Month: January 2007

I blogged about The Shakespeare Chronicles when it first came out.  It’s the story of a Professor Quandary, a meek little man who happens to trip upon the discovery of all time, the true author of Shakespeare’s works.  “Eh,” I thought, “I’ll pick it up, just to see if there’s any new theories that might be interesting.” Well, within the first few dozen pages I was ready to put it down and call it a day.  No real surprise – it’s Edward de Vere.  He doesn’t pick somebody that we’ve never heard of.  It’s something of a disappointment, and I definitely moved through some pages at the beginning saying, “That’s it?  Surely there has to be more than that.  It’s hardly like the de Vere theory is revolutionary.” Ah, but see, here’s the twist.  Dear Professor Quandary is nuts.  As in, a bonafide paranoid schizophrenic.  He speaks of himself in the third person, often referring to the Changes as an always capitalized event in his life that caused his true self to shine through.  There’s one point in the middle that I won’t spoil where I literally had to pause and say “Wait a second, he just did what?? That’s … well, crazy.” It is this “altered” Quandary who goes off on the path of discovery.  Think about that.  A paranoid schizophrenic who finds himself on the path of one of the great all time conspiracy theories.  And he thinks he’s solved it.  It actually becomes quite fascinating to read the progression as the story becomes less about Shakespeare and more about how his insanity progresses, all in the name of Shakespeare.  He sees evidence of his theory quite literally everywhere.  Everything you’ve ever heard all fits nicely into place.  The sonnets in particular are quoted heavily as keys to the puzzle.  Yes, there are new theories, it’s not just “deVere wrote them, that’s that.”  But as they’re revealed, you realize they’re being revealed by a nutcase.  So…does that mean that they’re incorrect?  Even if they make sense? So overall, I’m quite pleased.  Not quite finished yet, on about 160 out of 200 pages, and it’s dragging a bit.  But unlike the beginning where I was ready to give up on it, he’s now got my trust enough that something fascinating still has plenty of time to happen, and I’m anxious to see it through to the end.

I’ve finally worked my way through Jasper Fforde’s “Thursday Next” series to get to the one I’ve wanted. Something Rotten has Hamlet as a main character. For those not familiar with the plot of these novels they involve a rather odd sort of literary / scifi combo where detectives are charged with “bookjumping” themselves from reality right into the text of a book to prevent people from doing things like kidnapping characters, changing the ending, and so on. It’s really quite imaginative stuff. Throughout the series he has always stayed near the edges of Shakespeare – in book one, for instance, he introduces the notion of the Baconians as crazies who come door to door trying to convince people who the real author of Shakespeare’s works is :). And a later book (I think it was the second) is entirely centered around someone who claims to have found the text to the infamous lost work, Cardenio. I believe at one point someone is even arrested for the crime of overdramatically portraying Richard III. But this time Hamlet is an actual character in the play. And he has hopped out of the play and into reality. I’ve just started the book, but already I like it. One of Hamlet’s first actual pieces of dialogue is to explain how he wants to talk to people about what they think of him and his motivations, because he himself is confused. He gives the example that he’s supposed to be oh so very religious, but then he comes out with a line like “for there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so,” which Hamlet points out is a pretty atheistic thing to say. Man’s got a point. I’m anxious to see how this one goes. I wish I’d found it on audiobook, I’d get through it much faster, but I’ll take what I can get.  

Just heard it pointed out on the Penn Jillette radio show that “We hold these truths to be self-evident” is iambic pentameter.  Neat.  He kept calling it “perfect” iambic pentameter, because his co-host kept trying to pitch a 10-syllable sentence as iambic pentameter as well.  He kept saying that he was doing the whole thing with the emphasis on the syllables.  That’d be the iambic part :).

Ok, no fair putting the rest of us to shame.  Hot on the heels of my post yesterday about donations for Shakespeare’s crumbling church we have the story of the anonymous person who donated $1 million to the Baltimore Shakespeare Festival.    They’re going to use the interest alone, $40k/yr,  to handle their operating costs.  Nice.  

I am just painfully late on the whole “Shakespeare’s church is crumbling” story, and for that I apologize.  I’ve seen it, many times, but circumstances haven’t allowed me to give it the attention it deserves.  Quite honestly if I stop to think about it, it makes me sad.  It’s not like Shakespeare is buried in the Sistine Chapel or Westminster Abbey or something.  This is just a little church that happens to be a big part of history, and it’s falling apart. This USA Today story finally got my attention because it has a plan for doing something and not just saying “Oh woe are we, we need about a zillion dollars or the poor building is going to collapse around poor Shakespeare’s bones.”  Apparently the Friends of Shakespeare’s Churchthey’re trying out the slogan “adopt a gargoyle”.  I’m disappointed that the story does not explain what exactly that means.  Do I get a picture of my gargoyle?  A plaque with my name on it?  Something? Anybody have more information on the story?  Places to send money, and so on?  The Friends link above takes you to the central organization that’s doing all the money raising.