Thanks for pointing that out Johnny Bravo! I should have mentioned it when I recommended it as another way of looking at Hamlet. I’m just so used to recommending it to friends that it slipped right past me.
To me, the hard things to understand in Shakespeare are the allusions to classical mythology. Apparently, people then (even the ‘peasants’) knew WAY more about Greek and Roman traditions and myths and things then we do, and I often have no idea what Bill is talking about when he goes there. If you leave those bits out, for the most part it’s just an arty form of English made to fit the poetic scheme.
Firstly I recommend a brilliant book called The Actor and his Text by Cicely Berry. She’s the former voice coach at the RSC and the book is a goldmine of advice on how to understand and speak all forms of Elizabethan and Jacobean dialogue.
Secondly, track down a BBC series called Playing Shakespeare by former RSC director John Barton. This series was basically a group discussion on just how to understand and act the bard’s words and can be quite informative. Among notables in the group who discuss and act out scenes are Ian McKellen, Ben Kingsley, Judi Dench, Patrick Stewart and Roger Rees. Avoid the book of the series however.
There are also some great documentaries -
Looking For Richard: Al Pacino, wanting to do a film version of Richard III, found out that the McKellen one was already in production and decided to do a doco about Richard and the Bard instead. It rambles a little here and there, but it is an excellent way to get an idea of what Shakespeare and Richard III is about. Actually the double of this and McKellen’s Richard would be perfect.
Personally, I’ve got to say the single best version of Henry V, or more specifically Henry V act IV was in a BBC doco called Henry V At The Globe. It’s an hour long doco that talks about the building of the New Globe theatre, and it’s first production of Henry. It also features a fair whack of the fourth act, including the Crispin’s day speech. What sets it apart however is the truly phenominal performance of the lead Mark Rylance (Intimacy). Whose performance in that little snippet makes Branagh and Olivier’s seem weak. Seriously, I teared up during both the “O God of battles” prayer and the Crispin’s day speech. Plus it gives a very good leeson in just how the plays where performed originally.
Another approach: Start with the comedies, particularly the “sillier” ones. I’ve found, when watching the comedies, that even when I don’t quite catch the dialog, the physical acting often fills in the gaps quite nicely.
I’d second Johnny Bravo’s suggestion of watching Othello. Much as I love the history plays, they are hard to follow if you aren’t familiar with the characters and events involved, and even Hamlet rests on some implicit ideas about kingship and revenge that aren’t necessarily intuitive for a modern audience. Othello, on the other hand, is pretty timeless; it’s a tragedy of human relationships, which just don’t change that much.
And try to get hold of a copy of Marchette Chute’s Stories from Shakespeare, which is an excellent cheat sheet and much more engagingly written than the Cliff’s Notes.
This is true – I’m rather obsessed with the histories, myself, but they’re a lot of work for the uninitiated. 
That said, I second the recommendation for the McKellen Richard III, which recognizes the inherent difficulty of the source material and takes pains to either clarify dispense with a lot of the historical baggage that might get in the audience’s way. And McKellen’s performance is just spectacular.
Oh, and two other things –
Mahaloth said:
Indeed. And the Henry IVs are even better if you’re familiar with Richard II. History plays are kind of a package deal. See preceding about how they’re a lot of work. But it’s well worth it.
BrainGlutton said:
Agreed, agreed, agreed! And how apt is it that someone with BrainGlutton for a handle should want to see Falstaff onscreen…
The short answer is because the “dialogue” is what the play is; the plot is incidental. That’s a gross overstatement, of course, but nonetheless it gets at the truth. Shakespeare’s genius wasn’t in constructing grand plots; most of his plays were based either on history or previously-existing literature or mythology. He changed events (sometimes in major ways) and created characters, but he didn’t really invent stories out of whole cloth. In a very real sense, “West Side Story” and “O” did to Romeo and Juliet and Othello the exact same thing that Shakespeare did when he wrote the plays originally – except that his adaptations were probably closer to the source material in most respects. What Shakespeare did that was grand was create the language and the rhythms in the poetry, as well as creating his own details of character that fit within the larger plot and made his characters feel like real human beings instead of words on a page.
While I enjoy reading Shakespeare, reading is not the way to start. You need to learn how the rhythms work and how to understand the gist of a speech even if you don’t get all the words, and it’s much easier to do that when you can see the actions performed. While I liked Branagh’s Henry V, a lot of it is expository; you might be better served (as others have said) with his Hamlet, the Zefferelli/Gibson Hamlet, or even Baz Luhrman’s underrated "William Shakespeare’s Romeo+Juliet. (The DiCaprio/Danes version set in gangland California.) While some criticize the film because most of the actors don’t keep to the traditional rhythms as strictly as more conventional performances, for someone who’s not yet comfortable with the constant iambic pentameter that might be an advantage. (I also think some performances let the language get too sing-songy, which I hate; it’s not really acting if you let the language do all the emotion for you, is it?)
Trust me, when I first got into Shakespeare, I felt the same way you did. It takes effort to learn to read him, but he really is as good as everyone says he is, so it’s worth the effort.
–Cliffy
Posted by Cliffy:
Not California, Cliffy, southeastern Florida. “Verona Beach,” “Mantua Fields,” dig? I’m sure it was shot in Florida, too – the scenery is recognizably Miami-area, not SoCal. Oh, and yes, I loved that version of R&J! Imagine, Romeo’s first glimpse of Juliet coming at the tail end of a bad acid trip! And it is notable that (so far as I know) nobody protested Luhrman casting teenage actors to play teenage characters, just as the Bard intended! (Well, not quite as he intended . . . in the original production at the original Globe, Juliet, just like every other female character, would have been played by a boy in drag.)
I agree with many of the above posts, if you’re having trouble with the early modern english and/or the dialog in general, Romeo and Juliet is the place to start. Despite being a tragedy, I dare say it’s one of his “lighter” works, in that it’s much more accessable than Henry V or Macbeth.
Although I concur with the recommendation of this version, and to a lesser extent the Baz Luhrman version, my biggest complaint with both those readings of R+J is one that I’ve found with a lot of Shakespeare’s comedies as they are played by contemporary artists – they treat the material with too much reverence. R+J is hysterically funny right up to the part where people start dying, and even after that has some genuinely comic moments IF you play them up as comedic. Mercutio is a classic court jester character who basically spends most of his stage time thrusting his groin at every female character he sees or encouraging Romeo to do the same. But just because he’s in a tragedy, most people read him dead serious which misses the point.
So my caution to you is this: Shakespeare never met a pun he didn’t like, a poopie joke he wasn’t prepared to use or a sexual innuendo too obscene for his taste. When Hamlet speaks of “country matters” in reference to Ophelia’s lap, that’s a dirty, dirty pun (I’ll let you figure it out). Chances are, if something sounds funny, it’s not some bit of arcane subreference, but an actual joke. He wasn’t writing for the college crowd; he was writing for the masses. So don’t try too hard; just enjoy it as entertainment and try not to worry about the intellectual stuff.
I’ve never seen anybody read Mercutio seriously. Geez, that’d suck. I think people miss the comedy in Hamlet sometimes - I think that play is very funny at times.
Branagh’s Much Ado About Nothing is a real treat. (Except for the bits with Keanu Reeves–I just can’t shake the feeling that he has no idea what his lines mean!)
Does anybody know if the Shakespeare plays that played on public TV in the 80’s were ever put out on video/DVD? That was my first exposure to a lot of Shakespeare. I still have a video I recorded of “Much Ado About Nothing” with Cherie Lungie and Robert Lindsay. That version was head and shoulders above the Branagh version! (I used to dream about Robert Lindsay.)
I also saw King Lear in that series, and found it very very powerful and a bit disturbing.
Whenever I see Shakespeare, I have to give my ear time to get in tune with the dialogue. It’s hard to understand at first, but if I relax and pay attention, it starts to filter into my brain. It helps if you have decent actors delivering the lines too. And of course practice (seeing more Shakespeare) makes it easier to understand what’s going on.
It’s great stuff, really.
I say Romeo and Juliet. It should be subtitled “Fisher Price: My first Shakespeare”.
You can watch either the Zefferelli or the Luhrmann version, depending on what you feel you’ll relate to (or see them both), and definitely try and see it on stage. Shakespeare on screen just can’t live up to Shakespeare on stage.
R+J isn’t Shakespeare’s best play, but its his easiest. The themes are universal and writ large, and if you’re in the right mood, you’ll get grabbed by even the most overdone scene - the balcony scene, for instance. I don’t think that it’s possible to read/see a well done version of R+J without thinking “damn, Shakespeare really knew his shit.” Particularly if you’re 14 - which is not a criticism.
R&J’s Shakespeare’s easiest play to enjoy. It’s not his best play by far, and it’s atragedy – not because the teenagers die (a plus, for some viewers 
) but because they drag their families and an entire city down with them. Their families, feuding before, go into out and out warfare because two hormonal kids decided to get their jollies rather than be halfway sensible.
Cliff’s Notes for Shakespeare, or (better yet) reasonably written books and essays on his work, make it easier to understand what’s going on in the play. If you get the plot and an idea of what Will’s doing, you can sit and let the poetry take over from there. Keep a dictionary handy, though, or hope your copy’s well-footnoted.
And as DPJ said, Will was a punster extraordinaire in an era where the pun was considered high comedy. (Low comedy was the bear-baiting hall just down the road. Seriously. They competed with the Globe for people.) Every one of his plays has dirty jokes if you know where to look (hint: any word whatsoever with the syllable “con” or “cun” or something like it is, well…heheh, country pleasures). Next favorite are Biblical and classical puns and references.
If you’re studying Shakespeare on the page (it can be tricky to pick up on this in the theater, unless you’re really paying attention and you know how to close-listen as well as close-read), make note of the words he uses over and over again. I can’t remember how many times the words “Father” and “son” are used in the Henry plays, and I think in Hamlet too.
My favorite Shakespeare is The Tempest. It’s Will’s only attempt AFAIK at an original plot, and it’s so different in tone from all his other stuff. It’s really weird.
That’s the BBC Shakespeare series – you can get some of them at Poor Yorick in Stratford, Ontario, but the only thing you can order online is a five-pack of tragedies. I think you have to go to their store to get the individual editions (happily, I’m going there this summer).
As I understand it, the series is rather inconsistent – some installments (e.g. what I’ve seen of Much Ado are excellent), others dull. (The best one I’ve seen is their Richard II, starring Derek Jacobi…)
Little Plastic Ninja – A Midsummer Night’s Dream also has a more or less original plot…
My learning curve with Shakespeare started with MacBeth. Our English teacher knew how to appeal to teenage boys: Blood & Guts.
MacBeth is one of his simpler plays, the characters’ motives are transparent, their actions follow logically from one scene to the next. The dialogue is obviously Shakespearean, but there are very few references that are obscure or difficult.
Lady MacBeth is the most interesting character, (villian), you have ever watched.
“Screw your courage to the Sticking Post.”
I’m with you there.
Macbeth isn’t too hard to understand, and it’s short, which can be a plus.
Posted by Dread Pirate Jimbo:
Along the same lines: I was generally satisfied with Branagh’s ever-line-included screen adaptation of Hamlet, except for one thing: What a cold fish of a Polonius! He’s supposed to be the comic relief, isn’t he? Him and the gravedigger. What material the Bard gave him to work with, and not a single line could he deliver to raise a chuckle! Quite unlike the Polonius in the Mel Gibson version, who at least had the good sense to play the fool.
Posted by Little Plastic Ninja:
All true, and let’s not forget the good ol’ cuckold’s horns! Practically any use of the word “horns” or a synonym in an Elizabethan play is probably tied in with this one way or another. To a modern audience – if you don’t know about this usage it sails over your head, and if you do know about it, it gets old really fast. But for some reason the Elizabethans seemed never to tire of it.
Does anybody happen to know how horns became associated with cuckoldry? The sexual association (horn=erect penis) would appear obvious, but remember, the horns are on the head of the cuckold, not his of wife’s paramour. So what gives? Why should a cuckold wear even metaphorical horns?
This is a great discussion. I love you guys.
Hey you!: I’ve read and/or performed everything in Shakespeare’s canon (except “The Rape of Lucrece” and one other thing that slips my mind at the moment), and I will emphatically second what Cliffy said:
The vocabulary is an obstacle, but it is not an insurmountable one. Any decent Shakespearean text will include a glossary in the margin (I prefer The Riverside Shakespeare), and you can also find separately published Shakespeare dictionaries. I’d recommend Onions, which while old (originally from 1920 or thereabouts) is justifiably a classic. A great companion to a formal glossary would be Eric Partridge’s Shakespeare’s Bawdy, an in-depth treatment of most (not quite all) of the Bard’s nasty puns and other references. Trust me, you’ll never read Shakespeare the same way once you untangle Mercutio’s line, “the bawdy hand of the dial is now upon the prick of noon.”
Actually, here’s an example for you to digest. It’s a sonnet; read it first, then I’ll clue you in:
“Will” is obviously William Shakespeare, but it’s also a reference to willpower, to a bequeathment, and — most cunningly — to the genitalia (i.e. “willy”). If you want a hint, pump your hips when you say “making addition… thus.”
I’d also second the recommendation for Asimov’s Guide to Shakespeare, which is extremely informative, along with another reference book such as Shakespeare A to Z. Contains character sketches, plot summaries, and other details. Basically it’s a really excellent Cliffs Notes to the entire canon, all in one volume.
Because in addition to the language, there are occasional moments where the characters go on about something that, even if you understand what they’re saying, you don’t know what’s getting them worked up; it requires some knowledge of past beliefs and customs to understand the dramatic conflict. For example, in Richard III, there’s a scene where the dastardly title character visits a funeral procession and propositions the dead man’s widow. At one point, she says:
The language is clear, but what the heck is she talking about, seeing the wounds “bleed afresh”? Well, back in Shakespeare’s day, there was a belief that if somebody were killed, the presence of his murderer would make him bleed again. In other words, the woman is accusing Richard of being the man’s killer. That’s the kind of stuff a good guide will help you with.
It’s also perfectly in keeping with the scene, which is an excellent excuse to talk about why a translation into modern vernacular would rob Shakespeare of much of his value. Act three, scene five:
Quite a famous scene, yes? How many times have you seen it played as potentially dirty as it could be? They’ve been having sex all night, right? Romeo is tuckered out, as is Li’l Romeo. Now look at how many times they say “wilt.” Sure, it’s a part of the language of the day, but it occurs with much greater frequency in this passage; it’s even the first word of the scene. Juliet, in her first speech, refers to “piercing the fearful hollow,” after which Romeo says “night’s candles are burnt out.” Get it? Continuing: Could the “misty mountain tops” be a boob joke? And is it an accident that they’re punning on “die,” which is both a reference to mortality and sexual climax (le petit mort)? Finally, I think the last two lines are hilarious; Romeo has been saying, basically, please darling, I just can’t get it up any more… but wait! “How is’t, my soul?” Maybe I can get it up one more time. And Juliet, who has been begging him to stay, suddenly changes her mind: “It is, it is, hie hence, be gone, away!”
This stuff isn’t accidental, folks. 
The point is, if you translated the scene into modern speech, you’d lose three-quarters of the wordplay. You could maybe put the jokes back in, in a different form, but somehow raunchy humor, even as filthy as Shakespeare sometimes gets, comes off as less than nasty when written in such complex and witty verse, whereas in modern language it would just sound, I don’t know, crude.
So, to reiterate, yes, it’ll take a lot of effort and experience to get to where you’re enjoying Shakespeare’s writing on something approaching its own level, but, like Cliffy said, it’s absolutely worth it. The Bard doesn’t have the reputation he does for nothing.
Oh, and BrainGlutton, some discussion of the cuckolding horns was conducted in this thread (oddly, also started by Hey you!).