The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.0199  Monday, 26 January 2004

[1]     From:   Mike Sirofchuck <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
        Date:   Friday, 23 Jan 2004 10:41:00 -0900
        Subj:   Re: SHK 15.0180 Shakespeare for Kids

[2]     From:   John Velz <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
        Date:   Friday, 23 Jan 2004 22:07:35 -0600
        Subj:   SHK 15.0180 Shakespeare for Kids

[3]     From:   Peter Groves <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
        Date:   Friday, 23 Jan 2004 22:19:28 +0000
        Subj:   Re: SHK 15.0180 Shakespeare for Kids


[1]-----------------------------------------------------------------
From:           Mike Sirofchuck <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date:           Friday, 23 Jan 2004 10:41:00 -0900
Subject: 15.0180 Shakespeare for Kids
Comment:        Re: SHK 15.0180 Shakespeare for Kids

 >Give kids more credit.

Whitt is right on - my experience is that kids (almost) always rise to
the challenge and exceed our expectations when reading/performing/trying
to understand Shakespeare.

[2]-------------------------------------------------------------
From:           John Velz <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date:           Friday, 23 Jan 2004 22:07:35 -0600
Subject: Shakespeare for Kids
Comment:        SHK 15.0180 Shakespeare for Kids

In re. Bill Arnold on Spenser:

I recall the old adage: "To give Spenser to undergraduates is like
wasting scotch on beer drinkers."

Cheers for old E.S.,
jwv

[3]-------------------------------------------------------------
From:           Peter Groves <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date:           Friday, 23 Jan 2004 22:19:28 +0000
Subject: 15.0180 Shakespeare for Kids
Comment:        Re: SHK 15.0180 Shakespeare for Kids

Don Bloom is right to object to the botched metrics of the execrable
couplet:

        "Meanwhile King Claudius was still uptight:
        The cause of Hamlet's madness had not come to light."

Not only is "The cause of Hamlet's madness had not come to light" an
alexandrine where we expect a pentameter, it is a very weak alexandrine.
  The English alexandrine requires a clear pause after the sixth
position ("Yet nothing did he dread, | but euer was ydrad". (FQ
1.1.2.9)) or (as an occasional variation) the seventh ("Vpon his foe, a
Dragon | horrible and stearne." (FQ 1.1.3.9)); technically, it's a rest
or silent beat.   The caesura in "The cause of Hamlet's madness | had
not come to light", however, is weak because the syntactic bond between
subject and predicate is strong (in the two Spenser examples the caesura
represents a clear syntactic break); at the same time, the first beat of
the second colon falls (weakly) upon an unstressed syllable (since "had"
here is an auxiliary verb).

For whatever reason, an ear for metrics seems to be getting rarer and
rarer.  At a large Renaissance studies conference last year I heard an
eminent Spenserian refer repeatedly to characters called "LUciFEra" and
"GuYON", as in "And proud Lucifera men did her call" [1.4.12.1] and
"Whom when the good Sir Guyon did behold" [2.1.42.1].

I might add on a personal note (in response to Martin Steward) that,
though not to my knowledge certifiable, I first read the Faerie Queene
(the whole thing) at age 15 or 16; naturally all but the crassest
allegory went right over my head, but I read it for the poetry and the
narrative.

Peter Groves
Monash University

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Hardy M. Cook, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
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