Loyal readers may remember a post I made last summer called “Illustrating Shakespeare with Paper” about the new “Signature Shakespeare” series from Barnes and Noble.  Well the kind folks at Sterling Publishing (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Barnes and Noble) were generous enough to send me all *4* different editions (Hamlet, Much Ado, Romeo and Juliet and Macbeth) and I’M GIVING THEM AWAY!

I’ve got Romeo and Juliet here in front of me.  These are serious volumes, hardcover, weighing in at almost 400 pages.  These are the kind of books that make you think about the old days where you’d have an entire bookshelf with nothing but volumes of the encyclopedia.  How cool would that be, just a shelf consisting of beautiful hardcover illustrated editions of all the plays?  Want.

Do you know what these are?  These are essentially textbooks you might carry around in support of your college class.  There’s a good 50 pages of introductory material to lead off, and then we dig patiently into the play itself, spread out with one page of notes/glossary for every page of text (where there’s not enough to note, you get illustrations ;))  The scenes themselves are presented patiently, with ample wide space for easy reading.  Act 3 Scene 1, as a random example, spreads itself out over 20 pages.

Over and above the ample notes distributed throughout the text, there’s an additional “Longer Notes” section in the appendix, as well as essays on how the text has been edited over the years.  (These are of course notes about a single edition, but I am assuming that the series all take a similar structure).

What catches everybody’s eye, however, is the illustrations.  It’s not even fair to call them mere illustrations, because what they’ve done here is to take the artwork of Kevin Stanton and produce laser-cut multicolor versions that really have to be seen to be appreciated (there are images at the above link to the artist’s web page).  Haven’t we all folded up a piece of paper, make a few cutouts, and produced snowflakes?  Now imagine that a snip here and a snip there and when you unfold it you’ve got the balcony scene, or the nightingale scene, or the swordfight.  Honestly I’m scared to keep these for myself, because I’d never let my children touch them.  I do wish that they’d come up some some tougher stock for the cutouts, they feel as if they could rip at the slightest page turn.

Which poses a dilemma, because earlier I said that these would make perfect college textbooks.  But the wear and tear that such use would put on them would almost certainly destroy the artwork.  I almost want a coffee table book that truly showcases Stanton’s work, something that I can put out for my guests to enjoy. That way I can feel comfortable about the textbook portion, flipping pages at will, making notes in the margins, without feeling like I’m destroying a piece of art.

HOW DO I WIN ONE?

As I said I have 4 books to giveaway.  Since it is Shakespeare’s Birthday today and I’m going to make several dozen posts, here’s the rules:

• Make a comment on any of today’s (April 23) posts.  The more comments you make, the more entries you can have into the contest (up to a max of 1 comment per post!) Since this contest no doubt will go up earlier in the day don’t forget to come back and make more comments as more posts go up!
• Email me with your username (so I can find your comments) and your preference for which book you’d like.  I make no promises that I’ll be able to satisfy first choices, so please provide your first and second choice.
• Entries must be in the continental US, I’m afraid. As always I’m shipping these out of my own pocket, and this time in particular it’s going to be a strain on  ye olde piggy bank. These things are heavy!
• Contest ends midnight eastern standard time on Sunday April 28 (which happens to be *my* birthday).
• I’ll choose 4 winners at random, and try my best to get everybody their first choice.

Any questions or clarifications please feel free to contact me! As always I must reserve the right to modify the contest in the event of any stupid mistakes, oversights or ambiguities on my part that require clarification.  That’s never been a problem in the past, though I feel obligated to say it each time.

Ok, we good?  Get commenting!

This year’s Shakespeare Day Celebration is sponsored in part by Shakespeare Is Universal: Shakespeare truly is for everyone, and nothing demonstrates that sentiment better than his most famous quote of all, translated here into languages from around the world.   In celebration of Shakespeare’s birthday, show that you believe his works are just as relevant, powerful and important as they’ve ever been!

I tagged this blog post because I wanted to see how seriously the author took the question.  Is it one big self-fulfilling answer?  Plays are popular because we learned them all in school, but we learned them in school because they are more popular?  We recognize them because we’ve heard the quotes and seen the movies – but they’re quotable because they’re popular, not popular because they’re quotable.

There doesn’t seem to be a “right” answer.  There are certainly many contributing factors:

* Some plays, just like some books and movies, are better than others.  Everybody’s seen Star Wars, but only hardcore George Lucas fans have sought out THX-1138.  And before James Cameron had The Terminator, he had to deal with Piranha 2 : The Spawning.

* The reasons that some plays are taught more than others has nothing to do with their popularity. Julius Caesar, for instance, is often found in the school system primarily because there’s no sex humor in it for teachers to deal with (unlike Romeo and Juliet).

* Some plays are harder to produce (be it on stage, or screen).  Isn’t Antony and Cleopatra famous for having literally dozens of characters onstage at a time?

I know that there’s no single answer, but I wonder if one side contributes more to the equation than the other.  There are certainly practical issues that cause some plays to be more accessible than others, which in turn will result in more people knowing about those plays, which will result in stronger reinforcement of references from those plays.   That might be about 90% of the reason that we can all do large parts of Romeo and Juliet from memory. It’s because we’ve been beaten over the head with it since high school.

So then what about King Lear?  It’s not as frequently read in high schools.  You don’t see as many movie adaptations.  There is no balcony scene or dude dressed in black talking to a skull that stands out as the iconic scene from this one.  But if you know what the play is at all, you’re likely to agree that it’s the Mt. Everest of Shakespeare’s work.

I’ve always thought that (this will sound cheesy) Shakespeare comes to you when you’re ready for it.  Julius Caesar is an early starting point when students are already studying these real characters from ancient Rome.  And oh hey look at that, Romeo and Juliet pops up when you’re most likely to be your own lovestruck teenager.  Hamlet and his existential crisis hits around college age when you ask your own “Why am I here?” questions.  And Lear?  Lear takes a lifetime to understand.  I know that I couldn’t appreciate it 20 years ago.  Now, as a father (of daughters especially) I can begin to understand it.  Only much later in my life as I approach my retirement and ultimate death will I see it from an even deeper angle.  But there’s no way that your average high school student will *get* that.  Am I making sense?

This year’s Shakespeare Day Celebration is sponsored in part by Shakespeare Is Universal: Shakespeare truly is for everyone, and nothing demonstrates that sentiment better than his most famous quote of all, translated here into languages from around the world.   In celebration of Shakespeare’s birthday, show that you believe his works are just as relevant, powerful and important as they’ve ever been!

You likely know by now that legendary film critic Roger Ebert has lost his battle with cancer and is at long last reunited with his partner Gene Siskel who passed away a good number of years ago.  In tribute I went through his review archives to see what he had to say about Shakespeare on film.

Kenneth Branagh’s Hamlet

“…long but not slow, deep but not difficult, and it vibrates with the relief of actors who have great things to say, and the right ways to say them….Branagh’s version moved me, entertained me and made me feel for the first time at home in that doomed royal court.”

http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19970124/REVIEWS/701240303/1023

Ok, then, what about Hamlet 2?

“The problem with a sequel to Hamlet is that everybody interesting is dead by the end. That doesn’t discourage Dana Marschz, a Tucson high school drama teacher, from trying to save the school’s theater program with a sequel named “Hamlet 2.” … he brings back the dead characters, plus Jesus, Einstein and the very much alive Hillary Clinton.”

http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080821/REVIEWS/331

A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Whether you’re a follower of Harold Bloom or not, how cool is it that a movie critic can drop his name like that?

“Why is Shakespeare so popular with filmmakers when he contains so few car chases and explosions? Because he is the measuring stick by which actors and directors test themselves. His insights into human nature are so true that he has, as Bloom argues in his book, actually created our modern idea of the human personality. Before Hamlet asked, “to be, or not to be?,” dramatic characters just were. Ever since, they have known and questioned themselves. Even in a comedy like “Midsummer,” there are quick flashes of brilliance that help us see ourselves. “What fools these mortals be,” indeed.”

http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19990514/REVIEWS/905140304/1023

Much Ado about Much Ado

“…this is not a film “of” a Shakespeare play, but a film that begins with the same materials and the wonderful language and finds its own reality. It is cheerful from beginning to end.”

http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19930521/REVIEWS/305210302

Twefth Night, or, Did I Mention Romeo+Juliet Sucks?

For years now I’ve had “Speak publicly, in person, on the subject of Shakespeare” on my bucket list.  All of the online stuff I do is fun, don’t get me wrong, but it doesn’t push the boundaries.  I can write whatever I want without fear of real time critique or, pardon the expression, eff ups.

But also there’s an element of recognition that comes with this goal.  I have to be invited to do it, and I have to have a crowd that apparently thinks it’s useful to listen to me.  I suppose I could just grap a soap box and go down to Quincy Market and do my thing, but then I’m a street performer, and ironically enough if I go down that path I’m more likely to do the mime thing.

I digress.  My pal Bardfilm, who some of you might know is a college professor in real life, invited me to speak (via Skype) to his Modern Shakespearean Fiction class, specifically on the subject of adaptation, but also on the bigger and broader question of why Shakespeare? which I’ll get to in a moment.

It was fun!   A very polite, attentive and articulate class who looked like they were actually paying attention to what I said (and most importantly laughed at my jokes :)).  I suppose my standards were a little wonky as my only previous experience at this point has been reading to my kids’ elementary school classes and most of them have the attention span of elementary school students.  It was a pleasure today to speak at a higher level, to feel like I was understood, and to have some actual question and answer time that seemed productive.

Asked to choose a modern adaptation to discuss I picked the opening scene(s) from King Lear compared to A Thousand Acres starring Jason Robards. When asked why that adaptation of that scene I explained that quite honestly 10 Things and She’s The Man have been done to death, and I was far more interested in tackling the “Everest” of Shakespeare.

One of the issues of adaptation that came up is the idea of how much Shakespeare you need to retain in your adaptation.  We spoke of the Lion King and the idea that “the son avenges the father” is always a deliberate Hamlet adaptation, or if instead of the idea of Hamlet has become embedded in our consciousness as a story archetype like Cinderella or Star Wars (“hero’s journey”) or, I suppose, Romeo and Juliet.

I think to score on that point, though, you need to keep more than just some plot and character.  You need to keep the essence of the story.  My Thousand Acres story goes out of its way to include all the characters, even making them all share a first initial.  But within that first scene, the Lear character shows no heartbreak over the betrayal of his youngest daughter, and we learn quickly that this particular story has no interest in telling the Cordelia/Lear story, this adaptation wants to write a Regan/Goneril story.  Which is fine, if that’s what it wants to be – but I’ll lose interest very rapidly.

This post is getting long and it’s getting so I’m going to deal with the bigger “Why Shakespeare?” question in a later post.

Thanks to Professor Bardfilm and his class for having me! Thanks for staying awake and not spending all the time on your cellphones.