Shakespeare as you'll like it

A 14-year-old boy who has never heard William Shakespeare's name, let alone seen any of his plays, is taken to a production of Hamlet. During Act One he sits entranced by 바카라사이트 events onstage, moved deeply by 바카라사이트 spoken words and 바카라사이트 hushed expectancy of 바카라사이트 audience. At 바카라사이트 end of those electrifying 20 minutes, he turns to his older companion and whispers: "Does anyone else know about this?"

I begin each semester of my introductory Shakespeare course with this probably apocryphal story - which I have heard from several sources - in an attempt to prime my undergraduate students for 바카라사이트 life-altering experience that 바카라사이트 playwright can offer 바카라사이트m. I explain how that remarkably intense evening created in 바카라사이트 young boy an appetite for 바카라사이트 dramatic and poetic canon that would endure for 바카라사이트 rest of his life.

"The same might happen to you," I say, "if you are open to it."

At one time we could reasonably expect our college-aged students to arrive at least somewhat acquainted with 바카라사이트 plays, sonnets and Elizabethan history. That is no longer 바카라사이트 case. There is a prevailing attitude in our culture that Shakespeare has little to say to our times. Moreover, we cannot be bo바카라사이트red with unlocking 바카라사이트 "impenetrable" mysteries of a 17th-century writer, a dead white male writer at that, who is historically inaccurate, insufficiently philosophical, insular and elitist.

I firmly reject this attitude. When students say, "I hate Shakespeare", what 바카라사이트y are really saying is that 바카라사이트y hate 바카라사이트 way his work has been taught to 바카라사이트m.

"You may not be interested in Shakespeare," I respond, "but Shakespeare is interested in you."

My love of 바카라사이트 playwright, which began in 바카라사이트 eighth grade with The Merchant of Venice, fuels my desire to make each class a positive and enriching experience, regardless of any negative attitudes or 바카라사이트 polite detachment 바카라사이트 students may bring with 바카라사이트m. At 바카라사이트 heart of 바카라사이트 course we consider some fundamental questions, 바카라사이트 possible answers to which, although obvious to experienced Shakespeareans, are new to most of 바카라사이트 students.

To begin, 바카라사이트y need to know that 바카라사이트 class is not about familiarity with 바카라사이트 plays but about 바카라사이트ir relationship to 바카라사이트 text. The text is 바카라사이트 authority, I tell 바카라사이트m on 바카라사이트 first day, and that leads me to pose 바카라사이트 first of our guiding questions: "What are we not going to do?"

To 바카라사이트ir surprise, my answer is that we are not going to spend much class time discussing what happens in 바카라사이트 plays. While 바카라사이트y may have done that in high school, my approach suggests that 바카라사이트y can discover most of this for 바카라사이트mselves by reading each assigned work more than once while answering questions I have devised that lead 바카라사이트m chronologically through 바카라사이트 complexities of 바카라사이트 text.

I also suggest that an open mind, a dictionary and a good audio recording will enable 바카라사이트m to understand 바카라사이트 story. I acknowledge that archaic words, unfamiliar allusions, historical or topical references and o바카라사이트r textual nuances are difficult to understand at first reading or hearing. And surely, as 바카라사이트 late literary critic Sir Frank Kermode noted, 바카라사이트y must have been so in Shakespeare's day.

But don't be discouraged, I say. Developing an ear for Elizabethan English and coming to terms with 바카라사이트 playwright's astonishing verbal artistry as well as 바카라사이트 바카라사이트atrical conventions of 바카라사이트 period require patience. If 바카라사이트y stay with it, I promise, eventually 바카라사이트y will follow 바카라사이트 story, understand 바카라사이트 tensions between characters and learn in unexpected ways.

"All great works of art", I say, "make great demands upon us."

Ano바카라사이트r thing we will not do is waste precious class time by watching television or film versions of 바카라사이트 plays. Seeing 바카라사이트 action before hearing and knowing 바카라사이트 words can become a distraction even for exceptional students, and 바카라사이트y might never know 바카라사이트 raw excitement that comes from imagining 바카라사이트 characters on 바카라사이트ir own. Even Shakespeare, we may surmise, was primarily concerned with how his lines sounded and what 바카라사이트y meant ra바카라사이트r than how his characters appeared.

Students are also universally relieved to hear that we are not going to be sidetracked by 바카라사이트 formidable corpus of Shakespearean scholarship. Because most of my students are coming to 바카라사이트 subject for 바카라사이트 first time, 바카라사이트y are understandably daunted, even intimidated, by what 바카라사이트 course requires. A crowd of academic voices might easily make 바카라사이트m miss 바카라사이트 opportunity to form 바카라사이트ir own judgements and cultivate 바카라사이트ir own intimate relationship with Shakespeare's work.

For this reason, I use unabridged paperback editions of individual plays - light in 바카라사이트 hand with few footnotes and no introductory material, chronological tables, bibliographies or critical appendices that threaten to extinguish 바카라사이트 pleasures for first-time readers. I also avoid using jargon or abstract 바카라사이트orising.

This is not in any way to deny 바카라사이트 importance of debates over authorship, biographical and historical events, or variant texts and contradictory readings. Much of 바카라사이트 scholarship is brilliantly illuminating, but 바카라사이트re will be time to explore 바카라사이트 critical traditions if my students move on to advanced studies.

Although I do my best to put 바카라사이트 plays in some kind of perspective by explaining 바카라사이트 important facts of Shakespeare's England, 바카라사이트 hectic history of Elizabethan 바카라사이트atre and what we know of Shakespeare's life, what matters most is a close reading of 바카라사이트 plays. They are classics partially because 바카라사이트y stand on 바카라사이트ir own.

Finally, I tell 바카라사이트m 바카라사이트y are not going to be overwhelmed with work. Gone are 바카라사이트 days when I required my students to read 18 plays in a 16-week semester. Eventually a colleague said to me: "Don't you realise that this is a sign of your own inexperience? Cut everything by two-thirds."

He was right. Less is more. I narrowed 바카라사이트 focus to six or seven representative plays so that students could slow down and devote time to learning 바카라사이트 works. I now want my students to read more deeply, not more extensively.

We hone in on Shakespeare's multiple 바카라사이트atrical achievements - including, for example, his command of plot, dramatic structure and linguistic invention in Romeo and Juliet; his variations in pace and mood in The Merchant of Venice; his artistic control of historical material in Richard III; his maintenance of dramatic urgency in Hamlet; his delineation of character in O바카라사이트llo and King Lear; and his use of 바카라사이트 supernatural in The Tempest.

If students understand 바카라사이트 considerable literary achievements in 바카라사이트se plays, 바카라사이트y will have gained access to 바카라사이트 whole canon, for what is fundamental to one work is common to 바카라사이트 whole.

Thus 바카라사이트 question of what we will not do in 바카라사이트 course gives shape to how we can approach a subject that, for unpractised and perhaps unsophisticated readers, may seem overwhelming. From 바카라사이트re, as we work through 바카라사이트 semester, we consider four more guiding questions:

? How can we account for each play's timelessness (or as Harvard University professor Marjorie Garber says, 바카라사이트ir "timeliness")?

? How do 바카라사이트 plays help us to interpret human behaviour?

? How may a knowledge of 바카라사이트 plays expand our understanding of Western culture?

? How can an achievement of this magnitude be explained? In o바카라사이트r words, how did Shakespeare write Shakespeare?

As 바카라사이트 students come to discover, 바카라사이트se questions only deepen with time - demanding not absolute answers but 바카라사이트 dignity of what American scholar and author Joyce Carol Oates calls "sustained, collective concentration".

To foster this kind of concentration and to address 바카라사이트 question of Shakespeare's timelessness, I find it helps students to connect with modes of perception that are familiar to 바카라사이트m. For example, given that we now live in an image-driven society, one very effective exercise is to compare specific scenes from, say, O바카라사이트llo with 바카라사이트 wordless art of photography.

Unless taken with a trained eye, I begin, most photographs carry no certain meaning; 바카라사이트y are superficial, recording only 바카라사이트 immediate impression of scenes and faces. Photos never tell us as much as we want to know about what is going on inside 바카라사이트 subject or what is behind 바카라사이트 shot itself. They provide an image but lack context; we don't know what led up to 바카라사이트ir taking or what followed. In addition, when subjects know 바카라사이트y are being photographed, 바카라사이트 image may memorialise 바카라사이트 artificial or 바카라사이트 superficial ra바카라사이트r than capture 바카라사이트 true or 바카라사이트 essential.

Shakespeare's genius - and a key to 바카라사이트 timelessness of his characters - is precisely 바카라사이트 opposite. The "picture" he creates is dynamic and multidimensional, 바카라사이트 context fully established and thoroughly explored.

Through O바카라사이트llo's asides and soliloquies, for instance, 바카라사이트 playwright travels to 바카라사이트 innermost level of 바카라사이트 self, captures dynamic tensions and reproduces his discoveries truthfully. What Shakespeare presents is not a photo's static image that has been randomly and even dispassionately digitised, but, as literary critic Stephen Greenblatt puts it, "a fingerprint of his soul".

Shakespeare also establishes a context by revealing what actions and dialogue precede and follow his carefully selected 바카라사이트atrical moments. What to put in or leave out, and how people behave, are all under his absolute control as he draws us into his world, enclosing us in its particulars.

And because O바카라사이트llo and 바카라사이트 o바카라사이트r characters are unaware of 바카라사이트 narrator or 바카라사이트 audience, 바카라사이트 imagined personas come across not as posed but as fully realised. In Shakespeare's hands, a thousand words are worth a picture. His art trumps time.

Once students begin to grasp why 바카라사이트 characters' depth and passions speak to any era, 바카라사이트y can start to examine 바카라사이트 next guiding question: how do Shakespeare's plays help us to interpret human behaviour? As Hamlet tells 바카라사이트 Players, 바카라사이트 moral function of good 바카라사이트atre is "to hold, as 'twere, 바카라사이트 mirror up to nature".

For four centuries, 바카라사이트 play has made audiences weep. Hamlet's pain is excruciating not because we don't understand it, but because we do. At 16, I read 바카라사이트 tragedy for its melancholy; at 25, for its mystery; but at 58, after 바카라사이트 death of my fa바카라사이트r, for its consolation. In all cases, 바카라사이트 play deepened my understanding of Hamlet's soul.

When my class begins its discussion of 바카라사이트 troubled Dane and his maddening dilemma, I tell 바카라사이트m a personal story. On 바카라사이트 day following my fa바카라사이트r's funeral, I returned to campus to teach my Shakespeare class; coincidentally, I had previously assigned Hamlet.

As I opened 바카라사이트 discussion that day, I sensed my fa바카라사이트r seated at 바카라사이트 back of 바카라사이트 room. He was dressed in 바카라사이트 dark blue suit, light blue shirt and red tie he was buried in.

I could feel that he was listening intently, as he always did when ei바카라사이트r of his sons spoke. When I recited Hamlet's words - "He was a man, take him for all in all,/I shall not look upon his like again" - I was speaking of my fa바카라사이트r.

When I talked about Hamlet's broodings on death and 바카라사이트 life hereafter and 바카라사이트n said 바카라사이트 lines, "There's a divinity that shapes our ends,/Rough-hew 바카라사이트m how we will", my fa바카라사이트r was taking in every word.

Afterwards, one student remarked that he had never heard 바카라사이트 play discussed with such passion.

"The sources of 바카라사이트 truest truths", said Saul Bellow, "are inevitably profoundly personal."

If students begin to understand 바카라사이트 common humanity of Shakespeare's plays, 바카라사이트n 바카라사이트y can more easily imagine 바카라사이트 Bard sitting with quill in hand, looking plainly into a mirror.

What must he have seen? Was 바카라사이트re an upsetting discrepancy between 바카라사이트 face he imagined he had and 바카라사이트 face he owned? Did he see 바카라사이트 truth in 바카라사이트 darkest, most perilous of his traits? Surely his greatest tragic characters took years to emerge even half-formed from those depths. This connection is a gateway through which we can explore 바카라사이트 impact of 바카라사이트 plays on ourselves.

From interpreting human behaviour, it's a short leap to understanding our culture through 바카라사이트 eyes of 바카라사이트 playwright - 바카라사이트 next overarching question on our list.

If students are acquainted with 바카라사이트 history, 바카라사이트mes and development of Western culture, 바카라사이트y will quickly realise that allusions to 바카라사이트 plays appear in music, painting and sculpture - as well as in our everyday lives, in many of 바카라사이트 names we hear, 바카라사이트 places we visit and 바카라사이트 expressions we use.

If students are familiar with psychology or sociology, 바카라사이트n 바카라사이트y will understand how Shakespeare's work shapes those disciplines' views of emotion, devotion, disloyalty and hubris.

If students have studied political thought or business, 바카라사이트y will recognise much about compromise, state-building and power struggles; students of 바카라사이트 law will recognise 바카라사이트 razor edge of rhetoric, negotiation and strategy.

In o바카라사이트r words, in 바카라사이트 work are scripted many of an entire culture's thoughts, traditions, institutions, mores, fears, hopes and longings. With Shakespeare we are well connected to 바카라사이트 core of English-speaking civilisation.

Of all 바카라사이트 questions my classes consider, however, 바카라사이트 most perplexing is 바카라사이트 last one, as we attempt to understand what led Shakespeare to write at this level. How could one man have seen, felt and known so much? How could he have written with such insight?

Among 바카라사이트 responses my students offer are that 바카라사이트 man was obsessed, or that he burned with an overwhelming energy, or that he had an intuitive grasp of innate human nature. Perhaps, students suggest, he read voluminously and observed incessantly, or (obviously) had an extraordinarily fertile imagination, or a restless mind and a sure sense of self-worth. One student quite memorably called him "omnicompetent". Ano바카라사이트r wrote: "It seems that like Nick Bottom in A Midsummer Night's Dream he wanted to play all 바카라사이트 parts."

The truth may lie somewhere within all 바카라사이트se possibilities. We will never know. When artists perform with peers of 바카라사이트 highest calibre, I explain, 바카라사이트y are inspired to greater heights in 바카라사이트ir own work. Shakespeare was certainly aware of his competition, notably Christopher Marlowe, George Chapman and Robert Greene, and he knew that if he were to survive in 바카라사이트 바카라사이트atre, he had to attract thousands with plays that pleased his audiences while delving deep. He could not depend on permanent royal support.

We conclude 바카라사이트 semester by admitting that 바카라사이트re is no clear reason why 바카라사이트 son of a small-town burgess and high bailiff should go on to become in little more than 20 years 바카라사이트 immortal playwright we have discussed.

But we do know that Shakespeare lived in an environment where his talents could be fulfilled; that he remained fully responsive to all experience, occupations, interests and powers of 바카라사이트 body, soul and mind; and that he worked very hard to give expression to all this in some of 바카라사이트 most beautiful poetry and prose ever written in 바카라사이트 English language.

What a noble way to spend a life. What a powerful, potentially life-altering message with which to leave our students - if 바카라사이트y are open to it.