The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 11.0870  Thursday, 20 April 2000.

From:           Werner Broennimann <
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Date:           Wednesday, 19 Apr 2000 18:30:01 +0100
Subject: Prudery
Comment:        SHK 11.0796 Prudery

Terence Hawkes probably did not mean to be offensive.  Maybe he was,
like myself, just a bit shocked about the kind of prudery Norman Myers
has to face.  Norman and Terence just make different jokes about such a
cultural predicament.  I think that we still-even after the 60s-have the
duty to offend students.  How could we teach, say, Camus's L'Etranger
without hurting the tender sensitivities of those who favour the death
penalty?  And films that use a lot of product placement also hurt the
feelings of anyone opposing rampant materialism-Prospero's Books is a
case in point, since it unduly displays the pleasures of the Gellert
hotel in Budapest.  Drama in performance must offend; the only warning I
would endorse is the English one: "Gunshot will be used in this
performance."

Werner Br