Shakespeare for the Sick

Perhaps this is more detail than anyone cares to know about, but I got sick last week and have very unfortunately not been able to go running in over a week. :( So much for that part of my self-directed learning. But laying sick in bed afforded me similar opportunities for contemplation, so I guess it all worked out. I read The Tempest while I was sick, which was nice because then I was able to still be productive. I really enjoyed the play--I thought it was an entertaining play with an unusual (for Shakespeare) theme forgiveness and a happy ending. Maybe I'm just not well-read enough, but I think of Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet when I think of Shakespeare, and both of those are completely lacking in the departments of both forgiveness and happy endings. The thing that stood out to me the most from the play were the oft quoted lines that I didn't even realize were from Shakespeare until reading. I mentioned that I took the class to become more culturally aware--knowing from where and in what context oft-quoted lines originate is just exactly what I mean by that. So whenever I was reading and came across a line I recognized, I stopped, googled it, and saw what people had to say about it. I only came up with three (probably indication of my cultural ignorance) but that's why I'm taking this class. Here they are, along with my thoughts and the thoughts of some other folk.

"misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows"

Being miserable and in bed while reading this line, it kind of caught my eye. So what does it mean? Well, in context the impending storm causes Trinculo to seek shelter under Caliban's cloak. Trinculo, being miserable because of the storm, or desperate for shelter, is willing to do something he would not tend do under normal circumstances, share a cloak with this "monster" or strange bedfellow. At the moment I read that, I certainly could relate. I was miserable because I was sick. Because I was sick, I had decided to stay home from school and work, something I hardly ever do. I hate wasting time and have to be always doing something or working on something or engaged in some kind of activity. During the week, I normally leave either before 8 in the morning, and don't come home again until 7 or 8 or 10 or 12, depending on the week. Being sick dictated other circumstances, and I spent an entire day in my apartment sleeping, eating, and doing things other than homework and work--all strange (or unusual) companions (or bedfellows) for me. What did other people think it meant? Or what has this phrase come to mean? One lad said "misery loves company". Eh, I guess you could say that--when you're miserable, you seek the company or commiseration of other people who are also miserable. Another said that it means your attitude attracts people with similar attitudes--if you're miserable, you will attract other people with dark attitudes. Enotes.com says strange bedfellows has come to mean unexpected partners. Dictionary.com says strange bedfellows means “unlikely companions or allies; often used in the phrase ‘politics makes strangebedfellows.’”

"we are such stuff as dreams are made on"

This struck me as more the existential depressing kind of stuff of which great literature is full--it reminded me of Jacob's "and and also our lives passed away like as it were unto us a dream". I thought it was saying that our lives just kind of float along without direction. I've never really known what Jacob meant by his phrase, but it is plenty poetic. One reader interpreted it similarly,

"Prospero is making an analogy between the spirits, who seem like illusions, to life itself. The spirits can produce marvelous visions, but when they are done there is nothing left, and not even any sign that they ever were. Rather like a dream... something which can be fanciful or terrifying, but then you wake and it is gone. Prospero is suggesting that human lives are no different; a sentiment echoed by Hamlet in another work of Shakespeare's. The suggestion is the people live their lives and then are gone, leaving no appreciable mark and eventually not even a memory of their existance. And arguably this may be so - even if we do remember a few figures in history, there are billions more who get no mention; it's even likely that many of the ones we think we remember have little resemblance to the actual figure.”

Deeper thinkers read more into it--cliffnotes.com said,

“This is a reminder that the masque, with all its heavenly creatures, is not real. Like the masque, life, too, will come to its inevitable end. Prospero reminds Ferdinand that each man's life is framed by dreams. The evidence of that life, with its earthly possessions, is only temporary. Again, this points to the role of the young couple as redeemers for their father's sins. Alonso, and through him, Antonio and Sebastian, have placed too much emphasis on worldly possessions and titles. Even Prospero, with his focus on books, has forgotten that they are also only temporary vestiges in this life. This reminder that corporeal riches are only temporary also seems to be directed toward Stefano and Trinculo.”

I liked this interpretation best--not that our lives don't matter, or that they wander aimlessly, but that there is more to this life than the present state we can see. Ebook.com had a similar interpretation, and pointed out that Humphrey Bogart's famous last line in the 1941 film The Maltese Falcon was a misquote of this line; it reads, "The stuff that dreams are made of," rather than on.

"brave new world"

I was excited to find the source of this famous quote--little Miranda says this upon interacting for the first time in years with humans other than her father and Caliban--for her, humanity is a new world. I enjoyed the hopeful attitude it reflects about mankind: "O wonder! How many goodly creatures are there here! How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world, That has such people in it!" This line has come to be used in any context when we are entering previously unknown waters, such as in using new technology to teach an interactive class in two locations. The most famous use of this line is as the title of Aldous Huxley's book. Upon further reflection I thought that was kind of ironic since that book is all about mankind's depravity. Then after reading a Wikipedia article, I realized this is probably supposed to be an ironic line since Miranda's exposure to mankind is drunken sailors.