More Bad High School English
My senior year of high school, I took English 12. (As most everyone did, I suppose.) It was, one could say, a European (read: British) literature course. With some vocab worksheets thrown in. (Seriously, vocab worksheets? At age 18. Really? Then again, I suppose I did paint my face red, white, and blue on spirit day. But that is beside the point.)
One of the classic works we were introduced to was Beowulf. Great. But for some reason, it got stretched into a two month unit. We listened, yes listened to a tape of the entire thing. Which, seriously? It was 2000. Who was still using tapes? And because she taught more than one class period, she would always spend 5-10 minutes at the beginning of class cuing up the tape. (I suppose we should have worked on our vocab worksheets while she was doing that.)
Another work we listened to was The Canterbury Tales. People. Seriously. WHY WERE WE LISTENING TO THESE THINGS? No wonder I hate reading.
Next up, Macbeth. (The AP Classes did Hamlet. I suppose us regular high school seniors were too stoopid for Hamlet. Then again, does anyone [besides Steven Breese who can, apparently, work parts of Shakespeare's text into a modernish courtroom drama] fully understand Hamlet? I digress...)
Can anyone guess what the first thing we did with Macbeth was? If you guessed "took turns with the roles reading it aloud in class"...YOU'RE WRONG! If you guessed "were assigned parts of it to read at home"...WRONG AGAIN! If you guessed "did a vocab worksheet about it"...well, good guess, I suppose. If you guessed "threw hundreds of hardback copies of the Yale Shakespeare out of school bus windows at passing cars on Interstate 95 while on a field trip to the Kennedy Center to see Andrew Lloyd Webber's epic masterpiece The Phantom of the Opera"...well...then...you're...retarded.
We listened to it. Yup. Twice. Because we had a substitute for a couple of days and she, of course, didn't believe us when we told her that we had already listened to it, and that she'd better just give us some more vocab worksheets. (On a side note, I did the morning announcements in high school. Thus, I was a few minutes late to my first period class...which was English. When I came in late, the sub looked at me angrily and told me to sign the tardy book. "I do the morning announcements." "NO YOU DON'T! THAT'S A LAME EXCUSE!" "Good morning Gar-Field. Please stand and join me for the pledge of allegiance." She recognized my voice. I thought the whole thing was weird because my teacher usually left a note. And even if she didn't, why was the sub angry? I liked getting kids in trouble when I was a sub. I found out later that my teacher had left a note. She showed it to me. What a stupid sub.) (Additional note on subs getting kids in trouble: One time in health class, we had a sub. We were working in groups, and my group was laughing obnoxiously loud. The sub came over to yell at us, and was looking at me, and a girl across the circle from me made a gesture about one of the things we'd been laughing about. Thus, I laughed IN THE SUB'S FACE. She was like, THAT'S IT! She wrote me up. Then took me out into the hall and said something like this: "I know you're a good kid, I can tell. I am just writing you up as an example. I want everyone else to know that I'm not kidding around. So, you don't have to go to the office." So, I got to leave lame health class, during the LUNCH PERIOD and got to chill out during all three lunches. It was awesome. The most retarded part? The sub was only there for one day. And we had block scheduling, and 5th period was the short period. So she was with the class for about 50 minutes. Why did she feel the need to establish this hardass reputation? Whatever...)
What was I talking about. Yes. The Scottish Play.
After we listened to it TWICE, she showed us the movie. Which, I suppose, is nice, because it gives you a visualization. I appreciated, at least. It was, however, a weird version done by some knock off of the Royal Shakespeare Company. It was in the round and people kept like...well, it looked like they were floating in and out...they would like, come from behind the camera...it was fuckin' weird.
Then we moved on. To the next movie of Macbeth. This time it was a film version produced by, I kid you not, Playboy. This explained why the witches were topless.
Then we moved on. TO THE SAMURAI FILM VERSION OF MACBETH. I am not joking. It was in black and white and was one of the STRANGEST THINGS I'VE EVER SEEN IN MY LIFE. It was like, six hours long. (We were watching it for like, two weeks. Partly because she cued the tape up incorrectly and it was all so similar that it was hard to tell if we'd seen that part already...and partly because we had vocab worksheets to get finished.) Instead of three female witches, it had one, male witch. He was a skinny-type man in a cage with a spinning wheel of sorts. Then, at the end, when Birnam Wood came to Dunsinane...there were all these Samurai soldiers riding horses, carrying Christmas trees. They weren't decorated or anything, but wouldn't it have been great if they were?
When I went to college, the first play I auditioned for was A Midsummer Night's Dream. I, of course, pulled a 12 line "monologue" from Macbeth. For some reason, even though I had like, two weeks, I didn't bother to memorize it. I read it at the audition. And by read, I mean, nervously held a piece of paper that I glanced down at every now and again while I gave an unskilled line reading. Then they asked me to tell a story about myself. I did, and it was funny. But also very indicative. Also, at the beginning of the audition, when Steven asked what my piece was from, I said "The Scottish Play." He said "Oh good! You know the etiquette!" I found out a few years later that Steven thinks superstitions about Macbeth are utterly retarded. (Which actually surprises me...) Man. I was so stupid. No wonder Steven half hated me. I don't know how I got cast in Midsummer.
But I do know that all the girls thought my dress was the prettiest.
One of the classic works we were introduced to was Beowulf. Great. But for some reason, it got stretched into a two month unit. We listened, yes listened to a tape of the entire thing. Which, seriously? It was 2000. Who was still using tapes? And because she taught more than one class period, she would always spend 5-10 minutes at the beginning of class cuing up the tape. (I suppose we should have worked on our vocab worksheets while she was doing that.)
Another work we listened to was The Canterbury Tales. People. Seriously. WHY WERE WE LISTENING TO THESE THINGS? No wonder I hate reading.
Next up, Macbeth. (The AP Classes did Hamlet. I suppose us regular high school seniors were too stoopid for Hamlet. Then again, does anyone [besides Steven Breese who can, apparently, work parts of Shakespeare's text into a modernish courtroom drama] fully understand Hamlet? I digress...)
Can anyone guess what the first thing we did with Macbeth was? If you guessed "took turns with the roles reading it aloud in class"...YOU'RE WRONG! If you guessed "were assigned parts of it to read at home"...WRONG AGAIN! If you guessed "did a vocab worksheet about it"...well, good guess, I suppose. If you guessed "threw hundreds of hardback copies of the Yale Shakespeare out of school bus windows at passing cars on Interstate 95 while on a field trip to the Kennedy Center to see Andrew Lloyd Webber's epic masterpiece The Phantom of the Opera"...well...then...you're...retarded.
We listened to it. Yup. Twice. Because we had a substitute for a couple of days and she, of course, didn't believe us when we told her that we had already listened to it, and that she'd better just give us some more vocab worksheets. (On a side note, I did the morning announcements in high school. Thus, I was a few minutes late to my first period class...which was English. When I came in late, the sub looked at me angrily and told me to sign the tardy book. "I do the morning announcements." "NO YOU DON'T! THAT'S A LAME EXCUSE!" "Good morning Gar-Field. Please stand and join me for the pledge of allegiance." She recognized my voice. I thought the whole thing was weird because my teacher usually left a note. And even if she didn't, why was the sub angry? I liked getting kids in trouble when I was a sub. I found out later that my teacher had left a note. She showed it to me. What a stupid sub.) (Additional note on subs getting kids in trouble: One time in health class, we had a sub. We were working in groups, and my group was laughing obnoxiously loud. The sub came over to yell at us, and was looking at me, and a girl across the circle from me made a gesture about one of the things we'd been laughing about. Thus, I laughed IN THE SUB'S FACE. She was like, THAT'S IT! She wrote me up. Then took me out into the hall and said something like this: "I know you're a good kid, I can tell. I am just writing you up as an example. I want everyone else to know that I'm not kidding around. So, you don't have to go to the office." So, I got to leave lame health class, during the LUNCH PERIOD and got to chill out during all three lunches. It was awesome. The most retarded part? The sub was only there for one day. And we had block scheduling, and 5th period was the short period. So she was with the class for about 50 minutes. Why did she feel the need to establish this hardass reputation? Whatever...)
What was I talking about. Yes. The Scottish Play.
After we listened to it TWICE, she showed us the movie. Which, I suppose, is nice, because it gives you a visualization. I appreciated, at least. It was, however, a weird version done by some knock off of the Royal Shakespeare Company. It was in the round and people kept like...well, it looked like they were floating in and out...they would like, come from behind the camera...it was fuckin' weird.
Then we moved on. To the next movie of Macbeth. This time it was a film version produced by, I kid you not, Playboy. This explained why the witches were topless.
Then we moved on. TO THE SAMURAI FILM VERSION OF MACBETH. I am not joking. It was in black and white and was one of the STRANGEST THINGS I'VE EVER SEEN IN MY LIFE. It was like, six hours long. (We were watching it for like, two weeks. Partly because she cued the tape up incorrectly and it was all so similar that it was hard to tell if we'd seen that part already...and partly because we had vocab worksheets to get finished.) Instead of three female witches, it had one, male witch. He was a skinny-type man in a cage with a spinning wheel of sorts. Then, at the end, when Birnam Wood came to Dunsinane...there were all these Samurai soldiers riding horses, carrying Christmas trees. They weren't decorated or anything, but wouldn't it have been great if they were?
When I went to college, the first play I auditioned for was A Midsummer Night's Dream. I, of course, pulled a 12 line "monologue" from Macbeth. For some reason, even though I had like, two weeks, I didn't bother to memorize it. I read it at the audition. And by read, I mean, nervously held a piece of paper that I glanced down at every now and again while I gave an unskilled line reading. Then they asked me to tell a story about myself. I did, and it was funny. But also very indicative. Also, at the beginning of the audition, when Steven asked what my piece was from, I said "The Scottish Play." He said "Oh good! You know the etiquette!" I found out a few years later that Steven thinks superstitions about Macbeth are utterly retarded. (Which actually surprises me...) Man. I was so stupid. No wonder Steven half hated me. I don't know how I got cast in Midsummer.
But I do know that all the girls thought my dress was the prettiest.