Shakespeare's Thread
- Thread starter Hawkwood
- Start date
. My plan for this evening - Macbeth (2015)
Etaoin Shrdlu
Civis Illustris
At least he didn't repeat himself pointlessly.
Hawkwood
.
Come off it, I remember many moons ago you enjoying Shakey sonnets.
Who'd have thought the Prince of the Underworld was such a romantic at heart.
Hawkwood
.
Bardolatry and anti-Bardolatry.
1.
"I read Shakespeare directly I have finished writing. When my mind is agape and red-hot. Then it is astonishing. I never yet knew how amazing his stretch and speed and word coining power is, until I felt it utterly outpace and outrace my own, seeming to start equal and then I see him draw ahead and do things I could not in my wildest tumult and utmost press of mind imagine. Even the less known plays are written at a speed that is quicker than anybody else’s quickest; and the words drop so fast one can’t pick them up. Look at this. “Upon a gather’d lily almost wither’d.” (That is a pure accident. I happen to light on it.) Evidently the pliancy of his mind was so complete that he could furbish out any train of thought; and, relaxing, let fall a shower of such unregarded flowers. Why then should anyone else attempt to write? This is not “writing” at all. Indeed, I could say that Shakespeare surpasses literature altogether, if I knew what I meant."
Extract from Virginia Woolf's diary
2.
"With the single exception of Homer, there is
no eminent writer, not even Sir Walter Scott,
whom I can despise so entirely as I despise
Shakespear [...] . The intensity of my
impatience with him occasionally reaches such
a pitch, that it would positively be a relief
to me to dig him up and throw stones at
him."
George Bernard Shaw. Edwin Wilson edition (New York: Arno, 1980), pp. 54, 56.
1.
"I read Shakespeare directly I have finished writing. When my mind is agape and red-hot. Then it is astonishing. I never yet knew how amazing his stretch and speed and word coining power is, until I felt it utterly outpace and outrace my own, seeming to start equal and then I see him draw ahead and do things I could not in my wildest tumult and utmost press of mind imagine. Even the less known plays are written at a speed that is quicker than anybody else’s quickest; and the words drop so fast one can’t pick them up. Look at this. “Upon a gather’d lily almost wither’d.” (That is a pure accident. I happen to light on it.) Evidently the pliancy of his mind was so complete that he could furbish out any train of thought; and, relaxing, let fall a shower of such unregarded flowers. Why then should anyone else attempt to write? This is not “writing” at all. Indeed, I could say that Shakespeare surpasses literature altogether, if I knew what I meant."
Extract from Virginia Woolf's diary
2.
"With the single exception of Homer, there is
no eminent writer, not even Sir Walter Scott,
whom I can despise so entirely as I despise
Shakespear [...] . The intensity of my
impatience with him occasionally reaches such
a pitch, that it would positively be a relief
to me to dig him up and throw stones at
him."
George Bernard Shaw. Edwin Wilson edition (New York: Arno, 1980), pp. 54, 56.
Hawkwood
.
I've found it contained in a grouping along with the above authors (and more).
"France has not insults, fool’s-caps, and pillories enough for such a scoundrel. My blood boils in my own veins while I speak to you about him … And the terrible thing is that … it is I myself who was the first to speak about this Shakespeare [in France]. I was the first who showed to the French a few pearls which I had found in his enormous dunghill."
Voltaire in a letter to D'Argental
"France has not insults, fool’s-caps, and pillories enough for such a scoundrel. My blood boils in my own veins while I speak to you about him … And the terrible thing is that … it is I myself who was the first to speak about this Shakespeare [in France]. I was the first who showed to the French a few pearls which I had found in his enormous dunghill."
Voltaire in a letter to D'Argental
LCF
a.k.a. Lucifer
He really liked the English, I see...
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Etaoin Shrdlu
Civis Illustris
He had reason to despise anglophones, to be fair. They quote him in English, and saddle him with one of the most commonly misattributed quotations ('I may not agree with what you say...').
There's something he's written that I probably won't be able to locate easily from what I remember, but someone else might (Pacifica certainly will if I've referred to it before, which is possible) about the idiocy of the British as evinced by the case of a man who had attempted to cut his throat. At the time suicide was a crime in UK law, so he was tried and convicted for it. And sentenced to death.
A doctor had advised that they should wait for the wound in his neck to fully heal before hanging him, but this was ignored. So the wound reopened, the drop didn't break his neck and he spent quite some time strangling to death.
There's something he's written that I probably won't be able to locate easily from what I remember, but someone else might (Pacifica certainly will if I've referred to it before, which is possible) about the idiocy of the British as evinced by the case of a man who had attempted to cut his throat. At the time suicide was a crime in UK law, so he was tried and convicted for it. And sentenced to death.
A doctor had advised that they should wait for the wound in his neck to fully heal before hanging him, but this was ignored. So the wound reopened, the drop didn't break his neck and he spent quite some time strangling to death.
Bitmap
Civis Illustris
I suppose I'd have to dig up the article to find out how he arrived at that conclusion.
Etaoin Shrdlu
Civis Illustris
Everyone knows the quotation, nobody knows the context, so it might be worth doing. My guess is that it's just Shaw in in stroppy iconoclastic mode, given the reference to Homer and the rather silly hyperbole.