SHAKESPEARE IS STUPID Options

[P.P.A.]

When I started scanning the D.H.E. World Guidance book three days ago I thought I could fill the time during the scans and between putting on the next page wisely by reading Shakespeare's Sonnets, one at a time. Expecting sweet poetry, I instead read what has got to be some of the least romantic and most offensive bit of writing I have ever read. Example, Sonnet № 6:

Then let not winter's raggèd hand deface
In thee thy summer ere thou be distilled.
Make sweet some vial; treasure thou some place
With beauty's treasure ere it be self-killed.
That use is not forbidden usury
Which happies those that pay the willing loan –
That's for thyself to breed another thee,
or ten times happier be it ten for one.
Ten times thyself were happier than thou art,
If ten of thine ten times refigured thee:
Then what could death do if thou shouldst depart,
Leaving thee living in posterity?
 Be not self-willed, for thou art much too fair
 To be death's conquest and make worms thine heir.

This is downright insulting! No matter how relatively beautiful (although even the wording is offensive sometimes) the language, the core messages conveyed—“I see you just a temporal vessel for your beauty.”, “You need to make lots of children with me so your beauty can outline you once you're old, wrinkly, and ugly and eventually die!”, “Your own, personal happiness doesn't really matter to me.”, “Did I mention we need to make kids?!”—are simply awful! The rest of (at least the first couple of) the Sonnets are pretty much the same, all revolving around wanting to have sex, and about condemning her for not making children before time catches up with her.
The only response I could think of to any of these would be a slap in the face and yelling at him for daring to address her informally with “thou”.

Romeo and Juliet was also rather unimpressive when I read it. At least Much Ado About Nothing was very entertaining, at least while Beatrice and Benedick were both still tsundere for each other.
I guess I'll withhold judgement until I've also read Hamlet and A Midsummer Night's Dream, although my first and second impressions could be much better already—I just hope he's not just as bad and overrated as Goethe.

This post has been edited by P.P.A.: Aug 23 2011, 06:05 PM

[Dr Strum]

Okay, maybe right now breeding isn't the romantic thing to do, but back in the fifteenth century it was very much in vogue. Shakespeare definitely wrote to his day, and cannot be judged by present standards.

[P.P.A.]

Well, that's one of the things I'm criticising—I doubt neither the tremendous influence he had on the English language, nor that he was apparently quite good at appealing to large audiences, but object to his depiction as a timeless genius.
 That said, even bearing in mind that the status of females in the Occident was at a low point in that era, these lines are just tremendously offensive. I might do ill to compare them to the minnesong of the Middle Ages (since courtly women played a much more important role then, actually being able to read and write and thus administer a realm unlike their men—usually too busy warring—, and since the works of that time were often composed in praise of ladies of much higher, unattainable status, or sometimes married, in relation to the writer) but even these pieces are finer and more respectful, not only flowery descriptions of the object's external beauty, but also of the subject's own feelings, relation, and devotion to her—whereas a lot of the Sonnets are really just “Let me fuck you!”, mated with elaborate depictions of decay and death.
 The comparison to how Beatrix started out in Much Ado About Nothing—a loud-mouthed, self-confident, and independent lady—also robs Shakespeare of his excuse of being simply a child of his time. He had apparently little trouble defying the contemporary standards and imagining and worthily depicting such a female character, so this relapse into complete respect- and tastelessness seems all the more bewildering.

[Raijinili]

line

breaks

[P.P.A.]

I finally got around to Hamlet, and how this thread shames me now. It was a packing read, proving lies my previous criticism about a certain dullness in character and plot of some of his other words. The pro- and antagonists had layers of depth, the plot was thrilling till the bitter end, and all of it was wrapped in the most beautiful and skilled (and rich in meaning—I don't even want to know how many more double-meanings are lost to someone living in the 20th century) incarnation of the English language I have seen to date. I apologise!

[Rhiannon]

I read parts of Romeo and Juliet and couldn't really get into it.

In the beginning of October I was having a mental breakdown and felt like going for a walk and buying The Tempest at some storeforreallyoldcheapcrap was a good idea. I thought it used some very beautiful language in early parts, and I thought Prospero was an asshole for not freeing Ariel right then and there. I also thought Ariel was a girl for a long time. It was sort of nice I guess? But it never was pretty again, and the story was kind of boring. Maybe I missed a bunch of things. Or maybe I just hate plays. Why did I think that was a good idea.

WELL AT LEAST I SORT OF LIKED IT? THE TEMPEST IS MY FAVORITE SHAKESPEARE THING UNTIL I GET AROUND TO ACTUALLY READING HAMLET I GUESS I CAN AT LEAST VOUCH FOR ONE OF THE FILM ADAPTIONS OF THAT BEING GOOD

... but then why would even want to read a play when I do not like plays and know there is a film version that is quality?

EDIT MAN YOU KNOW WHAT IT'S JERK ANYWAY. IF ARIEL'S A BOY THEN ONLY MIRANDA IS A GIRL AS FAR AS PEOPLE WHO MATTER AT ALL TO THE STOY GO. AND MIRANDA'S ONLY THERE TO LOOK VERY PRETTY AND GIVE PROSPERO AN EXCUSE TO YELL AT SOME NICE YOUNG MAN.

[Dr Strum]

I´ve been wanting to read some Shakespeare lately. Really wanting to reread Macbeth. It´s just hard to find on the road.