To be fair, Shakespeare is basically Hitler. Mein Kampf is just a penny dreadful with floral language.
You compared people who like Shakespear and those who support Hitler and Trump and implied there was an overlap with both being stupid. Either you didn't think it through, or you purposefully meant to insult people.
The words he made up - people tend to forget a lot of those had actually been mentioned in early works, the Greeks, the Romans, and Shakespeare merely made them famous, and just as many were actually being used at the time, but Shakespeare was the first to write them down. Macbeth, yes, that's one of the few with a deeper plot, but really the same idea/theme could be written today and would be nothing more than another wannabe intellectual trying to come across as deep and falling a bit short with something bland like that. But he's Shakespeare, so everything he writes is automatically genius and the first of its kind, right? And they really are the penny dreadfuls of his time. Have you ever read or seen Twelfth Night? It is literally an airport romance novel with some fancy language - long lost siblings and unrequited love and all. I wasn't comparing people who like Shakespeare to Hitler and Trump supporters. At what point did I say that? I was just pointing out that simply because something has mass followers doesn't mean it's great or amazing.
Why would you reference Hitler, Trump, and stupid people, if you did not intend a comparison? You could literally have wrote "Majority does not equal correct", and it would have a much clearer meaning, without adding Hitler into it.
Saying majority does not equal correct doesn't really sound the same though, does it? And there's no proof, I could say whatever the hell I want but that won't make it real unless I add genuine historical examples. Hitler and Trump are just examples, and I'll add them into whatever sentence I want. Anyway, this isn't a thread about Hitler and Trump, it's about Shakespeare, so no need to get offended about it. If it really means that much to you though, I had no intention of calling Shakespeare fans stupid and I'm sorry if you interpreted it that way.
It doesn't sound the same because you wouldn't have referenced someone who committed genocide, or who is supported by the KKK. You could have referenced something like 50 Shades of Grey, which was read by a lot of people but most think is poorly written.
I'm not talking about words, I'm talking about phrases. Things like 'all that glitters is not gold' that have passed into common usage. I doubt very much that phrase came from an earlier Greek or Roman work, but even if it was, what does it matter? There's skill in translation. That he took some of his plots from other works is pretty common knowledge, if that's what you mean, but every writer reuses plots. Shakespeare's lasted because of the way he delivered those plots - his language and how he draws his characters. I suspect the same idea/theme is written today all the time. Lust for power is hardly a unique plot driver. The idea is nothing, the execution is where the value is. That is exactly what I meant every time I said The Tempest is dull, yes. I haven't read Twelfth Night. But if it is an airport novel, that doesn't say he was less skilled as a writer to me. That says he was capable of turning his hand to writing like that and writing like Macbeth, and doing both in a way that people enjoy. That shit is hard.
Right, I told myself I wouldn't get involved but nobody is allowed to say that about the Twelfth Night. For one thing, it's more about humour than romance, two, Shakespeare must be doing something right because I don't like romance. This play is not about lost siblings, it's about a bunch of people who are all self-centred idiots who don't take no for an answer. Also, they're not 'long lost', the siblings grew up together and that phrasing implies otherwise. This play is funny not romantic. Airport books are mushy, this isn't mushy. It involves a man wearing yellow stockings, cross-gartered, if you compared it to something like Some like it Hot I would be more understanding. Oh gosh, I'm sorry, I'm going on a bit. I'm really sorry. For this play to endure so long and all his other works, he must be doing something right. You may not like it, it may not be to your tastes but that doesn't make him good or bad. He just isn't your cup of tea. Like how cups of tea aren't mine. My rant is over, I'm sorry. I will try not to have one again.
Hamlet is probably Shakespeare's richest play, both in plot and theme. The only problem I had with Hamlet, was that besides two lines in the play that put him at 30 years old, he doesn't behave at all like a grown man. Even then, it seems every production of the play, it's a much more mature actor who plays Hamlet. Usually much older than 30. Reading the play it feels as though he's perhaps 20, 25 tops.
You started the thread entirely to bash works that you know many people love, and what's more you didn't do it in a way that expressed an academic interest in the subject matter or a genuine desire to learn from people what they saw in the work, but in a way that ridiculed and denigrated the body of work and its admirers. That's known colloquially as a 'dick move.' The Law of First Dicks states a causal connection between the first dick in an internet forum thread and subsequent bad behavior. According to the mathematics I've just derived from first principles (and can't share here without taking up a few dozen pages of posts and leaving you standing amazed), the "First Dick" in this thread is: Spoiler: Big Reveal Yes, the OP, who can't now complain that people are being insulting, having...er...unclean hands.
Fair point. But unless you yourself are Shakespeare and I'm criticizing your works, I'm not insulting anybody. Is it an insult to tell someone who likes coffee that I think coffee is gross? Twelfth Night is not funny at all. It's funny like someone saying the word poop makes a bunch of five year olds giggle. Which is exactly the point I made in the original post; Shakespeare's humor is about the same kind of humor they might use in a modern sitcom today. There's nothing about Malvolio prancing around in cross-garters that's any funnier than something literally any other author could have done much more subtly. Shakespeare's is that blunt, in-your-face humor that anyone could write, it takes a good author to write something genuinely funny with some thought put into it; what Shakespeare did with the cross-garters is no different to some sitcom writer having a character show up at a party thinking it's a fancy dress party. And you're right, Twelfth Night isn't airport novel, it's more of a soap opera.
No. But it's an insult to tell someone they're fuckin' stupid for liking coffee because it's the "cheap subway sandwich of beverage."
I agree. He's a college student, after all, and back then, boys went to college a lot younger. EDIT: Unless he was what we called a Perpetual Student. (We actually had a 33-year-old who lived in my dorm. But we had a very weird dorm.)
I had the privilege of teaching Shakespeare's "Sonnet No. 29" to three sections of 8th graders day before yesterday. I think at least two of the classes got it.
I never said Shakespeare's admirers were stupid; if that were the case, I'd be calling the entire world imbeciles.
If I'm reading you correctly (I am), you compared those who supported Hitler and Trump to those who like Shakespeare. refer to the bolded portion of your message. And it doesn't necessarily take those actual words (which you said) to know that your tone implies that you think you're right and everyone else is stupid.
Ah, okay. Well, I worded that very incorrectly and didn't really have the intention of calling Shakespeare fans stupid. Like I said, if that were the case, the earth would be populated by idiots. My tone doesn't imply anything, I'm simply saying what I think; it's not an insult to anyone but Shakespeare that I think Shakespeare's writing is crap, and if my tone comes across as calling everyone stupid, you're interpreting my words incorrectly. I can think I'm right and others are wrong, but wrong doesn't necessarily equal stupid.
I think that you would do better not to state your judgements of taste as absolute and universal fact.
Wow ... it's almost like people can have differing perspectives and opinions about art. Crazy how that works.
No, I really wouldn't. Because there are bad writers and there are good writers - no one is going to look at a four year old's writing and call them a literary genius. The four year old is a bad writer (compared to adults) and that isn't a matter of taste. And if someone is a bad writer, that's just a fact; some people simply don't have a way with words. Shakespeare is a bad writer. It's not a matter of taste.
Are you even listening to yourself? That is not a fact. That is your opinion. o·pin·ion əˈpinyən/ noun a view or judgment formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge. fact fakt/ noun a thing that is indisputably the case. See the difference there?
OK, I no longer believe that you're at all serious. This level of arrogance in believing that your opinion is synonymous with The Truth is simply not believable. Troll away.
