In Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human, Harold Bloom groups three Shakespeare plays into a category he calls "early comedies": The Comedy of Errors, The Taming of the Shrew, and The Two Gentlemen of Verona. We've done two of the three, so let's finish up this category with Two Gents.
Side note: This play always makes me think of the scene from "Shakespeare in Love," when Will says, "I'm still owed for one gentleman of Verona!"
As always, I'll post my thoughts next Sunday, and I look forward to the discussion!
Sunday, July 11, 2010
Discussion: King John
The play: The Life and Death of King John
The plot tweet: Young Arthur seeks John's usurped throne; brief war; brief peace; cardinal stirs up war again; Arthur dies (oops); nobles revolt; John dies.
My favorite line:
Grief fills the room up of my absent child,
Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me,
Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words,
Remembers me of all his gracious parts,
Stuffs out his vacant garments with his form;
Then have I reason to be fond of grief. (Constance)
---
A few weeks ago, I attended a performance of The Complete Works of Shakespeare (Abridged) at the Cincinnati Shakespeare Company. Seeking to establish the mock superiority of their Shakespeare knowledge, the presenters said, "Oh, these people don't know anything about Shakespeare. For example, who here has read King John? Go ahead, raise your hand." Not a single hand went up, not even mine.
"Well, that's no surprise," they said. "King John is considered part of Shakespeare's apocrypha ... also known to critics as total crap."
As you can imagine, I picked up this week's reading assignment with very low expectations.
I am willing to concede that King John lacks the magic and artistry of Shakespeare's later plays, but still I was pleasantly surprised by this play -- a quick read with engaging action, some memorable moments of beautiful language, and of course the out-sized character of the Bastard. The scene in which Hubert threatens to blind young Arthur is painfully touching, and the verbal catfights between Elinor and Constance are delightful.
From a critical perspective, however, I can't quite sink my teeth into this play. Apparently, neither can professional critics. The essays I read praised the character of the Bastard and then reverted to plot summary. Marjorie Garber, in Shakespeare After All, also managed one paragraph each about eye imagery and mother-son dynamics. Maurice Charney, in All of Shakespeare, got a few pages out of the historical inaccuracies of the play.
Critics do seem universally annoyed with Shakespeare for leaving out the signing of the Magna Carta, which we see as a pivotal document in the march toward democracy. This criticism puzzles me, as the histories are never particularly accurate, anyway. In any case, England was still a monarchy in Shakespeare's time, and perhaps the Magna Carta didn't seem as important to him as it now seems to us.
I think Charney does the best job of explaining our disquiet with this play:
The plot tweet: Young Arthur seeks John's usurped throne; brief war; brief peace; cardinal stirs up war again; Arthur dies (oops); nobles revolt; John dies.
My favorite line:
Grief fills the room up of my absent child,
Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me,
Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words,
Remembers me of all his gracious parts,
Stuffs out his vacant garments with his form;
Then have I reason to be fond of grief. (Constance)
---
A few weeks ago, I attended a performance of The Complete Works of Shakespeare (Abridged) at the Cincinnati Shakespeare Company. Seeking to establish the mock superiority of their Shakespeare knowledge, the presenters said, "Oh, these people don't know anything about Shakespeare. For example, who here has read King John? Go ahead, raise your hand." Not a single hand went up, not even mine.
"Well, that's no surprise," they said. "King John is considered part of Shakespeare's apocrypha ... also known to critics as total crap."
As you can imagine, I picked up this week's reading assignment with very low expectations.
I am willing to concede that King John lacks the magic and artistry of Shakespeare's later plays, but still I was pleasantly surprised by this play -- a quick read with engaging action, some memorable moments of beautiful language, and of course the out-sized character of the Bastard. The scene in which Hubert threatens to blind young Arthur is painfully touching, and the verbal catfights between Elinor and Constance are delightful.
From a critical perspective, however, I can't quite sink my teeth into this play. Apparently, neither can professional critics. The essays I read praised the character of the Bastard and then reverted to plot summary. Marjorie Garber, in Shakespeare After All, also managed one paragraph each about eye imagery and mother-son dynamics. Maurice Charney, in All of Shakespeare, got a few pages out of the historical inaccuracies of the play.
Critics do seem universally annoyed with Shakespeare for leaving out the signing of the Magna Carta, which we see as a pivotal document in the march toward democracy. This criticism puzzles me, as the histories are never particularly accurate, anyway. In any case, England was still a monarchy in Shakespeare's time, and perhaps the Magna Carta didn't seem as important to him as it now seems to us.
I think Charney does the best job of explaining our disquiet with this play:
The Bastard provides an outspoken, witty and heroic model for such later figures as Henry V, and his bluffness and honestly stand as a bulwark against the political chicanery of the rest of the play. But the Bastard is suddenly at the end deprived of the kingship he so richly deserves. The conclusion is strikingly indeterminate, as if there must be some other play or plays to wind up the historical action. We expect a mini-series that never comes.
Saturday, July 10, 2010
Folio Fail: Raymond Scott Convicted
If you've read Paul Collins' excellent The Book of William, about the history of Shakespeare's first folio, you know that every known copy has been meticulously studied, with every flaw and misprint carefully recorded. Pick any single page of a folio, and the experts can probably tell you which copy it's from.
So, how clueless is Raymond Scott? A few years ago, he walked into the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., and asked them to authenticate his copy of the first folio -- the same copy that had been stolen from Durham University in 1998. I can just imagine the librarian, with a pasted-on smile, pleasantly asking Scott to wait "just a few more minutes" while she quietly dialed the police. She probably offered him coffee and a Danish.
After a colorful trial, Scott was cleared this week of stealing the folio from Durham, but he was convicted of handling stolen goods. Given the value of the folio -- about 15 million British pounds -- he is likely to be sitting in prison for quite some time. Long enough, at least, to read the complete works of Shakespeare. But I very much doubt that he will.
So, how clueless is Raymond Scott? A few years ago, he walked into the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., and asked them to authenticate his copy of the first folio -- the same copy that had been stolen from Durham University in 1998. I can just imagine the librarian, with a pasted-on smile, pleasantly asking Scott to wait "just a few more minutes" while she quietly dialed the police. She probably offered him coffee and a Danish.
After a colorful trial, Scott was cleared this week of stealing the folio from Durham, but he was convicted of handling stolen goods. Given the value of the folio -- about 15 million British pounds -- he is likely to be sitting in prison for quite some time. Long enough, at least, to read the complete works of Shakespeare. But I very much doubt that he will.
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
Byrd and the Bard
Senator Robert Byrd, who died last week at 92, apparently had quite a reputation for quoting Shakespeare on the Senate floor. According to this column in the New York Times, Byrd managed in 1994 alone to quote every single play. It's hard to imagine any other senator doing that these days without being labeled an elitist. (Remember the snide remarks about Obama's preference for arugula?) So, if you could choose a Shakespearean eulogy for Senator Byrd, which quote would you choose?
Sunday, July 4, 2010
This Week's Reading Assignment
We can't avoid it forever. In the quest to read the complete works of Shakespeare, we eventually have to read the histories. So, here we go: This week's reading assignment is King John.
Generally, we've been approaching the plays in loose chronological order, based on our best estimate of the publication date. I want to approach the histories a bit differently, so that we're reading them in chronological order according to the characters and events portrayed. That gives us the following approach:
King John
Richard II
Henry IV, Part I
Henry IV, Part II
Henry V
Henry VI, Part I
Henry VI, Part II
Henry VI, Part III
Richard III
Henry VIII
Don't worry; we're not going to read them all in a row. Let's just slog our way through King John, try to find some redeeming qualities in the play, and move on. (As you can probably guess, I've never read the play, and I've never heard one good word spoken about it. I'm hoping I've been misinformed.)
Happy Independence Day!
Generally, we've been approaching the plays in loose chronological order, based on our best estimate of the publication date. I want to approach the histories a bit differently, so that we're reading them in chronological order according to the characters and events portrayed. That gives us the following approach:
King John
Richard II
Henry IV, Part I
Henry IV, Part II
Henry V
Henry VI, Part I
Henry VI, Part II
Henry VI, Part III
Richard III
Henry VIII
Don't worry; we're not going to read them all in a row. Let's just slog our way through King John, try to find some redeeming qualities in the play, and move on. (As you can probably guess, I've never read the play, and I've never heard one good word spoken about it. I'm hoping I've been misinformed.)
Happy Independence Day!
Discussion: The Taming of the Shrew
The play: The Taming of the Shrew
The plot tweet: While lovers vie for Bianca, Petruchio woos and weds her sister Kate. Tames shrew with her own medicine, probably lives happily ever after.
My favorite line:
And where two raging fires meet together
They do consume the thing that feeds their fury.
Though little fire grows great with little wind,
Yet extreme gusts will blow out fire and all.
So I to her, and so she yields to me,
For I am rough and woo not like a babe. (Petruchio)
---
As Marjorie Garber points out in Shakespeare After All, critical analysis of The Taming of the Shrew has tended to focus on two things: the introductory practical joke played on Christopher Sly, and Kate's final speech about women's duties to their husbands.
Some critics are derisive of the Sly introduction, claiming that it has no relation to the Shrew plot. (Indeed, in every production I've seen, this portion has been cut.) Other critics say that the Sly portion introduces themes, such as impersonation, transformation and disguise, that are critical to our understanding of the play. If this is true, it seems that the play should be crafted to teach Sly a lesson, perhaps about his drunkenness or the hazards of impersonating a nobleman. Yet drunkenness isn't an issue, and those in the play who do impersonate noblemen are sympathetic characters whose stories end well. Instead, the whole thrust of the action is the love story (and I think it is one) of Petruchio and Kate. What is Sly to learn from this?
I'll get to the other issue, Kate's final speech, in a minute. First, a question: Why, exactly, is Kate such a shrew in the first place? Does it come naturally to her, or does she have some cause? A few years ago, a production at the Stratford Shakespeare Festival took literally Petruchio's line "Why does the world report that Kate doth limp?" The suggestion was that her physical disability -- and society's reaction to it -- had created her foul temperament.
A more likely cause is the treatment Kate has received from her father, Baptista, who clearly favors Bianca. "Will you not suffer me? Nay, now I see / She is your treasure," Kate accuses him. During the course of the play, he calls her "thou hilding of a devilish spirit," "a shrew of thy impatient humor" and "the veriest shrew of all." With a father like that, who wouldn't turn out a bit nasty?
In that context, Petruchio's proposal offers Kate a welcome escape from an unhappy home (especially since she is probably the only one who realizes that her sister isn't the perfect angel she appears to be). Crazy as Petruchio seems, at least he claims to care for her. And they're clearly interested in each other from the start; their witty banter is laced with sexual puns, and Kate is genuinely upset when she thinks he's left her at the altar. Their partnership isn't instantly perfect; Kate must learn to manipulate quietly rather than rage and shout. But learn she does, and her final speech seems to reflect their unspoken agreement to live in harmony -- presenting a proper face to the world, but with Kate always quietly in control.
The Taming of the Shrew has sometimes been labeled a problem play, but Bloom doesn't think so, and neither do I. In Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human, he writes that Kate and Petruchio are "rather clearly going to be the happiest married couple in Shakespeare." Lucentio, it seems, is the one we ought to pity.
The plot tweet: While lovers vie for Bianca, Petruchio woos and weds her sister Kate. Tames shrew with her own medicine, probably lives happily ever after.
My favorite line:
And where two raging fires meet together
They do consume the thing that feeds their fury.
Though little fire grows great with little wind,
Yet extreme gusts will blow out fire and all.
So I to her, and so she yields to me,
For I am rough and woo not like a babe. (Petruchio)
---
As Marjorie Garber points out in Shakespeare After All, critical analysis of The Taming of the Shrew has tended to focus on two things: the introductory practical joke played on Christopher Sly, and Kate's final speech about women's duties to their husbands.
Some critics are derisive of the Sly introduction, claiming that it has no relation to the Shrew plot. (Indeed, in every production I've seen, this portion has been cut.) Other critics say that the Sly portion introduces themes, such as impersonation, transformation and disguise, that are critical to our understanding of the play. If this is true, it seems that the play should be crafted to teach Sly a lesson, perhaps about his drunkenness or the hazards of impersonating a nobleman. Yet drunkenness isn't an issue, and those in the play who do impersonate noblemen are sympathetic characters whose stories end well. Instead, the whole thrust of the action is the love story (and I think it is one) of Petruchio and Kate. What is Sly to learn from this?
I'll get to the other issue, Kate's final speech, in a minute. First, a question: Why, exactly, is Kate such a shrew in the first place? Does it come naturally to her, or does she have some cause? A few years ago, a production at the Stratford Shakespeare Festival took literally Petruchio's line "Why does the world report that Kate doth limp?" The suggestion was that her physical disability -- and society's reaction to it -- had created her foul temperament.
A more likely cause is the treatment Kate has received from her father, Baptista, who clearly favors Bianca. "Will you not suffer me? Nay, now I see / She is your treasure," Kate accuses him. During the course of the play, he calls her "thou hilding of a devilish spirit," "a shrew of thy impatient humor" and "the veriest shrew of all." With a father like that, who wouldn't turn out a bit nasty?
In that context, Petruchio's proposal offers Kate a welcome escape from an unhappy home (especially since she is probably the only one who realizes that her sister isn't the perfect angel she appears to be). Crazy as Petruchio seems, at least he claims to care for her. And they're clearly interested in each other from the start; their witty banter is laced with sexual puns, and Kate is genuinely upset when she thinks he's left her at the altar. Their partnership isn't instantly perfect; Kate must learn to manipulate quietly rather than rage and shout. But learn she does, and her final speech seems to reflect their unspoken agreement to live in harmony -- presenting a proper face to the world, but with Kate always quietly in control.
The Taming of the Shrew has sometimes been labeled a problem play, but Bloom doesn't think so, and neither do I. In Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human, he writes that Kate and Petruchio are "rather clearly going to be the happiest married couple in Shakespeare." Lucentio, it seems, is the one we ought to pity.
Friday, July 2, 2010
Shakespeare Gear
Are you the type to wear your heart on your sleeve? If so, you'll love today's Shirt.Woot t-shirt, an A-Z image of Shakespearean characters ($10). Or, try this charm bracelet on Etsy, with the names of several plays hand-stamped in brass ($44.95).Another of my favorite Etsy finds is this origami Christmas ornament, created from the pages of King Lear ($25).
With the exception of items that say "To thine own self be true,"
which I find annoying, I'm a huge sucker for this kind of Shakespeare merchandise. My library is home to a stuffed Shakespeare, with his companion Queen Elizabeth, a bobble-head Shakespeare, and a large Shakespeare bust. I also have half a dozen sets of antique Shakespeare bookends; my favorite feature the Tempest quote, "My library was dukedom large enough."Do you have a favorite Shakespeare tchotchke? If so, send us a photo! Shall we give a prize for the tackiest one?
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