J Atkinson's Online Journal

The Tempest is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1610–11, and thought by many critics to be the last play that Shakespeare wrote alone. The Tempest did not attract a significant amount of attention before the ban on the performance of plays in 1642, and only attained popularity after the Restoration, and then only in adapted versions. In the mid-19th century, theater productions began to reinstate the original Shakespearean text, and in the 20th century, critics and scholars undertook a significant re-appraisal of the play’s value, to the extent that it is now considered to be one of Shakespeare’s greatest works.Scholars also note that it is impossible to determine if the play was written before, after, or at the same time as The Winter’s Tale, the dating of which has been equally problematic. Edward Blount entered The Tempest into the Stationers’ Register on 8 November 1623. It was one of 16 Shakespearean plays that Blount registered on that date.There is no obvious single origin for the plot of The Tempest; it seems to have been created out of an amalgamation of sources.

Dear diary,
Today my father has given me one of the biggest shocks of my life, my father is the rightful duke of Milan. Unrightfully taken of his name by his brother as he was given power so my father could study. Of course my father still has magical power but it’s such a strange idea seeing father as royalty and not just some man playing God on a island. Of course this will change the way I will act and be on this island as I feel a little self righteous that I’m royalty but generally I want to stay happy and make everyone else happy.

Pa was always a man to never stand down, if someone proposed a challenge, he’d never stand down. It started off when the American soldiers started showing up, they had dogs, big vehicles and guns. They didn’t seem harmful, rarely coming in our village and when they did, just buying some supplies like food and water. They liked to keep quiet as if they were looking for someone when they came in the village, it seemed odd but most of us disregarded it. But A couple nights after that, in the middle of the night, we would hear heavy machinery pass the village, as if a massive fan was patrolling around. It disturbed some people when they slept but I’m a heavy sleeper so I never noticed it until my sisters started to talk about it. Then people started to go missing, they’d check out what the sound was and in the morning, all that left was blood trails. Everyone was terrifed and they blamed the ‘American Pigs’ for it, so the village stopped selling supplies to them.

One night, my dad who was a Shepard realised that some of his cattle started to go missing, he knew it was because of the Americans and it had something to do with that buzzing at night. So with a rifle he followed the trail of blood leaving the house as silently as he could, but I couldn’t sleep that night so as he was leaving I silently stalked behind him. It was a few miles of walking so being about 20 feet behind him was very risky but the freezing moon left a shadow over the desert, giving this walk a chilling atmosphere. As the night got darker Pa finally found something, decayed animal carcasses, they filled the air with a pungent smell, making me gag. But pa persisted on, until he reached a cave. Pitch black and wet, puddles splashed against his boots and nearly got me caught. Pa’s eyesight was poor in there but fortunately he had matches on hand, the revolting smell got worse and worse until the smell was replaced by a sound, like a buzz of something electronic. At this point I hid behind a rock not going any further ahead but even pa froze, but in shock.

A red light began to flash up about 20 feet away, I could barely make it out but it had gun barrels on the side of this machine, with a rusted paint of coat, the contraption was new and techy but the look was old and rusted up. The red light began to flicker as if to show a sign of decay.

I shouted ‘Pa Run!’ But it was too late. He turned around to look at me but bullets flew from the drone into his back making him spazim to the ground. Time slowed down as he looked at me on his knees. His last word was ‘Run…’ At first I was in shock of what had happened but heard the machine buzzing liked it just did a minute ago so I followed Pa’s advice and sprinted out of cave and ran for nearly 3 miles non-stop. It persisted at first but retreated back to its cave. As I walked back it hit me, pa was dead… I didn’t know what to say to ma, my sisters, how I just hid there as pa was being gunned down by a… Machine.

There i stood halfway to town, tears rolling down my face and a sudden sharp pain hits me in my hip, I look down to discover there was blood all over my clothes, one of the bullets hit me, the pain was nearly unbearable as I cried out for help. I had wasted all my Adrenaline running from the cave and now I was exhausted. Pitch black alone in the desert, bleeding and unable to walk. Sand started to fill my wounds making the pain excruciating, I was sure to die out here.

 10 minutes While stumbling through the sand, I see in my blurred vision the decrepit town hall, I was home. I was too weak to make it through. The village was still a mile away and my body was too weak. I fell to the floor.

As I layed there, I heard rushing footsteps from ahead of me. It was American soldiers. They rushed over to me and picked me up. I heard them talking about something called a ‘drone pilot gone rogue’ I paid no attention because I was on the verge of going unconscious. After a bumpy 10 minutes we arrived on the outskirts on the village where they dropped me off, shouted for help and ran back in the direction they brought me from. Fortunately the doctor was still awake and fixed me up, though sometimes I still think I feel sand in my hip. Ma picked me up from the doctors house and I never told her what happened in the cave. I never told anyone to this day.

In my personal opinion I believe that the best leader in the situation it is would be Piggy, he has suggested all the big decisions for the group to consider and also has the most logic and knowledge of the world around him and general facts. Although he may not posses the point of physicality and is bullied, he is the smartest of all the people in the group and shows great examples of leadership. Jack shows that he is scary and not afraid to do anything and Ralph shows the physicality but is quite ignorant. That is why I believe that Piggy should be the leader of the boys.

The book i have chosen is World War Z. This book is about the stories of many peoples personal views and experiences of the invasion. It was interpreted into a movie but the book tells more. In this there are many characters so there isn’t a main character. The author goes around the world to find peoples personal stories and peoples opinions, what he finds is amazing. The army’s involvement, what it was like from a civilians view, rescuing VIP’s and killing the zombies, and tales of young people who tell stories of how their parents went crazy trying to save them. I would recommend World War Z as it is a very interesting book that you can’t put down as it uses great language, has some interesting stories and altogether is a entertaining book. I would give a 9/10.

My opening to a persuasive speech

My speech is about if children in secondary school should wear school uniforms. I believe we should, it shows great examples if you are out in the public so that people know who you are. It also represents your school, what’s the point of going to school if you don’t represent it? You might as well be home schooled. Anyways, this will be my speech as to why we should wear School Uniform.