He hath shuffled off his mortal coil, James!
Posted on 04/23/2016 8:31:19 AM PDT by PJ-Comix
Exactly 400 years ago on this day, William Shakespeare passed this mortal coil. His effect on the English language was YUUUUUGE. Therefore I am asking for general observations on The Bard.
p.s. PLEASE DON'T post conspiracy theories about how the true author of the Shakespeare plays was really somebody else. That stuff is old AND annoying. It was SHAKESPEARE who wrote it.
Any bad review will do, anything to break up the bardolatry (I like that). My sophomore English teacher was really irreverent, he’d tell us which of the literary giants were junkies, he’d pick the weird parts of their catalogs (when it came time for Joyce he had us read An Encounter), made fun of the pie-pan sound effects on the version of Macbeth we watched, fun guy. He’s the only English teacher I had that didn’t ruin stuff, because he didn’t worship it. He respected it, but he knew not to take it too seriously.
He hath shuffled off his mortal coil, James!
“Borrowed” from Ecclesiastes sounds so much better.
Just kidding. It’s only plagiarism if you use the same language. Be happier on the day of your death than on the day of your birth. Ecclesiastes is the craziest book in the Bible but still full of wisdom.
Merchant of Venice one of the only ones we did not read in 10th grade. We read one a week.
I said in mine heart concerning the estate of the sons of men, that God might manifest them, and that they might see that they themselves are beasts.
For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts; even one thing befalleth them: as the one dieth, so dieth the other; yea, they have all one breath; so that a man hath no preeminence above a beast: for all is vanity.
All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again.
Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth?
Yes, it’s beautiful.
One of the most interesting classes, to me, in Shakespeare was when the professor pointed out how the iambic pentameter is regular when it’s a mundane line (And, in his mantle muffling up his face) and goes askew when there is emotion involved. The more emotion, the more it goes askew.
People who have problems with Shylock as a caricature should look at the other depictions of Jews from that time. It’s actually relatively sympathetic.
But it should not erase the fact that the play is, at its essence, very anti-Semitic. To play Shylock as a tragic figure instead of a villainous foil and thereby make Portia, Antonio and the others unsympathetic would render the play incoherent.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.