Pater Familias » Shakespeare

DID SHAKESPEARE KNOW THE WRITINGS OF HEGEL, MARX, NIETZSCHE, FREUD, WITTGENSTEIN AND DERRIDA?

Philip — Sun, 22 Apr 2012 01:14:23 +0000

DID SHAKESPEARE KNOW THE WRITINGS OF HEGEL, MARX, NIETZSCHE, FREUD, WITTGENSTEIN AND DERRIDA? Graham Holderness has a review in the Times Literary Supplement (April 20) of SHAKESPEARE AND LITERARY THEORY by Jonathan Gil Harris. The book has chapters for the major developments in literary theory in the last 20 years (“formalism, structuralism and deconstruction;…Marxism, …and postcolonial theory”). Holderness and Harris highlight the role of Shakespeare as inspiring the literary theory. Rather than theory interpreting Shakespeare’s plays, Shakespeare gives rise to modern theory. Holderness quotes Harris: “Literary theory is less an external set of ideas imposed on Shakespeare’s texts than a mode… of critical reflection inspired by, and emerging from, his writing.” Holderness and Harris both quote Terry Eagleton: “it is difficult to read Shakespeare without feeling that he was almost certainly familiar with the writings of Hegel, Marx, Nietszche, Freud, Wittgenstein and Derrida.”

OLIVIER’S INSIGHT ON IAGO’S MOTIVATION.

Philip — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 01:32:15 +0000

OLIVIER’S INSIGHT ON IAGO’S MOTIVATION. I can’t find it using Google, but long ago I read an interview with Olivier about Iago’s motivation. Olivier said that when he was young, he had trouble playing Iago because he could not understand Iago’s motivation. Then he had an insight during his service in World War II. Another man got an assignment that Olivier had coveted, and Olivier found himself consumed by rage against the person who had beaten him out. He then realized that the primary motive that Shakespeare ascribes to Iago was plausible, and said that he never had a problem with understanding Iago thereafter.

IAGO AS A SEDUCER.

Philip — Tue, 27 Mar 2012 02:31:45 +0000

IAGO AS A SEDUCER. The digital view of Othello also raises the possibility that Iago can be played as literally an attempted seducer with a homosexual attachment to Othello. The wikipedia article on Iago says that some critics thought that Kenneth Branagh played Iago as homosexual. Branagh’s response was that: “I had no consciousness of doing that at all, but I did play as though he loved Othello. But I don’t mean in a sexual sense.” And this review by Christopher Bray of terry Coleman’s biography OLIVIER retells a theater story: “Researching the part of Iago, Olivier had a chat with Freud’s biographer, Dr Ernest Jones, who told him he was playing a homosexual. At the next rehearsal, Olivier surprised Ralph Richardson’s Othello by kissing him on the lips.”

IAGO AS A COURTIER.

Philip — Tue, 27 Mar 2012 01:30:51 +0000

IAGO AS A COURTIER. The digital analysis of Othello that sees Iago’s dealings with Othello as “like the language of courtship but it’s really a perverse seduction of Othello by his lieutenant” has two aspects. That Iago is Othello’s lieutenant recalls plays where a subordinate manipulates and comments on his master. Courtiers deploy the skills of a courtier—flattery and gossip, and theater often mocks them or their masters. This wikipedia article on Iago says that the role is thought to have been created by Robert Armin who specialized in playing intelligent clowns and created the roles of Touchstone, Feste, and the Fool in Lear.

“THE JOKER IN THE PACK”.

Philip — Sun, 25 Mar 2012 17:13:23 +0000

“THE JOKER IN THE PACK”. Before the age of digital analysis, W.H. Auden had a view of the comic mechanisms which underlie the tragedy of Othello. In THE DYER’S HAND, he called Iago “The Joker in the Pack.” Auden acknowledges that one can’t call Othello a comedy, but that if it is a tragedy, “it is tragic in a peculiar way.” Auden recognizes how Iago is like a comic figure, with the difference that his goals are evil. He says: “When we first see Iago and Roderigo together, the situation is like that in a Ben Jonson comedy—a clever rascal is gulling a rich fool…” But, Auden observes, Iago’s goal is Roderigo’s moral corruption. Auden concludes that: “What Shakespeare gives us in Iago is a portrait of a practical joker of a peculiarly appalling kind….”

OTHELLO’S COMIC FOUNDATION.

Philip — Sun, 25 Mar 2012 01:39:28 +0000

OTHELLO’S COMIC FOUNDATION. Joel Henning reports in the Wall Street Journal (March 22) on his interview with Michael Witmore, the director of the Folger Shakespeare Library, who is a leader in the “data mining of Shakespeare”. One recent analysis by Jonathan Hope found that Shakespeare’s vocabulary and syntax “vary significantly among his comedies, historical plays and tragedies.” Witmore has found from his digitizing analysis that “…in linguistic terms, Othello uses some of the dance steps of Shakespeare’s comedies. We have an intense dialogue between Othello and Iago dancing around a subject, like the language of courtship but it’s really a perverse seduction of Othello by his lieutenant.” Witmore sees the play as a tragedy built on a comic foundation.

THE GREAT VOWEL SHIFT—CHAUCER’S PRONUNCIATION.

Philip — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 17:16:20 +0000

THE GREAT VOWEL SHIFT—CHAUCER’S PRONUNCIATION. Being a part of the Northern Cities Vowel Shift has a romance for me because it is reminiscent of the Great Vowel Shift which separates Chaucer’s pronunciation from ours. This wikipedia article describes the Great Vowel Shift, which took place between the 1100′s and the 1700′s, with the main change being in the 1400′s and early 1500′s. The main effect was in the pronunciation of long vowels. “Prior to the Great Vowel Shift, these vowels had “continental” values much like those remaining in Italian and liturgical Latin.” If you have heard the beginning of the Canterbury Tales with the equivalent of “showers” being pronounced with a vowel sound like that in the current word “boot”, you will get an idea of the changes. This article on Chaucer gives another example: the “Middle English “long e” in Chaucer’s “sheep” had the value of Latin “e” (and sounded like Modern English “shape”). The shift came from changes in the position of the tongue in the mouth when the words were spoken. The wikipedia article says:”The exact causes of the [Great Vowel Shift] are continuing mysteries in linguistics and cultural history.” The same is true for the Northern Cities Vowel Shift that is in progress today.

SHAKESPEARE AND ULYSSES GRANT.

Philip — Sun, 26 Feb 2012 21:12:30 +0000

SHAKESPEARE AND ULYSSES GRANT. Ta-Nehisi Coates says that the manuscript evidence that Grant wrote his memoirs means a lot to him. He says: “The beautiful thing about writing is it has no real respect for credentialism.” “Credentialism” is a good name for the belief that great writing can only be done by certain classes of people. Of course, I apply the term to the false claim that a commoner like Shakespeare could not have written Shakespeare’s plays—a view that I have argued against in one post after another (for example, here). Coates concludes eloquently: “But the fact that the best writing of the Civil War came from a frontiersman like Lincoln and middling West Point student like Grant is powerful. We should let it be true.”

SHAKESPEARE’S EDUCATION (COMMENT).

Philip — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 21:05:40 +0000

SHAKESPEARE’S EDUCATION (COMMENT). When I questioned the claim that a commoner could not have written Shakespeare’s plays in this post, Nick commented: “I wish I knew more about education that could be available at the time.” Simon Schama, in this critical review of Anonymous (“idiotic misunderstanding of history and the world of the theater”), describes Shakespeare’s education: “By the time he was 13 or so, Shakespeare would have read (in Latin) works by Terence, Plautus, Virgil, Erasmus, Cicero, and probably Plutarch and Livy too.” I quoted Victoria Kahn here on the rhetorical education of the Renaissance grammar school which “produced the great flowering of English literature” that included the works of Shakespeare, Donne and Milton. Shakespeare would have had a very good education in school.

I also think that the genius who wrote the plays could have picked up the learning he needed on his own.

ANONYMOUS—ONLY ARISTOCRATS CAN CREATE LITERATURE.

Philip — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 21:05:21 +0000

ANONYMOUS—ONLY ARISTOCRATS CAN CREATE LITERATURE. We saw the new movie Anonymous at the New Yorker festival about a month ago. After the screening, there was a discussion with the scholar James Shapiro and the director of the movie. Shapiro’s criticism of the movie was devastating. The movie is opening this week, and the advance reviews have been scathing. The movie relies on contempt for commoners as evidence that William Shakespeare could not have been the author of the plays. Shakespeare is portrayed as a buffoon. The movie has a difficult argument to make because Oxford died before a number of Shakespeare’s plays were performed. However, once you accept that Queen Elizabeth was the mother of the Earl of Oxford and later became the Earl of Oxford’s lover, it all follows….

ON COPIA—IS THIS HOW SHAKESPEARE, DONNE AND MILTON LEARNED TO WRITE?

Philip — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 22:49:23 +0000

ON COPIA—IS THIS HOW SHAKESPEARE, DONNE AND MILTON LEARNED TO WRITE? I posted here about Stanley Fish’s book HOW TO WRITE A SENTENCE which show students and others how to model good sentences on good sentences from great writers. Victoria Kahn in the Times Literary Supplement (September 9) writes about the rhetorical education of the Renaissance grammar school which “produced the great flowering of English literature” that included the works of Shakespeare, Donne and Milton. The grammar school education was devoted to what Erasmus called “copia”—”rhetorically pleasing persuasive and fluent writing on all variety of subjects.” Victoria Kahn cites “Erasmus’s manual, On Copia, [which] includes hundreds of ways of saying ‘I was so happy to receive your letter’….” Hundreds of variants. Posting on this blog often reminds me of how stilted my sentence choices are. Victoria Kahn suggests writing ten different versions of Erasmus’s sentence, and I can see the value in the exercise.

IS SHAKESPEARE UNIVERSAL? —THE CASE OF FRANCE.

Philip — Sat, 01 Oct 2011 02:53:37 +0000

IS SHAKESPEARE UNIVERSAL?—THE CASE OF FRANCE. I think of Shakespeare as universal—admired in all cultures. Here is a review (by Lenard R. Berlanstein) of a book by John Pemble, SHAKESPEARE GOES TO PARIS: HOW THE BARD CONQUERED PARIS, which argues that the French had a great deal of trouble acknowledging Shakespeare’s greatness. Shakespeare was not translated into French until 1746, over 100 years after he died. Pemble says that Shakespeare was “crucial to the long and painful adjustment of French consciousness to a world in which France and the French were no longer paramount.” Victor Hugo was a supporter of Shakespeare, but Shakespeare’s work was considered excessive and not in good taste. Voltaire referred to Shakespeare’s “pearls… in this enormous dung heap.” In 1947 Jean-Louis Barrault is quoted as saying: “Opinions have not changed since Voltaire. In the name of taste, Shakespeare is reproached for triviality; in the name of rules, for long-windedness and implausibility.”