O worthy prince, dishonour not your eye   

By throwing it on any other object

Till you have heard me in my true complaint,

And given me justice, justice, justice, justice.

-Isabella

Measure For Measure                   Act V, scene i     Line 23

Okay, let’s look at this line; Justice, justice, justice, justice. I get the idea that today’s line is about someone looking for justice. Now here’s the thing; I don’t really know anything about this play. We’ve had one Totally Random line previously from Measure For Measure, but I didn’t go into the play at all on that one. So I decided to look up a quick synopsis of Measure For Measure, just so I had some idea what it was about. Wanna know what I found out? It’s a play mostly about questions of morality and justice. Go figure. Totally Random, eh? I suppose you can say that if it’s a play about justice then we would be bound to run into lines that talk about justice. But a line that says ‘justice, justice, justice, justice’? I dunno about that.

Okay, I’m gonna let you chew on that one whilst I move on to another topic, iambic pentameter. I know, I’ve ranted on the old iamb thing before, but I guess I just can’t seem to get any resolution. So here’s my issue today: If you’re going to write in iambic pentameter, shouldn’t it all be in iambic pentameter? I mean, I get that this would be a hard thing to do, but you either do it or you don’t. The first three lines of today’s Totally Random lines are almost perfect iambic pentameter (not sure about ‘object’ at the end of the second line, but…). However, the last line loses it after the first two feet. And gi Ven me (so far, so good) Ju stice? No! it’s ju Stice. ju Stice, ju Stice, ju Stice. The accent in the word ‘justice’, when properly pronounced, is on the second syllable, not the first. So what’s up with that? Did they pronounce that word differently in 1600? I guess that’s possible. I certainly don’t know. Either way though, you have to admit that this iambic pentameter thing is pretty light and loose. Again, I get it that it’s hard to make every line iambic pentameter. I can tell you that I did write a ten page paper in college that was in iambic pentameter. Obviously it was a paper about Shakespeare, Henry IV to be exact, and it wasn’t particularly easy, and it wasn’t anything of Shakespearean quality. But it was all iambic pentameter, not just some of it. It just doesn’t seem right to me that you iamb where you can and just lose your iamb as needed; slip out of it and back in as needed? Then it’s not really iambic pentameter, is it?

So that’s my rant for the day. And I’ll leave you with the question: What’s with Will’s iambic pentameter? Why is it so imperfect? You tell me.

Yes, you're right; not iambic pentameter. I believe the verse is called anapestic tetrameter. If you don't recognize this verse and illustration you most certainly suffered through a deprived childhood. You'll also note the Theodore does a pretty darn consistent job with his meter.

Madam, methinks, if you did love him dearly,

You do not hold the method to enforce

The like from him.

-Charmian

 Antony and Cleopatra                   Act I, scene iii     Line 6

First off, and before we get too far into today's Totally Random line, what about this ‘methinks’ thing. I mean, all you have to do is start off with, or heck even midway through throw in, a ‘methinks’ and you’re putting a Shakespearean spin on it. And why not? You don’t even have to own the Shakespeare part of it, you can just use it and own it for the way it sounds. It sounds good. At least I think it does. But anyway, the line…

So with our first step into Will’s only play set in Egypt (I think it’s his only one. James?) we have a pretty good line because it speaks to a major theme of the play and that is the way that Cleopatra is doing her best to wrap Antony around her little finger. And it seems to be the right hand men and women who want to bring this theme to our attention. In fact, if you go back a few pages to the first lines of the play you’ll see Philo, one of Antony’s friends, talking about this same thing. But today’s Totally Random speaker is Charmian, Cleopatra’s attendant, and she’s reacting to the queen’s commands to basically go spy on Antony. Cleopatra’s been telling Charmian the different things to tell Antony depending on what kind of mood he’s in. And I believe Charmian’s Totally Random line is just saying that if you really love the guy, then be straight with him. But Cleopatra response to this is to tell Charmian that she’s a fool. So while the role of Cleopatra speaks to cleverness, but also the deceitfulness of women, I think that the simple honesty of Charmian speaks to the goodness of women. As in a lot of cases with Will, he’s not painting a picture to tell us how it is, he’s painting of picture with a little bit of everything in it so that we can decide on how it is. Clever fellow that Will.

Now, as a little bit of a post script on today’s blog, this is one of the first plays that I read while listening to the Arkangel Shakespeare CD (yeah, CD; can you believe it?). Cirian Hinds plays Antony. If you don’t recognize the name you would recognize the face and the voice if you heard it. He’s really good. So I’m plugging Arkangel again just because I feel they’re that good. Especially if you’re trying to introduce someone to the written Shakespeare. Get them to listen/read it. You won’t regret it.

What the… What’s that guy doing back? But okay, that’s Ciaran Hinds he’s pointing to. Recognize him? I mean Ciaran, not the guy in the funny outfit.

I am the best of them that speak this speech,

Were I but where ‘tis spoken.

How! The best!

-Ferdinand/Prospero

The Tempest                      Act I, scene ii      Line 432

That’s young Prince Ferdinand with the beginning part of today’s line and Prospero with the retort of How! The best! This of course from The Tempest and it’s the scene where Prospero and Miranda first meet Ferdinand. Miranda, who’s falling in love with Ferdinand at first sight has been marooned on the island with her father since she was a very small child. Now she’s a young woman and this is pretty much the first young man she’s ever seen or heard. He’s replying to her, and Prospero has begun to question his statement about being the best. The scene becomes sort of the classic deal of the father questioning the daughter’s first boyfriend.

Now I’ve seen this played out in zillions of sitcoms and movies where the father is the hard-ass making life difficult for the young guy. But I have to say, speaking from my experience as the young guy and my experience as the father, I can’t much relate to this scene. I never remember a father of any girl I dated (not that there were that many) trying to intimidate me or give me a hard time. And I don’t think I ever gave much of a hard time to any of the boyfriends of my two daughters. I dunno, maybe I’m just not remembering this stuff. But for all the good things I say about Will and what a good job he does of illustrating the human experience, this is one piece of it that I’m just not so sure about.

What do you think? Is it just me, or the way I’m remembering it? Do fathers of daughters generally intentionally intimidate boyfriends? The funny thing is that Will did have two daughters. I wonder how much of Prospero he drew from his own life experiences. Now that is a good question. I wish to heck we knew a little more about this guy so that we could do more than just wonder!

So that’s today’s question. Does this scene (and all the others since then) about the dad giving the hard time to the boyfriend have any basis in reality? Or is it just a concoction of Will and Hollywood? And if it does have basis in reality, how’d I miss that in my life? I guess only I can answer that last part. You worry about the first part.

In the meantime, tomorrow we can look forward to our first taste of Antony and Cleopatra.

This is an original drawing I just happen to have of this first encounter between Ferdinand and Miranda with Prospero looking on.

--We do here pronounce,

Upon the part o’the people, in whose power

We were elected theirs, Marcius is worthy

Of present death.

-Junius Brutus

Coriolanus                          Act III, scene i    Line 210

Today’s is the fifth post on Coriolanus. And Coriolanus is the one play that I’ve read and seen for the first time in the past two months, or since I started doing this silly Totally Random post. So I’d say that the time spent on reading and watching that play was time well spent.  The first time we dealt with this play, just our third post back in August, we had some citizen complaining about Caius Marcius. And the last time we dealt with this play, a week and a half ago we had Marcius give us that fabulous Oh world, thy slippery turns line right before he was about to join the enemy. Well today’s line is the citizenry of Rome pronouncing sentence on Marcius which will end up getting commuted from death to banishment and lead to him being at the enemies door uttering his slippery turns line. And if you recall, the enemy accepts Marcius’s offer and he ends up doing a lot of damage to the Roman citizenry. They maybe should have given it some more thought before passing judgement on this guy.

So, what to say about this line? Junius Brutus, today’s speaker, was discussed briefly in one of our previous posts. He’s an elected representative of the people, but he’s not of the highest caliber. He was represented in the movie version that I saw as a sort of self-serving doofus. And now he’s doing his best to oust the guy who helped save Rome on the battlefield. And by ousting him he’s gonna just cause Rome that much more trouble. This Junius guy is basically pretty worthless. You know, like a lot of the folks we have today in Washington. My goodness, and you ask why we’re still studying Shakespeare! His stuff is just incredibly ageless!

This is a picture of my little guys re-enacting Marcius's banishment. That's Marcius on the far left and the doofus Junius Brutus in the blue hat, closest to Marcius. You can tell that the two guys behind Junius are already having second thoughts.

And, if King Edward be as true and just

As I am subtle, false, and treacherous,

This day should Clarence be closely mew’d up,

About a prophecy, which says that G

Of Edward’s heirs the murderer should be.  

-Duke of Gloucester

King Richard III                 Act I, scene i       Line 39

And we’re back once more to Richard III. Let’s talk about these history plays for a minute. I think I covered some of this in a previous post, so hopefully I’m not repeating myself too much.

Will did a bunch of history plays covering the kings from Edward III in 1327 to Richard III in 1483. The only two kings in this period of time that don’t have their own plays are Richard III’s immediate predecessors Edwards IV and V, but he deals with these guys to some degree in his Henry VI Part III and in Richard III. So he pretty much covers that whole period of 150 years or so. His other two history plays, King John and Henry VIII are a bit disconnected; the former taking place much earlier and the latter a bit later. So the point I’m trying to make is that all these other plays, including today’s play Richard III are one continuous story, historically speaking. Not that Will is an accurate portrayer of history. If I’ve learned one thing from reading Shakespeare’s Kings it’s that Will is plays pretty loose with the facts when it comes to his version of history. He’s more concerned with a good story and good drama for the stage. As well he should be. But the problem with this is that it makes it a little harder to tell what’s going on and keep track of all the players (and there’s a lot of players in these nine plays!) in these plays because many times when reading Will’s plays the easiest reference is the history of these kings. Unfortunately though, that history doesn’t always jive with the tale that Will is spinning.   

Now what we have today is from the opening speech of Richard III in the play King Richard the Third. At this point Edward IV is still the king and Richard III is Richard, Duke of Gloucester. And speaking of identifying the good guys from the bad guys (see yesterday’s post), I think it’s pretty clear for today’s Totally Random line that Richard, by his own admission, is not one of the good guys. The Duke of Clarence that he’s referring to is his brother, the ‘mew’d up’ means ‘locked up’, and the prophecy he refers to is some prophecy (I’m not sure about the back story on the prophecy) that Edward had received that said that the murderers of Edward’s heirs would be some guy whose name began with a ‘G’. To clarify, the Duke of Clarence’s first name is George. And apparently it’s Richard who’s told Edward to be wary of old Clarence AKA George.

Okay, got all that? Exactly, it really is a boatload of info. I started putting together a chart that I could reference to keep all these guys straight. But one thing is pretty clear: Richard III = Rat Fink. At least we know that. We pretty much know that we’re dealing with the bad guy today.

If you’re interested, here’s the link to an article my daughter sent me today. It’s written by Stephen Greenblatt, so we know it’s legit. He’s applying the lessons of Will’s King Richard the Third to the current U.S. election. It’s pretty interesting, relatively short, and easy reading.  And he's pretty much of the same opinion as me regarding Richard III: Rat Fink.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/09/opinion/sunday/shakespeare-explains-the-2016-election.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&region=CColumn&module=MostEmailed&version=Full&src=me&WT.nav=MostEmailed&_r=0

How about this guy. He's a bad guy, isn't he?

I do profess

That for your highness’ good I ever labour’d

More than mine own; that am, have, and will be,--

Though all the world should crack their duty to you,

And throw it from their soul: though perils did

Abound, as thick as thought could make ‘em, and

Appear in forms more horrid,--yet my duty,

As doth a rock against the chiding flood,

Should the approach of this wild river break,

And stand unshaken yours.

 -Cardinal Wolsey

 King Henry the Eighth                   Act III, scene ii   Line 193

Check it out. Three days ago we had Henry the Eighth, and it was a line where two guys were talking about Cardinal Wolsey. Now today this same Cardinal is the speaker, and it’s a few scenes later. And yes, I did it to you again. I gave you way more than a line. Okay, I admit it. My infallible die led me to the Though all the world line, and as you can see, that line is part of the sentence that starts in the previous line and ends further on. And the whole thing I gave you today is really one big thought of Cardinal Wolsey trying to impress the king with just how devoted he is to him. And it’s a bit much, don’t you think? It reminds me a little of Goneril and Regan in King Lear. They professed their love for their father Lear in terms somewhat like this. And we know how well that turned out (very poorly for Lear if you don’t know). So even though I don’t know this play, based on today’s Totally Random line and also on Suffolk’s assessment of three days ago, I’m going to go out on a limb and say that Wolsey is a Schmoe.

Now let’s face it, I could be wrong about the guy. And that’s the challenge, isn’t it. The problem is that Will doesn’t always make it easy for us. Oh sure, there’s the random Iago here and there that’s just out and out bad. But most of Will’s characters are like us, very grey, in between the black and the white. And just like in real life where we have to figure out who’s more good than bad, so too in reading/watching Will’s plays we have to figure out for ourselves most of the time who the good guy is. And sometimes we’re just left wondering.

Now I’m not going to tell you whether the Cardinal here is good or bad. I’m not going to tell you because I can’t tell you. I don’t know. Are you the least bit curious, or have you passed judgement based on the little that I’ve already given you?

                                                                                                So which do you think it is; He's a weasel, or he's good old Wosley?

Why, sir, what’s your conceit in that?

 -Petruchio

 The Taming of the Shrew             Act IV, scene iii  Line 158

A pretty simple line today. Conceit means idea, or thought. Petruchio is simply asking Grumio what he’s thinking. It’s a kind of convoluted scene, so I don’t think we’ll go into it. This is our first shot at The Taming of the Shrew. It’s a comedy and it’s a pretty interesting play. It’s one of the first ones that I listened to on Arkangel, but it’s been a few years and I’m not all that up on it. So I’m not going to get into explaining the context of the line, or the scene, or what the play is all about. Having said that I could turn to you (if you were here) and say ‘What’s your conceit in that?’ Well, what do you think of that? I’m writing a post and I’m not going to spend any time talking about today’s Totally Random line. What’s your conceit in that? Eh?

                                                      What's this guy's conceit? Sure looks like there's something he's thinking about.