ShmoopTube

Where Monty Python meets your 10th grade teacher.

Search Thousands of Shmoop Videos

ELA 12: The Rake 12 Views


Share It!


Description:

Spoiler alert: The farmer is the chosen one, that secretive-looking old dude is definitely his father, and you probably shouldn't get too attached to the wise old teacher or the dog. How did we know? It's all in the archetypes. But have you heard of the rake?

Language:
English Language

Transcript

00:01

No despite what you might have been taught in kindergartens

00:06

everyone in the world is not some precious unique snowflake

00:10

Sorry to burst your balloon there especially true infections Often

00:14

characters in different works of fiction share similar traits sometimes

00:17

even playing similar roles in different stories Well such characters

00:21

fall under what we call archetypes character types that keep

00:26

popping up you know villains heroes even that come in

00:30

every man although if a story is simply composed of

00:33

every men you'll wind up with a story about a

00:36

functioning society where everything is more or less just fine

00:39

doesn't make her very riveting fiction believe in jane eyre

00:42

goes to the well of archetypes featuring a character that

00:45

fits the archetype of the rape No we're not referring

00:49

to the long handled outdoor tool we all know and

00:51

love rather we're talking about bored wealthy aristocrats always men

00:56

who are into sex lacks morals and generally just you

00:59

know having a good time In other words if you

01:01

want any work done on ly one of these two

01:04

rakes is going to be any help Well the rake

01:06

and jane are is mr rochester acknowledge that he had

01:10

quite a checkered past he had at least one mistress

01:13

fought in a duel and talks about having spent years

01:16

wandering around seeking happiness in pleasure all stereotypical or arkin

01:21

typical break behavior However unless we get two down on

01:25

mr r it's worth keeping in mind that the western

01:28

literary tradition contains plenty of riggs who are far worse

01:32

In fact one is kind of referenced in the text

01:35

of jane eyre itself It's mentioned in the first chapter

01:38

that jane's nurse bessie red pamela to the kids the

01:42

story of a servant girl named pamela who reforms and

01:44

marries her less shittiest employer Mr b however before all

01:48

that reforming and marion happens mr b does some horrible

01:52

gross stuff like attempting to rape him a lot Luckily

01:55

for rakes everywhere the most common character arc for a

01:58

rake is reformed Whether a grows almost rapist like mr

02:02

b or just a general pleasure seeker like mr rochester

02:07

the love of a good woman can usually help them

02:10

mend their rakish ways That said i wouldn't blame you

02:13

if you don't find rakes terribly sympathetic Sometimes you're better

02:16

off just leaving your rake in the garden shed with 00:02:18.93 --> [endTime] all the other tools Hey

Up Next

A Tale of Two Cities Summary
75858 Views

Meet Charles Darnay, the nobleman who spends more time on trial and in prison than attending balls and drinking expensive wine. Don't feel too bad...

Related Videos

Beowulf
113099 Views

Written in Anglo-Saxon, or Old English, sometime between the 8th and 11th centuries, Beowulf is an epic poem that reflects the early medieval warri...

Brave New World
79224 Views

Brave New World is supposed be an exciting book about a negative utopia and the corrupt powers of authority. So where’s the big car chase? What's...

Dracula
27348 Views

What is Dracula really about? Just Count Dracula? Or is there more to it than vampires? This video addresses some major ideas in Bram Stoker’s cl...

Dracula: Father of the Modern Vampire
17556 Views

There are plenty of famous vampires that send chills up our spines, but Dracula was and still is the king of them all. No one else can touch him. N...