Monday, September 04, 2023
What Was Shakespeare Really Like?
New York Theater: For his ninetieth birthday, Sir Stanley Wells, considered one of the world’s greatest authorities on William Shakespeare, was asked to deliver four lectures to answer the following questions:
What was Shakespeare like?
How did he write his plays?
What does the body of his work tell us about his personality?
What made him laugh?
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4 comments:
This article is about a series of lectures given about the life and personality of William Shakespeare. The most interesting thing I found that I shouldn’t have been surprised by was that Shakespeare wrote his plays to be performed, and not to be read, and did not have anything to do with the publishing process. This surprised me because I thought that they would’ve actually consulted with Shakespeare in order to present his words correctly to be reproduced outside of his theater. I was also surprised by Shakespeare’s sexual promiscuity, and feel like the sonnets he wrote were not autobiographical as the author claims, but instead merely an exercise in feeling from multiple perspectives. I feel like someone as popular in the public light as Shakespeare would have had more attention paid to his private life, and been socially punished if he were found out to live a promiscuous lifestyle.
I appreciate the dedication to history that comes with reading and studying William Shakespeare. He is a staple in historical theatre education, but he is just that, historical. We spend so much time focusing on the past instead of looking at the current waves of change within the current theatre world. Yes, learning the history of theatre is important and even doing Shakespeare is helpful to the learning and progression of theatre but there is very limited reason to do Shakespeare in its original state when it is in the public domain and can be altered. Additionally, there is still an ongoing debate if Shakespeare even wrote all of the plays that he is credited on doing. There are just so many influential playwrights at this point in time that have so much more to say than Shakespeare so maybe it is time to shift out efforts to more modern pieces of work.
This article pleasantly surprised me. I am not the biggest Shakespeare fan, therefore I was hesitant to click on it. However, what I read was incredibly fascinating! The first thing that caught my attention was how Shakespeare wrote specific roles for specific performers. I think this is something that benefits us and makes his work more accessible. He wrote roles that grew with performers as they aged, therefore, I would also assume that as present day performers age they have roles that continue to be accessible to them. I also thought the entire section about what made Shakespeare laugh was interesting. I cannot say that is a question I have ever asked myself before. I love this idea of almost laughing at humanity and making fun of what makes us human. I think that what the author said was accurate and I believe based on his plays that Shakespeare had a very unique sense of humor that he explored when he wrote. Overall, I am glad I clicked on this article despite being someone who struggles to love Shakespeare.
This article was interesting. A fun fact about me is that I consider myself a bit of a Shakespeare super fan. I took a class where I read all (but one) of his plays (I’m missing King John), so the minute I see any Shakespeare I will read about it. This was a somewhat interesting article however the author never really answered the question. I suppose nobody really has an answer because, as far as I know (maybe there’s secretly some immortal actors), nobody alive knew Shakespeare personally. One part about this article I found really interesting was when they talked about how he wrote his plays with specific actors in mind. It makes sense since he worked with a specific theater company that put on all of his shows, but it’s still cool to think about. The end of this article where the author states that what made Shakespeare so impactful was “his craftsmanship, his powers of linguistic expression, his ability to give voice to a wide range of characters, his understanding of human nature,” really spoke to me. As someone who tends to like more contemporary and a bit absurd theater, it baffles me that one of my favorite playwrights is some dusty old white man, however his theater does really speak to me, as it has to people for generations. His understanding of human nature really is timeless.
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