June
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 13.1549 Monday, 24 June 2002 [1] From: Clifford Stetner <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 21 Jun 2002 13:59:15 -0400 Subj: Re: SHK 13.1540 Re: William Catesby/Richard III [2] From: Sophie Masson <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 22 Jun 2002 23:58:10 +1000 Subj: Re: SHK 13.1540 Re: William Catesby/Richard III [1]----------------------------------------------------------------- From: Clifford Stetner <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 21 Jun 2002 13:59:15 -0400 Subject: 13.1540 Re: William Catesby/Richard III Comment: Re: SHK 13.1540 Re: William Catesby/Richard III >On the one hand, Richard fits with the extreme >villains that the author had already used in TA, and that he inherited >from Kyd and Marlowe (and they from Seneca). On the other hand, he fits >with the Tudor Myth that WS seems to have otherwise accepted -- as it >was both healthy and profitable to do. >Cheers, >don >I think it can be a mistake to expect historical accuracy from >Shakespeare. At times, especially with King John, he deliberately >subverts and distorts historicism for his dramatic ends. >Brian Willis It may be that Shakespeare used archetypal characters to comment on periods of English history so that he was less concerned with the representation of the historic Richard than with the way his myth personifies his epoch. Richard as the hunchback Machiavel is symbolic of a kind of murderous tyranny that was ubiquitous in the European and Near Eastern states of the late Middle Ages replete with tales of brothers poisoning brothers, children poisoning their parents, wives poisoning their husbands, ad nauseum in the pursuit of power. The death of Richard represents the end of this era in England and the advent of the enlightened modern (Tudor) state. The caricature exaggeration of his evil and deformity raises him to the level of archetype by preventing us from mistaking him for simply another of the mere portraits represented in the characters that converge around him and whose historic record can best be understood in the paradigmatic context he creates. In accordance with the doctrine of divine election, Richard "is" (or "was") England. His birth defects and moral bankruptcy are therefore symbolic of England's in the fifteenth century, born of the Wars of the Roses, and these, according to Shakespeare were extreme. As an ideologue of the Tudor myth for whatever motive, Shakespeare needs to emphasize the contrast between the deformity of England's past, symbolized in Richard and the natural beauty of England's present, symbolized in Henry. Slight spinal curvature and a little insider trading won't do. Clifford Stetner http://phoenixandturtle.net/ [2]------------------------------------------------------------- From: Sophie Masson <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Saturday, 22 Jun 2002 23:58:10 +1000 Subject: 13.1540 Re: William Catesby/Richard III Comment: Re: SHK 13.1540 Re: William Catesby/Richard III Thank you all for all your comments. I suppose what I meant by the portrait of Richard being a sardonic one was not that I expect WS to write 'proper' history, but rather that this particular portrait is a Grand Guignol one with tongue in cheek--a kind of subtle play on all kinds of things. It interested me that William Catesby had been Richard's confidant, not only in terms of the play, but also in terms of the fact Shakespeare probably knew the contemporay, eponymous William Catesby at Lapworth. If, as seems possible, Shakespeare and his family were part, even loosely, of a Catholic network(and I'm not at all meaning this in terms of anything formal or tight, more a matter of sympathies and silences, really), then it's possible that there are double meanings behind the portrayal of Richard. This is pure speculation on my part, I cheerfully admit it: but if the Elizabethan Catesby had a different view of his ancestor and Richard himself, things WS knew of, then it could have been fun for him to write the play in a vein not only of history and tragedy, but also of hidden satire. If Henry Tudor was seen as a prototype Protestant, for instance--if Richard's name was blackened not only for dynastic reasons--to make out he was an evil tyrant, who needed to be overthrown--but also for religious reasons--and therefore the lily was gilded in Tudor _and_ Protestant propaganda, then it is interesting to speculate on just the fact that almost alone of Shakespeare's villains, Richard has that 'Pulp Fiction' quality, if you like. Is the playwright making a subterranean point about the Tudors and their pretensions/hypocrisies? And is he using established pieties to do so? Everyone 'knew' Richard was a deformed monster--why not emphasise it so often that in fact it loses its punch and begins to seem almost suspect? Writers, especially those of a secretive/reserved character, like to make points, allude to things, even sometimes key in total inversions of what their work appears to be, just for their own fun, and that of others who may share their sympathies. Even if other people don't get it, it doesn't matter--as long as the story can stand on its own two feet anyway. Which Richard III obviously does. All stuff to play with, really; I am certainly not trying to prove anything in any way. Sophie Masson Author site: http://www.northnet.com.au/~smasson _______________________________________________________________ S H A K S P E R: The Global Shakespeare Discussion List Hardy M. Cook,This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. The S H A K S P E R Web Site <http://www.shaksper.net> DISCLAIMER: Although SHAKSPER is a moderated discussion list, the opinions expressed on it are the sole property of the poster, and the editor assumes no responsibility for them.
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 13.1548 Monday, 24 June 2002 [1] From: Tanya Gough <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 21 Jun 2002 12:38:40 -0400 Subj: Re: SHK 13.1543 Re: "A Funeral Elegy" [2] From: Richard Kennedy <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 21 Jun 2002 13:20:57 -0700 Subj: Re: SHK 13.1543 Re: "A Funeral Elegy" [3] From: Tom Reedy <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 21 Jun 2002 23:55:20 -0500 Subj: RE: SHK 13.1543 Re: "A Funeral Elegy" [4] From: Hardy M. Cook <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Monday, June 24, 2002 Subj: Re: "A Funeral Elegy" [1]----------------------------------------------------------------- From: Tanya Gough <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 21 Jun 2002 12:38:40 -0400 Subject: 13.1543 Re: "A Funeral Elegy" Comment: Re: SHK 13.1543 Re: "A Funeral Elegy" >As I wrote five years ago in The Observer, the "unseemly >rush to certitude in America will come to be seen as regrettable, even >embarrassing." Unfortunately, such events are far from uncommon. The Stratford (Ont) Festival this year is publishing the Sanders portrait in their programs in the "about the author" section, giving validation to the assumption that the attribution is correct. I fear an embarrassing situation for the Festival may occur, should the subject matter be disproved. Tanya Gough Poor Yorick www.bardcentral.com [2]------------------------------------------------------------- From: Richard Kennedy <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 21 Jun 2002 13:20:57 -0700 Subject: 13.1543 Re: "A Funeral Elegy" Comment: Re: SHK 13.1543 Re: "A Funeral Elegy" In March of 1996 I posted to SHAKSPER that John Ford was the best choice as the writer of the Funeral Elegy. This was the first mention offering Ford as the writer, and in his forthcoming book Brian Vickers credits me with that, and for the two year's struggle at this place to promote the attribution. Previously, Brian thought it might be by Simon Wastrel, but he liked my arguments better. In the summer of 1996, Monsarrat was doubtful that Shakespeare wrote the Elegy, but had not yet settled on another author although he was in communication with Vickers. Foster and myself exchanged several private letters in which I tried to bring him over to Ford, but he said that the idea had been investigated in depth, and that I was certainly wrong, and he asked what my credentials were. And evidently Ford had not been investigated at all, the Shaxicon database not informed of his early verse. Therefore, I find nothing at all graceful or scholarly in the man regarding the Funeral Elegy. My discovery came with no credentials, and so it was ignored, even ridiculed. It was not until Monsarrat and Vickers came up with John Ford that Foster gave any attention to the matter. So, in these early years with Vickers behind Ford, and also Prof. Leo Stock, who said he would "unhesitatingly" give the Funeral Elegy to Ford, Foster was sticking to the Funeral Elegy as being by Shakespeare, he was invested in that, as they say. Now he recants, and Christine Gilmore says it was a "remarkably graceful admission of an error." No. His error wasn't so awfully bad, many people were fooled and most of them had credentials, but unfortunately none of them had a poetic ear. Foster
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 13.1547 Monday, 24 June 2002 From: Mike LoMonico <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 21 Jun 2002 08:55:32 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Shakespeare magazine 6.2 The latest edition of Shakespeare magazine has just been published. Articles include: News on the Rialto A review of news, books, and theaters as well as a state-by-state list of summertime Shakespeare. "Not a mouse stirring at Orlando-UCF Festival." Lyn Frick talks to artistic Director Jim Helsinger about the new Florida Shakespeare Center. INVENTIVE TEACHERS AND INVESTED STUDENTS "The best actors in the world." G. G. Garth spends the weekend in New York at the English-Speaking Union National Shakespeare Competition. "She was alive all the time." Carolyn Henly makes a case for teaching "The Winter's Tale" in high school. Teaching love and understanding through Shakespeare. Melissa Borgmann and Lisa McDonagh show how their collaborative unit brought students from Minnesota and Massachusetts together. Politically correct sonnets. Deanna Hebbert has her students bowdlerize the sonnets. Broadsheet: "Hang there, my verse." Keli Brownell contributes an anthology of poems from her Southern California students. www.shakespearemag.com _______________________________________________________________ S H A K S P E R: The Global Shakespeare Discussion List Hardy M. Cook,This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. The S H A K S P E R Web Site <http://www.shaksper.net> DISCLAIMER: Although SHAKSPER is a moderated discussion list, the opinions expressed on it are the sole property of the poster, and the editor assumes no responsibility for them.
The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 13.1546 Monday, 24 June 2002 From: Dave Johnson <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Date: Friday, 21 Jun 2002 05:30:14 -1000 Subject: 13.1539 Re: Flapdragons Comment: Re: SHK 13.1539 Re: Flapdragons In clarification of my original question on flapdragons, through diligent research during an evening with friends, we have determined that neither raisins nor grapes float in any alcoholic beverage (or water, for that matter). That makes it hard to picture how one could snatch raisins out of burning brandy, and impossible to picture snatching burning grapes or raisins out of any alcoholic beverage if it was deeper than half the width of a raisin. Yet the quotes from various Elizabethan and later sources make clear that this was a common enjoyable activity. I understand that one can drink flaming beverages if one swigs quickly, but catching a raisin at the bottom of a flaming liquid is quite different - and mustache threatening. _______________________________________________________________ S H A K S P E R: The Global Shakespeare Discussion List Hardy M. Cook,This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. The S H A K S P E R Web Site <http://www.shaksper.net> DISCLAIMER: Although SHAKSPER is a moderated discussion list, the opinions expressed on it are the sole property of the poster, and the editor assumes no responsibility for them.
PUT SHAKS101 BIOGRAFY pw=rarmin S H A K S P E R Shakespeare Electronic Conference Member Biographies - Volume 103 ============================================================= *Perlman, Stephen B." <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > I am not in the academy, but am rather a 56 year old lawyer at the Boston law firm of Ropes & Gray. I'm a magna cum laude graduate of Brown University (1967), where I majored in physics but learned to love Shakespeare through several courses with the late Elmer Blistein. I'm a 1970 cum laude graduate of Harvard Law School. I've read all of Shakespeare's plays and have enjoyed productions in London and Stratford of Hamlet, Macbeth (with Derek Jacobi), A Midsummer Night's Dream (my first realization of how laugh-aloud funny a Shakespeare comedy could be), Twelfth Night, Julius Caesar (at the reconstructed Globe Theatre), King Lear, Henry IV Part 2, and The Tempest. I've read scholarly works on Shakespeare and have enjoyed the rendition of "all of Shakespeare's plays in 90 minutes" by The Reduced Shakespeare Company. ============================================================= *Plesh, Melanie <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > I am writing to request inclusion in your Shaksper electronic discussion group. My desire is primarily fueled by my personal interest in the work of Shakespeare (one of the greatest summers of my life was the one during which I read all of the history plays in chronological order according to the subjects of the plays, rather than in order of publication.). I love to be around other people who also love Shakespeare's work. I'm avid in my desire to hear and read other peoples' understandings. I have never studied Shakespeare formally except for one one-semester course at the University of New Orleans. I'm just in love with him. For me, Shakespeare, Dostoevski, and Faulkner share space on a pinhead. I do have some professional interest, although the professional interest came directly from my personal interest. I teach high school literature and writing, and several years ago created a Shakespeare elective course at my school, which is extremely popular. The only prerequisite for joining the elective course is a love for Shakespeare's work. There's nothing in the world like being in a room full of people with the same love, especially when they're adolescents and see in such a fresh way, and whose love is pure and beyond their understanding. ============================================================= * Chalub, Fabricio <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > My name is Fabricio Chalub, I was born in 1976 and currently residing in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. I work at the Computing Department of the Graduate School of Economics at Getulio Vargas Foundation (EPGE/FGV). My interest in S. is purely personal and I wanted to join SHAKSPER to listen (hopefully contribute?) to what more devoted people have to say about his works. [I may have a project for the future involving a web site on my mind, but this is nothing concrete.] ============================================================= *Zaffrann, Katie <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > My name is Katie Zaffrann and I am in my third year pursuing a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Musical Theatre at Syracuse University. Syracuse has a highly ranked and well-renowned Drama program and this fall I will be studying abroad in London through our program there, which has a partnership with London's Globe Theatre. In addition to my study of Shakespeare's text for the performance aspect, I am an English minor and will be taking a number of classes to get different viewpoints on and ways of approaching his works. While abroad, I also will be beginning my thesis project in hopes of graduating with honors, and am considering a Shakespearean emphasis for that project. I read about the listserv in a New York Times article, and am excited about its possibilities with my future work. ============================================================= *Laughlin, Nicholas <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Biography: Born 1975 in Port of Spain, Trinidad. BA in English Literature, University of the West Indies, St. Augustine, Trinidad (2000). Currently editor at a small publishing house specialising in Caribbean titles. Particular interests: Hamlet; the history of Shakespeare performance in former colonies of the British Empire; the 1769 Stratford Jubilee; the influence of Shakespeare on contemporary poetry. ============================================================= *Finnis, John <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Professor of Law and Legal Philosophy, Oxford University (since 1989); Biolchini Family Professor of Law, University of Notre Dame (since 1995); Fellow and Praelector of University College, Oxford, since 1966. Fellow of the British Academy (since 1990). Books: Natural Law and Natural Rights (OUP, 1980); Fundamental of Ethics (OUP, 1983); Aquinas: Moral, Political and Legal Theory (OUP, 1998); etc. Current interests: biography of William Sterrell. See Patrick Martin & John Finnis, "The Identity of 'Anthony Rivers'", Recusant History 26 (2002) 39-74; Patrick Martin & John Finnis, "Thomas Thorpe and the Catholic Intelligencers" forthcoming in The English Literary Renaissance. ============================================================= *Judson, William Haddon <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > My background is in engineering physics, both solid state and liquid state. Currently I am involved in designing data base architecture for MRP business systems: Fourth Shift Manufacturing Software Systems. And general data base design. My interest in William Shakespeare started as soon as I could read. I have read every piece of Shakespeare's works that I could find. I am interested in everything and anything regarding Shakespeare. I feel that Shakespeare had an excellent grasp of human nature and a lucid and erudite way of expressing his thoughts, feeling and emotions. At one time I tried to write in a similar vain as Shakespeare, but it was not even close to rank amateur. My second literary interest is in works of William Congeve (the Playwright). I discovered both Congreves from both an engineering stand point, the Congreves pump and Congreves rockets (Sir William Congreve), and the butchering of William Congreves (the playwright) quotes from his "The Mourning Bride". "Hell hath" rather than "Hell has", etc. I feel that to some extent William Congreve, the playwright, had continued along Shakespeare's direction. ============================================================= *Downend, Michael <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > Michael Downend & Karen Blomain: We're writers. Karen heads the Professional Writing Program at Kutztown University (Penn system). My new play, HIGH, THIN CIRRUS opens on July 25th at the Providence Playhouse. Barbra Streisand's Barwood Films is making A TRICK OF LIGHT based on Karen's novel. ============================================================= *Innaurato, Albert <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. > I am Albert Innaurato. I have been a playwright: my play Gemini is the sixth longest running play in Broadway history, The Transfiguration of Benno Blimpie has been given widely internationally as has Gemini, I directed it in London. I have won obies and other awards for plays such as Gus and Al, Herself as Lust, Passione (the last play to be given in the historic Morosco theater in Broadway before it was wrecked), Earthworms. My most recent play Dreading Thecla was given its world premiere at The Williamstown Theater Company in 1999. I have written for TV and movies (not especially often or notably successfully, though I did win the Emmy for Verna the USO Girl). I collaborated with Christopher Durang on a number of parody plays, when younger performing in them with him. Our longest effort, The Idiots' Karamazov was revived at Harvard's ART theater in 2000. I have written extensively on cultural matters for many publications. I am a frequent contributor to The Arts and Leisure section of The New York Times, Forbes Magazine, Vanity Fair, Vogue, Cond