Well, I had a look through the board, and if there's been a thread devoted to Shakespeare, it was a very long time ago and had a peculiar name.


I've always been a shameless detractor of the kinds of books intellectuals are supposed to like. The works of the Bronte sisters make me want to run down the street screaming "What's the bloody point", Dickens bores me to tears, I have an hour long anti Hemmingway rant based on "the old man and sea" if anybody is interested. But Shakespeare I can't escape. The man could WRITE. I found a copy of the collected works recently, and it's renewed my fondness, so I thought I would start this thread on the off chance that there are any other fans here.


I've made a poll with a few titles, selected largely at random (though I confess that I chose Much Ado because it's *my* favorite, Dream because it's the first I ever saw, and Hamlet because it's extraordinarly well known.

Why is the unnameable Scottish play not on the list?

For thread reference, you can find the complete collected plays of Shakespeare here. (It would seem some well-meaning MIT student meant to put the sonnets back up about 8 years ago, then proceeded to graduate and move on to other things.)

Thren, I too have a particular hatred for Hemmingway, to the dismay of so many people who seem like love him just because they're told they should.

ANYway... Midsummer Night's Dream will always have a soft spot for me, as a former drama student, because I was Helena. My other favourite is Titus Andronicus.

Cause, with the exception of the ones listed, I chose more or less at random by opening my Collected Works to the index. Also, much though I like Macbeth, it gets too much attention as is.


Edit:

Titus, eh Luna? Any particular reason?

Why Titus? Because it's gory as hell. As good as any slasher film.

If you can find it, check out the 1999 film adaptation with Anthony Hopkins. Absolutely stunning cinematography.

I chose The Tempest and King Lear. I really like the fool, great character.

This is a dangerous topic for me. I LOVE Shakespeare--one of the major reasons I'm in grad school, actually, and in fact I have 12 papers about Shakespeare to grade by 7:45 tomorrow morning. So, instead of doing that....

Hamlet's hands down my fave, though there are many others I love: Richard II, Richard III, Macbeth, The Tempest, the Henry IVs, R & J, Titus, Othello, As You Like It, Coriolanus. I'm probably forgetting some.

His poetry, his incisive understanding of so many different kinds of characters, the rhythm of his language--there's nothing more fun to roll around on the tongue than "hie thee hither, that I may pour my spirits into thine ear / And chastise, with the valor of my tongue / All that impedes thee from the golden round." Yum! Also there are so many cool things about metatheatricality and life as art. And it's so fun to read aloud, because if you give yourself wholly over to it, the words begin to speak YOU. And the quotes that come back to me at surprising times. I remember being about 16 and being in a glum, melancholy mood, walking downtown on an annoyingly beautiful spring day and hearing in my head, "How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable seem to me all the uses of this world!" It was true, and it immediately made me much happier because there's no better way to say that. And there it was, hanging out in my head, ready for me to need it.

Squee!

A Winter's Tale hasn't been mentioned yet, which I would like to include, because although I think there are lots of his plays that are better than it, I recently saw an open-air version that was very good. Though I've never seen the point of the messenger, who, halfway through the play, is eaten by a bear.

Titus Andronicus is amazingly gory. However, I chose Romeo and Juliet, because that's what I've just finished doing for my GCSE, Midsummer Night's Dream, and Hamlet, because I like the play and also how its 'imagery' has been carried on into other parts of culture. Like in the work of the pre-Raphaelites, who are over-hyped but I love.

Merewena...glad to hear I'm not the only one who's big on Henry IV (both parts) . afterall, those are the plays that gave us Falstaff. Falstaff is probably my favorite Shakespeare character of all time!


Goblin: Exit, pursued by bear.

I'm very gladdened to see so many fans of Bill here!

I'm at devoted follower myself. I voted Henry V because, to me, it has the whole package. It has the action, it has the love, and it has the comedy, often all happening at the same time. The wooing of Catherine pretty much sums up my entire experience with romance (except that he gets the girl).

I did Midsummer and Caesar last year. This year I'm doing Love's Labour and Macbeth. I'm having a ball. I intend to make my way through the entire canon on stage at some point.

As for Winter's Tale - I love it. I have a clip of Patrick Stewart doing Leontes just as his wife's "statue" comes back. He never fails to make me and everyone else in the room weep with the 2 words "she's warm". And with the "Exit, pursued by a bear" it's extremely likely that was put in because there was a bear in the theatre for bear baiting immediately before or after the show. So odds are that it was written in as a stage direction after the fact because the guy actually was pursued by a bear!

As an actor I'm such a huge fan of the Bard because the text is chock full of suggestions and cues for the actors. Hints, options, great choices. For example: you get entirely different interpretations of certain lines and speeches if you take breath pauses at the end of lines as opposed to punctuation. Another example: if you find a speech where the last phrase in that speech is repeated earlier, odds are he was screwing with the actors. Remember that the actors only knew the last few words that came before their line. So what happens is he creates a section where one actor is forced, unknowing, to cut interrupt the other actor and they both are pissed and frustrated by the end of said speech - exactly what the scene needed.

Damn that's hard to explain in text. It's a lot easier to write down the roles and just let the actors find out the trick for themselves.

Captain Nevarre
...will chat endlessly on the bard with anyone who wants. PM me!...

Wow, Cap. New information there....all very interesting.


I am now picturing a very confused actor being chased off the stage by a bear.

LOVE Patrick Stewart. I saw a clip of him doing Shylock's "Many a time and oft on the Rialto hast thou rated me..." and it was amazing. It was with a workshop, so he did three different interpreations--the evil "Jew dog" (Stewart's words), the kind and oppressed Shylock of 19th-century fame (think Henry Irving), and his own reading--an ironic, cruel-but-hurt Shylock, who was smarter than his lines. As you may guess, the third was the best.

I never knew/thought about the repetitive phrases thing, Captain. That's really cool. Because what makes an actor great but *listening*? The reactions are so much more personal and emotional if you as an actor can really take in what your comrade is saying and feel your/your character's impulsive reaction to it (Yes, method actor, sorry). I'll have to tell that to my classes in future.

RE: pauses: have you looked at the different variations in texts? It is actually really interesting, even though some of the non-authorized texts (i.e. Hamlet Q1, which reads: "to be or not to be: that's the point!") have wacky stuff. As I'm sure you know there's no way of knowing what Shakespeare "intended," but there seem to be lots of actor choices embedded in the various early printings.

I love reading "bad" quarto editions! You're absolutely right, Merewena. Even though "that is the question" (also one of the most famous scansion examples) is a much better way to go, there are a lot of character suggestions in every different printing. I always go back to the first folio no matter what cutting and edition the show is using. It is invaluable for research. Even the capitalization in the first folio (capitalization that is often "corrected" by editors) gives important clues.

So who has read the Bowdler editions?

Captain Nevarre

Never read the Bowlder editions, but I HAVE read Lambs Tales from Shakespeare, which are their own special kind of not right.

I chose King Lear, I absolutely loved reading and writing papers on both King Lear and The Tempest. King Lear came out on top because I think it is simply amazing. I view it as a tale of personal transformation and an excellent example that nothing is impossible where human nature is concerned.