Smartphone Shakespeare

Monday, September 26, 2016

Advantages to Marking Up Electronic Books

My students are learning digital literacy by studying from Kindle ebooks in my Shakespeare courses this year. We are exploring the brave new worlds of ebook literacy from various angles. In this post: advantages of highlighting passages and making notes within Kindle ebooks:

Ebooks and their notes are preserved in the cloud
You can lose your electronic device, but you won't lose the ebooks that are associated with your Amazon account, nor any of the things you've marked in those ebooks. This means you can actually find those books and notes. With nearly 50 years of reading behind me, I sure wish I could keep track of the books I've read, and would love to have an easy way to rediscover my interactions with those books.
Ebooks and their notes are synchronized
In the digital age we tend to hope from one device to another, and Amazon has made it simple to keep one's reading continuous: I can highlight a passage or insert a note while reading Henry V on my Kindle device, then find that same highlighting or note when looking at this ebook via read.amazon.com or within the Kindle app on my iPad or my Android phone. (And I'm not even going to discuss the seamless way Amazon makes it possible to alternate seamlessly between audiobook and ebook versions across devices!)
You can collate and edit your highlights and notes.
Amazon has features on its Kindle devices and apps whereby it will extract and list all in one place the highlighting and notes you've done within your ebooks. Or, on a web browser, you can see every highlight and note you took, extracted from but also linked to the full ebook, at Your Highlights at kindle.amazon.com. That's something one could never do with a print book, and is especially helpful for those anticipating doing some kind of analysis or book review. You can clean up your highlights and notes, going back to the text for context, and clarifying some of the cryptic ways we tend to make notes on the fly.
You can review your highlights and notes
Through its "Daily Review" feature that appears at the top of kindle.amazon.com when you are logged in, Amazon generates electronic flashcards with one highlighted passage/note at a time, another way to return to and page through one's highlights and notes. This is semi-automated, too, so that books are returned to the queue for you to review again later.

The Daily Review feature reminded me of a passage I highlighted
and note I made when reading this ebook a couple years ago

One last advantage -- perhaps one that surpasses all the others -- has to do with how one can socialize one's reading in new ways through Kindle ebooks and the Amazon platform. This, however, I will save for a separate post of its own.

Wednesday, September 21, 2016

My Sonnet: To What An End

*Before I get to the sonnet, I just wanted to say how much I loved this assignment. Back in high school, I thought I was a bit of a poet, (admittedly a poor one) and it was nice to get back in that vein. I had never written in iambic pentameter before, but I found it to be a refreshing and pleasantly challenging exercise.

To What An End

To what an end these means may justify?

What purpose, the, could such an effort serve?

Where all is ripped apart, left to the sky,

To wind and weather, wounded, open-nerved.

If truth will out, why then do lies pervade,

Tenacious in their grasp of human-kind:

So helpless to resist it men are made,

That day by day, we languish in its bind.

Yet, by dear heaven, I would be deceived—

Yes, blinded to assert that falsehood stands.

We see the lies, but must they be believed?

I say the time for truth is nigh at hand.

And then, and last, we all will come to know

The reason and the rhyme of all our woe.

Tuesday, September 20, 2016

Dr. Pepper Addiction

My friends do claim I am addicted when

I go to get a dark brown fizzy drink.

Alas to their misguided deep chagrin

It cannot be as bad as they all think.

So should I let the Dr. Pepper go?

Are well meaning friends right to have concerns?

I don’t think I should really have to show

That even though my heart and tongue do yearn-

And the world starts to feel like quite a waste

When I don’t sip that carbonation- I

am not addicted to the fizz or taste

I don’t need Dr. Pepper to get by.

I’m trying but my friends can’t seem to see,

Oh what on earth can you expect from me?

Musings on Virtue No.2

Can I go into that cold night alone?

to wander with no family at my side

where stillborn snow like feathers softly roam

and anchors make deep footsteps in the night

here fire warms my aching bones of flesh

and someone speaks sweet words into my ear

the stone casters have all been made to rest

and I am sovereign of each action here

the future can’t compete when moment’s stage

burns bridges that warm up the winter night

yet, cold has earned its place through every age

and night is but a breath from heaven’s sight

can I go into that cold night alone?

where only frozen snow will me condone

Hope in the Wrong

The television screen is turned to on

As I stare, unprepared to really see.

I’d wearily state my faith is not gone

But f I bet, I'd only have a fee,

"Go, go" the women clad in black may scream,

as masked men cheer in hopes of victory.

And hopefully this hope is not in dreams;

Reality is contradictory.

The game begins and now whoosh they go.

Past the first, past the next for the win.

Our men go fast and yet are too slow,

as the enemy scores with a grin.

Now I love my team, I do, it is true.

Raiders, come on! Win more than a few.

Wandr'ing Storm Cloud and the Like

Photo Credit: Sebastian Gabriel

The wand’ring storm clouds high up in the sky,

the little running blue grey birds in line,

green leaves that pop as sky veiled, seems to cry,

the wind’s cool gentle lick, of sun and brine;

Poppies of orange and yellow tulips bright,

the river’s gasp while running off the brink,

the mountain’s rocky shoulders, twilight bathed

a shell’s smooth inside surface soft and pink;

Stars brightly lit on heaven’s calm, dark face,

cold lace of stars from winter’s sky falls down,

the sea’s waves playful, warm in sand’s embrace.

the petals soft, a flower’s tiny crown.

From paintings, sonnets, even prose these shine.

Yet, I hear whisp'ring. These are works of Mine.

In Defense of Quiet

So oft I’m prodded come “out of your shell”--

that noxious expression which clearly states

introversion must be a form of hell,

a disappointment and second-class trait.

A notion that also fails to proclaim

some animals carry shelter where they

go, and that some humans are just the same.

It does not mean that they have less to say.

Sometimes I will stay in at night, fleeing

aimless chat; I won’t feel distraught.

There is no connection between being

the best talker and having the best thoughts.

We have been given one mouth and two ears

To use proportionally, without fear.

image via

Finding My Space

Photo credit: Alice Keeler

Just as I feared there is no space. Cars lined
this street and back, for miles and miles. Unjust
are parking patrollers who search and find
poor tired souls whose parking bluff they'll bust.
A boot or ticket lucky prize, worst case,
of course, they'll take my car to lock it up.
A cost far greater then the crime. Disgrace,
I walk, as guilt penetrates my bitter cup.
At night in Provo Town, you'll find all spots
are taken two by two, so selfishly
by students unaware of giving thoughts.
A mile at one AM I can't walk safely.
Let freedom for our parking ring, let's strike
for parking space we need. Or get a bike.

Thoughts of the Student Athlete Academic Center Drop-in Writing Tutor

I wait. The door (propped open to invite

the passing athletes to come in and sit

with me)—symbolic, meaning "I can't write"—

is why, each day, alone, I read. Permit

me now to dissipate this myth that they

are fearless, though they play with courage on

the field; or court; or track; for all obey

dear Pride's controlling voice. Not speed nor brawn

can separate them now from others who,

at college, struggle to complete their work.

With knowing eyes, I watch them ponder: "Do,

today, this opportunity, I shirk?"
I bite my tongue; these thoughts don't leave my slate.
The door, still open to invite. I wait.

Monday, September 19, 2016

The Creature Inside

Last night my friends sent me a text in jest

(A funny meme of Shrek’s protected swamp)

I missed the chance to chortle with the rest

of them because my cognizance was romped

by some internal creature craving sleep!

Is she a fiend, or is she my old friend,

replenishing my energy to keep

my time well spent when time I have to lend?

The real dilemma’s that I have no choice!

The creature calls; I have to leave my post

No matter where I am, I lose my voice

and animate ability is toast!

I hope my friends can pardon me this fault:

It’s half past eight; I'm sorry, I must halt.

Bemoan the Careful Paths

Poetic inspiration can come from anywhere... even a stolen grounds sign.

Bemoan the Careful Paths

Shall I compare you to the white grounds sign?

You are more passive and inanimate.

And while your love is grown by inches, mine

Is dying by the feet. Dispassionate

And led by you, I kept to careful paths.

But I would rather stray to greater plans

Than hide behind some artificial masks.

Your edges dimmed by weather - your words ran

Soft with time. Just like the spark I saw in

You - living on borrowed time. And so our

love is over...a pitiful has been.

And from my mind will slip behind each hour.

Beware the fall from out of love: bemoan.

From quandary of broken love you've grown.

Timely Inspiration

Timely Inspiration

Shall I compose this piece for you, my dear,
A timely effort to unveil the truth?
I'll sit for hours with thoughts of love and cheer
And search for words that play our story smooth.
The light will sink and moon rise up three times
and I'll rehash and throw my pen again
in quest for perfect and uniting rhymes,
but Nature favors not the time of men.
It's Nature, sure, that poetry inspires,
With songs of change and freedom in its air.
As humans, we have great and strange desires,
But even we can't force an art so rare.
My love for you beats all that time demands,
In this, I know it formed in Nature's hands.