Group Presentations

Everyone has done an amazing job with the group presentations so far and I've really enjoyed watching them.  The play that has interested me the most is Titus Andronicus.  Not only because it is so gory (which I'll have to admit is what got my attention initially) but because it seems like a dense labyrinth of intertwining stories, all dealing with revenge. It  made me wonder how it was received by audiences when it came out in the playhouses.  How did Elizabethan audiences like that the "bad guy" was a woman?  How did they respond to the violence?  Did they use red ribbons? I looked up a quick synopsis of the play on the Internet to be able to blog about it but it is definitely on my summer reading list. I'm just not the beach-read chick lit type I guess. 

To be fair, Titus drew first blood, killing Tamora's first son, but it is still horrifying to me what Demetrius and Chiron did to Levinia.  This takes the Shakespeare rape scene to a whole other dimension not unlike some horror movies I've seen. The poor girl doesn't even get to live after managing to identify her attackers with a stick and her stumps! Which leads me to wonder if maybe Shakespeare got into some kind of trouble or got bad reviews because he definitely toned down the violence in his later works.  This was his first tragedy, right? Maybe he wanted to make a splash to get noticed, or perhaps he was channeling the rapes of of Roman and Greek mythology that were brutal and animalistic.  Zeus was a pretty dirty guy.

 I'd like to talk about Aaron.  Who is this guy and why is he so evil? is he some kind of personification of minority oppression and frustration?  It confuses me that he sacrificed himself for the baby he had with Tamora considering everything he tells his captors about his evil plot and the fact that the only regret he has is that he didn't commit more evil in his life. By the way, I thought Craig did a great job with the speech Aaron gives before he gets buried. 

On a final side note, I love that the group brought up Sweeny Todd.  In the synopsis of the play I read it says that before Titus put Demetrius and Chiron in the meat pies, he slit their throats and let their blood drain into a basin.  JUST LIKE SWEENY. good job guys.

mind on my Shakespeare and Shakespeare on my mind

As You Like It Rap

All the world’s a stage

And we’re just players

My dad was exiled

‘cause Fredrick was a hater

Like Jacob and Esau

And the bowl of stew

Usurped his power

This story’s not new

I am not Rosalind

I am Ganymede

Went to Arden so Fredrick

Couldn’t mess with me

Took his girl Celia

But she knew the truth

Still had my back like

Naomi and Ruth

Wherever thou goeset

There I will go

But I made it up to her

By the end of the show

Met some boys back home

Orlando had no game

So I showed him how to love

But I used a different name

Ganymede was a

Pretty-faced boy

Taken to Olympus

To be Zeus’s toy

So it makes sense

That everyone wants me

O-l-i-v-e-r

And that wench named Audrey

Everyone got married

‘cause it’s a comedy

Took off my guise

And told them it was me

So What I can’t rap

I don’t give a S#*t

This is my paper

On As You Like It

Term Paper Ideas

I had a really hard time making the connections between Myth and Shakespeare this semester either out of ignorance on the subject or the astounding density of my skull, and I can see how this will continue to be a problem when I become a teacher and try to cover Shakespeare. I need to figure out how to make these myths related to Shakespeare relevant enough to hold the attention of my students while helping them make their own connections between the texts. good luck.

Why do kids hate Shakespeare? Is it the unfamiliar language or an inability to find the parallels to modern life that are only visible if you are familiar with the myths he is alluding to? What do need to know about mythology to get something out of Shakespeare? How do you teach these things alongside the plays?

My intention is to mold these questions into some kind of term paper that is not just about teaching but finds a balance between an inquiry in the best methods of how to teach Shakespeare and a discussion on what I have learned about mythology this semester that I will use when teaching Shakespeare.   

cheers.

Winter's Tale

So...was Hermione dead and brought back to life? or was she gone like her daughter and by the power of fairy-tales came back just in time for the happy ending? And why does she come back other than to fulfill the reunion special theme of the romances? I really don't think her husband learned his lesson.  The whole dwelling-near-the-churchyard thing seems more like an outward display of penance meant for the benefit of those judging him rather than the purification of his own soul that we've said comes only from suffering.  In the end, I really don't care because I'm so excited that the magician was a woman.  I love these strong female characters...maybe a term paper idea?

I'm liking these Romances and the way they mix the gory violence of tragedy with the happy endings of comedies.  I don't know if this is because they were written at the end of Shakespeare's career and are a part of the logical evolution of the play to the way we know the novel to be now, mixing a little suffering with the happy endings or if it is just coincidence.  But something tells me there are no coincidences with Shakespeare. Especially when you look at the intertextuality of the plays, making allusions to one another in line with the mythological allusions. 

Cymbeline, Mythology, and the Unwashed Masses

We asked the question of why plays like Cymbeline, and frankly, anything other than the holy trinity of Romeo and Juliet, King Lear, and The Tempest are not taught in schools, and I think it has to do with an unsubstantial foundation in Mythology despite the fact that reading more Shakespeare would remedy this problem.  Yes, Cymbeline is violent and overtly sexual and perverse, but what Shakespeare play isn't? I think it is because students (or teachers) lack the background knowledge or willingness to develop a background knowledge of the less popular plays due to how much you have to have read beforehand to get the inside-joke nature of these allusions.  I personally think that introducing a play as outrageous as Cybeline or Measure for Measure (which is pretty dang violent/sexual as well) to a classroom with the effort made to get the kids to understand what's going on would only make the kids (a few at least) more excited about the Bard. 

In regards to the last 4 plays, I feel like you almost need to read them first to understand some of the earlier ones.  There are several mythological allusions in Cymbeline that would help a reader better understand the archetypes that are in all of the other plays such as the goddess of love and the leo = lion stuff. 

I Will Give thee Bloody Teeth

The introduction to Antony & Cleopatra has a picture of Vivian Leigh (Scarlett O'Hara!) as Cleo so naturally I couldn't help but think of Scarlett (and Elizabeth Taylor) when reading Cleopatra's lines.  It seems as though the female characters are getting increasingly bold as we read these plays.  We saw a hint of it in Rosalind's wit but we haven't seen anything like Cleopatra's love games she plays on poor but not so innocent Antony:

"If you find him sad

Say I am dancing; if in mirth, report

That I am sudden sick." 

Even with the news of his wife's death she mocks Antony for his faithfulness but it only makes him want her more.  She is sexually explicit, pining for Antony and envying the horse he rides while away for "bearing the weight of Antony" and uses her beauty as a weapon to manipulate Antony and to get her way. My favorite line of hers is when Charmian has compared Antony to Caesar, and she basically tells him she's going to punch him in the mouth: 

"By Isis, I will give thee bloody teeth,

If thou with Caesar paragon again

My man of men." 

She's cool, calm, sexy, but if you talk about her man she'll bust your teeth. 

Too bad Antony hasn't turned around yet on some grand staircase and told her "Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn." 

Shakespeare really had a firm understanding of manipulative women.  It makes perfect sense today to have these strong female actors playing the feisty Cleopatra, but how did the male actor play her at the time of its publication?  Did he overact like the mechanics in MSND to exaggerate the wiles of a woman, or did he understand like Shakespeare that coolness and subtlety are the tools of a woman's cruelty?

Cordelia and The Fool

After my initial fascination borne from a high school performance of the play, I have read King Lear a few time and each time I find something new or at least a new way of looking at the same words.  I am particularly interested in the characters of Cordelia and the Fool, as well as the suspicion I have heard mentioned that they are in fact the same actor, and who is Lear talking about when he says "my poor fool is hanged" anyway? 

Even though all of the good characters (King of France, The Fool, etc) of the play like her, it is hard to read her motives or to discern how good she is at all. The same can be said about the Fool.  With all of his riddles and songs it is nigh impossible to tell who he is directing his criticism towards or why he is saying it.   Did Cordelia refuse to flatter Lear out of honesty and to put herself apart from the obviously contrived praise of her sisters or is she truly unable to tell him she loves him.  You can't really blame her if this is the case as he is a kind of pompous guy anyway.  Maybe she's just keeping him down to earth the way the fool does.  Like Cordelia, the Fool does not flatter Lear but because he does it indirectly and uses doublespeak he is not faced with any serious wrath.  However, Cordelia remains loyal to the King even after he disowns her, reinforcing the idea that she is his only true ally, but is she doing this out of love for a father or out of being generally virtuous as the King of France sees her.Perhaps by using the same actor for both roles is a way to indicate that each character possesses similar traits and deficiencies.  Both characters see and speak the truth, and are punished for it despite their loyalty.