I've Got No Excuse
Since I studied English Lit in college, I think it's only appropriate that I talk about Shakespeare from time to time. I have a Complete Works of Shakespeare book that I more or less inherited from my grandmother, and it is currently in my bathroom for those lengthy sit down times which crop up (or down, as it were) from time to time. If reading Shakespeare on the can seems like a disrespectful notion, let me once again point to my English Lit education as some kind of indication of my abiding respect toward the Bard. It is difficult for me to countenance someone studying literature not having a love for Shakespeare, but my friend Craig is not a fan, so what do I know?
Now Shakespeare wrote comedies, tragedies, and histories. The histories I'll overlook for the moment, since at best they're irrelevant and at worst mildly undermine the crux of the following argument. As for comedy and drama, it's hardly something Shakespeare alone dabbled in; classic dramatic theory would have it that the entirety of art (or perhaps narrative art) is either one or the other, and often both. Hamlet is a tragedy, Much Ado About Nothing is a comedy. Personally, when a thing is both comedy and tragedy I feel that is the highest of highs from an authorial standpoint. I laugh, I cry, I cry because I'm laughing so hard, I laugh because I'm crying so hard, what have you.
Which is why, for me, Romeo and Juliet is the best Shakespearean play. It's a tragedy that reads like a comedy. Two kids who love each other so much after being together for a few minutes that they can't bear to live without one another is a ridiculous story. If I had a friend who met a girl at a party and then a few days later said he was going to kill himself because he couldn't be with her, well, I'd probably do the job for him, but only after laughing at his stupidity. Suffer not a stupid person to live.
Maybe for some, that would indicate a weakness in the play, but for me, it is the very center of its strength. The real world, as we reckon it, is a tragic place largely because of how comically idiotic we are. I was once asked whether I viewed life as a comedy or a tragedy, but truthfully, it's not one or the other; life is a comedy because it's so tragic. Or it's a tragedy because of it's so comical. Whichever you prefer. Most of our garden variety awful stems not from good or evil but from stupid, ridiculous human behavior. My dog can't figure out not to play with the cat that scratches him on the face and hisses at him. Humanity isn't much better. That guy or girl who is emotionally destructive but oh so attractive, they're scratching you on the face but you're too dense to figure out they don't really want to play a game you'll enjoy.
I've been accused of being a cynic a time or two. In fact, I've accused myself of that more than once. It's not really true. I don't belong to the cynical camp. I'm actually an idealist, hard as it is to believe. A relevant quote from Flannery O'Connor, if you please, as it is one of my favorites:
"The writer who emphasizes spiritual values is very likely to take the darkest view of all of what he sees in this country today. For him, the fact that we are the most powerful and wealthiest nation in the world doesn't mean a thing in any positive sense. The sharper the light of faith, the more glaring are apt to be the distortions the writer sees in the life around him...My own feeling is that writers who see by the light of their Christian faith will have, in these times, the sharpest eyes for the grotesque, for the perverse, and for the unacceptable...The novelist with Christian concerns will find in modern life distortions which are repugnant to him, and his problem will be to make these appear as distortions to an audience which is used to seeing them as natural."
So if it sometimes seems like I'm a cynic, it's really a failing of the English language, that thing I studied so arduously (ha ha ha, really, I did study...sometimes) in college. I make fun of things not because I'm awful but because I'm not sure others see that they are awful. Maybe I overuse satire, but it worked for Jonathan Swift, and he was a lot smarter than me, so I'll follow his lead. In other words, I'm not a cynic...I'm a Christian, and one who fancies himself a writer.
Now Shakespeare wrote comedies, tragedies, and histories. The histories I'll overlook for the moment, since at best they're irrelevant and at worst mildly undermine the crux of the following argument. As for comedy and drama, it's hardly something Shakespeare alone dabbled in; classic dramatic theory would have it that the entirety of art (or perhaps narrative art) is either one or the other, and often both. Hamlet is a tragedy, Much Ado About Nothing is a comedy. Personally, when a thing is both comedy and tragedy I feel that is the highest of highs from an authorial standpoint. I laugh, I cry, I cry because I'm laughing so hard, I laugh because I'm crying so hard, what have you.
Which is why, for me, Romeo and Juliet is the best Shakespearean play. It's a tragedy that reads like a comedy. Two kids who love each other so much after being together for a few minutes that they can't bear to live without one another is a ridiculous story. If I had a friend who met a girl at a party and then a few days later said he was going to kill himself because he couldn't be with her, well, I'd probably do the job for him, but only after laughing at his stupidity. Suffer not a stupid person to live.
Maybe for some, that would indicate a weakness in the play, but for me, it is the very center of its strength. The real world, as we reckon it, is a tragic place largely because of how comically idiotic we are. I was once asked whether I viewed life as a comedy or a tragedy, but truthfully, it's not one or the other; life is a comedy because it's so tragic. Or it's a tragedy because of it's so comical. Whichever you prefer. Most of our garden variety awful stems not from good or evil but from stupid, ridiculous human behavior. My dog can't figure out not to play with the cat that scratches him on the face and hisses at him. Humanity isn't much better. That guy or girl who is emotionally destructive but oh so attractive, they're scratching you on the face but you're too dense to figure out they don't really want to play a game you'll enjoy.
I've been accused of being a cynic a time or two. In fact, I've accused myself of that more than once. It's not really true. I don't belong to the cynical camp. I'm actually an idealist, hard as it is to believe. A relevant quote from Flannery O'Connor, if you please, as it is one of my favorites:
"The writer who emphasizes spiritual values is very likely to take the darkest view of all of what he sees in this country today. For him, the fact that we are the most powerful and wealthiest nation in the world doesn't mean a thing in any positive sense. The sharper the light of faith, the more glaring are apt to be the distortions the writer sees in the life around him...My own feeling is that writers who see by the light of their Christian faith will have, in these times, the sharpest eyes for the grotesque, for the perverse, and for the unacceptable...The novelist with Christian concerns will find in modern life distortions which are repugnant to him, and his problem will be to make these appear as distortions to an audience which is used to seeing them as natural."
So if it sometimes seems like I'm a cynic, it's really a failing of the English language, that thing I studied so arduously (ha ha ha, really, I did study...sometimes) in college. I make fun of things not because I'm awful but because I'm not sure others see that they are awful. Maybe I overuse satire, but it worked for Jonathan Swift, and he was a lot smarter than me, so I'll follow his lead. In other words, I'm not a cynic...I'm a Christian, and one who fancies himself a writer.