During my quest for a bit of jewelry, I did find several vendors that do customized versions of those “silicone bracelets” that everybody wears these days.  You know the kind, often yellow, rubbery looking, with some sort of cause or charity emblazoned on it.  Popularized by Lance Armstrong’s cancer foundation, though now you see them all over the place with all sorts of colors and sayings.  Hence, I suppose, companies that do customized versions of them :). I’m tempted to get a few done up with some Shakespearean sentiment – maybe a quote, maybe just some character names.  Live Like Falstaff :).  Would my other Shakespeare geeks out there actually wear such a thing, or would I be a total loser?  I’m not planning to go into business or anything — if anything I’d end up doing them as promotional items or something.  I don’t want to waste the time and money having them made only to have people say “That’s stupid.” Too whorey?

http://www.holytaco.com/2008/06/03/the-10-most-worthless-college-majors/ In this humorous list of “worst majors if you want to actually get a job”, English Lit comes in fourth behind Latin, Film and Religion.

(I prefer to spell it “Moebius”, by the way, since there’s an accented character in the middle, but the search engines tell me most people spell it the less complicated way.) Recently I mentioned my quest for a Shakespearean Mobius bracelet.  I noticed them a year or so ago when looking for a gift for my wife.  First I thought about a pendant of some sort, but when I saw the bracelet, especially with the “infinity twist”, I loved it.  It helps that by writing on both sides of the bracelet you can also get a very long quote, something not as possible with a simple pendant.  But I loathe that dreaded Sonnet 116 (“Let me not to the marriage of true minds….”)  Using that sonnet in your wedding is like believing in Buddhism because Brad Pitt does.  There’s a 154 of them to choose from, surely you can find one that’s more personal. Long story short (read the linked post), I was told that a personalized version can’t exist.  The machinery to make them means essentially that if you’re not making them by the thousand, you’re out of luck.  I’ve continued to hunt, if not for this than for something similar.  I found one supplier (via this blog) who sent me along to her manufacturer, who told me that they only work with “companies with a catalog.”  So I went back to the first supplier and asked if they’d consider putting this piece in their catalog just so I could buy one :).  I haven’t heard back and don’t expect to. But guess what?  I ACTUALLY FOUND SOMEBODY TO DO IT!  I’m very excited.  I hit upon their web page which showed a blank Mobius bracelet, with a note “engraving available, contact for details.”  So I did, and basically explained the situation: “I’ve been informed by numerous jewelers that engraving one of these is impossible, so I’m assuming that by offering engraving what you mean is a short quote that only goes on one side and does not take the twist into account.” I got back a note the same day saying “Nope, we do both sides, right through the twist.  What do you need?” Woohoo!  I actually get a whopping 270 characters to play with, which is way too long for my mandatory quote (“If I could write the beauty of your eyes….”) but too short for the whole first half (“Who will believe my verse in time to come….”) by a good 10 characters or so.  So instead I’ve sprinkled it with several choice quotes, including “I will swear I love thee infinitely” which Alan and Bill were nice enough to validate for me as being something appropriate for a gift.  How do you not love an infinity quote on a Mobius strip?  Or is that just me being a geeky geek? My timing couldn’t be better (he said ironically) as the jeweler left for vacation yesterday and won’t be back until next week.  So it’s still a good month or so until I get to see my finished product.  I have avoided linking their site, because well, you know, I haven’t actually seen the finished product yet and I did have a number of people tell me it’s impossible.  So there’s at least a slight worry on my part that I’m going to be disappointed. When it arrives I’ll be sure to take pictures so everybody can see it.  At the time I’ll definitely rant and rave and provide links, hopefully in good context :).  It should end up as an anniversary present, though my anniversary is at the end of September and I’m not sure I’ll be able to keep the secret that long.

Ok, here’s a question.  I’ve admitted my weak knowledge of Henry IV.  For a project I’m doing I wanted a Shakespeare quote on infinity, and I found a great one — “I will swear I love thee infinitely.” Here’s the thing, I would like to know the character of the man who says it (Hotspur, in this case, to his wife).  Surely right now, somewhere in the world, somebody is using a Shakespeare quote out of context.  And just as surely I could use it as I see fit, for a gift, and the recipient would be none the wiser.  But you people know me by now, and you know that it would bug the ever-living heck out of me, it would just tarnish the present forever, if I knew that in context it was something shallow or sarcastic. So, I’m asking.  Does Hotspur mean it?  Does he indeed have a loving relationship with his wife?  Or is he just saying “Yes yes you silly woman I’ll tell you whatever you want to hear, just let me get on my horse and get out of here!” I still have Chimes At Midnight, and am looking at the scene right now. I think he’s sincere.  But I’m not familiar with the play enough to have confidence in that opinion.  Anybody help me out?

Imagine you’re in school again.  You’re a teenager.  For the sake of argument let’s assume you’re also a girl (bear with me :)) You are handed a copy of Cinderella (the text, not the movie!) and told this is what we’ll be studying this semester.  There will be a final exam. What do you do?  Groan?  Worry?  Whine about how hard it is, how you don’t want to do it, how it’s not relevant to kids these days?  I mean, really, what’s a “ball”?  Sounds dirty.  What exactly does “cinder” mean, anyway, and why is this one girl stuck cleaning them?  Why doesn’t she call DSS if her stepmom is so bad?  I don’t get this story, it makes no sense!  Nobody would do the stuff these people do!  If this girl is old enough to get married to the prince, why doesn’t she go live on her own?  (And so on….) Or do you laugh about it and then never look at the text until the day of the final, where you waltz through all the questions from memory?  After all, it’s a story you grew up on.  Everybody knows this story.  It doesn’t matter that you don’t have to clean the chimney, you can still have days where you think your mom and your big sisters are being mean to you.  And even though fairy godmothers don’t really show up and sing BibbidiBobbidiBoo in real life, it doesn’t stop you from daydreaming about somebody to come along and sweep you off your feet.  It’s a *fairy tale*, after all.  It’s not about the setting or the vocabulary or the specifics, it’s about the bigger picture.  That’s why there’s a cliche about things being “a Cinderella story” and everybody knows what that means. Now tell me why Shakespeare can’t be like that.    Why doesn’t Disney do a movie about The Tempest, and why don’t kids grow up learning the story of how Miranda avoids the monster Caliban, defeats the pirates who try to take the island from her father (with the help of Ariel), meets the prince and sails off to live happily ever after?  The “original” text can come later, just like most children’s experience with Cinderella goes as far as the Disney movie, and only when they are older do they actually get to read “the original”.  (If you want a different example try Wizard of Oz, lots more differences between the original and the movie there). Here’s the big difference that I think is stopping everybody:  Every parent out there who reads Cinderella to their kids, also had Cinderella read to them as a kid.  It’s almost like a privilege, like a gift you can’t wait to share with them.  Most every parent, however, hated Shakespeare in high school, and thus wouldn’t think of exposing their kid to it any sooner than they had to. If I ever get off my butt and write my book (well, technically, to write a book I supposed I would have to in fact sit back down…), it’ll be to solve that problem, right there.  Something to break that cycle.  I could use a little help, Disney!  Are you listening???