Dec 19 2008
News Article Two – Luke, En Garde!
Luke, En Garde!
December 17, 2008
By Ilayda Williamson
Betrayal. A common theme through the ages, and the topic of the debate in Mr. Murray’s Grade Twelve English class on Monday December 15, 2008. Two teams met, the Affirmative (Adam Young, Matt Brown, Stuart Gendron) and the Negative (Jon Hughes-Khatib, Tyler Keith and Alex Van der Mout) to argue whether or not Gertrude betrayed both Old and New Hamlet. The judges presiding over this debate were Megan Marshall, Stephanie Wilson, and Jayme Bedell.
The debate began, as usual, with a recitation of the rules. The rule which made the audience giggle and the debaters whip our the light sabers provided to them was the one that during the free for all, the debaters must end every major argument with a sword fight. All anticipated this with bated breath. The Affirmative began the debate at 10:09 a.m. with a quote from Osho (as well as an appeal to authority) and the things which may qualify betrayal (lying and decieving). They also then outlined how Gertrude fell into these qualifications – her involvement in certain death plots, as well as eavesdropping in order to further Claudius’ plans.
The Negative then began to lay out their points. They first highlighted the difference between modern marriages, which are for love, and marriages in the time of the play, which were for status and safety. This invalidates a speedy remarriage as proof of betrayal as it was probably more of a political move – to strengthen Gertrude’s and Hamlet’s position on the throne, as well as have them remain in court more securely. They also pointed out the possibility of her pragmatism – that she simply saw the need to move on far more quickly than Hamlet. Finally, they took the Ghost’s words as proof. Old Hamlet’s ghost told his son not to harm Gertrude. The Affirmative took this to mean that Old Hamlet did not see Gertrude as guilty of betrayal. During this argument, anaphora was used nicely to help the audience accept the points.
The rebuttals and following arguments centered around young Hamlet. The fact that young Hamlet makes jabs at his mother for almost the entirety of the play was brought up, as well as the inconsistency of the point of Gertrude safegaurding Hamlet’s future safety by remarrying – as the man she remarries and aids is the one planning to kill her son. An interesting suggestion made by the Negative team was the one of Gertrude’s play-acting, just as her son was. They proposed that Gertrude was playing along simply to save her and her son’s necks. To not go along with Claudius’ plans was to show a crack in her guise, which would ruin her. The first rebuttals were finished with a Shakespearean insult, which made the audience laugh a little.
The most interesting part of the debate was the free for all. This period of time was rife with sword-fights. Sadly, one of the judge’s beloved light sabers was broken during the final sword fight, but it was a single casaulty in a war of point-winning tricks. Tyler Keith begun the free for all with an impressive soliloquy written by himself and performed very dramatically. Not surprisingly, given the preceding debates and debaters, it was cut short by an ad hominem delivered by the opposition. This led to a sword fight, and Tyler quickly redeemed himself with a win. Stuart, the flinger of the first ad hominem and apparent antagonist of the free for all, begun another fight with Jon, managing to win this sword fight. Following this, a burden of proof fallacy was utilized, as a “You prove it! You prove it doesn’t!” quarrel erupted. Following this fallacy, one of the teams said that a Queen could show no emotion, because she is the Queen and is watched far too closely. This was a strong point made, which could be verified by looking back at history. Amusingly, throughout the free-for-all Jon used an appeal to fear. This garnered giggles from the audience. The last fight had had epic music in the background provided by Jon’s laptop, and Tyler once again was the victor. This intense free for all was ended by a point made by Jen (who was speaking for this reporter, who was too shy at the moment) about the political nature of marriage in those ages. One simply did not marry for love then.
Betrayal, even when defined by a dictionary, does not make finding the guilty easier. This was shown by the debate. One side had the strong point that she did have a heavy hand in helping Hamlet be driven out. The other side, however, made the earnest argument that she was the Hamlets’ mother and wife – that all loyalty and devotion should go strictly to them, and that all passions should be felt for them. In the end, the negative team won by an additional point. A fair fight fought, with light sabers and clean arguments on both sides.
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