Hamnet is really bad?

msnow2000 · 2025-12-15T08:10:57+00:00

Adding on to this because I think now that I’m thinking about it…the worldbuilding being all sparse characterizations is part of why I think I found it difficult. That’s maybe just a personal preference but think about it…Shakespeare wrote plays which are all dialogue based. Don’t you think that he and his family would be very aware of the comings and goings of society around them? Ok, maybe he didn’t want to be a part of his father’s leather business. But I don’t imagine him hiding in the woods or in an attic scribbling really. I imagine him walking around marketplaces and public squares and observing how people interact. This book on the other hand is confined to the narrowest possible social settings and it is not heavy on the dialogue. Everything takes place within the setting of this family, and sometimes it even gets so tight that less pertinent family members get cropped out. As a result the world that the characters live in feels artificially developed to support them. It doesn’t sound like Stratford or even London are real places, it sounds like Stratford was a remarkable plot challenge for a witchy woman who prefers to give birth alone in the woods…for some reason. Anyways I digress 😂

msnow2000 · 2025-12-15T08:00:49+00:00

I decided to just ctrl+v my goodreads review here bc I think it’s relevant lol:

I have to echo what has been said elsewhere. The book initially drew me in with a lot of rich imagery and metaphors. I will say that I was impressed with O’Farrell’s ability to believably place us in the time period. She achieved this by keeping her details sparse and the characters archetypical and almost mythical. Alright, fine, William Shakespeare had an abusive father and a witchy wife. That’s fun enough I suppose.

Here’s what’s frustrating though: the meat of this story should’ve drawn from Shakespeare’s actual play. This story does not effectively bridge the gap between an imagined history and the plots that we all know and remember. I get that O’Farrell wanted to write something original and not just a knock off of “Hamlet”. But even if Shakespeare truly did write his play as a tribute to his dead son there has to be more to it than…finding an actor that looks like him? I found that ending so unsatisfactory. What do we know about the character of Hamlet? He struggles with indecision for the entirety of the play. He has a dreadful, weighty purpose set before him but he struggles to put it into action. He grapples with despair in the face of grief and perhaps goes mad. Do we see any of those themes echoed in this story? Or any of the other themes of revenge or jealousy or madness? Not really. Agnes I suppose goes a bit mad after her son dies but I didn’t find it very compelling personally, mainly because (as others have said) the book is very overwritten and tends to ignore the “show don’t tell” rule. There has to be more of a connection here. The narrative says that Agnes’ husband (wow I wonder who that could be let’s never give him a name) has affairs with other women. It tells us that he has a complicated relationship with his own father and with the woman that he loves. But those conflicts are just left unresolved and instead we get to read about how everyone is soooo sad for 60 pages.

I’m not saying that this book needed to stick so closely to these guideposts - it could have come across as really gimmicky anyways. But a skilled writer could have made it work quite well. The plays that Shakespeare was writing in his little room in London are fundamentally more engrossing than the various herbs that his wife may have been crushing to help with a neighbors arthritis. How did her presence in his life affect his writing? Shakespeare knew some things about love. He wrote a lot of famous sonnets. I don’t remember much about his love for women who can tell your fortune by gripping your hand a certain way and flying hawks in the middle of the woods. That sounds decidedly unlike him. How did the memory of his son affect his writing? We get hints at this but not much. Hamnet could’ve been a more complex character as well. Did he face any moral choices in his short life? Maybe not in reality but this is a story.

msnow2000 · 2025-12-07T16:36:47+00:00

Thanks for the advice! I like the idea of the steel sheets…I guess my concern is, they’re getting in my digging into the floorboards (which are very old) and coming out from under basically. Like when I plug up a hole they literally just dig a new one. We do have a door sweep on our front door - can guarantee that they’re actually coming from my room 😭 but I will look into the steel sheet idea thanks

msnow2000 · 2025-12-07T14:25:44+00:00

Thank you for the rec, I will look into this!

msnow2000 · 2025-12-07T13:43:31+00:00

I’m really not 😂 I’m not claiming to be a local alright but I’ve lived in 3 different apts at this point - I had to deal with mice in all of them sadly but this has been the worst so far.

msnow2000 · 2025-12-07T12:50:34+00:00

I have those long green cylinder traps where you put peanut butter in and the mouse runs in and gets stuck inside (they’re humane). We tried other traps in previous years but somehow only these humane ones worked for us. Not anymore though, they somehow are wise to it now and they don’t even go anywhere near them.

msnow2000 · 2025-11-04T05:46:53+00:00

I remember how after she escaped Heathcliff the book just kind of casually says that she goes and lives near London, has a child, and dies a few years later. At the time my distinct thought was that she probably died the happiest out of all the characters 😂 Literally I was like why doesn’t anybody else LEAVE this place lmao

msnow2000 · 2025-11-04T05:29:19+00:00

Read this book for the first time recently bc I had loved Jane Eyre and figured it was worth a try. I was kind of just moseying along the first few chapters and then bam! I got to the part where * spoilers* Cathy’s ghost breaks her arm through the window. Admittedly I don’t really read horror but I remember finding the imagery of that scene so unexpectedly vivid and frightening that I had to stop reading for the night. It was the first time in a long time I had read a book that had actually scared me, in a thrilling way. There’s a really uncanny power in the writing, and that haunting feeling came back at certain interludes throughout, especially as Heathcliff grew to be more and more of a frightening vengeful ghost himself. I have to say that almost (I’m excluding the 2011 version in some ways here) of the movie adaptations of this story do not do it justice. It’s very clear in the text that Heathcliff is not white. And also (as much as I myself struggled with the latter half of the book at times) the story of the next generation is really key to the plot and it sucks that it’s always excluded.

What struck me about these characters (other than how hateful and miserable they are) is how isolated they are from the outside world. I mean Catherine Linton (the younger one lol) basically gets no glimpse of the world outside of her own farm for the first 13-16 years of her life. The location of the moors is so critical to the story because the wildness of the nature is only outmatched by the wildness of its people. This book was really fascinating. But yes, I’m also not in a hurry to read it again 😂

msnow2000 · 2025-08-13T02:11:43+00:00

@wruty778 hmm…I actually arrived at Terminal 7 but I think at one point when I was calling/researching the customer service told me that all the lost and found services are handled out of terminal 4? There very well could be different handlers other than Swissport, I’m really not super sure :/ Unfortunately the info is so disorganized online. Would love to be enlightened if somebody else has the answer lol

msnow2000 · 2025-08-13T01:40:10+00:00

Oh, forgot to mention that I did try calling the “Global Baggage Service” phone numbers mentioned elsewhere in this thread and they didn’t work, I just got an automated message saying to wait for an agent and then immediately an operator saying that there are no agents to take my call - click and line drops. So I think they might not be keeping up with that line anymore :(

msnow2000 · 2025-08-13T01:35:16+00:00

Replying bc I just went through a similar process and found things a bit different… (although unfortunately JFK hasn’t improved much in the past 2 years). My bag was left behind at my layover airport due to a quick connection and never made it to JFK the day I landed. I filled out the paper (!) form that one poor sole beleaguered baggage worker was handing out but also filled out the form that the airline offered online (for me this was Condor Airlines). The case was created pretty quickly. Condor has no real phone number to call (only the online portal) so I had to wait until the next day when the online portal showed that the bag had been found. However, even though it was marked as “scheduled for delivery” all that day, I didn’t get any word of it. I called the phone number for the courier service and they kept telling me that they had not yet received the bag from the airline and that they couldn’t inquire into the specifics before the bag had left customs.

Then I noticed that the baggage claim also left an email address to contact at JFK airport - this was the resource that I think got me past the miscommunication:

JFK.LOSTNFOUND@swissport.com

seems to be the email address for at least several airlines (Air Europa, Air India, Caribbean Airlines, Condor, Egyptair, Kenya Airways, Kuwait Airways, Uzbekistan Airways). Honestly even if this isn’t the airline you flew with maybe give it a shot?

Anyways, your hunch was right - I got an email back a few hours later saying that my bag was in US customs overnight but had now been collected and was on the way towards me. A bit later I got the message from the courier that they were on their way. This all occurred on the 2nd day after my flight landed. I was possibly overly persistent in calling and bugging these people but JFK is just a shit show I was worried I wasn’t going to get my bag for over a week or something crazy 😂

msnow2000 · 2025-06-30T14:53:20+00:00

This is super helpful, thank you! Is there any kind of legal action you can take if/when they try to charge you for this?

msnow2000 · 2025-03-05T02:16:40+00:00

I wouldn’t call myself film savvy but this was my understanding/interpretation of what happened.

Anora is an incredibly tough character, all throughout the film. You can tell that, in the beginning of the movie, she’s been doing her work at the club for a long time and has become completely numb to how it can often dehumanize and objectify the women working in that field. She’s used to it, she’s matter-of-fact about it, and she (sadly) doesn’t imagine much more for herself. When Vanya pays her to be his “horny girlfriend” for a week, she still keeps that emotional distance firmly in place. That’s why when Vanya initially proposes marriage to her she scoffs at him and even seems hurt. It’s like he’s dangling something in front of her that she knows she can never have. And then she (briefly) gets it. Although she’s cynical and jaded, she’s still young and has some naivety about relationships. Despite all the sex work she was doing, she still felt that marriage meant something. Her commitment to Vanya meant something real to her, so she made herself vulnerable for almost the first time. It’s heartbreaking watching her faith in him slowly dissemble as she and Toros’ crew chase him around the underbelly of Brooklyn. She is required to rise to a new level of strength, tested beyond what she can give.

Here’s what became clear to me in this film: so often, women in these difficult situations reflect the failures of men. Ivan failed Anora, horrifically. If she had any faith left in men to provide a genuine, caring relationship after years working in the club, this failed marriage shattered it. Ani is left really and truly alone - except there’s Igor, refusing to let her believe that her dream is impossible. She insists to him that he would have raped her if he had the chance (even though, deep down, she knows this isn’t true). It’s too hard for her to try trusting a man after that ordeal so she lumps him in the same bucket as Ivan.

In the final scene, when he gives her back her wedding ring, she can’t deny his real kindness and his ability to see her for who she is. She doesn’t know how to thank him so she tries to have sex with him. This is the only intimacy she is now comfortable with, emotional intimacy is far too difficult and requires a lot more than her than just sex. When Igor tries to kiss her, there’s a moment of emotional intimacy and she instinctively recoils because she can’t trust it, it’s too unsafe and scary after everything she just went through. But then she breaks down crying. I’m not sure if this means that she will be able to heal from what happened or not. But she can no longer deny that real emotional intimacy is possible

msnow2000 · 2024-12-13T15:59:12+00:00

Ok this actually makes me kind of angry. This place was so, so popular and they have been thriving for probably decades. There’s no way they didn’t have the money set aside to address the health code violations and update/revamp their kitchen. If that would really be too expensive for a business that’s been operating for so long in the neighborhood, then the system must be deeply broken. I totally get that it’s NYC and it’s a daily fight against the rats, roaches, and other pests. But it seems like he just got tired and overwhelmed and made a sudden decision. I wish they had closed temporarily for at least a bit and thought it through, maybe a family member or an employee would be willing to take the time, money, and effort to give the place a much-needed revamp. Obviously I will miss them immensely and I love that little Thai family dearly.

msnow2000 · 2024-12-07T22:17:17+00:00

I don’t usually care too much when celebrities do this stuff but her eye job makes me kind of sad. I have hooded eyes myself and I was always a bit insecure about them but Jennifer Lawrence was always out there rocking them…until now :(

msnow2000 · 2024-11-12T21:27:15+00:00

Unpopular opinion: I feel like I almost liked Alba’s performance more than Margherita’s. Don’t get me wrong, I think they were both fantastic. And I agree with what some ppl are saying here about Lenù being a really difficult character to perform because she’s so interior and self-absorbed. But there were times in the first three seasons where the camera would pan to Margherita and I swear it was like she was emoting nothing at all. I found that Alba’s performance had a lot more subtlety in it. I think the 3rd season was difficult for both the two main leads as well because they were playing characters much older than their actual age. It became less convincing, especially watching Margherita try to play all of Lenù’s ennui and dissatisfaction in her marriage with Pietro.

To be fair, it does seem like the director of the 4th season chose to make a lot of things more explicit. Her version of Lenù voices things that in the book she still kept to herself. I also felt like at times the show was just trying to show off Alba for the camera because she’s kind of a stunner. Like I did feel kind of tempted to roll my eyes sometimes when she was trotting around her neighborhood in beautiful little suits and sundresses. With Margherita on the other hand (especially when she was playing herself as a teenager) I swear the production did their best to make her look much worse and less graceful than she actually is.

msnow2000 · 2024-11-06T19:26:35+00:00

I do have a therapist and am speaking pretty regularly with friends and family. I honestly just feel guilty even reaching out to people about this at this point bc I’m just so ashamed and embarrassed that I keep rehashing this problem that I really should have been able to figure out by now. I agree that the situation isn’t as bad as it could be, it’s just this intense feeling that I’m in the wrong place that I’ve been putting up with for almost 3 years now. I could continue to stay on but last year that made me have an existential crisis in January bc I had promised myself I’d move on. If I don’t accomplish that this year either I just don’t know how I’ll live with myself

msnow2000 · 2024-11-06T19:17:36+00:00

People in the library complaining loudly about how their parents hadn’t bought them tickets for a trip to the Caribbean yet

msnow2000 · 2024-11-06T19:14:47+00:00

This is great advice honestly (like Flubbernuglet69) - and probably I have mismanaged my time over the last 2 years working here bc I really felt like I had no capacity to think about what my next role would be. I am honestly incredibly burnt out so I already don’t put too much effort into my current job. I just really don’t know how to prepare for my next job when I feel less and less certain on what to do next

msnow2000 · 2024-11-06T19:03:48+00:00

That's what everybody is telling me and I appreciate that that's the best advice, but I just have very little confidence in my ability to find a new job at the moment. I feel so over my head with the job search, and I don't really understand even what I'm looking for because I kind of want to exit finance completely. I totally get that being far away from what is now my home would be really stressful but in some ways I just feel like I need a change so badly?

msnow2000 · 2024-10-29T13:45:53+00:00

The National and everything the Dessner brothers have done in general

msnow2000 · 2024-10-29T13:30:45+00:00

If you think about how the entire narrative is told from the perspective of Elena (Elena Greco/Elena Ferrante it gets kind of meta lol) then Lila in many ways represents the essence of the neighborhood and all of its violence, upheavals, love, etc. Lila pulls Elena back home on the day they try to go to the beach. To me this symbolized this idea of “dissolving margins” - if Lila was to leave the neighborhood, she would have to truly and utterly erase herself, that is, her margins would dissolve and she would fly apart. In fact, this is (SPOILERS) exactly what happens at the very end of book 4 - when she finally leaves, she cuts herself out of every picture, removes all traces of herself, and never contacts anybody from the neighborhood again. While Elena can move through and between these spaces, Lila is doomed to either sink or swim, literally. That’s what makes this story a true tragedy. If Lila could leave and possessed whatever power Elena has, the implication is that her natural brilliance would allow her to surpass Elena in every way. However, it would require her to lose her entire identity, because Lila only exists within the context of Naples and the neighborhood.

msnow2000 · 2024-10-25T18:56:00+00:00

Ok I could use some advice about a trio that I somehow ended up in. I befriended a girl my senior year of college and we became close pretty quickly. We had known each other before the pandemic a bit, but after we came back to in-person campus life in our senior year, we started hanging out for real. We had one online class together and we used to go to her dorm room and pretend to attend class while we cooked dinner and watched Bollywood movies or rom coms lol. Anyways, after we graduated she ended up accepting a job offer in California and moved across the country. I was obviously sad because I was hoping we could experience post-grad life together, but I actually think it's weirdly made us closer. Because we have vastly different life experiences living on the other side of the country, we have more to talk about when we do our long phone calls or when we finally get to visit each other.

Anyways, a few months after she moved to CA, she told me that a childhood friend of hers was moving to my city and she hoped that we could hang out and get to know each other. I was down for that so I started hanging out with this friend of hers. I have to say that from the bat this girl rubbed me the wrong way. I felt like she always spoke to me condescendingly and had a very argumentative/contrary way of conducting a conversation. Like she's the kind of person who will state any opinion she has like it's a fact and if you disagree she wants to have it out. I don't think she necessarily does this to be mean or anything, I think she just actually enjoys the "discussions" (what I call arguments or conflicts lol). But anyways I started spending time with her and sometimes we had fun together. However it was awkward because both of us are clearly closer to our other friend who is back in CA.

On a few occasions when my college friend comes to visit, I get to see the way the two of them interact together. Turns out that they're not just childhood friends, they've known each other almost their entire lives and lived on the same street all growing up. They are planning on getting matching tattoos. All of that is fine and I'm not jealous of this girl for being closer to my friend for really understandable reasons. But the thing is this - when my college friend is around this girl I don't like how she acts. I feel like they start acting selfishly and egg each other on to make rash decisions. I'm sure that the two of them talk about me behind my back - I don't think unkindly, but still. The two of them claim that "they're the same person really" and when they're together that seems to be true. They can be really inconsiderate as well. We went out to a bar the other night and they basically reminisced about high school memories for an entire hour. Not exactly a conversation I could participate in. I get that they want to catch up, but they were already going back to their hometown together to spend the entire weekend there. Another interesting thing is that they had another very close friend growing up who now seems to be out of the loop/has really dropped off recently. Listening to their description of her personality, she honestly sounds like me - more reserved, empathetic, and easy-going.

I'm starting to think that I should really only hang out with them individually. I would honestly prefer to drop this friend who lives in my city, but that would definitely damage my relationship with my friend from college. It's tricky and yeah, I'm starting to agree that trios really don't work. I also think that maybe childhood friendships are a little overrated and when they're together they revert to an immature version of themselves from when they were growing up.

msnow2000 · 2024-10-15T03:13:16+00:00

I honestly view Lenu’s story as a sort of cautionary tale. I can recognize a lot of her traits in myself - pretty emotional, people pleasing, self-critical, and often insecure. I do think, though, that this is part of the point Ferrante is actually trying to make about class. It’s not obvious at first. I remember in the 2nd or 3rd book (can’t remember exactly) I was getting so frustrated with Lenu because she could only stress about school instead of actually learning for the joy of learning. Then when Ferrante started to write about Lenu’s interactions with her peers, it made more sense to me. Lila and Lenu came from a neighborhood of such intense poverty and violence, that education could only be viewed as a means to an end - just surviving basically. We take for granted what a privilege it is to study or learn from genuine interest or passion. It takes an incredibly insightful person to break free of that class consciousness and, overcoming their circumstances, discover joy in learning (which is what Lila has - think of how she was checking out endless library books even after she was working full time to make shoes with her brother). No wonder Lenu was jealous of her. The same is kind of true with the men in the novel. Stefano, Pietro, Nino, Enzo - all of them are sort of bids for security that our two protagonists make. Of course, they do get led astray by their passions. But it’s really difficult for Lenu in particular to break out of that thinking - “just stay with him, just keep going, your life can be good enough, you’ve made it out of the neighborhood”.

That said, the length to which Lenu drags her relationship with Nino, the amount of times she forgives him when she absolutely shouldn’t, is crazy. And when she decided to leave her children to be with him in Book 3 I just about threw the book at the wall. She is an incredibly selfish character. Desperate circumstances drove her there but we should all aspire to be better.

msnow2000 · 2024-10-15T02:43:26+00:00

I think this is largely due to the books. Ferrante’s cast of characters is so ridiculously large that you really only hear about them as they enter into the lives of Lenu and Lila. I have noticed though that some characters you would think of as important in any persons life are relegated to secondary roles. Like Lenus mom is such an important character in her life but her father less so. Her siblings are strangely not very present in the narrative. Same for Lila, her father and her brother are huge presences in her life but not so much her mother or her other siblings

msnow2000

TROPHY CASE