Category: Uncategorized

Most of the posts in this category are simply leftovers from a previous era before the site had categories. Over time I plan to reduce that number to zero and remove this category. Until then, here they are. I had to put something in the box.

Review : Pocket Posh Shakespeare, from The Puzzle Society

~ duane ~ Leave a comment


I love a good puzzle. Even got dragged to one of those puzzler’s league conventions, once. And everything’s better with Shakespeare, right? (Seems like there’s a Bacon joke in there somewhere.)

Whenever Andrews McMeel Publishing asked me if I wanted to review a Shakespeare puzzle book from The Puzzle Society, I got all excited. I didn’t think such a thing even existed – as a matter of fact I’d even given thought to seeing if I could piece together and distribute one myself. So I quickly said yes.

What was I expecting? I think, when I think “puzzle book”, I imagine those ubiquitous, cheapy “5000 Sudoku Puzzles!” ones you see at the supermarket checkout for a buck ninety-nine, and I think I was expecting something like that here. So imagine my pleasant surprise when out of the shipping envelope dropped a smaller book that looks exactly like a Moleskine notebook. Hard, textured cover. Strong binding. Even an embedded elastic wrapped around, to keep it closed when you’re not using it. Nice. Quality stuff, here.

The book itself is labelled as having “100 puzzles and quizzes.” What sorts of puzzles? A whole variety:

* Word searches (“Find all these words and characters from Antony and Cleopatra”, or “Find all these cliches that Shakespeare first used”) Both the traditional kind as well as “pathfinders” where each word links up to a new one and you have to find them all in a row.

* Quizzes (ranging from easy (“What did Shakespeare bequeath to his wife Anne in his will?”) to tricky (“Which is the largest female role, by line count?” Your mileage may vary.)

* Crosswords, and multiple variations – Kriss Kross, ArrowWords, etc…

* Codecrackers – one of my favorites, where you’ve got a crossword sort of puzzle where each blank has a number between 1 and 26, and you have to figure out which letter goes with which number. Do it right and spell out a Shakespeare quote.

* A variety of smaller puzzles like a jigsaw puzzle with letters on it, or “word wheels”, or word transformation games (for instance you’re given “drat” and “a light breeze”, so you add an F to get draft)

How’s the Shakespeare? As billed, every puzzle has some Shakespeare in it. I have to be honest, some seem to be phoning it in a bit more than others. A word search where every word is a Macbeth character? Cool. A traditional crossword puzzle, with traditional non-Shakespeare clues, with one little “At the end, the letters in the shaded circles will spell out a Shakespeare character” addition on the end? Not so much.

Here’s my metric for dealing with that – does my knowledge of Shakespeare in some way help me solve the puzzle? If so, then I count it as a win. For instance if I’m supposed to be guessing the name of a Shakespeare character by adding letters based on clues, but I spot right away based on the closing F that the character is Falstaff, then win. Likewise even with the word searches – there’s something exciting about spotting the word Leontes among a scramble of letters that you simply don’t feel when you find a generic word like vehicle or library. This is why I love the code cracker puzzles, because the earlier I recognize the quote, the faster I can fill in the unknown letters. I don’t know about you, but I only ever consider a puzzle done when I’ve filled in all the clues, not just when I got the “special” answer at the end.

With that metric in mind, I’m happy to report that pretty much all these puzzles succeed. The crosswords less so, for reasons described – but even there, you never know if you’re going to get a “movie based on a Shakespeare play” or “a famous actor famous for playing Shakespeare”, so there’s some challenge to it, and some level of surprise.

Downsides? Well, this is a small book. As I did several puzzles I found it very hard to keep the cover curled back and out of the way, holding the book in one hand, while still keeping it firm enough to write in. If I put it down on the table, I think the cover would constantly be trying to get in the way. And though I want to share these puzzles with my kids, the form factor really doesn’t lend itself to sharing. In a big puzzle book we could all put our heads together (literally, sometimes, complete with thunk noise :)) and everybody could do a word search. With such a small book I can maybe let me 8yr old take a crack at some puzzles by herself, but the 4yr old’s not getting his little chocolatey hands on it.

There’s also the potential issue of price. I don’t think this is out yet – the marketing copy said April 2011 – but the price printed on it is $7.99 US. I’m sitting here asking myself, if I was browsing the bookstore and spotted this in the wild, would I have scooped it up at that price? If you’re a puzzling Shakespeare fan who is going to do all the puzzles by yourself, then yes absolutely of course you do. [ While we’re on the subject, if you are in the mind to snap this one up, please consider clicking that Amazon link up there, which is an affiliate link, and helps support Shakespeare Geek. Thanks!

In my case, knowing the above family constraints, I wonder. That’s expensive for a book of puzzles that’s really just for me, not something I can share with the kids. Even though this one is 100% pure Shakespeare, they’d get more value out of one of those $1.99 cheapies at the front of the store with 500 pages in it.

Overall I’m very glad that books like this exist, and I am far happier to see this quality product (granted, at the higher price) than if I’d been handed a ninety-nine cent special that looks like a coloring book. My issue with the price could well be my own personal situation and nothing more. Know what I’d love to see, now that I think about it? Once this book is out, I’d love it if their website had online versions – even printable ones – of a bunch of the puzzles. That would cover my “sharing with the kids” issue completely. If that were the case, then all my reservations would be completely gone.

Now! Anybody know a three letter word, ends with O, Much blank About Nothing….? Hmmm…..

UPDATED  Win this book!   (Contest ends Thursday, March 10)

Multi-Sensory Art

~ duane ~ 1 Comment

What exactly is the nature of art? It’s a big question, no doubt. One that we struggle with constantly, trying to find the line between the value inherent in what Shakespeare gave us, and any given interpretation. Although much the same battle rages every time a cover song comes out — does the cover surpass the original? Can it, ever? Matter of opinion.
So, here’s the thing. I just finished Marco and the Red Granny, the latest podcast from Mur Lafferty. It’s short (7 episodes), it’s complete (so you can get it all at once), and it’s available in ebook if you prefer to read. Highly recommended. In this story, Mur imagined a world where art is multisensory – you see a painting of a thunderstorm and taste hot chocolate with marshmallows. You put on a fancy new shirt and feel the anger of having a fight with your spouse. It’s science fiction, of course. But it’s a fascinating idea.
It was with that story in mind that I returned to this ongoing idea of page and stage, whether reading Shakespeare has value, or whether he must be performed. I compared acting Shakespeare to grabbing some brushes and canvas and trying to paint your own Mona Lisa….but it’s not the same. There’s one Mona Lisa, we can all see it, it doesn’t change.
But is that a good thing? Shakespeare’s words don’t change, but we’re quick to point out that that’s not the same — how you *say* them (and why and where…) always changes, and that’s part of its nature.
Is that the way it should be, or simply the way it is? What if it was different? We’ll never know why Mona Lisa is smiling. What if we did? What if, in Mur’s world, simply looking at the painting could impart to you exactly what she was thinking? What if the very nature of reading Shakespeare’s works made you experience the same rush of emotions that Hamlet does? Technically, I suppose, it does … but in each case it’s merely your own brain doing it for you, it’s not like the creator could leap through his medium and stick those emotions into your brain.
A related example – the invention of film as a medium did not kill theatre. On the contrary, theatre fans are quick to point out all the places where theatre is still superior. When I saw Macbeth? The power went out. Scared us silly. Oh, yeah? Well I saw King Lear during a thunderstorm, it was amazing! I saw Timon of Athens and the person behind me unwrapped hard candy the whole time, I hated it. Film can’t do that.
I’ll give you an even simpler example. Books, particularly old books, smell. eBooks do not. This is enough, in many people’s minds, to brush aside the rise of ebooks and swear that nothing will ever replace a “real” book. In its own way, that is the exact same argument. Where, exactly, is the value in reading a book? Is it to impart the information contained in the words on the page? Or is it the whole multisensory experience associated with how old you were when you read it, what the book looked and smelled like, how it made you feel, etc….?
I don’t know where I”m going with this, really. Bit of a ramble. Trying to decide whether or not our inability to capture all those things is a good thing, a bad thing, or only a matter of time.

Helen Mirren Said What?

~ duane ~ 13 Comments

“Let’s ban Shakespeare,” says Helen Mirren,

Got your attention? šŸ™‚ What she actually said was to ban reading Shakespeare in class, and start taking kids to plays instead. I don’t know that anybody here is going to disagree with that.
At least, not totally ;). I’ve always felt that people feel the need to take sides in the “see, don’t read” war. In truth the answer can only ever be, both. If you see a live show of Hamlet once in your life and never think about it again, consider how little you really got out of it. You probably missed half the dialog. You certainly missed any bits that this particular interpretation chose to excise. And you’re left thinking that Hamlet is a whiny git because this guy happened to play him that way.
See it, yes, *and* read it. Stop with the either/or nonsense. By seeing performance you are doing two things – you are getting closer to the source material, but you are also seeing one particular group’s interpretation of that source material. Here’s the beautiful thing — every time you see it? The first bit remains the same, you get closer to the source material. But the second changes every time.
You know how else you can get close to the source material? Read it. šŸ™‚ As long as you understand that reading the text for yourself is just another tool in your arsenal, another step in your journey, then I don’t see where all the hating comes from.

The Melancholy Mick?

~ duane ~ Leave a comment

[ Apologies for the slur, just trying to turn a phrase ;). And me mother’s name is Daly, my daddy’s name is Moran, so I’m as Irish as they come! ]
New research out of Scandinavia adds a piece to the puzzle of Hamlet’s source material – by linking the name “Hamlet”, via Snow Bear’s “Amlothi”, to an Irish story called The Destruction of Da Derga’s Hostel, featuring a character named “Admlithi”. That extra D, the story is quick to point out, is silent.
From there Dr. Lisa Collinson makes the connection between this name and sea monsters, and then to Hamlet’s “sea of troubles.” Although I think that last one is a bit of a stretch :).
It’s an interesting idea, I suppose, but I’ve never been that interested in the history. Would new research in this area make you change your understanding of Shakespeare’s Hamlet? Is there any possibility at all that if this story is true, that Shakespeare actually would have known and understood the original story?

Eve of Ides : David Blixt's Latest Work!

~ duane ~ Leave a comment

I’ll let him tell it

I’ve been sitting on this particular piece of news for a couple weeks, but the official announcement went out today. My original Caesar/Brutus play, EVE OF IDES, has been chosen for a reading at the Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey this September, as part of their Lend Us Your Ears play reading series. The reading will be directed by the amazing and talented Rick Sordelet.

Congratulations to The Master Of Verona, and go see it if you can!