What Comics Can Take From Shakespeare

~ duane ~ Leave a comment
I tagged this article by John Ostrander without knowing who he is.  I gathered from a quick skim that he is an author of comic books, who cites Shakespeare as one of his influences.  I like that.  I’m reminded of last week’s Ben Kingsley story where he said that he “Brings a little Shakespeare into everything he does.”  Which in turn reminds me of the great Martin Luther King’s quote about, and I will paraphrase this because I’ve got to get back to the topic at hand, “If you are called to sweep streets, then sweep streets like Shakespeare wrote poetry.” Amen, Dr. King.

Anyway, where was I?  Oh, yeah, John Ostrander on what the comics can take from Shakespeare. The fact that he uses Measure for Measure as his primary example shows that there’s going to be some depth to his argument, he’s not just pulling high school memories of Hamlet or Romeo and Juliet and doing little but name dropping our dear bard.  Mr. Ostrander’s apparently thought a lot about this.

A brief excerpt:

Explore all sides of the question. What did Shakespeare think on any given question? It’s hard to tell because he would give convincing arguments to both (or more) sides of a question.

He then uses the example of Claudio preparing for his possible death, first speaking with the Duke and accepting it, but then turning around and telling his sister Isabella how much he fears it.

Which attitude speaks Shakespeare’s true mind? 

Both. Both are true, to the moment, to the character, to the author, and for the reader or audience. It comes down to which is truer for us and that was Shakespeare’s intent or what I learned from it. Shakespeare had a many faceted mind and he used it in his work.

That’s just one of several points he makes (although, to be temper my original praise, his point about Hamlet seems a little thin.)

Oh, and before I wrote this I had to google Mr. Ostrander so that I didn’t get schooled by the comic geeks in the audience for not knowing him.  Turns out he’s not only done time with Marvel and DC, he’s contributed to the Star Wars universe as well.  Looks like his Shakespeare lessons have been serving him well!

Iago Does Not Exist

~ duane ~ 3 Comments

I love a good “Hey look at Shakespeare *this* way” theory, and the TV Tropes brought me some new ones to play with. Hat tip to Michigan Shakespeare Festival for posting about this on their Facebook page!

How about the idea that Iago doesn’t exist?  That he is just the personification of the individual evil side of each character?

He’s the incarnation of that voice within every person’s mind, which is why it’s so easy for him to trick everyone into believing what he says. He’s not saying it — they’re thinking it. Emilia is just a klepto with self-esteem issues; Othello is suffering from paranoia (or, if you hold that his seizures are real, he’s also having epileptic hallucinations); Roderigo is generally unstable; Cassio has a serious drinking problem… the list goes on.

Now, obviously we’re out of the realm of what Shakespeare may have actually intended – there’s no way he had the narrative to even think of something like this.  But in terms of modern interpretation, could you pull this off?  I wonder whether some sort of weird version could be made where there is no Iago character, but instead each of the characters listed above takes turns reciting Iago’s appropriate lines as if schizophrenic.

How many scenes does Iago have by himself?

There’s a few more good theories on that page (like Horatio being a hired assassin sent by Fortinbras) that maybe we’ll get to another time.

This Geek Hath Had Good Counsel — A HUNDRED SHIRTS!

~ duane ~ 1 Comment

If you didn’t see the email, or the Facebook posts, or the Twitter tweets… our Shakespeare is Universal campaign has reached its goal, with 3 days to spare!  If you’re one of those 100 you will get your shirt, and thank you from the bottom of my heart for joining our cause.  As I wrote in a previous email this wasn’t just an opportunity to go fishing for funds, this was a bit of a crisis of faith on my part, and I’d really convinced myself that if after all these years I couldn’t find an audience of 100 people who were willing to make a real world commitment to what we were trying to do here?  Let’s just say I was seriously thinking about how I’d be spending my time going forward.

BUT!  That’s all in the past, because you do like Shakespeare, you really really like Shakespeare, and I am a very happy geek heading off into the weekend.  I will stop checking my dashboard every 3 minutes like I’ve been doing for the last 3 weeks, and I will sleep soundly.

Thanks again.

Please note that the campaign does not officially end until sometime Monday afternoon (the page actually has a counter), so if you planned on buying a shirt you still have time to do so.  Of course you won’t get to ride the rollercoaster that we all just did of not knowing whether they’d ever exist!  You’ll just know you’re getting yours.  And that’s ok, too.  Shakespeare for everybody!

Happy Shakespeare Mother’s Day!

~ duane ~ 3 Comments

In honor of our moms, this week we imagine what Mother’s Day cards might have been like from Shakespeare’s characters.  Shakespeare is a bit like Disney in not giving us very many mothers to work with, but we do our best.

Happy Mother’s Day!

“Dearest Mother, I can not begin to tell you how thankful I am that you did not pluck your nipple from my toothless gums and dash my brains out.” 

“Mom, I know you don’t always like to express just how much you care about me, but I know you do because you died of grief at the end of our play.  Offstage of course.  Love, Romeo.” 

“To The Woman Who Raised Me As If I Were Her Own Daughter,   I’m totally crushing on your son Bertram, could help me hook that up?” 

“What would I do for you, Mother?  I would spare Rome, even if you did embarrass me in front of Aufidius and his friends.” 

“For A Wonderful Mother-In-Law on Mother’s Day.  Sorry about the Tybalt thing Mrs. Capulet, I totally understand why you tried to have me executed.” 

“You Are The Queen, Your Husband’s Brother’s Wife, and Would It Were Not So You Are My Mother.  Happy Mother’s Day. “

Clandestine Geekery

~ duane ~ Leave a comment

Waiting in line at the bank today, one woman spots somebody else she knows and they have a mini-reunion. I don’t catch the names but it’s not long before I hear #1 say to #2, “Are you still doing any theatre or music?”

My ears perk up.  Theatre?  I suppose they coud mean musical theatre.

#2 replies, among other things, “Right now I’m working with the Burlington Players…”

I pull out my phone and google the 2013-2014 for the Burlington Players to see if there’s any Shakespeare on the bill, giving me a wide open excuse to invite myself into the conversation (and look like a complete stalker).

Alas there is not.  39 Steps. Dirty Rotten Scoundrels.  Although I do spot (later) that their teen program did something called “Reviving Ophelia.”

<shrug>  That’s the kind of geekery I do for you folks.  I smell even the hint of something Shakespeare to talk about and I’m all over it. 😉

The Shakespeare Geek blog has been around since 2005, making it the oldest continually active Shakespeare blog today. Shakespeare is Universal represents our biggest fund-raising effort to date. For almost eight years and almost three thousand posts I’ve tried my best to make a place where everyone can talk about everything related to the subject of Shakespeare. If you’ve found my sites and products useful and interesting, I would greatly appreciate your support so that I can continue to do even more. Thank you.