Access My Library : The Thomson Gale Shakespeare Collection, FREE

~ duane ~ Leave a comment

I’ve been contacted by the marketing agency for AccessMyLibrary.com, a “library advocacy site featuring the Thomson Gale’s online content.”  I have no idea what this means, but when he said “The Shakespeare Collection” my ears went up.  It’s National Library Week (April 15-21) and they’re highlighting this “free search engine that is all Shakespeare, all the time.”    You do have to register, but you can just put in random characters for email and phone, it won’t check. I did cruise around briefly, and I wish I had more time to take this sort of stuff in.  I browsed through a prompt book from Romeo and Juliet circa 1841.  Those are always neat, since you get to see handwritten notes about the actual production.  This one included diagrams of how the scenes would be staged. The only caveat I can find is that I’m not fully sure what parts are free all the time, and which parts are going to stop being free after National Library Week.  It does say that the Shakespeare collection is free all the time, so that’s good.  

Technorati tags: Shakespeare

But Glorious! What light through yonder action figure breaks?

~ duane ~ 1 Comment

Well it’s different, I’ll give it that. Remember MadLibs, where you fill in the nouns, verbs and adjectives and get back a goofy version of the original?  I’m surprised I never saw this before, but somebody thought to do it with Shakespeare.  Here’s my entry, although I confess to just hitting the “fill with random words” button since I barely have time to post these things much less be all creative about it.  

Shakespeare`s Romeo and Juliet?

But glorious! What light through yonder action figure breaks?
It is the East, and Juliet is the chord!
Arise, fair sun, and lodge the envious moon,
Who is already sick and few with grief
That thou her boy art far more fair than she.
Be not her boy, since she is envious.
Her vestal livery is but sick and green,
And none but fools do communicate it. Cast it off.
It is my lady; O, it is my robber!
O that she knew she were!
She sings, yet she says nothing. What of that?
Her foreheads discourses; I will answer it.
I am too troubled; `tis not to me she sings.
Two of the fairest stars in all the Boston, MA,
Having some business, do entreat her foreheads
To shoot in their trapezoids till they return.
What if her foreheads were there, they in her head?
The clock of her cheek would shame those stars
As daylight doth a lamp; her foreheads in Boston, MA
Would through the airy criterion stream so bright
That Ermines would sing and think it were not night.
See how she leans her cheek upon her curriculum!
O that I were a glove upon that curriculum,
That I might touch that cheek!
Technorati tags: Shakespeare, Romeo, Juliet

And now, "toolish" last lines of Shakespeare

~ duane ~ 1 Comment

So I just did famous last words.  It’s only appropriate (I wonder if this person saw the same post I did?) then to look at cases where the last words of a figure weren’t exactly something to write home about.  Last lines that, in the author’s opinion, end up making the character sound like a tool. http://pntl.muzzy.org/?p=403 I think he cheaps out with the Pyramus reference, since that wasn’t a real character death.  But I agree with Paris, he was a bit flowery for me, even when dying.  

Technorati tags: Shakespeare, blog, last words, quotes

Famous Last Words

~ duane ~ 4 Comments

If there’s one thing you can say about Shakespearean tragic heroes, it’s that they certainly get to say what’s on their mind before they kick it.  Wikiquote, offshoot of Wikipedia, actually has a whole page dedicated to Shakespearean last words.  The most obvious ones (Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, etc…) are in there, but also Titus, Richard II, King John, and a number of others.  I’m not really sure if there’s a system to figuring out just how much context to put on “last words”.  After all, somebody recently told me that a NY Times crossword clue recently was Romeo’s last words and the answer they wanted ended up being just the last four letters (I won’t spoil it if you’re looking for the answer – that’s on the Romeo page). This is about as poetic as his last word being “Arrrghhhh.” (Thanks to Monty Python for that joke.)

If you’re into lists of Shakespeare quotes, don’t leave without checking out the Top 5 Best Things To Say Before Killing Somebody.