The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 11.0666  Monday, 3 April 2000.

[1]     From:   Tom Reedy <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
        Date:   Friday, 31 Mar 2000 11:19:30 -0600
        Subj:   Re: SHK 11.0639 Bottom's Hay

[2]     From:   Gabriel Egan <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
        Date:   Friday, 31 Mar 2000 18:17:54 +0100
        Subj:   Re: SHK 11.0639 Bottom's Hay

[3]     From:   Larry Weiss <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
        Date:   Friday, 31 Mar 2000 13:31:48 -0500
        Subj:   Re: SHK 11.0639 Bottom's Hay


[1]-----------------------------------------------------------------
From:           Tom Reedy <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date:           Friday, 31 Mar 2000 11:19:30 -0600
Subject: 11.0639 Bottom's Hay
Comment:        Re: SHK 11.0639 Bottom's Hay

Werner Broennimann <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.> writes:

> In contrast to Marlowe or Jonson, Shakespeare does not mention tobacco.

This is not true.  In 1.3 of 1H4 Hotspur complains of a snuff-taking
messenger:

He was perfumed like a milliner;
And 'twixt his finger and his thumb he held
A pouncet-box, which ever and anon
He gave his nose and took't away again;
Who therewith angry, when it next came there,
Took it in snuff; and still he smiled and talk'd.

Tom Reedy

[2]-------------------------------------------------------------
From:           Gabriel Egan <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date:           Friday, 31 Mar 2000 18:17:54 +0100
Subject: 11.0639 Bottom's Hay
Comment:        Re: SHK 11.0639 Bottom's Hay

I have no answer to Werner Broennimann's charge that my "bumming a fag"
anecdote is homophobic, because I don't understand it. The "why" as well
as the "what" of the charge might help my understanding. If it's the
circulation of the offensive term "fag" then how are we to treat the
critical term "queer theory"-the thing the students in question were
studying-which is (pace Jean Peterson) at least as problematic as
"nigger" and "bitch"? Rather than assume, as Peterson does, that
reappropriation of offensive terms is an unalloyed good, the first
lesson was a discussion of the merits and demerits of this phenomenon as
an act of political resistance.

As for the "goof" that "Shakespeare does not mention tobacco" I can only
plead that I didn't suggest Shakespeare does. (But I'm glad to have been
prompted to check the veracity of Broennimann's assertion.)

Gabriel Egan

[3]-------------------------------------------------------------
From:           Larry Weiss <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date:           Friday, 31 Mar 2000 13:31:48 -0500
Subject: 11.0639 Bottom's Hay
Comment:        Re: SHK 11.0639 Bottom's Hay

Wasn't a "bottom" some sort of spool used in weaving?  The name would
then refer to Nick's trade, like "Snug the Joiner" and "Starveling the
tailor." (Tailors were proverbially impoverished)

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