March
Shakespeare Electronic Conference, Vol. 6, No. 0168. Monday, 6 March 1995. (1) From: Dan T. M. How <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 4 Mar 1995 19:15:46 -0800 Subj: Re: SHK 6.0165 Re: *Romeo and Juliet* (2) From: Frank Savukinas <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Sunday, 5 Mar 1995 18:52:54 -0500 (EST) Subj: Re: SHK 6.0165 Re: *Romeo and Juliet* (1)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Dan T. M. How <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 4 Mar 1995 19:15:46 -0800 Subject: 6.0165 Re: *Romeo and Juliet* Comment: Re: SHK 6.0165 Re: *Romeo and Juliet* In response to Sean Lawrence... "teen" in this context is defined by the OED as meaning, "suffering, grief, woe". There's a definite pun possibility there, and it really depends on how you interpret the line, but I think those lines (13-14) can be interpreted as "I'd bet fourteen of my teeth, even though to my sorrow I have only four, that she's not fourteen." (2)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Frank Savukinas <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Sunday, 5 Mar 1995 18:52:54 -0500 (EST) Subject: 6.0165 Re: *Romeo and Juliet* Comment: Re: SHK 6.0165 Re: *Romeo and Juliet* >RE:R&J I have three questions about the final scene and I would appreciate any >and all considered opinions- 1) "Tybalt, liest thou there in thu bloody sheet?" >Would the Caps really have laid Tyb out without cleaning him up or is this a >metaphor for shroud or what thinkst thou? 2)"Thy husband in thy bosom there >lies dead" does this mean that Romeo has literally fallen on her chest and >she's talking and doesnt realize this or are we talking metaphor again? 3)"A >cup clos'd in my true love's hand" are we to believe that Romeo hauls in a >chalice and some thing to pour liquid out of and stops the scne to mix this >toddy for himself and if not why doesnt she say vial- I know cup clos'ed is >better sounding than vial clos'd but I always assume Shakespeare was telling me >something and maybe I'm missing it. In response to your first question about Tybalt and the "bloody sheet," I think that it was a metaphor for a shroud as you suggested. Secondly, I don't think Shakespeare meant for Romeo to fall "in" her bosom. Romeo would probably have fallen next to the bosom, presumably on the ground next to Juliet. Finally, I always assumed that after leaving the apothecary, Romeo found some readily available liquid like water before he and Balthasar rode back to Verona. Technically, a cup and vial are the same thing. Frank SavukinasThis email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Shakespeare Electronic Conference, Vol. 6, No. 0167. Monday, 6 March 1995. (1) From: Dan T. M. How <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Sunday, 5 Mar 1995 14:45:30 -0800 Subj: Re: SHK 6.0166 Q: Teaching Acting Sh. (2) From: W. L. Godshalk <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 04 Mar 1995 22:25:37 -0500 (EST) Subj: Re: SHK 6.0164 Re: Teaching the Scottish Play (3) From: Amy Ulen <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 4 Mar 1995 22:26:21 -0800 (PST) Subj: Teaching "Macbeth" (4) From: Mary Tyler Knowles <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Sunday, 5 Mar 1995 10:54:48 -0500 Subj: Re: SHK 6.0164 Re: Teaching *Macbeth* (5) From: Leslie Harris <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Sunday, Mar 5 21:51:10 EST 1995 Subj: Re: SHK 6.0164 Re: Teaching *Macbeth* (1)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Dan T. M. How <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Sunday, 5 Mar 1995 14:45:30 -0800 Subject: 6.0166 Q: Teaching Acting Sh. Comment: Re: SHK 6.0166 Q: Teaching Acting Sh. In response to Eric Grischkat... The most helpful things for ME were learning about word history and looking up words in the OED, learning about iambic pentameter and its foot variations, learning sonnet structure, and learning basic tools of rhetoric. Then, writting sonnets, with set foot variations; writing sonnets "on-the-spot", which forced us to think in the form. Then, studying a monologue; its structure, its irregularities, its language, its subtext and its context. Then, doing actual work for a monologue to be performed, then a scene. After this, I BEGAN to understand Shakespeare, and was able to appreciate his works more, which made me take more classes, which made me want to perform, which made me... (2)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: W. L. Godshalk <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 04 Mar 1995 22:25:37 -0500 (EST) Subject: 6.0164 Re: Teaching the Scottish Play Comment: Re: SHK 6.0164 Re: Teaching the Scottish Play If I were teaching the play to fourteen year olds, I'd emphasize the language. Some years ago when Herb Coursen was giving a teaching seminar for high school teachers and students in Akron, we all learned that high school students -- older than fourteen -- have a difficult time understanding the language. I'd have my class do a great deal of reading aloud -- in unison to begin. Then I'd have half the class read one line and have the other half of the class respond with the next line. (If this reminds you of Peggy O'Brien, it should.) I'd get them to play with the words, until they were familiar with rhythms, etc. Sadly enough I find that advanced English majors at Cincinnati have a difficult time understanding Shakespeare's language. I've tried all the suggestions that you all kindly gave me last year -- to no avail. I've just got done reading a set of papers on WT 4.4, and I am sick at heart. Yours, Bill (3)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Amy Ulen <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 4 Mar 1995 22:26:21 -0800 (PST) Subject: Teaching "Macbeth" In response to Jennie Johnson's request for teaching ideas, I suggest the Folger Library's "Shakespeare Set Free" series. The key is to get kids on their feet EXPERIENCING the language! I teach at an alternative school for kids who have previously dropped-out or have been kicked out of high school. The age range is 13-21. Thanks to the folks at Shakespeare & Company and the NEH's National Institute on Teaching Shakespeare, my kids are truly experiencing Shakespeare! So far this school year, I have taught "Midsummer," "Macbeth," "Hamlet," and "Much Ado." I didn't start any of these plays at Act I, scene i. By the end of the play, each student had memorized and performed scenes and/or monologues. Most of my students hated Shakespeare before we began the year. By experiencing the plays through "performance," they have a new appreciation for the Bard. Prime example -- yesterday (Friday) they begged me to show the movie "Henry V." I think that is pretty amazing coming from a bunch of kids who use drugs and alcohol to escape. They are starting to think! Thank you, Shakespeare! Amy Ulen Lead Teacher Moscow Alternative School Center (4)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Mary Tyler Knowles <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Sunday, 5 Mar 1995 10:54:48 -0500 Subject: 6.0164 Re: Teaching *Macbeth* Comment: Re: SHK 6.0164 Re: Teaching *Macbeth* I've taught *Macbeth* for a very long time to our ninth graders. I cannot remember when they have not loved it. One piece of information that they find fascinating is that of the Elizabethan *chain of being* for then they are able to see disruption at every level, from the most psychological to the most cosmic, from the animal kingdom to the human kingdom. I also ask my students each to be in charge of a particular kind of image (clothing, for example) and at the end, having collected ALL the images of this type and their associated images, to produce a ten minute oral report. They become much more scrupulous readers as a result and also begin to connect image to theme. I also enjoy having them stage the banquet scene. As a preliminary step, I ask them to write directions for each speech's delivery (and for each part of each speech that needs direction) and to indicate the blocking for the scene. They must have reasons why they choose to have the characters move and speak as they do, reasons that relate to their concept of the play and concept of the characters. These reasons must also be explained. Then I devote several class periods to the *hands on* part, the actual directing of other classmates. It's interesting to watch as each one has come up with her (it's an all-girls school) own dramatic interpretation yet is asked to be part of someone else's. Hope these thoughts are helpful. I LOVE to teach *Macbeth*. -- Mary Tyler Knowles Head, English Dept. The Winsor School Boston, MA (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ) (5)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Leslie Harris <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Sunday, Mar 5 21:51:10 EST 1995 Subject: 6.0164 Re: Teaching *Macbeth* Comment: Re: SHK 6.0164 Re: Teaching *Macbeth* > Most often, my students have a problem thinking of Macbeth as anything but > an examplum of the judiciousness of the "three strikes and you're out" > policy. I have found it quite useful, however, to suggest a slightly > different context for the play. Without too much embarrassment, I suggest > that they should regard this play, in part, from the perspective of a > Klingon ideology in the various _Star Treks_. I don't press this idea too > far, of course, but students seem to understand quite readily the ethos of a > character such as Worf and transfer that to the play. Klingons are bloody, > bold, and resolute in the battle because that is precisely what they are > supposed to be. They are this also when it comes to leadership aspirations. > They are not, however, as Macbeth is not, merely homicidal thugs. The same > method also works very well for the Roman plays. Wow--and I thought I was the only eccentric who used _Star Trek_ and _Star Trek: The Next Generation_ to explain Shakespeare. I like to compare the system of feuding families in _Romeo and Juliet_ to the similar system in the Klingon world. For a Capulet and a Montague (at least until R&J hook up), as for a Klingon, personal and familial honor is everything. Any affront to that honor must be answered by a challenge to combat. Death is answered by a similar mortal challenge (as Worf challenges Duras when Worf's betrothed is killed by Duras). Both are warrior cultures and display the aggressive values of that culture. I hope these comparisons illuminate the plays for my students, although I've found (much to my chagrin) that almost none of my students have watched the original _Star Trek_, and precious few (perhaps one or two per class) were fans of the _Next Generation_. Now, either I have uninteresting students, or there's just no accounting for taste. Live long and prosper! Leslie HarrisThis email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Shakespeare Electronic Conference, Vol. 6, No. 0166. Sunday, 5 March 1995. (1) From: Dan T. M. How <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 3 Mar 1995 17:08:04 -0800 Subj: AYLI music (2) From: Kirk Hendershott-Kraetzer <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 4 Mar 1995 17:15:37 -0500 Subj: Renaissance Music, and a question (3) From: Eric Grischkat <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 4 Mar 1995 08:58:51 -0800 (PST) Subj: Teaching Acting for Shakespeare (1)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Dan T. M. How <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 3 Mar 1995 17:08:04 -0800 Subject: AYLI music Can anyone recommend a good recording of the music from AYLI, or just a good recording of Shakespeare music in general? -dan (2)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Kirk Hendershott-Kraetzer <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 4 Mar 1995 17:15:37 -0500 Subject: Renaissance Music, and a question Two disks that I've found useful in my teaching are *Popular Music from the Time of Queen Elizabeth I* by the Camerata of London (Saga Classics SCD 9013), which has seven songs from the stage along with a number of others from the period, and *The Art of the Bawdy Song* by The Baltimore Consort and The Merry Companions (Dorian DOR-90155). I've been looking high and low for a film version of *Macbeth* which probably came out in the early 80s. My best memory is of a Siskel and Ebert review of the film. It was updated to modern times, and maybe even had modernized dialogue: I remember them showing a clip in which a husband and wife were trying to figure out what to do with the body of the boss, whom they'd just done to death in the kitchen. Can't remember whether the film was supposed to be good or who was in it. Not much to go on, I know, but if any of you have even slight leads, I'd appreciate hearing them. Best, Kirk Hendershott-Kraetzer <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > (3)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Eric Grischkat <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 4 Mar 1995 08:58:51 -0800 (PST) Subject: Teaching Acting for Shakespeare I'm currently teaching a Shakepeare Performance class for professional actors in San Diego. I use Barton's and Berry's books, and exercises from six years of acting training. I always am searching for better exercises. Specifally ones that will help the actor personalize the text and exercises to activate the student. Love to hear about specific tools/ exercises that others have come across which have been successful. Eric George GrischkatThis email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. University of San Diego
Shakespeare Electronic Conference, Vol. 6, No. 0165. Saturday, 4 March 1995. (1) From: Sean Lawrence <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 3 Mar 1995 17:28:20 -0800 (PST) Subj: Re: SHK 6.0145 Re: *Romeo and Juliet* (2) From: Jennie Johnson <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 4 Mar 1995 15:07:09 +0000 (GMT) Subj: [Re: *Romeo and Juliet*] (3) From: Marcia Hepps <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 03 Mar 1995 11:01:31 EST Subj: [Re: *Romeo and Juliet*] (1)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Sean Lawrence <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 3 Mar 1995 17:28:20 -0800 (PST) Subject: 6.0145 Re: *Romeo and Juliet* Comment: Re: SHK 6.0145 Re: *Romeo and Juliet* Hi, guys. This may seem trivial, but isn't there another interpretation of the line where the nurse talks about her teeth? "To my teen be it spoken I have but four" could mean that she has four-teen, which makes her bet a little more touching: she knows her dental situation, and is willing to bet every tooth in her head. Just a thought. Cheers, Sean. (2)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Jennie Johnson <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 4 Mar 1995 15:07:09 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [Re: *Romeo and Juliet*] Does anyone have any issues or comments to raise on Romeo and Juliet, Act 1 sc.5 (Party where the lovers meet) and Act. 3 sc. 3 (Friar Lawrence's cell). These two scenes are given to English children in the new S.A.T.S. exam this summer. (Standard Attainment Targets) The kids are 13/14. Any interesting observations will be much appreciated. I am a student teacher just outside London. Thanks in advance.... .....Jennie. (3)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Marcia Hepps <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 03 Mar 1995 11:01:31 EST Subject: [Re: *Romeo and Juliet*] RE:R&J I have three questions about the final scene and I would appreciate any and all considered opinions- 1) "Tybalt, liest thou there in thu bloody sheet?" Would the Caps really have laid Tyb out without cleaning him up or is this a metaphor for shroud or what thinkst thou? 2)"Thy husband in thy bosom there lies dead" does this mean that Romeo has literally fallen on her chest and she's talking and doesnt realize this or are we talking metaphor again? 3)"A cup clos'd in my true love's hand" are we to believe that Romeo hauls in a chalice and some thing to pour liquid out of and stops the scne to mix this toddy for himself and if not why doesnt she say vial- I know cup clos'ed is better sounding than vial clos'd but I always assume Shakespeare was telling me something and maybe I'm missing it. Thanks for thinking on this-I'm stumped.
Shakespeare Electronic Conference, Vol. 6, No. 0164. Saturday, 4 March 1995. (1) From: Dan T. M. How <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 3 Mar 1995 17:04:16 -0800 Subj: Re: SHK 6.0157 Q: Teaching *Macbeth* (2) From: Robert Saenger <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 3 Mar 1995 23:28:43 -0500 (EST) Subj: Re: SHK 6.0157 Q: Teaching *Macbeth* (3) From: Gareth M. Euridge <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 04 Mar 1995 11:25:01 -0500 Subj: Re: SHK 6.0157 Q: Teaching *Macbeth* (1)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Dan T. M. How <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 3 Mar 1995 17:04:16 -0800 Subject: 6.0157 Q: Teaching *Macbeth* Comment: Re: SHK 6.0157 Q: Teaching *Macbeth* In response to Jennie Johnson... Good for you!! I myself didn't bother with Shakespeare until I was in college really, but I'll bet if we tackled Macbeth in high school, I would have been hooked. It looks like you have all the bases covered, but I'll tell you what I myself would want to learn as a 14 year old. Supernatural of couse, and pyrotechnics if you got 'em. Emphasis the sleep issue, and how that affects people. Neither of them do much sleeping through the play, and this fact is glossed over a lot. I'll bet I'd be seeing daggers if I haven't had any sleep for a while, too. Also, cover fate vs freedom of choice. That's a pretty dominant theme and it comes around full circle at the end. And of course, for a moral lesson, emphasis ambition and greed, and how they changed Mr and Mrs Macbeth, and caused their downfall. (2)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Robert Saenger <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 3 Mar 1995 23:28:43 -0500 (EST) Subject: 6.0157 Q: Teaching *Macbeth* Comment: Re: SHK 6.0157 Q: Teaching *Macbeth* Regarding Jennie Johnson's query on teaching Macbeth- You sound like a very consciencious teacher, so the kids are lucky. I would try having them (not quite making all of them) learn a speech and perform it. That is how I learned Macbeth at 14; it was so much fun I didn't realize how much I was learning. Michael Saenger (3)---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Gareth M. Euridge <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 04 Mar 1995 11:25:01 -0500 Subject: 6.0157 Q: Teaching *Macbeth* Comment: Re: SHK 6.0157 Q: Teaching *Macbeth* Re. teaching of _Macbeth_. Most often, my students have a problem thinking of Macbeth as anything but an examplum of the judiciousness of the "three strikes and you're out" policy. I have found it quite useful, however, to suggest a slightly different context for the play. Without too much embarrassment, I suggest that they should regard this play, in part, from the perspective of a Klingon ideology in the various _Star Treks_. I don't press this idea too far, of course, but students seem to understand quite readily the ethos of a character such as Worf and transfer that to the play. Klingons are bloody, bold, and resolute in the battle because that is precisely what they are supposed to be. They are this also when it comes to leadership aspirations. They are not, however, as Macbeth is not, merely homicidal thugs. The same method also works very well for the Roman plays. It's not perfect, and I attempt to move away from it quite quickly, but it does make problematic many students' attempts to perceive Shakespearean drama as simple morality plays in which "what goes around comes around." . . . and then of course, there is always the joke in _Next Generation_ in which Shakespeare is said to be much better in the original Klingon . . . Gareth M. EuridgeThis email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.