Do you like Shakespeare? (2 Viewers)

[tenordas]

Marlowe, he was a well-liked, well-known, respected and highly literate author, playwright who introduced a young William Shakespeare to the crude, often dirty but fresh and thriving late Elizabethan 16th century London stage scene. A lot of the actors(actresses werent allowed to be played on-stage until Queen Elizabeth I's time)/actresses that became famous later on in Shakespeare's plays, at the Globe Theater. He also was and has been seen and viewed as a menacing, shadowy figure with an interest in the occult, black magic, very, very anti-clerical in his religious views, much more radical in his views on politics, religion and philosophy as well as expressing his themes, concepts in his works. His biggest, most well-known novel was Faust, but without Christopher Marlowe, more then likely, a young, provincial lad like William Shakespear (his actual real name) would've gotten lost, bewildered, and eventually wouldve given up his artistic protentions and gone back home to live a more simpler life. Marlowe helped create William Shakespeare and develop his career at the very crucial, initial stages.

British historians, to this day, aren't exactly sure on the circumstances, series or chronology of events or people involved that led to Marlowe's death or IMHO, murder because he was murdered. He had some powerful friends and equally powerful enemies, could have been one of Walsingham's fiends or spies working in concert with Elizabeth I's coutriers? Or perhaps he was assassinated by someone connected to a powerful English Catholic Lord or family?

Agreed, and I would go on to say that if he hadn't been murdered, Marlowe might have become the more famous playwright over history. The international influence that "The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus" had alone makes him nearly as influential as Shakespeare already.

His first play "Tamburlaine the Great" was enormously popular and so influential that it established the writing style for that period of history. It was Ben Johnson who noted that it was Marlowe who established blank verse as the staple of Elizabethan dramatic writing that both Johnson and Shakespeare used with such success. Marlowe wrote a sequel to "Tamburlaine" as well as Faustus, "Dido, Queen of Carthage," "Edward II," and "The Massacre at Paris" (also "The Tragedy of the Rich Jew of Malta," but that was never performed nor even published until 40 years after his death) in only six years, stopped short by his murder. Imagine how much more his influence and international fame would have been if he'd had the same number of years to keep writing as Shakespeare had.

 

[Optimus Prime]

I laughed way too hard at this

https://va.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_rm2jsqzS4M1zxbuns_720.mp4

 

[Optimus Prime]

“It’s a funny thing,” admits Elizabeth Winkler. “I don’t really like controversy. I don’t seek it out. There are some people that thrive on it and I don’t. I find it upsetting and distressing to see my work and my ideas misrepresented and twisted. It’s not fun. But you study the history of the subject, you know that’s how it goes.”

The subject in question is perhaps the final blasphemy of British culture: the theory that William Shakespeare of Stratford-upon-Avon might not have written Hamlet, Macbeth, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and other plays and poems that bear his name.

The doubters point to Shakespeare’s lack of higher education and aristocratic background and the scarcity of personal documents and literary evidence directly linking him to the works. Some suggest candidates such as Francis Bacon, Christopher Marlowe or Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford, as potential authors of Shakespeare’s plays.

It would of course have been the hoax of the millennium: no need to fake a moon landing. The theory remains decidedly fringe, outside the mainstream academic consensus and, as Winkler puts it, “not permitted”. In her book, Shakespeare Was a Woman and Other Heresies, she writes that “it has become the most horrible, vexed, unspeakable subject in the history of English literature.

“In literary circles, even the phrase ‘Shakespeare authorship question’ elicits contempt – eye-rolling, name-calling, mudslinging. If you raise it casually in a social setting, someone might chastise you as though you’ve uttered a deeply offensive profanity. Someone else might get up and leave the room. Tears may be shed. A whip may be produced. You will be punished, which is to say, educated. Because it is obscene to suggest that the god of English literature might be a false god. It is heresy.”…….

‘It was shocking’: the author under attack for doubting Shakespeare

Elizabeth Winkler’s controversial new book Shakespeare Was a Woman and Other Heresies investigates highly fraught theories around the beloved playwright

www.theguardian.com

 

[Optimus Prime]

What a great thread! Love the OP and had that same Eureka moment with Shakespeare myself while reading Anthony's tribute to the dead Caesar

My Eureka moment was wrong.

I misinterpreted everything

The play I thought I read was great but was nothing like what Shakespeare wrote. Not even close

 

[Sun Wukong]

“It’s a funny thing,” admits Elizabeth Winkler. “I don’t really like controversy. I don’t seek it out. There are some people that thrive on it and I don’t. I find it upsetting and distressing to see my work and my ideas misrepresented and twisted. It’s not fun. But you study the history of the subject, you know that’s how it goes.”

The subject in question is perhaps the final blasphemy of British culture: the theory that William Shakespeare of Stratford-upon-Avon might not have written Hamlet, Macbeth, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and other plays and poems that bear his name.

The doubters point to Shakespeare’s lack of higher education and aristocratic background and the scarcity of personal documents and literary evidence directly linking him to the works. Some suggest candidates such as Francis Bacon, Christopher Marlowe or Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford, as potential authors of Shakespeare’s plays.

It would of course have been the hoax of the millennium: no need to fake a moon landing. The theory remains decidedly fringe, outside the mainstream academic consensus and, as Winkler puts it, “not permitted”. In her book, Shakespeare Was a Woman and Other Heresies, she writes that “it has become the most horrible, vexed, unspeakable subject in the history of English literature.

“In literary circles, even the phrase ‘Shakespeare authorship question’ elicits contempt – eye-rolling, name-calling, mudslinging. If you raise it casually in a social setting, someone might chastise you as though you’ve uttered a deeply offensive profanity. Someone else might get up and leave the room. Tears may be shed. A whip may be produced. You will be punished, which is to say, educated. Because it is obscene to suggest that the god of English literature might be a false god. It is heresy.”…….

‘It was shocking’: the author under attack for doubting Shakespeare

Elizabeth Winkler’s controversial new book Shakespeare Was a Woman and Other Heresies investigates highly fraught theories around the beloved playwright

www.theguardian.com

God, what a crybaby. "I'm putting forth fringe theories with no meaningful evidence to support them and nobody in serious scholarship circles wants to bother with it." Cry more.

 

[guidomerkinsrules]

“It’s a funny thing,” admits Elizabeth Winkler. “I don’t really like controversy. I don’t seek it out. There are some people that thrive on it and I don’t. I find it upsetting and distressing to see my work and my ideas misrepresented and twisted. It’s not fun. But you study the history of the subject, you know that’s how it goes.”

The subject in question is perhaps the final blasphemy of British culture: the theory that William Shakespeare of Stratford-upon-Avon might not have written Hamlet, Macbeth, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and other plays and poems that bear his name.

The doubters point to Shakespeare’s lack of higher education and aristocratic background and the scarcity of personal documents and literary evidence directly linking him to the works. Some suggest candidates such as Francis Bacon, Christopher Marlowe or Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford, as potential authors of Shakespeare’s plays.

It would of course have been the hoax of the millennium: no need to fake a moon landing. The theory remains decidedly fringe, outside the mainstream academic consensus and, as Winkler puts it, “not permitted”. In her book, Shakespeare Was a Woman and Other Heresies, she writes that “it has become the most horrible, vexed, unspeakable subject in the history of English literature.

“In literary circles, even the phrase ‘Shakespeare authorship question’ elicits contempt – eye-rolling, name-calling, mudslinging. If you raise it casually in a social setting, someone might chastise you as though you’ve uttered a deeply offensive profanity. Someone else might get up and leave the room. Tears may be shed. A whip may be produced. You will be punished, which is to say, educated. Because it is obscene to suggest that the god of English literature might be a false god. It is heresy.”…….

‘It was shocking’: the author under attack for doubting Shakespeare

Elizabeth Winkler’s controversial new book Shakespeare Was a Woman and Other Heresies investigates highly fraught theories around the beloved playwright

www.theguardian.com

 

[limeyjohn]

I was born and raised in Warwickshire, not far from Stratford Upon Avon at all
At school most of my mates hated him, personally l liked his takes on human nature, though he did tend to use 20 words when 5 would have been plenty
Just find it so cool that a lot of his quotes are still in use today

 

[guidomerkinsrules]

God, what a crybaby. "I'm putting forth fringe theories with no meaningful evidence to support them and nobody in serious scholarship circles wants to bother with it." Cry more.

Yeah I listened to the pod - I imagine her book goes into more detail, but essentially she was offering up a thought piece without much detail aside from ‘isn’t it interesting that…’
She did makes passing references to Shakespeare as a secular god and I wish she would have pursued that more
Way more meat in that bone than ‘who wrote these 500 year old plays?’

 

[Optimus Prime]

English teachers in Hillsborough County are preparing lessons for the new school year with only excerpts from William Shakespeare’s works.

Students will be assigned pages from the classics, which might include “Macbeth,” “Hamlet” and the time-honored teen favorite, “Romeo and Juliet.” But if they want to read them in their entirety, they will likely have to do it on their own time.

School district officials said they redesigned their instructional guides for teachers because of revised state teaching standards and a new set of state exams that cover a vast array of books and writing styles.

“It was also in consideration of the law,” said school district spokeswoman Tanya Arja, referring to the newly expanded Parental Rights in Education Act. The measure, promoted and signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis, tells schools to steer clear of content and class discussion that is sexual in nature unless it is related to a standard, such as health class.

“There’s some raunchiness in Shakespeare,” said Joseph Cool, a reading teacher at Gaither High School. “Because that’s what sold tickets during his time.”

In staying with excerpts, the schools can teach about Shakespeare while avoiding anything racy or sexual.

As the district explained the situation, English classes in the past would require students to read two complete novels or plays, one in the fall and one in the spring.

The new Benchmarks for Excellent Student Thinking include lists of books that might be included on the state competency exam. To give students a better chance of mastering the material, the district switched to one novel and excerpts from five to seven different books, including plays.

“We need to make sure our students are prepared with enough material during the year so they will be prepared for their assessments,” Arja said. That includes a variety of writing styles and time periods.

There are ways that students can read these works in their entirety, district officials said. If a student can obtain a copy of one of the books or plays, perhaps with the help of their parents, they can do so.

But teachers are advised, during class lessons, to stay with the approved guidelines, which call for excerpts. If not, in extreme circumstances, they might have to defend themselves against a parent complaint or a disciplinary case at their school............

Hillsborough schools cut back on Shakespeare, citing new Florida rules

The decision is aimed at better performance on state tests and avoiding sexual content found in some of the Bard’s work.

www.tampabay.com

 

[Optimus Prime]

 

[guidomerkinsrules]

How else are you going to turn a threes company episode into a 3 hr play?

 

[Optimus Prime]

 

[guidomerkinsrules]

Interestingly (to me at least) I am directing’The Dream’ which is essentially Midsummer’s with the device of putting The Lovers in high school
I hadn’t thought of the burrito thing
Consider it thought

 

[staphory]

Ok, I understand that I am late to this party.
I don’t dislike Shakespeare but I don’t understand what kids are supposed to be learning here. The only lesson I see is that when it comes to plays, movies, and tv shows, none of it is really new.
What am I missing?

 

[Madmarsha]

Not really but maybe I'll go to the Globe Theatre next week since the musical I really wanted to see isn't playing on the West End.

Narrator: She didn't.

I tell ya, though, his wife has had a good long run and even became Princess of Genovia.