When my 6yr old spots a word he does not understand, he asks me what it means.  No context, just the word.  He then inserts my definition into the original sentence and tries to work it out.  Two actual examples:

<watching “Despicable Me”>  “Daddy, what does despicable mean?”
   “It means the bad guy.”
“So….The Bad Guy Me?”
   “Kind of.”

…

<wandering through Home Depot>  “Daddy, what does depot mean?”
   “Actually it’s the place where the train stops.”
“Oh, so Home Place Where The Train Stops?”

This is what I fear happens when students – particularly those that have already come into Shakespeare with that “I have no idea what this means and I never will” confusion – are given the text and a glossary and told to get started.   You point one at “Not a whit. We defy augury. There’s special providence in the fall of a sparrow…” and he pages and flips and goes back and forth and comes up with “Not a small amount. We defy interpretation of omens. There’s special protection of God in the fall of a sparrow.”

Is this helpful? Sure, he’s a little closer to understanding what’s going on.  And, remember, I’m not talking about the students who already get this stuff who are deliberately using the glossary to aid in their understanding.  I’m talking about the first timer who’s been handed a text with a glossary.

I don’t think that this method ever generates the “Aha!” moment you need, where you finally realize that Shakespeare’s not speaking in a different language and doesn’t need to be deciphered.  You need to step back from individually understanding it a word at a time and look at the big picture.  And then you end up with Hamlet saying to his friend, “Don’t worry about it!  I don’t pay attention to that superstitious nonsense.  God’s got a controlling hand in even the most trivial thing, like a dying bird.”

The “line by line translation into modern English” is hardly any better.  You’re just doing the work for them and saving the page flipping.  You destroy the poetry, and end up with text that makes little sense because it has none of the natural flow you started with.

Shakespeare is not something to be “decoded” like a foreign language.  You don’t swap out one phrase for another, repeatedly, and expect the new version to make sense, anymore than you can do that with English into French back into English.

(For fun, I took that last paragraph and “babelfished” it, piping it through Google’s English->French->Spanish->English translator, and got this:

Shakespeare is not something that is “decoded” as a foreign language. You do not have to re-word the other, on several occasions, and wait for the new version to make sense, nor can with English to French to English again.

I imagine that this is a little like what Shakespeare ends up sounding like to first timers relying too heavily on the glossary.  Sure, it kind of makes sense?  But it’s more awkward than necessary.)

This year’s Shakespeare Day Celebration is sponsored in part by Shakespeare Is Universal: Shakespeare truly is for everyone, and nothing demonstrates that sentiment better than his most famous quote of all, translated here into languages from around the world.   In celebration of Shakespeare’s birthday, show that you believe his works are just as relevant, powerful and important as they’ve ever been!

Been a long time since I posted a geeklet story.

I’m in the kitchen tallying up girl scout cookie money when my wife calls in from the other room, “What year did Elizabeth I ascend the throne?”  I realize that she has picked up one of the kids’ Shakespeare books and is quizzing me.

“Umm….” I say.  History was never my strong suit.  “Since Shakespeare was really young.  I’m going to guess 1560’s.”

“Wrong!” she tells me.  “1559.”

“I was close!” I call back, “I was within 10 years. That’s not bad.”

But then geeklet in the other room hears half the conversation and says, “What’s Mommy need, Daddy?”

“Mommy was just asking me when Elizabeth I became queen.”

So geeklet tells me, “1559.”

Very nice.

UPDATE – I’m told that the actual date is 1558.  Blame the book – the one that my wife was reading from is the one that my kids already read.

So tonight it’s bath night and I’m pouring water over my son’s head in the tub.  “Look, a double bubble!” he says.

Haven’t done one of these stories in a while.

Back in January, I told the story of working my kids (who are now 10, 8 and 6) through Julie Taymor’s Tempest on DVD.  Basically we’d do 10 minutes at a time, with me muting and pausing as appropriate, to explain what’s going on.

Well, we lost the momentum and it’s been awhile since I’ve popped that one back in.  Every now and then the kids would ask about it, but it’s one of those things you need to be in the mood for (which normally translates to “Just Daddy and the kids”, since my wife’s not a strong believer in using the minutes before bedtime as a teaching opportunity).

Well tonight the girls started cheerleading camp and it lasts an hour longer than the boy’s karate practice so we had some time to kill and in went The Tempest.  We start with the “Thou liest!” scene, as Ariel breaks up the jolly band of “pirates” Stefano, Trinculo and Caliban.

“Is that the guy who never stops talking?” my geeklet asks, as Stefano enters the scene.

“I suppose so,” I say to the unusual question, “He does talk a lot.”

Enter Trinculo.  “Is that the guy that doesn’t stop talking?” he asks again.

“Well, yeah, I suppose Trinculo talks more than Stefano…”

“But where is the white guy?”

“Who?”

“The white guy, the white guy who never stops talking.”

At this point Ariel’s spirit pops up behind Trinculo to yell, “Thou liest!” and I realize that in this interpretation, Ariel is entirely white.

“Oh, him?” I ask.  “Is that the white guy you’re talking about?”  I don’t really think of Ariel as never shutting up, but he’s clearly all white.  My geeklet does not seem satisfied.

Cut, a few minutes later, to king Alonso and his followers wandering around the island (and about to stumble across a magical banquet).  “There’s the white guy that never stops talking!” my son shouts, pointing at the screen.

At Gonzalo.  With his white hair. The guy who never stops talking.

My 6 year old son, having not seen this Shakespeare movie in over 6 months, remembers Gonzalo – a character arguably so minor that I’ve seen a production of this play where he was completely excised (and I wasn’t happy about it, I like him).

Wait, it gets better.

Cut to Prospera handing over Miranda to Ferdinand (and, luckily, I do not have to explain “virgin knot” to anybody).  My son asks, “Now, I know that she’s never seen another boy and that’s why she fell in love with him, but has the boy ever seen another girl? Then how come he fell in love with her?”

….ummm…..ahhh……is this really happening?  Is my 6 yr old jumping back into a lesson on one of Shakespeare’s lesser known plays right where we left off 6 months ago?

These were just two examples.  I was also quizzed on the nature of Ariel’s invisibility and whether he was *always* invisible (except to Prospera), or merely chose to be invisible most of the time.
I am well and truly blown away, I have to admit.  Is it possible that my kids are actually paying attention to this stuff?

I love nights like this.