Comments | baleanoptera: Whiney princes and Nora's belated departure

baleanoptera

Whiney princes and Nora's belated departure

Sep 21, 2006 16:47

In a recent discussion losyark refered to Hamlet as the whiney prince. After years of reading Hamlet she’d developed a certain allergy towards the brooding Dane. This got me thinking ( Read more... )

ramblings on culture

Comments 4

alexandral September 22 2006, 09:30:33 UTC

I totally agree with you! For example in Russia the "school" classics are Dostoevsky and Tolstoy. This IMHO spoils the taste for these great authors FOREVER for majority of people!. And anyway - what can an average 15 year old understand in "Anna Karenina"??????? Or 14 year old in "Evgeniy Onegin"?

baleanoptera September 22 2006, 15:54:59 UTC

Firstly - Pushkin love! I've read Onegin, but sadly only in English as my Russian is limited to saying "This is the black cat Murka" and "One ticket for the metro please."

But more seriously - it is so sad that the constant hammering on certain authors or artist, ends up destroying them. We actually had to read Ibsen's "Ghosts" three years in a row - from we were 14 to 17. I hated that play in the end, and only reluctantly reread it for an university class. Then I was surprised to discover I really liked it - and thereby proving your point that 15 year old's don't necessarily understand "Anna Karenina" or in my case "Ghosts".

But then comes the problem - how can we not teach them about the great classics? For it's a double edged sword really - they need to learn the classics, but if you repeat the classics to much they might end up hating them instead.

losyark February 11 2007, 16:14:37 UTC

You know, I totally forgot to comment on this one. I do in part blame the schools for things like this, but you can't blame them totally. One piece of art, one THING, has to be held up as the prime example of such-and-such and it wouldn't be so bad if you have to do it OVER and OVER ( ... )

baleanoptera February 13 2007, 12:59:59 UTC

A huge big WORD to "The School in Athens" - but then again Raphael was always my least favourite of the great Renaissance painters. ( I'm a Michealangelo girl all the way. He is amazing at everything he does, in addition to having a personal life that is really interesting. Hee.)

"Sienfeld" (SHUDDER)

Would this be the tv-show? Because I must admit I never like it. Then again I wasn't to crazy about Friends either.

Romeo and Juliet) (It wasn't even a damned tragedy!! It was a bunch of stupid mistakes happening all at once - a farce with a sad ending!)

*huge grin* This is so very, very true! And Juliet might be okay enough - but Romeo is a joke. What does she see in him?

And late replies are love! And thank you for all the lovely comments.