Mojo, The Bard, & Me

 

Today’s Totally Random Line(s)

           

Good Grandam, tell us, is our father dead?

Son

King Richard the Third     Act II, Scene ii, Line 1

 

And Grandam answers, ‘No, boy.’ Which, of course is a bald-faced lie. She knows darn well her son Clarence, the boy's father, is dead as a doornail, and she admits as such a few lines down. Or perhaps you could say she wasn’t lying, because perhaps she was saying, ‘No, boy. I’m not going to tell you if your father is dead.’ After all, who would want to tell a kid that?

But here’s something even more interesting. A few lines further, the Queen shows up with her hair about her ears. That’s the stage direction: Enter the Queen, with her hair about her ears. And I thought, well, where else is your hair going to be? I mean, my hair, albeit a little long, is always about my ears. Isn’t that where it belongs? I don’t want it about my nose or chin, or something else.

Just then Patrice breezes in, all dressed and ready to go (she’s usually in her pj’s at this point in the morning). So I asked her what she thought that stage direction meant, and she said it probably means the queen didn’t have time to put her hair up, so it means she’s a bit disheveled. 

And since her first lines (the queen’s first lines, not Patrice’s) are
O, who shall hinder me to wail and weep,
To chide my fortune, and torment myself?
the fact that she might be disheveled seems to make pretty good sense.

Now this is fairly momentous on two counts (I’m talking about Patrice’s comment, not on the queen’s dishevelment): one, it’s momentous that Patrice did such a good job interpreting Will’s writing, and two, it’s even more momentous that she did ANY job of interpreting Will’s writing, rather than just mumbling ‘stupid Shakespeare’ under her breath, as she walked away.

So, kudos to Patrice this morning. 

And here's my indefatigable Shakespeare expert being an intrepid explorer on safari in Botswana. We felt like the royal family at this point, but for some reason she decided to do her Winston Churchill impression instead. I guess she felt she didn't have a good Queen Elizabeth ready to go. 

You will notice, though, that she does not have her hair about her ears. So, be it Winston or Elizabeth (we're not sure), you can call her what you will; but just don't call her disheveled.