The Comedy of Errors: Love this one every time I read it, or see it performed. Shakespeare is the master of the fat joke. First time I read the part where the guys are talking about the kitchen maid's size I was all like "DAYUM Willy, that's HARSH."

The Tragedy of Coriolanus: I was afraid this one would be as boring as Antony and Cleopatra, but thankfully it was actually good. Some of the political commentary is relevant today, I actually give a fuck about the characters, why is Antony and Cleopatra the one people talk about and not this one?

Cymbeline: Why were we not introduced to this one in high school? Guaranteed literacy rate increase.
"CLOTEN(dude trying to woo some chick with music). I would this music would come. I am advised to give her music a mornings; they say it will penetrate.

Enter musicians
Come on, tune. If you can penetrate her with your fingering, so. We'll try with tongue, too. If none will do, let her remain; but i'll never give o'er."

The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark: It's Hamlet. Source of half the figures of speech in the English language. I cannot possibly say anything about it that hasn't been said a million times before.

Now we reach the part I'm currently heading in to read. "The First Part of King Henry the Fourth".

A history. In multiple parts, no less. I'm not in for another slog like Antony and Cleopatra, am I?

>>16502
No worries. Henry IV has Falstaff.

My opinion is more or less the same as yours on all of the above, though I haven't touched Coriolanus, and I only remember one or two things from 'As You Like It'.

I once saw a modernized rendition of the 'Comedy of Errors.' They had cell phones. And black people. And used modern slang. You might have liked that. It was actually somewhat clever.

>>16504
So far, Henry IV seems to be entertaining bits with great characterization, sandwiched between other bits that are some guys talking a whole lot about war but not doing much actual warring.

>>16505
Finally, some action. And you spoke truth, Falstaff is great. Verdict is: starts shaky, but totally worth getting into. On to part two!

reminds me of a dream I had on the 4.2.2012 (2.4 to the murrkans)
at work we all are watching a movie named "Stephen Daedalus" and it appears to be Kubrick style big cinema but I panic over having not the slightest idea about what's happening on screen. I shout "what are the references! explain the references!"
I hear laughter
I hear my drinking buddy saying
"He is a Maligned and a Turban'd Turk"
more laughter
someone else shouting:
"He didn't even read shakespeare!"
I am getting carried away but on my way out I shout
"right now I'm reading Timon of Athens"
They've thrown me out of the window and I do endure a very realistic death experience on crushing against the asphalt. (and afterlife is a clipping error, 1990s ego shooter style)

i had to look both timon and stephen up upon awakening

Weird order you're reading them in. I read the first half of the Norton Shakespeare--I quite enjoyed all the essays and it was nice having all the explanatory notes and synonyms (although the latter got really frustrating towards the end) if I needed them. One good thing about it was it was in (an attempt at) chronological order. It's super cool seeing him develop so much as an artist. The fucking Histories get a bit much though it must be said. I guess you're just starting them... Good luck!

I'm kinda annoyed I stopped halfway through actually, I might get back on it.

Also, once you've got a proper hold on the language and the style, give the sonnets a shot. I got kinda obsessed with them, read them several times now, annotated versions, original language versions (those are super fucking heavy--no punctuation, crazy-ass spelling) memorised about 20 of them, they're fucking beautiful.

I look forward to hearing you're opinion of Titus Andronicus. In my version it was the first, and came with a lot of notes. It must be said its generally pretty fucking insane. I really liked it, just for its... absurdity? Yeah, that.

>>16500
>Coriolanus
>Some of the political commentary is relevant today
given you are a fascist

>>16528
Which is why I said "some". There's still some pretty apt passages, like:

"...there have been many great men that have
flatter'd the people, who ne'er loved them; and there be many
that they have loved, they know not wherefore;"

File 135703530645.png - (64.45KB , 1024x634 , volsci-everywhere.png )

>>16550
>"...there have been many great men that have flatter'd the people, who ne'er loved them; and there be many that they have loved, they know not wherefore;"
which is why those plebeian ingrates and their treacherous tribune liberals might as well be barred from politics.

>>16554
You can agree with a "such-and-such is so" without agreeing with the "therefore".

Back to Henry 4-2, going to say anyone who liked the first part is going to like the second. Still reading it, due to holiday season family stuff, but I've read enough to be fairly certain there isn't a curve ball in the second half. More dudes monologuing at length about war, more Falstaff being Falstaff.

Pour a fotie for Falstaff, we gonna ride.

>>16585

So as you can probably tell, I'm in Henry 5 now. Is there any subtext I'm missing in the scene where the two chicks are talking in French about what body parts are called in English, or is it just to say "hey y'all, we's in France now".

I just assumed if there was some subtext, it was about war. Wild guess out of nowhere, roight?

Okay, sorry to break up the circlejerk, but every single Shakespearean piece mention is a FUCKING PLAY. You have to see it acted out and interpreted live to even have an opinion on the matter. That being said, "The Taming of the Shrew" incredibly moving, even just in print.

>>16609
1. If you gave a damn for reading, you would have read the thread and learned that OP is doing it to grow acquainted with Shakespeare: not to enjoy the whole Shakespeare experience.
2. There are such things as good and bad script. One can have an educated opinion on this with or without acting.
3. This is masturbation; not a circle jerk. In the past two weeks, only OP has posted.

>>16594

They're dirty jokes. I don't have the scene in front of me, but I can remember one off the top of my head. When they try to say "foot" in english it sounds like "futre" in French, which is akin to "fuck" in english. It's all very silly and not integral to the plot, but it can be pretty funny on stage.

>>16616

Ah, should have known. Bill does like his dirty jokes.

I like his dirty jokes as well, but haven't read much outside required reading and a handful of sonnets. What are a few plays to start with in no particular order? The path less traveled always seems to work better for me, though.

>>16621

Hmm. I guess it depends on what was required reading for you. I happen to like The Winter's Tale and will recommend it to you. There's some crazy magic and some weird morality and also a bear attack that doesn't seem to make any sense no matter how you think about it. I also quite like the name Paulina.

Also, I should have mentioned here >>16616
that there's a little more to it than vulgarity. There's a bit of a body part motif running through all of Hal's plays. You often see mentions of body parts in isolation of the body they're supposed to be attached to, and the mood can be horrifying, silly, or sexual depending on the context, which is no accident.

Not invested in any of the characters? I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to disagree. Ant & Cleo is Shakespeare's improvement on Romeo and Juliet, and it's aim is the portrayal of a complex, mature love. In dramatizing any character, Shakespeare is always looking to confound your expectations. Although Antony and Cleopatra share an ardent love, various political betrayals subvert prior intimations of that love. That being said, I agree that Ant & Cleopatra is quite long, but there are lots of fruits in it. Some of the speeches are spectacular, like Cleopatra's fishing speech, or her ending speech, when she sticks the asp to her breast. Also, you might have wanted to read Julius Caesar, the prequel, before reading Antony and Cleopatra, because Shakespeare has narrative conventions he makes improvements on in the latter.

>>16635
>looking to confound your expectations

So is the joke "why did the chicken cross the road?"

Antony's reasons for marrying Caesar's sister are fairly nonexistent. I mean, yeah, it'll help smooth things over politically for a little while, but EVERYONE IN THE GODDAMN PLAY, including Antony himself, knows it's going to end up screwing him over and says so outright.

There's no tragedy when the crucial character is not only carrying the idiot ball but waving it around and showing it off to everyone like he's proud of it.

I'm not saying a good troupe couldn't breathe some life into it, but then a good troupe can make anything entertaining.

So after a hiatus for classes (my final semester at BGSU), I'm back to Bill. And going through Henry 6, two main points here.

One: FUCK Fastolfe. His existence is a sad, empty reminder of what a great character Falstaff was.

Two: suddenly MAJIK AN WICHEZ LOL. "Oh hey, y'know this chick that France is calling a saint and England is calling a witch just becoz she's totally kicking English ass? Turns out she's RILLY A REAL WITCH IN LEAGUE WITH DARKNESS N THINGS!"

Henry 8: "Minion, do the dance of exposition!" And I don't even get a war to cap it off.

King John: Okay, I'm glad semi-alphabetical order put this one last so that my reading of the series ended on a high note. The Bastard is the kind of entertaining character the last few Henrys desperately needed.

Reading Julius Caesar makes Antony and Cleopatra even worse. Antony is a wily sumbitch in the first, but in the next he can't come up with a better plan to fix his political troubles than the one that is most guaranteed to fail catastrophically? 'A better portrayal of a more mature love' my shit-vomiting ASS, at least we can excuse the blind idiocy of Romeo and Juliet on the fact that they are still children, Antony has no excuse whatsoever.

But yeah, Julius Caesar. Great play, great play.

King Lear: One of the ones I've read before this. Now here's a tragedy. Dude just wants to die with a little bit of peace and dignity, and the goddamn vultures in his family can't even allow him that much.

Love's Labour's Lost: If you dig Willy's wit and wordplay, this one is a must read. A lot more wordplay than even in Comedy of Errors, but Comedy of Errors I still think is the better play because it has a much more solidly satisfying ending.

Macbeth: Like Hamlet, there is nothing I can possibly say about it that hasn't already been said. It's a fantastic play, just go READ IT.

Measure for Measure, a good one to read for wordplay. Not as funny as Comedy of Errors, but a more solid ending than Love's Labour's Lost.

Though LLL is really growing on me, what I especially dig about it is the way it makes fun of the pretentious affectations of fancy speakers.

what

I absolutely loved Antony and Cleopatra, the fact I couldn't care about any of the characters but the fact that the whole thing was still tragic is what I loved the most about it.

That, and the character of Cleopatra is incredibly cool.

>>16738

If you don't care about the characters, a tragedy is about as tragic as Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer.

Surprisingly, Merchant of Venice is one I hadn't yet read. Of course I already was familiar with the "if you prick us" bit, and it is moving, but I have to say that it loses a bit in context since it's being spoken by a walking negative stereotype.

Other than that, good play.

Merry Wives of Windsor. More Falstaff and his buddies, sans the war stuff? I can get behind this. Could have used a few more fat jokes though.

Midsummer Night's Dream: Classic. I've read it before, I'll read it again, if you haven't read it go do it now you putz.

My readings of Much Ado About Nothing are forever corrupted by the '93 film. And honestly, I can't say that's a bad thing. Sure, Keanu is his usual wooden self, but his character's supposed to be a douchebag anyway. And Denzel Washington balances him out, as well as Michael Keaton's performance of Dogberry. As for the play, I'll agree with its general recognition as one of the better Willy comedies.

Othello, on the other hand, while I have seen the film version with Laurence Fishburne in a badass rendition of the titular role, is not so overshadowed in my mind by that film as I'm reading it. Classic tragedy, again, top tier Shakespeare.

The Richards are about the same as the Henrys. If you're into that, roll with it.

Romeo and Juliet, you could do worse. It's better popular entertainment than the crap we've got these days. There's some great dirty wordplay here and there too.

And suddenly, re-reading Taming of the Shrew, I figure out exactly what was bugging me about the Henrys and Richards.

In Taming of the Shrew, we SEE Katherine acting like a bitch. We see things she's doing that get her called a shrew.

But in the King *s, we get a lot of people saying that X is a tyrant and the people hate him or Y is the best ever and the people love him, but we rarely see actual things that are being done to or for the people that are earning their hate or their love. Sure, we see murders of nobles, and stuff like that, but the best we get of the impact on the commoners, is SOMETIMES a passing mention of aggressive taxation or something like that.

Not that I really blame Bill for that though, trying to convey years, sometimes decades worth of events like this in a single play is tough. But they're not as strong as his other plays.

As for Taming, I dig this one because of the characterization. In some of his plays you get characters that are kind of a blank slate that the actor has to bring to life, but in this play you really get a sense of who these characters are just reading it.

The Tempest was interesting. I'm not quite sure what to make of it. When all is said and done, I don't really think much actually happened in it. There wasn't any crisis at any point, the conflicts were either minor or immediately defused. Prospero's plans weren't in any danger of failing at any point.

The character of Caliban is an unsubtle statement about how it's okay to fuck over indigenous populations and take their land because they're ugly, stupid, gullible, and violent.

But it was pretty. I'll bet we can get James Cameron to direct it.

The pretty version was filmed by Peter Greenway, titled Prospero's Books.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prospero%27s_books

It was a bit disjointed and didn't do much with the story, but I remember it had strong visuals. Not really worth tracking down a copy, but it might be worth a rental.

Timon of Athens: Lear Junior. Not as old, not as powerful, not as big a fall, he only goes disgruntled instead of really going mad, but I'd say their themes are in the same ballpark. This play lacks a lot of the power of Lear, though it's still worth a read. I'd say what it really needs is a more significant end, it just kind of peters out toward the end.

Am I supposed to feel sorry for Titus Andronicus? Because I don't. He clearly doesn't even think of his children as people, and despite the lengths Willy goes to in order to paint Tamora and her kids as villains they have a legitimate basis for revenge against Titus.

This one gets pretty fucked up, even for a Shakespeare play. I want to see a version done by Troma.

I share your opinion of Titus Andronicus. Characters behaving absurdly to provide an excuse to shock the audience.