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More thoughts on Romeo & Juliet, Midsummer Night's Dream, and King John
Well, it's been a couple of months, but I haven't given up on Shakespeare! I did, however, lose my Kindle, on which I did all my Shakespeare reading. As mentioned earlier, I read the footnoted versions of Shakespeare, with the main text on my Kindle and the footnotes in the Kindle app on my phone. So, losing the Kindle threw a real wrench into that ( Read more... ) -
Wellington museums to visit
My entertainment project for this winter, once it gets cold enough that I don't feel like spending as much time outdoors, is to visit every museum in Wellington. Specifically, I want to visit all the boring and/or obscure museums, but since I can't think of a good cutoff level of boringness, I'm just going to visit them all and then rate them in ( Read more... ) -
Shakespeares 6, 7, and 8: Romeo & Juliet, Midsummer Night's Dream, and Life & Death of King John
I've really fallen behind on writing up my reactions to the plays! And I won't be catching up right now. But I have still been reading them, at least. Since the last update I've finished "Romeo and Juliet" and "A Midsummer Night's Dream", and started on the histories beginning with "The Life and Death of King John".
In brief, Romeo & Juliet was ( Read more... ) -
Why is Shakespeare hard to read?
Yesterday I finished Romeo & Juliet, and I'm thinking about what I'll write about that play. But in the meantime, I thought I'd write about a topic I often think about while pondering Shakespeare. That's the fact that Shakespeare is hard to read, and the reasons why. Three of the big ones are Shakespeare's usage of words that are now obsolete, his ( Read more... ) -
Shakespeare 5, Love's Labour's Lost
On to "Love's Labour's Lost", the fifth play in my reading order, though probably the 10th in chronological order ( since I'm reading the histories in historical order). What you need to know about Love's Labour's Lost in a nutshell is this: it's a very funny, very light comedy, with an abrupt cliffhanger ending. And, the follow-up to that ( Read more... ) -
Shakespeare 4, The Comedy of Errors
Shakespeare's shortest play, "The Comedy of Errors" is like a modern-day sitcom setup. I really enjoyed this one, but I guess that's not news because I've really enjoyed every Shakespeare play so far.
Thus far, I was proceeding on the belief that Shakespeare was spoiler-proof, i.e. that the plays would be just as enjoyable if I knew the plot outline ( Read more... ) -
Shakespeare 3, Titus Andronicus
Skipping the Henry VI's for now, it's on to "Titus Andronicus", Shakespeare's earliest tragedy and somewhat notorious for being his least liked play. People familiar with the comedic "The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged)" will remember it as the play where someone's head gets baked into a pie.
It was popular in Shakespeare's own time ( Read more... ) -
Play 2: The Taming of the Shrew
This is one of those top 10 Shakespeare plays that everyone has heard of, isn't it? But somehow I'd never gotten around to reading it. I guess that's why I embarked on this resolution in the first place, though.
( More exciting Shakespeare reactions after the cut! )
