Shakespeare MEME and a Sonnet
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The MEME is more or less gacked from lost_spook. I've added my favorite sonnet after the MEME because the MEME is all about his plays, and the man wrote things besides plays.
1) What was the first Shakespeare play you saw/read?
I think the first Shakespeare play I was exposed to was a text version of A Midsummer Night's Dream for young readers. I have vague memories of the faeries drawn around the text.
2) What is your most favorite Shakespeare play?
I can't pick one absolute favorite because I can't pick one genre over another. I do have an absolute favorite in each genre. My favorite comedy is Much Ado About Nothing. Beatrice and Benedict are my favorite couple in all of Shakespeare's plays. My favorite history is Henry V. It makes Henry the Fifth one of my most favorite kings in all of literature. My favorite tragedy is Hamlet. It helped me survive getting pretty suicidal in high school.
3) What is your least favorite Shakespeare play?
I HATE Romeo and Juliet. I have since I was first forced to read it in grade school, and it wasn't the being forced part that made me hate it. I didn't mind a number of other plays I had to read in grade school, Twelfth Night, Othello, and Julius Caesar are just a few examples. No, it was how utterly stupid I felt the title couple were. I lost all interest in the play when Mercutio was killed. I couldn't even care if his "a plague on both your houses" curse stuck. I may have gotten older, but I haven't grown fonder of it.
4) Who do you think wrote Shakespeare's works; are you a Stratfordian or Oxfordian?
a) From a basic pragmatic standpoint, I'm a Stratfordian. I see no reason to argue for a more convoluted explanation of who wrote the work.
b) From the "conspiracy theories are rubbish, but lots of fun" standpoint I've gotten into the idea of "Shake-Speare" having been a collective rather than a single author. That is--lots of the people who have been named as possible authors of the complete body of work, including William Shakespeare, actually worked together on it. With that theory "Shake-Speare" is a name for the collective, like "Anonymous" is the name of the hacking collective. It may be ridiculous, but it does consolidate the competing theories into one.
5) How many Shakespeare plays have you seen/read?
I have a copy of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, but I'd be lying if I claimed to have read them all. Most of my exposure, by both reading and watching, has been to the comedies and tragedies. I'm glad the BBC is doing fresh productions of the histories. Henry V was still my favorite in the first batch. I mean it was my favorite play going in, and it had Tom Hiddleston as Henry, hard for the others to compete. I'm looking forward to getting to see Benedict Cumberbatch do Richard III. It may make me a bigger fan of that play than I have been.
Sonnet 130
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare.
*
The MEME is more or less gacked from lost_spook. I've added my favorite sonnet after the MEME because the MEME is all about his plays, and the man wrote things besides plays.
1) What was the first Shakespeare play you saw/read?
I think the first Shakespeare play I was exposed to was a text version of A Midsummer Night's Dream for young readers. I have vague memories of the faeries drawn around the text.
2) What is your most favorite Shakespeare play?
I can't pick one absolute favorite because I can't pick one genre over another. I do have an absolute favorite in each genre. My favorite comedy is Much Ado About Nothing. Beatrice and Benedict are my favorite couple in all of Shakespeare's plays. My favorite history is Henry V. It makes Henry the Fifth one of my most favorite kings in all of literature. My favorite tragedy is Hamlet. It helped me survive getting pretty suicidal in high school.
3) What is your least favorite Shakespeare play?
I HATE Romeo and Juliet. I have since I was first forced to read it in grade school, and it wasn't the being forced part that made me hate it. I didn't mind a number of other plays I had to read in grade school, Twelfth Night, Othello, and Julius Caesar are just a few examples. No, it was how utterly stupid I felt the title couple were. I lost all interest in the play when Mercutio was killed. I couldn't even care if his "a plague on both your houses" curse stuck. I may have gotten older, but I haven't grown fonder of it.
4) Who do you think wrote Shakespeare's works; are you a Stratfordian or Oxfordian?
a) From a basic pragmatic standpoint, I'm a Stratfordian. I see no reason to argue for a more convoluted explanation of who wrote the work.
b) From the "conspiracy theories are rubbish, but lots of fun" standpoint I've gotten into the idea of "Shake-Speare" having been a collective rather than a single author. That is--lots of the people who have been named as possible authors of the complete body of work, including William Shakespeare, actually worked together on it. With that theory "Shake-Speare" is a name for the collective, like "Anonymous" is the name of the hacking collective. It may be ridiculous, but it does consolidate the competing theories into one.
5) How many Shakespeare plays have you seen/read?
I have a copy of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, but I'd be lying if I claimed to have read them all. Most of my exposure, by both reading and watching, has been to the comedies and tragedies. I'm glad the BBC is doing fresh productions of the histories. Henry V was still my favorite in the first batch. I mean it was my favorite play going in, and it had Tom Hiddleston as Henry, hard for the others to compete. I'm looking forward to getting to see Benedict Cumberbatch do Richard III. It may make me a bigger fan of that play than I have been.
Sonnet 130
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare.
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