Perhaps the most famous image in drama is Hamlet contemplating Yorick's skull (another contender would be the balcony scene in Romeo and Juliet), at which point he closes his conversation with the jester's memory by saying: "Now get you to my lady's chamber, and tell her, let her paint an inch thick, to this favour she must come. Make her laugh at that." The concision and directness of the final sentence is truly remarkable, and certainly part of the reason for the scene's renown. There is a scene that is of a similar nature in King Lear, where Lear, in the storm, confronted by Edgar in his disguise as the madman, Poor Tom, says the following:

Why, thou wert better in thy grave than to answer with thy

uncover'd body this extremity of the skies. Is man no more than

this? Consider him well. Thou ow'st the worm no silk, the beast

no hide, the sheep no wool, the cat no perfume. Ha! Here's three

on's are sophisticated! Thou art the thing itself; unaccommodated

man is no more but such a poor, bare, forked animal as thou art.

Off, off, you lendings! Come, unbutton here.

The entire passage is of great interest, but the line that I'm thinking of in this context is: "Thou art the thing itself", which rivals the above example from Hamlet in terms of briefness and power. In another sense though, the protagonists are looking in quite different directions. Hamlet's epiphany (like several of his others) concerns the all-conquering power of death, whereas Lear's is a realization about human life, and how much of it he has missed.

Here are two interesting thoughts on the ending of King Lear: Fintan O'Toole in Shakespeare Is Hard But So Is Life (2002), writes that the ending, and more specifically the "gratuitous" death of Cordelia is meant to show that if there is no justice in a society, then what does it matter if there is a happy ending to a story about a bunch of powerful people? Marjorie Garber, in Shakespeare After All (2004) points to the idea that drama and its rituals have often been used for purposes other than aesthetic ones, and that one of these is to help prevent errors in judgement, like the ones made by Lear, that can have catastrophic results. Thus literature can (and should) have an "ameliorative" and perhaps "educative" purpose that helps in "warding off danger".

I strongly agree with both of these points, and the thought that I would add to them is this: I think the setting of the play is very important, and that it is meant to show a world without many of the concepts and institutions that we take for granted - and that it is also meant to make us consider the reasons why such things as philosophy, art and education were created. So yes, the ending of the play is a most tragic one, but in my opinion it's intended effect is not nihilistic, but rather deeply moral. It presents life unadorned to its audience and asks, "What are you going to do about it?"

The ending of King Lear, and particularly the death of Cordelia, is still a controversial one. It is so dark, and so tragic, that even words as strong as "nihilistic" have been used in discussing the play. In fact, one Norman Tate went so far as to "improve" it by re-writing it with a happy ending (Edgar and Cordelia get married - I'm not sure what happens to the King of France), and this version, apparently, was the one you would have seen in a theater at any point between 1681 and 1838.

Well, I'm giving my King Lear lecture tomorrow, so I'm not going to give away my thoughts on the matter just yet, but over the next couple of posts, I will - with assistance from some of the splendid criticism I've read recently. Or you could come to the lecture and hear it in person.

(Wednesday, September 29 - 11 am: King Lear

The Atwater Library: 1200 Avenue Atwater, Westmount, Quebec

(514) 935-7344

Admission: $20

georgewalllectures@gmail.com for further information, or to reserve a seat.)

One of the most thorough and interesting books of Shakespeare criticism that I've encountered is Marjorie Garber's Shakespeare After All (2004). It is thorough in many ways, but I'm thinking of two specifically today: The first is that she covers all the plays fairly, even those that are often undervalued, which makes the book very useful both as a reference and as a place from which to learn. Second, she does a splendid job of incorporating the positions and ideas of leading critics from both the past and present and interspersing them with brilliant original observations of her own. Here is one of the latter. In her must-read essay on The Winter's Tale, Garber points out the following: "Like a number of other Shakespeare plays, The Winter's Tale begins with a conversation that seems to take place half offstage and half on, so that the audience is invited to feel itself a privileged spectator, in effect eavesdropping on a private conversation before the public spectacle is put on show. This is a clever dramaturgical device, drawing us into the action and allowing us to consider the immediately succeeding episode, in this case the second half of the first scene, with a more careful and critical eye." It so happens that both King Lear and Antony and Cleopatra, the next two plays in my lecture series, also begin with the use of this technique, and her description of it made me consider both opening scenes from a new angle. I think the best thing that I can do to say thanks is to highly recommend her book.

Another principle that seems consistent throughout Shakespeare's work is that his main interest was rarely, perhaps never, to create plots simply for the purpose of realism. Rather, he used the stories to maximize the dramatic effect on both the audience and the characters. For example, Othello, at the beginning of the play, is the type of successful and respected military man who would never choose to show his inner workings and true emotions. But the plot doesn't give him any choice, and by the end of the story, all is revealed. One of the most powerful moments in 3.3, the scene where Othello is psychologically turned upside down by Iago, occurs when he realizes that his confidence and therefore his career are in the past:

O, now, for ever

Farewell the tranquil mind! farewell content!

Farewell the plumed troop, and the big wars,

That make ambition virtue! O, farewell!

Farewell the neighing steed, and the shrill trump,

The spirit-stirring drum, the ear-piercing fife,

The royal banner, and all quality,

Pride, pomp and circumstance of glorious war!

And, O you mortal engines, whose rude throats

The immortal Jove's dead clamours counterfeit,

Farewell! Othello's occupation's gone!

It's particularly remarkable for the fact that ordinarily we would never see a military professional admit that some aspects of war are enjoyed. But as Picasso once said, "Art is the lie that reveals the truth."

In my continuing quest to try to understand the principles that guided Shakespeare's writing, I've noticed this: With every appearance of a character, there is always change and/or growth in his or her thinking. It can happen between scenes or even between plays, but never does the audience feel that there is repetitiveness in terms of psychological content. I'd better use an example. At the end of Julius Caesar (5.5), Antony gives his famous speech at the death of Brutus, wherein he contrasts his character with those of the other conspirators:

This was the noblest Roman of them all:

All the conspirators save only he

Did that they did in envy of great Caesar;

He only, in a general honest thought

And common good to all, made one of them.

His life was gentle, and the elements

So mix'd in him that Nature might stand up

And say to all the world 'This was a man!'

OK, in the sequel (of sorts), Antony and Cleopatra, Antony mentions Brutus only once. In this scene (3.11), he realizes that his own defeat is approaching, and he is bitterly slighting the leader who is ascendant, Octavius, as a poor soldier who did little to defeat the Republican forces at the battle of Philippi, and doesn't deserve his power:

... he at Philippi kept

His sword e'en like a dancer; while I struck

The lean and wrinkled Cassius; and 'twas I

That the mad Brutus ended: he alone

Dealt on lieutenantry, and no practise had

In the brave squares of war: yet now--No matter.

What is it that brought about Antony's change in attitude toward Brutus? The audience is left with work to do, a gap to fill. There are many examples of this type of thing in Shakespeare. As always, thought is provoked.

Another under-appreciated but amazing moment in Hamlet occurs in 2.2 - the spectacular scene that allows us to see many of Hamlet's personas, as he encounters and converses with Polonius; Rosencrantz and Guildenstern; Polonius again; and ultimately, the players. After greeting them, he asks the first player if he will "do a request", a scene probably based on Marlowe and Nashe's Dido, Queen of Carthage, which entails a description of the events concerning Pyrrhus, a Greek soldier who was among the ones hidden in the Trojan Horse, and who eventually slays Priam, the king of Troy. Hamlet begins by reciting the first part of the speech, which refers to Pyrrhus' being dressed in black (for the purpose of nocturnal camouflage) but who is at this moment covered in blood and gore (its description is another example of Shakespeare's consistent anti-war message) as he looks for the king:

One speech in it I

chiefly loved: 'twas Aeneas' tale to Dido; and

thereabout of it especially, where he speaks of

Priam's slaughter: if it live in your memory, begin

at this line: let me see, let me see--

'The rugged Pyrrhus, like the Hyrcanian beast,'--

it is not so:--it begins with Pyrrhus:--

'The rugged Pyrrhus, he whose sable arms,

Black as his purpose, did the night resemble

When he lay couched in the ominous horse,

Hath now this dread and black complexion smear'd

With heraldry more dismal; head to foot

Now is he total gules; horridly trick'd

With blood of fathers, mothers, daughters, sons,

Baked and impasted with the parching streets,

That lend a tyrannous and damned light

To their lord's murder: roasted in wrath and fire,

And thus o'er-sized with coagulate gore,

With eyes like carbuncles, the hellish Pyrrhus

Old grandsire Priam seeks.'

So, proceed you.

The first player then takes over, and the entire scene, we come to realize, is another contrast (i.e. foil) for Hamlet. Pyrrhus, wearing black as Hamlet did earlier for a different reason, with a mission to kill a king, who hesitates (though briefly), before the fatal moment. And like yesterday, the declamatory style is meant to off-set the rest of the play, with its innovation that shows characters actually thinking, and making decisions. Or not.

I've mentioned before that cutting lines or scenes from a Shakespeare text is a mistake. Today, I'd like to turn your attention to a scene from Hamlet that is, unfortunately, frequently excised: the scene between the player king and his queen during the play-within-the-play scene. In it, the player king is trying to tell his wife that he doesn't have long to live, and that he is fine with the fact that she'll remarry after his death. The queen interjects that she has no plans to do so, and that in fact those who do are not doing it for love, but for other reasons. Then the player king has a remarkable speech that reveals one of the play's deepest themes: the fact that alliances form and break with time and with necessity. And that human beings are, in essence, survival-machines that will do what is needed when it is needed. Therefore, promises (like the queen's) may be made in an emotional way, but when new emotions arise, they will (and perhaps should) be forgotten. Here is the excerpt (which is purposely written in an older style of verse):

Player Queen

The instances that second marriage move

Are base respects of thrift, but none of love:

A second time I kill my husband dead,

When second husband kisses me in bed.

Player King

I do believe you think what now you speak;

But what we do determine oft we break.

Purpose is but the slave to memory,

Of violent birth, but poor validity;

Which now, like fruit unripe, sticks on the tree;

But fall, unshaken, when they mellow be.

Most necessary 'tis that we forget

To pay ourselves what to ourselves is debt:

What to ourselves in passion we propose,

The passion ending, doth the purpose lose.

The violence of either grief or joy

Their own enactures with themselves destroy:

Where joy most revels, grief doth most lament;

Grief joys, joy grieves, on slender accident.

This world is not for aye, nor 'tis not strange

That even our loves should with our fortunes change;

For 'tis a question left us yet to prove,

Whether love lead fortune, or else fortune love.

The great man down, you mark his favourite flies;

The poor advanced makes friends of enemies.

And hitherto doth love on fortune tend;

For who not needs shall never lack a friend,

And who in want a hollow friend doth try,

Directly seasons him his enemy.

But, orderly to end where I begun,

Our wills and fates do so contrary run

That our devices still are overthrown;

Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own:

So think thou wilt no second husband wed;

But die thy thoughts when thy first lord is dead.

There are books that contain historical maps of Europe (for example) which show how friendly nations have become enemies, and vice versa, many times over. Have a look at one while keeping this passage in mind.

Shakespeare's political sophistication seems boundless. In Julius Caesar, for example, he delineates the endless cycle toward, and then away from, centralized power. He embodies it in the character of Cassius, a man who knows enough of both Rome and himself to make his cynicism work for political ends, but who can't overcome his distrust of his own nature. He understands the dangers presented by Mark Antony much more clearly than Brutus does, but he lets himself be over-ruled in the play's moment of crisis: the decision of whether to allow Mark Antony to speak at Caesar's funeral. And we are introduced to this double nature the first time we meet him. At the end of 1.2, after his having convinced Brutus to at least consider joining the plot to assassinate Caesar, he has a moment of astonishing honesty in a brief soliloquy at the end of the scene. In it, he imagines telling Brutus the truth: that an honest man should avoid people like him (Cassius, that is), and that if he were loved by Caesar the way that Brutus is, that he wouldn't allow himself to be talked into upsetting his favoured position by anyone:

Well, Brutus, thou art noble; yet, I see,

Thy honourable metal may be wrought

From that it is disposed: therefore it is meet

That noble minds keep ever with their likes;

For who so firm that cannot be seduced?

Caesar doth bear me hard; but he loves Brutus:

If I were Brutus now and he were Cassius,

He should not humour me.

A term that has become fairly pervasive in the discussion of drama is "metatheatre". It usually refers to dramatic characters that are at least partially conscious of being in a play. It can also refer to the complex responses that audiences may have while viewing a multi-leveled piece. I became aware of many examples of both of the above senses during the time that I spent studying Hamlet recently. I'll give one example today, and one tomorrow. But perhaps a better word for these would be metapoetry, as they both deal with an awareness of the difficulties in its interpretation and comprehension. The first occurs at the beginning of 4.5, where a gentleman and Horatio are trying to convince the queen to intercede with Ophelia, who has recently gone mad after the death of her father. The gentleman is trying to warn the queen that the people will be made afraid and perhaps angry if Ophelia is left to wander about, talking of who-knows-what:

She speaks much of her father; says she hears

There's tricks i' the world; and hems, and beats her heart;

Spurns enviously at straws; speaks things in doubt,

That carry but half sense: her speech is nothing,

Yet the unshaped use of it doth move

The hearers to collection; they aim at it,

And botch the words up fit to their own thoughts;

Which, as her winks, and nods, and gestures yield them,

Indeed would make one think there might be thought,

Though nothing sure, yet much unhappily.

Of course, this could be also considered as a comment on the interpretation of poetry, where often readers might "botch the words up fit to their own thoughts". And in a play that deals deeply with themes concerning the nature of language, we are presented with one more pitfall to understand - and thus avoid. The second example is found in the conversation between Hamlet and Osric (the sycophantic courtier who has come to bring the formal offer of the fencing exhibition that will ultimately lead to the deaths of the four remaining central characters). Here Hamlet asks for a definition from Osric, who has been showing off his vocabulary for the prince to humourous effect, and Horatio comments, "I knew you must be edified by the margent ere you had done." At which point, the reader might look up "margent" in the margin or on the facing page (i.e. the glossary), and the joke becomes clear.

Another frequent question that comes up with regard to Shakespeare concerns whether he was a dramatist who wrote in verse, or a poet who wrote plays. Northrop Frye argued for the former (in Northrop Frye on Shakespeare) and although I seldom disagree with the great man, I do here. To me, the clearest way to see the plays for what they really are is to accept them as large-scale poems that treat several related themes in various but ultimately connected ways. They are like literary symphonies. This is not to say that Shakespeare was not a masterful playwright in the strictest story-telling sense - he was. But at no point in any of the plays is language and poetry ever disregarded or treated as secondary. The most comprehensive handbook that I've come across in terms of explaining the various and subtle aspects of poetry is John Ciardi and Miller Williams' How Does a Poem Mean?(1959). It does a splendid job of discussing meter, rhyme, figurative language, diction, tone, imagery - and there is not one section of the book, one concept or poetic technique that could not be illustrated by an example from Shakespeare. This could not be said about any other dramatist that used verse. Consider this also: Hamlet, the work of literature that explores the human condition more deeply than any before and perhaps since, states its thematic concern with this concise and powerful opening: "Who's there?" Only a poet of the highest order would (or could) have done so.

I'm currently re-reading the three plays that are going to be performed in Montreal this November (links below), and it occurred to me that perhaps I've found the answer (for me, anyway) to the age-old question regarding Shakespeare: Is it better to read, or to see, one of his plays? Answer: It's better to read it. Why? Because it requires more from us. I often think back to an insight from one of Marshall McLuhan's essays, wherein he contrasted "hot" and "cool" media as follows: the more that a medium demands from the participant, the "hotter" it is. One of the brilliant aspects of Shakespeare (or any great drama, in fact) is that it opens up so many possible ways of interacting and being creative. Actors, directors, set designers, composers, teachers, critics - anyone who has spent time working with Shakespeare - will often consider it a highlight of their career, a point where their creativity was at its peak. That is very hot media. And reading the play gives our creativity and imaginations the greatest possible challenge. All of this being said, don't get the idea that I would dissuade anyone from seeing the plays live. I can't wait to see them myself. Once again, here are the links:

Measure for Measure - http://www.mcgill.ca/english/moyse/

Love's Labour's Lost - http://www.dawsoncollege.qc.ca/theatre-box-office/performances

Henry V - http://www.persephoneproductions.org/

There aren't many aspects of modern psychology and philosophy that weren't first seen in Hamlet. In fact, just how many fields of enquiry did this play open? In terms of psychology, there are scenes that deal with depression, manic-depression, Freudian theory, the stages from Elisabeth Kubler-Ross' On Death and Dying... there's even a moment that seems to foreshadow the Rorschach test (with clouds substituting for ink at the end of 3.2). As for philosophy, and the literature based on it, I'm going to quote the ending of the essay on Hamlet from Northrop Frye on Shakespeare (1986), which is one of my favourite books:

"During the nineteenth century, and through much of the early twentieth, Hamlet was regarded as Shakespeare's central and most significant play, because it dramatized a central preoccupation of the age of Romanticism: the conflict of consciousness and action, the sense of consciousness as a withdrawal from action which could make for futility, and yet was all that could prevent action from becoming totally mindless. No other play has explored the paradoxes of action and thinking about action so deeply, but because it did explore them, literature ever since has been immeasurably deepened and made bolder. Perhaps, if we had not had Hamlet, we might not have had the romantic movement at all, or the works of Dostoyevsky and Nietzsche and Kierkegaard that follow it, and recast the Hamlet situation in ways that come progressively nearer to us. Nearer to us in cultural conditions, that is, not in imaginative impact: there, Shakespeare will always be first."

Fintan O'Toole's Shakespeare Is Hard, But So Is Life is a lot of fun to read. Its central concern is with permanently putting to silence the theory of the "Tragic Flaw", which for about a century dominated commentary on the tragedies. O'Toole contends that this view came about for the purpose of turning Shakespeare's great works (the book contains essays on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear and Macbeth) into Victorian morality lessons. And he's very convincing. I hadn't realized before how much space this unsupported (and quite ridiculous) position had occupied in the minds of readers. How unfortunate and misguided it was to reduce these incomparably rich works down to didacticism - to argue that Hamlet was guilty of "shirking", or some other nonsense, for example. Thank goodness for O'Toole, who uses wit, irony and powerful textual evidence to win the argument decisively and to put the emphasis back where it belongs: the thoughts, the language and the stories.

He also states that the great tragedies deal with protagonists who find themselves divided between world-views and/or time periods. For example, Hamlet finds himself torn between the medieval mindset of honour, blind loyalty and revenge (personified by the ghost) and the renaissance one of education, art and political change. There is a telling moment at the end of act one, scene two where after Horatio and the two guards (Marcellus and Bernardo) have told Hamlet about the existence of the ghost, they make plans to meet him later on the battlements, and then say goodbye to him in a formal, but appropriate way - he is a prince, after all. But Hamlet responds in a surprising fashion - and one that entirely supports O'Toole's ideas:

HAMLET

If it assume my noble father's person,

I'll speak to it, though hell itself should gape

And bid me hold my peace. I pray you all,

If you have hitherto conceal'd this sight,

Let it be tenable in your silence still;

And whatsoever else shall hap to-night,

Give it an understanding, but no tongue:

I will requite your loves. So, fare you well:

Upon the platform, 'twixt eleven and twelve,

I'll visit you.

All

Our duty to your honour.

HAMLET

Your loves, as mine to you: farewell.

Harold Goddard's The Meaning of Shakespeare (1951) contains many highly original insights. The one I'm concerned with today is his contention that the turning point in Hamlet actually occurs during the play-within-the-play scene. At this point, Hamlet has not yet killed anyone (whereas by the end of the play, he's directly responsible for five deaths, and not quite as directly, for two others - three if you include his own), so theoretically the story could still end happily. Goddard states that the key moment is when Hamlet decides to not simply let the play do its work, but rather to intercede with a running commentary (maybe Shakespeare was taking a jab at critics). The actor playing Lucianus is about to act (or reenact) the murder, by pouring poison in the ear of the king, when Hamlet makes his fateful interjection:

LUCIANUS

Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and time agreeing;

Confederate season, else no creature seeing;

Thou mixture rank, of midnight weeds collected,

With Hecate's ban thrice blasted, thrice infected,

Thy natural magic and dire property,

On wholesome life usurp immediately.

(Pours the poison into the sleeper's ears)

HAMLET

He poisons him i' the garden for's estate. His

name's Gonzago: the story is extant, and writ in

choice Italian: you shall see anon how the murderer

gets the love of Gonzago's wife.

OPHELIA

The king rises.

Goddard's position is that the court would not see the king rising as an admission of guilt, but rather that the prince's lunacy had reached an intolerable point, thus occasioning the king's departure. And that, left alone, the play would have perhaps had the effect of working his conscience toward confession, maybe even abdication. We'll never know. Goddard brilliantly sums up the two warring states in Hamlet at this point by invoking Blake's phrase, "Art Against Empire". Of course, this theme is dealt with throughout the sonnets, as well; see 65 for a particularly pertinent example.

Jan Kott's Shakespeare, Our Contemporary (1964) was a landmark in Shakespeare criticism that continues to resonate. Its central idea is that Shakespeare's work is more relevant, in many ways, to our time than to his own. I happen to agree. His view of Hamlet is particularly interesting in the way that he sees it as a work primarily concerned with politics and the nature of power. For him, the backdrop of wars past and present, the atmosphere of intrigue and treachery, and the constant surveillance of the three young central characters (Hamlet, Laertes, and Ophelia) create a play that is primarily concerned with life in a police state. Seen from this perspective, many puzzling aspects of the action make more sense - for example, Hamlet's soliloquies are the only times when he can speak freely, but he's not communicating with anyone and he knows it. This redoubles his frustration. Even his interests in the humanities have no outlet: the play-within-the-play that he helps to direct is put on for explicitly political purposes. Kott also points out that even casual conversation in the play is dominated by politics. I hadn't previously noticed the extent to which this is true.

Also, the character of Claudius is revealed more fully in this light: he has committed murder to gain power, but once he gets it, he realizes that it's not what he imagined. Virtually every move that he makes in the play is tempered with his concern for how it will be viewed by others. Even the king is controlled by political concern.

I've been spending quite a bit of time preparing for my talk on Hamlet tomorrow. And one of the play's qualities that I've found most astonishing is the number of theories and/or thematic interpretations it can withstand. One commentator will find Theme A - and be able to support the contention with quotations and summaries of the action. And the next will be able to do the same with Theme B, and so on and on. It's as though the play contains so much that almost anything can be found there. Over the next few days, I'll be posting about some of these theories.

Further to yesterday, where I mentioned that Hamlet changed the game for all literature (all art, in fact) to follow, here's what I meant: The play, on the surface, is a revenge tragedy, which is one of the least complicated formulas a writer could engage - but Shakespeare turned it into a psychological and philosophical investigation of a human life, and after it, art turned inward. It became less concerned with what happens and more concerned with why. If you don't believe me, read any play (not by Shakespeare) that was written before it.

It's always interesting to consider which principles guided Shakespeare in his work. He made so many brilliant aesthetic decisions that we can't help but learn, if we approach it correctly. One facet that comes up over and over is its difficulty. The first time through one of the plays is heavy slogging, even for readers with a lot of experience. Was this intentional on Shakespeare's part? It's a complicated question, but my belief is that it was. It's my contention that he wanted readers and actors to spend time with the words: to really think about them. The fact that his plays can be considered as poems (or "poem[s] unlimited", as Polonius puts it) adds to the complexity, of course, because poetry is not written to have its meanings nailed down permanently. Rather it suggests things - ways of thinking, for the most part. And of course the language itself is meant to demonstrate that. Hamlet is the prime example. It is also the work of literature that changed the game for all art to follow. More on this tomorrow.

Measure for Measure, and not Hamlet, contains the most memorable and frightening description of death in Shakespeare. (This is not to say that it considers death from as many angles as Hamlet. Nothing does.) The words are Claudio's. He is a young man in prison and awaiting a death sentence for the crime of adultery - in this case, for being the father of a child out of wedlock because the marriage didn't precede conception. The law is a new one in a recently morally tyrannical Vienna, and the person in charge of upholding it, Angelo, is a novice in his position. He was put there by the Duke Vicentio for reasons that become clarified, somewhat anyway, later in the play. Claudio's sister, Isabella, is studying toward becoming a nun at the beginning of the play, but she comes to her brother's defense when she hears of his situation. He asks her to plead for his life with Angelo. She does so, very eloquently, and Angelo is greatly moved. But he doesn't relent. Neither does Isabella, and eventually Angelo becomes smitten. He finally makes an offer that is, of course, rich in irony: Her brother can go free if she'll sleep with him. Horrified, she refuses and returns to Claudio with the bad news that nothing can be done. But gradually (she's too ashamed to say it right out), he becomes aware of Angelo's proposition. And his thinking goes from something like, "Yes, of course, you're right..." to "Can we at least talk about this?" Here is the passage:

ISABELLA

What says my brother?

CLAUDIO

Death is a fearful thing.

ISABELLA

And shamed life a hateful.

CLAUDIO

Ay, but to die, and go we know not where;

To lie in cold obstruction and to rot;

This sensible warm motion to become

A kneaded clod; and the delighted spirit

To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside

In thrilling region of thick-ribbed ice;

To be imprison'd in the viewless winds,

And blown with restless violence round about

The pendent world; or to be worse than worst

Of those that lawless and incertain thought

Imagine howling: 'tis too horrible!

The weariest and most loathed worldly life

That age, ache, penury and imprisonment

Can lay on nature is a paradise

To what we fear of death.

(3.1)

Just the phrase "to lie in cold obstruction and to rot" is enough to terrify. So what happens? Read and/or see the play, and all will be revealed.

Measure for Measure, one of the three Shakespeare plays that will be presented in the region of Montreal this fall (the others are Love's Labour's Lost and Henry V), begins with a very thought-provoking moment. The Duke Vincentio wants to recuse himself from his duties for a while, and the person that he is asking to replace him, Angelo, is being told the following: When we are born with abilities, it is our moral obligation to share them. Here's the original:

Thyself and thy belongings

Are not thine own so proper as to waste

Thyself upon thy virtues, they on thee.

Heaven doth with us as we with torches do,

Not light them for themselves; for if our virtues

Did not go forth of us, 'twere all alike

As if we had them not.

Exquisite, isn't it? Imagine a world where all people have the chance to reach their potentials, and to let the results "go forth" of them, like Shakespeare did. ("'Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished.")

Here are the links for the productions mentioned above:

Measure for Measure - http://www.mcgill.ca/english/moyse/

Love's Labour's Lost - http://www.dawsoncollege.qc.ca/theatre-box-office/performances

Henry V - http://www.persephoneproductions.org/

Shakespeare's early plays, particularly Titus Andronicus and the three parts of Henry VI, are often undervalued by commentators. There's no question that compared to the late tragedies, or the great histories that form the Henriad (Richard II, the two parts of Henry IV and Henry V), these plays do not stand up well. Aside from the fact that few plays do, it should be understood that in these works Shakespeare was learning about his craft both technically and philosophically. And in them he found the material that he was going to unravel artistically for the remainder of his working days. The plays portray dark, treacherous worlds completely in keeping with the contents of history books - as William James once said, "History is a blood bath." My contention is that Shakespeare wrote to try to inform us of how to avoid repeating the errors of the past. And so a revenge tragedy like Titus Andronicus, which is clearly a direct descendant of Seneca, started the artistic growth that allowed a play like Hamlet to be written. And on the technical side, we can clearly see that King Lear's opening two scenes are clearly the progeny of the first two in Titus. But the play is very compelling in and of itself, not just as preparation for later plays. If you haven't seen Titus Andronicus, there are several that I'd recommend: Julie Taymor's 1999 version, starring Anthony Hopkins, is excellent, as is the BBC production from 1985 - which was the last play produced for the series. Hmm...

Titus Andronicus is a fearsome spectacle. It contains a series of atrocities that are very hard to watch (it's certainly the Shakespeare play that inspires the most walkouts), and many commentators wonder why someone of his talent would write such a relentless and bloody play. I have mixed feelings about it myself, but I'm convinced that it was necessary in Shakespeare's development as a playwright. And that without Titus Andronicus we may not have had many of the later tragedies, including Hamlet, Lear, Othello and Macbeth. I'll explain tomorrow.

If it has an agenda, it isn't literature. That's about as simply as I can put it. And in his writing, Shakespeare didn't have one. His characters certainly did, but not him. Drama is often described as the most objective art form - and it's easy to see why: each personage has an individual viewpoint that may be (and usually is) contradicted by the very next speaker. Therefore, it is a mistake to attribute words spoken by a character to Shakespeare. Yes, he wrote them - but he didn't necessarily endorse them. For an example, the famed dictum "This above all: to thine own self be true..." is spoken by a character that immediately contradicts his own words by attempting to pry into a private conversation. The reader may choose to consider the thought important anyway, but it's a mistake to think that Shakespeare was using the moment to "tell" us something. If he had written in this way (i.e. agenda-driven), his art would have been hugely diminished, and he likely would have been forgotten by now, or close to it.

OK, let's return to The Merry Wives of Windsor. This play, as I mentioned in earlier posts, is roundly detested by many commentators - largely because of its treatment of Falstaff. But consider this: Perhaps Shakespeare did not allow any feelings of affection or dislike for characters to enter into his decision-making. Perhaps he simply put them into dramatic situations, and then allowed the results to flow naturally, like a scientist observing an experiment. The best literature, like the best music, has an aura of inevitability to it. And this is why - there isn't anything contrived or forced about the outcomes, because the creator doesn't have any vested interest in there being any. So to read The Merry Wives of Windsor in expectation of being entertained by Falstaff in a similar way to an earlier play is to be disappointed. So we shouldn't do that. Rather, we should read it for what it is: a highly entertaining and thought-provoking exploration of human nature, as are all Shakespeare plays.

Perhaps the biggest reason for Falstaff's enduring popularity - many commentators consider him the greatest of comic characters - is the fact that he first appears in histories, not comedies. Thus, he stands out starkly from all the soldiers, princes, rebels, etc. who are running about and ranting about war and honour. Imagine what a liberating thing it must have been to hear a character, in the middle of a battle, say such things as:

Can honour set to a leg? no: or

an arm? no: or take away the grief of a wound? no.

Honour hath no skill in surgery, then? no. What is

honour? a word. What is in that word honour? what

is that honour? air. A trim reckoning! Who hath it?

he that died o' Wednesday. Doth he feel it? no.

Doth he hear it? no. 'Tis insensible, then. Yea,

to the dead. But will it not live with the living?

no. Why? detraction will not suffer it. Therefore

I'll none of it. Honour is a mere scutcheon: and so

ends my catechism.

(1H4.5.1)

Think of how many comedians, from Charlie Chaplin to the men of Monty Python, were influenced by this counter-historical positioning. And somehow he still retains his freshness and ability to surprise. In the two parts of Henry IV, that is, because the only other play he appears in - The Merry Wives of Windsor, a comedy of course - is not loved by Falstaffians, for reasons that were discussed yesterday. I'll give my own thoughts on the play tomorrow.

Why is The Merry Wives of Windsor so disliked? Harold Bloom, a self-described "bardaloter" literally detests the play, referring only to a pseudo-Falstaff in his comments in Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human. W.H. Auden, in his Lectures on Shakespeare, said that the only good thing about the play was that it inspired Verdi's Falstaff, and then played a recording of the opera rather than discuss the matter further. These are not rare opinions, either.

What's going on? I think the answer lies in Falstaff. It is commonly acknowledged that Sir John ran away with the two parts of Henry IV. In fact, he became so popular that Queen Elizabeth, according to legend, requested another play showing him in love. I think at this point Shakespeare may have become somewhat tired of him, and may have felt like the violinist that, told that his violin had a beautiful tone, held it to his ear and said, "I don't hear anything." And so, in this play, a very different side of Falstaff is shown, and he ends up being the butt of the humour, rather than its source. In fact, he isn't the funniest character in the play, for once. There is great and varied humour from a large cast - but it may not be what a Falstaff fan would like or expect. Approaching Shakespeare with assumptions is not a wise plan, though. More on all of this tomorrow.

Just a short post to let you know what this space will contain over the next few days. Last week I gave a lecture on the plays that will be performed at the Stratford Festival during the 2011 season. As I was preparing, I came across some interesting points in regard to them. I wrote a little on Twelfth Night this week, and I've also touched on Richard III a couple of times. So next I'll be sharing some thoughts regarding the other two on the playbill: The Merry Wives of Windsor and Titus Andronicus. These two are among the least loved in the canon, by the way, but my own estimation of them has risen in proportion to the time I've spent with them - funny how that works - and I'll be explaining why this week.

My fall lecture series on the tragedies will be starting a week from Wednesday. Here is the necessary information.

George Wall Shakespeare Lectures: The Tragedies

Wednesday, September 15 - 11 am: Hamlet

Wednesday, September 29 - 11 am: King Lear

Wednesday, October 13 - 11 am: Antony and Cleopatra

Wednesday, October 27 - 11 am: Othello

Wednesday, November 10 - 11 am: Macbeth

Wednesday, December 1 - 11 am: Romeo and Juliet

The cost of these lectures will be $20 each, or all six for $100. You can email me at georgewalllectures@gmail.com for further information, or to get tickets. I'll hope to see you there.

The Atwater Library: 1200 Avenue Atwater, Westmount, Quebec - (514) 935-7344

In Twelfth Night, the two identical twins, Viola and Sebastien, are shipwrecked and wash up separately onto the shore of Illyria. Viola assumes her brother must have drowned and wonders how she'll be able to survive in a strange place on her own. With the help of the ship's captain, she comes up with a plan: She will disguise herself as a boy and work as a servant/confidant of the Duke Orsino. The Duke is in love with a noblewoman named Olivia, who is mourning the death of her brother (unlike Viola's situation, this is a real death), and thus will accept no "entreaties" regarding love or marriage. So Orsino, impressed with the sensitivity and intelligence of his new worker Cesario (Viola's assumed male name), sends him/her to plead his case to Olivia. What ends up happening of course is that each person falls in love with the one they can't have: Olivia falls for Cesario, Viola for Orsina, and Orsino we already know about.

It's an extraordinary plot in every sense of the word. But to spend time considering its plausibility is an error, because its point is to allow the characters into worlds and ways of thinking that would not be possible otherwise. So Cesario/Viola engages in thoughtful discussions regarding the nature of love with both a male and a female. She herself is forced to consider it from fresh vantage points. And she takes the audience along.

In Shakespeare, the stories and so forth are always secondary to 1. the dramatic power of the scenes 2. the insights that can be found into human nature. With lesser literature, there is no larger payoff with which to mitigate hard-to-believe stories, but with this writer that's not the case. And even with unlikely plots like this one, the results of the exploration of thought and emotion are very easy to accept.

In my lecture yesterday, one of the issues that was raised was that some of the plots are hard to accept easily - how "suspension of disbelief" can be hard to attain, in other words. For example, plots with identical twins and shipwrecks are used in both The Comedy of Errors and Twelfth Night. In taking a close look at Twelfth Night, it occurred to me that the benefit of such a "fantastic" story line is that it allows characters (and the audience) to go to places they wouldn't be able to otherwise. I'll explain, with examples, tomorrow.

Here's another observation regarding Othello: The character of Roderigo is an extraordinary one. He's the chap that is so far gone in infatuation with Desdemona, that he allows himself to be utterly manipulated by Iago. Iago lies to him about everything, spends his money and ultimately convinces him to murder Cassio. He doesn't succeed, though. He merely wounds Cassio, and so Iago, having to cover his tracks, walks up and kills him. At which point Roderigo sees the truth of his life for the first time, albeit very briefly. But the really remarkable thing about the character is that Shakespeare was able to control his telling of the story carefully enough, so as to make Iago the only person that interacts with him in the play. Roderigo literally allows another person to shape his entire view of the world. I forget who said that "all a poet can do is warn", but this character is the best illustration of that thought possible. One must consider one's sources.

Further to yesterday's post on act three, scene three from Othello, it is interesting to juxtapose the powerful and complex figurative language that Othello uses to convey his murderous psychological state with the very simple line that ends the scene. Because, for me anyway, it contains the most frightening statement in Shakespeare. We'll have to go back for a moment before we get to it. At the play's opening, Iago tells Roderigo (and the audience) that his hatred for Iago comes from his having been passed over for a promotion (and if you think this doesn't sound plausible, either you haven't been in the working world for very long, or you've been very fortunate). The position of lieutenant to Othello was given to Michael Cassio instead, and so, Iago begins to formulate a plan to destroy both of them. At the end of 3.3, Iago has convinced Othello that his wife, Desdemona, has been having an affair with Cassio. But as Othello's rage grows, Iago pretends to hedge, and Othello speaks the passage discussed yesterday. Then Iago kneels down and swears an oath to help his "friend" in any way he can. So Othello asks him to kill Cassio. Here is the rest of the scene, including the aforementioned final line:

IAGO

My friend is dead; 'tis done at your request:

But let her live.

OTHELLO

Damn her, lewd minx! O, damn her!

Come, go with me apart; I will withdraw,

To furnish me with some swift means of death

For the fair devil. Now art thou my lieutenant.

IAGO

I am your own for ever.