I don’t often get to post random, drive-by Shakespeare stories that involve my oldest, now that she’s in middle school and her knowledge of subjects has shifted from “People would be surprised to hear us talking about this” to “You understand what I’m saying and can have a conversation with me about it.”

So instead I get stuff like this:

Geeklet : “Tomorrow I need ten bucks for school.”

Me:  “Why?”

Geeklet : “It’s book fair and there’s a Shakespeare book I want.”

Me : “Oh?  Which one?”  I’m already assuming that it’s one we’ve talked about.

Geeklet : “Not Shakespeare Stealer
or That Shakespeare Kid
. A different one.  Something about a girl named Shakespeare or something like that.”

Me : “The Total Tragedy of a Girl Named Hamlet?
“

Geeklet : “That’s it!”

Me : “Yup, I know that one.  Haven’t read it yet, but I’ve talked about it with people. I hear it’s … ok.”

Geeklet : “Well, I want it.”

She got the book and loves it, by the way.  I’ll have to add it to my list to read and review when she’s done.

How excited would *you* get when the headline “Branagh hints at Shakespeare with Hiddleston” pops up in your newsfeeds?  Instaclick!

“…he also found time to tell us that he’d love to direct Tom Hiddleston as Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing.”

Wait….really?  Is Branagh going down the “reboot” path on his already well-respected, star-studded 1993 version?

Or could it have something to do with the fact that another director of superheroes (Kenneth Branagh did Thor,  Joss Whedon did the Avengers) just had a more recent, also very well regarded version?

The funny thing is that they’ve now both directed Tom Hiddleston as Loki.  I have this vision of them both having him by one arm and pulling in opposite directions screaming “Mine!”) until he splits down the middle.

“Hey Kenneth, did you hear that Joss got the Avengers gig?  So he gets to direct Thor this time.”


    “Yeah, well, fine, I’ve still got the whole Shakespeare thing.”


“Well, yeah, about that….”


How funny would it be if Branagh couldn’t get Hiddleston because Tom had already signed on for Joss’ next project, a full-text Hamlet?

I always love it when a judge quotes Shakespeare at a criminal.  I imagine the defendant (and quite possibly most of the courtroom) getting this confused sort of “Huh?” look and requiring it be explained to them.

The quote:

“He’s here in double trust,” quoted the judge. ‘First, as I am his kinsman and his subject, strong both against the deed: then, as his host, who should against his murderer shut the door, not bear the knife himself.”

Macbeth, of course. The story of a man who invites the king to his house, and then rather than protecting him, kills him.

The crime:

Ontario Court Justice Gilles Renaud remarked that Marcel Bouchard had the trust of a 64-year-old neighbour who looked to him for protection but violated that trust when he sexually assaulted her after taking her on a birthday date to a Swiss Chalet restaurant.

Not quite the same scale, I suppose. But then again Shakespeare didn’t give us many examples of the latter (except maybe Two Gents?)

“Shakespeare Puppies Appeal bags some cash,” the headline read.  Now what am I supposed to do with that?

Turns out to be a fundraiser for a project that, are you ready for this, “aims to provide 25 guide dogs, each of which will be named after a Shakespeare character.” They’ve already started with Juliet and hope to follow with Hamlet, Titus, Troilus, Othello…

On the one hand I love this idea.  Whenever the task of naming something comes up, I always start with “Can I name it from Shakespeare?”  (Remind me to tell you a funny story about that later in this post.)  So I love the idea of dogs named for Shakespeare.  I’m usually outvoted in my own personal life, otherwise I’d be surrounded by such things.

But…doesn’t the ultimate owner of a guide dog get to name it?  Maybe I don’t understand, but that seems unusual.  When we got our dog we didn’t ask what her name already was. We named her.

And how about the choices they rattled off in the article?  How about adoption day for the poor guy that gets Troilus?  “I can’t wait, this is so cool, I love the idea that my dog is going to be named from Shakespeare, maybe I’ll get Iago or Hamlet or Brutus…..wha….who the heck is Troilus?”

(*) When you install new Unix machines on a network you have to give them a name. Sometimes there is already a naming scheme in place, sometimes you get to start one.  This was a new team with all new computers, and I had two to install which I named Macbeth and Macduff.  As new machines came up I continued naming from Shakespeare – Lear, Othello, Hamlet, Iago…  Well eventually we hired dedicated IT people to do this, and the chief IT guy who had a sense of humor on him decided that the original naming scheme was actually “mac-” words.  So he began naming machines “macncheese”, “macgruff”, “macfly”, “macjagger” and so on (yes, he was playing fast and loose with the mac/mc thing).  Then another IT guy got in on the act decided that “macfly” was really supposed to be “80’s movie catch phrases” and named a machine “bueller”.  I wish I could remember all the different directions it spun from there.

Steve Jobs may no longer be with us, but this new Apple commercial had my jaw on the floor for every word, before I even knew what it was a commercial for:

I heard Robin Williams say, “We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race,” and thought, “Well holy sh*t that’s going on the blog.” Ask me again why Shakespeare is relevant. Go on, ask me. Because I know what my answer is going to be.

We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman, “O me! O life!… of the questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the faithless… of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid these, O me, O life?” Answer. That you are here – that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. What will your verse be?