Shakespeare

[(poco) Sforzando]

Indeed, in fact I know several people who think that way.

Alas.

[Brian]

I would answer obliquely, by starting with a character who unquestionably pretends madness. Here is Edgar in King Lear:

Your answer, however oblique, is effective. Shakespearean madness was never subtle, whether real or fake (and there's both in Lear). Hamlet never approaches that kind of exaggerated language/behavior, although maybe he is teasing Polonius with something similar (very like a whale).

Claudius has plotted almost the perfect crime,

He just didn't account for the possibility of ghosts


-

Every year I finish the year out by reading one of the plays. (Last year was an inauspicious choice - Merry Wives. The Boito is better.) This discussion in general has me racing back to choose Hamlet, although I was hoping I'd get around to a re-read of Merchant...maybe the only way to go is to read 'em both over Christmas.

[(poco) Sforzando]

Your answer, however oblique, is effective. Shakespearean madness was never subtle, whether real or fake (and there's both in Lear). Hamlet never approaches that kind of exaggerated language/behavior, although maybe he is teasing Polonius with something similar (very like a whale).

"Very like a whale" comes close, but of course it's for comic ends. Hamlet does at times find it convenient to admit to madness (his apology to Laertes), but I reject any idea of any organized scheme to play the lunatic in order to protect himself from the king, gather data, or any such.

Every year I finish the year out by reading one of the plays. (Last year was an inauspicious choice - Merry Wives. The Boito is better.) This discussion in general has me racing back to choose Hamlet, although I was hoping I'd get around to a re-read of Merchant...maybe the only way to go is to read 'em both over Christmas.

Yes, but at that rate you'll be 60 by the time you're done! (Many years ago when I was commuting by train to NYC, I decided I'd re-read all of Shakespeare on my trips back and forth. Took eight months, but I got through everything, even Timon of Athens.)

[kishnevi]

One thing about "get thee to a nunnery":  in Elizabethan slang, nunnery seems to have meant " brothel". In which case Hamlet was not giving her friendly advice.

[lisa needs braces]

One thing about "get thee to a nunnery":  in Elizabethan slang, nunnery seems to have meant " brothel". In which case Hamlet was not giving her friendly advice.

This seems to fit in with John Mcwhorter's thesis about a lot of Shakespeare going over audience's heads:

http://www.wsj.com/articles/a-facelift-for-shakespeare-1443194924

[SimonNZ]

One thing about "get thee to a nunnery":  in Elizabethan slang, nunnery seems to have meant " brothel". In which case Hamlet was not giving her friendly advice.

There's nothing in the context of the scene to suggest its being used that way.

This seems to fit in with John Mcwhorter's thesis about a lot of Shakespeare going over audience's heads:

http://www.wsj.com/articles/a-facelift-for-shakespeare-1443194924

You've already linked to that article, and people have already given their comments on it,  and "modernizing" the language isn't going to help with supposed double meanings. Would you like the modernizer to choose "nunnery" or "brothel" there? (pretending the second was even an option)

The audience is smarter than you seem to think they are. Nobody, to pick one random example, has ever been confused about what Richard III means when he says he is "rudely stamped", even though neither word is used with a modern meaning.

[(poco) Sforzando]

There's nothing in the context of the scene to suggest its being used that way.

Exactly, which is why I didn't bring the point up. The issue is well-discussed here:
http://www.terrania.us/journal/2006/10/gk-chesterton-was-right.html
http://thealexandrian.net/wordpress/29277/theater/thought-of-the-day-whorehouse-nunneries-and-vagina-nothings

It reminds me of the claim that "nunnery" means "whorehouse" in Shakespeare, so that when Hamlet tells Ophelia to go to the nunnery he's really telling her to become a whore. No. He isn't. The only Elizabethan references to "nunnery" meaning "whorehouse" are in a comedy where a whorehouse being referred to as a nunnery is a joke specifically because a nunnery isn't a whorehouse.

When I get a chance, I'll look up the word in the OED. (I've got the Compact Edition, bought years ago, where four standard pages are photographically reduced to a single page. It's like a miniature score.) But context of course supports the standard meaning:

Get thee to a nunnery, why woulds't thou be a breeder of sinners?

Last time I heard, there was nothing about joining a brothel that would prevent a woman from getting pregnant and breeding sinners. Hamlet's point, of course, is to counsel poor innocent confused Ophelia to renounce the world and avoid populating it with sinners like himself.

[North Star]

When I get a chance, I'll look up the word in the OED. (I've got the Compact Edition, bought years ago, where four standard pages are photographically reduced to a single page. It's like a miniature score.) But context of course supports the standard meaning:

Shakespeare probably would have known the slang meaning, but its meaningfulness in Hamlet is of course questionable.

http://islingtonnow.co.uk/2013/03/19/from-clerkenwell-or-not-from-clerkenwell-that-is-the-question/
http://shaksper.net/archive/2002/191-may/16317-re-queen-elizabeth-is-other-profession-sp-342659053
http://mrshakespeare.typepad.com/mrshakespeare/2007/10/gesta-grayorum.html

1.
a. A place of residence for a community of nuns; a building or group of buildings in which nuns live as a religious community; a convent. Also fig.
...
1603   Shakespeare Hamlet iii. i. 123   Go to a Nunnery [1604 Nunry, 1623 Nunnerie] goe.
...


b. slang. A brothel. Now hist.

1593   T. Nashe Christs Teares 79 b,   [To] some one Gentleman generally acquainted, they giue..free priuiledge thenceforward in theyr Nunnery, to procure them frequentance.
1594   Gesta Grayorum (1914) 12   Lucy Negro, Abbess de Clerkenwell, holdeth the Nunnery of Clerkenwell.

[(poco) Sforzando]

Shakespeare probably would have known the slang meaning, but its meaningfulness in Hamlet is of course questionable.

http://islingtonnow.co.uk/2013/03/19/from-clerkenwell-or-not-from-clerkenwell-that-is-the-question/
http://shaksper.net/archive/2002/191-may/16317-re-queen-elizabeth-is-other-profession-sp-342659053
http://mrshakespeare.typepad.com/mrshakespeare/2007/10/gesta-grayorum.html

I think you'll find the standard definition dates back many centuries before. In any case, entries past 1603 are not relevant.

[North Star]

I think you'll find the standard definition dates back many centuries before. In any case, entries past 1603 are not relevant.

Well obviously. And again. I see I didn't bother  trimming the entries.

[SimonNZ]

Watched last night: Henry the Sixth, Part 1 from the BBC complete series

A problematic production of a problematic play (one that, curiously, I think it would make a better Hollywood movie, with its all too regular battle scenes and easy(er) language its spoon-feeding of historical exposition).

On the plus side are the fine performances by Bernard Hill as the Duke of York and Trevor Peacock as Talbot, as well as a surprisingly succesful casting of Peter Benson as the King - far too old for the role, but perfect for the ineffectual meekness and naievity.

On the minus side the Playschool-like painted sets, all the French acting like Keystone Cops and the sub-pantomime fight scenes. But worst of all is the usually superb Brenda Blethyn as an oikish and coarse Joan of Arc - neither director nor actress seemed at all interested in trying to square the historical Joan with the Joan of Shakespeares text (which I think is more possible than it may first appear), instead we get all the supporting character's references to Joan being a cynical amoral irreligious opportunist jarringly supported here in every way by the manner of Joan herself. That was, for me, a deal breaker.

But still... it'll be on to parts 2 and 3 over the next week. Haven't seen the Age Of Kings versions yet, hope they have more success, and it will also be interesting to see how season two of The Hollow Crown does them.

[zamyrabyrd]

One thing about "get thee to a nunnery":  in Elizabethan slang, nunnery seems to have meant " brothel". In which case Hamlet was not giving her friendly advice.

I don't know if it would make any difference in staging Hamlet, if indeed Ophelia is in the "family way":
http://www.craftyscreenwriting.com/ophelia.html

Hamlet really lays into Ophelia in III:i, ending by telling her, "To a nunnery, go!" In high school they tell you that "nunnery" was slang for a whorehouse, but it is also, more literally, an excellent place for a family to send a pregnant, unmarried noblewoman. The nuns will take care of her, and keep her out of sight, and the baby can be handed off to someone else to raise...

Why is Ophelia singing about a maid seduced by her lover? Aside from the songs of mourning, all her songs are songs of betrayed love. A few lines later, she is singing an even more pointed song:

Quoth she, "Before you tumbled me, You promis'd me to wed."
He answers: "So would I ha'done, by yonder sun, An thou hadst not come to my bed."

[SimonNZ]

Anyone seen any of the Henry the Sixth dvds I mentioned or seen it live?

Anyone seen any Shakespeare in film or theatre recently?

I see that at the end of this month the'll be a one-off screening of Kenneth Branagh's Winter's Tale production, which I might be able to get to (these things frustratingly are almost always screened at times and days when I can't get away from work). Did anyone elsewhere in the world see the late November screenings?

[(poco) Sforzando]

Anyone seen any of the Henry the Sixth dvds I mentioned or seen it live?

Anyone seen any Shakespeare in film or theatre recently?

I see that at the end of this month the'll be a one-off screening of Kenneth Branagh's Winter's Tale production, which I might be able to get to (these things frustratingly are almost always screened at times and days when I can't get away from work). Did anyone elsewhere in the world see the late November screenings?

I get the Winter's Tale in my area later this week, and will report back. I am expecting great things from "Exit, pursued by a bear."

My latest fiasco was a production of Midsummer Night's Dream at the Pearl Theater on New York's west side. Ben Brantley in the NY Times raved about this 6-character version, which was co-produced by the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival. My one previous experience with Hudson having been a disastrous Tempest, with an Ariel who sounded like a screeching harpy, I should have been wary of this effort before buying my ticket. But silly me.

It's not that reduced-cast Shakespeare can't work. Just a year before I had seen the Dream, in a 1-hour version abridged for touring the local high-schools, performed with utter charm and humor by six students from one of my local colleges. Too bad this performance was not brought to New York or at least uploaded to YouTube. And a 6-character Cymbeline mounted by the Fiasco Theatre group, whose expertise totally belied their name, was such a revelation that I saw it twice. Their Two Gentlemen of Verona was nearly as good, though it could not overcome the deficiencies of the play.

But the Pearl Theatre's Dream was a disaster from the start. There were only six performers, which meant they were doubled, tripled, and eve quadrupled on parts. Snug the Joiner was represented by two actors, which might not have been a bad idea had the rest of the production been more successful. For some reason the Demetrius was directed to perform with a Spanish accent (what, in Athens?), and some of his dialogue was even translated into Spanish, I suppose for the benefit of New Yorkers for whom the city is bilingual anyway. Groups of schoolkids had been brought to my matinee, and at intermission I heard them complaining they couldn't follow the character switches. At the end, when Puck started "If we shadows have offended," the man next to me (I swear it was not I) who had been working on crossword puzzles the entire show, said "You certainly have!" in a voice that hopefully carried through the whole theater.

Most revolting to my mind was the decision to show the "translated" Bottom shtupping Titania from behind in the second half. The elderly couple on the other side of me who left during intermission unfortunately missed this piece of directorial imagination, which finally got a lot of laughs of the ho-ho-ho, tee-hee, isn't Shakespeare funny because's he's all about sex, King Leer variety. But I detect here the deleterious influence of Jan Kott, who in "Shakespeare our Contemporary" decided that this charming and subtle comedy was in fact far darker and more sinister than any of us had realized. Putting two and two together to arrive at seven, Kott noted that asses were noted in the Renaissance for having abnormally large schlongs, and concluded on that basis (there's no evidence in the play, of course) that Bottom had sex with Titania in that enchanted bower.

It's not that I have anything about fairy queens having sex with donkeys; if that's your thing, go for it. But Shakespeare's actual joke is lighter, more subtle, and funnier. In the play Shakespeare wrote, Titania is enamored of Bottom but he does not share her interest. Instead, Bottom is interested only in hanging out with his four little fairy pals, having his back scratched, and getting his supplies of hay and honey. Balanchine got this in his choreographed version of The Dream, where Bottom completely ignores Titania's advances and shows interest only in putting his head into the bag of hay set out for him, and Balanchine was right.

I also saw a telecast of an RSC Henry V I thought pretty good. It wasn't as exciting as the Globe Theater version with Jamie Parker, but at least the language wasn't updated, the male parts were played by males and the females by females, and the play was largely uncut. In this day, that's achievement enough.

As for the BBC telecasts, I own the complete set but haven't really done much beyond dipping into them. The productions always seem so earnest and reverential. Do you know any you particularly like?

[SimonNZ]

As for the BBC telecasts, I own the complete set but haven't really done much beyond dipping into them. The productions always seem so earnest and reverential. Do you know any you particularly like?

They do all suffer from an austerity and what was clearly a very limited budget, and have strengths and weakness within each film from actor to actor and scene to scene. But usually they all have elements that I'm pleased to have seen finally delivered clearly or uncut.

Measure For Measure I would probably rate as the most successful of all from the set that I've so far watched. Have you seen that one?



edit: I may need to put a little space between that last bit and this next bit, but... I just discovered in looking for some clips from that Measure For Measure that some people on Youtube have done a homage to the wonderful Drunk History program as Drunk Shakespeare. Its not half bad:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l36PK8jCcqk

[(poco) Sforzando]

I see that at the end of this month the'll be a one-off screening of Kenneth Branagh's Winter's Tale production, which I might be able to get to (these things frustratingly are almost always screened at times and days when I can't get away from work). Did anyone elsewhere in the world see the late November screenings?

I saw it yesterday. The good news is that this WT was one of Branagh's better recent efforts. Perhaps since it was a staged production, he couldn't muck it up the way he did his film of AYLI, but then he introduced all kinds of extraneous nonsense into his staged Macbeth too. I was afraid we'd be in for a lot of directorial shtick when the play opened with a Christmas carol (this being the WINTER'S tale, you know), but once it got going it moved right along. If Branagh could not convince me of Leontes's sudden repentance following the supposed death of Hermione, this was a minor drawback, and production benefited greatly by the authoritative Paulina of Judi Dench.

The bear was represented by a projected bear's head, which seemed to me rather unimaginative. Some say that in Shakespeare's day he used a tame beast from the bear-baiting arenas not far from the Globe; some think he used a man in a bear's suit. I incline to the live bear theory, but perhaps the only tame bruin in London was otherwise engaged this season. The final statue scene, however, was right on point and very moving.

The biggest problem for me was the lighting, which was too dark throughout. I can see the contrast between a dark first half and a brightly lit second, but the second half here was not much sunnier than the first.

Not Branagh's fault, but the production once more showed how much we lose by not having boys in the female roles. Shakespeare usually had three boy actors; he would need one each for Pauline and Hermione, and the youngest boy most likely would have played both Mamilius and Perdita. Otherwise the rather clumsily managed death of Mamilius makes little sense, but if the same boy played both roles, then Leontes's dead son becomes reborn as his living daughter. Understandably, however, women want as many opportunities to play Shakespeare as possible, and if an adult male Leontes or Florizel were seen kissing an adolescent male Hermione or Perdita, the vice squad would be called in.

Worth seeing if you can.

[(poco) Sforzando]

One of the local colleges is doing Hamlet, and I peeked at the latest rehearsal call. I fear this is not a misprint:

Friday, January 29th
7:00pm – 10:00pm Claudius, Gertrude, Polonia
8:30pm Add Hamlet

What do you people think about so-called "gender-blind" (which really means giving male roles to females) casting in Shakespeare? Is Queen Lear next? Henrietta IV? Julia Caesar?

[Florestan]

What do you people think about so-called "gender-blind" (which really means giving male roles to females) casting in Shakespeare? Is Queen Lear next? Henrietta IV? Julia Caesar?

King Queer is more like it. My faves though are Hamlette, Coriolanna and Phallustaff. No, wait, actually the last is wrong.

[Karl Henning]

The Two Wenches of Verona

[kishnevi]

One of the local colleges is doing Hamlet, and I peeked at the latest rehearsal call. I fear this is not a misprint:

Friday, January 29th
7:00pm – 10:00pm Claudius, Gertrude, Polonia
8:30pm Add Hamlet

What do you people think about so-called "gender-blind" (which really means giving male roles to females) casting in Shakespeare? Is Queen Lear next? Henrietta IV? Julia Caesar?

To be fair, Polonius is a character which can be switched to female without any real loss to the story.  Ophelia would have a garrulous interfering mother instead of a garrulous interfering father.

Horatio could likewise be changed to Horatia.  Even Laertes could be changed.

OTOH, Ophelia could not be switched to a male without making nonsense of the story...even more so Hamlet, Claudius and Gertrude.