Scrutinizing Shakespeare

One of the many things I want to work on this year is reading Shakespeare. Last year I fell in love with his work and decided I wanted to finish off my "Shakespeare a Month" challenge as well as look at some of his other work.

Below I've outlined his plays, poems, sonnets and apocrypha. I've also picked some films that have been recommended to me as well as books on Shakespeare. I don't have a timeline for this but I wanted to post it to remind me of what I want to accomplish this year.

Plays

The Two Gentlemen of Verona (1589-1591)
The Taming of the Shrew (1590-1594)
Henry VI Part 2 (1590-1594)
Henry VI Part 1 (1591)
Henry VI Part 3 (1591)
Titus Andronicus (1591-1592)
Richard III (1592-1593)
The Comedy of Errors (1594)
Love's Labour's Lost (1594-1595)
Love's Labour's Won (1595-1596)
Richard II (1595)
Romeo and Juliet (1595)

A Midsummer Night's Dream (1595)
The Life and Death of King John (1596)
The Merchant of Venice (1596)
Henry IV, Part 1 (1596-1597)
Henry IV, Part 2 (1596-1597)
The Merry Wives of Windsor (1597-1598)
Much Ado About Nothing (1598-1599)
Henry V (1598-1599)
Julius Caesar (1599)
As You Like It (1599-1600)
Hamlet (1599-1601)
Twelfth Night (1601)
Troilus and Cressida (1602)
Measure for Measure (1603-1604)

Othello (1603-1604)
King Lear (1605-1606)
Timon of Athens (1605-1606)
Macbeth (1606)
Antony and Cleopatra (1606)
All's Well That Ends Well (1606-1607)
Pericles, Prince of Tyre (1607)
Coriolanus (1608)
The Winter's Tale (1609-1610)
Cymbeline (1610-1611)
The Tempest (1610-1611)
Cardenio (1612-1613)
Henry VIII, or All is True (1613)
The Two Noble Kinsman (1613)


Apocrypha

Sir John Oldcastle (1600)
Sir Thomas More (1603-1604)
The London Prodigal (1604)
A Yorkshire Tragedy (1605)

Poems

Venus and Adonis (1592-1593)
The Rape of Lucrece (1594)
The Phoenix and the Turtle (1601)
The Lover's Complaint (1609)
The Passionate Pilgrim (1609)

Sonnets

1-154

Films

A Midsummer Night's Dream (1935)
Henry V (1944)
Macbeth (1948)
Hamlet (1948)
Othello (1952)
Julius Caesar (1953)

King Lear (1953)
Richard III (1955)
Forbidden Planet (1956)
Throne of Blood (1957)
Chimes at Midnight (1957)
West Side Story (1961)
The Taming of the Shrew (1967)
Romeo and Juliet (1968)
Macbeth (1971)
King Lear (1971)
Strange Brew (1983)
Ran (1985)
King Lear (1987)

Henry V (1989)
Hamlet (1990)
Prospero's Books (1991)
My Own Private Idaho (1992)
Much Ado About Nothing (1993)
The Lion King (1994)
Richard III (1995)
Romeo and Juliet (1996)
Hamlet (1996)
Twelfth Night (1996)
Titus (1999)
The Merchant of Venice (2004)
Hamlet (2009)

Books on Shakespeare

Shakespeare: The World as Stage - Bill Bryson
In Search of Shakespeare - Michael Wood
Contested Will: Who Wrotes Shakespeare? - James Shapiro
Tales from Shakespeare - Charles and Mary Lamb
Shakespearean Tragedy - AC Bradley
Will in the World: How Shakespeare became Shakespeare - Stephen Greenblatt
Shakespeare - Anthony Burgess
Ungentle Shakespeare - Katherine Duncan-Jones

Macbeth - William Shakespeare

"Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble. "

A Scottish lord named Macbeth has won a great victory for his king, Duncan. On his return he encounters three witches who prophesize that he will be King of Scotland. He demands an explanation as Scotland still has a king in Duncan who is still living but the witches vanish. Macbeth informs his wife of this strange encounter and things quickly spiral out of control. The result is madness, murder and civil war.

"Macbeth" is one of Shakespeare's more well known tragedies. The plot is fast moving and propelled by ambition while characters are trapped by guilt and destiny. The initial catalyst that propels Macbeth on his headlong course isn’t fleshed out as much as I would like as we really only get the description that he’s despatched one of the rebels, Macdonald, in a most gruesome manner to hint at the reasoning for his future decisions. In defeating the rebels, Duncan makes him Thane of Glamis though it should be noted the last Thane was stripped of his title and executed for committing treason. Foreshadowing much? My only real issue with the beginning was I felt I was dumped into the story in medias res. At this point I didn’t know if Duncan was a good king or if Macbeth was a loyal subject and I thought it was strange how quickly and easily Macbeth accepted the idea that he would be king even though the witches offered no explanation to him. What is interesting is the course Macbeth chooses because he decides to make his prophecy come true by going after Duncan. He makes his own destiny while also falling in line with the fate set out for him by the witches. Imagine what would have happened if he hadn’t listened to them? And come to think of it, why did they decide to appear to him in the first place and mess with his head? Was this their idea of joyriding, running roughshod over someone else’s future?

The characters of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth I found to be the most interesting because they were more evil than everyone else. I always find villains more intriguing than heroes because their motivations are always so widespread and varied. I liked that once reality set in, Macbeth had a crises of conscience about his decision and we saw that Lady Macbeth was the cold fish of the duo. She calls him a coward and she is the one that thinks clearly to keep them from being discovered. I loved that she was the instigator for action against Duncan! She said Macbeth was ”too full o' the milk of human kindness” to commit the act and had to urge him towards it. Even though he told her about the prophecy she is the one that has to drive him to it. It’s not often that we see a strong female villain taking such a central role in a story, especially over a male villain. Some might call the duo tragic anti-heroes but for me, their original actions colour their characters for the rest of the play.

The language as always was gorgeous. My favourite parts were definitely the soliloquies.

Here's one of my favourites from the play:

"Be innocent of the knowledge, dearest chuck,
Till thou applaud the deed - Come, seeling night,
Scarf up the tender eye of pitiful day,
And with thy bloody and invisible hand
Cancel and tear to pieces that great bond
Which keeps me pale. Light thickens,
And the crow makes wing to th' rooky wood;
Good things of day begin to droop and drowse,
Whiles night's black agents to their preys do rouse.
- Thou marvell'st at my words; but hold thee still,
Things bad begun make strong themselves by ill -
So prithee go with me."

It did take forever to actually read the play though because I was so far removed from when the source material was written that the archaic diction and phrases interrupted the flow of the story. I had to keep referring to footnotes and the introduction to understand everything that was going on. This was my first time reading the play in more than ten years now I feel that I understand the plot, who the characters are and the general gist of the language. If you haven’t read Shakespeare before or not in a long time I would suggest reading a version with annotations and then watch one of the many movie versions of the plays. I felt this really helped as I had a good idea of the plot going into the film and then listening to the dialogue and watching the action made everything far more understandable.

I was hoping to see Banquo’s story play out. I liked the parallel prophecies for him and Macbeth but we never get to see his fulfilled it’s never addressed again after Macbeth goes after him. The play ends abruptly and I wondered if this was deliberate or not. In any case, it’s one of Shakespeare’s best and I highly recommend it.

Rating: 4/5

"Macbeth" (1948)

"Macbeth! Be bold, bloody, and resolute; laugh to scorn the power of man; for none of woman born shall harm Macbeth."

In my ocd stupor over the play "Macbeth", I decided to check out some of the film adapatations including this one and the Ian McKellan/Judi Dench version. I expect both to be extremely different.

In this adaptation, Welles has a stipped down set, with aspects of expressionist architecture. The costumes and props indicate a more primitive culture than one would expect to find in Scotland in 1040. Also, Welles provides a powerful performance with a modified script that was not well accepted at the time.

Made for $700 000 and shot in 23 days, the fact that Welles managed to pull this together at all, is amazing. The sets are a little strange and look like a combination between paper mache and the Batcave. As well, Welles cut and pasted the dialogue, giving lines to different people, introducing new characters and aspects not in the play. When it debuted, the public did not take well to the changes, resulting in a box office disaster. Today, there are a variety of adaptations of Macbeth, not all strictly following stage directions and settings put out by Shakespeare and I think they're the better for it. I love the fact that Welles was willing to experiment with the source material and make it his own.

One of the weirder aspects I encountered was some of the costuming. This is especially true of Welles. At the beginning his hat seemed more suited to a film set in the Far East. It felt out of place for Scotland but that wasn't the first or the last strange piece of headgear seen in the film. Look out for Welles with two strange-looking crowns and one on Lady Macbeth played by Jeanette Nolan.

Another aspect changed in the film was the introduction of Christianity alongside the witches. Modern religion played no part in the play, instead reaching back into the shadows of time for paganistic riturals. Here, it provided a counterpoint to the supernatural aspects of the film but it felt a little stilted. The holy man takes many of Ross' lines, a nobleman who accompanies Lennox in the play, as well as the lines of the Old Man. Welles shows Macduff and Malcolm united behind a sea of crosses against Macbeth and his prophesying witches. The march of progress dictates that Macbeth should lose, even without the proclamation of the haggish trio. Note: One of the witches is actually a man. Look out for a voice that sounds more masculine than feminine.

After reading the play and becoming extremely familiar with all the soliloquies and archaic diction, I knew immediately that Welles had messed with the script. I flipped through my copy of the play, as dialogue jumped back and forth, was assigned to different people and skipped whole sections altogther. The uncut version of the film ran only 107 minutes and was another complaint voiced by Welles' critics. After settling into the movie I found I actually didn't mind his changes. They cut out some of the other less important sections of dialogue and I was very impressed that Welles managed to make everything fit together so well. He essentially managed to create dialogue that still made sense, was entertaining and tightly woven. He kept all the important aspects of the play and cutting all the excess speech pumped up the action. It must have taken forever for Welles to make the dialogue work which just speaks to his genius as a film maker.

My main complaint about the film was the acting. Welles always was a scene chewer but Jeanette Nolan also goes overboard in the DRAMATIC EMOTIONS! department, especially her spot soliloquy. This, tied in with the fact that the film has a very static feel (ie, it's based off of a play), hurts the film. Just watch the feast/ghost scene and you'll understand what I mean. Welles literally flips a table over!

I enjoyed the film, despite some of its deterrants and thought that Welles did an amazing job with the limited time and budget he had access to. If you're looking for a slightly different interpretation of the play than please check out this film.

Rating: 3.5/5

Macbeth Progress

The first time I read "Macbeth" I was in high school where I basically skimmed the play, racing to the end.

I remember the gist of the story through osmosis of pop culture and literature but I really wanted to re-read this, partly for personal reasons and partly because of the Reading Shakespeare project from Breadcrumb Reads. I currently happen to be four months behind but I'm doing things at my own pace.

The play is taking forever to get through, mainly because I have to check on the definition and use of every second word. But reading this way I feel that I get more out of the story and I'm understanding everything rather than skipping over what I don't.

Does anyone else find Lady Macbeth scary? She's murderously ambitious and very pushy when it comes to Macbeth. But she does have some great lines!

"The raven himself is hoarse
That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan
Under my battlements. Come, you spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
And fill me from the crown to the toe, top-full
Of direst cruelty. Make thick my blood,
Stop up th'access and passage to remorse,
That no compunctious visitings of nature
Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between
Th'effect and it. Come to my woman's breasts
And take my milk for gall, you murd'ring ministers,
Wherever, in your sightless substances,
You wait on nature's mischief. Come, thick night,
And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of Hell,
That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,
Nor Heaven peep through the blanket of the dark
To cry, 'Hold, hold'."

Shakespeare consistently leaves me speechless.

Looking through adaptations, people really seem to like making the play into a movie. Also, when looking at some of the actors who've played the title role I'm a bit blown away:

Ian McKellan
Orson Welles
Patrick Stewart

I'm excited to try and watch some of the films though and see how they've decided to shoot the story.

For the moment though, please enjoy these clips!

Blackadder



Orson Welles - Macbeth intro



Animaniacs



Patrick Stewart

A Midsummer Night's Dream - William Shakespeare

"The course of true love never did run smooth."

Theseus, King of Athens is getting married to Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons and everyone's invited! This includes Oberon and Titania, King and Queen of the fairies who are having some marital issues as well as a group of young lovers with their own twisted quadrangle: Hermia, Helen, Lysander and Demetrius. Things go awry when Oberon plays matchmaker and messes in the love lives of his wife and the quartet of mortals running around the woods.

Oberon and Titania are married gods who need to attend couples therapy. It is their argument that leads to all the strife in the story. If not for Oberon, Bottom wouldn't have been transformed and the lovebirds would most likely have sorted out their own issues without the confusion caused by a love potion. I saw Oberon as a selfish and cruel manipulator, despite directing Puck to help the mortals out. His meddling caused more problems than it solved and what he does to his own wife to "teach her a lesson" felt like a form of abuse. What I didn't understand was why he wasn't omnipotent. Yes Puck makes a honest mistake, using love potion on the wrong people but why does Oberon allow him to make the mistake in the first place?

I liked the idea of the play being set in Greece but combining Celtic and Greek mythology with Brits playing was a weird mashup.

I also wondered why Bill chose to have two Robins in the play. Usually stories don't contain characters with the same or similar sounding names to avoid confusing the reader but here Bill doesn't seem concerned. We have Robin Starveling and Robin Goodfellow, names which may reference Robert Dudley and Robert Deveraux, both favourites of Queen Elizabeth I, monarch at the time of Shakespeare.

When I read this play I enjoyed it but wasn't blown away with what I consider to be seond-tier Shakespeare. Looking closer though, there's a lot more going on than meets the eye. Bill manages to juggle four different storylines within a small space and all blend together seamlessly. Theseus and Hippolyta's wedding, the play within a play, Oberon and Titania and Bottom and the four lovers in the forest. And as always, Bill is a master wordsmith and plays the funnyman. Look at what he does with alliteration.

"Whereat with blade, with bloody blameful blade,
He bravely broached his boiling bloody breast."

Talk about a tongue twister!

My major complaint was I found it tough to keep track of who was enchanted and who was in love with who, a major plot problem. But as with all of Bill's plays, I suspect it works better on stage than on paper. There's something about the spoken word that glosses over all the archaic language and long-forgotten references. It was a solid read and I'd highly suggest it for those interested in Bill's comedy plays.

Review 3.5/5


If you liked this review, please check out my Macbeth Review for part of Breadcrumb Reads - Reading Shakespeare: A Play a Month.

Medea - Euripides

"For in other ways a woman is full of fear, defenseless, dreads the sight of cold steel; but, when once she is wronged in the matter of love, no other soul can hold so many thoughts of blood."

My first introduction to Medea was with Jason and the Argonauts. She was, at most, a side character despite the fact that it was only with her help that Jason attained the Golden Fleece. He then marries her and brings her back to Corinth, has two children and this is where our story picks up.

Jason has essentially thrown Medea over for another woman from Corinth and marries her, despite remaining married to Medea. As you can understand Medea doesn't take this news well and sees this "other woman" as usurping her rightful place. She still loves Jason but is bitterly resentful towards him. He even recommends she go into exile with his children and would be smart to take his advice. That's enough to make anyone angry.

Medea then commits a horrible crime to avenge herself against Jason and his actions. And the strange thing about the entire reading experience was I did feel some small measure of sympathy for her. I didn't see her actions at all justifiable but I can understand why she would be angry. She's the one who left her home and her family to come to a foreign land only to have the only person she knows well desert her for another woman.

As well, it only serves to show just how much of an idiot Jason is. Not only is he bigamous, he also shouldn't be considered among the great heroes of Greek myth like Odysseus or Perseus. He's always been at best, a B level hero but his lack of heroic deeds in the Argosy and his philandering ways make him less than worthy of the hero canon.

I found the play powerful but also maddening. Both Jason and Medea are acting only for their own self-interest, to the detriment of each other and those around them.

From my Greek and Roman studies classes I understand the story to highlight Medea's position as a foreigner and as such, a barbarian with barbarian ways in sharp contrast to the civilized Greeks. She does not act as a dutiful wife, she has violent thoughts and doesn't accept the position Jason has put her in. Those watching the play are supposed to view foreigners as "other" and uncivilized, a group that must be civilized to avoid what happens in this play.

Rating: Overall I enjoyed this short little play. 3.5/5

"The Little Foxes" - Lillian Hellman

"Well, there are people who eat the earth and eat all the people on it like in the Bible with the locusts. Then there are people who stand around and watch them eat it. Sometimes I think it ain't right to stand and watch them do it."

The Hubbards are a familiy with ambition. Their greed is all consuming as they struggle to profit from exploiting what is left of the Old South after the Civil War. Ben Hubbard is head of the family with his younger brother Oscar towing the family line as a sheep would obey a sheperd. Regina is their sister, wife to Horace, mother to Alexandra, with a dangerous hunger for profit. The trio hatch a plan for a cotton factory in town, partnering with a Northerner but they need to raise the capital to start building. By coincidence Horace has a great number of bonds in a safety deposit box and it seems up to the siblings to pressure him to donate to their future financial happiness. Should their plan fail, Oscar's son Leo just happens works at the bank.

I'm not a great reader of plays so this was a good introduction to post-modern theatre. Hellman has a real understanding of dialogue as the tension rises, the sentences get shorten, the diction more terse. Also, the infighting between siblings is believable and enticing to read. The intrigues of their attempted manipulation of each other reminds me of "The Lion in Winter" with bickering royals.

My complaint is how few and weak the protagonists seem. Horace, Birdie, Oscar's wife and Alexandra are all that stand up to the Hubbards. Horace is an invalid, Bertie has personal problems and Alexandra is a child. They seem unequal to the task of holding on through the play. If Hellman had only created one strong character I would have felt the odds more in their favour.

It's a good play and was even turned into a movie with Bette Davis as Regina. If you're a fan of reading about sibling rivalries this is the book for you.

Rating: 3/5