Mojo, The Bard, & Me

 

Upon a wooden coffin we attend;

 -Duke of Exeter

 King Henry The Sixth Part One         Act I, scene i, line 19  

This is the first time that we’ve picked page one in my compilation. Since this is the first play in my compilation, and the plays in this book are placed in the order in which Will wrote them, this tells us that this is the nineteenth line that he wrote in his career. However, it should be noted that the exact order in which he wrote the plays is unknown, and there are quite a few other lists which do not have this as his first play. Nonetheless, I believe we are safe in saying that this is one of the first lines in one of his very earliest works. Upon a wooden coffin we attend; The play starts with Bedford, Gloster, Exeter, Warwick, and the Bishop of Winchester bemoaning the recent death of Henry V. And so, this is the beginning of the reign of Henry VI.

 

And isn’t it a little interesting that Will starts his cannon off with an ending. One of the themes that I see in his works occurring over and over and over is the idea of contradiction, and appearance vs reality, or maybe better put, things being opposite of what we expect, or what they appear to be. Is it an ending or a beginning? Why do you suppose he does this? Maybe because every ending is a beginning, and because all the explicating of life (and he does a lot of explicating of life, in fact that’s all he does) involves two sides of a coin – never just one side. An ending and a beginning. Hmmm, a bit philosophical.

 

 

Now take this picture for example. It's a lot a grays, light and dark. And it doesn't really look like anything, and yet, it must be something. I think it might be an extreme closeup of something that would be entirely recognizable if it were taken and viewed from another angle. But I don't know for sure. So what is it? Beginning or end? You tell me.