Shakespeare for the Satisfied

The title of my blog came one night when I was in the attitude of alliteration, seeking some sort of theme that would be catchy and memorable for my blog. I am a very happy person with happy life circumstances--family, friends, major, and job which I adore, and plenty of faith and hope for the future. I was a supremely satisfied person, and thought that would be a good descriptor and introduction to me and my life. As I am now reviewing my blog and this semester worth of Shakespeare learning, I am finding I am still supremely satisfied with my life, and I am also satisfied with my blog and my Shakespeare learning experience. I managed to keep the alliterative theme throughout the entire semester, and though sometimes it was a stretch, the title of each blog always made sense to me. The purpose of this specific blog post is to review in further detail the learning outcomes of my Shakespeare class and why exactly I am satisfied that I have met them.

1.) How have I gained Shakespeare literacy?

I have read many different Shakespeare plays--all the ones assigned for our class, plus my individually assigned play, which was Macbeth. I could have done without that one, by the way. I was also exposed to the general plot and theme of several more Shakespeare plays by reading the blogs and listening to the discussions of class members regarding their individually assigned plays. I've experienced Shakespeare in 2 live performances, as well as a good mix of audio book recordings, from the occasionally extremely dry Librivox to the professionally done BYU audio recordings, as well as couple of screen recordings as well. I still have to say that Henry V was my favorite out of all of them. I probably did more in-depth analysis of that play, but I also spent plenty of time on Macbeth as well. From seeking information about how to try and make our lost plays look legit, I've gained appreciation for the legacy of Shakespeare as well--how the plays have come to us now, what types of analysis and engagement of the plays have occurred in the past, and are occurring now. Also, just for fun, I analyzed and performed a Shakespearean sonnet for my public speaking class, Sonnet XXIX, When in Disgrace with Fortune and Men's eyes, since I knew we wouldn't have time to study Shakespeare sonnets in our class. I never did blog about that experience, but it was a fun one that contributed to my Shakespeare literacy. I've still got it memorized and sometimes quote it to myself when I'm driving alone in the car.  

2.) How have I analyzed Shakespeare critically?
One of my favorite ways to analyze Shakespeare was to pick out famous quotes from the plays we read and analyze them. One of my main motivations for taking this class was to be better able to recognize and understand Shakespeare references, which the vast majority of the time come as quotations of famous lines or speeches from Shakespeare. Several blog posts do nothing but analyze several Shakespeare quotes for both textual and contextual analysis. Probably half my blog posts analyze Shakespeare critically in some form or fashion.

3.) How have I engaged Shakespeare creatively?
I have to say, my favorite way I have analyzed Shakespeare creatively this whole semester was with the parody of the St. Crispian's Day Speech, Relief Society style. I suppose the recitation of the sonnet for my public speaking class would also count--that was the only speech I gave all semester that I 100% on, and it's because I practiced so long having good vocal range, hand gestures, and facial expression, all of which was a big step outside my comfort zone. Writing about Shakespeare and running has also been fun, and has definitely required some creativity. There is not a whole lot out there in terms of Shakespeare and running, but one of my favorite blog posts (Shakespeare for the Soaked) was a comparison of my run and several Shakespeare plays. Development of the story for the lost plays was also creative engagement, and involved lots of outside research about the origin and analysis of First Folio documents, manuscript analysis, etc.  (See the Wiki and my blog)

4.) How have I shared Shakespeare meaningfully?

Over the semester, I have shared thoughts and insights about Shakespeare with family, roommates and even on several dates. The more noteworthy experiences I blogged about, but there were many more that did not make it to to the blog level. I also of course, shared my thoughts and insights about Shakespeare with the world via my blog. Though most of the traffic on my blog has come from others in our class, my friends and family outside of the class have also read my blog. One example of this is a guy I taught on my mission in Los Angeles, CA who has started reading my blog.

5.) How have I gained digital literacy?

Well, blogging was a new experience for me, which I have definitely enjoyed, and at which I am much more adept. Google reader was a new introduction for me also which has completely changed my consumption of blogs, and which I will certainly use a lot in the future. Learning how to use and edit a wiki, upload and share videos on youtube, and use prezi have all also been new learning experiences as well. Taking videos on my phone and editing them and putting them together into prototype videos, as well as participating in green screen filming all were also new for me. I am a veteran skyper, so that wasn't too new, but skyping with a professor certainly was. Through blogging, I was able to connect with my classmates in a way I never had in other classes. I was also able to connect with Brad Westwood and share in his expertise with rare books and rare book collecting, which in turn contributed to our ability to develop a creative and believable story in regard to the discovery of our lost plays. This class has certainly been a real demonstration of Thomas Friedman's book, The World is Flat.

Shakespeare for the Sneaky 6

Draft 2 of our documentary...

Shakespeare for the Sneaky 5

Here's what we've got so far as a prototype for production content.  The first is a News Report.  The second is a documentary.  Keep in mind these are just rough draft versions.  Enjoy!

--The Story of Team

Shakespeare for the Sneaky 4

Segment 1: Breaking News Story

Kim: And in other news, in Pasadena, CA, in the Huntington Library, 4 lost Shakespeare plays have been discovered.  News Correspondent Moriah Manwerring has the story.

Moriah: Here in Pasadena, CA, the Huntington Library has always been famous for its extensive collection of rare books, manuscripts, prints, photographs, maps, and other materials in the fields of British and American history.  The Library collections range in time period from the Middle Ages to the 21st century. The greatest concentration is in the English Renaissance, about 1500 to 1641.  Much of the content for the library was purchased back in the 1890s by the library’s founder Henry E. Huntington.  Recently, horticulture expert Dr. Dan Adcock was taking advantage of the library’s ancient collection of horticulture documentation, and discovered something remarkable.  Dan, would you mind telling us what happened?

Dan: I was looking through one of the really large portfolios on horticulture they have here, discovered that some of the sections were missing.  I spoke with the horticulture curator and he told me that there was a duplicate of this particular portfolio they kept in the vault.  We opened it up and as I was going through this duplicate book which quite obviously had not been opened for many years, towards the back I came across a collection of older looking documents; they looked like they were manuscripts from some kind of play or something.  I asked the curator about the documents; she was baffled.  We contacted the manuscript section of the library, and after some precursory examination, they’re saying it looks like Shakespeare! 

Moriah:  Wow, that’s a pretty incredible discovery!  Kim, back to you.

Kim: Thanks Moriah.  After only a couple days of analysis, the results are still inconclusive as to the origin of this play, but the Shakespeare world is abuzz with the news of this possibility.  Experts are performing ink and carbon tests; handwriting and manuscript experts are pouring over this recently discovered text, trying to piece together what really we have here.  But an initial examination it looks like there were pieces from 4 separate plays that quite possibly might be Shakespeare originals.  We’ll have more as this story continues to unfold.  

Shakespeare for the Sneaky 3

Idea Better:

After consulting with Brad Westwood, Dr. Burton's friend who works now for the Church doing special collections stuff, but used to do that at BYU, I have a few more ideas a whole lot of good details to make this sound legit.  I have awesome notes with a couple of his different ideas, but for the sake of time and progress, for now I'm just going to put up my favorite that I vote we use as the story of discovery.  So how's this?

During WWI and WWII in England, old aristocracy had incredible, really old family libraries with lots of original manuscripts.  As the fell on hard times with the war, many of these libraries were sold off wholesale; Americans with wealth (from the Guilded Age in the 1880s to the depression) would buy these libraries.  There were large estate sales where series of manuscripts were sold off.  they could have easily been inventoried and misidentified..."Its still possible that they could have stuff...not discovered." (I got tons of quotes like this from him we could use in an interview or something.)   So all this rich English literature ends up in the US.  We're still treading on the non-fiction so far.  Huntington Library, in Pasadena, CA is a private library founded by a guy who loved horticulture and literature, and from what I understand from Bro. Westwood,  aquired large amounts from British libraries in the "rape of Europe" as he called it.  At this library, they have a huge backlog of "elephant size books", many of which have not been opened in a long time...like maybe even since they came over from England.  All of this is fact.  So here's the story: in a cache of 17th century books, there is an elephant portfolio on horticulture with a duplicate set; the duplicate has been left in the vault.  A horticulture curator (Dan Sagen) going through the one left out notices some missing plates, and pulls out the duplicate to consult.  He finds some literature that obviously doesn't go in a horticulture book...its in iambic pentameter, and appears to be some plays, or something...he contacts the manuscript section and hands it over to them.  The manuscripts are just sections of paper bound together with red fabric, tied through 2 holes in the top (typical for manuscripts of the time.)  The ink is from a quill pen on handmade stationary, of the kind used by gentlemen back in the day.  Red pen marks from editing litter the manuscript; handwriting experts find that it is from some undetermined hand that matches the hand of edit marks on a known manuscript--someone who worked closely with Shakespeare on other plays.  The ink is tested for mineral content, carbon test done on the ink and paper, UV light tests, all done--results  match that of other Shakespeare original manuscripts at the time.  It's breaking news!  And soon I'll have a news story for it.  That can go on our YouTube Channel.  Along with all the other awesome videos that result from this discovery.  It's such a legit story, we might not even need any doubters!  What think ye? https://sites.google.com/site/firstfauxlio/story---documentary/story-of-discovery

Shakespeare for the Switcher of Sex

Boyet--a woman?  Or two?  Moth in love with Don Adriano de Armado? What?  Dang, I really wish that I had written this closer to when I watched Love's Labor's Lost--I'm having a hard time remembering all my thoughts now...but I went with my sister to see the play, and like Sarah, I found that knowing the plot was super helpful understanding what was going on, and being able to explain that to my sister was a good exercise for me.  And, like a lot of people said, watching it made me be able to relate to the play a lot more, and caused me to like it a lot more too.

Since a lot of people have commented on the setting already (which I though was terribly clever and very well adapted), I thought I'd mainly focus on other things.  I thought the gender switching was interesting how in both this play and the Merchant of Venice.  In Shakespeare's day, as we've discussed, the actors were all male and the female roles were played by men and boys dressed as women.  Then of course there was the additional layer of disguise when a character cross dressed in the plays.  In both of the plays we watched, the characters themselves were changed from male to female characters.  In the Merchant of Venice, I thought perhaps it was to avoid the whole homosexual thing.  But perhaps the motivation was the guy-to-girl ratio of the actors?  They had the opposite problem as Shakespeare--more female than male actors.  But rather than maintaining the gender of the character and having the actor play accordingly, they simply switched the gender of the characters.  Or, did they do that in Love's Labor's Lost in order to allow for even more matchmaking and love potential (as if there wasn't enough already)?  Or was it to match the setting by having certain characters fulfill certain social roles?  I couldn't decide.  But here are some of the gender switches I can remember from the play.  (There might have been another 1 or 2 I forgot.  Please make note of them if I did.)

Boyet--In the Shakespeare original, a man.  In this play: 2 woman.  This is one switch I could see being motivated by the social role thing--the setting for the Princess of France and her attendants to plan, plot, and discuss is a dressing room.  Very appropriate and believable setting too, in my opinion.  For Boyet to be a part of those discussions, would only make sense for him to be female.  There is a definite divide between the men and the women in the 1940s setting, which parallels the divide between France and England in the original, and making Boyet a woman (or 2) certainly fits this.  Another note on this--all the women are dressed in very bright and vibrant colors--the woman representing the princess is dressed in red--indicative of power, or at least social prominence?  The exception is the two women playing Boyet--they were both dressed in blue--the archetypal male color.

Moth--Again, this could be a setting-motivated switch also.  It makes more sense for the radio host's foil to be a woman.  This, of course, led to obvious match and romantic potential in the relationship, which changed the feel of that relationship.  And did it seem to anyone else like Moth had feelings for Don Armado that led to disappointed love in the end, when he ended up with Jaquenetta?

Holofernes--Call me slow but I didn't get this role at all in the 1940s version.  But, it did lead to some more romantic potential, and she ended up with someone in the end, didn't she?  Was it Nathanial?  There were so many matches it was tough to keep them all straight.

So maybe all this gender switching was motivated by the setting.  Afterall, if it really was just a lack of male actors, couldn't they just dress the women up as men like they did the men as women in Shakespeare's day?

Shakespeare for the Surprised

Ok this really has nothing to do with Shakespeare at all, other than the fact that in talking with Dr. Burton about provenance, which is trying to track down and prove the origin of ancient artifacts, like what we're pretending to do with these lost plays, he mentioned the story of Mark Hofmann. What a crazy guy! He was a big time forger that focused a lot of his forgery on forging documents from Church History that make the church look bad, like the Salamander letter that was a different version of how Joseph Smith obtained the plates. And he was successful for a long time. But I just wanted to say that he is, to me, an awesome example of how no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing. Despite what the Wikipedia article said, Mark Hofmann did not permanently impair the progression of the LDS Church. Mark Hofmann is no more than a bug on a wind shield that maybe made kind of a messy and annoying splat; and like the effect of the bug/windshield encounter, I fear much more for the bug than the windshield.

Shakespeare for the Sneaky 2

Instructions for Production Content for the Wiki:

Please put any ideas for how you'd like to present your play in the documentary. Please include the following types of things:

• plot pitch (10-20 sec)
• monologues
• other play dialogue
• controversial material that might have caused the play to be censored--remember what our guest speaker said in this regard--there are two reasons that things might be censored:
• overtly religious
• political
• personal, explicit references to the current monarchy or Church of England in a demeaning way.

You can do this via link to your pages with the content, bulleted lists with ideas, or whatever works for you. Thanks!

Shakespeare for the Scholarly

Knowledge vs. Love? Those were the closing words of Nixon's post about Love's Labor Lost. That certainly is the dichotomy presented in this Shakespeare play. Or is it? It's certainly very silly, mocking just about everything under the sun; is it mocking this mindset as well? I'm not sure; to be honest I was struggling just to follow the plot and dialogue; perhaps further study of this play would reveal whether this was what Shakespeare intended or not. But Nixon's post, pointing out this mindset, as well as the discussion we had in class the other day, and Sarah's post about how society sometimes views love in the way it is mockingly portrayed in Love's Labor Lost made me start thinking about this mindset as well. In the play, the king and his buds all swear off women and make all kinds of strict vows including to fast once a week in order to become "scholarly" Act 4, Scene 3 really epitomizes this mindset: There's Beroune with his humorous internal struggle: "I will not love; if I do, hang me; i' faith, I will not. O! but her eye, — by this light, but for her eye, I would not love her; yes, for her two eyes. " And the King, with his misery loves company: "sweet fellowship in shame!" after each struggles with the temptation of women, and seeks to rationalize or find company in this "vice" they find out that each of the others has done the same. Then when they realize they are each in love, Beroune argues that experience is the best way to learn, or in other words, looking at a woman is the best way to learn beauty, and that their oath was inhibiting rather than complimenting their scholarship, and they go on to woo the women. But how often do people today have that same mindset? "My grades are bad because I'm in love." "I don't have time to date and be social." Academic and social endeavors are often set up as being exclusive. Maybe this is a idealistic view of the world and love, but I believe love and scholarship ought to be complimentary. When a balance exists between social and academic pursuits, they are mutually beneficial. Placing an extreme emphasis on either one certainly would lead to the detriment and eventual exclusion of the other, but if there is moderation diligent scholarship aids in the development of relationships worth perusing, and a relationship worth perusing would lead to increased motivation and focus on scholarship. I often hear of stories where people's grades improve after getting married. That is the kind of relationship look for and seek to develop: one where we help each other to become better and achieve our goals, rather than bringing each other down.

Shakespeare for the Suppressed

So, this post is mostly a comment on Nixon's post. I totally agree with what he says about the difficulty humans have in getting over their prejudices and old ways of looking at things and getting outside of their comfort zone. But I can think of a couple of cases where that was the case, though the process was long and laborious and required lots of sacrifice. One example I can think of is with women's rights. It has taken a long time for women to gain the ability to participate in society with as much freedom as men, and to gain the rights that were traditionally men, but I believe it has happened. As one of the few females in engineering, I am quite grateful for the progress that has been made on this front. There are still people who argue that we are not there yet, and there will always be those few that have their own personal prejudices and biases, but nominally those walls of bias and prejudice have been obliterated. Another example I think of is the Civil Rights Movement. This one has definitely been long and laborious (from the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 til today), but it has come a long way since slavery in the 1860s. It might not be over yet, but having a black President (however you feel about his politics) I think is a pretty big sign that for most of the country, we're getting there. Having lived in Mississippi for 14 years, I saw people (generally of the 60+ category) who still struggled with the idea of equality for all. Perhaps with all of these things, the old generation must first pass away before new ways of thinking "outside of the comfort zone" can be adopted, but with enough work and sacrifice and people standing up for what they believe, it has occurred in our country's past. Can it occur on the international scene, like Nixon was mentioning? I think a lot of it has to do with people letting go of age old prejudices, and at least in the US, that has happened for many groups of people. To tie it back to Shakespeare, he definitely addressed this idea of prejudice and the repercussions that result therefrom in Merchant of Venice. Though perhaps it was not a clear warning against the dangers of prejudice (and if it was, is fear of repercussion from the oppressed parties the best reason to avoid prejudice? Though the if you prick me speech was pretty powerful) , it certainly brought up this age old struggle.

Shakespeare for the Speaker Clever

Love's Labor Lost--the whole time I was reading, I was torn between disgust at the utter silliness of the dialogue and admiration of the clever rhetoric. I am always one that has appreciated clever rhetoric--I think that is the thing I appreciate most about Jane Austen books, and my favorite part of reading Shakespeare. It reminds me of a friend I have who is always busting out the most ridiculous puns--you can't help but roll your eyes, but deep down you kind of have to admire the quick wit that draws forth puns on every topic at the drop of a pin. She knows it too, and thinks she's pretty punny (ha ha).

There is way too much good stuff to analyze all of it, but this one passage caught my eye,

After explaining to Armado how to "brawl in French", Armado asks Moth, "How hast thou purchased this experience?" Moth's response: "By my penny of observation." I don't know why this clever little metaphor tickled my fancy so much, but I liked it. Armado asks how he "purchased" experience, meaning how he obtained it; obviously experience cannot be purchased for a monetary amount, but is obtained via experience. But Moth keeps with the monetary theme and responds with a monetary reference--my (the ownership indicates that it was particular to him--his own observation) penny of observation.

This follows with clever reference to Hamlet, where the hobby horse represents something of little lasting consequence. Hamlet, in mocking the way his mother has moved on after his father's death, says that you have to build churches to not be forgotten 2 months after your death. If not, then you are like the hobby horse, whose epitaph is “For, oh, for, oh, the hobby-horse is forgot.” When Don Adriano de Armado says, "But O — but O, — ", Moth cleverly finishes the sentence with 'The hobby-horse is forgot.' It's like when we today quote lines from movies--he was

making reference to another Shakespeare play. In quoting this line, it seems like he's discounting the lasting value and reality of Armado's love, which Armado himself questions-- "Call'st thou my love 'hobby-horse'?" which Armado refutes--no, a hackney. So I looked up what a hackney is--it's a particular kind of horse specially bred in Britain intended for carriage driving. They are elegant, and known for their stamina. Pretty much the complete opposite of a hobby horse, which is not only not alive, (unless it refers to the Irish hobby, a breed of horses popular in the British Isles in the Middle Ages that is now extinct, but that's also dead) but particularly in the context of the reference to Hamlet, represents something of fleeting value.

*To add further to the association of the passing value of a hobby horse, I have a personal story that I think of whenever I think of hobby horses. When I was 2 or 3, there was a boy that lived across the street from me. He was, I believe, a month older than me--but when your 2 a month is a significant portion of your existence, and I looked at him the way 7th graders look at 8th graders. He had a hobby horse, kind of like the one in the picture, and I though it was so cool. He would not let me play with it, and I was quite jealous of his little horse. I just had this desire to have one of those little hobby horses, and this idea that they were so cool, even after we moved away from that house, and for quite a while after. Years later, my mom bought one for one of my younger siblings, and I told her that story; and she said she wished that she had known, and that she would have gotten me one. By that point I had grown up, and the idea of a hobby horse was no longer alluring--I was wanting a car, not a horse. My great enamoration for what seemed like such a desirable thing had faded, just as the memory of a hobby horse fades;

Shakespeare for the Sneaky

What we are doing, creating the byproducts of a "lost" Shakespeare play to indicate the existence of a non-existing phenomenon is clever. And the way we are exhibiting our newly acquired Shakespeare knowledge in the process is also clever. So when I think of our project, I think it's clever. When I think of clever I think tricky. When I think tricky I think sneaky. Hence the title of this blog post. I refuse to abandon the theme!

First Folio Research:

http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/onlineex/landprint/shakespeare/index.html

• The First Folio is the collection of Shakespeare's plays
• Published in 1623, 7 years after Shakespeare's death
• Compiled by his friens John Heminge and Henry Condell, who had access to hand manuscript and stage prompt notes, making this by far the most legit version of any of Shakespeare's works.
• Published by Isaac Jaggard and Edward Blount.
• Definition of a Folio--a leaf of a book or in the printing industry, a standard piece of paper folded in half to make 4 pages.
• Back in the day, books were printed and stitched together but not bound--the purchaser could then pay additional money to have them bound according to their preference.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Folio#cite_note-8

• The quantity of quality rag paper for the book was imported from France.
• Around 750 copies of the First Folio were printed and 228 are reported still in existence.
• 5 Compositors involved, as shown below--E was a not expert apprentice, John Leason, who had the most difficulty.

	Comedies	Histories	Tragedies	Total pages
"A"	74	80	40	194
"B"	143	89	213	445
"C"	79	22	19	120
"D"	35½	0	0	35½
"E"	0	0	71½	71½

http://shakespeare.palomar.edu/sources.htm

Shakespeare for the Saintly Sister

So I mentioned a while ago that I really wanted to do a parody of the St. Crispin's Day Speech Relief Society style, so I decided to work on it this week. In light of how we are developing material for our final project, I think this is quite appropriate--though we likely will not use this exact speech, I think a pump up speech of sorts is a must for whatever play we end up doing, and analyzing this one for themes and applying them to Relief Society in preparation for that seems like a productive exercise. I'm going to draw off some of the themes Austen talked about in his analysis of pump up speeches. I’ve also tried to maintain the iambic pentameter, but I’m really new to such a thing so it’s kind of rough. Assistance would be appreciated, if there are any experts in the realm, at least to point out where it’s lacking that special speech rhythm.

FIRST COUNSELOR

O that we now had here
But one ten tenth of those sisters in Utah,
That make no visits to-day!

RELIEF SOCIETY PRESIDENT

What's she that wishes so?
If we are mark'd to fail, we are enow
To do the kingdom loss; and if to serve,
The fewer serve, the greater share of blessings.
God's will! I pray thee, wish not one sister more.
By Jove, I am not covetous for gold,
Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost;
It yearns me not if Facebook posts are made;
Such earthly things dwell not in my desires:
But if it be a sin to covet blessings,
I am the most offending soul alive.
No, faith, wish not a sister from Utah:
God's peace! I would not lose so great an honour
As one sister more, methinks, would share from me
For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more!
Rather proclaim it to'th Society,
That she which hath no spirit for service,
Let her depart; her route shall not be made
She can Facebook posts put on her wall:
We would not serve in that girl's company
That fears her fellowship to serve with us.
This time is called the time of Sisterhood:
She that serves well this day, and reports back,
Will stand a tip-toe when report is made,
And rouse her at the name of Sisterhood.
She that visits this month, and then the next,
Will oft think on her visits to sisters,
And say ‘I loved those girls so very much!'
Then will she think of friendships dear to her.
And say 'These bonds were formed from visits made.'
Humans forget: yet all shall be forgot,
But she'll remember with fond gratitude
What love she showed that day: then shall the names.
Familiar in her mouth as household words
Sister of the Green Jell-O, the Quilter,
Maker of the Great Funeral Potatoe,
Be in their flowing cups freshly remember'd.
This story shall the mother teach her dau’ter;
And vis’ting month shall never yet go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But visits to all shall be remember-ed;
We few, we happy few, we band of sisters;
For she to-day that lives this life with me
Shall be my sister; be she e'er so lost,
This day shall gentle her confusion:
And sisters back in Utah at the mall
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their friendship cheap whiles any speaks
That served with us in Sisterhood.

This is still in rough draft form (that’s appropriate for a blog, right?)—I welcome any comments or suggestions for improvement.

Shakespeare for the Source Seeker

In preparation for our "lost play" project, I did a little bit of background research about the origin of Shakespeare's plays. As Professor Burton taught us in class, most of his plays are based off of something; the histories, quite obviously, are based off of real events, at least to some degree. Where do the rest of them come from? Well, I read a lot of people's opinions, including Wikipedia, all of whom had some different ideas, but I thought going old school Encyclopedia style might be a good idea, and I found a super interesting article in the Encyclopedia Britannica (that was my favorite in high school because our library's copy was brown and looked really old and legit--full of much wisdom) here. But I'll spare you the trouble of reading it unless you're interested by summarizing some of the main points that I thought would be pertinent for our final project.

• Sources of Plots:
• --old stories (Hamlet and Pericles)
• --relatively recent Italian writers (Romeo and Juliet, Much Ado about Nothing, Othello)
• --popular prose fiction(As you Like It, The Winter's Tale)

• Even historical plays needed some source to tell him the history:
• --for Roman historical plays, Sir Thomas North's translation of Plutarch's Lives of the Noble Grecians and Romans
• --For the English historical plays, chronicles of Edward Hall and Holinshed for the plays based upon English history.
• Some of the historical plays had been done before by other people, like King Lear and Henry V.
• Many of his plays have been lost (as mentioned in class)Shakespeare was a genius and likely had access to lots of books. He was obviously well read and used bits and pieces of lots of works, and made reference to lots in his works (like the Illiad, Montaigne, and many others contemporary and more ancient), including the Bible. (So the whole Job thing from Andrew's post would work)
• Even though he got the basic plot or idea from these many sources, he took plenty of literary licence and got rid of things that weren't dramatic enough and developed characters from "brief suggestions" from his source invented totally new characters to support the story as needed. He totally rearranged the plot for "more-effective contrasts of character, climaxes, and conclusions".

So the moral of the story is, we have good basis for doing a lost play, and having some little known fable from Africa or Greek myth or anything serve as the foundation for the plot is totally believable and in line with where Shakespeare actually got his material. We've just got to make it dramatic, and there's no problem with taking all the literary licence we need. Also, as an interesting side note and further support for the legitimacy of what we're doing, when I googled lost play, the majority of the things that popped up were about a lost Shakespeare play. If google thinks it's plausible, it really must be.

Shakespeare for the Scorched

"Woah, hang on, it's only 2100 degrees; that's not hot enough!" For my senior design class, my team was given the project to design a piece of hardware for Rio Tinto's copper refinery: a sacrificial enclosure to go inside a molten metal bath and keep the electronics it protects cool enough to survive. After working on this all year, we finally were ready to test our design in the heat treating ovens here at BYU. We got a steel enclosure and placed the insulating material we've been working to develop inside, and stuck it inside. The video below is me putting the enclosure in an oven very appropriately named Lucifer. (This has a tie to Shakespeare; just hang with me.)

The furnace has to get up to about 2200 degrees F inside; as a point of reference, a flame burns about 1800 degrees F. Without gloves and protective gear, I couldn't even get close to such heat. Even my gloves, just from being close start to smoke, and if they are close long enough burst into flame. Even something that you think of as being indestructible like steel can't take the heat forever; when the steel enclosure started out, it was a bright and shiny steel. After just a couple hours in the furnace, it was black and beat up. Every time we put it in, more of the metal oxidizes and more of it oxidizes and cracks and peels off. The picture shown is a pile of steel

shavings that came off after one of our tests. Although there are certainly metals that can withstand such temperatures, the analogy still was impressive to me. There are things in life that take their toll on human souls and no matter how toughened and hardened a soul might be, it cannot withstand forever the heat. This is a theme Shakespeare treats often in his plays, and one which I think would be very appropriate to include in our own version of Shakespeare. Lady Macbeth really is the inspiration for this analogy--even she, a tough and hardened character ("unsex me now") that wishes to be impervious to the weaknesses of a conscience can't stand forever the memory of the black deeds which she has committed and to which she contributed. Like the steel, though initially she appears untouched by her conscience, and curses her husband and his, eventually starts to crack under the pressure. She begins walking in her sleep, confessing her terrible deeds. She rubs her hands together trying to cleanse them. Macbeth calls a doctor and asks,

“Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased,

Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow,

Raze out the written troubles of the brain,

And with some sweet oblivious antidote

Cleanse the stuff’d bosom of that perilous stuff

Which weighs upon the heart?”

Isn't there something you can do to cure her of her guilt? The doctor's response?

"Therein the patient must minister to himself."

There's nothing any outside person can do about such guilt. The damage is irreversible unless repair is initiated by the guilty party. Unfortunately for steel, that pretty much seals the deal. For Lady Macbeth it apparently does too: she breaks completely and goes crazy and dies. Her guilt and suffering are a huge theme in Macbeth, and one Shakespeare treats so well it has drawn countless references over the years. (One of my favorites is a gospel classic from Elder Holland.) Anyway, thinking about themes from Shakespeare made me think of these themes of guilt and suffering, and how damaging they are to the human soul to the extent that they frequently lead to the end of the afflicted party's life. They are so well addressed in the tragedies. If we do end up doing a tragedy of some sort for our final project, this is a theme that must be included.

Shakespeare for the Starved

Since we didn't have a new play to do this week, I took a bit of advice from Kent (which was first suggested to us by Dr. Burton) and checked out the BYU audio books. He was right. They're amazing. So amazing, in fact, that I will give you a link. Just click on Shakespeare Audio plays. It' now bookmarked on my computer. I had originally mixed in some Librivox with my reading of King Lear, and it was nice. I found it to be about the same as with Macbeth--some good actors, some bad, but still nice enough to listen to. I still haven't had any horrible experiences with Librivox, but maybe I'm not as discerning of a listener as Kent. I also think ramen tastes just fine, so I'm obviously not too picky. In fact, googling pictures of ramen made me so hungry I'm about to go home and eat now. But yes, BYU Library Audio versions are the way to go, so long as you have the happy privilege of studentdom. After that, Librivox is not too terrible of an alternative. Plus, by then you can afford a little more besides ramen anyway.

Shakespeare for the Secure

Shakespeare has done it again! In a few eloquent words in Macbeth, he makes a profound statement about human tendency. This is one I could see myself starting to quote, I like it so much. Though no words say it better than his, the essence is that being overconfident is dangerous to because you get lax. The quote comes from Hecate, the leader of the witches in Macbeth.

She is telling her minion witches they ought to give Macbeth visions to make him think he is invincible, which they do, which leads to his downfall. Not only is this a neat, succinct description of an aspect of human nature, but it foreshadows Macbeth’s later downfall. Without further ado, in William's very own words, I present the quote:

“Security is mortals' chiefest enemy.”

Shakespeare for the Singer

My roommate was in BYU Concert Choir a while back and they sang this song...What the random? First off, this is a weird passage from Macbeth--it's the witches doing their weird witch stuff. On the Librivox audio, it sounded creepy. So why anyone would think to put it to music beats me. But it's a cool sounding song, so in the name of multidisciplinary goodness I'm posting it.

Well, I can't figure out how to post their version, but here is the University of Utah choir singing the same song...they did it almost as well....just kidding.

And, speaking of awesome cultural references, JK Rawling totally got inspiration from Shakespeare on this one...check it out!

Shakespeare for the Sincere

"She is herself a dowry," says the French prince in response to the information that Cordelia would have no dowry. I would be hard pressed to find a more sincere expression of love in all of Shakespeare's works. Every husband and potential suitor ought to feel that way about the woman he loves. Contrast that with the countless other expressions of love in this play, many of which demonstrate a lack of sincerity, honesty, and integrity which is absolutely nauseating and heart wrenching. The play opens with declarations as nauseatingly sweet as they were blatantly false from Regan and Goneril. The king completely buys their falsity while casting out and disowning his sincere daughter who refuses to suck up. (I suppose it is fitting that the sincere Cordelia should receive such a sincere compliment from her lover. As we are so often told these days, light attracts light.) Before the scene even ends the 2 deceitful daughters are already plotting against their father. Of course there is the backwards relationship of Gloucester and his sons; again, the loyal and sincere son Edgar being ousted in favor of the deceitful and malicious son Edmond.

The French Prince's expression of love reflects more than just love but an understanding of the worth of man (or woman in this case). Such a theme is also addressed in this play, with Lear's question, "Is man no more than this?" (Act 3 scene 4) provoking further discussion of this issue. Present in the statement from the French prince is an acknowledgment of the inherent worth which Cordelia has, even without a dowry of money. Lear's question, posed after seeing poor Tom, who is devoid of all man made trimmings, implies the worthlessness of man. "Consider him well," says Lear. He points out that without the coverings that come from other animals and plants, Poor Tom demonstrates the essence of man. "Thou art the thing itself: unaccommodated man is no more but such a poor, bare, forked animal as thou art." A poor, bare, forked animal? That sentiment is a far cry from the French Prince's sentiment. The contrast reminds me of one of the best talks of all time, "You Matter to Him" by President Uchtdorf. He explores the
contrasting descriptions of the worth of man of man "The worth of souls is great in the sight of God" and "Man is nothing" with the statements "We are greater than you suppose" and "We are less than we suppose." I highly recommend the talk, and will refrain from saying anything else on the subject because President Uchtdorf says it better; but it sufficeth me to say that Shakespeare yet again hit upon one of the great questions of the soul, and yet again God's servants addressed that question perfectly with the light of the Revealed Gospel.