Would you like to help beta test a Shakespeare Discord server?
The server is designed to be a place where people can ask questions about the Bard, enjoy talking about his work, find resources, and more. My goal is for the server to be a helpful place for students, actors, teachers, and anyone just generally interested in Shakespeare.
I’ve been thinking it could be an interesting way to have discussion for anyone interested in Shakespeare, is studying it in school, etc.
Heading back for the new school year? Assigned to read some Shakespeare? Have no fear, Finding the Bard is here. Okay that was really corny, but here are some tips for those of you assigned to read some Shakespeare that are feeling a little nervous about it. Hope it’s helpful! If you have any suggestions or comments, please share so we can help each other out!
If you’re tackling @nanowrimo this year, check out these helpful tips:
1. When in doubt, deus ex machina it.
2. Why write “she’s pretty hot” when you can write, “but soft, what light through yonder window breaks? It is the East and this chick is the sun so shine on, baby!”?
3. If you don’t have any story ideas, just steal them from someone else. They won’t care. Probably.
4. Why write “yes” when you can write, “aye, forsooth; marry, what you hath spoken is verily not false but has the countenance of truth in all its establishèd veracity”?
5. What am even research? Just make stuff up.
6. Save your brain power for the poetic asides—not the plot.
7. When in doubt, liven things up with a little crossdressing. Alternatively, crossdressing twins.
8. Characters are overrated. You can kill them. All.
9. Structure sentence grammar and unimportant are. You do you.
10. Fear not a small vocabulary. Just make up your own words. People will figure it out.
Happy @nanowrimo day one! Thought I'd share this post from last year so Shakespeare can help you on your way to 50,000 words. Enjoy, and good luck!
When Beatrice dragged this audience member onstage so that she could hide behind him in the gulling scene, he immediately started quoting Snout from A Midsummer Night’s Dream. “In this same interlude it doth befall/That I, one Snout by name, present a wall;…”
Oh my, I think I have died. Actually died from laughing.
Oscar Wilde compares two of William Shakespeare’s most famous characters, Falstaff and Hamlet, to help illustrate an underlying truth about human nature in his dialogue on The Decay of Lying, the first section of his 1891 work on aesthetic criticism simply titled Intentions. (via craftingtheclassics)
LOVE this!
I decided to take some much needed time off this week and give myself an extra long weekend. I couldn’t really decide how I wanted to use that time, though, until I had the idea to see how much Shakespeare-related stuff I could pack into my weekend. So for today’s post, I’m going to share some of what I did, presented as a how-to for your very own Shakespeare stay-cation. Because you know you want to.
After my most recent post (regarding Shakespeare's continued relevance), I thought it would be fun to share a few of Shakespeare's plays that feel especially relevant today. The ones that feel like they were written for 2018 more than 1600 or 1610 or 1593, etc. The list I've come up with are plays (in no particular order) that I would like to revisit this year. Plays that I think speak to the fears, hopes, and demons that we coming to terms with in 2018.
Terry Eagleton, Literary Theory: An Introduction (via theclassicsreader)
Love this!
Why do people say Shakespeare remains so relevant? How can someone who died more than 400 years ago have anything of value to say about our post-modern lives?
In today’s post, I talk about what it is about Shakespeare that makes him so eternally relevant and how that’s even possible.
It’s been a hot minute, but I’m back!
This time, I have a question for YOU:
What are your favorite Shakespeare film adaptations?
It could be a film version of one of his plays, or just something Shakespeare-related.
I’m always on the hunt and I’d really love to hear what your favorites are!
(And by the way, another post will be coming soon, so stay tuned!)
Most of my favourite filmed Shakespeare plays are live stage productions, particularly from the RSC: Hamlet (Simon Godwin, 2016), Richard II (Gregory Doran, 2013), Much Ado About Nothing (Christopher Luscombe, 2014), The Merchant of Venice (Polly Findlay, 2015). I’m also very fond of Doran’s 2009 made-for-TV version of Hamlet with David Tennant, which kickstarted my love of Shakespeare.
Of all the Shakespeare plays I’ve seen made into actual movies (which admittedly isn’t many), the only one I really feel takes full advantage of both Shakespeare’s text and the possibilities of cinema is Richard Loncraine’s 1995 film of Richard III, starring Ian McKellen. It works visually / cinematically without overshadowing the text, which is performed brilliantly.
And for Shakespeare-related films, my favourites are: West Side Story (which I actually prefer to any version of Romeo & Juliet I’ve ever seen), Ran (Kurosawa’s loose adaptation of King Lear), Bill (Pythonesque comedy about Shakespeare by the Horrible Histories team), In the Bleak Midwinter (Ken Branagh’s backstage comedy about an amateur production of Hamlet, which I think is better than his actual film of Hamlet), and Theatre of Blood (in which Vincent Price murders theatre critics in Shakespeare-inspired ways).
I am totally with you about some of the best Shakespeare films being recorded stage productions! Have you seen the version of As You Like It that was filmed at the Globe? It’s one of my favorites of all time.
I think I’ve only seen a couple of the ones you mentioned, so I’ll definitely have to take a look, but YES YES YES to West Wide Story. It’s not always what I’m in the mood for, but it is incredible!
It’s been a hot minute, but I’m back!
This time, I have a question for YOU:
What are your favorite Shakespeare film adaptations?
It could be a film version of one of his plays, or just something Shakespeare-related.
I’m always on the hunt and I’d really love to hear what your favorites are!
(And by the way, another post will be coming soon, so stay tuned!)
If you’re tackling @nanowrimo this year, check out these helpful tips:
1. When in doubt, deus ex machina it.
2. Why write “she’s pretty hot” when you can write, “but soft, what light through yonder window breaks? It is the East and this chick is the sun so shine on, baby!”?
3. If you don’t have any story ideas, just steal them from someone else. They won’t care. Probably.
4. Why write “yes” when you can write, “aye, forsooth; marry, what you hath spoken is verily not false but has the countenance of truth in all its establishèd veracity”?
5. What am even research? Just make stuff up.
6. Save your brain power for the poetic asides—not the plot.
7. When in doubt, liven things up with a little crossdressing. Alternatively, crossdressing twins.
8. Characters are overrated. You can kill them. All.
9. Structure sentence grammar and unimportant are. You do you.
10. Fear not a small vocabulary. Just make up your own words. People will figure it out.
