja, seems inaccessible to the Western reader, as she speaks in grand metaphors and images, typical of her cultural morays. However, Soyinka structures the story so that the indigenous characters begin and end the journey which the audience experiences through the play. Even the title of the play illustrates the importance of ‘death’, mourning and ritual. Moreover, the author’s note acts as a cautionary preface to the text, and dictates that the play should not be read from a ‘universal’ perspective, but one focused on “the universe of the Yoruba mind” (6).

Reading in the ‘universal’ perspective creates an unfortunate detachment between what Soyinka has written and what is available to be absorbed by the Western reader. This detachment is a symptom of the academic process by which some readers examine the text. For example, the usual task of a university student who studies literature is to uncover themes and rhetorical devices, ultimately to help form an argument on the given text. However, Soyinka directs his author’s note to the “would-be-producer” of his play, thus intending the play for dramatization, rather than solely academic analysis. The mere inclusion of the author’s note negates a presupposition with the Western reader, and intentionally denies the reader any authority on understanding a foreign event, such as ritual suicide in the play. As Larson suggests, the student is thus limited in fully understanding the themes which she simply assumes to be important, such as the experience of a tribal community or participation in ritual suicide. She is left however, to draw on her own academic background to extract the liberal or ‘universal’ ideals, such as the need to preserve tradition, religion, cultural practice, and beliefs, with which she identifies due to her own unique Western cultural experience. In this respect, by cautioning against “reductionist tendency” and to interpret the text simply in its colonial context, Soyinka presents an immense challenge to the Western reader engaged in the postcolonial discourse (Soyinka 5).

This academic approach lends itself merely to presume the author’s intent, especially one who writes in a postcolonial or neo-colonial world. There are components in the text Death and the King’s Horseman which highlight various details regarding Soyinka’s authorship. Firstly, the fact that the play is written in English rather than Yoruba, his native language, expresses anxieties Soyinka might have had about limited potential readership and production. Like other postcolonial nations’ literatures, “most African writers communicate with a tiny subculture within society” and may be subject to a low volume of African readership, limited promotion and the high cost of publication (Kotei 406). Moreover, Chinua Achebe in “The Politics of Language”, reveals that in 20th century Nigeria, the English language is essential to the nation, as it holds “more than two hundred component nationalities together through an alien language” (Achebe “The Politics of Language” 268). Thus, writing in English allows the writer a wider readership base and the potential for greater literary success. However, it is interesting to note that this particular text, Death and the King’s Horseman, was written in 1975, at the latter part of an already established and celebrated body of Soyinka’s work, most of which was written outside of his native land, Nigeria.

The play clearly illustrates Soyinka’s apt and creative use of language. By combining poetic use of language with his myriad Western-African experiences, he creates a text which can simultaneously satirize the colonizer, and celebrate the lamentation of his indigenous Yoruba history. The play, like Soyinka’s other works, may be read as a political satire on previous colonial rule. However, Soyinka’s political involvement and voluntary exile from Nigeria suggests that there was an ideological or political desire to write this script (Connolly, “Playwright: Wole Soyinka”, par. 5). Achebe, in his article “Colonialist Criticism”, explains the paradox of the “modern African myth-maker”, which is to use the knowledge of the colonizer (British literature and culture) to create his own vision of a “colonial rule” as seen through the eyes of a dually cultured indigenous person (Achebe “Colonialist Criticism” 73).

With the author’s note in Death and the King’s Horseman, Soyinka acts as an educated myth-maker, and destroys Western notions of the African disenfranchised other through this text. He is able to use his experience with English language and literary culture of the colonizer in order to frame the work as he intended it: a preservation and homage to the practices of his native people and culture which were destroyed by colonialist occupation.

WORKS CITED

Achebe, Chinua. “Colonialist Criticism”. Post-Colonial Studies Reader. Ed. Ashcroft, Bill, Gareth Griffiths and Helen Tiffin. 3rd ed. New York: Routledge, 2007.

Achebe, Chinua. “The Politics of Language”. Post-Colonial Studies Reader. Ed. Ashcroft, Bill, Gareth Griffiths and Helen Tiffin. 3rd ed. New York: Routledge, 2007.

Connoly, Michelle. “Playwright, Wole Soyinka”. Kalamazoo College. 3 Sept 2008. 5 Nov 2008.

Kotei, S.I.A. “The Book Today in Africa”. Post-Colonial Studies Reader. Ed. Ashcroft, Bill, Gareth Griffiths and Helen Tiffin. 3rd ed. New York: Routledge, 2007.

Larson, Charles. “Heroic Ethnocentrism”. Post-Colonial Studies Reader. Ed. Ashcroft, Bill, Gareth Griffiths and Helen Tiffin. 3rd ed. New York: Routledge, 2007.
Soyinka, Wole. Death and the King’s Horseman. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2002.

(For ENGL*2200, Postcolonial Literatures, for K. Sheibani, November 2008)

My date with Christopher Plummer

In May 2009, I was lucky enough to be awarded the J. Percy Smith Prize from the University of Guelph. I was also fortunate enough that renowned Canadian actor Christopher Plummer presented me with the award. You can see my stunned and ridiculously nervous/glowing self pictured here.

J Percy Smith Prize Qualifications: Graduating honours student in Drama with high academic standing in Drama courses, who has also made a worthy contribution to Department of Drama activities in general. Annual prize of $200. (And in my case, the honour of meeting Christopher Plummer!!)

Mr. Plummer was given an honorary degree from the University of Guelph on the same day. His speech was truly inspiring. Take a look at it on U of G's website: http://www.uoguelph.ca/convocation/christopherplummer/

POETRY: Here she comes

Here She Comes (2005)

Tiptoed black stilettos

Click and clack against swirling taupe marble

Resonating in the emptied hallway

There is a hush of murmurs

As she swishes toward the grand hall

Meshed layers of her dress fall onto each other

Twice per step

(Like the crinkling of an old man’s candy wrapper)

Before she enters, she holds her breath, listens and waits

Sticking her taut-braided coif forward

Peering through velvet curtains to see a vacant spot

She creeps past with soft-pitched ‘pardon’s and ‘‘scuse me ma’am’s

Then she may finally lay her petite feet to rest upon the plush carpeted floor

The tension in her wrist resists and falters

She squints quickly at it for its violation at this crucial moment

(Her entrance)