At my other site, Diego found an old post of mine entitled, Iambic Pentameter – What Is It? He asked a good question. He’s wondering if anybody has a good source on tape that teaches you what iambic pentameter sounds like. I figure somebody here might know. Anybody? I don’t know of specific lessons, per se, but I have to assume that somebody out there has an audio sample of how iambic pentameter is supposed to be spoken.
Year: 2007
Shakespeare Ink
While doing the grocery shopping today I saw a man with an interesting tattoo. It was text that scrolled its way around his forearm. As I passed him I caught “To dream” out of the corner of my eye and thought, “No, wait….” and looked again. Sure enough, what it said was “To die, to sleep, perchance to dream” and I’m not sure how much more — there was more text but I couldn’t read it all. “Is that Hamlet tattooed on your arm?” I asked him. “Yeah,” he said. “Nice,” I told him. “I spotted that right away.” “Good deal,” said he. Walking away, he seemed pleased that somebody had noticed it. Not too talkative, we guys.
Antique Shakespeare Photographs
No, not of Shakespeare himself, but Cleveland University Library has made available some 400+ photographs of Shakespearean performances dating back to 1870. Make sure to click on the good ones to get the full caption, as well as details on the performance, and information about the collection from which it came.
Oh Great, The "Filthy Shakespeare" Movement Is Back
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2007/09/25/entertainment/e122915D48.DTLThere’s been a book around for something like 50 years called “Shakespeare’s Bawdy” that serves as a dictionary for all the dirty words and puns that Shakespeare used. I have it, it’s a very dry read. But people seem fascinated with this idea of finding the dirty words, and it seems like every now and then somebody does a new project that somehow finds even more bad words. Or perhaps they’re just phrasing it differently, to keep up with the times.In the new book “Filthy Shakespeare: Shakespeare’s Most Outrageous Sexual Puns” we’re going to learn that “something is rotten in the state of Denmark” really meant “Claudius has syphilis.” And that the real meaning of “Hey nonny, nonny hey nonny” would make our old English teacher Mrs Grundy roll over in her grave.
How To Write Your Own E-Book in Seven Days!
The very great irony of books and articles like this is how they titter and say “Yes, but what about the F word? Do you discuss the F word?” It’s an article about a book about what amounts to 400yr old literary obscenity. The joke is “The world’s greatest dramatist is being downright filthy right in front of you and you proclaim it a masterpiece”, and in trying to make that reference, we’re afraid to use our own dirty words. We’re fascinated by the ones he used because we’re so busy taking words out of our own language. It’s still impossible for somebody to look you in the eye today and explain what Hamlet meant by “country matters.” By the way, can somebody please explain the Love’s Labor’s Lost reference in the article? It says “the modern version [of the provided quote] is impolite and you wouldn’t read it to a bench of bishops.” But it doesn’t explain why, and I don’t see any obvious puns, unless of course it’s as easy as “dance” being a euphemism for, you know, that dreaded f-word. Although now that I look at it I am assuming that “needless” has to be some sort of phallic joke? Does that make Barbing (barb, thorn, something to stab with) a sex reference as well? It’s funny how paranoid you get, you can find a sex reference in everything.More Filthy Shakespeare …
Greater Shakespeare Railway Map
http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/music/rscmap1072.jpg Cute idea, breaking down all the major Shakespearean characters on various rail lines like “lovers”, “warriors”, “mothers” and so on. Bonus credit for the little icons, like having the sign for “Restaurant” over Titus. 🙂 Update: Some more links on the background history of the map:
http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/theatre/2007/09/all_the_stages_a_world.html http://www.britishtheatreguide.info/news/RSCshakesmap.htm http://arts.guardian.co.uk/theatre/news/story/0,,2177000,00.html The map is part of a branding campaign for the RSC and we’ll soon see it on t-shirts, mugs, bags and so on.