Sunday, April 16, 2017


I’ll bring her to the Grecian presently:

-Troilus

Troilus And Cressida                                       Act IV, Scene iii, Line 6


Just to re-set: Troilus and Cressida is about the two titular lovers, but it’s also about the Trojan war. It encompasses a lot of the action of the Iliad, but I’m not sure whether or not Troilus and Cressida are part of the Iliad or if they are Will’s add-on to that story. But we’re not going to find that out today.
Anyway, this is a very short scene. Here’s the entirety of Act IV, Scene iii.


 SCENE III. The same. Street before Pandarus' house.

Enter PARIS, TROILUS, AENEAS, DEIPHOBUS, ANTENOR, and DIOMEDES


It is great morning, and the hour prefix'd
Of her delivery to this valiant Greek
Comes fast upon. Good my brother Troilus,
Tell you the lady what she is to do,
And haste her to the purpose.



Exit



Exeunt



And that’s it. Thirteen lines. Without getting into the whole story too much, what’s happening here is that the Trojans and Greeks have agreed to a prisoner swap. Well, not actually prisoners, at least not both of them. But the deal is that the Trojans sent Cressida (a Trojan) to the Greeks and the Greeks send a Trojan prisoner back to Troy. I think that’s all you need to know for now. I know, you’re asking why do the Greeks want Cressida? Well her father, a Trojan, is now in the Greek camp. Not sure what’s up with that.

So this is the scene where Troilus is being told that it’s time to surrender his babe for the swap. He seems to be taking it pretty well, don’t you think. I mean, he makes the little statement about offering up his heart to an altar, but other than that he doesn’t seem to be fighting the deal. It’s a pretty mild mannered statement. I’ll bring her to the Grecian presently (yawn). And then what? Oh yeah, I think I was gonna go get a haircut. Yeah, that’s what it was. Well this is sort of a comedy anyway, so…
All right then. This is my copy of The Iliad, and this is the pronouncing glossary in the back of the book. If you zoom in you can see Troilus's name there. But if you go to the 'C' page there is on Cressida (that's why Cressida here, holding the book open, looks so pissed off). So it looks like maybe Will invented Cressida, but not Troilus? And if Cressida never really existed then that would explain why Troilus was so cavalier about giving  her up to the Greeks. It's all a bit confusing, isn't it?



Friday, April 14, 2017


For you, mistress,
Save you your labor.


-Gratiano

Othello                                 Act V, Scene i, Line 100


I believe Gratiano is telling Bianca, Cassio’s girlfriend, to not bother with the injured Cassio because they’re going to get the surgeon to look at him. So here’s what’s going on: This is the scene where Iago orchestrates an attack on Cassio by Rodrigo. Naturally Iago isn’t there when the attack takes place but only shows up after Cassio has defended himself against Rodrigo. Then Iago sneaks up behind Cassio and slices his leg and runs away before he’s seen. A few minutes later he sneaks in again and kills the wounded Rodrigo, and again runs away before he’s seen. Then he shows up again and starts spreading the blame on different people for the stuff he’s done. He really couldn’t get much rattier. Yeah, that’s probably not a word, but then again there’s probably never been a villain quite like Iago, so he needs his own word. Rattier. Or perhaps rattiest.

There, Will is obviously a much better wordsmith than I, but that doesn’t mean I can’t come up with a gem now and then. Rattiest. But keep in mind how evil Iago is, and he's the inspiration for the word. So don’t be telling your sister she’s the rattiest just because she left a mess in the living room. She’d have to burn down the living room and steal your boyfriend to even get started on the road to rattiesthood. No, you’ll have to save this word for an extra-special occasion. It’s basically a once in a lifetime word.  
This is a monster that I helped my little buddy make a few years ago. I'm not using him for tonight's picture because of his rattiness. No, I couldn't find anything to illustrate true rattiness. But since I came up empty on tonight's picture I thought I'd use a picture of the monster because I think he's interesting. Do you think he's interesting?

Thursday, April 13, 2017


Thrice the brinded cat hath mew’d.
-First Witch

Macbeth                              Act IV, Scene i, Line 1

That’s right, First Witch. There’s three witches in this play, and they show up time and again. In fact, the play opens with them and of course they are integral to the plot since they pretty much get Macbeth going down his path of mayhem. And what are they doing in this scene. Not sure. But they’re obviously up to something. Thrice the brinded cat hath mew’d. What’s a brinded cat?

So check this out. I thought when I read this line that it must certainly be a line that had since been borrowed and re-used for something. Even though nobody these days knows what a brinded cat is, the line itself just sounds cool. And I’m right. Thrice the brinded cat hath mew’d, is a book by Alan Bradley. Look at me, now I’m giving a plug for Alan Bradley, whoever that is. Apparently he’s either a pretty well known author or he’s just got a good web presence because if you google today’s line (which, as you can see, was written by William Shakespeare) you’ll get pages of references to Alan’s new book. Poor Will. Poor us. No offense, Alan.

Oh well.

I'm pretty sure this is not the first, second, or third witch. But it is a witch. I'm sure of that, because I made that witch costume myself.

Wednesday, April 12, 2017



4/12/17
I know that you can do very little alone;

-Menenius

Coriolanus                                    Act II, Scene i, Line 35


I know you can do very little alone; for your helps
are many, or else your actions would grow wondrous
single: your abilities are too infant-like for
doing much alone. You talk of pride: O that you
could turn your eyes toward the napes of your necks,
and make but an interior survey of your good selves!
O that you could!

That’s the full quote there, those seven lines. I gave you a nice short piece of it for today’s Totally Random line, but I thought you could use the seven lines to give it better context. This is Menenius talking to two of the tribunes (representatives) of the people, Sicinius and Junius. It’s pretty obvious that Menenius has a low opinion of these two guys he’s talking to. And he’s right, because they are pretty sleazy. They are politicians and Will has embodied in them all the things that we don’t like in politicians. Not that all politicians are bad. But these guys are.

You know what is a little curious though, is this thing about turning their eyes toward the napes of your necks. What’s up with that? An interior survey of your good selves, I get that. But eyes toward the napes of your necks?

And this leads me to a little bit of an epistle. Get comfortable.

One of the things I remember from my MAT program (that’s masters of teaching program) was the idea that one of the best ways to go about teaching is to make the subject matter the center of the classroom. In a sense, to take the subject matter, whether it’s Shakespeare, or the area of a triangle, or the atomic weight of wheat (okay, not sure if that last one makes sense), and literally or figuratively put it in the middle of the class and gather round it. And then take turns talking about it, questioning it, or just poking at it. As a teacher you should be doing some poking too. And yes, helping out a bit if you know a little more about the subject matter than the rest. This is in stark opposition to making it a teacher centered classroom where you’re just lecturing and the students are supposed to be paying attention to you.

With that in mind, my point is that Menenius’s seven lines today are a perfect example of how poke-able Shakespeare is. Why would you turn your eyes toward the napes of your neck? Why does Menenius have such a low opinion of politicians. These lines, and the questions I’m raising about these two lines,  are the kind of things that you can toss out into the middle of the circle and start poking. If you stop and look at these little things in the play, in the text, you can find some really interesting stuff. Shakespeare is so incredibly full of interesting stuff. Some of it’s very obscure, like the nape of the neck thing. And some is incredibly relevant and relatable to our world, like the politician thing.  

So that’s my epistle. It’s too bad I don’t have any teachers reading this blog, huh?
Here's my guys going at it again. They are just crazy about this play. That's Jerry, on the left, playing Sicinius and staring at Junius's neck. I coached him a bit on this one because I told him I wanted to put extra emphasis on the neck staring thing. He just took it and ran with it. Beautiful!

Monday, April 10, 2017


Where is the beauteous majesty of Denmark?



-Ophelia

Hamlet                                         Act IV, Scene iv, Line 21

I think it’s pretty interesting that I was talking about TWLOHA in my last post and today we’re dealing with Ophelia, another in Will’s long list of tragic characters. Do you ever wonder if Will wasn’t perhaps a manic depressive?



In today’s scene Ophelia is losing her grip on reality. And no wonder! So far in the play her boyfriend (sort of) Hamlet has killed her father Polonius (by accident, sort of). And now Hamlet has been sent away to be killed himself, though Ophelia doesn’t yet know that. I’m not sure, but I think Ophelia’s referring to Hamlet as the ‘beauteous majesty of Denmark.’



Anyway, and more to the point, Ophelia, who dies or kills herself depending on who you ask, has become synonymous in our contemporary world with a name for troubled adolescent girls and particularly girls like the ones that TWLOHA tries to help. There is, in fact, a well known book on the subject of adolescent girls titled Reviving Ophelia: Saving The Selves Of Adolescent Girls.



So last post we talked about TWLOHA and today we run into Ophelia. And it’s all so Perfectly Random.
Yeah, I thought I'd throw TWLOHA another plug. I really don't know much about them, but I think they're legit, and I know this cause is legit.



Saturday, April 8, 2017


How love is wise in folly, foolish-witty:


-Narrator

Venus and Adonis                                           Stanza 141


We have arrived, today, at the very page that we started on way back last August. This is, nonetheless , a tough line. At the very least you need the whole stanza. Here it is.


She marking them begins a wailing note
And sings extemporally a woeful ditty;
How love makes young men thrall and old men dote;
How love is wise in folly, foolish-witty:
Her heavy anthem still concludes in woe,
And still the choir of echoes answer so.


 So, for the sake of a little clarity, let me give you a little more. Adonis has just left to go home for the night and Venus is lying alone in the woods. She’s moaning that Adonis left her, and her moans are being echoed by neighboring caves (neighboring caves?). And these echoes are what she ‘marks’ in the first line of this stanza. Then she begins to sing a little song about ‘How love makes young men thrall and old men dote; how love is wise in folly, foolish-witty:’


And that’s about it. Love makes young men slaves (to their passion?) and old men act foolishly. Love is wise in folly and foolish-witty. It sounds like she’s just repeating how foolish love is, especially in the line we’ve picked for today.


How love is wise in folly, foolish-witty.


And this leads me to something completely different. I was going to comment on sort of agreeing with Venus and her view of love, and then I thought of something that I came across yesterday. It was a car with a sticker on the back. The sticker was the letters TWLOHA. I didn’t know what that was. Do you? Well I’ll tell you. It’s a non-profit organization called To Write Love On Her Arms. It’s a group based in Florida whose purpose is to help victims of depression and addiction. What’s it mean? It comes from the story of one young woman that the founder of the group was trying to help. This girl was suffering in silence and her suffering was taking the form of her cutting the word ‘fuck-up’ into her arms. And when the founder spoke about trying to help this girl he said that he was hoping that he would be able to get her to write love on her arms instead. To Write Love On Her Arms. That’s it. So in that case, I don’t think love is foolish at all. In that case love is pretty powerful, and it’s the best thing there is.
The moral of today's story? There's a lot of different kinds of love, and a lot (most?) of them are really good and really important. And yes, some of them can be a bit foolish-witty.

TO
WRITE
LOVE
ON HER
ARMS

This one's pretty important (consider it a public service announcement).




Thursday, April 6, 2017


Keep, then, fair league and truce with thy true bed;


Adriana             


The Comedy Of Errors                    Act II, Scene ii    Line 144


Okay, back to The Comedy Of Errors. Remember, this is a story about twins separated at birth and living apart, not knowing where the other one is. To make it more interesting, each twin has as his personal servant one of another set of twins. And of course to make it supremely interesting, each of these two pairs of brothers has the same name as the other brother. The play takes place over the course of one day when one of the twins, with his servant, wanders into the town where the other lives. During the course of the play none of the twins are ever in the same scene as their twin, and they don’t even know that the other exists in the town. It’s not till the last scene of the play that they all end up on the stage together and realize what’s been going on. Only Will and the Three’s Company writers could have come up with this one. 

Anyway, today’s line is the wife of resident twin talking to the visiting twin (of course thinking he’s the resident twin, that is to say, her husband).  His response will be something along the lines of ‘who are you?’ And her line above is just a small part of what she’s going on and on about. So do we want to talk about this line? I mean, what do we do with it. To wrangle much meaning out of it we’d have to do at least a little context work with it. And honestly, I just don’t know if I’m up for that tonight. I think I’d rather just find some sort of mildly related picture and move on. 

Okay, what's this? It's a rose on a bed. So it seems like this would be a bed that you'd want to keep a truce with. Right?


Today’s Totally Random Lines   What’s the matter now?   Hamlet Hamlet                     Act III Scene iv, Line 14 Oh my good...